On Tue, Jun 17, 2014 at 11:12 AM, George Herbert <george.herbert(a)gmail.com>
wrote:
On Tue, Jun 17, 2014 at 8:58 AM, Pete Forsyth
<peteforsyth(a)gmail.com>
wrote:
Can you clarify -- who do you intend by "we"? If your answer is "English
Wikipedia," I think we already have a somewhat workable solution to this
complex problem: fair use is permitted in certain cases.[2] Of course,
you
probably mean something broader. But the solution
English Wikipedia has
chosen is available, by virtue of a WMF resolution,[3] to every Wikimedia
project. So if fair use is the issue, why not simply propose permitting
it
at specific local projects?
The whole point of Commons is to serve as a central repository of shared
images for Projects to use together.
I think if we're going to talk about the *whole* point of Commons, we
should look back at the original proposal for its establishment, which
clearly identified it as a place for *freely licensed* works:
http://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikipedia-l/2004-March/014885.html
The same image on en.wikipedia and
ru.wikipedia and es.wikipedia and the dictionaries and books and travel
and...
But en.wikipedia and ru.wikipedia and es.wikipedia have different standards
about whether a non-free file can be used. So, does a shared repository for
non-free files really make sense, considering that most projects prohibit
them outright, and those few that do permit them only permit them under
very narrow and unique circumstances?
The failure of Commons
The failure of Commons? You consider the most extensive project created in
the Wikimedia movement a failure? On what grounds?
I have no problem with Commons
remaining as-is if we have an alternate
lowest-common-denominator image
repo that will automatically be searched for images as Commons is now.
"Fair use" law in the U.S. is pretty tightly tied to the way something is
used; so the very act of publishing something *outside* of a use context
would, by its very nature, strain at the limits of the fair use provision.
And English Wikipedia's standards are actually much tighter than those of
the U.S. law in that regard.
-Pete