Can an Open Source Map Project Make Money?

Roblimo writes "Bing and Mapquest both use output from OpenStreetMap.org. Mapquest supports the project with money for equipment and access to the code they've written to integrate OSM's work with their display. Bing? They just take from the project and do nothing for it in return. This may be okay in a legal sense, but it is a seriously nekulturny way to behave. Even so, having Microsoft's Bing as a reference might help the project's founder make money. They've put a lot of work into this project, and it's doing a lot of people a lot of good, so they certainly deserve some sort of payback, either direct or indirect. They have a few ideas about how they might legitimately earn a few bucks from their project while remaining free software purists. Do you have any ideas, yourself, about how they might turn a few bucks from OSM?"

Comments

Freedom

[odies]

Bing? They just take from the project and do nothing for it in return. This may be okay in a legal sense, but it is a seriously nekulturny way to behave.

Free software advocates really need to understand that if you want to have true freedom, you have to let people use the project the way the want to and stop tossing a fit when someone doesn't contribute back to it. If you expect or want to get contributions back, you should choose a license that requires it. Otherwise you're being quite a hypocrite about free software.

Purpose of the BSD license also is to let everyone use code freely the way they want, the only true form of freedom. Once you start demanding something more than attribution you're removing freedom and limiting what people can do, making it no better than just having a commercial license. This is also why I view BSD license as way more free than GPL, which has many, many limitations forced upon you. Not really the definition of freedom, is it?

Re:Freedom

[Frosty Piss]

Indeed. If you expect people to "give back", put it in the licence, otherwise quit bitching.

Re:Freedom

[mr_matticus]

It's more than just that. It's absolutely true that the license sets the expectations. There is no legal difference between an open source and a proprietary license--the only differences are philosophical and in the contours of what the developers choose to allow. Everyone has the freedom to make or not make a project, and every creator has the right to determine the terms under which s/he shares that project. If you choose a broadly permissive license that requires nothing in return in terms of money or contribution, the expectation is that people will do things you don't really like. That is the meaning of freedom, and it must be accepted. If it is not acceptable, use a different license.

But to me, there is a bigger problem in that many, but certainly not all and hopefully not even most, open source advocates engage in mental gymnastics around the issue--working themselves into a lather about companies or individuals not giving back or breaking the "spirit" as they view it, stealing from these projects (and note how no one EVER false-pedant "corrects" with the 'it's not stealing' broken argument on a F/OSS story), while actively engaging in infringement of proprietary licenses. The sentiment is clear, but there is no reconciling this position.

The argument that "I wouldn't have bought Photoshop anyway, and they still have all of code and data, so it's no loss" applies equally, then, to Microsoft here--they wouldn't support this project anyway, and they still have all their original code and data, so there's no harm.

Obviously that's a broken argument, but a number of the posters here can't seem to navigate that disconnect.

Re:Freedom

[Frosty Piss]

Prats like you cannot determine the difference between a casual user and large enterprise.

No, not "prats like me", but rather the *licence* of the project does not differentiate between "a casual user and large enterprise".

Re:Freedom

[Darkness404]

The problem isn't that the license doesn't allow it, the license does, its just that its common courtesy to contribute back to the project if you are making money or a large enterprise working on it.

Its like tipping, nowhere does it say that you -must- tip (unless the tip is included with the bill) but its still common courtesy. A waitress has every right to be mad when someone orders $300 worth of food and doesn't even leave her a single cent.

Legal != Moral. Just because something doesn't /have/ to be done doesn't mean it shouldn't be done.

Re:Freedom

[oldhack]

I hate tipping, and I hate this bogus whining. Change the license or shut up.

Re:Freedom

[amolapacificapaloma]

I think the point is that a large enterprise should be wise enough to know the difference, especially if they are making (or saving) big bucks. They could do a lot of things for the open source effort without expending any money, like raise awareness of the project among end users, suggesting donations... They are just being less polite than the rest of kids in the block. It is also a good time for MS to make a nice PR move to go along with all those "we love open source" statements they are now proclaiming...

Re:Freedom

[OzPeter]

Its like tipping, nowhere does it say that you -must- tip

And there are places in the world where they pay their waitstaff decent amounts of money so that the customer doesn't have to tip.

You just disproved your own argument

Re:Freedom

[catbutt]

I say that's not a tip, then, by definition.

Re:Freedom

[vadim_t]

If you see that as a problem, change the license.

I've got this personal philosophy: don't offer to give more than you're really willing to part with. It's a general philosophy applying to pretty much everything. For instance, don't offer to do a favour, or pay for something if it'd really get on your nerves to have that offer accepted, then get nothing in return.

If you really want to get something in return, GPL or CC-SA it. If, and only if you're really deep inside willing to give something with no strings attached, and won't mind even if somebody takes that and makes millions on it while not giving you a single cent, only then BSD or public domain it.

You're not doing yourself any favours by pretending to be more altruistic than you really are. If deep down you want something in exchange for your trouble, make sure to get it, or you may regret it.

