Here's a first crack at revised attribution language. When the language is completely finalized, I'll send a separate note explaining some of our reasoning for this general approach in more detail. In the meantime, I'd appreciate it if you could point out any bugs in this specific language, given its intent which should be self-evident. To keep the discussion focused, please read it from the perspective of a "from scratch" attribution model, i.e., imagine that a new encyclopedia wiki that you'd contribute to had these terms. Which problems would they cause? Are there specific third party uses that would be significantly hampered by these terms?
Thanks for any constructive feedback, Erik
Attribution: To re-distribute an article page in any form, provide credit to the authors either by, at your choice, including a) a link (URL) to the article or articles you are re-using, b) a link to an alternative online copy which is freely accessible and conforms with the license and includes a list a list of all authors, or c) such a list of all authors. (Any list of authors may be filtered to exclude very small or irrelevant contributions.) Rich media (images, sound, video, etc.) that are the result of substantive collaborations between at least five people can be credited in the same fashion, but must otherwise be attributed in the manner specified by the uploader. These attribution requirements apply to content developed and uploaded by the Wikimedia community. Text and rich media contributions that come from external sources may attach additional attribution requirements to the work, which we will strive to indicate clearly to you on the article or the description page for the file(s) in question.
Erik Moeller wrote:
b) a link to an alternative online copy which is freely accessible and conforms with the license and includes a list a list of all authors,
What is the purpose of the wording "and includes a list a list of all authors," ?
Doesn't that preclude people from applying the same understanding of what "reasonable" attribution is, that the text seems to require of wikimedia itself (I am not commenting on whether it is reasonable at this point, just on the fact that you seem to with this wording be requiring a full list of all authors in addition to linking in the same form you would link to wikimedia.
I could understand that this would make people prefer to link to wikipedia rather than a site for which you are claiming a more strong attribution form would be required. But I am unclear on what the thinking is behind this, so perhaps not best to speculate. Can you clarify?
To me philosophically (I will need to think about the ramifications more deeply before I can offer even a thoughtful layman's opinion on the matter), it seems to at the very least go against the spirit of the "share-alike" part of the license.
Yours,
Jussi-Ville Heiskanen
2009/3/10 Jussi-Ville Heiskanen cimonavaro@gmail.com:
Erik Moeller wrote:
b) a link to an alternative online copy which is freely accessible and conforms with the license and includes a list a list of all authors,
What is the purpose of the wording "and includes a list a list of all authors," ?
b) in the attribution language is essentially intended to refer to any alternative online copy that has all the same key characteristics as Wikipedia. Wikipedia includes a list of all authors (through its page history), so any alternative online copy that we accept as a link target should also do so. I'm not suggesting that they need to list the authors in a different format - is the wording unclear here?
Erik Moeller wrote:
2009/3/10 Jussi-Ville Heiskanen cimonavaro@gmail.com:
Erik Moeller wrote:
b) a link to an alternative online copy which is freely accessible and conforms with the license and includes a list a list of all authors,
What is the purpose of the wording "and includes a list a list of all authors," ?
b) in the attribution language is essentially intended to refer to any alternative online copy that has all the same key characteristics as Wikipedia. Wikipedia includes a list of all authors (through its page history), so any alternative online copy that we accept as a link target should also do so. I'm not suggesting that they need to list the authors in a different format - is the wording unclear here?
Clear as mud. :-D
1. If the suggestion is to imply that the simplest way to be sure to conform with the license is to list all authors, the phrase is semi-redundant, when connected that way, with the word "and". To be clear in that case, it should be put:
<quote> b) a link to an alternative online copy which is freely accessible in a stable form which conforms with the license. This is easiest done by including a list of all authors, </quote>
(I added that "in a stable form" because I think it is useful) That way it is clear that listing the authors is a means of conforming with the license in the most easy and clear form, rather than doing some extra hurdle beyond that. But then the question comes clear - what is the point of linking to an alternative online copy, if you are going to give the full list of authors anyway? What are the key characteristics in wikipedia beyond the attribution information, that reside in the online copy, that you would have the reusers point their readers at?
2. If your intent is to say that an online copy that conforms with the license would list the authors (as being the simplest case), I would suggest a clearer phrasing on the lines of:
<quote> b) a link to an alternative online copy which is freely accessible in a stable form which conforms with the license. A conformant copy would give correct attribution to the authors, which is simplest done by listing all the authors. </quote>
(By the way, this would be my much preferred legalese form of expressing what is right, purely personally.)
3. If the intent is to maintain a stipulation that conforming to the license can be done by satisfying a significantly lower threshold than supplying the authors, but since we are doing that "more onerous route", every other sad site should do the same; well I simply disagree, and that phrasing merely reads petulant and doesn't even get the point across.
Yours,
Jussi-Ville Heiskanen
2009/3/11 Jussi-Ville Heiskanen cimonavaro@gmail.com:
- If the intent is to maintain a stipulation that conforming
to the license can be done by satisfying a significantly lower threshold than supplying the authors, but since we are doing that "more onerous route", every other sad site should do the same; well I simply disagree, and that phrasing merely reads petulant and doesn't even get the point across.
I'm not sure we're understanding each other, still.
The point of the provision is to ensure that attribution by link always happens by linking to a copy that actually gives authorship information. In most cases that will be our website, but the attribution requirements should allow for independent mirrors and forks.
I've reworded it slightly: "b) a hyperlink (where possible) or URL to an alternative, stable online copy which is freely accessible, which conforms with the license, and which provides credit to the authors in a manner equivalent to the credit given on this website"
2009/3/13 Erik Moeller erik@wikimedia.org:
The point of the provision is to ensure that attribution by link always happens by linking to a copy that actually gives authorship information.
It is vitally important that that be the case, otherwise you could have two mirrors each linking to each other with neither listing the authors, which is not "attribution" is any meaningful sense of the word. I don't under Jussi-Ville's objections - there must be a misunderstand somewhere.
Thomas Dalton wrote:
2009/3/13 Erik Moeller erik@wikimedia.org:
The point of the provision is to ensure that attribution by link always happens by linking to a copy that actually gives authorship information.
It is vitally important that that be the case, otherwise you could have two mirrors each linking to each other with neither listing the authors, which is not "attribution" is any meaningful sense of the word. I don't under Jussi-Ville's objections - there must be a misunderstand somewhere.
I think you fail at logic.
You could not have two mirrors linking to each others with neither listing the authors, if the first one to mirror was compliant with the CC-BY-SA. Posit the first mirror complied with and required compliance of that license. It would have to attribute in a reasonable form and require attribution in a reasonable form from those taking content from it. If the site copying from it, did not attribute in a reasonable form, it could in no way be considered compliant. Logic 101.
Yours,
Jussi-Ville Heiskanen
2009/3/14 Jussi-Ville Heiskanen
I think you fail at logic.
You could not have two mirrors linking to each others with neither listing the authors, if the first one to mirror was compliant with the CC-BY-SA. Posit the first mirror complied with and required compliance of that license. It would have to attribute in a reasonable form and require attribution in a reasonable form from those taking content from it. If the site copying from it, did not attribute in a reasonable form, it could in no way be considered compliant. Logic 101.
I think you misunderstand what we're discussing here. We're talking about what forms of attribution are acceptable for people using our content under CC-BY-SA. We're saying that attribution by URL is acceptable for people using the content under CC-BY-SA.
Thomas Dalton wrote:
I think you misunderstand what we're discussing here. We're talking about what forms of attribution are acceptable for people using our content under CC-BY-SA. We're saying that attribution by URL is acceptable for people using the content under CC-BY-SA.
Well, yes, but the URL would have to be to the history of the article. Currently the wording suggests otherwise; which is just too bad.
The attribution information won't be found if the URL points to a wikipedia article, rather than its history. Thus pointing the URL at the article would be no attribution at all.
And similarly if a reuser is pointing to an article that is only pointing to the history by url, rather than being the history itself inline with the article, that of course won't be attribution at all.
However the text currently says it is okay to link to a wikipedia article, even though the article itself does not contain the attribution.
At least that is how I read it. And yes, I *do* think that is inconsistent.
And for that matter, we can say anything we like, but it won't change the license itself.
Yours,
Jussi-Ville Heiskanen
Thomas Dalton wrote:
I think you misunderstand what we're discussing here. We're talking about what forms of attribution are acceptable for people using our content under CC-BY-SA. We're saying that attribution by URL is acceptable for people using the content under CC-BY-SA.
But who says it's "our" content? Maybe another wiki wrote articles about every Ukrainian action hero or all butterfly species in Zambia, under CC-BY-SA, and we imported articles from there into Wikipedia. And then someone mirrors Wikipedia. Why should that mirror get away with just crediting Wikipedia's URL for each article?
And what if this mirror site is another wiki (such as Wookieepedia) that also creates new content and gets mirrored? Why should the next mirror not get away with just crediting Wookieepedia's URL for each article?
Jussi-Ville used the analogy with books (the content) and libraries (the websites, or what I previously called the space between the copies [1]). Mirrors are copying the books. But is Wikipedia's website (as opposed to its content) really a book, or is it just another library?
[1] http://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/foundation-l/2009-March/050824.html
On Fri, Mar 13, 2009 at 7:23 PM, Erik Moeller erik@wikimedia.org wrote:
I've reworded it slightly: "b) a hyperlink (where possible) or URL to an alternative, stable online copy which is freely accessible, which conforms with the license, and which provides credit to the authors in a manner equivalent to the credit given on this website"
Now "c) such a list of all authors" doesn't make sense.
2009/3/13 Anthony wikimail@inbox.org:
On Fri, Mar 13, 2009 at 7:23 PM, Erik Moeller erik@wikimedia.org wrote:
I've reworded it slightly: "b) a hyperlink (where possible) or URL to an alternative, stable online copy which is freely accessible, which conforms with the license, and which provides credit to the authors in a manner equivalent to the credit given on this website"
Now "c) such a list of all authors" doesn't make sense.
Thanks; I've removed the word "such" to clarify.
Erik Moeller wrote:
2009/3/11 Jussi-Ville Heiskanen cimonavaro@gmail.com:
- If the intent is to maintain a stipulation that conforming
to the license can be done by satisfying a significantly lower threshold than supplying the authors, but since we are doing that "more onerous route", every other sad site should do the same; well I simply disagree, and that phrasing merely reads petulant and doesn't even get the point across.
I'm not sure we're understanding each other, still.
The point of the provision is to ensure that attribution by link always happens by linking to a copy that actually gives authorship information. In most cases that will be our website, but the attribution requirements should allow for independent mirrors and forks.
