[Foundation-l] foundation-l Digest, Vol 85, Issue 52

[Ray Saintonge]

On 04/25/11 9:33 AM, Joan Goma wrote:
> My interest in a legal opinion is not to know if what they do is legal or
> not.
>
> My interest is to know for example what can they do if I copy the content
> they previously have translated from an English Wikipedia article I have
> previously written.

The translation would give rise to a new copyright *in addition* to 
yours. You would be infringing their copyright. This all assumes that it 
was a human translation.  If it was a machine translation the argument 
could be made that as a mechanical process it lacked the originality 
needed to acquire copyright.

> How do they put a dollar figure on the damages suffered if the income they
> get from that content is obtained from my work they have translated without
> my permission?

In principle damages are evaluated on the basis of market activity. If 
the quantum of damages is the issue the burden of proof is on the person 
seeking damages.

> They only have my permission to publish derived works under same license.
> Then I have the right to copy the derived works back. So any damage they
> could claim is exactly the same damage I suffer for not being able to do
> those copies.
No, because the translation is not identical to the work you produced.  
This still does not account for how different jurisdictions will handle 
the matter. At first glance it would seem more convenient for them to 
have the case heard in a Chinese court and for you in a Spanish court.

Ray

>> Date: Mon, 25 Apr 2011 01:11:25 -0700
>> From: Ray Saintonge<saintonge at telus.net>
>>
>> On 04/24/11 11:45 PM, Joan Goma wrote:
>>> As Ray saids legal prosecution to claim for formal accomplishing of the
>>> copyright terms is expensive and difficult. But the same happens the
>> other
>>> way around.
>>>
>>> I would like to have a clear legal opinion about applying the terms
>> without
>>> going to court.
>>>
>>> They have copied articles from Chinese Wikipedia and translated articles
>>> from English and Japanese Wikipedia so in my opinion their work is a
>>> derivative one and according to the CCSA terms it is also CCSA no mater
>> what
>>> they say.
>>>
>>> What about creating a bot to copy from Baidu all the articles not yet
>>> existing in Chinese wikipedia.
>>>
>>> Could Geoff Brigham provide us his legal advice?
>> Getting a legal opinion that what they are doing is illegal would be the
>> easy part.  The challenge is what can you do with that opinion once you
>> have it.
>>
>> Copyright, and least in common law countries, is primarily an economic
>> right.  In that context courts would be more concerned with the measure
>> of economic damage.  How do you put a dollar figure on the damages
>> suffered when the original authors weren't seeking to make money from
>> it?  Whoever starts the fight still needs to fund prosecuting the
>> battle, and that could be very expensive.
>>
>> Ray
>>
>>