Satellite Imagery in Flight Sim

[falcon409]

I'm going to lay the groundwork here for a question that has bugged me since I quit doing photoreal ground textures for my airport scenery. In the past few months I have come across dozens of airports uploaded to several websites that utilize satellite imagery pulled from Google Earth. When I questioned the Authors they referred me to this page
http://support.google.com/earth/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=21422
and subsequent pages for their justification in using the images freely for "non-commercial" usage. I felt it was worth my time to give them fair warning that they could get into trouble were they to continue. Again, as per what they gleaned from the copyright laws on those pages, as long as they were not reproducing the images for "Commercial Re-Sale" they were within their rights to continue as long as attribution was given as stipulated in the "terms of Usage". . . . .thanks for the warning, but we'll be fine. Their method of capturing those images and placing them in the scenery they were producing was the same one I use SBuilderX 3.13.

That's their side. . . .I have repeatedly brought this up on the FSDevelopers website and gotten a totally different take on the subject. Basically that any redistribution without written consent from Google Earth is prohibited. So, with that information in place. . . . .
What is the correct answer? Has anyone actually contacted Google Earth and requested the use of satellite imagery for non-commercial use (specifically for re-sale) in MS Flight Simulator and been told they cannot use it in any way, shape or form? Or, like the authors of these recent scenery works who feel the terms of usage states that it can be used as long as it's not for re-sale commercially, have we just come to assume through an individuals interpretation of the Terms of Usage, that we can't use the imagery?

I've read the Terms of Usage and about 5 other pages of legal mumbo jumbo and personally, given what I would use it for, I can't find anything that says. . . .NO you cannot use it for that. The only thing that Google Earth is saying no to is Commercial re-sale of their images. Even then, they may consider it based on individual needs, but only after a written request is submitted. They also ask that any use of the imagery be accompanied by proper attribution, no problem. Unless someone can show me something definitive, something that states specifically that use of Google Earth imagery for use in MS Flight Sim is prohibited, I'm inclined to resurrect the 100+ sceneries that I had pulled a few years ago.

 

[CodyValkyrie]

It is a bit of a grey area, actually. Someone could claim Fair Use on the material in the U.S., since it is not being used for commercial purposes. To be honest, I'm not even sure 100% if Fair Use comes into play.

Here is a bit more information:
http://www.copyright.gov/fls/fl102.html

In the past, on YouTube, I have claimed Fair Use on videos I previously made non-commercially that contained copywritten music. I was mostly oblivious to the copyright laws when I made said videos. Most of these videos were made prior to me making a single dime and were for most intensive purposes Machinima. Frankly, I didn't want the videos removed, especially with the high view count on some of them. I claimed Fair Use on all of these videos and they were unlocked and allowed to be viewed in most countries.

 

[Dain Arns]

You can personally use an image from the application (for example on your website, on a blog or in a word document) as long as you preserve the copyrights and attributions including the Google logo attribution.

Sounds like you can use 'an' image, as long as it has the 'Google' logo on it somewhere. That's my take.


Me personally, Ed?
I've been tweeking some local airports around me in FSX, again.
I'm back to the point I'd rather not mess around with a photoscenery base anymore, and build airport/scenery like you have been lately.
No worries about seasons.
Just so much easier and faster.

 

[falcon409]

Sounds like you can use 'an' image, as long as it has the 'Google' logo on it somewhere. That's my take.


Me personally, Ed?
I've been tweeking some local airports around me in FSX.
I'm back to the point I'd rather not mess around with a photoscenery base anymore, and build airport/scenery like you have been lately.
No worries about seasons.
Just so much easier and faster.

Yea, as Cody mentiones, it's a very gray area. Even the "Fair Use" that he speaks of seems to be most concerned with the usage being used for Commercial gain, in other words using it to make money. . . .which my projects are not. They can be construed as being for personal use only based on legal phraseology which can leave you numb after a few paragraphs, lol.

 

[Dain Arns]

Yea, as Cody mentiones, it's a very gray area. Even the "Fair Use" that he speaks of seems to be most concerned with the usage being used for Commercial gain, in other words using it to make money. . . .which my projects are not. They can be construed as being for personal use only based on legal phraseology which can leave you numb after a few paragraphs, lol.

But point I was making, Ed, need to include the 'Google' logo somewhere visible on the photoscenery.
Least that's my interpretation.

