Dear AI Companies, instead of scraping OpenStreetMap, how about a $10k donation?

Re:Dear AI Companies, instead of scraping OpenStreetMap, how... by amiga386 on Tuesday July 30, 2024 @01:02PM (#41111454)

I liked the analogy to Gabe Newell's "piracy is a service problem" adage, embodied in Virgin API consumer vs Chad third-party scraper https://x.com/gf_256/status/1514131084702797827

Make it easier to get the data, put less roadblocks in the way for legitimate access, and you'll find fewer scrapers. Even if you make scraping _very_ hard, people will still prefer scraping if legitimate use is even more cumbersome than scraping, or you refuse to even offer a legitimate option.

Admittedly, we are talking here because some people are scraping OSM when they could get the entire dataset for free... but I'm hoping these people are outliers, and most consume the non-profit org's data in the way they ask.

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Re:Dear AI Companies, instead of scraping OpenStreetMap, how... by rat9988 on Tuesday July 30, 2024 @01:28PM (#41111829)

I think this very example proves that the adage is wrong, or at least doesn't capture many things for the full picture.

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Re:Dear AI Companies, instead of scraping OpenStreetMap, how... by pona-a on Tuesday July 30, 2024 @02:46PM (#41112758)

Well, it isn't a case of piracy, is it? The data exists on the website, for free, under the assumption/social contract that you are a human, not an agent of a shady enterprise wasting the bandwidth. An analogy would be the game itself being put out for free on itch.io, but then downloaded and unpacked to make an asset flip.

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Re:Dear AI Companies, instead of scraping OpenStreetMap, how... by xigoi on Tuesday July 30, 2024 @07:40PM (#41115171)

Ironic of him to say that seeing that it’s often easier to pirate Steam gates than to get them legitimately.

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