Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Humanities/2008 January 26

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January 26

Using a freely-licensed work inside a work that is not freely-licensed

See my talk page for the full discussion. We are talking about reproducing creative work released under a free content license.

The GFDL says that you can distribute:

• a "modification" of a creative work, as long as it's under the GFDL
• a "collection" of the creative work and other works, as long as it's under the GFDL
• an "aggregate" of the creative work and other works, and the aggregate does not need to be under the GFDL.

The Creative commons licenses say that you can distribute:

• an "adaptation" of a creative work, as long as it's under a CC-compatible license
• a "collection" of the creative work and other works, and the collection does not need to be under a CC-compatible license

But when combining multiple creative works, what's the difference between a "modification", "adaptation", "collection", and "aggregate"? Can you give concrete examples of each? If someone uses my image as an illustration in copyright-restricted coursework, which does that fall under? If someone uses a CC image as an illustration in a GFDL encyclopedia article, which does that fall under?

I've always assumed that using free works inside non-free or incompatibly-licensed works was permitted, as long as the free work is reproduced in whole, has the license information, and can be taken out by recipients and reused as per the license, especially since we allow this on Wikipedia. But after reading through the legalese, I'm not so sure what's permitted. — Omegatron 00:44, 26 January 2008 (UTC)

Your understanding is my understanding. What's key here is that you are considering the final work to be an "aggregate" (GFDL) or "collection" (CC). The definition of such is that it is composed of many differently licensed works and the differences in licensing are clear, obvious, and one could easily extract the "free" stuff from it. A "modification/adaptation" means you are modifying the "free" work itself. Think of it in terms of poems. A "aggregate/collection" of poems means that each poem is unmodified and has its own copyright info—I could go through and easily pick out all of the GFDL poems and put them in my GFDL poem project. A "modified/adaptation" would be if I took a GFDL poem, rewrote a few lines, and put my name as one of the authors. My contributions are not inseparable from the final product. Make sense? The classic example of an "aggregate/collection" is an encyclopedia like Wikipedia itself—overall the text and collection itself is GFDL, but we images and other media which are whole and separable from the overall project are given a variety of different licenses. But something as simple as "most of the text here is copyrighted, but these couple of images are CC-BY-SA" is fine as long as the boundaries between the two types of content are visible. --24.147.69.31 (talk) 16:30, 26 January 2008 (UTC)

So what if you take a GFDL poem and insert it in the middle of an essay that is not GFDL?

Can you release a collection under the GFDL that contains non-GFDL parts? As I understand it, you can. You get a copyright on the collection and the placement of images or other content within it, but the content that you use remains the copyright of the original authors. — Omegatron 19:04, 26 January 2008 (UTC)

Protectionism in the E.U.

As far as i am aware the E.U has several protectionist policies/laws. For instance there is a quota on the amount of Chinese textiles that can be imported. I beleive there are laws that say it is ok for african countries to sell raw coffee beans and cocoa to the E.U, but not allowing them to sell finished manufactured coffee or chocolate (or there are heavy tarrifs). Then there is the Common Agricultural Policy, which forces member states to contribute to subsidies for European farmers to keep food prices down. I think there are lots more tarrifs, quotas, and generaly protectionist E.U laws right?

Now my question is, what if an E.U member state said it was no longer going to implement these rules? What if a member state said it would no longer contribute anything to the CAP. What if a member state said it was abolishing all its tarrifs and quotas on goods from outside the E.U? What would be the consequences for this state? Would it be fined by the E.U.? Would the other member states institute economic sanctions against it? Would it have to leave the E.U? Willy turner (talk) 03:10, 26 January 2008 (UTC)

The E.U. can fine member states who break the rules, as reported for example here. There are also rules for "suspending the rights" of Member States, in particular the right to vote in the European Council.  --Lambiam 09:26, 26 January 2008 (UTC)

This would be a usual violation of an obligation under the treaty establishing the European community. The sanctions are described in ArtArt 226-228 of the treaty:

Article 226

If the Commission considers that a Member State has failed to fulfil an obligation under this Treaty, it shall deliver a reasoned opinion on the matter after giving the State concerned the opportunity to submit its observations.

If the State concerned does not comply with the opinion within the period laid down by the Commission, the latter may bring the matter before the Court of Justice.

Article 227 (ex Article 170)

A Member State which considers that another Member State has failed to fulfil an obligation under this Treaty may bring the matter before the Court of Justice.

Before a Member State brings an action against another Member State for an alleged infringement of an obligation under this Treaty, it shall bring the matter before the Commission.

The Commission shall deliver a reasoned opinion after each of the States concerned has been given the opportunity to submit its own case and its observations on the other party's case both orally and in writing.

If the Commission has not delivered an opinion within three months of the date on which the matter was brought before it, the absence of such opinion shall not prevent the matter from being brought before the Court of Justice.

Article 228 (ex Article 171)

1. If the Court of Justice finds that a Member State has failed to fulfil an obligation under this Treaty, the State shall be required to take the necessary measures to comply with the judgment of the Court of Justice.

2. If the Commission considers that the Member State concerned has not taken such measures it shall, after giving that State the opportunity to submit its observations, issue a reasoned opinion specifying the points on which the Member State concerned has not complied with the judgment of the Court of Justice.