I've reworded it slightly: "b) a hyperlink (where possible) or URL to an alternative, stable online copy which is freely accessible, which conforms with the license, and which provides credit to the authors in a manner equivalent to the credit given on this website"
There is certainly nothing in that reworded phrasing that could prove to be an active nuisance to us, or for that matter anyone, beyond perhaps that last dangling redundant clause making the WMF look a bit amateurish, which is of course no problem for us, given our history. ;-)
The worst that wording can cause anyone is making some competent lawyer retch at the work the word "equivalent" is being made to carry. :-D
Yours,
Jussi-Ville Heiskanen
Erik Moeller wrote:
2009/3/11 Jussi-Ville Heiskanen cimonavaro@gmail.com:
- If the intent is to maintain a stipulation that conforming
to the license can be done by satisfying a significantly lower threshold than supplying the authors, but since we are doing that "more onerous route", every other sad site should do the same; well I simply disagree, and that phrasing merely reads petulant and doesn't even get the point across.
I'm not sure we're understanding each other, still.
The point of the provision is to ensure that attribution by link always happens by linking to a copy that actually gives authorship information. In most cases that will be our website, but the attribution requirements should allow for independent mirrors and forks.
I've reworded it slightly: "b) a hyperlink (where possible) or URL to an alternative, stable online copy which is freely accessible, which conforms with the license, and which provides credit to the authors in a manner equivalent to the credit given on this website"
First, allow me to apologize if my first reply was a bit flip and perhaps not useful in tracking down where our source of differing viewpoint lies.
Any Wikimedia hosting website will never be a "copy" in the sense of you being able to link to it to satisfy the intent of the CC-BY-SA license. (Much as a library is not a book.) And if it were a possibility to mislead our reusers to think that were actually the case, that would be a very bad thing indeed.
The only thing *on* wikimedia websites that does satisfy that currently is the history of articles; a direct link into the history is sadly the only option available. I think it is way cool that people are thinking of innovative ways of formatting that information (in ways that would for instance cut out the often inflammatory edit summaries), but that is for the future.
It would be astonishingly brash to expect that content that is CC-BY-SA would in most cases be attributed to their rightful authors via our site. I am frankly surprised you even raise the notion. Share Alike means that Wikimedia isn't privileged in any shape or form in the chain of copyleft. If I can ask of anything, I ask you please not to try to break that chain.
Yours,
Jussi-Ville Heiskanen
2009/3/14 Jussi-Ville Heiskanen cimonavaro@gmail.com:
The only thing *on* wikimedia websites that does satisfy that currently is the history of articles; a direct link into the history is sadly the only option available. I think it is way cool that people are thinking of innovative ways of formatting that information (in ways that would for instance cut out the often inflammatory edit summaries), but that is for the future.
Here's an idea: nice URLs for the history. So we don't end up with stupid things peppered with ? and & and = printed on mugs, travel guides, etc.
e.g. http://en.wikipedia.org/history/Xenu for the history of http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Xenu .
Something to point at for CC-by-sa attribution is an actual reason to put this into MediaWiki.
cc to wikitech-l - is this something suitable for Wikimedia use? Shall I file an enhancement bug?
See also: https://bugzilla.wikimedia.org/show_bug.cgi?id=1450 .
- d.
2009/3/14 David Gerard dgerard@gmail.com:
2009/3/14 Jussi-Ville Heiskanen cimonavaro@gmail.com:
The only thing *on* wikimedia websites that does satisfy that currently is the history of articles; a direct link into the history is sadly the only option available. I think it is way cool that people are thinking of innovative ways of formatting that information (in ways that would for instance cut out the often inflammatory edit summaries), but that is for the future.
Here's an idea: nice URLs for the history. So we don't end up with stupid things peppered with ? and & and = printed on mugs, travel guides, etc.
If the people producing the mugs want that they are free to produce a version of the history on their servers or more legally more solid include a sheet of paper with a complete list of authors with the mug.
2009/3/14 geni geniice@gmail.com:
2009/3/14 David Gerard dgerard@gmail.com:
Here's an idea: nice URLs for the history. So we don't end up with stupid things peppered with ? and & and = printed on mugs, travel guides, etc.
If the people producing the mugs want that they are free to produce a version of the history on their servers or more legally more solid include a sheet of paper with a complete list of authors with the mug.
That's true. OTOH, non-pukey history URLs would be good to have anyway.
- d.
2009/3/14 David Gerard dgerard@gmail.com:
2009/3/14 geni geniice@gmail.com:
2009/3/14 David Gerard dgerard@gmail.com:
Here's an idea: nice URLs for the history. So we don't end up with stupid things peppered with ? and & and = printed on mugs, travel guides, etc.
If the people producing the mugs want that they are free to produce a version of the history on their servers or more legally more solid include a sheet of paper with a complete list of authors with the mug.
That's true. OTOH, non-pukey history URLs would be good to have anyway.
I figure a regular URL which will survive speech is a good thing. The best way to compliance is to make it really easy.
Bug filed: https://bugzilla.wikimedia.org/show_bug.cgi?id=17981
- d.
geni wrote:
2009/3/14 David Gerard dgerard@gmail.com:
Here's an idea: nice URLs for the history. So we don't end up with stupid things peppered with ? and & and = printed on mugs, travel guides, etc.
If the people producing the mugs want that they are free to produce a version of the history on their servers or more legally more solid include a sheet of paper with a complete list of authors with the mug.
It's hard to know who's being serious here.
Ec
On Sat, Mar 14, 2009 at 3:39 PM, Ray Saintonge saintonge@telus.net wrote:
If the people producing the mugs want that they are free to produce a version of the history on their servers or more legally more solid include a sheet of paper with a complete list of authors with the mug.
It's hard to know who's being serious here.
Indeed, would I be violating the GFDL if I open the box, throw away the paper, but keep the mug...
On Sat, Mar 14, 2009 at 2:13 PM, Magnus Manske magnusmanske@googlemail.com wrote:
What might /really/ be cool would be http://en.wikipedia.org/authors/Xenu
This would still give the wrong data if the page has been moved to [[Xenu (Scientology)]] and the [[Xenu (disambiguation)]] is moved to [[Xenu]], which isn't a totally unreasonable outcome.
You'd have to use something like: http://en.wikipedia.org/authors/46634 as an alias for: http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?curid=46634&action=history
or have it forward to something like this better yet if it can be tweaked to accept a `page_id` parameter instead of a title (ideally made part of the software proper): http://toolserver.org/~daniel/WikiSense/Contributors.php?wikilang=en&wik...
or even http://en.wikipedia.org/main_authors/Xenu filtering out minor contribs and IPs...
Would this rely on the `rev_minor_edit` field or something more sophisticated? I see too many false positives and negatives to this approach, but I guess that's somebody else's problem?
—C.W.
2009/3/15 Charlotte Webb charlottethewebb@gmail.com:
This would still give the wrong data if the page has been moved to [[Xenu (Scientology)]] and the [[Xenu (disambiguation)]] is moved to [[Xenu]], which isn't a totally unreasonable outcome. You'd have to use something like: http://en.wikipedia.org/authors/46634 as an alias for: http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?curid=46634&action=history or have it forward to something like this better yet if it can be tweaked to accept a `page_id` parameter instead of a title (ideally made part of the software proper): http://toolserver.org/~daniel/WikiSense/Contributors.php?wikilang=en&wik...
Would this mean the vicious lunatic arsehole contributor (note I don't say "hypothetical" there, there are quite enough real-world examples of unbalanced nutters out to nail us on anything) who takes the mug-maker to court would win, or lose? To what extent? If the link was correct at the time, they could point to having followed the Wikimedia FAQ on the subject and completely demonstrate a good-faith attempt to keep to the license per wording and guidelines?
This is what "law is squishy" means. It's not sane or reasonable to require that the Foundation's guidelines specify only actions that would be mathematically provably robust in all possible circumstances for an indefinite time into the future; in civil litigation, as any such suit would be, one does in fact get a lot of points for doing the reasonable thing to the best of one's abilities.
- d.
- d.
2009/3/15 David Gerard dgerard@gmail.com:
Would this mean the vicious lunatic arsehole contributor (note I don't say "hypothetical" there, there are quite enough real-world examples of unbalanced nutters out to nail us on anything) who takes the mug-maker to court would win, or lose? To what extent? If the link was correct at the time, they could point to having followed the Wikimedia FAQ on the subject and completely demonstrate a good-faith attempt to keep to the license per wording and guidelines?
Wikimedia is not a party to the license therefor it's FAQ is of no relevance. The answer again goes to the license text. "You must...keep intact all copyright notices for the Work and provide ,reasonable to the medium or means You are utilizing: (i) the name of the Original Author". The mug maker could lose the case on the grounds that the license made it clear that it is the person who is doing the reuse who has to provide the credit and attempting to do it via third parties is not legitimate.
This is what "law is squishy" means. It's not sane or reasonable to require that the Foundation's guidelines specify only actions that would be mathematically provably robust in all possible circumstances for an indefinite time into the future; in civil litigation, as any such suit would be, one does in fact get a lot of points for doing the reasonable thing to the best of one's abilities.
However any guidelines the foundation uses must be as robust as possible otherwise rather than being a significant part of the free content movement wikipedia ends up as the copyright equivalent of a radioactive mess no sane person would touch.
2009/3/15 geni geniice@gmail.com:
Wikimedia is not a party to the license therefor it's FAQ is of no relevance. The answer again goes to the license text. "You must...keep intact all copyright notices for the Work and provide ,reasonable to the medium or means You are utilizing: (i) the name of the Original Author". The mug maker could lose the case on the grounds that the license made it clear that it is the person who is doing the reuse who has to provide the credit and attempting to do it via third parties is not legitimate. However any guidelines the foundation uses must be as robust as possible otherwise rather than being a significant part of the free content movement wikipedia ends up as the copyright equivalent of a radioactive mess no sane person would touch.
Good thing we're not using an impossible-to-obey licence like the GFDL, then.
- d.
2009/3/15 Charlotte Webb charlottethewebb@gmail.com:
On Sat, Mar 14, 2009 at 3:39 PM, Ray Saintonge saintonge@telus.net wrote:
If the people producing the mugs want that they are free to produce a version of the history on their servers or more legally more solid include a sheet of paper with a complete list of authors with the mug.
It's hard to know who's being serious here.
Indeed, would I be violating the GFDL if I open the box, throw away the paper, but keep the mug...
No. Only if you then give the mug to someone else, make copies and give those to someone else or err publicly perform the mug.
geni wrote:
2009/3/15 Charlotte Webb :
On Sat, Mar 14, 2009 at 3:39 PM, Ray Saintonge wrote:
If the people producing the mugs want that they are free to produce a version of the history on their servers or more legally more solid include a sheet of paper with a complete list of authors with the mug.
It's hard to know who's being serious here.