And forget about this "common courtesy" stuff. Corporations don't have it. Picture working at some huge company. Deadline is looming, project budget is tight. Even if you'd like to give something back to whoever you took something useful from, you will need your boss' authorization, and he'll need his, and perhaps it will go further up. They're almost guaranteed not to bother unless there's some good reason for it, such as the license actually requiring it.

Re:Freedom

[Angst Badger]

Purpose of the BSD license also is to let everyone use code freely the way they want, the only true form of freedom. Once you start demanding something more than attribution you're removing freedom and limiting what people can do, making it no better than just having a commercial license. This is also why I view BSD license as way more free than GPL, which has many, many limitations forced upon you. Not really the definition of freedom, is it?

I wish to heck that people would stop having arguments over the definition of "freedom" as if they were debating something substantial. It's like debating the definition of "art" or the value of the variable x. The meaning depends upon who's using it and in what context. The BSD license is more free in the sense that you're using the word, and less free in the sense that GPL advocates use the word. Neither side is right or wrong, and at least for a concept as vague (in both cases) as "freedom", there is no "true form of freedom". (In your case, public domain is freer than the BSD license.) Both sides are stubbornly arguing over terminology. More disturbingly, an awful lot of people seem to be unable to tell the difference between words/symbols and the things to which they refer.

Free software advocates really need to understand that if you want to have true freedom, you have to let people use the project the way the want to and stop tossing a fit when someone doesn't contribute back to it.

This much is obvious. If giving things away was a good way to get things in return, it would have supplanted the selling of things thousands of years ago. What free software advocates really need to do is to decide whether they're generously contributing to the common good or running a business. With the exception of full-blown non-profit organizations -- which are not trivial undertakings -- the two goals are mutually exclusive. And yes, expecting for-profit businesses not to take anything cheap or free they can get and turn around and sell it at a premium, value-added or not, is breathtakingly naïve. Speaking of definitions, that's what "business" means.

Re:Freedom

[flimflammer]

The GPL doesn't force you to do anything. You're entirely free to not use the code. If you use it, that is your choice, freely made (nobody's going to believe the Underpants Gnomes team up with the GNAA to install firefox on your pc).

That is a ridiculous notion. What you're essentially saying is the GPL does not impose any restrictions on you because you agreed to use the code and therefore accepted the restrictions. See the problem with that statement? The choice not to use the code in the first place does not mean there are no restrictions if you use it. It just means you have to abide by the restrictions when you do.

The GPL restrictive. If I use GPL code then I am forced to share my modifications with the world. I may not want to, but I have to. It also dictates what I can and can't include with my code because something I may have a license to use, those who try to use my code may not. That sounds an awful lot like restrictions to me.

As a preference I prefer to release my code under BSD because I support my code being truly free for everyone. I want anyone who wishes to use my code to be allowed to without compromising their own goals, even if that goal is financial in nature.

Re:Freedom

[evilviper]

A waitress has every right to be mad when someone orders $300 worth of food and doesn't even leave her a single cent.

"right" has nothing to do with it. She has every right to provide terrible service and expect a tip as well... She has every right to expect anything she wants, but that doesn't mean it's moral or amoral to not give it to her.

Legal != Moral. Just because something doesn't /have/ to be done doesn't mean it shouldn't be done.

No, but using a license that says free for commercial use, then EXPECTING to get a GIFT in return, and COMPLAINING when you don't, just makes you an idiot.

How would you feel about eating at a restaurant that has a big policy statement on the wall, indicating the tip is included in the bill, then getting shouted at by the waitress because you didn't leave her a tip, or not big enough of a tip? Just because your courtesy expectations don't meet-up with someone else's, doesn't give either any right to yell at them about it.

Re:Freedom

[OzPeter]

I've never understood tipping, really, or rather my understanding is not something that jives with the norm.

My concept of tipping is that is a scam for business owners to minimize tax liability by effectively forcing payroll taxes onto the waitstaff. if not, then why not just build the labour cost into the product price?

Re:Freedom

[Jah-Wren Ryel]

But that doesn't mean you aren't an asshole if you do these things.

The reason someone who does those things is an asshole is because he is violating an implied social contract.
It's effectively impossible to enforce that contract either privately or legislatively, but it's still a contract.

In the case of stuff like software and map information, it is significantly easier to enforce a contract. After all, they already have a contract in place to begin with, it just doesn't contain the terms that (apparently) the developer would like. Since the contract is completely under his control, he should add those terms (and be prepared for any unintended consequences that occur as a result too).

Re:Freedom

[Roger W Moore]

I think the point is that a large enterprise should be wise enough to know the difference, especially if they are making (or saving) big bucks.

Yes the should be but unless you've been living on another planet for the past decade or so you should realize that "large enterprise" and "wise" go together like "banks" and "sensible lending" or "oil companies" and "taking care of the environment" or "CEOs" and "reasonable pay" or.... The best thing to do would be to ask for a donation to help maintain the project. If they are smart they'll support you, if they are stupid they won't and if they are like the RIAA they'll probably sue you for daring to threatening their business model.

