[Foundation-l] Blackout at Italian Wikipedia - What exactly does the proposed law say?

[Jussi-Ville Heiskanen]

On Thu, Oct 6, 2011 at 3:11 AM, Andreas Kolbe <jayen466 at yahoo.com> wrote:
> --- On Wed, 5/10/11, Andrea Zanni <zanni.andrea84 at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> From: Andrea Zanni <zanni.andrea84 at gmail.com>
> Subject: Re: [Foundation-l] Blackout at Italian Wikipedia - What exactly does the proposed law say?
> To: "Wikimedia Foundation Mailing List" <foundation-l at lists.wikimedia.org>
> Date: Wednesday, 5 October, 2011, 22:44
>
>
>> Given that a Wikipedia biography is usually the first google hit to come up for a name, it
>> doesn't actually strike me as *that* ludicrous. What Wikipedia writes about a person reaches
>> more readers today than a New York Times article. As someone else mentioned recently,
>> there is a responsibility that comes with that kind of reach. Saying that "we don't
>> necessarily stand behind what our article says about you the way a newspaper publisher
>> would stand behind an article of theirs" is frankly little consolation to an aggrieved BLP
>> subject.
>
> Moreover, some people in Italy are quite easy in sueing:
> Wikimedia Italy is still on trial (in the person of her president)
> beacuse someone
> wrote something "bad" on the owners of a political newspaper. (and
> they asked us 20 million dollars...).
>
> Well, that *is* nuts. Moreover, the 48-hour time period and potential €12,000 fine in the
> proposed law are nuts (pity the blogger who has gone on a 2-week holiday). Yet that
> €12,000 fine is not mentioned in the it:WP statement. Being forced to include a statement
> in an article is less of an issue to me than the prospect of being fined €12,000 if it isn't done
> in time. *That* is where the chilling effect comes from, yet the it:WP statement doesn't
> mention it.

Okay. You convinced me totally. That is beyond the pale. I suppose
cool heads like we have here up north, just couldn't comprehend
mediterranean "think with your balls, not your head, because they will
be cooler" thinking. All support to the Italian strike, if the law was
that moronic.




-- 
--
Jussi-Ville Heiskanen, ~ [[User:Cimon Avaro]]