Indeed, would I be violating the GFDL if I open the box, throw away the paper, but keep the mug...
No. Only if you then give the mug to someone else, make copies and give those to someone else or err publicly perform the mug.
So, if I want to give to give a mug with an erotic description of the Kama Sutra to my girl friend, I also need to give her this list of authors. Are there really people here who would be so law-abiding that they would threaten their love-life with that kind of anti-climax?
Ec
Ray Saintonge wrote:
geni wrote:
2009/3/15 Charlotte Webb :
On Sat, Mar 14, 2009 at 3:39 PM, Ray Saintonge wrote:
If the people producing the mugs want that they are free to produce a version of the history on their servers or more legally more solid include a sheet of paper with a complete list of authors with the mug.
It's hard to know who's being serious here.
Indeed, would I be violating the GFDL if I open the box, throw away the paper, but keep the mug...
No. Only if you then give the mug to someone else, make copies and give those to someone else or err publicly perform the mug.
So, if I want to give to give a mug with an erotic description of the Kama Sutra to my girl friend, I also need to give her this list of authors. Are there really people here who would be so law-abiding that they would threaten their love-life with that kind of anti-climax?
Print the list on the base of the mug in a 2 pt font; satisfies the requirements, and doesn't compromise whatever effect you wish to achieve by the gift. Although, if such a gift could "threaten a love-life", either I've missed your satirical intent, or something else needs attention.
2009/3/16 Ray Saintonge saintonge@telus.net:
So, if I want to give to give a mug with an erotic description of the Kama Sutra to my girl friend, I also need to give her this list of authors. Are there really people here who would be so law-abiding that they would threaten their love-life with that kind of anti-climax?
Ec
I understand there was a time when the mixtape was part of some western courtship rituals. So expecting people to follow any license terms in that area is probably a lost cause. On the other hand looking at how much packaging even a mug can come with these days an extra sheet of paper would be unremarkable.
2009/3/16 Ray Saintonge saintonge@telus.net:
So, if I want to give to give a mug with an erotic description of the Kama Sutra to my girl friend, I also need to give her this list of authors. Are there really people here who would be so law-abiding that they would threaten their love-life with that kind of anti-climax?
I think that can be resolved by invoking the rule: "It's only illegal if you get caught." It's completely inconceivable that the copyright holder(s) would find out about your private gift to your girlfriend (unless she tried to sell it after a messy breakup, perhaps...), so you are really only answerable to your conscience.
David Gerard wrote:
2009/3/14 Jussi-Ville Heiskanen cimonavaro@gmail.com:
The only thing *on* wikimedia websites that does satisfy that currently is the history of articles; a direct link into the history is sadly the only option available. I think it is way cool that people are thinking of innovative ways of formatting that information (in ways that would for instance cut out the often inflammatory edit summaries), but that is for the future.
Here's an idea: nice URLs for the history. So we don't end up with stupid things peppered with ? and & and = printed on mugs, travel guides, etc.
e.g. http://en.wikipedia.org/history/Xenu for the history of http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Xenu .
Something to point at for CC-by-sa attribution is an actual reason to put this into MediaWiki.
cc to wikitech-l - is this something suitable for Wikimedia use? Shall I file an enhancement bug?
See also: https://bugzilla.wikimedia.org/show_bug.cgi?id=1450 .
Hehe, I am way ahead of you, brother.
I've already sort of put the idea out there, discreetly, that it would be cool if there was a url redirection service on wikimedia servers, that would shorten the urls into something like http://wmattr/342y6 or the like (perhaps even http://wpattr/342y6 ; http://wsattr/342y6 ; http://wnattr/342y6 and the like. Of course it would be better if it would direct (in the future at least) to a stripped history without the summaries.
Yours,
Jussi-Ville Heiskanen
2009/3/15 Jussi-Ville Heiskanen cimonavaro@gmail.com:
Hehe, I am way ahead of you, brother.
I've already sort of put the idea out there, discreetly, that it would be cool if there was a url redirection service on wikimedia servers, that would shorten the urls into something like http://wmattr/342y6 or the like (perhaps even http://wpattr/342y6 ; http://wsattr/342y6 ; http://wnattr/342y6 and the like. Of course it would be better if it would direct (in the future at least) to a stripped history without the summaries.
Presumably you mean to have a ".org" in there?
I think the summaries are necessary, though - they are where we put details of where non-original content has come from. You can't just attribute the content you are reusing to the appropriate Wikimedians, you need to attribute it to the actual creators.
Thomas Dalton wrote:
2009/3/15 Jussi-Ville Heiskanen cimonavaro@gmail.com:
Hehe, I am way ahead of you, brother.
I've already sort of put the idea out there, discreetly, that it would be cool if there was a url redirection service on wikimedia servers, that would shorten the urls into something like http://wmattr/342y6 or the like (perhaps even http://wpattr/342y6 ; http://wsattr/342y6 ; http://wnattr/342y6 and the like. Of course it would be better if it would direct (in the future at least) to a stripped history without the summaries.
Presumably you mean to have a ".org" in there?
I think the summaries are necessary, though - they are where we put details of where non-original content has come from. You can't just attribute the content you are reusing to the appropriate Wikimedians, you need to attribute it to the actual creators.
I think the practice of using summary lines for attribution has from the start been viewed as a temporary solution, only to be used until we figure out a better way to handle content such as translations from other language projects.
I think if we do go towards creating an easy link which contains a list of editors culled from history with no duplicates, it might include a method of externally adding attributions into that plain text form, for just such translations and imported content from other sites, where the content may even have a large list of authors itself.
When and if that eventually materializes (next year in Jerusalem; yearning for Zion; by and by, lord; when the lion shall lie down with the lamb - insert your own religious affiliations allusion to the eternal return here) naturally the summaries should be purged and the attributions temporarily lodged there given their proper place. I could even imagine some semi-automated method that would while stripping off the summaries, simultaneously scrape off the urls and wikilinks in them and for good measure append them to the list of editors.
Yours,
Jussi-Ville Heiskanen
2009/3/15 Jussi-Ville Heiskanen cimonavaro@gmail.com:
I think the practice of using summary lines for attribution has from the start been viewed as a temporary solution, only to be used until we figure out a better way to handle content such as translations from other language projects.
I think if we do go towards creating an easy link which contains a list of editors culled from history with no duplicates, it might include a method of externally adding attributions into that plain text form, for just such translations and imported content from other sites, where the content may even have a large list of authors itself.
That would be great, if it can be made to work.
When and if that eventually materializes (next year in Jerusalem; yearning for Zion; by and by, lord; when the lion shall lie down with the lamb - insert your own religious affiliations allusion to the eternal return here) naturally the summaries should be purged and the attributions temporarily lodged there given their proper place. I could even imagine some semi-automated method that would while stripping off the summaries, simultaneously scrape off the urls and wikilinks in them and for good measure append them to the list of editors.
Unfortunately there is no standard way of writing attribution edit summaries, so automation is going to be difficult. Semi-automation, as you say, might be possible for those summaries that include links (a person would need to determine if they are attributions, but that's easy enough - a couple of seconds a summary with a decent number of people helping out could get it done is a reasonable amount of time), but what about content taken from offline sources? Probably extremely rare, but can we risk failing to correctly attribute even one or two sources?
On Tue, Mar 10, 2009 at 10:41 PM, Erik Moeller erik@wikimedia.org wrote:
Rich media (images, sound, video, etc.) that are the result of substantive collaborations between at least five people can be credited in the same fashion, but must otherwise be attributed in the manner specified by the uploader.
This is unclear. "but must otherwise" can be read to apply only to rich media that are 5+ collaborations and for which a reuser chooses not to use the above "same fashion" author list. But I assume "attributed in the manner specified by the uploader" ought to apply both in the 5+ cases where a "same fashion" list is not used and in all cases with rich media made by 4 or fewer people.
-Sage
2009/3/10 Sage Ross ragesoss+wikipedia@gmail.com:
This is unclear. "but must otherwise" can be read to apply only to rich media that are 5+ collaborations and for which a reuser chooses not to use the above "same fashion" author list. But I assume "attributed in the manner specified by the uploader" ought to apply both in the 5+ cases where a "same fashion" list is not used and in all cases with rich media made by 4 or fewer people.
I've revised it in: http://meta.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?title=Licensing_update&oldid=14221...
Essentially, I'm looking for a wording that applies roughly the same standards to text and multimedia, while recognizing that most multimedia works we have today are single-author works. The idea is that if you're talking about a true collaboration between multiple authors, you could attribute it in the same way in which you would attribute a Wikipedia article (by linking to the source), whereas if it's essentially the work of one or very few authors, you have to name them.
I'm not really clear on what a link is. You specify it as a URL, but a URL alone does not constitute a link. A link is the rendering of this code:
<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Main_Page">label</a>
But the proposed attribution guideline says absolutely nothing about what the link label should be, and only specifies the href component of the link.
On Tue, Mar 10, 2009 at 8:41 PM, Erik Moeller erik@wikimedia.org wrote:
Here's a first crack at revised attribution language. When the language is completely finalized, I'll send a separate note explaining some of our reasoning for this general approach in more detail. In the meantime, I'd appreciate it if you could point out any bugs in this specific language, given its intent which should be self-evident. To keep the discussion focused, please read it from the perspective of a "from scratch" attribution model, i.e., imagine that a new encyclopedia wiki that you'd contribute to had these terms. Which problems would they cause? Are there specific third party uses that would be significantly hampered by these terms?
Thanks for any constructive feedback, Erik
Attribution: To re-distribute an article page in any form, provide credit to the authors either by, at your choice, including a) a link (URL) to the article or articles you are re-using, b) a link to an alternative online copy which is freely accessible and conforms with the license and includes a list a list of all authors, or c) such a list of all authors. (Any list of authors may be filtered to exclude very small or irrelevant contributions.) Rich media (images, sound, video, etc.) that are the result of substantive collaborations between at least five people can be credited in the same fashion, but must otherwise be attributed in the manner specified by the uploader. These attribution requirements apply to content developed and uploaded by the Wikimedia community. Text and rich media contributions that come from external sources may attach additional attribution requirements to the work, which we will strive to indicate clearly to you on the article or the description page for the file(s) in question.
-- Erik Möller Deputy Director, Wikimedia Foundation
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Whilst I concur that we need to address more of the specifics, I would disagree that the proposal should incorporate rigidity about the link text itself. There are various contexts which this will potentially accompany, and I cannot imagine that there is a one-size-fits-all link title.
- Chris
On Wed, Mar 11, 2009 at 5:03 AM, Brian Brian.Mingus@colorado.edu wrote:
I'm not really clear on what a link is. You specify it as a URL, but a URL alone does not constitute a link. A link is the rendering of this code:
<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Main_Page">label</a>
But the proposed attribution guideline says absolutely nothing about what the link label should be, and only specifies the href component of the link.
