[WikiEN-l] Removing personal information

Mon Oct 6 17:27:41 UTC 2003

From: "Stevertigo" <utilitymuffinresearch2 at yahoo.com>

> What I mean is: since WP enables the publishing of
> stuff --
> and then says "this user who did the posting is
> responsible, for any infringement not us" (forgeting
> about shielding the user for now) -- is WP under some
> obligation to keep its ip logs just in case, to
> deflect liability?  If these are insufficient-- ( in
> the case that some violators may use decent enough
> proxies) -- might a court say that WP (since its in
> the business of "publishing") must also be in the
> business of ID-ing its "users" -- and not simply give
> them free reign to pubish? 
> 
There is an argument that because of the GFDL that 
requires WP to maintain any information that can
establish the identity of contributors.  The GFDL
is worthless if it is impossible to confirm that the
contributions being made by WP are original and
without infringing material.  How can one do that
without getting a statement from the contributor
that the materials are not copied from someone
else (people working at VfD/copyvio try to do
this, but they can only really check for online
copying, there are tonnes of text out there that
are not searchable over the internet but still 
copyright).

Thus the ip logs can help to establish and confirm
identity.

I doubt that a court could order WP to register
its users. There is a strong freedom of speech
argument there. Also US copyright law specifically
protects pseudonymous authorship (though
it is not tied to the death of the individual,
it is actually the shortest copyright period
available, on of the reasons I don't post under
my full name).

> might WP run into an eventuality where its existence
> as a "Wiki" is a simple contradiction to the
> responsibilities demanded by US legal liability?

Someone will analyze it and figure out some way
to fit it in, but my intuitive response is that a 
wiki is really a pass through that goes back to
the contributor/user. How can it be otherwise?

Of course the more institutionalized a wiki gets
the more it takes on the persona of the institution.
However it is not like a wiki used on an intranet,
it is a free and open wiki that anyone can contribute
to (even anonymously). For this reason it would
seem it could never become a shield.

All the more reason to warn users of their
potential liability if they post anything wrong.

Of course if someone has a good reason to take
off material about themselves I think that serious
consideration should be done to do so, but even
deleted pages are reviewable by sysops, so everything
is preserved and their is no destruction of evidence.

Alex756