I always thought that translations were considered "wholely derivative", that is that a new copyright is *not* created, by translating.
In a message dated 4/25/2011 1:57:34 P.M. Pacific Daylight Time, saintonge@telus.net writes:
On 04/25/11 9:33 AM, Joan Goma wrote:
My interest in a legal opinion is not to know if what they do is legal or not.
My interest is to know for example what can they do if I copy the content they previously have translated from an English Wikipedia article I have previously written.
The translation would give rise to a new copyright *in addition* to yours. You would be infringing their copyright. This all assumes that it was a human translation. If it was a machine translation the argument could be made that as a mechanical process it lacked the originality needed to acquire copyright.
How do they put a dollar figure on the damages suffered if the income
they
get from that content is obtained from my work they have translated
without
my permission?
In principle damages are evaluated on the basis of market activity. If the quantum of damages is the issue the burden of proof is on the person seeking damages.
They only have my permission to publish derived works under same license. Then I have the right to copy the derived works back. So any damage they could claim is exactly the same damage I suffer for not being able to do those copies.
No, because the translation is not identical to the work you produced. This still does not account for how different jurisdictions will handle the matter. At first glance it would seem more convenient for them to have the case heard in a Chinese court and for you in a Spanish court.
Ray
Date: Mon, 25 Apr 2011 01:11:25 -0700 From: Ray Saintongesaintonge@telus.net
On 04/24/11 11:45 PM, Joan Goma wrote:
As Ray saids legal prosecution to claim for formal accomplishing of the copyright terms is expensive and difficult. But the same happens the
other
way around.
I would like to have a clear legal opinion about applying the terms
without
going to court.
They have copied articles from Chinese Wikipedia and translated
articles
from English and Japanese Wikipedia so in my opinion their work is a derivative one and according to the CCSA terms it is also CCSA no mater
what
they say.
What about creating a bot to copy from Baidu all the articles not yet existing in Chinese wikipedia.
Could Geoff Brigham provide us his legal advice?
Getting a legal opinion that what they are doing is illegal would be the easy part. The challenge is what can you do with that opinion once you have it.
Copyright, and least in common law countries, is primarily an economic right. In that context courts would be more concerned with the measure of economic damage. How do you put a dollar figure on the damages suffered when the original authors weren't seeking to make money from it? Whoever starts the fight still needs to fund prosecuting the battle, and that could be very expensive.
Ray
_______________________________________________ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
On 26 April 2011 03:06, WJhonson@aol.com wrote:
I always thought that translations were considered "wholely derivative", that is that a new copyright is *not* created, by translating.
I would expect that to vary from jurisdiction to jurisdiction. For example, jurisdictions that includes some kind of "sweat of the brow" doctrine would probably protect translations. What jurisdiction are you referring to?
On 04/26/2011 07:58 AM, Thomas Dalton wrote:
On 26 April 2011 03:06,WJhonson@aol.com wrote:
I always thought that translations were considered "wholely derivative", that is that a new copyright is *not* created, by translating.
I would expect that to vary from jurisdiction to jurisdiction. For example, jurisdictions that includes some kind of "sweat of the brow" doctrine would probably protect translations. What jurisdiction are you referring to?
Translation is not "sweat of the brow". Copyright law of Germany, for example, explicitly states that translations are copyrighted: http://bundesrecht.juris.de/urhg/__3.html . Copyright law of Serbia, for another example, does the same.
On 04/25/11 7:06 PM, WJhonson@aol.com wrote:
I always thought that translations were considered "wholely derivative", that is that a new copyright is *not* created, by translating.
It would be nice if things could be that easy; a third person using the translation must respect the copyright of both the author and translator, even when the translation is an infringement. I know of no law that distinguishes wholly derivative from partly derivative. Some translations, especially of poetry, take a great deal of skill and originality to convey the sense of the source language. Translations of the same work by different translators can vary considerably.
Ray
In a message dated 4/25/2011 1:57:34 P.M. Pacific Daylight Time, saintonge@telus.net writes:
The translation would give rise to a new copyright *in addition* to yours. You would be infringing their copyright. This all assumes that it was a human translation. If it was a machine translation the argument could be made that as a mechanical process it lacked the originality needed to acquire copyright.
Baidu do not translate anything copy from English Wikipedia or Japanese Wikipedia, but just keep the full content without attribution and changing anything. There are totally about 50 articles copy from Eng & Japanese WP. HW
________________________________ 寄件人﹕ "WJhonson@aol.com" WJhonson@aol.com 收件人﹕ foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org 傳送日期﹕ 2011/4/26 (二) 10:06:34 AM 主題： Re: [Foundation-l] foundation-l Digest, Vol 85, Issue 52
I always thought that translations were considered "wholely derivative", that is that a new copyright is *not* created, by translating.
In a message dated 4/25/2011 1:57:34 P.M. Pacific Daylight Time, saintonge@telus.net writes:
On 04/25/11 9:33 AM, Joan Goma wrote:
My interest in a legal opinion is not to know if what they do is legal or not.
My interest is to know for example what can they do if I copy the content they previously have translated from an English Wikipedia article I have previously written.
The translation would give rise to a new copyright *in addition* to yours. You would be infringing their copyright. This all assumes that it was a human translation. If it was a machine translation the argument could be made that as a mechanical process it lacked the originality needed to acquire copyright.
How do they put a dollar figure on the damages suffered if the income
they
get from that content is obtained from my work they have translated
without
my permission?
In principle damages are evaluated on the basis of market activity. If the quantum of damages is the issue the burden of proof is on the person seeking damages.
They only have my permission to publish derived works under same license. Then I have the right to copy the derived works back. So any damage they could claim is exactly the same damage I suffer for not being able to do those copies.
No, because the translation is not identical to the work you produced. This still does not account for how different jurisdictions will handle the matter. At first glance it would seem more convenient for them to have the case heard in a Chinese court and for you in a Spanish court.
Ray
Date: Mon, 25 Apr 2011 01:11:25 -0700 From: Ray Saintongesaintonge@telus.net
On 04/24/11 11:45 PM, Joan Goma wrote:
As Ray saids legal prosecution to claim for formal accomplishing of the copyright terms is expensive and difficult. But the same happens the
other
way around.
I would like to have a clear legal opinion about applying the terms
without
going to court.
They have copied articles from Chinese Wikipedia and translated
articles
from English and Japanese Wikipedia so in my opinion their work is a derivative one and according to the CCSA terms it is also CCSA no mater
what
they say.
What about creating a bot to copy from Baidu all the articles not yet existing in Chinese wikipedia.
Could Geoff Brigham provide us his legal advice?
Getting a legal opinion that what they are doing is illegal would be the easy part. The challenge is what can you do with that opinion once you have it.
Copyright, and least in common law countries, is primarily an economic right. In that context courts would be more concerned with the measure of economic damage. How do you put a dollar figure on the damages suffered when the original authors weren't seeking to make money from it? Whoever starts the fight still needs to fund prosecuting the battle, and that could be very expensive.
Ray
_______________________________________________ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
_______________________________________________ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org