[Wikipedia-l] Re: no need to remove the article nor the chapter

[Gregory Maxwell]

On Sun, 20 Mar 2005 10:35:38 +0100, Karl Eichwalder <ke at gnu.franken.de> wrote:
> As long as someone can claim the additional paragraphs are "derived"
> from the copyvio, you would better remove the additional paragraphs as
> early as possible.

Right.   Keeping all changes in a publicly accessible version control
system is beyond fantastic, but it's also a liability.

Elseware the past expansive definition of derived works has been
tolerable largely because normal writing models don't have so much
copyvio risk, and the lack of (open) version control makes proving a
transitory risk near impossible.

I think I would have a good chance, equipped with a video like the
'heavy metal umlat', of convincing a court in the US that years of
wikipedia contributions on an article are the derived works of a
couple of paragraphs of copyvio that spent a few months in the text
early on and then were surgically removed.

I agree that this makes no sense, but thats what intellectual property
law has become in the US.  At wikipedia we have two additional
complicating factors as well, a public history that makes making the
case easy, and a court system which is likely to view the work of
wikipedia as unimportant compared to the properties of, say, corbis
because we don't charge for it, but they charge for their content.