[okfn-discuss] Open data share-alike and Linked Data

Thu Sep 27 14:30:33 UTC 2012

I do not recall discussions here on the list regarding share-alike 
licences and Linked Data services.

I suppose an "closed" entity can query ODbL-license data and serve that 
under ODbL. But what if the data is aggregated with "closed" data. Is 
the ODbL data now "an adapted database" in the sense of 
http://opendatacommons.org/licenses/odbl/summary/

I suppose no? It should be regarded as a "Collective Database" in the 
sense of paragraph 4.5a in http://opendatacommons.org/licenses/odbl/1.0/

A similar problem occurs in software development were linking to 
libraries is an issue, and that is the reason we have the LGPL/GPL 
distinction.

In Denmark we have information.dk that extracts data from 
Wikipedia/DBpedia and serve it on their webpage along with their 
copyrighted journalistic content, e.g., 
http://www.information.dk/verden/mellemoesten/syrien/damaskus . In my 
view that shouldn't be a problem.

But the difference between a "Derivative Database" and a "Collective 
Database" may not be clear. To be concrete and speak in the SQL language 
regarding tables:

A "JOIN" is resulting in a "Collective Database"? Where one part of a 
table is ODbL, the other "closed"?

An "UPDATE" is resulting in a "Derivative Database"?

What is an "INSERT" (of a row)? Does it result in a "Collective Database"?

What is an "ALTER TABLE ADD COLUMN" followed by INSERTs in the column? 
Does it result in a "Collective Database"?

---
Finn Årup Nielsen
http://www.imm.dtu.dk/~fn/