Talk:Translation requests/WMF/Terms of Use/en

Hello. While I was checking the Japanese translation of this Terms of Use, I noticed some ambiguities and other things that merits changes. This page might not be the best place to write them down, but I post them anyway. Tomos 11:09, 23 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I now notice that on the Foundation's site/wiki, there is some discussion of this TOU at foundation:Talk:Terms_of_Use, and this talk page is suggested as a good place to have discussion. So perhaps using this page was not that a bad idea. Good to know.Tomos 09:23, 23 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Agreement regarding attribution[edit]

I think this part has to do with the attribution for CC-BY-SA 3.0 Unported license (mentioned in the 4d of the license), because GFDL's requirements about list of authors on the Title Page and preservation of History section are rather different from attribution mentioned here. I think it is better to make an explicit statement that the agreement is about the attribution requirement .

The last sentence in a bracket seems open to some unintended interpretation. To begin with, a list of authors do not include any "contribution," small or big, relevant or irrelevant. What I should say, I think, is something like "Any list of authors may be filtered to exclude contributors who made only very small or irrelevant contributions."
- Strictly speaking, I can imagine some editors making multiple small contributions that makes up a non-small contribution. That complicates the question of how to efficiently filter names of contributors.

This ToU explains, or give permission, for contributors that mention in the edit summary is sufficient as an attribution for Wikimedia-internal copying. But it never asks agreement from the contributors about this way of attribution. I think there should be an item asking such agreement.

Tomos 09:24, 23 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Changing the Term of Use[edit]

The last part of this ToU says that this is not subject to change. I think it means that it is not subject to change by any user communities, because the context (section explaining about the precedence of English version) is related to translation into different language project. I think it is better to qualify the statement, so that it does not lead people to believe that ToU will never change, no matter what.

Tomos 11:09, 23 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Licensing options for derivative works[edit]

I am not entirely sure that what you license is just "modifications" or "additions" that the re-users make. I suppose, rather, the entire work (as modified or made additions), will be licensed under the CC-BY-SA 3.0 or later version.　Or, it is just that my understanding of English is not quite precise and there is no problem...
This explanation does not mention that there are potentially some other options for licensing of modified works. "the Creative Commons Attribution Share-Alike" license in this ToU seem to indicate that of Unported version. It is possible to license it under other jurisdictions' licenses such as CC-BY-SA 3.0 US. It is also possible, though this remains a theoretical possibility to date, under other "Creative Commons Compatible License" as defined in 1c of the CC-BY-SA 3.0 Unported license. Now this part may be just explanations, or "guidelines" as described in the page, and not really a "Term." Simplicity and accessibility is as important as precision, so I would say it is good to add "for other licensing options, please refer to the license text."

Tomos 11:09, 23 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Fair Use and other limitations and exceptions to copyright[edit]

This Terms of Use does not allow any post based on fair use.. In spirit, we can think of the text like the one under a license that is compatible with CC-BY-SA. But of course, it is not under any particular "license." Tomos 13:26, 23 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Okay... After working on translating the TOU, I admit with embarrassment that above comment is incorrect.. The contributors are asked to license the text that they hold rights to. Fair use texts, for which they do not have rights, could remain unlicensed. Good. Tomos 09:17, 23 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]