[open-bibliography] Mendeley and open data...

[Jonathan Gray]

On Tue, Aug 31, 2010 at 12:17 AM, Thomas Krichel <krichel at openlib.org> wrote:
>  Peter Murray-Rust writes
>> Available isn't good enough. That's the point of the Open
>> Defintion. If it's just "available" and you re-use it without
>> permission they can send the lawyers. They can close the site, etc.
>
>  It's a waste of time and effort worrying about this.

Something being online is *surely* not sufficient to make it open?
Just because a picture is online this does not mean I am free to reuse
it for any purpose. Part of the raison d'etre of the OKF is to promote
the use of licenses (Creative Commons, Open Data Commons, ...), which
enable and encourage people to use material for any purpose. Rationale
is very similar to open source software. You need robust legal tools
and legal certainty for a data commons to scale. Hence, as Peter says,
the Open Knowledge Definition:

  http://www.opendefinition.org/

> Just make them make it available and then build services that
> demonstrate that further use is in the data holders interest.

I think there is a danger in having to constantly look for data
holders approval/consent when reusing datasets. This is basically not
so different from the permission based culture we currently have,
which arguably stifles innovation. Knowing that I may invest a bunch
of time into doing something and the data holder may refuse permission
if it is not 'good enough' or ask for a huge sum of money if it is, is
surely a bit of a disincentive?

-- 
Jonathan Gray

Community Coordinator
The Open Knowledge Foundation
http://blog.okfn.org

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