[Foundation-l] Wikisource Licence Terms

Wed Nov 23 01:14:01 UTC 2005

I would completely agree with you on that. The simple exemple of the UN 
texts shows that there is enough space for concurrent interpretations 
and that we need a good basis to discuss and get an evolving, but 
reasonable policy.

David Newton wrote:
> As has become apparent recently there is considerable confusion
> possible when reading the text of the Wikisource copyright page at
> [[Wikisource: Copyright]]. It is not clear whether only GFDL works,
> GFDL-compatible works and public domain works can be posted at the
> site, or whether any licence that allows relatively free reproduction
> can be used. We need this situation cleared up. I am therefore
> proposing to re-write the offending bits of the Wikisource copyright
> page to remove the ambiguity.
> 
> Since this is a serious step for the project I thought it sensible to
> post here and see what the level of agreement is with what I am
> proposing to do. I will also post an equivalent message to the
> Scriptorium.
> 
> What I am proposing to do is to re-word the licensing page to make it
> clear that the documents themselves are licensed separately from the
> content of the site. That means that things on talk pages, the
> Scriptorium, Community Portal and similar will be under the GFDL as
> per Wikipedia. However, the documents themselves will be licensed
> according to conditions appropriate to their source. That means that
> works that are public domain in the United States should be noted as
> such with a template at the top or bottom of the page, whichever is
> felt most appropriate. It means that works that carry different
> licensing conditions from the GFDL and that have licences that are
> incompatible with the GFDL can be noted as such.
> 
> Such a step will open up Wikisource to a large number of possibilities
> of hosting that are currently not open and it will also clear up a
> considerable amount of confusion. What do you think?
> 
> David Newton
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