On 9/9/07, Axel Boldt axelboldt@yahoo.com wrote:
--- Delirium delirium@hackish.org wrote:
"Not perfectly clean from a legalistic standpoint" is rather an understatement. "Not even remotely legal" would be more like it.
Just as legal as the opt-out copyright infringement of the Internet Archive, which to my knowledge has never been sued.
They have been sued (see for example http://www.eff.org/legal/cases/landmark/), and considering that archives are explicitly protected under the DMCA I'd say it's a much different legal position.
In any event, I don't think it's important to follow legal rules just for the sake of formality; the only thing that matters is whether your actions are ethical and how likely it is that you can be successfully sued over them.
Agreed, but not applicable, as what would be ethical would be to start following the GFDL.
Of course, from a legal standpoint, that'd be irrelevant, since the WMF has already had its rights terminated under the GFDL (see section 9).