If the Member State concerned fails to take the necessary measures to comply with the Court's judgment within the time-limit laid down by the Commission, the latter may bring the case before the Court of Justice. In so doing it shall specify the amount of the lump sum or penalty payment to be paid by the Member State concerned which it considers appropriate in the circumstances.

If the Court of Justice finds that the Member State concerned has not complied with its judgment it may impose a lump sum or penalty payment on it.

This procedure shall be without prejudice to Article 227.

In short words: In a first step, the Court of Justice tells the state, what to do. If the state still fails to follow the rules, it will get really expensive.--Thw1309 (talk) 09:28, 26 January 2008 (UTC)

Strange Book

Several years ago (~2002) I purchased a certain book, the name of which escapes my recollection. I remember the title had the word "Apocryphal" or "Apocalypse" in it and contained several seemingly unrelated quotes, from Charles Manson's "Death is psycho-somatic" to other more bizarre things, like "I shit on your album"(???). Can anyone shed some light on this book and if possible, its name and the origin of the latter quote? I lost the book a long time ago and have been unable to find it through google or amazon. --72.211.192.84 (talk) 04:26, 26 January 2008 (UTC)

A possibility: Apocalypse Culture II. [1] ◄Zahakiel► 18:53, 26 January 2008 (UTC)

James Thurber's eye color

What color was Jim's eye? (Presumably the same color as his glass eye, which I can't find any pictures of online.) Cilantrohead (talk) 08:51, 26 January 2008 (UTC)

Gray? Not always the same color as his glass eye though. According to Al Hirschfeld he would bring a whole set to parties, and replace it with increasingly bloodshot versions as the evening wore on—and last would be one with a tiny American flag. Grauer, Neil A. (1994) Remember Laughter: A Life of James Thurber. p. 39.—eric 19:21, 26 January 2008 (UTC)

Cilantrohead, are you the reincarnation of John Aubrey? Deor (talk) 12:27, 27 January 2008 (UTC)

Is this greatest debate performance ever audio recorded?

[2]

David Lange v. Jerry Falwell, Oxford Union 1985

His diction is so immaculate and elocution so flawless--and it sounds to some degree improvised! Have you ever heard any performance that can top Lange?

Lotsofissues 13:50, 26 January 2008 (UTC)

Not me, but have to thankk you for bring up this one. It's impressively high level public speaking. Is there one for Jerry Falwell? No matter, I had the wrong Jerry. Julia Rossi (talk) 05:15, 29 January 2008 (UTC)

The question and answer at 17:00 confuses me. Lotsofissues 11:38, 29 January 2008 (UTC) —Preceding unsigned comment added by Lotsofissues (talk • contribs)

Ragnarok now?

Does Japanese myth have anything like Ragnarok? Trekphiler (talk) 20:34, 26 January 2008 (UTC)

I'm not real clear on what you mean by "Japanese myth". There are many religions that are followed by the Japanese people, if that's what you mean. And some of those religion's beliefs are spelled out in the end time article. Dismas|^(talk) 13:44, 27 January 2008 (UTC)

The traditional religion of Japan is Shinto, which doesn't believe that the world will ever end - instead we are forever at naka-ima, or "middle time", so every moment in time is equally valid. However, there are also a lot of Buddhist influences in Japan mythology (indeed, most religious Japanese people follow a mixture of Shinto and Buddhism), and Buddhist eschatology says that the teachings of the Buddha would disappear after 5,000 years (in around 4500 AD - originally it was 500 years, but by the time it was revised in the Middle Ages, the apocalypse was 1,500 years overdue) during a time known as Mappō, and although it wouldn't end the world, it would lead to the abolishion of Dharma - not unlike the corruption and moral decay that fundamentalist Christians associate with Revelations. Laïka 22:19, 27 January 2008 (UTC)

Just goes to show how ignorant about it I am! Thanks! Trekphiler (talk) 01:28, 28 January 2008 (UTC)

Nice map showing evolution internal structure of Soviet Union : Wikipedia doesn't have it anymore

Hello,

some time ago (like a year ago) Wikipedia used to have a nice map on one of its pages showing the several stages the internal soviet structure went through (new constituent republics being created or simply added to the country, etc....). Now I can't find any decent overview on Wikipedia of that evolution, nor can I find that particular set of maps. The layout looked like the one you find at the bottom of Kazakh_Soviet_Socialist_Republic. Can anyone help? Thanks!Evilbu (talk) 22:23, 26 January 2008 (UTC)

I suppose you're talking about this set of maps. I don't know why it's not used on any page in English Wikipedia though. — Kpalion^(talk) 16:44, 27 January 2008 (UTC)

Geez, hasn't the mapmaker heard that the Four color map problem has been solved? Or is this some subtle commentary on the monolithic nature of the Soviet system? Clarityfiend (talk) 17:11, 27 January 2008 (UTC)

Well, gee, one country, one color, how does that go against the map theorem? Seriously, it's not uncommon for this kind of map to be colored that way. Other examples on Wikipedia include the maps at Territorial evolution of the United States and the animated map at Image:Canada provinces evolution.gif. If the USSR had had different types of SSR or something like that, another color might have been used for those. --Anonymous, 03:21 UTC, January 30, 2008.