Re: [Foundation-l] English Wikipedia considering declaring open-season on works from countries lacking US copyright relations

-- Wikimedia UK is the operating name of Wiki UK Limited, a Charitable Company Registered in England and Wales, No: 6741827. Charity No:1144513 Office: 4th Floor, Development House, 56-64 Leonard Street, London EC2A 4LT. Wikimedia UK is the local chapter of the Wikimedia Foundation (who operate Wikipedia, amongst other projects). It is an independent non-profit organization with no legal control over Wikipedia nor responsibility for its contents. On 05/03/2012 05:01, Newyorkbrad wrote: > This would be shockingly inappropriate, to the point that I would urge > intervention at the Foundation level if this were to happen. > > The Wikimedia communities' approaches to copyright and related issues > often reflect what I consider a bewildering contradiction. On the one > hand, even when it damages the encyclopedias, we are often careful to > uphold intellectual property rights that hypertechnically might > conceivably exist, even where it is blindingly obvious that no real > person or entity has any existing interest in the intellectual > property and there is no prospect that any claim will ever be > asserted. > > On the other hand, we sometimes are just as strongly willing to > disregard actual assertions of rights by bona-fide creators and > rightsholders on the basis of the slightest arguable legal defect in > the rights claim, without regard to any other considerations. The > position you describe below would be an example of the latter, and in > my view a well-nigh indefensible one. > > Newyorkbrad > > > On 2/23/12, Robert Rohderarohde@gmail.com wrote: >> On Thu, Feb 23, 2012 at 11:14 AM, Newyorkbradnewyorkbrad@gmail.com wrote: >>> Can we agree that if the creator of a (reasonably recent) work from >>> one of these countries were ACTUALLY to request that the file be >>> deleted due to a copyright issue, we would grant the request rather >>> than rely on an omission or incompatibility in the copyright treaty >>> regime? >> One of the most vocal commenters at w:Talk:Copyrights, would almost >> certainly say no. >> >> For example: >> >> "... [T]hey have the opportunity to obtain copyrights elsewhere and >> chose not to do so. That is their responsibility." >> >> "The rights of copyright for the individuals end at the border of Iran, >> period." >> >> At least some of the Wikipedia commenters seem prepared to draw a hard >> line on this issue with no exceptions. >> >> Personally, I'd like to believe that we as a community are more >> reasonable than that. >> >> -Robert Rohde >> >> _______________________________________________ >> foundation-l mailing list >> foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org >> Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l >> > _______________________________________________ > foundation-l mailing list > foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org > Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l >