[WikiEN-l] Application of the {{pd-art}} tag

[Erik Moeller]

On 4/11/06, Jimmy Wales <jwales at wikia.com> wrote:

> Bridgeman v. Corel was a district court case, never litigated at the
> appeals court level, and therefore is not a strong precedent.  It is, as
> far as I have been able to determine, a fairly unusual result not likely
> to be followed by other courts.
>
> Therefore, relying on Bridgeman v. Corel for anything is likely wishful
> thinking.

We do rely on it quite strongly at present; in fact, it is explicitly
cited in our "PD-Art" template, which is used on thousands of
pictures:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Template:PD-Art

>From the Wikipedia article about the case:

"Several federal courts have followed the ruling in Bridgeman, though
it has yet to be endorsed specifically by the Supreme Court. Moreover,
this case has not been cited by any appellate-level circuit court
meaning that it has no mandatory legal authority and its persuasive
legal authority, as a district court opinion, has not been confirmed.
However, the Supreme Court's ruling in Feist v. Rural, explicitly
rejecting difficulty of labor or expense as a consideration in
copyrightability, seems to support the fundamental reasoning behind
Bridgeman." (That case was about copyrightability of phone
directories.)

I do believe that for two-dimensional works, the principle "public
domain stays public domain" is very much one worth defending in court,
if necessary.

Erik