On 10/29/06, J JIH jus168jih@gmail.com wrote:
Please explain how the template is probably misleading at best for most people. The content of [[s:en:Template:PD-UN]] has been based on USA copyright law and prolonged discussions at English Wikisource when so many UN Security Council Resolutions have arised the copyright concern. If you can think of better content, please be more specific. Users outside the USA must also be aware of the laws in their countries as countries that are party to Protocol 2 of the Universal Copyright Convention done at Paris on 24 July 1971 require copyright protection for works published for the first time by the United Nations.
I think most people who see something that is a PD-UN template will assume that there is some special reason that the UN material is PD. As the template explains in a round-about way, this isn't true. You might as well not have a PD-UN template, or have it say very explicitly "UN material is subject to US copyright. Please see such-and-such a page about US copyright law to determine if this is in the public domain."
Having PD templates seems to imply special PD categories -- 90% of them say, "This work is PD because of this reason." It's better, in my opinion, to not have PD templates which say, "This is PD because of one of the four reasons, none of which have anything specifically to do with the UN." It makes it hard for anyone else to know WHY it is PD, for one thing (which reason is it?), and it is probably extra-hard on people whose English isn't that great (since it is a rather complicate way to explain, "UN material is the same as any other copyrighted material in the US."
Just my take on it, but I'm not leading any campaign against it.
FF