[WikiEN-l] Copyright question ("compilation copyright")

[Bryan Derksen]

Guy Chapman aka JzG wrote:
> Oh thank you so much.  And there was I thinking that reproducing
> chunks of stuff directly out of primary sources was forbidden by law,
> and I was just trying to stop us getting sued.

Such as your image uploads
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Chichester-Psalms.jpg
and
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Durufl%C3%A9-Requiem-Kirie.jpg
for example? Those particular pages of sheet music aren't even directly
discussed in the articles they're used in, they're just there for
decoration.

You're taking a radically extreme interpretation of copyright in this
one case of "fancruft", but clearly you realize that Wikipedia's
copyright guidelines actually aren't that stringent or you wouldn't have
uploaded those copyrighted scans.

In the first post of this thread you ended your description of the
situation with:

> Original research?  You decide.
> 
> Copyright?  I think so, but what do I know?
> 
> Fancruft?  Ooooh, tricky :-)
> 
> Guidance appreciated.

Well, you've been getting plenty of guidance; lots of editors have
chimed in to agree that we're highly unlikely to get sued over this and
that it isn't original research in any significant way. But you don't
seem to be appreciating it, you seem to have had your mind made up to
the contrary from the start. So much for "you decide" and "what do I know?"

IMO it's looking more and more like you just wanted to find excuses to
back up the removal of some content you didn't like. You may win
individual battles that way but if you really want to rid Wikipedia as a
whole of fancruft then I'd suggest debating _fancruft itself_ rather
than trying to warp other unrelated policies to the task. You'll just
wind up annoying people and possibly causing unintended side effects.