On Tue, Mar 10, 2009 at 8:41 PM, Erik Moeller erik@wikimedia.org wrote:
Here's a first crack at revised attribution language. When the language is completely finalized, I'll send a separate note explaining some of our reasoning for this general approach in more detail. In the meantime, I'd appreciate it if you could point out any bugs in this specific language, given its intent which should be self-evident. To keep the discussion focused, please read it from the perspective of a "from scratch" attribution model, i.e., imagine that a new encyclopedia wiki that you'd contribute to had these terms. Which problems would they cause? Are there specific third party uses that would be significantly hampered by these terms?
Thanks for any constructive feedback, Erik
Attribution: To re-distribute an article page in any form, provide credit to the authors either by, at your choice, including a) a link (URL) to the article or articles you are re-using, b) a link to an alternative online copy which is freely accessible and conforms with the license and includes a list a list of all authors, or c) such a list of all authors. (Any list of authors may be filtered to exclude very small or irrelevant contributions.) Rich media (images, sound, video, etc.) that are the result of substantive collaborations between at least five people can be credited in the same fashion, but must otherwise be attributed in the manner specified by the uploader. These attribution requirements apply to content developed and uploaded by the Wikimedia community. Text and rich media contributions that come from external sources may attach additional attribution requirements to the work, which we will strive to indicate clearly to you on the article or the description page for the file(s) in question.
-- Erik Möller Deputy Director, Wikimedia Foundation
Support Free Knowledge: http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Donate
foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
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If there are no specifics instructions as to what a link is except that it contains the correct url then I can argue that this is sufficient attribution:
<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Some Article" rel="nofollow">source</a>
This is not the kind of attribution I have in mind.
On Tue, Mar 10, 2009 at 11:09 PM, Chris Down neuro.wikipedia@googlemail.com wrote:
Whilst I concur that we need to address more of the specifics, I would disagree that the proposal should incorporate rigidity about the link text itself. There are various contexts which this will potentially accompany, and I cannot imagine that there is a one-size-fits-all link title.
- Chris
On
That is not the kind of attribution that I have in mind, either. I think what we need are guidelines as to what links should or should not be saying, but we need to make it so that people can style it in a manner appropriate for the work they are using it in.
- Chris
On Wed, Mar 11, 2009 at 5:27 AM, Brian Brian.Mingus@colorado.edu wrote:
If there are no specifics instructions as to what a link is except that it contains the correct url then I can argue that this is sufficient attribution:
<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Some Article" rel="nofollow">source</a>
This is not the kind of attribution I have in mind.
On Tue, Mar 10, 2009 at 11:09 PM, Chris Down neuro.wikipedia@googlemail.com wrote:
Whilst I concur that we need to address more of the specifics, I would disagree that the proposal should incorporate rigidity about the link
text
itself. There are various contexts which this will potentially accompany, and I cannot imagine that there is a one-size-fits-all link title.
- Chris
On
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On Wed, Mar 11, 2009 at 6:03 AM, Brian Brian.Mingus@colorado.edu wrote:
I'm not really clear on what a link is. You specify it as a URL, but a URL alone does not constitute a link. A link is the rendering of this code:
<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Main_Page">label</a>
But the proposed attribution guideline says absolutely nothing about what the link label should be, and only specifies the href component of the link.
This definition would exclude any offline "linking"... Rigid definitions of link texts might lead to confusion in case of a non-English version of this attribution requirement. (Should the link text be always in English; if the translation has a typoor worse a translation error in it, should it be rigidly followed by reusers for whom the link text would have no real meaning).
Regards, Bence Damokos
Brian wrote:
I'm not really clear on what a link is. You specify it as a URL, but a URL alone does not constitute a link. A link is the rendering of this code:
<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Main_Page">label</a>
But the proposed attribution guideline says absolutely nothing about what the link label should be, and only specifies the href component of the link.
I share this worry. At a minimum we should require that the person coming up on the link understand what it is. That is that somewhere behind the curtain there is a list of authors that can be got at, no matter how many clicks they have to do to get at them.
I will not actively say that I support the idea that just linking to the source (as opposed to linking into history) is sufficient, but if that is the method used, it (the link text) damn well better make clear that the authors are in the history of that source article page, and not in the plaintext.
Yours,
Jussi-Ville Heiskanen
On Wed, Mar 11, 2009 at 3:41 AM, Erik Moeller erik@wikimedia.org wrote:
Here's a first crack at revised attribution language. When the language is completely finalized, I'll send a separate note explaining some of our reasoning for this general approach in more detail. In the meantime, I'd appreciate it if you could point out any bugs in this specific language, given its intent which should be self-evident. To keep the discussion focused, please read it from the perspective of a "from scratch" attribution model, i.e., imagine that a new encyclopedia wiki that you'd contribute to had these terms. Which problems would they cause? Are there specific third party uses that would be significantly hampered by these terms?
Thanks for any constructive feedback, Erik
Attribution: To re-distribute an article page in any form, provide credit to the authors either by, at your choice, including a) a link (URL) to the article or articles you are re-using, b) a link to an alternative online copy which is freely accessible and conforms with the license and includes a list a list of all authors, or c) such a list of all authors. (Any list of authors may be filtered to exclude very small or irrelevant contributions.) Rich media (images, sound, video, etc.) that are the result of substantive collaborations between at least five people can be credited in the same fashion, but must otherwise be attributed in the manner specified by the uploader. These attribution requirements apply to content developed and uploaded by the Wikimedia community. Text and rich media contributions that come from external sources may attach additional attribution requirements to the work, which we will strive to indicate clearly to you on the article or the description page for the file(s) in question.
--
From the text's point of view, these observations might just be my
inadequate English. "a list a list of all authors" is a typo; also I don't actually understand the role of "such" in point c) (I don't see what it could refer back to, as the requirements of a "list of all authors" comes in the following sentence, and not in one of the previous ones).
From an attribution point of view, the definition of "full list of authors"
that excludes very small contributions is not really acceptable to me. Imagine, that Joe only corrects spelling mistakes: arguably very small contributions - you wouldn't say he is the author of the articles. Now imagine, that you would print a hundred articles that Joe has corrected, and you omit his name from the list of authors - for he has minor contributions. I think Joe would be a bit upset that he is not credited, even though without his small contributions the articles would be unpublishable.
Best regards, Bence Damokos
2009/3/11 Bence Damokos bdamokos@gmail.com:
From an attribution point of view, the definition of "full list of authors" that excludes very small contributions is not really acceptable to me. Imagine, that Joe only corrects spelling mistakes: arguably very small contributions - you wouldn't say he is the author of the articles. Now imagine, that you would print a hundred articles that Joe has corrected, and you omit his name from the list of authors - for he has minor contributions. I think Joe would be a bit upset that he is not credited, even though without his small contributions the articles would be unpublishable.
I think a distinction needs to be made between an aggregate of small changes, or a single small change. I'm not sure this distinction needs to be made more explicitly in this language, though: if someone has made an aggregate of small changes, they have arguably not made "very small or irrelevant" contributions to an article.
Erik Moeller wrote:
2009/3/11 Bence Damokos bdamokos@gmail.com:
From an attribution point of view, the definition of "full list of authors" that excludes very small contributions is not really acceptable to me. Imagine, that Joe only corrects spelling mistakes: arguably very small contributions - you wouldn't say he is the author of the articles. Now imagine, that you would print a hundred articles that Joe has corrected, and you omit his name from the list of authors - for he has minor contributions. I think Joe would be a bit upset that he is not credited, even though without his small contributions the articles would be unpublishable.
I think a distinction needs to be made between an aggregate of small changes, or a single small change. I'm not sure this distinction needs to be made more explicitly in this language, though: if someone has made an aggregate of small changes, they have arguably not made "very small or irrelevant" contributions to an article.
"Arguably" is not the standard you want to satisfy realistically, though, but "understandably" and "clearly" is, when you are giving language for people who want to do real world stuff, and aren't necessarily lawyers themselves.
Yours,
Jussi-Ville Heiskanen
2009/3/11 Erik Moeller erik@wikimedia.org:
Here's a first crack at revised attribution language. When the language is completely finalized, I'll send a separate note explaining some of our reasoning for this general approach in more detail. In the meantime, I'd appreciate it if you could point out any bugs in this specific language, given its intent which should be self-evident. To keep the discussion focused, please read it from the perspective of a "from scratch" attribution model, i.e., imagine that a new encyclopedia wiki that you'd contribute to had these terms. Which problems would they cause?
Importing wikipedia content would be an absolute pain and moveing article titles would result in some interesting legal situations.
Are there specific third party uses that would be significantly hampered by these terms?
Pretty much all french ones. The slightly vague definition of URL would potentially cause issues if you wished to embed new encyclopedia wiki content in QR code.
The phrase "otherwise be attributed in the manner specified by the uploader" is intensely bad because it allows people to specify attribution via skywriting.
2009/3/11 Ryan Kaldari kaldari@gmail.com:
"either by, at your choice, including"
"at your choice" is unnecessarily verbose. The sentence has the same meaning without the extra clause.
Removed it from the draft.
2009/3/11 geni geniice@gmail.com:
Importing wikipedia content would be an absolute pain
Why? The language doesn't require you to include a full list of authors. Only if you want your copy to be a "link-creditable" copy, you would need to do so.
and moveing article titles would result in some interesting legal situations.
That's true for any approach that utilizes hyperlinks; there are probably technical strategies we can use to mitigate it.
The phrase "otherwise be attributed in the manner specified by the uploader" is intensely bad because it allows people to specify attribution via skywriting.
CC-BY-SA itself places limitations on credit, but I've nevertheless qualified it with "reasonable".
2009/3/11 Erik Moeller erik@wikimedia.org:
2009/3/11 geni geniice@gmail.com:
Importing wikipedia content would be an absolute pain
Why? The language doesn't require you to include a full list of authors. Only if you want your copy to be a "link-creditable" copy, you would need to do so.
Is provideing credit reasonable to the medium or means an additional requirement?
and moveing article titles would result in some interesting legal situations.
That's true for any approach that utilizes hyperlinks; there are probably technical strategies we can use to mitigate it.
Nope. Not as long as the deletion button continues to exist. The GFDL was smart enough to pick that up which is why when it offers computer-network locations as an option for distributing transparent copies the burden is on the person doing the distribution to make sure that the thing will remain accessible at the network location for at least a year.
With attribution the situation is more interesting since given the likely age of some new encyclopedia wikians you would need to make sure the hyperlinks continue to be active for at least 150 years (life+70 frequently generates copyrights that long or longer).
