Is there any way we can take action against Baidu Baike? Surely there is
some legal means of recourse, because they apparently are taking things from
the Chinese Wikipedia wholesale, with utter copyright violations. We have to
deal with copyright issues, I don't see why we should idly stand by and let
ourselves get trampled over with. Since we have been sending cease and
desist notices to small mirrors now, surely this is the ripe target, as
Baidu Baike is state-sponsored by the People's Republic of China.
As an example of lifting, see their
version<http://baike.baidu.com/lemma-php/dispose/view.php/202855.htm>…
our
version<http://zh.wikipedia.org/wiki/%25E4%25B8%25AD%25E5%259B%25BD%25E5…9A>.
This occurs for the huge majority of articles (90,000). For context, these
are articles which discuss Sun Yat-Sen. Our version at zh was much earlier,
with last edits in January, while Baidu Baike, set up in April has only made
minor excisions and modifications. It is clear that the contributors to the
Wikipedia article hold the copyright.
I think we should give up any hope of negotiating with the PRC entirely, as
they obviously have taken a hostile and insulting stance to us by lifting
material wholesale, then saying it is their copyright. This is such a gross
violation of Wikipedia's philosophy, and PRC being a member of the World
Trade Organisation (with compulsory ratification of the WIPO), some form of
action *must* be taken. I do not think this is a time for lega pacifism.
If we could initiate any attempts I think the whole community will cheer on.
The right to sue is clearly there, perhaps the tediousness is in collecting
copyright holders, but then again I think we can make a point of this case.
The PRC is required to comply, because such a gross violation can mean PRC's
expulsion from the WTO. If anything I think we should treat Baidu Baike as
an enemy, and drop any pretenses or hopes that the PRC will ever willingly
unblock zh.
Natalinasmpf