koyaanis qatsi wrote:
Not to be a wag, but how can we reconcile anonymous contributions of any stripe--including ones that aren't logged in--with the FDL?
Those are pseudonyms. Nothing about the FDL requires authors to give their 'real names'. However an author chooses to identify themselves is good enough.
Pick an AOL IP address and try to assign it to one author, without AOL's help. Impossible.
Sure, and lots of people have the same names, too.
The GNU FDL only requires redistributors to pass along at least 5 names of prior contributors, not that the prior contributors be hunted down and investigated for their 'real' names.
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I think this is worth stressing. Suppose someone came up to you and handed you a bit of paper with an essay on it. "Hi, my name is Bob, and you can create derivative works from this paper if you like, but you have to attribute the original to me. Bye bye!"
Are you ethically required to research whether or not Bob is his real name? Or, since he said he was 'Bob', isn't that sufficient, morally, ethically, and legally?
I think this is a non-issue, really.
--Jimbo