[LINK] Yet another we-own-it-all Web service

[Richard Chirgwin]

Linkers,

Amazon is encouraging organisations to upload "free public data sets" to
its Web services platform:
http://aws.amazon.com/publicdatasets/

And why would it not encourage people to provide it with stuff to sell?
The angle is that users pay to crunch the data on Amazon (ie, rather
than downloading the data to their own computers), and then there's the
T&Cs...
>
>
>       COPYRIGHT
>
> All content included on this Site, such as text, graphics, logos,
> button icons, images, audio clips, digital downloads, data
> compilations, and software, is the property of AWS or its content
> suppliers and protected by United States and international copyright
> laws. The compilation of all content on this Site is the exclusive
> property of AWS and protected by U.S. and international copyright
> laws. All software used on this Site is the property of AWS or its
> software suppliers and protected by United States and international
> copyright laws.
>
>
Note the line about compilation being Amazon's property? I would
interpret that as a land-grab ... "oh, someone else has launched a
compilation of public data sets, that must be a breach of Amazon's
copyright."

Back at the beginning of the decade, dotcom-ism was partly encouraged by
journalists who saw their role as advocacy rather than investigation ...
now, the fans-with-typewriters will instead tell us how wonderful it is
that Amazon is letting people pay to work with free data ...

RC