SOPA and a strike, Jimbo requests comments Options

[Cla68]

SOPA has earned the dubious honor of facilitating Internet censorship in the name of fighting online infringement. The Wikimedia Foundation opposed that legislation, but we should be clear that Wikimedia has an equally strong commitment against copyright violations. The Wikimedia community, which has developed an unparalleled expertise in intellectual property law, spends untold hours ensuring that our sites are free of infringing content. In a community that embraces freely-licensed information, there is no room for copyright abuses.

Bullshit. Commons contains thousands of images snatched from Flickr, Photobucket, and Picasa,
usually taken with no attempt to verify ownership or permissions. I even know which admins
are doing this, and have been doing this for years.

If Geoff really was so smart, he wouldn't work for Jimbo's Folly.

Whenever someone from corporate management, any corporate management, tries to blow sunshine up everyone's patooty with rosy, general statements like this, the way to respond is asking for specifics: Exactly what measures does the WMF take to ensure there are no copyright violations in its projects? Is the number of violations found each year measured and recorded? If so, what are the numbers per year? Is copyright violation oversight incorporated into the WMF's 5-year plan? If not, why not? How much does the WMF spend each year on copyright infringement oversight? How many personnel are assigned to the issue? Are their performance evaluations based on their performance in this area? and so on...

[TungstenCarbide]

If Geoff really was so smart, he wouldn't work for Jimbo's Folly.

Lawyers advocate for their client, whoever that client is. Advocating for a questionable client doesn't make a lawyer bad or dumb.

Geoff's blog post makes Godwin look like a child by comparison - he's a smart cookie.

This post has been edited by TungstenCarbide: Wed 14th December 2011, 10:54pm

[lilburne]

Whenever someone from corporate management, any corporate management, tries to blow sunshine up everyone's patooty with rosy, general statements like this, the way to respond is asking for specifics: Exactly what measures does the WMF take to ensure there are no copyright violations in its projects? Is the number of violations found each year measured and recorded? If so, what are the numbers per year? Is copyright violation oversight incorporated into the WMF's 5-year plan? If not, why not? How much does the WMF spend each year on copyright infringement oversight? How many personnel are assigned to the issue? Are their performance evaluations based on their performance in this area? and so on...

Don't be silly. Web 2.0 companies are almost all anti-copyright and have an absolute contempt for content creators. Copyright is just nasty gunk in the money making machine. It means that you have to have actual people dealing with infringement cases, you need lawyers, and all sorts of arrangements that get in the way of making money.

[SB_Johnny]

Restored: Dow Lohnes.

[thekohser]

Restored: Dow Lohnes.

You restored a G11 "blatant advertising: spam" article? When should we expect your AN/I hearing?

[Michaeldsuarez]

Restored: Dow Lohnes.

You restored a G11 "blatant advertising: spam" article? When should we expect your AN/I hearing?

http://www.google.com/search?tbm=nws&q=%22dow+lohnes%22

http://www.google.com/search?tbs=ar%3A1&tb...22dow+lohnes%22

There should be enough sources to establish notability in the eyes of Wikipedians.

[thekohser]

Restored: Dow Lohnes.

You restored a G11 "blatant advertising: spam" article? When should we expect your AN/I hearing?

http://www.google.com/search?tbm=nws&q=%22dow+lohnes%22

http://www.google.com/search?tbs=ar%3A1&tb...22dow+lohnes%22

There should be enough sources to establish notability in the eyes of Wikipedians.

These are all "passing mentions" of the firm by independent sources, or press releases by the firm. None provide detailed, independent coverage of the firm itself. It is therefore non-notable. Strong delete.

(Wow, I'm getting good at acting like an idiotic Wikipediot, aren't I?)

[carbuncle]

No comment (other than to note that Wehwalt is a lawyer):

Trigger

I believe that we should act sooner. Currently, this proposing is advising us to wait until the bill passes through both Houses of Congress before acting. I believe that this is too risky. If the bill passes through both Houses, then Wikipedia's fate shall be left in the hand of a single individual. Let's send a strong message to Congress and its constituents first. --Michaeldsuarez (talk) 02:42, 15 December 2011 (UTC)

While Geoff doesn't quite come out and say this (he says parts of it, but it's rather buried in his text), it appears that this statute as presently proposed has no applicability to Wikipedia. We are not a foreign site, and we are not an internet search engine. We do not in response to a query list sites elsewhere on the internet; we list our own pages. We don't even have a google option. Accordingly, if we were to strike, we would be striking in sympathy with other sites, rather than because of a direct threat. That would be a bad idea, because then we have lowered the bar for action, which will take place whenever someone can pull in off the net sufficient support (say a verdict goes the wrong way in some criminal trial, or that death penalty is really bad isn't it, or let's go with that old chestnut, social justice).--Wehwalt (talk) 08:46, 15 December 2011 (UTC)

[lilburne]

No comment (other than to note that Wehwalt is a lawyer):

Pretty much as I called it yesterday:

Godwin's replacement speaks:

http://blog.wikimedia.org/2011/12/13/how-s...-and-wikipedia/

Basically SOPA won't affect them at all, they are shilling for Google.