The phrase "otherwise be attributed in the manner specified by the uploader" is intensely bad because it allows people to specify attribution via skywriting.
CC-BY-SA itself places limitations on credit, but I've nevertheless qualified it with "reasonable".
CC-BY-SA does indeed place limits on how you can demand credit. Problem is that your phase disabled the section in question. On the basis that new encyclopedia wiki doesn't need the added problem of trying to figure out the difference between "reasonable" and "reasonable to the medium and means" scraping the whole section would be a better approach rather than messing with something CC-BY-SA has already delt with.
2009/3/11 geni geniice@gmail.com:
Why? The language doesn't require you to include a full list of authors. Only if you want your copy to be a "link-creditable" copy, you would need to do so.
Is provideing credit reasonable to the medium or means an additional requirement?
No; the attribution terms merely describe what the license means in the context of the specific collaborative work that it's applied to.
That's true for any approach that utilizes hyperlinks; there are probably technical strategies we can use to mitigate it.
Nope. Not as long as the deletion button continues to exist.
We already make deletion logs visible to everyone; is there any reason why we shouldn't do the same with contribution histories other than the occasional case where they include information that shouldn't be publicly viewable?
Erik
2009/3/11 Erik Moeller erik@wikimedia.org:
2009/3/11 geni geniice@gmail.com:
Why? The language doesn't require you to include a full list of authors. Only if you want your copy to be a "link-creditable" copy, you would need to do so.
Is provideing credit reasonable to the medium or means an additional requirement?
No; the attribution terms merely describe what the license means in the context of the specific collaborative work that it's applied to.
So you wouldn't have to make a note when you imported wikipedia material even though it couldn't be under the TOS you described.
That's true for any approach that utilizes hyperlinks; there are probably technical strategies we can use to mitigate it.
Nope. Not as long as the deletion button continues to exist.
We already make deletion logs visible to everyone; is there any reason why we shouldn't do the same with contribution histories other than the occasional case where they include information that shouldn't be publicly viewable?
Other than? Don't you remember what happened last time we tried it?
On Thu, Mar 12, 2009 at 8:50 AM, Erik Moeller erik@wikimedia.org wrote:
Nope. Not as long as the deletion button continues to exist.
We already make deletion logs visible to everyone; is there any reason why we shouldn't do the same with contribution histories other than the occasional case where they include information that shouldn't be publicly viewable?
A permalink to the history would be really useful. If it was just the author list and not potentially problematic edit summaries, it's not too likely to cause problems. (Problem usernames can be hidden already).
Right now there's no link to the history's permalink even for non-deleted pages. But it is possible, http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?oldid=276617393&action=history will always link to the history of the page that is at [[x]] now even if x is moved and [[x]] becomes a totally different article.
Angela
Erik Moeller wrote:
2009/3/11 geni geniice@gmail.com:
Importing wikipedia content would be an absolute pain
Why? The language doesn't require you to include a full list of authors. Only if you want your copy to be a "link-creditable" copy, you would need to do so.
The language of the license does not, but the fact that we are an international operation that works across jurisdictions and not merely under US law, makes it inevitable as a requirement, to satisfy the share alike portion, and allow use across the globe.
If somebody were to argue that we have traditionally operated under US law; I would rebut that by clarifying that only pertains to the operation of our site, and the workings of the overarching Foundation which acts as caretaker. Chapters for instance have to comply with their respective jurisdictions laws, and the same clearly applies with content reuse. The content reuse will not be hosted on wikimedia servers, to state the obvious; so in a vast majority of cases Florida law is completely irrelevant, to put it mildly ;-D
Yours,
Jussi-Ville Heiskanen
On Wed, Mar 11, 2009 at 4:51 PM, Erik Moeller erik@wikimedia.org wrote:
2009/3/11 geni geniice@gmail.com:
Importing wikipedia content would be an absolute pain
Why? The language doesn't require you to include a full list of authors. Only if you want your copy to be a "link-creditable" copy, you would need to do so.
Does that mean the link has to be to the history page? Is everything at the same domain name considered part of the "alternative online copy"?
I think I understand what you're getting at (link to something equivalent to Wikipedia), but that's not what it says.
Erik Moeller wrote:
Here's a first crack at revised attribution language. When the language is completely finalized, I'll send a separate note explaining some of our reasoning for this general approach in more detail. In the meantime, I'd appreciate it if you could point out any bugs in this specific language, given its intent which should be self-evident. To keep the discussion focused, please read it from the perspective of a "from scratch" attribution model, i.e., imagine that a new encyclopedia wiki that you'd contribute to had these terms. Which problems would they cause? Are there specific third party uses that would be significantly hampered by these terms?
BTW, the most (not only specific but even general) significant third party use hampered by the general scheme of your whole conception of that "from scratch" approach, is that it is simply false. Sorry. Somebody had to say that.
We are not starting fresh. We have way too much baggage for that to work.
Language will not bind contributors who understand they are protected by the copyleft provisions of both GFDL and CC-BY-SA. That just will not happen.
In the real world much of the terms of use will be just so much arm-waving, let us be realistic.
Yours,
Jussi-Ville Heiskanen
P.S. Anyone going to catch the 19.3. speech by Lawrence Lessig at the San Francisco "Legally Speaking" event? Only costs 50 bucks for entrance.
Jussi-Ville Heiskanen wrote:
Language will not bind contributors who understand they are protected by the copyleft provisions of both GFDL and CC-BY-SA. That just will not happen.
In the real world much of the terms of use will be just so much arm-waving, let us be realistic.
This just brings us back to a point I tried to make before. When a user fails or even refuses to comply with whatever attribution rules we proclaim, who is going to force him to do so? Contributors: Take solace in the knowledge that your rights are fully protected by an army of paper tigers.
Ec
Erik Moeller wrote:
a) a link (URL) to the article or articles you are re-using,
As I have said on a few occasions now in a few threads, this is of course no attribution at all.
This needs sorely to be worded something like
a) a link (URL) to the history page of the article or other page that contains the authorship information of the articles you are re-using.
Yours,
Jussi-Ville Heiskanen
If you can link to the article you can link to the history. We already have that mechanism. The problem I see is that people will link to a specific version, and though that satisfies the licensing requirements, and is necessary academically for tracing the actual sources and authors, in most cases we do want people to see the improved article.
David Goodman, Ph.D, M.L.S. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:DGG
On Sun, Mar 15, 2009 at 6:31 AM, Jussi-Ville Heiskanen cimonavaro@gmail.com wrote:
Erik Moeller wrote:
a) a link (URL) to the article or articles you are re-using,
As I have said on a few occasions now in a few threads, this is of course no attribution at all.
This needs sorely to be worded something like
a) a link (URL) to the history page of the article or other page that contains the authorship information of the articles you are re-using.
Yours,
Jussi-Ville Heiskanen
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On Sun, Mar 15, 2009 at 6:31 AM, Jussi-Ville Heiskanen <cimonavaro@gmail.com
wrote:
Erik Moeller wrote:
a) a link (URL) to the article or articles you are re-using,
As I have said on a few occasions now in a few threads, this is of course no attribution at all.
Unfortunately, 4 out of 5 people disagree with you, and the foundation is probably going to go with majority rules.
This needs sorely to be worded something like
a) a link (URL) to the history page of the article or other page that contains the authorship information of the articles you are re-using.
For offline copies, that would likewise be no attribution at all.
Anthony wrote:
a) a link (URL) to the history page of the article or other page that contains the authorship information of the articles you are re-using.
For offline copies, that would likewise be no attribution at all.
Can we please drop the nonsense that a URL is "no attribution at all" in an offline context? I've made this point before, but URLs do not suddenly become devoid of meaning just because you're using a medium where you can't follow a hyperlink. I could just as soon say that print media aren't acceptable sources for Wikipedia articles because you can't check them by following a hyperlink, it's the same logic. We allow references that adapt the conventions of other media to our context, we should allow people using other media the same privilege in adapting our conventions to their context.
--Michael Snow
2009/3/16 Michael Snow wikipedia@verizon.net:
Anthony wrote:
For offline copies, that would likewise be no attribution at all.
Can we please drop the nonsense that a URL is "no attribution at all" in an offline context? I've made this point before, but URLs do not suddenly become devoid of meaning just because you're using a medium where you can't follow a hyperlink. I could just as soon say that print media aren't acceptable sources for Wikipedia articles because you can't check them by following a hyperlink, it's the same logic. We allow references that adapt the conventions of other media to our context, we should allow people using other media the same privilege in adapting our conventions to their context.
Indeed. The claim is meaningless and querulous noise. Printed objects commonly have a URL on them these days. Listing a source or history short URL would do the job it's intended to.
- d.
On Mon, Mar 16, 2009 at 1:59 AM, David Gerard dgerard@gmail.com wrote:
2009/3/16 Michael Snow wikipedia@verizon.net:
Anthony wrote:
For offline copies, that would likewise be no attribution at all.
Can we please drop the nonsense that a URL is "no attribution at all" in an offline context? I've made this point before, but URLs do not suddenly become devoid of meaning just because you're using a medium where you can't follow a hyperlink. I could just as soon say that print media aren't acceptable sources for Wikipedia articles because you can't check them by following a hyperlink, it's the same logic. We allow references that adapt the conventions of other media to our context, we should allow people using other media the same privilege in adapting our conventions to their context.
Indeed. The claim is meaningless and querulous noise. Printed objects commonly have a URL on them these days. Listing a source or history short URL would do the job it's intended to.
True, but those are not URLs that contain information that they are contractually obliged to provide to you together with the object.
2009/3/16 Andre Engels andreengels@gmail.com:
On Mon, Mar 16, 2009 at 1:59 AM, David Gerard dgerard@gmail.com wrote:
Indeed. The claim is meaningless and querulous noise. Printed objects commonly have a URL on them these days. Listing a source or history short URL would do the job it's intended to.
True, but those are not URLs that contain information that they are contractually obliged to provide to you together with the object.
You have failed to establish how that makes any difference - it doesn't. The reason for it being there makes no difference as to whether people know what a URL is when they see it in print.
- d.
2009/3/16 David Gerard dgerard@gmail.com:
You have failed to establish how that makes any difference - it doesn't. The reason for it being there makes no difference as to whether people know what a URL is when they see it in print.
Interesting claim I'm not aware of any testing.
If we limit ourselves to industrialized nations we can probably assume that most people will pick up what www.example.com is. Probably pick up example.com but how many would pick up "nucleoprote.in" ([[nucleoprotein]] is a valid article). Of course you could try and argue that technically the approach Erik keeps pushing wouldn't allow for that (the lack of resource type means it is questionable if that is a legit URL) but the need to understand formal technical definitions is just another reason why messing with CC-BY-SA's "reasonable to the medium or means" is a really bad idea.