 

[CodyValkyrie]

Yea, as Cody mentiones, it's a very gray area. Even the "Fair Use" that he speaks of seems to be most concerned with the usage being used for Commercial gain, in other words using it to make money. . . .which my projects are not. They can be construed as being for personal use only based on legal phraseology which can leave you numb after a few paragraphs, lol.

YouTube has conditions which make it easy for artists. Should I use for example something from Led Zeppelin, generally they will put an advertisement for their records, etc, even under the Fair Use act. It's a positive way to work around the issue with both the artists and the copyright offender.

I'm often a bit of a "ask for forgiveness not permission" mentality. If it was me, I would go for it, claim Fair Use, give Google credit in the Readme.txt file. Then, and only if Google gave me a Cease and Desist order, I would simply have the files removed from the offending sites. Naturally, this won't likely happen.

BUT, that is me....

The laws governing copyright use in the U.S. are quite convoluted, and in many ways written poorly. They often were made for medias which are no longer in play and are hardly adaptable to today's internet. It's like trying to fit a square peg in a round hole. What's to say that if someone distributed music, for example, that they are not doing so for "educational purposes" and thus claim Fair Use? I mean, they are not making money at it right, and neither are the downloaders? Then the company would have to prove loss in sales and take said offenders to court to prove their case, which is naturally much easier against VERY large distributors such as torrenting sites who make money from advertising, although there has been a stir about going after the "little guy" and there have been known (although rare) cases of this happening in what I feel are a way of these companies to make examples out of people. This leads to a conundrum, as this technically could happen with the likes of Google as well.

Here is what I think though.... Unlike music, which is sold at an often standard rate via online commerce or physical purchase (CD, etc), Google is offering their services at no cost. I think they also realize that the material is going to be distributed so far and so wide that even with their business acumen and technical know how, they would spend to eternity chasing down these kinds of issues, so thus focus their efforts on going after people who are illegally utilizing their copywritten work for commercial gain.

*shrugs*

 

[falcon409]

But point I was making, Ed, need to include the 'Google' logo somewhere visible on the photoscenery.
Least that's my interpretation.

Yep, and actually if you look closely at the imagery, the Google name is emblazoned over the entire tile, it's just not very easy to pick out.

 

[kilo delta]

My take on Google's stance on the matter is it's okay to use the tiles to create the photoscenery for personal use, but probably not to upload and share...even if it's non commercial. Having said that, Google generated photo scenery is widely available on FS sites and I've never once heard of anyone getting a Cease and Desist in relation to the sceneries...so maybe Google turn a blind eye to it,without giving an official OK.
In the same vain, there are many photoreal aircraft textures available to download that have probably not necessarily had the base image taken by the uploader. This too is a copyright infringement but I've never heard anyone complain about using/downloading these files.


TLR Go ahead and do it,claim Fair Use, and credit the tile use in the readme.txt

 

[roger-wilco-66]

Someone should try it. I mean, contacting Google to get a permission to use the tiles for a FSX freeware scenario. If I would try it I'd set up a new mail account and identity somewhere to unlink the test from my previous work and internet person, make a little test scenario, and ask them for their permission to release it as freeware with the GE phototiles. I'd be interested in the answer, and maybe it would put an end to all the speculation.
That type of problem is not only related to photoscenery, by the way. I lately became very reluctant to offer source information in the public, e.g. on which reference I traced my coastlines or from which source I have the mesh for a scenery. It all seems to be a bit on the grey side, and no one wants to be in an original precedence case with something like that. We freeware developers can only loose in such a case, since we don't gain anything financially with our work to pay for endless copyright lawsuits. Oh well.

My 2 ct
Mark

 

[roger-wilco-66]

Yea, as Cody mentiones, it's a very gray area. Even the "Fair Use" that he speaks of seems to be most concerned with the usage being used for Commercial gain, in other words using it to make money. . . .which my projects are not. They can be construed as being for personal use only based on legal phraseology which can leave you numb after a few paragraphs, lol.

I think the problem goes further. If your scenery is offered on a site that earns money with their service by ads or paid memberships, this already could be a problem.
But maybe I'm wrong, I'm no lawyer (thank god for that).


Mark

 

[Meshman]

This may or may not be long, depending upon how the fingers feel. First, I want to clarify that the issue is aerial imagery, not satellite photos. Second, GE's use of images must be understood by what Google is, that being an internet based provider of imagery. Key word is internet. When considering that, you can decipher rather easily what their terms of use allow; You can personally use an image from the application (for example on your website, on a blog or in a word document) as long as you preserve the copyrights and attributions including the Google logo attribution. Many sites, for example a MLS site for real estate, will show a map of where the property is located. That is delivered via the internet. A blog can access imagery via the internet. Even a Word document can access imagery through the Google API. All things here reflect an online access, not downloading and using offline.

