[Wikipedia-l] Stallman on fair use

[Lee Pilich]

At 14:25 15/06/2003 -0700, Axel wrote:
>--- Lee Pilich <pilich at btopenworld.com> wrote:
>
> > I still think getting rid of all instances of fair use is a bad idea,
> > though.
>
>I don't think anybody has argued for that.

I suspected not, but it didn't seem clear - nobody (as far as I could tell) 
had said exactly how a distinction was to be drawn between "acceptable" and 
"unacceptable" fair use.

> > I don't see how we can practically allow some kinds of fair use
> > but not others
>
>Maybe we can. How about if we give up our current distinction between
>images and text and require a single confirmation whenever people
>upload material to Wikipedia:
>
>   By uploading material to Wikipedia, you certify that either
>      * the material is in the public domain, or
>      * the copyright owner of the material releases it under GFDL, or
>      * the material can be used under the [[fair use]] doctrine and
>        such fair use will likely extend to all third party users of
>        Wikipedia
>
>(maybe even with three checkboxes.)

That would work I guess. If we want to discourage the use of fair use 
materials that might not be reusable (which seems a reasonable attitude), 
then this seems a good way of going about it - certainly better than what 
we have at present where the possibilty of fair use isn't mentioned at all 
(unless I'm missing something).

The only thing is, of course, the meaning of "such fair use will likely 
extend to all third party users of Wikipedia" is very much open to 
interpretation (we don't know who these third party users will be, after 
all), and probably won't mean very much to most users. Then again, I don't 
suppose the GFDL means very much to most users, and a certain degree of 
vagueness is probably unavoidable.

This is perhaps a little off-topic, but is there a quick and easy 
explanation of why the Wikipedia is released under the GFDL and not into 
the public domain? Somebody asked me the other day, and I realised that I 
didn't actually know.

Apologies if I seemed a bit on the hysterical side earlier - I worry about 
this sort of stuff.
Lee (Camembert)