This too should get wider distribution! Cheers, Kat ---------- Forwarded message ---------- From: David Monniaux <David.Monniaux(a)free.fr> Date: Tue, Sep 22, 2009 at 2:57 PM Subject: Re: [Commons-l] a heads-up on Wikimedia France's adventures with the French cultural authorities To: Wikimedia Commons Discussion List <commons-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org> Of special relevance to us is this section of the report: Second recommendation Lift the obstacles to the presence of French data on collaborative sites Context The Internet has changed because of the development of a multitude of personal sites, as well as a new generation of platforms and services whose content is provided by “communities”, some of which have become powerful international industries. Thus, the sites Wikipedia around the world welcome a total of 240 million unique visitors a month and the site in French 10 million unique visitors a month. The articles on these sites on topics related to France are currently illustrated by amateur photographs, or photographs from foreign collections. Arguments When an encyclopedic site such as Wikipedia needs photographs of Egyptian antiquities in order to get illustrations for its articles, it calls a museum. For the Louvre, accepting to donate its photographs would significantly augment their exposure to the world and, thus, the visibility of the museum as opposed to, say, the British Museum or the Cairo Museum. All the more, the presentation of paintings or drawings of Ingres on a site with such a high number of visitors would be positive for the museum of Montauban. The presence of public cultural data on community-run platforms would augment their visibility and that of the public organizations that provided them, both nationally and internationally. Nevertheless, some legal obstacles currently hinder agreements with these platforms. Indeed, because these sites are mostly constituted of texts written and posted by private individuals, they propose so-called “free” licenses which are in certain respects incompatible with current French intellectual property law : no royalties for right holders, indefinite rights of reuse, incompatibility with certain moral rights. Therefore, a common ground should be reached so that these legal difficulties are not insurmontable. Conditions for fulfilling this recommendation Elaborate and implement a specific reflection that would take into account the forces of the parties, the potential gains for visibility of the data and public cultural institutions, and the legal obstacles of the exposition of our public data on collaborative sites. Such an agreement would evidently include restrictions on the resolution of photographs or videos put online and the obligation to create links, which could maximize the flow of visits and income to the donating institutions and the distribution pole considered (RMN, INA, etc.). [Note of translator: the report suggests centralizing the currently dispersed system for licensing of public works on a few number of poles, such as the Reunion of national museums (RMN; museum photographs) and the National audiovisual institute (television archives).] _______________________________________________ Commons-l mailing list Commons-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/commons-l -- Your donations keep Wikipedia online: http://donate.wikimedia.org/en Wikimedia, Press: kat(a)wikimedia.org * Personal: kat(a)mindspillage.org http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Mindspillage * (G)AIM:Mindspillage mindspillage or mind|wandering on irc.freenode.net * email for phone