Hello wikipeople! How can we ever be sure, that those people who (often anonymously) write new articles for wikipedia didn't just copy'n'paste it from another site? I think we can't. Take for example http://de.wikipedia.com/wiki.cgi?Gopher http://www.uni-stuttgart.de/rus/42/internet/gopher.html and chapter 2.6 here: http://www.fitug.de/bildung/allgem/inetein2.html Is it all from the same author? Or is the wikipedia article just a ('stolen') copy? Or the copy of a revised (but 'stolen') copy? Or is the source under the GNU Free Documentation License? How can we be sure about that? I think nobody wants that just authors with prooved identities (who are responsible for their writing) are allowed to contribute to wikipedia. But are we on the save side if we just close our eyes and wait for people to come and force us to delete articles that many people have put much work in, but that are based on their text? Sorry for my bad English, I'm German. If you don't understand what I'm talking about I'll try my best to make it clearer. Bye, Kurt

Kurt Jansson wrote: We can't be certain. But it's my butt on the line, legally speaking, and I think that under the DMCA as a provider of Internet services, my obligation only extends so far as to take down material when there is a complaint. I'm actually much more proactive than that, in that we take down anything for which there is a suspicion. This is partly because I believe that it is wrong for us to take materials. Opinions on copyright differ, but even those who are opposed to the legal situation with copyrights will tend to agree that taking people's work without appropriate permission and credit is unethical, or at least unprofessional. Your English is at least as good as many Americans on Usenet, my friend. :-) Anyhow, our policy should be that whenever we suspect that something has been used without appropriate permission, we should get rid of it ASAP. This is partly to save me from legal troubles, but more importantly, it should be a point of pride with us that we created the encyclopedia from scratch, ourselves, using only our own minds, or the work of people who gave permission for us to use it. -- ********************************************************************* *"The rifle itself has no moral stature, since it has no will of its* * own. Naturally, it may be used by evil men for evil purposes, but * * there are more good men than evil, and while the latter cannot be * * pursuaded to the path of righteousness by propaganda, they can * * certainly be corrected by good men with rifles." -Jeff Cooper * ********************************************************************

"Laura T." &lt;ldb64(a)midwest.net&gt; writes: Yes. It should be noted though that (print) publishers often retain exclusive rights to articles/books published through them. One should always check the specific agreement or contract. See <URL:http://mathworld.wolfram.com/authors_note.html> for one horror story. I think web publishers are less notorious about this. I'm quite positive you're not the first/only woman working on Wikipedia. They are definitely in the minority, though. Let's hope this situation gets better over time. This seems part of the reason -- so every new female on board helps double. Enough speculatin' ... -- Robbe

On Mon, 14 Jan 2002, Jimmy Wales wrote: Let's not forget JHK, --April, and Dreamyshade, to name three of the more hard-working females. There are quite a few others, too. Wikipedia is definitely male-dominated, though, which I agree is regrettable. Larry