Photo: Flickr user lifeontheedge

Tuesday, July 18, 2006

Pediapress sells print-on-demand compendiums of wikipedia articles. Hopefully it's the first in a minor ecosystem of companies repurposing wikimedia content: that's what the GFD Licence specifically allows.

But wait! The name Wikimedia isn't free; it's trademarked. And the names of the subprojects, too (Wikipedia, Wikibooks, etc.). But repurposed copies have to use that name to show where the content's from. And how's Wikimedia going to prevent scam artists from using its name (for example) to sell articles peppered with implanted ads for real estate?

The GFDL and trademark law collided to produce this byzantine debate on the mailing list.

In semi-related news, the Library of Congress and Wikipedia might share content.

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