[WikiEN-l] Citizendium to launch this week

[Matthew Woodcraft]

David Gerard wrote:
> On 26/03/07, Matthew Woodcraft wrote:
>> Vee wrote:
>>> I can't believe they've gone 'live' without even sorting out basic copyright
>>> issues... CZ is a joke.

>> It isn't so terribly shocking. After all, Wikipedia did the same.

> Eh? I understood Wikipedia started with GFDL because Nupedia did.

Certainly it was said to be GFDL from the beginning.

But there was a good deal of discussion and disagreement during the
first year or so about just what this meant, including:

- whether authors were transferring their copyright to Bomis (LMS
   thought so, IIRC);

- whether Bomis could change the licence to something else if it wished;

- whether Wikipedia was in fact satisfying its obligations under the
   GFDL (to provide transparent copies, attribution, and so forth);

- whether each page was a separate work under the GFDL;

- whether there was, or should be, an invariant section on every page
   containing a link back to Wikipedia.

The point is that a new, small project can in practice get away with
fudging these issues for a while.

-M-