Imagico.de

Open Data, Free Software and Open Design work

The services and products i offer are mostly based on Open Geodata sources. Open Geodata is not only practically a key ressource for my work, i also consider the open availability of basic geographic information - representing a substantial part of knowledge of society on the geography - to be key to healthy intellectual development of humanity, to a functioning market and to the goal of maximizing the social and macro-economic benefit derived from geographic data collection.

I also make extensive use of Free Open Source Software in my work - whether that is is data processing or graphics design. The decision to do so stems from practical and strategic considerations. Free Open Source Software that i use widely offers functionality that is not available in proprietary software and using Free Software ensures my long term freedom to continue or stop using it purely based on my own considerations.

I am not a software developer myself in the sense that my business model substantially includes writing code to be used by others. The implementations of data processing methods i develop are - predominantly - in house developments, neither intended nor suitable to be used by others. I am open to and welcome cooperation with professional Free Software developers to make available methods i develop in the form of software for others to use.

I publish select results of my design and visual data processing work under open licenses, but the bulk of my design work is offered under proprietary licenses. I would like to extend the scope of openly licensed design work, but this depends on the economic feasibility of such an approach. Like with the development of data processing and design methods i am open to and welcome cooperation with others to facilitate this through cooperation.

What i routinely publish under open licenses is map design work i do based on OpenStreetMap data. There is - so far - not much of an economic basis in doing so. But the idea of openly cooperative rule based map design is a passion of mine - and i hope that our society will develop in a way that - in the not too far future - it will be viable for professional designers and artists to work in that field in an economically sustainable fashion. By publishing my work in that field i hope to contribute to building such a future.

Customers licensing design and visual data processing work from me get fair licensing terms without vendor lock-in, per-view payment plans or automatically renewing subscriptions. I aim to attract and retain customers through the quality of my work, not through contractual trickery.