[Foundation-l] Public domain Mickey Mouse. At last.

[Orionist]

>
> I'm not sure a consenus of
> wikimedians is the best way to make legal decisions anyway, shouldn't we
> consult an expert?


In a perfect world we'd have a legal department that vets each and every
image uploaded to Commons. The thing is, we'd need at least 200 lawyers from
all around the world, each one an expert in their country's copyright law,
and ready to work overtime. Even then, a legal expert's opinion is no
guarantee that a court will go the same way in case of a lawsuit.

...a deletion discussion among
> non-professionals is not the proper way to determine the law.


Neither is the opinion of a legal expert: That's the job of the courts.
Commons editors are only trying to weed out copyright infringements without
falling for copyfraud. They use their best judgement based on the text of
law and precedent cases, with the intention of protecting the end user as
much as possible. That, however, doesn't mean they offer a guarantee. The
end users are still responsible for their use of Commons' files and should
seek legal advice on their own.

If non-professional Commons editors shouldn't be deciding which images are
PD, then they shouldn't be deciding which images are copyrighted either, and
not one image should be deleted whatever evidence of its copyrighted status
comes up. I don't think that's acceptable to anyone here.

Regards,
--
Orionist



On Sun, Oct 23, 2011 at 4:12 PM, Thomas Dalton <thomas.dalton at gmail.com>wrote:

> I agree. There is no way a derivative work being PD invalidates the
> underlying copyright. That would be ridiculous. It would undermine the
> whole
> concept of derivative works.
>
> The deletion discussion on commons seems to have been closed prematurely.
> There was hardly any discussion at all. I'm not sure a consenus of
> wikimedians is the best way to make legal decisions anyway, shouldn't we
> consult an expert?
> On Oct 23, 2011 2:01 AM, "Anthony" <wikimail at inbox.org> wrote:
>
> > On Sat, Oct 22, 2011 at 8:35 PM, Anthony <wikimail at inbox.org> wrote:
> > > On Sat, Oct 22, 2011 at 8:29 PM, David Gerard <dgerard at gmail.com>
> wrote:
> > >> On 23 October 2011 01:21, Anthony <wikimail at inbox.org> wrote:
> > >>
> > >>> On what grounds is it out of copyright?  Doesn't a derivative work
> > >>> carry (at least) two copyrights, the one on the original work, and
> the
> > >>> one on the derivative (which "extends only to the material
> contributed
> > >>> by the author of such work, as distinguished from the preexisting
> > >>> material employed in the work")?
> > >>
> > >>
> > >> Read the deletion discussion.
> > >
> > > I read the deletion discussion before I posted that.  It does not
> > > address the copyright on the original work (Steamboat Willie), only
> > > the copyright on the derivative work.
> > >
> > Just found a cite.  Nope, the underlying work is still copyright, and
> > a copy of the poster infringes on the underlying work.  See Filmvideo
> > Releasing Corp. vs David R. Hastings II:
> >
> > "The principal question on this appeal is whether a licensed,
> > derivative, copyrighted work and the underlying copyrighted matter
> > which it incorporates both fall into the public domain where the
> > underlying copyright has been renewed but the derivative copyright has
> > not. We agree with the Ninth Circuit, Russell v. Price, 612 F.2d 1123,
> > 1126-29 (9th Cir. 1979), cert. denied, 446 U.S. 952 , 100 S.Ct. 2919,
> > 64 L.Ed.2d 809 (1980), that the answer is "No"."
> >
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