Think in a contribuor of the old days, which hasn't contributed to Wikipedia for months or even years:
Axel Boldt wrote:
I guess that's what it boils down to: how legally risky is my proposition? Granted that I don't have any experience in these matters; I just find it hard to believe that a person could
- prove that they own the copyright to some Wikipedia content
By using the account who added that content to the page.
- convince a jury that they never heard about the opt-out offer
"I left Wikipedia X time ago. Then, i moved and on my new home i don't have Internet Access. Why whould i heard about it?"
- claim that the license change caused damages larger than their
legal costs.
"They're stealing my content, part of which i have published on book Y." Also, i don't see why this point is needed. You can't relicense others work with an opt-out procedure. You can only use an opt-in procedure as it was used for insatance by the Mozilla Foundation http://www.mozilla.org/MPL/relicensing-faq.html and removing (replacing) all content not opted-in. Which is not feasible.
If such whimsical lawsuits are indeed a possibility, then the danger of action should be weighed against the danger of inaction: right now, any past contributor could sue for violating GFDL 4.A, failing to change an article's title after modification. I just don't see how suits like that are viable.
--Axel
What do you mean by "Article title"? We do provide an article title which changes with every edit. Click on "Permanent link". It's also availabe with the author list. The GFDL itself recommends adding an unique number to the end of a title section to make it unique (section 5).
Also, you would also need to prove that you didn't gave permission to keep the title when abiding to Wikipedia rules: "You may use the same title as a previous version if the original publisher of that version gives permission." If we consider that the publisher are not you but the Wikipedia project, the case is even clearer.