[Foundation-l] Re: Copyright and local liability (was: Emily Dickinson poems)

Tue Jun 7 00:55:48 UTC 2005

Jimmy:
> Soufron wrote:
> 
>>>Don't you folks feel like we're getting more and more stuff like this 
>>>these days ? 
> 
> 
> Yes, I think we are.
> 
> The kind of case that I personally find most annoying are claims from
> museums where the art underlying the photo has clearly been in the
> public domain for a very long time.  If I get one more like that, I'm
> going to go on a rampage and make a lot of noise about it.

If German copyright law or precedent made such reproductions 
copyrightable, would the German Wikipedia have to remove them? Would the 
Commons?

Are we increasing the risk of such a situation arising with every new 
chapter and every new server cluster around the planet, particularly 
with servers which are not mere proxies? I would prefer to see all 
copyright liability directed at Wikimedia USA and to be able to defer 
solely to US precedent in cases like this. But perhaps it's already too 
late for that and we're headed for a global legal nightmare.

Erik