[Foundation-l] Texts deleted on French Wikisource

[Gerard Meijssen]

Hoi,
The notion that French is spoken only in France is factually wrong.
Consequently the claim that French literature targets the French public is
arguably wrong as well. Either French is a world language or it is only
spoken by the French public, you cannot have it both ways.

Not only in my opinion is French a world language.
Thanks,
       GerardM

On 2 June 2010 14:43, Yann Forget <yannfo at gmail.com> wrote:

> Hello,
>
> In the beginning of March 2010, a few hundreds files have been deleted
> on the French Wikisource following a request from Gallimard, a leading
> French publisher. [1] The Wikimedia Foundation received a request from
> Editions Gallimard to takedown content from the French Wikisource.
> This request is based on Editions Gallimard's claim that "Wikisource
> content in the French language targets the French public, and
> therefore, under French conflict of laws principles, the copyright law
> of France applies to this content." They were deleted, according to
> Mike Godwin, following the Online Copyright Infringement Liability
> Limitation Act [2]. These texts are from a dozen authors, and some are
> even in the public domain in France.
>
> In addition, I receive a personal letter, as "the main editor" of
> these texts, according to Gallimard. We didn't receive any information
> from the Wikimedia Foundation, and I know the details only because I
> have been personally involved.
>
> I understand that there is a 15 business days delay after which the
> material "must be put back up" (cf. Wikipedia) if Gallimard does not
> file a lawsuit. Now three months later, we didn't receive any
> information from the Foundation about this, and the texts are still
> deleted. Many contributors are obviously not very happy, and feel that
> the Foundation submitted to the pressure of a commercial publisher.
> Comparing with the National Portrait Gallery affair on Commons, it
> looks like a double standard was applied.
>
> Just a few days before these texts were deleted, I asked Cary what was
> the official opinion of Wikimedia Foundation about texts which are in
> the public domain in USA, but not in France. I was told that "the
> community is entitled to decide by itself".
>
> Comments?
>
> Regards,
>
> Yann
>
> [1]
> http://fr.wikisource.org/wiki/Wikisource:Demande_des_%C3%A9ditions_Gallimard_du_15_f%C3%A9vrier_2010
> [2]
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Online_Copyright_Infringement_Liability_Limitation_Act
>
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