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I am currently thinking od an application that posts certain map areas as screenshots on Facebook/G+. Now, I am not sure how to interprete the license there in combination with Facebook's terms.

E.g., the Facebook terms state: You own all of the content and information you post on Facebook, and you can control how it is shared through your privacy and application settings. In addition: For content that is covered by intellectual property rights, like photos and videos (IP content), you specifically give us the following permission, subject to your privacy and application settings: you grant us a non-exclusive, transferable, sub-licensable, royalty-free, worldwide license to use any IP content that you post on or in connection with Facebook (IP License). This IP License ends when you delete your IP content or your account unless your content has been shared with others, and they have not deleted it.

Now, this seems to me like a no-go to me, since neither me nor the user of the planned application own the Openstreetmap data. However, when looking at the openstreetmap copyright and license statements, the first statement "You are free to copy, distribute, transmit and adapt our maps and data, as long as you credit OpenStreetMap and its contributors." encourages me. I guess, this could be easily fulfilled on any social network.

Do you have any insights on that? Are there any applications around that post openstreetmap data on social networks? Thx! Peter

asked 29 Dec '11, 06:27

tufffl's gravatar image

tufffl
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The problem is that while you could trivially credit OpenStreetMap on, say, Facebook, the paragraph you quoted requires you to give permission to Facebook to use your content in any way. But the license that OpenStreetMap currently comes under - CC-BY-SA 2.0 - expressly forbids you to "sub-license" the work. Facebook does have permission to re-use the content that you post under the terms of CC-BY-SA 2.0 (which means that when they re-publish it they again must give credit and place any derived works under CC-BY-SA 2.0 again), but they can never gain permission to use your content outside of CC-BY-SA 2.0.

I believe you are right and this is a no-go, but you could search the web for information on "posting CC-BY-SA licensed content on Facebook" and see what others have to say. Posting a Wikipedia excerpt on Facebook would have the exact same problem.

Under our new license, ODbL, which we plan to implement some time in 2012, things will be slightly different but you would still be required to ensure that someone whom you give an OSM-derived work to (Facebook) gives appropriate credit, and the quoted Facebook statement does not seem to guarantee that, so even with the new license I see little wriggle room.

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answered 29 Dec '11, 07:17

Frederik%20Ramm's gravatar image

Frederik Ramm ♦
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accept rate: 23%

edited 29 Dec '11, 07:31

Thx for your detailed reply. That confirms my doubts. Regarding the ODbL: I guess, one could always put the credits directly into the posted picture, which ensures that the context between credits and picture ist not lost. Looking forward to that license change, because some interesting apps could be created when combining social networks and map data.

(29 Dec '11, 08:43) tufffl
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question asked: 29 Dec '11, 06:27

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last updated: 29 Dec '11, 11:19

NOTICE: help.openstreetmap.org is no longer in use from 1st March 2024. Please use the OpenStreetMap Community Forum