Sorry to only pick up on one point out of a whole e-mail, but we are absolutely committed to the GFDL, whether we like it or not: anything that we use 99.99% of the content already submitted for has to be compatible with the GFDL, because that is the licence it has been submitted to us under.

As I said in the very email you replied to (see what happens when you pick up on one point and ignore the rest), Jimmy Wales has already said that all images, regardless of license, are compatible with the GFDL.

As I say, we can do two things with images: (1) distribute a GFDL version of Wikipedia with only those images that are compatible with the GFDL, and a separate version which includes all images, but is under a more restrictive licence that is compatible with the licence of *all* images used; fair use images, strictly, should not appear in the former; and the latter may actually breach the GFDL's terms for "derivative works" for all I know. or (2) throw out any image that is not GFDL-compliant

I suggest you read the GFDL, specifically, clause 7.

"A compilation of the Document or its derivatives with other separate and independent documents or works, in or on a volume of a storage or distribution medium, is called an "aggregate" if the copyright resulting from the compilation is not used to limit the legal rights of the compilation's users beyond what the individual works permit. When the Document is included in an aggregate, this License does not apply to the other works in the aggregate which are not themselves derivative works of the Document."

AFAIK, currently, we are following option (0), which is "fudge it by saying we haven't decided yet, and offer the images for reuse under a label saying 'these may or may not actually be legal for you to reuse'; and rely on the fact that nobody hates us enough yet to challenge us over it". I may be wrong on that bit, but that's my understanding.

There really hasn't been an official determination made by the board, as far as I can tell, and the statement on [[Wikipedia:Copyrights]] is ambiguous as hell, but the position that the website is an aggregation of both GFDL and non-GFDL documents is certainly plausible. I'd say the bigger problem right now is that we don't have a compliant title page or history section.

Rowan Collins BSc

Anthony