Angela wrote:
The text is from [[MediaWiki:History copyright]]. The text on the English Wikipedia was added by Jamesday last year following a discussion on this mailing list where Tim made the addition to the history footers possible. See http://mail.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikien-l/2004-June/013706.html
There is also related discussion at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia_talk:Terms_of_use#Title_17
Information is also at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Page_history which states the Wikimedia Foundation's official view on this matter. See this diff which Anthere and Jimmy both agreed to lasy July - http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia:Page_history&diff=48...
I'm puzzled as to who came up with the idea that 17 USC 108 applies to page histories. The section applies to "libraries and archives", but I think it's a very strained reading to try and say it has anything to do with Wikipedia.
Section 108 makes several references to premises, which suggests to me that it has in mind libraries and archives as physical facilities in "meatspace". Also, it limits reproduction/distribution to a single copy (three for unpublished works). If we have copyright infringements in page history, in many cases there will be more than one copy; the violation may not have been discovered until a number of revisions passed.
The application of this section is quite limited, and I do not think we should be relying on it. Congress apparently intended this section to cover things like preservation or replacement of documents, and interlibrary loans of excerpts or out-of-print materials. The notes for this section are instructive: http://www4.law.cornell.edu/uscode/html/uscode17/usc_sec_17_00000108----000-...
While I understand the concern about potentially infringing materials in page histories, I don't think it warrants a special disclaimer. Since every revision of an article is arguably licensed separately under the GFDL, it would therefore require a statement that the GFDL applies. The current software message does not satisfy that. I think it would be better to use the same message that appears on current versions, which, after all, have the same potential problem. I don't see this message on history pages for our other projects, and we ought to keep this consistent.
If a copyright holder complains specifically about infringement in the page history, I believe we can deal with the issue at that point. Based on the discussions I've seen, I understand the developers can purge portions of text from individual revisions if necessary. In the meantime, I think this is an unnecessary and ultimately ineffective disclaimer.
--Michael Snow
I think it would be better to have some sort of link so that "if you are the copyright owner of infringing material and would like it removed, click here....". We shouldn't be making it difficult for people to get material they own removed from the history.
And in many cases we can quite easily remove material infringing someone's copyright from the page history, by using the selective undelete feature. The only problem area is where the copyright-infringing material has been incorporated into many revisions of an otherwise legitimate article since then.
~Mark
Mark Ryan <ultrablue@...> writes:
I think it would be better to have some sort of link so that "if you are the copyright owner of infringing material and would like it removed, click here....". We shouldn't be making it difficult for people to get material they own removed from the history.
See also [[Wikipedia talk:Copyrights#Making life easier for new users]]
I am not really convinced. In many cases, the material stayed in many versions and we should not delete them just for this reason. As for removing specific parts of text, developers are really not keen to do that. I think I had a couple of requests in the year and it was never done. So, we should not make people believe it is just simple to ask and do.
I'd rather that people forget about a bit of infringment lost in history, than seeing the board list flooded with people requesting complete removal :-)
ihmo
ant
Mark Ryan a écrit:
I think it would be better to have some sort of link so that "if you are the copyright owner of infringing material and would like it removed, click here....". We shouldn't be making it difficult for people to get material they own removed from the history.
And in many cases we can quite easily remove material infringing someone's copyright from the page history, by using the selective undelete feature. The only problem area is where the copyright-infringing material has been incorporated into many revisions of an otherwise legitimate article since then.
~Mark
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MediaWiki%3AHistory_copyright
What do you think ?
Ant
Michael Snow a écrit:
Angela wrote:
The text is from [[MediaWiki:History copyright]]. The text on the English Wikipedia was added by Jamesday last year following a discussion on this mailing list where Tim made the addition to the history footers possible. See http://mail.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikien-l/2004-June/013706.html
There is also related discussion at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia_talk:Terms_of_use#Title_17
Information is also at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Page_history which states the Wikimedia Foundation's official view on this matter. See this diff which Anthere and Jimmy both agreed to lasy July - http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia:Page_history&diff=48...
I'm puzzled as to who came up with the idea that 17 USC 108 applies to page histories. The section applies to "libraries and archives", but I think it's a very strained reading to try and say it has anything to do with Wikipedia.
Section 108 makes several references to premises, which suggests to me that it has in mind libraries and archives as physical facilities in "meatspace". Also, it limits reproduction/distribution to a single copy (three for unpublished works). If we have copyright infringements in page history, in many cases there will be more than one copy; the violation may not have been discovered until a number of revisions passed.
The application of this section is quite limited, and I do not think we should be relying on it. Congress apparently intended this section to cover things like preservation or replacement of documents, and interlibrary loans of excerpts or out-of-print materials. The notes for this section are instructive: http://www4.law.cornell.edu/uscode/html/uscode17/usc_sec_17_00000108----000-...
While I understand the concern about potentially infringing materials in page histories, I don't think it warrants a special disclaimer. Since every revision of an article is arguably licensed separately under the GFDL, it would therefore require a statement that the GFDL applies. The current software message does not satisfy that. I think it would be better to use the same message that appears on current versions, which, after all, have the same potential problem. I don't see this message on history pages for our other projects, and we ought to keep this consistent.
If a copyright holder complains specifically about infringement in the page history, I believe we can deal with the issue at that point. Based on the discussions I've seen, I understand the developers can purge portions of text from individual revisions if necessary. In the meantime, I think this is an unnecessary and ultimately ineffective disclaimer.
--Michael Snow