On 22/11/2007, Mike Godwin <mnemonic(a)gmail.com> wrote:
Robert Horning writes:
I've seen other websites try this with
Wikimedia content, and I don't
know how you give "full notice to the community" of a license change.
I regard this as essentially a trivial problem. You could put it on
the front page of each language's Wikipedia, for example. Those who
never see the Project front pages might not see such a notice -- but
they probably don't know we're having a fundraiser, either.
What does a fundraiser have to do with it? Are you suggesting that
people that don't donate don't deserve to have their legal rights
respected?
Furthermore, I'm willing to bet that the set of
contributors who both
(a) insist on an old version of GFDL and (b) care about it enough to
remove content if migration happens, and (c) wouldn't hear about the
migration is a very, very, small set of contributors.
It only takes one.
If you are
modifying the license
terms outside of the terms of the GFDL, you need to renegotiate with
that contributor...including all anonymous contributors.
I don't believe this is required, as a practical matter. Consider,
for example, credit-card companies. They change the terms of user
agreements all the time, unilaterally. They issue long, complicated
notices when they do this. Amazingly, this triggers neither mass
departures nor massive negotiations with individuals. And they are
dealing with far larger populations than we are.
I agree that you're right in theory, of course. In practice, not so
big a problem.
Credit card companies have a list of people they need to notify. We
don't. They also have a clause reserving the right to make unilateral
changes (Question: Do credit card companies in Germany have similar
clauses, or are they invalid under the same principle? If not, what's
the difference?), we're not sure we have that right internationally,
which could cause serious problems.
I of course support your prerogative to do this. I
think that any
migration has to accommodate GFDL "ideologists" and allow for their
removal of their content if they believe the project is not adequately
copyleft for them.
You've yet to describe a practical way of removing content.
At the end of the day, what you have to ask yourself
is this: is our
primary purpose as Wikipedians to get the knowledge out to the world
for free (and in a way that keeps it free), or is our purpose to
privilege an older version of GFDL regardless of whether it inhibits
our ability to provide the world information for free? I tend to
think our purpose is more the first than the second.
You're the lawyer, but I'm pretty sure the law doesn't care what our
primary purpose is. We still have to obey it, even if it goes against
what we're trying to do.