[WikiEN-l] BBC blog on WSJ study

[Bod Notbod]

On Fri, Nov 27, 2009 at 7:08 PM, Ray Saintonge <saintonge at telus.net> wrote:

> Certain copyright issues are also at the heart of the problem, notably
> that you can't copyright information.  You can copyright expression, but
> Wikipedians are quite happy to not use the actual wording of news
> reports.

I wonder how true that is, though. I'm sure people on Wikinews do
sometimes cut 'n' paste, but I feel there's more to it than that.

It actually takes quite a bit of work to read an entire article and
process it in your mind then put out a purely self-made version. And,
let's take the *most* optimistic view of editors: you're still
reporting a report. Some guy went out there, said what he saw, got
money for it, funded by advertising.

At best, all we can do is say "this guy saw what he saw and now I'm
repeating it".

Don't misunderstand me... I'm still on Wikipedia/Wikinews's side on
this. But that's as a reader and editor, not as someone running a
business.

Surely it must be true to say that Wikinews would be nothing without
paid journalists from whom we aggregate content?