[Foundation-l] Offering Wikibooks content for sale

Wed Jul 5 17:28:04 UTC 2006

Anthony wrote:

>On 7/5/06, Robert Scott Horning <robert_horning at netzero.net> wrote:
>  
>
>>My impression is that using the title of the book (Wikijunior Big Cats)
>>is an acceptable use of trademarks, but perhaps I'm wrong.  How this
>>sort of trademark applies to GFDL'd content is untested legally.
>>    
>>
>
>
>The GFDL is rather explicit with this, at least with regard to
>derivative works.  Derivatives are supposed to "Use in the Title Page
>(and on the covers, if any) a title distinct from that of the
>Document, and from those of previous versions (which should, if there
>were any, be listed in the History section of the Document)."
>Verbatim copies would presumably have the same title, but I suppose
>the GFDL doesn't explicitly state this.
>
>However, [[Wikibooks:Copyrights]] states that "You may use the same
>title as the Wikibooks book and/or module(s) but trademark law
>prevents you from advertising the Wikibooks or Wikimedia names without
>our written permission."
>
>Anthony
>  
>
Although in this case it is the verbatim copy of a document, not a 
derivitive document that merely uses some of the content of the previous 
document.  Any changes are merely formatting and are not related to the 
content of the document.

For some (I guess IANAL) advise you can go to [[Wikipedia: Verbatim 
copying]] that seems to give the exact opposite advise as to what you 
are suggesting here.  Indeed it says that you *MUST NOT* change the 
title of the document (i.e.Wikijunior Big Cats).  So which bit of advise 
is correct here?

This would stop you from claiming that you have created a book like 
"Anthony's Big Cats" when in fact it really is a Wikijunior book that 
you have changed the title of and republished as if you created it in 
the first place, even if you have small print somewhere that says 
otherwise buried near the back page of the book.

I can see all kinds of problems either way in terms of both using 
trademarks and changing titles of books that you republish.  It is 
precisely in this situation where copyleft law is undefined and why this 
is a totally new beast from traditional copyright law and how it would 
be treated if it were a publication from a traditional publisher who 
doesn't give copyleft permissions.  Again, it is an issue of how the WMF 
wants to treat their trademarks, and how anal they want to get about 
protecting those trademarks.

This does have a small impact on even page names, and I see a hard-nosed 
view of protecting trademarks running straight into the GFDL like a 
brick wall, especially for individual project names as trademarks.

-- 
Robert Scott Horning