[WikiEN-l] Copyright situation

[MacGyverMagic/Mgm]

Regardless of where a certain text comes from. It's copyrighted as
soon as the author puts it on paper in a tangible form. Some
governments give up their copyrights over this material, but I think
anything that can be traced to a written source that's not
specifically released under the GFDL or released into the PD by it's
author is off limits to Wikipedia regardless where it comes from.

--Mgm

On 8/18/05, Jimmy Wales <jwales at wikia.com> wrote:
> Roozbeh Pournader wrote:
> > There are problems with that:
> > 1) I believe the Wikimedia Foundation would be breaking Iranian law by
> > distributing those material to Iran, that is, serving its pages to
> > Iranian readers. If it wishes to use the material, it should block
> > Iran from its readership.
> > 2) It's not only the government, and other Iranians may wish to sue
> > the Wikimedia Foundation.
> 
> Well, although I agree with you about the ultimate point here (we should
> not violate Iranian copyrights, even if it is legal to do so in the US),
> I don't find these two arguments to be the most compelling.
> 
> First, if we are breaking Iranian censorship laws, then so be it.  (I
> have no idea, actually, but I would imagine that we are.)   Merely
> "breaking Iranian law" isn't particularly worrisome.
> 
> Second, I think the point is that such use would be legal in the US, and
> if so, I don't see that Iranians would have much of a way to sue us,
> except perhaps in Iran, which would be more or less pointless.
> 
> I think the most compelling argument is that we want to encourage broad
> re-use, including in Iran, and if Iranian copyright laws are more or
> less as sensible as the laws of other places, then we should follow
> those laws, regardless of ongoing disputes between the US and Iran which
> may prevent an actual treaty.
> 
> --Jimbo
> 
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