[Wikipedia-l] Re: [Wikitech-l] Re: Contributors list

[Michael Snow]

Magnus Manske wrote:

> IANAL, but IMHO:
> * We already list *all* contributors for the page, in the page 
> history. I'd say that the single click required to see it is 
> comparable to turning a page in a printed version, which is not too 
> much to ask, under any legal system I know of. 

I agree.

> * If you want to find the main contributors, go ahead and use the diff 
> function. By listing them all, we also listed the main editors. 

It has been pointed out (and even illustrated by complaints over McFly's 
choices of whom to credit) that identifying "principal authors" is 
highly subjective at best. I think this requirement is one of the 
silliest things in the GFDL; it might be better if the GFDL just 
required a Modified Version to list the same authors as the Title Page 
of the original Document, plus the authors of the modifications.

> * The fact that noone *ever* demanded to see his/her name on the 
> article page itself indicates to me that there is strong community 
> (=contributor) consensus regarding our current practice in that matter. 

An excellent point. I have a longer argument to present here, but I 
definitely support this approach to the problem.

There are two sections of the GFDL that require author attribution, 
section 4B and section 4I - Title Page and History, respectively. 
History we provide. Because we are not in printed format (yet), Title 
Page should mean "the text near the most prominent appearance of the 
work's title, preceding the beginning of the body of the text." For us, 
I take that to be at the top of the article, where it says something like:

Title of article
 From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.
(the latter part meets the requirement of section 4C, that the Title 
Page state the name of the publisher)

Section 4B allows the authors to release you from the requirement to 
identify five principal authors. Since the title of the article 
functions as the Title Page for GFDL purposes, and because we have 
never, as far as I know, identified principal authors along with the 
title of the article, I would argue that the release applies. Given our 
existing practices, we should take the position that all contributors 
have implicitly released us from the requirement to list authors on the 
Title Page. This would also neatly eliminate the problem of how to 
identify "principal authors".

> If the GFDL really requires that list *on the same document* (can't be 
> really the same page, think printed version again), can't we declare 
> the whole wikipedia as one giant document in itself?

That would be highly counterintuitive. It would also defeat our efforts 
to provide a history section, since those are done by article (and 
before anybody says it, I would not accept Recent changes as adequate 
history for GFDL purposes).

--Michael Snow