[Wikipedia-l] How about the legal stuff when use of audio on wikipedia

[Jimmy Wales]

I agree with this.  We should be vigilant about making sure that our
fair use really is fair use, i.e. snippets only of copyrighted stuff,
and in the context of criticism and commentary.

Posting a snippet from a song is not materially different from quoting a paragraph
from a book.

We DO want to make sure that the Napster/Gnutella crowd doesn't get the idea that
we're running some kind of underground file swapping service, of course.  I am very
interested in the changing nature of copyright in the face of technological changes,
so I'm glad *other people* are testing the boundaries.  But Wikipedia is not about
copyright activism, it's about making an encyclopedia.

--Jimbo