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@mark@mastodon.fixermark.com

2025-06-23 02:52 UTC

@Asimech@mastodon.social Data scraping for providing accurate information hasn't been considered illegal by anyone but news companies afraid of losing their advertising monopoly. I concur that it'd be better for everyone if Google attributed its sources, but you'll have to walk me through the thought process that gets us to "it's wrong for Google to ground-truth-check its maps against other maps even though the end result is more accurate maps." Especially when people depend on the accuracy of maps in their day-to-day. What is the risk or harm to society here? (ETA) Even in the context of the parent post where the story was "I reported an issue and nothing happened, then I edited OSM and the map was fixed," Google cross-checking against another map source seems to be a success story, right? Now the street Nikita's mum lives on is properly cataloged so there's less likelihood of someone over-trusting automated directions making a wrong-turn onto it. I'm having a hard time finding a moral framework where that should be considered wrong.

Replies (1)

  • @Asimech@mastodon.social 2025-06-23 05:00

    @mark@mastodon.fixermark.com When did I say anything about legality? I specifically used the word "ethical" in my original comment because that's what's wrong here: It's unethical to copy someone else's work without proper attribution unless that source specifically says it's fine not to credit them. It is misleading of the copier's own ability to collect information and it stinks of taking credit.

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