[Talk-GB] License change & anonymous edits

[David Earl]

On 10/01/2012 16:05, Richard Fairhurst wrote:
> David Earl wrote:
>> Why does pressing the keys make any
>> difference whatsoever? The original contributor doesn't own the
>> copyright in the name, only their contribution, and by marking it
>> odbl clean I'm making an alternative contribution which asserts
>> the source is now legitimate.
>
> I think you're both right. This is "sweat of the brow" in a nutshell. The
> act of making the contribution is protected, not just the contribution. It's
> an utterly braindead law, yes, and for once the UK would be much better off
> if it followed the practice of our cousins across the pond... but it is,
> nonetheless, the law.
>
> So:
>
> If you spend time reviewing a fact expressed in the database; confirm that
> the fact is correct and not original; and therefore tag it odbl=clean; I
> think that is sufficient sweat-of-the-brow for the "IP" to reside with you.
> Keyboard-mashing per se is not a distinct concept in the law,
> sweat-of-the-brow is, and if the sweat is expended on reviewing and
> retaining the data (and, as an inevitably corollary, deleting data for which
> you can find no corroborating evidence)... then that works.


Precisely, thank you Richard.

However in order to make use of this, it needs to be sanctioned (i.e. we 
need to know for sure that doing this won't still end up with such 
contributions removed, or we're all wasting our time).

As it seems from an earlier message that there isn't a definitive 
process to decide, it seems just like tags, that all the power will 
reside with those who write the code. Who is writing the code to do the 
cleaning?

David