Birgitte SB wrote:
The main difference as I see is this. Wikipedia is
creating content. WP could chose to make it's content
free or not; they chose to make it free. Wikisource
has no control on whether our content is free or where
it is free. We can only choose whether or not to make
it available. Downstream users are going to have to
evaluate whether they are free to use Wikisource
contect individually unless they are in the United
States. Our material is under various licenses as
well as public domain (as applicable in the US). We
cannot give anyone a blanket guarantee the content is
free for them to use whether we include non-commercial
or not. They are still going to have to evaluate each
license category and judge based on the laws they must
abide by.
Absolutely. It's important to have broad principles like NPOV to guide
all projects, but it's also important to recognize that not all projects
will have the same priorities as Wikipedia. For most of Wikisource NPOV
is meaningless, as is the ability of downstream users to modify the
material. If the material is modified it is no longer the same
material. We can permit editing, translating and other commentary, and
that will be subject to the usual rules for NPOV and modifiability, but
unless there is a clear recognition of an inviolable source text it is
all meaningless. When a vandal wanted change a string of digits in the
middle of "Pi to 1,000,000 places" on Wikisource I suppose it could be
explained in terms of the right to modify, but the result was no longer pi.
It's also important to trust the leadership in each project. Those who
have taken on leadership roles in established projects are going to be
known quantities who are not going to rush headlong into radical stands.
(This may be different in newer or smaller projects, but even there as
time goes on trust can be built.) Trusted leaders are not about to
allow others to recklessly ignore copyrights, but at the same time they
are not going to take such disadvantageously narrow interpretations of
copyright that would bar any material with a mere suggestion of a
violation. Removing the Security Council Resolutions would be a clear
act of copyright paranoia. I have heard of no complaint from the United
Nations about it, and I'm sure that an understanding could be reached if
they did complain. The concern of governmental or quasi-governmental
bodies about the republication of such documents has nothing to do with
the loss of revenue, but with a belief that they might be reproduced
inaccurately.
Going out of our way to ensure that downstream users will be able to
copy this material is ultimately an untenable position. People must
accept responsibility for their own actions. We do well to warn them of
possible problems, but we should have no obligation to hold their hands
in the way that we would hold those of a child. We can say that we have
reasonable and supportable grounds for saying that a given document is
in the public domain, or that it is covered by fair use (or dealing) in
the server jurisdiction, and that we cannot vouch for its legal status
in some other jurisdiction. In saying this I make a specific statement
that I do not consider public interest alone to be grounds for
publishing most documents.
Too little attention has been paid to the perils of Wikipedia's success,
a success that has also dragged the rest of the projects along with it.
Protecting the Foundation from legal liability is a fine ideal, but the
tone of that protection has changed in the 4+ years that I have
participated. An operation with a $1,000,000 annual hardware budget is
not the same as one with a $10,000 annual hardware budget. The
willingness to take risks is replaced by the fear that we really could
lose something, and that stiffles innovation. The corporate world often
protects itself through a series of corporate structures that would have
the effect of creating firewalls between divisions to protect the others
from collateral damage when any one of them runs into trouble. Perhaps
it's something the Foundation should be thinking about.
I think new languages should be supported if they seem
likely to suceed establishing an active community.
Before we can judge that or set up any guidelines we
really need more information. I would very much like
to take the first step in this. Which I believe is
analizing what has worked or not in the past. But
right now some of the stats pages are months old and
Wikisource has none at all for individual languages.
I don't know that the information I can get from any
updated stats would really tell what makes a community
sucessfull. However it should allow us to see what
communities have a certain level of activity. Then I
think we should ask people from various communities to
fill out a survey about the beginings of their
community and maybe we can find some indicators we can
use to answer your points.
I don't know that a survey will accomplish anything. I still think that
dividing Wikisource into separate language communities was a big
mistake; that's the one issue that most influenced me to drift away from
it and back to where most of my time is now spent dealing with Wiktionary.
The leader in a project, as you now appear to be in Wikisource, needs
vision. That person needs an instinct to recognize what would divert
the project into unproductive paths. Of course, it takes great skill to
shape an army of dilletentes into a productive force.
Formats can be a big time waster. Some people are obsessed with the
sense of order that clearly defined formats can bring into a project.
For them having the world well ordered brings them a sense of
professionalism, forgetting at the same time that we are all amateurs
here. For the most part that really doesn't matter. The substantive
content and information are what matter; a format is nothing more than a
tool for making that information more accessible. If the format fails
in that mission it's not much good.
Ec