God's Eye View's MIT licence: can you share screenshots and videos?

God's Eye View is open source under the MIT licence. That licence covers the code, not the pictures on your screen. The satellite imagery, the 3D cities, the aircraft and the cables each come from a provider with its own terms. So the practical question is not "is it open source?" but "may I post this screenshot, or use this recording in a video?" We read the providers' own terms to find out, and the honest answer differs per provider and per use.

This is the third article in our series. The first covers what God's Eye View does and what you need to run it. The second covers the free Cesium ion route to 3D cities.

What the MIT licence covers

The project is clear about this, and deserves credit for it. Its LICENSE file contains the standard MIT text, followed by a note in capitals: "THE MIT LICENSE ABOVE COVERS THE SOURCE CODE ONLY." Bundled datasets and everything fetched from providers while the app runs "are owned by their respective sources and are NOT licensed under MIT".

A second file, DATA_SOURCES.md, lists dozens of sources with a licence and a credit for each. We used it as a map of what to check, not as the answer. It is the maker's summary, and in two places it did not match what we found at the provider. We come back to both.

The README also says something about the project's own demo clips. They show Google's 3D tiles "used promotionally with in-frame attribution; they aren't licensed for standalone reuse". If the makers are that careful with their own clips, it is worth being careful with yours.

Three different things: a screenshot, a video, reusing the data

Terms of use rarely say "commercial use: yes or no". They describe situations. Three matter here.

• A screenshot in a blog post, a forum or on social media. A still image of what the app rendered.
• A video: a screen recording on YouTube, with or without advertising. Some providers treat video separately, and some treat monetised video separately again.
• Reusing the data: building your own app, dashboard or product on the same feeds. This is a much larger question with stricter answers. It needs its own research, and we do not cover it here.

One more point. A free account is not the same as free to reuse. A provider can give you access without a fee and still limit what you publish. Cesium ion's free plan and OpenSky's anonymous access both work that way.

What is on your screen

Start the app without any API key and four providers fill the first screen. The satellite imagery comes from Esri. The terrain comes from Re:Earth. Aircraft come from the OpenSky Network, with adsb.lol as a fallback. Roads and mapped places come from OpenStreetMap.

Add a free Cesium ion token and the imagery changes to Google's Photorealistic 3D Tiles, streamed through Cesium. From that moment two more sets of terms apply: Cesium's and Google's.

In the bottom-left corner of the app there is a small link, Data attribution. It opens the panel in our cover image. The panel is a useful starting point for identifying providers. Where the app supports more than one source for a layer, as it does for aircraft, also check which source supplied the layer you captured. The app itself writes "(non-commercial)" behind OpenSky and "NonCommercial" behind the submarine cable data.

What each provider says

We read the terms below on 17 September 2026. "Not stated" means the page we read does not mention that use. It does not mean the use is forbidden, and it does not mean it is allowed.

OpenStreetMap has the clearest rules. Its attribution guidelines cover static images and video by name. For video they make a distinction. If a map is only visible in passing, for example on a laptop someone is filmed using, you must not remove the existing credit and need do nothing more. If the map is "a major component of what is shown", the credit "should typically appear in a corner of the map, in addition to attribution in the end credits or description". It does not have to stay in view while you pan and zoom, as long as it was on screen long enough to be read. A screen recording of this app falls in the second group.

Esri publishes terms for static maps, and it counts screen captures as static maps. Reports, presentations, marketing material, a company website and academic publications are named as allowed, with attribution. "For any other uses, you must first obtain permission from Esri", and it names "commercial monetization and direct resale" as examples. The page is written for ArcGIS Online users. It does not say whether it also covers the keyless service this app uses, and it does not mention video.

Google is where it gets difficult. The policy page for the Map Tiles API has a section on video. It allows promotional videos under conditions: no Street View imagery, "no more than 30 seconds in length", "about the capabilities of your application(s)", marked "for promotional purposes only", with attribution. A ten-minute YouTube video about your city is not a promotional video for your application, and the page says nothing about it. We read that as "not covered", not as "forbidden".

Do not confuse this with Google's friendlier guidelines for Google Maps and Google Earth. Those say you do not need permission for an educational or entertainment video with Google Earth content, "even if your work is monetized". But they are written for the consumer products, not for tiles an app fetches through the developer API. God's Eye View uses the API.

Cesium ion adds its own layer. Its content usage guide says: "You may also create and publish renderings of your projects, such as videos, that include assets provided by Cesium ion. Some third-party data providers limit the use of renderings that include their data." Its terms for Google content then list, among the things you will not do: "include any Google Maps Content in any electronic or printed documents". We could not reconcile those two sentences for a screenshot in an article. Our own second article contains such screenshots. On 17 September 2026, we asked Cesium whether these screenshots are permitted and whether any images or credits need adjustment.

