[Foundation-l] GLAM-WIKI report

[Tim Starling]

Brianna Laugher wrote:
> The suggestion was also made that Wikimedia should revisit its
> restriction on NC material, and it was written down too, although I
> think I was thinking the same thing as every other Wikimedian in the
> room...

For Wikimedia I think the lack of non-commercial material is
relatively arbitrary.

For open source software development, developers have it in their
interests to allow commercial use since they usually end up getting
paid by the companies that use their free software. And for the GLAM
sector, a non-commercial restriction makes sense because they want to
encourage dissemination in the cultural sphere, while recovering some
costs from the commercial sphere, which is more able to afford it and
has a sense of reciprocity or corporate social responsibility.

Wikimedia's justifications seem weaker to me. We say that commercial
dissemination will aid our mission, but so far, such commercial use
has been underdeveloped. The only kind of commercial reuse that is
fully developed is the thousands of out-of-date mirrors run by SEO
professionals, who make little contribution to our wider goals.

But I think there is a value in consistency. Now that we have this
vast encyclopedia illustrated with images that are free for commercial
use, it would be a pity to destroy that potential benefit by adding a
handful of images that are non-commercial only, with commercial use to
be negotiated directly with the institution. That would create a
landmine for commercial reusers and would discourage them
disproportionately.

So I think we should continue to negotiate with our content sources to
have them release their content without a non-commercial restriction.
And I think we should try to be more effective at encouraging
commercial use which supports their goals and ours, so that we have a
better answer to the question when it inevitably comes up.

-- Tim Starling