[Python-legal-sig] Wikipedia / CLA

[anatoly techtonik]

On Thu, Aug 15, 2013 at 11:50 AM, Antoine Pitrou <solipsis at pitrou.net> wrote:
> On Thu, 15 Aug 2013 10:53:59 +1000
> Ben Finney <ben+python at benfinney.id.au> wrote:
>> Jesse Noller <jnoller at gmail.com> writes:
>>
>> > On May 1, 2013, at 8:44 AM, anatoly techtonik <techtonik at gmail.com> wrote:
>> >
>> > > Wikipedia doesn't require to sign up a CLA to edit pages. Is CLA
>> > > required to send and accept edits for Python documentation? Why?
>> >
>> > We are not Wikipedia.
>>
>> True, but both Wikimedia Foundation and Python Software Foundation
>> accept contributions from third parties, under a free-software license,
>> for redistribution to others. It seems a salient comparison for this
>> discussion.
>>
>> So what is the difference that means Wikimedia Foundation do not ask for
>> additional agreement documents, while PSF do ask for additional
>> agreement documents from the contributor?
>
> The Wikimedia Foundation (with the FSF's complicity) showed how much
> they respected their contributors when they switched all content from
> GFDL to BY-SA without even asking them, and without them having signed
> a CLA.
>
> I don't think that's a very good example, unless you wanted to argue
> that an organization doesn't need a CLA to act like a jerk.

This "Wikimedia Foundation's Way" explains it all:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:AxelBoldt/Let's_switch_to_CC-BY-SA

And this is a letter regarding "breach of trust" from FSF:
https://www.fsf.org/blogs/licensing/2008-12-fdl-open-letter

I don't see anything wrong. IMO less than 0.1% of Wikipedia authors cared
about GFDL before and even less care about GFDL vs CC-BY-SA
differences. What made people sad is that they were not asked. But from
technical point of view there are less than 0.01% who disagree with the
CC-BY-SA choice, so it is a good move in the end. In addition CC-BY-SA
can not be escaped anymore, so technically they've just fixed a bug.
--
anatoly t.