OpenSky supplies the aircraft you see by default. Its terms of use grant a licence "solely for the purpose of non-profit research and non-profit education". Any use by a for-profit entity needs a written licence. For publications the terms ask you to anonymise aircraft identifiers, to cite OpenSky's paper and to send them a link. The terms are written for people who use the data, and they do not say how they apply to someone posting a screenshot of a third-party app. We put that question to OpenSky. Meanwhile we replaced our own cover image of the first article, which showed call signs across a whole continent.

Where to place credits in screenshots and video

Every provider we read asks for credit, but not in the same place. Follow each provider's attribution requirements for the format you publish. A caption or video description may supplement on-screen credits, but does not always replace them. There is also a catch that is easy to miss.

In the app the credits are folded away. The corner shows a logo, "Powered by Esri" or "Google Maps", and the Data attribution link. In an interactive app, users can open that panel. Whether this satisfies the attribution requirements depends on the provider. In a screenshot or a video nobody can open anything.

Cesium's guide says so directly: for "static content like images or videos", "just showing the static 'Data attribution' link text is insufficient". It suggests three ways to fix that: show the attribution at all times, put it in the image caption, or list it at the end of the video. That is Cesium's guidance for assets from Cesium ion. Google's policy for its 3D tiles asks for more: all attributions for the displayed tiles shown "in a line", "usually along the bottom of the rendering". So for Google's tiles a caption adds to the on-screen line and does not replace it.

What we do ourselves:

• Do not crop the bottom-left corner away. The logos there are part of what the providers require. The project's own notes say the line stays visible even in its clean recording mode, for this reason.
• Open the Data attribution panel before you capture, note the providers for your view, and name them in your caption as well. The Google credits change per location: for Amsterdam the panel listed Google and Airbus, for Austin it listed Google, Landsat / Copernicus and several ocean-data providers.
• For OpenStreetMap in video, show "© OpenStreetMap contributors" in a corner of the map, and add it with the link openstreetmap.org/copyright to the end credits or description.

We now name the providers under every screenshot in this series. That is our own practice, not a rule that settles every provider's requirements.

What we could not establish

The submarine cables. The project documents TeleGeography's cable data as CC BY-NC-SA 3.0, a licence that excludes commercial use, and the app's own panel says "NonCommercial". TeleGeography's current FAQ says that references to a TeleGeography map, URL or screen capture are available under CC BY-SA 4.0, which has no such clause. The FAQ speaks about maps and screen captures. It does not mention the two data files the project bundles, and we found no licence statement for those files. We could not establish which licence applies to them, and that is the question we put to TeleGeography.

The adsb.lol aircraft data. The project lists it as ODbL 1.0. The licence page of adsb.lol says that people who feed data waive their rights under CC0. Both can be true at once, one for the contributions and one for the collected database, but we did not find a page that says so. We have not confirmed which terms govern screenshots of this feed. Attribution alone does not resolve that uncertainty.

Camera images. Several camera providers require a credit, for example Transport for London and Finland's Fintraffic. A licence is only half the question there. Camera frames can show people and number plates, and privacy law applies regardless of the data licence. We did not research that, and we do not publish camera frames.

A short checklist before you post

• Note what is in the frame, and keep the corner. Write down the providers from the Data attribution panel, and leave the logos and the credit line in the picture.
• Follow each provider's credit rules for your format. A caption or description can add to the on-screen credits. It does not always replace them.
• Aircraft in view? OpenSky's terms are the strictest of the default layers. If it is unclear whether your use is permitted, switch the flights layer off before you capture, or ask OpenSky first.
• Google's 3D cities in view? This is the least settled case in the terms we read. Ask Cesium or Google before you rely on it.
• A commercial purpose? It can matter even before you display ads. Check the applicable terms for your organisation and intended use, including future monetisation.
• Building a product on the data? That is a different and stricter question than anything above. Read each provider's terms in full, or get legal advice.

How we checked

We reviewed the project's LICENSE, README and DATA_SOURCES.md at commit 531ef52. We checked the provider pages linked in this article on 17 September 2026. Where we write "not stated", we mean that the specific page reviewed did not address that use—not that it is necessarily permitted or prohibited. Terms can change.

The screenshots were captured by us on 17 September 2026, without configured API keys. They have only been resized, except for the credit-line detail, which is cropped from the screenshot above it. Provider names in the captions were taken from the app's Data attribution panel.

Provider responses — 17 September 2026. We emailed TeleGeography, Cesium and the OpenSky Network with the questions described above. OpenSky sent an automated acknowledgement; we have not yet received a substantive answer to our questions from any of the three providers. We will update this article with a dated note when relevant clarification becomes available, and seek permission before quoting their replies.

Our review covers screenshots and video. It does not assess data reuse in commercial products or privacy issues involving camera footage. This is an editorial review of the sources we consulted, not legal advice.