Steven M. Ottens wrote:
If the source data is properly licensed, the derived works are also properly licensed. For instance CC-SA will allow derived works to be used and shared under 'under the same, similar or a compatible license.' Which also means you can use it with OSM and their ODbL (http://www.opendatacommons.org/licenses/odbl/). I don't think you can license the imagery, without licensing its derivatives in one way or the other.
As Chris says, the case law (that we know of) says that tracing is not derivative, so this doesn't arise.
See Bauman v Fussell, Antiquesportfolio v Fitch, and Ets-Hokin v Skyy Spirits. (I've blogged at tedious length about this.) A good summary from Christina Michalos's 'The Law of Photography and Digital Images':
"It is submitted that for a non-original photograph of a mundane 3-D object taken 'straight-on' which is intended to be an accurate copy of that object, any copyright that subsists is a 'thin' copyright which is only infringed by actual reproduction of that image...
"It is the work labour and skill in creating that image which is protected... The 'thin' copyright conferred on photographs intended to reproduce 3-D objects should protect only the work labour and skill and not the photograph's subject."
On the other matter, FWIW I don't believe there is a consensus that ODbL is a "similar or compatible license" to CC-BY-SA, sadly. The decision on this would be in CC's court, but they are very much of the opinion (via Science Commons) that data should only be licensed with a public domain waiver (plus norms), not a sharealike condition. See OSM legal-talk passim.
cheers Richard _______________________________________________ talk mailing list [email protected] http://openaerialmap.org/mailman/listinfo/talk_openaerialmap.org