On Sun, Mar 15, 2009 at 8:55 PM, Michael Snow wikipedia@verizon.net wrote:
Anthony wrote:
a) a link (URL) to the history page of the article or other page that contains the authorship information of the articles you are re-using.
For offline copies, that would likewise be no attribution at all.
Can we please drop the nonsense that a URL is "no attribution at all" in an offline context? I've made this point before, but URLs do not suddenly become devoid of meaning just because you're using a medium where you can't follow a hyperlink. I could just as soon say that print media aren't acceptable sources for Wikipedia articles because you can't check them by following a hyperlink, it's the same logic.
It's not the same logic at all. A reference, by the very definition of the term, refers to something outside the work itself.
Anthony wrote:
On Sun, Mar 15, 2009 at 8:55 PM, Michael Snow wikipedia@verizon.net wrote:
Anthony wrote:
a) a link (URL) to the history page of the article or other page that contains the authorship information of the articles you are re-using.
For offline copies, that would likewise be no attribution at all.
Can we please drop the nonsense that a URL is "no attribution at all" in an offline context? I've made this point before, but URLs do not suddenly become devoid of meaning just because you're using a medium where you can't follow a hyperlink. I could just as soon say that print media aren't acceptable sources for Wikipedia articles because you can't check them by following a hyperlink, it's the same logic.
It's not the same logic at all. A reference, by the very definition of the term, refers to something outside the work itself.
In its own way, attribution by definition refers to something outside the work itself. Even if you reduce me to the contents of my user page on Wikipedia, that page is not an actual part of the Wikipedia articles I've helped write, and that holds true regardless of what you think is the "right" way to be doing attribution. That's even the case online, with hyperlinks and all. I suppose it's "not the same logic at all" in the same way that a URL is "no attribution at all" then?
--Michael Snow
On Sun, Mar 15, 2009 at 11:42 PM, Michael Snow wikipedia@verizon.netwrote:
Anthony wrote:
On Sun, Mar 15, 2009 at 8:55 PM, Michael Snow wikipedia@verizon.net
wrote:
Anthony wrote:
a) a link (URL) to the history page of the article or other page that contains the authorship information of the articles you are re-using.
For offline copies, that would likewise be no attribution at all.
Can we please drop the nonsense that a URL is "no attribution at all" in an offline context? I've made this point before, but URLs do not suddenly become devoid of meaning just because you're using a medium where you can't follow a hyperlink. I could just as soon say that print media aren't acceptable sources for Wikipedia articles because you can't check them by following a hyperlink, it's the same logic.
It's not the same logic at all. A reference, by the very definition of
the
term, refers to something outside the work itself.
In its own way, attribution by definition refers to something outside the work itself. Even if you reduce me to the contents of my user page on Wikipedia, that page is not an actual part of the Wikipedia articles I've helped write, and that holds true regardless of what you think is the "right" way to be doing attribution. That's even the case online, with hyperlinks and all. I suppose it's "not the same logic at all" in the same way that a URL is "no attribution at all" then?
In the context of an encyclopedia or encyclopedia article, what attribution means seems clear, listing the names or the pseudonyms of the authors. That I'm apt to not raise a fuss over a reuser who fails to do this in certain situations (e.g. where that list is just a click away) does not create a slippery slope whereby it is OK for any reuser to omit this list of names in any situation they deem appropriate.
2009/3/16 Anthony wikimail@inbox.org:
In the context of an encyclopedia or encyclopedia article, what attribution means seems clear, listing the names or the pseudonyms of the authors. That I'm apt to not raise a fuss over a reuser who fails to do this in certain situations (e.g. where that list is just a click away) does not create a slippery slope whereby it is OK for any reuser to omit this list of names in any situation they deem appropriate.
In that case, surely the letter of the license (and having touched all bases first as far as getting the reuser to do the right thing) is all the aggrieved contributor needs.
WMF advice can't actually construct new terms for the CC by-sa 3.0.
- d.
On Mon, Mar 16, 2009 at 10:01 AM, David Gerard dgerard@gmail.com wrote:
2009/3/16 Anthony wikimail@inbox.org:
In the context of an encyclopedia or encyclopedia article, what
attribution
means seems clear, listing the names or the pseudonyms of the authors.
That
I'm apt to not raise a fuss over a reuser who fails to do this in certain situations (e.g. where that list is just a click away) does not create a slippery slope whereby it is OK for any reuser to omit this list of names
in
any situation they deem appropriate.
In that case, surely the letter of the license (and having touched all bases first as far as getting the reuser to do the right thing) is all the aggrieved contributor needs.
WMF advice can't actually construct new terms for the CC by-sa 3.0.
It can't even release my contributions under CC by-sa 3.0, for that matter.
2009/3/16 Anthony wikimail@inbox.org:
On Mon, Mar 16, 2009 at 10:01 AM, David Gerard dgerard@gmail.com wrote:
WMF advice can't actually construct new terms for the CC by-sa 3.0.
It can't even release my contributions under CC by-sa 3.0, for that matter.
No, but you did with the "or later." Stop FUDding.
- d.
On Mon, Mar 16, 2009 at 10:09 AM, David Gerard dgerard@gmail.com wrote:
2009/3/16 Anthony wikimail@inbox.org:
On Mon, Mar 16, 2009 at 10:01 AM, David Gerard dgerard@gmail.com
wrote:
WMF advice can't actually construct new terms for the CC by-sa 3.0.
It can't even release my contributions under CC by-sa 3.0, for that
matter.
No, but you did with the "or later." Stop FUDding.
When did I? How did I? Why didn't I know I was doing so?
2009/3/16 Anthony wikimail@inbox.org:
On Mon, Mar 16, 2009 at 10:09 AM, David Gerard dgerard@gmail.com wrote:
2009/3/16 Anthony wikimail@inbox.org:
On Mon, Mar 16, 2009 at 10:01 AM, David Gerard dgerard@gmail.com
wrote:
WMF advice can't actually construct new terms for the CC by-sa 3.0.
It can't even release my contributions under CC by-sa 3.0, for that
matter.
No, but you did with the "or later." Stop FUDding.
When did I? How did I? Why didn't I know I was doing so?
When you pressed "submit" on the "GFDL 1.2 or later" button.
Your contributions to this debate have been almost entirely FUD. Has it ever occurred to you to think that perhaps you're largely banned from the wikis because of some attiribute of yourself, rather than everyone else being wrong?
- d.
On Mon, Mar 16, 2009 at 10:13 AM, David Gerard dgerard@gmail.com wrote:
2009/3/16 Anthony wikimail@inbox.org:
On Mon, Mar 16, 2009 at 10:09 AM, David Gerard dgerard@gmail.com
wrote:
2009/3/16 Anthony wikimail@inbox.org:
On Mon, Mar 16, 2009 at 10:01 AM, David Gerard dgerard@gmail.com
wrote:
WMF advice can't actually construct new terms for the CC by-sa 3.0.
It can't even release my contributions under CC by-sa 3.0, for that
matter.
No, but you did with the "or later." Stop FUDding.
When did I? How did I? Why didn't I know I was doing so?
When you pressed "submit" on the "GFDL 1.2 or later" button
I've never pressed "submit" on a button which read "GFDL 1.2 or later". Try again.
2009/3/16 Anthony wikimail@inbox.org:
I've never pressed "submit" on a button which read "GFDL 1.2 or later". Try again.
The edit page has said "or later" as long as I can remember. Are you claiming that it didn't used to? What did it used to say and when?
On Mon, Mar 16, 2009 at 10:29 AM, Thomas Dalton thomas.dalton@gmail.comwrote:
2009/3/16 Anthony wikimail@inbox.org:
I've never pressed "submit" on a button which read "GFDL 1.2 or later".
Try
again.
The edit page has said "or later" as long as I can remember. Are you claiming that it didn't used to? What did it used to say and when?
It still doesn't. There is a place where it says "Version 1.2 or any later version published by the Free Software Foundation", which was added in March 2007. But CC-by-sa is not published by the FSF, and the word "published", according to Wiktionary, is in the past tense (and I have not clicked submit since Version 1.3 was released). So that argument fails in many ways, before even getting to the problems with GFDL 1.3 itself.
2009/3/16 Anthony wikimail@inbox.org:
On Mon, Mar 16, 2009 at 10:29 AM, Thomas Dalton thomas.dalton@gmail.comwrote:
2009/3/16 Anthony wikimail@inbox.org:
I've never pressed "submit" on a button which read "GFDL 1.2 or later".
Try
again.
The edit page has said "or later" as long as I can remember. Are you claiming that it didn't used to? What did it used to say and when?
It still doesn't. There is a place where it says "Version 1.2 or any later version published by the Free Software Foundation", which was added in March 2007. But CC-by-sa is not published by the FSF, and the word "published", according to Wiktionary, is in the past tense (and I have not clicked submit since Version 1.3 was released). So that argument fails in many ways, before even getting to the problems with GFDL 1.3 itself.
Your paragraph is hopelessly tangled. Which of the following are you claiming:
(a) your edits were not released under GFDL 1.2 or later? (b) that edits (in general) released under GFDL 1.2 or later would not be usable under GFDL 1.3? (c) that edits released under GFDL 1.3 could not be moved to CC by-sa 3.0?
- d.
On Mon, Mar 16, 2009 at 10:37 AM, David Gerard dgerard@gmail.com wrote:
2009/3/16 Anthony wikimail@inbox.org:
On Mon, Mar 16, 2009 at 10:29 AM, Thomas Dalton <thomas.dalton@gmail.com wrote:
2009/3/16 Anthony wikimail@inbox.org:
I've never pressed "submit" on a button which read "GFDL 1.2 or
later".
Try
again.
The edit page has said "or later" as long as I can remember. Are you claiming that it didn't used to? What did it used to say and when?
It still doesn't. There is a place where it says "Version 1.2 or any
later
version published by the Free Software Foundation", which was added in
March
- But CC-by-sa is not published by the FSF, and the word
"published",
according to Wiktionary, is in the past tense (and I have not clicked
submit
since Version 1.3 was released). So that argument fails in many ways, before even getting to the problems with GFDL 1.3 itself.
Your paragraph is hopelessly tangled.
So is the trail from GFDL 1.2 to CC-BY-SA.
Which of the following are you claiming:
(a) your edits were not released under GFDL 1.2 or later?
Certainly not in the manner that you interpret that.
(b) that edits (in general) released under GFDL 1.2 or later would not
be usable under GFDL 1.3?
In some hypothetical situation, maybe. Not in the present one.
(c) that edits released under GFDL 1.3 could not be moved to CC by-sa 3.0?
