[Foundation-l] Fair Use and Registered Trademarks

Mon Jul 18 20:14:30 UTC 2005

Robert Scott Horning wrote:

> To this end, in regards to the 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica, I have 
> created a specific disclaimer for this project:
>
> http://wikisource.org/wiki/1911_Encyclop%C3%A6dia_Britannica%3AProject_Disclaimer 
>
>
> I feel a little awkward trying to write such a disclaimer, but I think 
> it covers most of the points listed above.  The one thing that I may 
> be going over the top on is claiming Wikimedia Foundation liability on 
> trademark infringement.  It is not my intention to speak for the 
> board, but rather note that legal issues about Wikimedia content 
> should involve the board at some point.  What mechanism the board 
> wants to have on that issue is beyond my call.
>
> I'm certainly not going to make it easy for a lawyer to file a lawsuit 
> against me, but at the same time I do want somebody to know that there 
> is an organization behind these websites, and we take trademark 
> infringement seriously... wheither we as a community inadvertantly do 
> it or it is done against us.  It is also not our intention to pretend 
> we are something that we are not.

The one subtle change that I would make is to have "Reference to the 
trademark" rather than "Use of the trademark".  We aren't really "using" 
the trademark.

Ec