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

[Andre Engels]

2007/2/9, Andrew Gray <shimgray at gmail.com>:
>
> On 09/02/07, Andrew Gray <shimgray at gmail.com> wrote:
> > (I am unsure what that translated to in practice - I'm trying to dig
> > up the reports, but suspect it was something along the lines of "you
> > can only sue for the first couple of months of infringing use")
>
> Aha, found it. Reported in the Times, Dec.02 1996:
>
> "The owner of copyright in films who was aware that one of its
> licensees had plans to broadcast the films outside the area specified
> in the licence agreement and had subsequently done so, but did not
> complain or take any other action to stop them, had acquiesced and was
> therefore not entitled to claim an infringement of copyright."
>

I do not have the actual judgement, but it seems to me from this quote that
the effect of the acquiescence was not equivalent to the material being in
the public domain. Only the given copyright infringement ceased to be
enforceable. If someone else took the same films, or even if the licensee
were to use them in a way covered neither by his original license nor by the
acquiesced-to announcement, normal copyright protection would again prevail.
For the OrphanWiki this would mean that if one could make a sufficiently
strong case that the work's owner had known about te copyright infringement
for a certain amount of time without trying to take action, it could
afterward remain on the OrphanWiki, but there is no reason to assume that
copyright protection would be diminished or removed beyond that.

-- 
Andre Engels, andreengels at gmail.com
ICQ: 6260644  --  Skype: a_engels