[Foundation-l] Copyright on Wikisource

[Patrick, Brad]

As American counsel, I would not dare contradict my French counterparts, but the answer is really simple - we will get sued by someone in France, and would subject the Foundation to the possibility of jurisdiction in France.  As our colleagues at Yahoo! Can attest, that is not a good thing.  It is not necessarily always in the interests of the mission of the organization to be aggressive at every turn.  This is one such example.

-Brad 

-----Original Message-----
From: foundation-l-bounces at wikimedia.org [mailto:foundation-l-bounces at wikimedia.org] On Behalf Of Yann Forget
Sent: Tuesday, March 14, 2006 5:25 PM
To: Wikimedia Foundation Mailing List
Subject: [Foundation-l] Copyright on Wikisource

Hi,

The question is asked whether we can host on Wikisource French authors whose works are not yet in the public domain in France, but are in the USA. 
Recently Villy and JB Soufron said we can't. JB Soufron supported the site "les Classiques des sciences sociales" when they host the very same works.
Why not on Wikisource?

However we do host such works in Wikisource for the last two years. Why changing policy now? On all subdomains, we apply US law regarding copyright. 
Why applying different laws, different standards, on different subdomains?

More over, there are hundreds, maybe thousands of web sites hosted in US laws which have these kind of works. AFAIK, there never was any judgement against them. So I don't understand why Wikisource could not host these works.

Further more, I would suggest than Wikisource should be hosted in Canada, so that the benefit of Canadian copyright law could be used.

Regards,

Yann

--
http://www.non-violence.org/ | Site collaboratif sur la non-violence http://www.forget-me.net/ | Alternatives sur le Net http://fr.wikipedia.org/ | Encyclopédie libre _______________________________________________
foundation-l mailing list
foundation-l at wikimedia.org
http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l 

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 
Disclaimer under IRS Circular 230: Unless expressly stated otherwise in this transmission, nothing contained in this message is intended or written to be used, nor may it be relied upon or used, (1) by any taxpayer for the purpose of avoiding penalties that may be imposed on the taxpayer under the Internal Revenue Code of 1986, as amended and/or (2) by any person to support the promotion or marketing of or to recommend any Federal tax transaction(s) or matter(s) addressed in this message. 

If you desire a formal opinion on a particular tax matter for the purpose of avoiding the imposition of any penalties, we will discuss the additional Treasury requirements that must be met and whether it is possible to meet those requirements under the circumstances, as well as the anticipated time and additional fees involved. 
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 
Confidentiality Disclaimer: This e-mail message and any attachments are private communication sent by a law firm, Fowler White Boggs Banker P.A., and may contain confidential, legally privileged information meant solely for the intended recipient. If you are not the intended recipient, you are hereby notified that any use, dissemination, distribution or copying of this communication is strictly prohibited. Please notify the sender immediately by replying to this message, then delete the e-mail and any attachments from your system. Thank you.