On Mar 9, 2009, at 4:11 PM, Ulf Lamping wrote: > > OSM is about to have a *free* database. Saying "your not allowed to > change the data" is *not* a free database as I understand it.
For this particular case, it's not that you're not "allowed" to change the data -- it's that it makes no sense to change the data. The data is an assertion by the DEC of what lands it manages. By definition nobody can change that data -- because then it wouldn't have the same meaning. And as the fellow points out, there's nothing you can determine from examining the site which would give you reason or information necessary to change the data. You could find a sign not on the boundary -- but that would mean that the sign was wrong -- not that the boundary should be moved. But this raises a larger question. I have some reason to assert a claim of authority for railroad data for New York State. How would you react to me staking a claim on NYS railroad data in OSM, saying "fair warning: if you edit any railroad data in NYS, I will revert your changes unless I approve of them." Obviously the potential exists for a revert war, but given that I have a reasonable claim for my authority (e.g. http://rutlandtrail.org/list.cgi), why would someone else edit data that I am more expert in? Yes, this is a very high-level topic; much higher than any import. Is there room in OSM for people to make more authoritative edits than other people? On what basis are we to evaluate the quality of edits? How do we know if a particular edit improves or degrades the accuracy of the map? -- Russ Nelson - http://community.cloudmade.com/blog - http://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/User:RussNelson r...@cloudmade.com - http://openstreetmap.org/user/RussNelson _______________________________________________ talk mailing list talk@openstreetmap.org http://lists.openstreetmap.org/listinfo/talk