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| Subject: | GISList: =?iso-8859-1?Q?ODC_-_The_Open_Data_Consortium:_A_project_to_standardize_d?=
=?iso-8859-1?Q?ata_distribution?= |
| Date: |
09/15/2002 01:09:01 PM |
| From: |
Bob Heitzman |
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RE: http://www.directionsmag.com/article.php?article_id=235
Since I work at an agency (Air Pollution Control District) that has a $0
data budget, and work with various non-profits on GIS projects, I'm not that
interested in making it easy for agencies (cities, counties, states,
regulatory bodies, feds) to begin to charge for their data. Besides the
legal issues about the only thing holding a lot of them back from charging
are the accounting issues - they just don't do retail sales.
I would also be afraid that such agreements would quickly turn into sole
source contracts and we would be prevented from getting the data via any
other method, even agency to agency when all parties aggreed to the
transfer.
I do agree that providing standard wording addressing the legal issue would
be a boon. As simple as possible please! If its much more then "Your on your
own!" it is probably too long.
I would support wording to encourage local agencies to give their data away
with provisions for royalties for those who resell data essentially
unchanged. This wording should exclude such "vendors" like
GeoDepot/Directions Magazine/etc. who only provide data storage and FTP
services. If the data is bundled into a _retail_ product agencies should
have a mechanism to get a piece of the action if they so desire. If the data
is significantly re-worked there should be an out for the reseller. (Most
street layers derived from TIGER comes to mind.)
Wording in support of distribution agreements whereby agencies hire
distributors to publish their data would be good. The data itself should
still be available for free, the agency is basically paying someone to host
their download site. A clause should prevent sole distributor agreements to
allow easy transfers of data between agencies with legal interference.
Maybe a just a variation on CopyLeft would be appropriate?
http://www.gnu.org/copyleft/copyleft.html
Any way, and few thoughts to ponder upon!
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