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| - Hey Dan, I'm just wondering what the effect on changing from the GFDL to the CCL will have on the articles ported from Wikipedia (Gene Roddenberry for one, and most of the [[Memory Alpha:]] pages), since they have to use use the GFDL. We already have been tagged slightly, and the terms of using Wikipedia articles state that the GFDL must be stated and linked to: Wikipedia's copyright, the GNU Free Documentation License (GFDL) requires that any derivative of works from Wikipedia must be released under that same license, must state that it is released under that license, and must acknowledge the main authors (which can be accomplished with a link back to Wikipedia's article). This does not apply to material that was released into the public domain, to material whose authors have given permission, and to use that can be defended as fair use. -- DarkHorizon 15:10, 15 Jan 2004 (PST) Certainly a valid question. I've already been in contact with a couple of people who are fairly heavily involved with Wikipedia; in fact, it was one of them (User:Eloquence) who suggested that we adopt a somewhat less-restrictive license. The specific reason Harry and I decided to go with this change is because the GFDL is a bit too restrictive concerning the display of images -- under the strictly interpreted terms of the license, all images that are displayed on Memory Alpha must be released under the GFDL. There's a confusing potential loophole concerning whether images represent a "combination" or an "aggregation" of works in Memory Alpha when displayed in an article, but it'd be tough to argue if worse came to worst. Basically, this left us a bit too vulnerable, so we decided to adapt a more open license that we can use under our own terms. The best part about this new license is that it is actually more free than the GFDL itself in most respects (aside from the non-commercial exclusion for ours), and so we're technically okay because we're fulfilling the terms of the GFDL (including the available link to the terms of the GFDL). At worst, we'll have to add some text to these pages noting that the specific page(s) are under the terms of the GFDL; however, it's my understanding that that's not necessary. The GFDL states: This License is a kind of "copyleft", which means that derivative works of the document must themselves be free in the same sense. [1] Also, in section seven it says: A compilation of the Document or its derivatives with other separate and independent documents or works, in or on a volume of a storage or distribution medium, is called an "aggregate" if the copyright resulting from the compilation is not used to limit the legal rights of the compilation's users beyond what the individual works permit. Of course, I'm not a lawyer (though I played one in high school, in the Model UN International Court of Justice! ). There may be circumstances and permutations that we haven't accounted for, but I don't think we've got much to worry about. Also, aside from Gene Roddenberry, the only Wikipedia content we've copied is documentation and policies, which for the most part are technically part of the MediaWiki software. I'm actually also on the MediaWiki mailing list and will be working with a couple of others to develop a standardized set of "help" pages that can be distributed with the software and uploaded to the wikis, making it easier to find the necessary documentation. Whew, this has been a long post, hasn't it? -- MinutiaeMan 06:42, 16 Jan 2004 (PST)
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