Wednesday 2 September 2009

After quiet reflection, I actually do have something serious to say

What is the point of all this Wikia-bashing? Our Creative Commons licensing allows anyone, even Corporate Satan, (that right there needs a picture or something) to redistribute our work as long as their version is also available under the same license. The fact that Wikia or anyone wants to host a copy or fork of our content should be perceived as flattering if we really do believe in the Creative Commons mindset. (As I do) What isn't Creative Commons is our name, Illogicopedia, which ought to be trademarked. If their site has the same name as ours, that would be something to complain about, not the fact that they've copied our content within the terms of our license.

Though, as I understand it, even if we don't have a registered trademark we should be protected on the name because our use of it on EditThis before we moved to Wikia is clearly an example of "prior art" which would show anyone else's attempt to trademark the name to be fraudulent.

Just thought I'd enlighten anyone who's not aware of the legal issues surrounding the whole Illogicopedia vs Wikia thing.

6 comments:

  1. actually creative commons does not allow profit on such works, so there is something to moan about if they stole any new works.

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  2. 1.Wikia has comitted far worse crimes to other wikis than us.

    complaintwiki.org/wiki/Main_Page

    2.Who is the anonymous! Arhg!

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  3. Wikia is CC now, I believe.

    It's all legal bullshit. Wikia is morally corrupt. ;p

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  4. If we're trying to complain that putting CC non-commercial content on a site that happens to have advertisements is a violation of the license ... besides the fact that this would really hurt the distribution of works that have the NC (non-commercial) option .... we wouldn't be making sense. NC is meant to prevent selling stuff. Wikia is not doing that.

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  5. I'm not really sure if that's what everyone's complaining about, Nerd. What we're all cheesed off about is the fact they had to be so stubborn about it all and forego simple moral courtesy, pissing off a whole community of users in favour of their own business model.

    It's essentially a clash of cultures - us Illogicopedians are Socialist beings, while Wikia are Capitalist hogs using peoples' good nature to fuel their project.

    In return, all we got was an enforced, buggy skin unsuitable for our needs and administrators all too willing to step on our toes and disrespect Illogicopedia as a whole.

    On top o' that, can we not have a joke? I don't know if I'm speaking for everyone here, but I certainly don't really hate Wikia as much as I am making out. It's all in the name of humour, my friend/adversary/dawg.

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  6. I am very much a Capitalist.

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