Hi Cleary,
I suggest that the best way to get governments to change licensing
policy, and get data into Open Street Map is to go to the media.
The problem is that people who understand the problem (OSM mappers)
don't have political clout, and politicians who have the power don't
understand the problem, and 99% of voters who put the politicians in
positions of power don't understand the problem.
So the path forward is to get the problem explained in newspapers.
I'm looping in Anthony Wallace, who writes for Spatial Source.
Anthony a story could go:
* Government has decided it is good for the country to open data
* Government has created licenses to achieve this
* The good test to see if such policy is working is to see if open data
sources (wikipedia, open street map) are using the data
* Currently this is not the case
* Phone up someone in the government and try and get a quote from them
* Lets now make government accountable
Anthony, this story will be good for spatial source, but you really want
to see it in mainstream news channels as well. The ABC, The Australian, ...
Are you interested in approaching these news agencies to republish your
story?
Warm regards, Cameron Shorter
On 23-Mar-17 10:12 AM, cleary wrote:
A few months ago, I wrote to the Department of Prime Minister and
Cabinet seeking access to datasets published by data.gov.au including
the PSMA Administrative Boundaries. The response was that "due to the
large number of datasets on data.gov.au and, in some instances,
obligations on the government due to its licensing arrangements with its
data suppliers, we are unable to amend the licence terms, or provide
exemptions on an individual basis."
Since clarification of OSM's requirements relating to data published
under the CC BY 4.0 licence, I have written again asking if there is any
possibility of reconsideration but I am not hopeful that the response
will be positive. I also requested that the limitations of the CC BY 4.0
licence be addressed in the context of any future review of Government
policy regarding community access to public data.
If I receive any helpful response, I will share the information on the
talk-au list.
In regard to Commonwealth Government agencies, the best approach appears
to be submission of requests to individual agencies - as has been done
successfully with the Department of the Environment and Energy and with
GeoScience Australia.
In regard to the PSMA boundaries, it appears that the data owners are
the respective state and territory governments. I think we have access
to that data in ACT, NSW and SA and it will be necessary to get
permission from the other state and territory governments for their
boundaries data. The data owners are listed at
https://www.psma.com.au/psma-data-copyright-and-disclaimer
As far as I can ascertain, in the United States, the US federal
government policy (adopted also by some but not not yet by all states of
the US) is that data collected with taxpayers' money is published in the
public domain without any copyright restrictions. Our government is keen
to follow the United States in many areas, and I suggest keen Aussie
mappers may like to send letters or emails to their local members of
parliament, both federal and also in states where we don't yet have
access to data, highlighting difficulties with licences such as CC BY
and commending the American approach to copyright on government data, so
that public data is truly open. You can point out that it won't cost
them money - and while government would be making a compromise on
attribution, most users will still choose to attribute the source in
some way in order to attest to its authenticity and accuracy. It is
unlikely to get immediate results but we can tell them now and tell them
again at election time so that we are planting seeds that may germinate
when the issue is reviewed at government level. When politicians come
door-knocking at election time, tell them about OSM and how concerned
you are about the current copyright restrictions on public data. That
is, of course, if the copyright restrictions on public data bother you
as much as they vex me.
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--
Cameron Shorter,
Software and Data Solutions Manager, Jirotech,
Suite 112, Jones Bay Wharf,
26 - 32 Pirrama Rd, Pyrmont NSW 2009
P +61 2 8099 9000, M +61 419 142 254, W www.jirotech.com
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