I surmise that it is Wales' and wikipedia's debt to Google that is being called called in.

Jump rabbits, jump.

[EricBarbour]

Just in: a group letter, signed by the high nabobs of the internet, sent to Congress.

Please note that Wales is calling himself "founder of Wikipedia" again.

[thekohser]

Just in: a group letter, signed by the high nabobs of the internet, sent to Congress.

Please note that Wales is calling himself "founder of Wikipedia" again.

I wonder how many of the guys on that list wish they could get with Caterina Fake (who is also on the list)? And why was Gina Bianchini absent from the list? Marc Andreessen was on it, so why not Gina?

[lilburne]

Just in: a group letter, signed by the high nabobs of the internet, sent to Congress.

Please note that Wales is calling himself "founder of Wikipedia" again.

Was it a mistake to get Hurley to sign it:

YouTube’s posting of its copyrighted works, e-mails among the video site’s three primary founders Chad Hurley, Steve Chen and Jawad Karim, demonstrate the debates the trio had over how to handle unauthorized content. The e-mails, from the first year of YouTube’s existence, detail clear concerns and veer to outright indifference among the founders and about how it should handle the issue. For the most part, Hurley is mostly worried about creating ill will among large media companies he hoped would pay “big money” to acquire YouTube.
http://paidcontent.org/article/419-youtube...uggles-over-co/

[SB_Johnny]

Restored: Dow Lohnes.

You restored a G11 "blatant advertising: spam" article? When should we expect your AN/I hearing?

Dunno! Perhaps I'm just way to subtle to draw the fire of the drama queens?

[SB_Johnny]

Anyone know why this doesn't seem to show up?

[Michaeldsuarez]

Anyone know why this doesn't seem to show up?

http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=...oldid=466090904

Fixed by an anon. It's the result of the diff URL you inserted, since that URL contained an equal sign. The equal sign confuses MediaWiki due to the role the equal sign plays in templates.

[Kelly Martin]

Geoff's blog post makes Godwin look like a child by comparison - he's a smart cookie.

Still, being a better lawyer than Godwin isn't saying much, as Godwin was, and is, a piss poor lawyer.

[lilburne]

At bottom, this is a political fight between the overwhelming majority of law-abiding Americans, companies and institutions hurt by rampant piracy versus a small minority of special interests who profit or benefit from the convenience of unfettered piracy, and a small minority of techtopians who politically oppose enforcement of property rights online as a threat to transparency, sharing, freedom of speech and democracy.
http://www.forbes.com/sites/scottcleland/2...ecially-google/

And better yet:

Google is the only public opponent that is an admitted criminal aider-and-abettor of piracy via rogue websites. Remember, in August, Google admitted to knowingly and repeatedly violating Federal criminal laws against the “unsafe and unlawful importation of prescription drugs” via the promotion of rogue websites for years, in a criminal non-prosecution agreement; Google also paid a near record $500m criminal forfeiture penalty.
http://www.forbes.com/sites/scottcleland/2...ially-google/2/

[thekohser]

At bottom, this is a political fight between the overwhelming majority of law-abiding Americans, companies and institutions hurt by rampant piracy versus a small minority of special interests who profit or benefit from the convenience of unfettered piracy, and a small minority of techtopians who politically oppose enforcement of property rights online as a threat to transparency, sharing, freedom of speech and democracy.
http://www.forbes.com/sites/scottcleland/2...ecially-google/

And better yet:

Google is the only public opponent that is an admitted criminal aider-and-abettor of piracy via rogue websites. Remember, in August, Google admitted to knowingly and repeatedly violating Federal criminal laws against the “unsafe and unlawful importation of prescription drugs” via the promotion of rogue websites for years, in a criminal non-prosecution agreement; Google also paid a near record $500m criminal forfeiture penalty.
http://www.forbes.com/sites/scottcleland/2...ially-google/2/

Exactly, Lilburne. Which is why it is generally a safe bet that if the Wikimedia Foundation rallies around some cause in the real world, one is more likely to be choosing the more ethically high-minded path by selecting the path not followed by the WMF. I knew I supported the SOPA legislation the moment Jimbo started yammering dramatically about it.

[Michaeldsuarez]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Vil..._early_2012_RfC

Here's the proposed plan of action.

[GlassBeadGame]

Exactly, Lilburne. Which is why it is generally a safe bet that if the Wikimedia Foundation rallies around some cause in the real world, one is more likely to be choosing the more ethically high-minded path by selecting the path not followed by the WMF. I knew I supported the SOPA legislation the moment Jimbo started yammering dramatically about it.

Kohs suffers from The Dialectics of Wikipedianism as surely as the most foaming-at-the-mouth acolyte policing Mr. Wales' talk page. But don't tell him I said so.