Re:Freedom

[DRJlaw]

So I take it you aren't mad whenever someone slams a door in your face, after all you didn't sign a contract that he wouldn't.

Conversely, you would apparently become apoplectic if you signed a contract to fight in a boxing match and then got punched in the head in round 1.

Copyright and License
OpenStreetMap is open data, licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 2.0 licence (CC-BY-SA).

You are free to copy, distribute, transmit and adapt our maps and data, as long as you credit OpenStreetMap and its contributors. If you alter or build upon our maps or data, you may distribute the result only under the same licence. The full legal code explains your rights and responsibilities.

That is the invitation that this project made. They 'signed a contract' that explicitly said that Bing could do exactly what it is doing. Not quite analogous to getting a door unexpectedly slammed in your face, now is it?

Re:Freedom

[hey!]

I feel entitled to withhold a tip if I get bad service, but it's actually in my self interest to tip reasonable or good service. This is the way waitresses and waiters are compensated in our culture, and it's actually a reasonably good system for me as a diner. Basically, dealing with the public sucks. The tip system gives servers an incentive to put the schmuck who came in earlier behind them and give me good service.

Now there are people who feel entitled to repay good service with no tip, but the system would not work if everyone did what they did. Waiters and waitresses aren't paid a living wage, and if everyone stiffed the people who waited on them, we'd have to raise the wages of the servers and roll that into the food prices. Then there'd be no incentive except professional pride for a server to make an effort to take care of me after they'd had a crappy experience with the last customer. And we certainly don't want to pay the kind of wages that buy professional pride.

So in a nutshell, people who don't tip are contemptible freeloaders, but there's no way to eliminate the possibility of freeloading without eliminating incentive pay (i.e., "tips"). Stiffing a waiter who has given you acceptable service certainly *is* immoral.

Now as this applies to open source projects, its not exactly the same situation, but the same issue of enlightened self-interest apply. If one benefits from an open source project and are in a position to help that project, it is quite reasonable to do so. It wouldn't kill Microsoft to throw some help the developer's way in this case, as Mapquest has done. It's just common sense.

Where it might get interesting is if Microsoft actually thinks that helping the project is against its own interest. In that case, they're quite entitled to even work against the project while at the same time benefiting from it. But in that case the rest of us who benefit from that project might well question whether we want to encourage Microsoft to act this way.

Let me say for the record I don't think Microsoft is pursuing rational self-interest here. I don't think that giving back, even in rational self-interest, is part of the corporate culture there. It's a company renowned for people undermining each other within the organization itself.

Re:Freedom

[Dr Herbert West]

Unbelievable. Spend less time reading Ayn Rand and try spending some time on the other side of the counter/cash register.

Only a clueless twat who's never had a job like that would dare be so flippant.

Re:Freedom

[InfiniteWisdom]

For normal service you get nothing, but you get a regular customer.

Correction, the owner of the establishment gets a regular customer.

Re:Freedom

[daveime]

Donation : A voluntary gift (as of money or service or ideas) made to some worthwhile cause.

The operative word is VOLUNTARY.

If they actually meant OBLIGATORY, then they should have bloody written it down.

Re:Freedom

[anyGould]

Which means as long as Microsoft is crediting OpenStreetMap, they're in compliance.

And this, boys and girls, is why you should put the "NonCommerical" part in your CC license - so that Big Company doesn't take your little community project and make all the cash.

Re:So lets say they make some money...

[hedwards]

That's my thought on the matter. Cash is usually to cover the cost of a resource and generally not expected if a person is being expected to contribute his or her time and effort. With /. users with sufficient karma are allowed to deactivate ads officially as a reward for contributing in other ways. I'd say in this case, that unless there's value being added which can't otherwise be had that donations or ads, but presumably not both, would be reasonable. But if you go that route all of a sudden that raises the expectations a great deal.

I hope you all remember this...

[Anonymous Coward]

They just take from the project and do nothing for it in return.

If you all agreed that MS is rat bastards for pulling this kinds of tricks just remember that the next time someone goes on one of their MAFIAA rants. After all, Microsoft just made a copy... and did it all legal like, unlike the pirates who wave their flags high around here.

If it sucks when Microsoft does it, it sucks more when you do it.

Re:Legally ok... Morally not.

[SWroclawski]

> without any acknowledgement or payment to the origin of the product is just immoral,

Acknowledgement is attribution, and attribution is part of the license. And the license is being followed.

As for payment... there is no obligation for that. Would it be nice? Sure. But it's not required.

Re:Clarifications

[rhendershot]

Bing is not doing evil here. They are in full compliance with the license as far as I know. And they have expressed interest in offering the project help in the future.

I'm sorry you couldn't get that into the OP. I have had my fill of /. sensationalisms.