[Wikimedia-l] [Wikimedia Announcements] Wikimedia Foundation Seeks Declaratory Relief in response to Legal Threats from Internet Brands

[Thomas Morton]

Of course; if a member of the local Muslim community put on a fake uniform
for the shop in question, and stood outside handing out leaflets about the
better place... that would be a problem.

This is what IB appear to be alleging.

All of these metaphor, however, are very interesting; but not really utile
in advancing the discussion. We can all think up varying metaphors to
support our points - fortunately courts do not rely on metaphors :)

Tom

On 12 September 2012 12:09, FT2 <ft2.wiki at gmail.com> wrote:

> To tackle both these at once:
>
> *@Deryck Chan, three trivial rebuttals: *
>
>    1. WT's "mission" is stated clearly, "*Wikitravel is a project to create
>    a free, complete, up-to-date and reliable world-wide travel guide".*  I
>    don't see any of the parties that are proposing or wishing to fork, not
>    endorsing that goal thoroughly. They are merely stating they wish to
> pursue
>    that goal on a different website, under different hosting behavior.
>    2. The TOU you cite state that WT is a "built in collaboration by
>    Wikitravellers from around the globe", not a site "built in
> collaboration
>    with IB". The consensus policy speaks to collaboration between members
> of
>    the public writing, and its pages show that the community did not
> consider
>    IB to have a heightened right to declare itself "the community" or "the
>    party obtaining mandatory agreement" in that collaboration. The initial
>    legal agreement (I gather) says as much.  There is no evidence that
> WT'ers
>    were not willing to collaborate with WT'ers, as the policy states.
> Rather,
>    WT'ers did not like the hosting service IB provided, or felt they could
>    obtain better, which is completely separate.
>    3. At the worst to use your own logic against itself, the departing
>    WTers did indeed use the service while they felt able to follow the TOU
> you
>    cite.  When they realised they did not feel like collaborating, they
> did as
>    it required - indeed demanded or asked they do - namely departed. And
> used
>    their right to reinstate their CC content at the new host of their
>    choosing, following discussion. Others had done so previously, and
>    individuals had departed not en masse due to IB before. No WTer is
> forced
>    to leave, or impeded in freewill.
>
>
> *@Nemo:*
> In fact AFAIK, this is legal
> too<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_billboard>.
>
>
>    1. If a supermarket, for example, unreliably stocks Hallal food,
>    garnering numerous complains over the years, and a person who shops at a
>    competitor contacts or is contacted by members of the local Muslim
>    community, or puts members of the community in touch with that other
>    vendor, on the basis they provide a wider range of Hallal food of the
> types
>    complained about, and at a better price, and as a result a number of
> local
>    community members agree in social discussions that many of them feel
> like
>    switching to shop at the other store. This is completely normal and
> legal,
>    and happens every day.
>    2. A clerk is an employee with a contractual obligation of loyalty.
>    Nobody is suggesting that is the case here, or an IB staffer was
> involved.
>
>
> FT2
>
>
> On Wed, Sep 12, 2012 at 11:42 AM, Deryck Chan <deryckchan at wikimedia.hk
> >wrote:
>
> > One possibility lies within their terms of use:
> > "If you're not interested in our goals, or if you agree with our goals
> but
> > refuse to collaborate, compromise, reach
> > consensus<http://wikitravel.org/en/Wikitravel:Consensus>or make
> > concessions with other Wikitravellers, we ask that you not use this
> > Web service. If you continue to use the service against our wishes, we
> > reserve the right to use whatever means available -- technical or legal
> --
> > to prevent you from disrupting our work together."
> >
> > The goals page (http://wikitravel.org/en/Wikitravel:Goals_and_non-goals)
> > does imply the goal of making Wikitravel the travel guide, not just a
> > travel guide. It is therefore possible to make a case against the
> > fork-enthusiasts, and James in particular because he spent more time on
> > Wikitravel preparing the fork than actually improving Wikitravel, that
> > they're violating the Wikitravel terms of use in some fringe way, which
> is
> > a form of breach of contract.
> >
> >
> On Wed, Sep 12, 2012 at 11:47 AM, Federico Leva (Nemo)
> <nemowiki at gmail.com>wrote:
> >
> > Actually, a fairer representation of what IB claims is that the "members
> > of the public" are free to choose where to drink their beer, but someone
> > with a "Pub X" cap in front of "Pub X" stopped all passing people and
> > regulars that "Pub X" was renovating and to go to the new location "Pub
> Xb"
> > across the street instead. Or that a clerk of "Y bookshop" used the list
> of
> > all its customers and its official letter papers to mail them saying to
> > send their next mail orders to the new postal address of "Yb bookshop".
> > Surely it's not trivial to prove, so to say...
> >
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