On 9/14/06, Brianna Laugher brianna.laugher@gmail.com wrote:
On 15/09/06, Fastfission fastfission@gmail.com wrote:
I'm not sure a large and free-form table is the best way to accomplish this. I think it will confuse people. I think perhaps though that if we agree on certain issues (say, the architecture one), we could make specific templates relating just to those instances. They should be relatively limited in scope.
There do seem to be a small number of recurring issues in this regard:
- public art
- architecture (= derivative works? freedom of panorama?)
(in some, maybe all, countries these are considered together?) -limits of PD-ineligible (notably, German logos) -privacy rights -possibly 'sweat of brow' vs 'mechanical copy'? (we are still inconsistent about this, with flags) -and if we're going to go down this route, many countries probably have laws about offensive/seditious material?
That's a pretty good list to start with. I think we should put off the offensive/seditious material question for another day -- it's a very big kettle of fish. The only exception to that is that there are US laws regulating the need for publishers to maintain detailed records about anyone appearing in sexual situations. I'm pretty sure Jimbo has said in the past that he wasn't interested in trying to keep such records; anyway it's an issue to think about since we do "publish" out of the US.
It would be great if, for the sake of discussing it, we had a little table that explained the international differences on the above issues. I only know bits and pieces about a few of them. It might help us clarify what the legal issue is, and from there we can also probably think about the ethical issues (I'm inclined, for example, to support privacy rights in any compromising photographs which are not of "public figures," whether or not the law strictly requires it or not).
FF