> The question I'm asking (which you chopped out of the quote) is > whether or not the tracing is copyrightable.
Automatic tracing is not copyrightable by the tracer, according to the test. What was copyrightable is the aerial image, and automatic tracing is just a way of making a specific copy of that (just like you use B&W copymachine to copy colored image, different result, but still just a copy). Generally you must have permission to copy from the holder of the original. If different people use same tracing soft+config+source, they'll get exactly the same result. Manual tracing is different: it will become combined art, as you partly just create copy and partly create art yourself. I guess that to publish/sell combined art you have to have agreement (and revenue sharing) with the original also. In common sense it seems quite clear, simple and logical to me. Why different countries have different copyright principles, and it depends on type of creation (software, maps, photos, art etc) is another question. Especially in some countries I'm afraid it just reflects which interest group happened to have more power and therefore better attorneys/lobbyists. Unfortunately they still have, so their truth is stronger than my philosophical points of view. OSM is just a huge collective artistic work. Probably the largest one in the world, in terms of number of artists. Who owns it? It is matter of agreement between artists, and as far as I know then general consensus/agreement seems to be that it is OSMF and the license for the work will be ODbL (unless someone proves that the votes you all know have been flawed). Of course, artists tend to be crazy people (luckily usually in good sense) and with collective work you'll always find some of them who think that their 0.001% part of the work is so important that they'll always find reason to try to tear whole picture to the pieces. But it would be ashame if they'll succeed. -- Jaak _______________________________________________ talk mailing list talk@openstreetmap.org http://lists.openstreetmap.org/listinfo/talk
