[WikiEN-l] Rorschach wars continue

[Gwern Branwen]

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/07/29/technology/internet/29inkblot.html

"Has Wikipedia Created a Rorschach Cheat Sheet?"

' Yet in the last few months, the online encyclopedia Wikipedia has
been engulfed in a furious debate involving psychologists who are
angry that the 10 original Rorschach plates are reproduced online,
along with common responses for each. For them, the Wikipedia page is
the equivalent of posting an answer sheet to next year’s SAT.

They are pitted against the overwhelming majority of Wikipedia’s
users, who share the site’s “free culture” ethos, which opposes the
suppression of information that it is legal to publish. (Because the
Rorschach plates were created nearly 90 years ago, they have lost
their copyright protection in the United States.)'
...
'Trudi Finger, a spokeswoman for Hogrefe & Huber Publishing, the
German company that bought an early publisher of Hermann Rorschach’s
book, said in an e-mail message last week: “We are assessing legal
steps against Wikimedia,” referring to the foundation that runs the
Wikipedia sites.
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“It is therefore unbelievably reckless and even cynical of Wikipedia,”
she said, “to on one hand point out the concerns and dangers voiced by
recognized scientists and important professional associations and on
the other hand — in the same article — publish the test material along
with supposedly ‘expected responses.’ ”

Mike Godwin, the general counsel at Wikimedia, hardly sounded
concerned, saying he “had to laugh a bit” at the legal and ethical
arguments made in the statement from Hogrefe.

Hogrefe licenses a number of companies in the United States to sell
the plates along with interpretative material. One such distributor,
Western Psychological Services, sells the plates themselves for $110
and a larger kit for $185.'

I'm starting to think maybe the Signpost or Foundation should start
soliciting donations from Noam Cohen - he only ever seems to write
based on them...

-- 
gwern