The word "moved" (or "move") does not appear in GFDL 1.3 What it says is that "The operator of an MMC Site may republish an MMC contained in the site under CC-BY-SA on the same site at any time before August 1, 2009, provided the MMC is eligible for relicensing." Of course, in the case where that MMC Site's license under the GFDL has been revoked, it's academic. But there's nothing in the GFDL 1.3 which even *claims* that a third party can use the work under CC-BY-SA, and further even if the GFDL 1.3 did make that claim it would be void anyway as CC-BY-SA is not in the same spirit as the GFDL.
2009/3/16 Anthony wikimail@inbox.org:
On Mon, Mar 16, 2009 at 10:29 AM, Thomas Dalton thomas.dalton@gmail.comwrote:
2009/3/16 Anthony wikimail@inbox.org:
I've never pressed "submit" on a button which read "GFDL 1.2 or later".
Try
again.
The edit page has said "or later" as long as I can remember. Are you claiming that it didn't used to? What did it used to say and when?
It still doesn't. There is a place where it says "Version 1.2 or any later version published by the Free Software Foundation", which was added in March 2007.
So it does say it... you are contradicting yourself. What did it say before March 2007? If it just said "GFDL" (which I think is likely), then that implicitly means "or later" (the license text makes that clear).
But CC-by-sa is not published by the FSF, and the word "published", according to Wiktionary, is in the past tense (and I have not clicked submit since Version 1.3 was released). So that argument fails in many ways, before even getting to the problems with GFDL 1.3 itself.
Obviously when reusing it you need to reuse it under a license that was published in the past, that's what is meant by the use of the past tense and I think that is perfectly clear to any reasonable person. We know CC-BY-SA isn't an FSF license, the FSF have released a new version of GFDL allowing relicensing under CC-BY-SA (as you well know), so what are you claiming, that the "or later" part is invalid or that a license which allows relicensing under a different license is invalid?
On Mon, Mar 16, 2009 at 10:47 AM, Thomas Dalton thomas.dalton@gmail.comwrote:
2009/3/16 Anthony wikimail@inbox.org:
On Mon, Mar 16, 2009 at 10:29 AM, Thomas Dalton <thomas.dalton@gmail.com wrote:
2009/3/16 Anthony wikimail@inbox.org:
I've never pressed "submit" on a button which read "GFDL 1.2 or
later".
Try
again.
The edit page has said "or later" as long as I can remember. Are you claiming that it didn't used to? What did it used to say and when?
It still doesn't. There is a place where it says "Version 1.2 or any
later
version published by the Free Software Foundation", which was added in
March
So it does say it... you are contradicting yourself.
It doesn't say "or later". It says "or [...] later [...]".
What did it say before March 2007? If it just said "GFDL" (which I think is likely), then that implicitly means "or later" (the license text makes that clear).
Immediately before March 2007 it said "GFDL". The full history is at http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=MediaWiki:Copyrightwarning&act...
But CC-by-sa is not published by the FSF, and the word "published", according to Wiktionary, is in the past tense (and I have not clicked
submit
since Version 1.3 was released). So that argument fails in many ways, before even getting to the problems with GFDL 1.3 itself.
Obviously when reusing it you need to reuse it under a license that was published in the past, that's what is meant by the use of the past tense and I think that is perfectly clear to any reasonable person.
I don't think that's clear at all. In fact, I think what's clear is that if someone is releasing a work under a license, they are not releasing it under a license that doesn't yet exist.
We know CC-BY-SA isn't an FSF license, the FSF have released a new version of GFDL allowing relicensing under CC-BY-SA (as you well know),
It allows an MMC Site (presumably, the WMF) to republish the work under CC-BY-SA. But the WMF has had its rights under the GFDL revoked, and the permission to republish doesn't extend to third parties anyway.
so what are you claiming, that the "or later" part is invalid or that a license which allows relicensing under a different license is invalid?
Both, and then some.
2009/3/16 Anthony wikimail@inbox.org:
I don't think that's clear at all. In fact, I think what's clear is that if someone is releasing a work under a license, they are not releasing it under a license that doesn't yet exist.
Yes, because Eben Moglen (who would have cleared the "or later" provision) knows so much less about how these things work than you do. I find myself oddly unconvinced.
You are FUDding.
- d.
On Mon, Mar 16, 2009 at 10:57 AM, David Gerard dgerard@gmail.com wrote:
2009/3/16 Anthony wikimail@inbox.org:
I don't think that's clear at all. In fact, I think what's clear is that
if
someone is releasing a work under a license, they are not releasing it
under
a license that doesn't yet exist.
Yes, because Eben Moglen (who would have cleared the "or later" provision) knows so much less about how these things work than you do. I find myself oddly unconvinced.
Eben Moglen knows nothing about my intent when I grant a license.
2009/3/16 Anthony wikimail@inbox.org:
On Mon, Mar 16, 2009 at 10:57 AM, David Gerard dgerard@gmail.com wrote:
2009/3/16 Anthony wikimail@inbox.org:
I don't think that's clear at all. In fact, I think what's clear is that
if
someone is releasing a work under a license, they are not releasing it
under
a license that doesn't yet exist.
Yes, because Eben Moglen (who would have cleared the "or later" provision) knows so much less about how these things work than you do. I find myself oddly unconvinced.
Eben Moglen knows nothing about my intent when I grant a license.
I'm sure the judge will find that convincing.
- d.
Anthony,
If you don't mind, let's be specific.
Which edits are yours? (Were you User:Anthony?)
Who, if anyone, do you believe is presently infringing your rights such that you feel corrective action is necessary to satisfy your expectations as an author? What action do you want to see taken? As a wiki editor, which existing infringements of your work are most troubling to you?
Assuming the licensing proposal is adopted and WMF declares that all of their properties are dual licensed: Are you likely to complain to reusers who rely on that in using work that you edited? Would you seriously consider taking legal action against the WMF or any third party even if they are following the CC-BY-SA license in good faith?
It is certainly useful to talk about relicensing in general and abstract terms, since most of the editors involved aren't here to comment. However, for months now you have portrayed yourself as a specifically aggrieved party. That being the case, I would like to know where/why you believe this to be the case, what you have tried to do about it, and what you think we (in the broad sense of the WMF and/or the Wikimedia volunteer community) might do about it to address your concerns.
-Robert Rohde
On Mon, Mar 16, 2009 at 10:54 AM, Anthony wikimail@inbox.org wrote:
It allows an MMC Site (presumably, the WMF) to republish the work under CC-BY-SA.
Sorry, I forgot to add "on the same site". I shouldn't try to abbreviate - it says "The operator of an MMC Site may republish an MMC contained in the site under CC-BY-SA on the same site at any time before August 1, 2009, provided the MMC is eligible for relicensing."
2009/3/16 Anthony wikimail@inbox.org:
It doesn't say "or later". It says "or [...] later [...]".
And that is where I bid you "farewell".
You are wrong my friend. When you hit that little button, you agreed to license your contributions under 1.2 or any later version. Therefore if the Foundation moves to 1.3, the license transfers. As 1.3 is a dual license, its dual licensed.
________________________________ From: Anthony wikimail@inbox.org To: Wikimedia Foundation Mailing List foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Sent: Monday, March 16, 2009 7:33:37 AM Subject: Re: [Foundation-l] Proposed revised attribution language
On Mon, Mar 16, 2009 at 10:29 AM, Thomas Dalton thomas.dalton@gmail.comwrote:
2009/3/16 Anthony wikimail@inbox.org:
I've never pressed "submit" on a button which read "GFDL 1.2 or later".
Try
again.
The edit page has said "or later" as long as I can remember. Are you claiming that it didn't used to? What did it used to say and when?
It still doesn't. There is a place where it says "Version 1.2 or any later version published by the Free Software Foundation", which was added in March 2007. But CC-by-sa is not published by the FSF, and the word "published", according to Wiktionary, is in the past tense (and I have not clicked submit since Version 1.3 was released). So that argument fails in many ways, before even getting to the problems with GFDL 1.3 itself. _______________________________________________ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
On Mon, Mar 16, 2009 at 11:25 AM, Geoffrey Plourde geo.plrd@yahoo.comwrote:
You are wrong my friend. When you hit that little button, you agreed to license your contributions under 1.2 or any later version.
Any later version published by the FSF.
Therefore if the Foundation moves to 1.3, the license transfers.
Interesting theory. What happens if the Foundation doesn't "move to 1.3"?
As 1.3 is a dual license, its dual licensed.
{{dubious}}
1.3 allows for the transfer to CC by SA, please stop playing semantics
________________________________ From: Anthony wikimail@inbox.org To: Wikimedia Foundation Mailing List foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Sent: Monday, March 16, 2009 9:49:51 AM Subject: Re: [Foundation-l] Proposed revised attribution language
On Mon, Mar 16, 2009 at 11:25 AM, Geoffrey Plourde geo.plrd@yahoo.comwrote:
You are wrong my friend. When you hit that little button, you agreed to license your contributions under 1.2 or any later version.
Any later version published by the FSF.
Therefore if the Foundation moves to 1.3, the license transfers.
Interesting theory. What happens if the Foundation doesn't "move to 1.3"?
As 1.3 is a dual license, its dual licensed.
{{dubious}} _______________________________________________ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
2009/3/16 Geoffrey Plourde geo.plrd@yahoo.com:
1.3 allows for the transfer to CC by SA, please stop playing semantics
Michael, could you please moderate Anthony? He's only here to spread FUD.
- d.
On Mon, Mar 16, 2009 at 2:09 PM, David Gerard dgerard@gmail.com wrote:
2009/3/16 Geoffrey Plourde geo.plrd@yahoo.com:
1.3 allows for the transfer to CC by SA, please stop playing semantics
Michael, could you please moderate Anthony? He's only here to spread FUD.
- d.
foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
You're both cluttering our inboxes with your inane back-and-forth.
-Chad
On 3/16/09, Chad innocentkiller@gmail.com wrote:
On Mon, Mar 16, 2009 at 2:09 PM, David Gerard dgerard@gmail.com wrote:
2009/3/16 Geoffrey Plourde geo.plrd@yahoo.com:
1.3 allows for the transfer to CC by SA, please stop playing semantics
Michael, could you please moderate Anthony? He's only here to spread FUD.
- d.
foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
You're both cluttering our inboxes with your inane back-and-forth.
Indeed, I think both of you should just leave this thread alone.
Anthony, you have stated your opinion on the proposed license migration quite pointedly. I am yet to find someone who agrees. So for now I guess you can only watch what happens and, if you remain disagreeing, sue the WMF. But stop trying to persuade us on this mailinglist.
Michael
-Chad
foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
On Mon, Mar 16, 2009 at 4:53 PM, Michael Bimmler mbimmler@gmail.com wrote:
Indeed, I think both of you should just leave this thread alone.
