Right – and if there is an equivalent to the European DB law in the US, I am not aware of it, which means you get considerable “legal shear” across borders even among large Western capitalist economies.

Plus, I don’t know how it is in Europe, but in the US, litigation isn’t a determination of correct adherence to the law, it’s a battle of attrition where money is the ammunition. A small company like LR doesn’t have the resources for a protracted battle – our staff is so small that hauling one of us in for depositions is nearly equivalent to seeking an injunction on all business activity. So the IP law provides a framework for companies to club each other, but it doesn’t necessarily provide a useful source of protection to everyone.

So we now have GPL V3 that handles software patents and the new ODbL that deals with the European database laws.

The European database directive is one of the weirdest laws imaginable, because it allows protections to databases even if all of their content is based on freely available data, but its still something you have to deal with.

Hard to say…part of the airports are factual (this is the runway number, this is the airport name) but some of it is more like a composition (this is my WED line drawing of the taxiways). It sort of falls between. I’d recommend keeping with GPL because it protects the more important parts and everyone understands it.

Yes, this is not really on topic. Sorry, I can’t play 20 questions regarding all aspects of the global scenery, particularly the ones that aren’t finalized yet.

No idea – please see the other comments re: distribution. We have no idea yet what the future of non-release DSFs is, nor are we committing to anything now, having not had time to give it appropriate examination. It’s something we’ll certainly look into after v10 ships.

– Robin