On 30 June 2012 22:45, Tom Morris tom@tommorris.org wrote:
The Foundation and the projects are kept at arms length because of s.230 of the Communications Decency Act in the U.S. so that the Foundation isn't held legally responsible as the "publisher" of content on Wikipedia, but instead delegates that publication to the community, and instead seeing themselves as the hosting company. Fine. I expect the Foundation lawyers know how to do just that, and where the line is.
But, the problem is under the Draft Communications Bill, if the Secretary of State wished to serve "Wikipedia" or "Wikimedia" generally with a s.1 notice, how would that play out? Could WMUK be held responsible under this Bill? How about individual volunteers?
This draft act isn't aimed at publishers, it is aimed at service providers, so it would definitely be the WMF that is considered responsible for Wikipedia. I can't see any other interpretation.