[open-government] National legal barriers to open data in Europe

Wed Jan 5 12:06:23 UTC 2011

Hi Toby and Chris,

The key issue is the liability of the holder of the original data (usually I'm thinking of PSI).

I'm just pointing out a problem if try to isolate the acts of

1) running a retrieval service and setting conditions on use of such service and
2) attaching a license to the data (= setting conditions to the use of the actual data)

Neither the conditions nor the license should need to include a clause stating that they can be used only for legal purposes in an attempt to guard the PSI holder from lawsuits.

On the other hand, I also see the reasoning behind trying to extend spamming laws to PSI holders. The latter may be more likely to obey the law than the spammers.

The liability questions are far from solved, but a good rule would be that the users of the data bear the responsibility rather than data holders or any services that facilitate the use of the data.

Antti

________________________________
Lähettäjä: Toby Mendel [mailto:toby at law-democracy.org]
Lähetetty: 5. tammikuuta 2011 13:51
Vastaanottaja: Chris Taggart
Kopio: Eskola Antti TEM; open-government at lists.okfn.org
Aihe: Re: [open-government] National legal barriers to open data in Europe

Hi all,

I agree with Chris on two points, which I see as related:

1) There is no need in a licence to remind people that breaking the law is illegal.
2) It is not appropriate, either from an openness perspective or from a more general analysis of appropriate lines of responsibility, to make distributors of data responsible for downstream spamming.

To strain Chris' analogy below, it is a bit like making those who sell knives are responsible for the wrongs that those who buy the knives might commit. In other words, the spamming rule treats this social good in a different way than we treat other social goods, which impacts negatively on openness.

I think we must argue strongly against such rules.

Toby

On 5 Jan 2011, at 07:09, Chris Taggart wrote:

On Wed, Jan 5, 2011 at 9:43 AM, Antti.Eskola at tem.fi<mailto:Antti.Eskola at tem.fi> <Antti.Eskola at tem.fi<mailto:Antti.Eskola at tem.fi>> wrote:
This solves the problem only if the retriever and the first user is the same and remains the end user. Why can't the license text mention that the data can be used only for legal purposes? Strange if it is doesn't mention it yet.

Cris's point may be that e.g. spam laws should target spammers themselves, not those who release public sector data in good faith, but that data is subsequently misused by spammers. Right?

Antti Eskola

 Yes, that's right. In fact I don't think it's necessary for the licence to say it should only be used for legal purposes -- it's redundant, a bit like having a sign on a shop which say 'You may only enter here if you promise not to steal from us'

Chris
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