[Foundation-l] Clearing up Wikimedia's media licensing policies (some important points)

[Claudio Mastroianni]

Il giorno 08/feb/07, alle ore 17:54, Gregory Maxwell ha scritto:

> I am not responding to the rest of your email right now. Not out of
> disrespect but instead because I think we can go much further once one
> misunderstanding is cleared up.
>
> On 2/8/07, Claudio Mastroianni <gattonero a gmail.com> wrote:
>> Let's repeat.
>> Images with permission? Not allowed.
>> Fair use images? Allowed.
>
> Images which would be fairuse/dealing in places where that is
> permitted (which is far more than 4 or 5 countries) plus permission?
> Allowed.

How are you going to obtain it?
There's no way for an italian (or other people from other countries  
which don't have fair use/dealing) to upload an image "under fair use".
The only way to upload these images, is by permission. But permission  
doesn't mean "You have the right to use it in every way you want":  
permission means "You can use it in these precise conditions".
Then: it's impossible for a "image with permission" to be tagged as  
"fair use", cause a tag like this would not respect the deal who  
brought to the permission.

I'm not sure if I've been clear.

The way permission works is:
"Ehy, copyright holder, could we use an image of your *whatever* on  
Wikipedia?"
"Yes, wikipedian. You can use it ON http://it.wikipedia.org, but no  
printing" (or similar)

That's why, if I put a "fair use tag" or permitt another one to use a  
"fair use tag", the deal is broken.

> Wikimedia is an international project. Where the laws of nations
> differ we must deal with a few hard constraints (the laws of where the
> WMF itself legally operates) and otherwise try to strike a balance
> which makes the most sense in most of the world.

That's the point. UK, US, Canada, Australia, New Zealand and  
Singapore are not "the most of the world".
Surely we can't allow copyrighted images, that's why we can't allow  
fair use images.

> Yes, the foundation sees permission as more restrictive than fair
> dealing, because it is for the foundations larger goals.

Making money in the Commonwealth?
Distributing information in the Commonwealth, where fair use images  
are legal?


> Itwiki is
> still able to accept permission, it only must also make an effort to
> make sure these images would be fair use/fair dealing in the places
> where these concepts are codified in law.
>
> Again, what do you lose?

Again, "all media on Wikimedia sites which are used under terms that  
specify non-commercial use only, no-derivatives only, or permission  
for Wikimedia only, need to be be phased out and replaced with media  
that does not have these restrictions"

Gatto Nero