[Foundation-l] Clearing up Wikimedia's media licensing policies

[Jon Harald Søby]

On 2/8/07, Gunnar René Øie <gunnarre at nvg.ntnu.no> wrote:
>
> Den 8. feb. 2007 kl. 12.00 skrev Claudio Mastroianni:
>
> >
> > I still can't understand how's been possible to state two
> > constrasting statement in the same letter, as "we accept only free
> > media for all users and purposes" and "we accept fair use, who's not
> > *for all users and purposes*".
>
> Because if the fair use claim is valid and strong enough, then
> commercial re-users can use those fair-use images. Non-commercial and
> "Wikipedia only"? Not so.

Wrong. If the fair use claim is valid and strong enough, then
commercial re-users can use those fair-use images IN THE USA. Please
note that 30-33% - or some 111 million people* - of all first-language
users live outside the US, and thus cannot legally freely reuse this
content. If you count second-language speakers as well, this number
rises to 1.5 BILLION PEOPLE who cannot freely reuse Wikipedia
content.* Is that within our scope? I don't think so.

* If I read the Wikipedia article on English correctly.

-- 
Best regards,
Jon Harald Søby

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