I would like to use text from the English language versions of the Wikipedia/Wiktionary in
a derivative work (an English language dictionary of audiovisual industry terms). The GNU
Free Documentation License confuses me (and I'm trying to avoid having to hire a
lawyer), so I am not sure if I can use the Wikimedia material as intended (since my
intended use does not exactly follow one of the examples given). Would the following be
acceptable?
* Various articles from the Wikipedia and Wiktionary would be used as the basis of a
derivative work (specifically, individual entries in an audiovisual dictionary). This work
will also contain original material and other materials licensed from third parties.
Wikimedia articles would never be reproduced verbatim in their entirety. Articles based on
Wikimedia material would represent a small fraction of the overall work (there are already
in excess of 10,000 identified terms without making direct use of any Wikimedia
materials).
* Rather than identify each use of Wikimedia material (either accompanying each derived
entry or in an exhaustive list at the end, which the proposed format would not
accommodate), I would acknowledge the Wikimedia origin of some of the dictionary's
material in two ways:
1. Citations in the bibliography indicating that Wikimedia material was used in the
development of the dictionary (the traditional citation for fair use of copyrighted
material in an academic work):
Wikipedia, St. Petersburg, Florida: Wikimedia Foundation,
en.wikipedia.org.
Wiktionary, St. Petersburg, Florida: Wikimedia Foundation,
en.wiktionary.org.
2. Entries in the section of the acknowledgements that identifies copyrighted material
incorporated into the dictionary under license from the copyright holder:
Wikipedia: The Free Encyclopedia
(
en.wikipedia.org)
© Wikimedia Foundation,
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Copyrights
GNU Free Documentation License,
www.gnu.org/copyleft/fdl.html
Wiktionary: a wiki-based Open Content dictionary
(
en.wiktionary.org)
© Wikimedia Foundation,
en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Wiktionary:Copyrights
GNU Free Documentation License,
www.gnu.org/copyleft/fdl.html
* Those portions of the work licensed from third parties and entries that do not contain
Wikimedia material would not fall under the GNU Free Documentation License, but would
remain under the ownership of the respective copyright holders.
* If the dictionary is made available online, it would be formatted using standard HTML
and the URLs noted above would be presented as live links. Most likely, it will be
published as a printed book.
So, can I use Wikimedia material under these conditions? If this is not acceptable, then I
will limit myself to traditional fair use applications only.
Thank you for your time and consideration.
--Richard