Well, since you mention me by name I feel I ought to be able to defend myself. If you want to deny me this right of reply by moderating me, so be it. I'll be brief.
Anthony, you have stated your opinion on the proposed license
migration quite pointedly. I am yet to find someone who agrees.
Perhaps so, but at the same time, I am yet to find someone who has been able to explain how it works. It is being taken on faith that this switch is 1) possible, and 2) properly implemented.
On 16 Mar 2009, at 00:55, Michael Snow wrote:
Can we please drop the nonsense that a URL is "no attribution at all" in an offline context? I've made this point before, but URLs do not suddenly become devoid of meaning just because you're using a medium where you can't follow a hyperlink. I could just as soon say that print media aren't acceptable sources for Wikipedia articles because you can't check them by following a hyperlink, it's the same logic. We allow references that adapt the conventions of other media to our context, we should allow people using other media the same privilege in adapting our conventions to their context.
--Michael Snow
The issue, from my point of view*, is that they do "suddenly become devoid of meaning" as soon as those links stop working. This can happen for a number of reasons, including article moves, deletions, and (<insert deity> forbid) wikipedia.org going away. There are no guarantees that I'm aware of that the links will continue to work for even a decade, let alone the full length of copyright (and, given the tendency to attribute authors even for PD works, afterwards).
On the other hand, a local copy of the author list (normally) stays accessible as long as the work does.
How does the WMF plan to tackle this problem if attribution-by-link is used?
Mike Peel
* Note that these points have been raised several times before on this mailing list, but I've yet to see an adequate response, so I figure they deserve raising again.
Michael Peel email@mikepeel.net wrote:
Can we please drop the nonsense that a URL is "no attribution at all" in an offline context? I've made this point before, but URLs do not suddenly become devoid of meaning just because you're using a medium where you can't follow a hyperlink. I could just as soon say that print media aren't acceptable sources for Wikipedia articles because you can't check them by following a hyperlink, it's the same logic. We allow references that adapt the conventions of other media to our context, we should allow people using other media the same privilege in adapting our conventions to their context.
The issue, from my point of view*, is that they do "suddenly become devoid of meaning" as soon as those links stop working. This can happen for a number of reasons, including article moves, deletions, and (<insert deity> forbid) wikipedia.org going away. There are no guarantees that I'm aware of that the links will continue to work for even a decade, let alone the full length of copyright (and, given the tendency to attribute authors even for PD works, afterwards).
On the other hand, a local copy of the author list (normally) stays accessible as long as the work does. [...]
Is this problem really exclusive to online references? I'd guess there is plenitude of author references to "[...] et al." (or none at all) out there that cannot be resolved without access to a catalog or the source material itself and become "devoid of meaning" at the latest when these re- sources are destroyed or not accessible.
If the shards of a coffee mug with a URL attribution get excavated 100 years in the future, I think a bit of research on the part of the archaeologists can be asked for.
Tim
On 20 Mar 2009, at 08:57, Tim Landscheidt wrote:
Michael Peel email@mikepeel.net wrote:
The issue, from my point of view*, is that they do "suddenly become devoid of meaning" as soon as those links stop working. This can happen for a number of reasons, including article moves, deletions, and (<insert deity> forbid) wikipedia.org going away. There are no guarantees that I'm aware of that the links will continue to work for even a decade, let alone the full length of copyright (and, given the tendency to attribute authors even for PD works, afterwards).
On the other hand, a local copy of the author list (normally) stays accessible as long as the work does. [...]
Is this problem really exclusive to online references? I'd guess there is plenitude of author references to "[...] et al." (or none at all) out there that cannot be resolved without access to a catalog or the source material itself and become "devoid of meaning" at the latest when these re- sources are destroyed or not accessible.
I'm not talking about references to a text, I'm talking about a copy of the text. That's completely different. Please, give me examples of where text is reprinted with the authors attributed as "[...] et al." or none at all.
If the shards of a coffee mug with a URL attribution get excavated 100 years in the future, I think a bit of research on the part of the archaeologists can be asked for.
The whole discussion of coffee mugs is a red herring. That's most likely using a quote from an article, which would fall under fair use anyway and probably wouldn't (or shouldn't) need URL attribution. I'm interested in the cases where a substantial part (or all) of the text is used.
Wikipedia has many uses, and I don't think a one-size-fits-all attribution-by-url works, technically nor logically (and possibly not legally, given the debates going on at this mailing list). I'd much rather see a sliding scale of attribution, based on how much of the content you're wanting to reuse and the situation in which you're reusing it. If you're printing a book with wikipedia content, then a full author list is reasonable. If you're using a paragraph online, then perhaps attribution-by-url is appropriate. If you're using a sentence in a news article or on a coffee mug, then attributing "Wikipedia" would probably be OK.
So long as the tools for the different levels of attribution exist (the only two lacking are an easy and obvious way to get an author list from wikipedia and a decent history URL), then why not set up a page on wikipedia (et al.) which the community can edit (and debate), defining the levels of attribution required?
Mike
Michael Peel wrote:
On 20 Mar 2009, at 08:57, Tim Landscheidt wrote:
Is this problem really exclusive to online references? I'd guess there is plenitude of author references to "[...] et al." (or none at all) out there that cannot be resolved without access to a catalog or the source material itself and become "devoid of meaning" at the latest when these re- sources are destroyed or not accessible.
I'm not talking about references to a text, I'm talking about a copy of the text. That's completely different. Please, give me examples of where text is reprinted with the authors attributed as "[...] et al." or none at all.
A copy of Wikipedia text is frequently used in eBay descriptions of books. The attribution is simply to Wikipedia, and does not progress so far as to say "[...] et al." That's about as much as anyone could reasonably expect, no matter what the licence says.
Only my own laziness and the economics of publishing prevent me from putting together a book of related Wikipedia articles. (Maybe a wiki-guide to Vancouver in time for the upcoming Olympics.) If I did I could do so safely in the knowledge that no-one would sue me. For any author to expect otherwise is to suffer (to use Milos's appropriate term) from "bourgeois egotism."
Ec
On 20 Mar 2009, at 17:03, Ray Saintonge wrote:
Michael Peel wrote:
On 20 Mar 2009, at 08:57, Tim Landscheidt wrote:
Is this problem really exclusive to online references? I'd guess there is plenitude of author references to "[...] et al." (or none at all) out there that cannot be resolved without access to a catalog or the source material itself and become "devoid of meaning" at the latest when these re- sources are destroyed or not accessible.
I'm not talking about references to a text, I'm talking about a copy of the text. That's completely different. Please, give me examples of where text is reprinted with the authors attributed as "[...] et al." or none at all.
A copy of Wikipedia text is frequently used in eBay descriptions of books. The attribution is simply to Wikipedia, and does not progress so far as to say "[...] et al." That's about as much as anyone could reasonably expect, no matter what the licence says.
I was meaning non-Wikipedia text, i.e. existing attribution methods for other works.
In the case of eBay, where the use is temporary, attribution by URL seems fine to me. Were it more permanent (e.g. a proper website, or a book), then attribution by author names would seem more appropriate.
Only my own laziness and the economics of publishing prevent me from putting together a book of related Wikipedia articles. (Maybe a wiki-guide to Vancouver in time for the upcoming Olympics.) If I did I could do so safely in the knowledge that no-one would sue me. For any author to expect otherwise is to suffer (to use Milos's appropriate term) from "bourgeois egotism."
That's an argument for clear rules, with no relation to attribution. A simple rule saying "if you use this text for that, attribute these authors" suffices and removes any doubt about anyone being sued.
Mike
2009/3/20 Ray Saintonge saintonge@telus.net:
A copy of Wikipedia text is frequently used in eBay descriptions of books. The attribution is simply to Wikipedia, and does not progress so far as to say "[...] et al." That's about as much as anyone could reasonably expect, no matter what the licence says.
This is what I mean when I say this is not a game of Nomic, and the law is squishy. Does anyone actually think they could stop someone from doing this? (If so, you're too batshit crazy to be listened to in this discussion.)
- d.
2009/3/20 David Gerard dgerard@gmail.com:
2009/3/20 Ray Saintonge saintonge@telus.net:
A copy of Wikipedia text is frequently used in eBay descriptions of books. The attribution is simply to Wikipedia, and does not progress so far as to say "[...] et al." That's about as much as anyone could reasonably expect, no matter what the licence says.
This is what I mean when I say this is not a game of Nomic, and the law is squishy. Does anyone actually think they could stop someone from doing this? (If so, you're too batshit crazy to be listened to in this discussion.)
eBay will remove items that violate various rules - they would probably remove something that violated copyright if the copyright holder reported it through the proper channels.
2009/3/20 David Gerard dgerard@gmail.com:
This is what I mean when I say this is not a game of Nomic, and the law is squishy. Does anyone actually think they could stop someone from doing this? (If so, you're too batshit crazy to be listened to in this discussion.)
- d.
DMCA take down notice. Ebay will likely follow it. By the time the person has decided if they want to risk taking the matter through the court the auction will be over.
As for how it would work out in court? With material under the GFDL their position would be rather hard to defend. No GFDL no excuse for use they lose the case.
Under CC-BY-SA it boils down to the reasonable to the medium and means clause which is a rather more defendable position.
geni wrote:
2009/3/20 David Gerard:
This is what I mean when I say this is not a game of Nomic, and the law is squishy. Does anyone actually think they could stop someone from doing this? (If so, you're too batshit crazy to be listened to in this discussion.)
DMCA take down notice. Ebay will likely follow it. By the time the person has decided if they want to risk taking the matter through the court the auction will be over.
As for how it would work out in court? With material under the GFDL their position would be rather hard to defend. No GFDL no excuse for use they lose the case.
Under CC-BY-SA it boils down to the reasonable to the medium and means clause which is a rather more defendable position.
Who will issue the take down order to start with? Properly speaking, the person who issues the order in relation to his own work, so he must identify where his own rights have been infringed. He has no business asking eBay to take down the work of any other contributor to the article. He also needs to establish that his expression has been infringed, and not his contributed information, which is not copyright. If I am one of the other contributors who has personally given permission for my work in the same article to be used I have equal rights to do so as a co-author. I can even issue a put-back order challenging the take down, designating where I want the case heard. I will always have the Merchant of Venice, pound-of-flesh argument on my side.
I grant that the ephemeral nature of eBay material seriously diminishes the practicality of the process on that site, but I'm sure that, if necessary, other websites would become known where the material is placed there with the intent of being there longer.
I don't characterise taking the matter to court as a risk, but as a pleasure. Some of the possibilities are so remote that I would have to wait until Clint Eastwood dresses in pink chiffon and waves a fairy wand when he says "Make my day!"
Ec
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