--- Ray Saintonge <saintonge(a)telus.net> wrote:
I too thought that the response was peculiar.
Passing the buck onto
some na�ve individual who may not understand
copyright law at all evades
responsibility.
Its understandable. Official positions not only must
remain uncolored, but also moderately defensive of the
institution. Any offical doctrine is going to draw a
sharp and non-intuitive line, unless dealing with
specific cases. Language is just codewords, and
paradoxically enough, private discussion can be more
open.
Sometimes we need to say, "This material may
still
be copyright, but
it's 30 years old, the publisher went bankrupt 25
years ago, and the
writer or photographer died 20 years ago without a
family and without
mentioning copyrights in his will. Maybe we should
take a chance."
I dont think that its remotely this conditional. Alex
made it clear that it's all pretty unclear as to how a
case could come down. The most touchy aspects are all
very general and current issues for law, not at all
particular to WP. To stick-neck-out or
not-stick-neck-out; that is the question. And this is
in degrees: the *degree of caution expressed (in
direct proportion to the number of nuts invested)
versus the degree to which such caution is
{{{understood}}} to stifle the goal of development.
The balanced and cautious community decision led to
the well understood and vigilant requirement for
attribution. This is good enough IMNSHO.
S
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