On 24/09/06, Sage Ross ragesoss+wikipedia@gmail.com wrote:
I wonder if it would be possible to simply declare, by fiat, that previous anonymous contributions will be relicensed?
Probably not legally safe, and almost certainly not ethically safe or public-relations safe.
Since we don't, technically, follow the GFDL as it is,
Possibly. At present it's a can of worms mostly dealt with by not opening it.
and other free licenses are clearly consistent with the spirit of free content that any contributor implicitly agrees to, it shouldn't be that big a deal.
All we need is a few such IP editors saying "I edited from that IP which I can show I own and owned then, and I say HOW DARE YOU SIR" and we have actual trouble.
The remaining problem would be outside text for which explicit permission was obtained to license it under the GFDL for Wikipedia. The owners of such content might conceivably get upset (and litigious) over it. As a minimum safeguard, we would need to, by default, not mulit-license any given existing entry until it was checked over for such potentially problematic content (or content from editors who refused to multi-license, but that could be done automatically).
Every entry to be declared 'hereby multilicensed' would need to be given that status one at a time.
- d.