Re: [Wiki Loves Monuments] Wikimedia Sverige vs. the Visual Copyright Society in Sweden (BUS)

Today we received some bad news in Sweden. The Swedish Patent and Market Court ruled against Wikimedia Sverige in a lawsuit filed by Visual Copyright Society in Sweden (BUS). The case concerns images of public art online, more specifically in the case of our website Offentligkonst.se, a service created by Wikimedia Sverige using images from Wikimedia Commons. The ruling means that Freedom of Panorama is eroded and the public space is diminished. It is a detrimental loss for our projects. Next we will talk to our lawyers and WMF legal team to see what our remaining legal options are. Our lawyers however believe that success is not very likely if we would decide to move forward. Intensive efforts to advocate for our elected officials to change the outdated and problematic clauses in Swedish copyright law will be initiated during the year. We have also started a crowdfunding campaign to cover some of the cost of the legal expenses and fines of about 750,000 SEK stated in the verdict (around 89,000 USD) and for future national and international lobbying efforts. Please consider making a donation at http://wikimedia.se/en/donera, even if it is a symbolic sum. Simply add “BUS” in the comment, and all the money will be used for these costs. Some useful links (in Swedish): The legal argumentation from the court: http://www.bildupphovsratt.se/sites/default/files/upload/stockholms_tr_pmt_… Our press release: https://www.mynewsdesk.com/se/wikimedia-sverige/pressreleases/domslut-krymp… A timeline of what has happened: https://se.wikimedia.org/wiki/Offentligkonst.se/Stämning Best, John - - - - John Andersson Executive Director Wikimedia Sverige Phone: +46(0)73-3965189 Email: john.andersson(a)wikimedia.se Skype: johnandersson86 _______________________________________________ Wiki Loves Monuments mailing list WikiLovesMonuments(a)lists.wikimedia.org https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikilovesmonuments http://www.wikilovesmonuments.org