I'm not talking about quoting, I'm talking about things like the copious images of Disney characters sprinkled throughout the site, without even mentioning the anime characters. But I'm not advocating paranoia, but I am advocating a less nonchalant attitude about fair use. At the moment it is often used as a "get out of copyright free" card in ways which I suspect would not be legally defensible, or not worth the money or time it would take to defend it (considering the principle at hand would be "does this qualify as X under this law," I'm not sure this would really be a first-amendment blockbuster if it clearly didn't qualify).
FF
On 5/10/05, David Gerard fun@thingy.apana.org.au wrote:
Fastfission (fastfission@gmail.com) [050511 01:25]:
I don't see any good way around this. It is less a problem of Wikipedia itself (though I'd be very careful of "fair use" because of the way it is structured in US law), as it is with the ability of the big and powerful to wage legal war even on principles they are in the wrong on. It's more of a maddening thought than it is a sobering one.
The mediapathic nature of such a suit.
"They're suing an encyclopedia for quoting them." "WTF?!"
"They're suing Wikipedia for quoting them." "UNLEASH THE NINJA FIRST-AMENDMENT ATTACK LAWYERS!"
It's the sort of backup one hopes never to have to call upon. But it's there and keen to help. Avoid copyright paranoia.
- d.
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