I'll speak for the U.S. only, as that it what I'm most familiar with. Most all imagery used by the online providers is part of a governmental access program, either State or Federal. Google's "copyright" would apply to what they do with the imagery in preparing it for use via the internet. I've not seen any references to Google having a fleet of planes flying patterns across the U.S. to gather aerial imagery. Most of the U.S. imagery is done by the USDA as part of their NAIP program, where a state may be flown and collected on an annual, bi-annual or tri-annual basis. Almost always, but not 100% of the time, since the aerial imagery is paid for by the taxpayers it is considered to be placed into the public domain. One example where this is not the case is Hawai'i, where a third party firm collected and continues to collect imagery on their dime and then licenses the data. That license is very restrictive and release of the data controlled. Even the State of Hawai'i and the U.S. government must pay a liceensing fee.

Since most of the data is in the public domain, use for non-commercial or commercial purposes is OK. Finding the data is pretty easy and it's almost always the same data that GE or Bing or Yahoo uses. Sometimes it's even better. One of the "easiest" sites to get U.S. based aerial imagery is from the USGS Seamless server, especially if you know the coordinates going in. It comes out in a format that the SDKs won't handle, but reprojecting it into the proper format is relatively easy and there are freeware tools that can handle the task.

No one should think of this as circumventing GE's copyright, because GE does not hold the copyright to the original source material. Most all the data is there, readily available and free to use. I have a LOT of aerial imagery sitting on a couple of big HDs just waiting to be worked on. Not a single bit of it is subject to any copyright restrictions. Generally there is a notation with the imagery to recognize the State as the provider. If it's a State I liked, I might do that. If they had lousy roads, unfriendly Highway Patrol or too many weigh stations (Pennsylvania, Ohio, Arkansas) they'll get a raspberry from me!

 

[orionll]

I'm with Lance on this. Not only is it safer legally, but I'd say it's easier to just get imagery from the USGS, reproject, and compile with the SDK.

 

[falcon409]

Someone should try it. I mean, contacting Google to get a permission to use the tiles for a FSX freeware scenario. If I would try it I'd set up a new mail account and identity somewhere to unlink the test from my previous work and internet person, make a little test scenario, and ask them for their permission to release it as freeware with the GE phototiles. I'd be interested in the answer, and maybe it would put an end to all the speculation.
. . . . . . .
My 2 ct
Mark

Actually while I was scanning the pages of the Google Terms of Use, there was a link to request use of imagery. . .hmmmmm I thought, I'll just give it a try. Not that easy actually as there are 5 or 6 blocks that are required to be filled otherwise the request form keeps kicking back wanting that info. Aside from the "NAME" and "Description" (what you are requesting), blocks I had nothing I could put in the other boxes (Title, Company, etc.). So that's as far as it went. Actually there were also drop downs to choose what you intended to use the imagery for and none came close to "photoreal ground textures for FSX scenery".

 

[falcon409]

I'm with Lance on this. Not only is it safer legally, but I'd say it's easier to just get imagery from the USGS, reproject, and compile with the SDK.

Ok, and that brings up another question, one I have asked many times and gotten the same slurred answer. Yes, I can download the tiles from the USGS Seamless Server, great now what? It does not come out in a format that FSX or SBuilderX recognizes. Next question: So how do I reconcile that little problem and get it into a form that I can import to SBuilderX and compile a usable bgl file? . . . .and the answer is. . . ."Well there are utilities "out there" that will do the job". Huh? What utility, out where? There was someone who also asked this question a few months back and I stated then that apparently there is a utility that will transform that USGS tile to a format that FSX will recognize and the folks who use it are quite successful with it and if you ask around they'll tell you there's a utility that will do that. . . .and then the conversation trails off to an inaudible mumble.

 

[scott967b]

Google released a new ToS policy on 1 MAR:

http://www.google.com/intl/en/policies/terms/

Using our Services does not give you ownership of any intellectual property rights in our Services or the content you access. You may not use content from our Services unless you obtain permission from its owner or are otherwise permitted by law. These terms do not grant you the right to use any branding or logos used in our Services. Don’t remove, obscure, or alter any legal notices displayed in or along with our Services.

So my reading is that you are bound by applicable copyright law. In the US you can raise "fair use" as a defense against infringement. Don't know if any case law directly bears on this type of use. I also don't know if this supersedes Google's prior terms as linked above.

I note that wherever GE gets its source data, it often does things like coloring or other value-added processing (derivative work).

Also note that copying a work into a file, or even into RAM in the US is considered to be "fixing a work in a tangible medium" and hence subject to exclusive rights of the holder.

As far as getting a response from Google, I wish you luck.

scott s.
.

 

[Dain Arns]

I would recommend reviewing the Google Earth/Maps Terms of Service [LINESTRIKE]instead[/LINESTRIKE] as well, as it applies directly to the images being used in this case.

http://earth.google.com/intl/en/license.html


Therein, is does mention (Section 3, sub part j) that a user will not "use any robot, spider, site search/retrieval application, or other device to retrieve or index any portion of the Google services or Content...".
And that is where the issue/problem possibly occurs.

 

[Meshman]

Ok, and that brings up another question, one I have asked many times and gotten the same slurred answer.

Here's one; http://www.mapwindow.org/

and another; http://fwtools.maptools.org/ <----beware, command line driven only!

and one that might work?; http://vterrain.org/ (I need to hunt for the tool and I'm hosting a MP session if Flight.)

The "issue" with the imagery from the USGS is like the difference between color and colour. Both mean the same thing, but there's a small spelling difference. So goes the data from USGS, it's 99.9% the same as what you would see when in the SDK format, but the "spelling" is slightly different. Technically, the projection and datum are not what the SDKs want, so they need to be modified. And then the work begins. But once you've changed from a UTM/NAD83 to a Geographic/WGS84 format it will look the same. And when it's in the correct Proj/Datum there is no need to worry about SBuilderX. Making an INF file takes a minute or two and then the file gets compiled into a BGL.

If you want to try things out, then start a thread down in the Landscapers with an airport to work on and I add in any help needed, without using too much geek speak! :salute:

 

[orionll]

Ok, and that brings up another question, one I have asked many times and gotten the same slurred answer. Yes, I can download the tiles from the USGS Seamless Server, great now what? It does not come out in a format that FSX or SBuilderX recognizes. Next question: So how do I reconcile that little problem and get it into a form that I can import to SBuilderX and compile a usable bgl file? . . . .and the answer is. . . ."Well there are utilities "out there" that will do the job". Huh? What utility, out where? There was someone who also asked this question a few months back and I stated then that apparently there is a utility that will transform that USGS tile to a format that FSX will recognize and the folks who use it are quite successful with it and if you ask around they'll tell you there's a utility that will do that. . . .and then the conversation trails off to an inaudible mumble.

Well, after you obtain your orthoimagery, you'll want to reproject the GeoTIFF into the WGS84 geographic (lat/lon) projection, acceptable for FSX resample. There are instructions on doing so at the FSDeveloper Wiki: http://www.fsdeveloper.com/wiki/index.php?title=GeoTIFF_file_creation_with_FwTools.

Once you've reprojected to WGS84, you are then free to do color correction, variations, masks, etc. If you do make any changes or variations, be sure to extract the geotags prior, so you will have the location information to add back to your TIFF, or alternatively define in your INF file. There are instructions on doing so in the aforementioned FSDeveloper Wiki article (linked to above).

Next, you'll need to create an INF file suitable for Resample. There is an explanation on the format, along with a handful of examples available at MSDN: http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc707102.aspx#TheResampleTool & http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc707102.aspx#ResampleExamples.

Lastly, you can annotate autogen, if that's the sort of thing you like. Same procedure as annotating any other FSX photoscenery, so no real need to go into it considering the context of this post.

Edit: Looks like Lance beat me to it.

 

[jdhaenens]

I have to agree with Lance and orionll. I have a payware program called Global Mapper that makes it extremely easy to ready the USGS data for resample in FSX. USGS requests you mention the data in attribution with "Data courtesy USGS seamless server." ...or data gateway, or wherever you came upon it. It's the only completely legal way to do it that leaves no question other than buying the data from the folks that supply Google.

Jim

 

[orionll]

Yep, The National Map has this in its FAQ: http://viewer.nationalmap.gov/help/index.php?categoryID=3&faqID=136, also linking here: http://www.usgs.gov/visual-id/credit_usgs.html. Simply writing "Data available from U.S. Geological Survey, National Geospatial Program." or "Orthoimagery courtesy of the U.S. Geological Survey." should satisfy the attribution requirements.