I saw one site where they had copied most of their articles from Wikipedia and then at the bottom wrote something like "article taken from Wikipedia". Is that legal?
Under the GNU Free Documentation License, yes, you can. Read more below: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Text_of_the_GNU_Free_Documentation_License
Actually, without permission from other sites. Its called referencing. document1: This happened today in whatever blah blah blah Other site: According to document1 "This happened today in whatever blah blah blah" (document1). etc. Remember the research papers in school? It is perfectly legal as long as full credit is given where it is due!
This isn't the same situation as a "research paper" in school, since there is a fair use educational exception in that situation. You can't take content from another site without their permission EVEN IF you cite where you got it.
Then I am mistaken. Apologies for the mis-information on my part... I was way to broad with what I had said. This is one of those situations that it is based off of the content you are "borrowing". Facts, quotes, general knowledge of course is ok though.
I myself have used wikipedia data. I was under the impression it was in the public domain under the guidelines of the GNU. I referenced the proper GNU documentation, linked back to Wikipedia as I thought was ethical. I was included in an article/list of sites on wikipedia which mirrored or republished wikipedia data. I felt that the general tone was critical almost as if the author felt that the info was their property and that just linking to Wikipedia was needed. My SERP`s plummetted even though my PR went up several notches. At this time I no longer utilize Wikipedia data and my opinion of them has depreciated...
you can take the wh0oo0o0o0o0o0o0le Wikipedia http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Database_download
I havent read the whole of GNU license, but can one use such stuff for commerical reasons, i mean not to sell wikipedia content but to use it as content on a site selling some products or services?
I assumed so and I believe it is acceptable according to the GNU but it seems there are "those" who frown upon it....
If it is illegal, wikipedia is going to have a heck of a time tracking everyone down. A lot of times when a site looks too well written to me given the general nature of it, I'll copy and paste part of it into Google. More often than not, it ends up being straight from wikipedia. I was just rewriting a site that was extensively wikipedia stolen last week. That being said, I have paraphrased some information from them before myself. I find the biggest problem is that you can never really be certain whether that information is completely correct without doing even more research on the subject. I'm starting to view wikipedia more as a children's encyclopedia than a useful research tool. JP
Is it just me, or is that license almost impenetrably complex? Wikipedia: Copyrights says: This says to me that if I use Wikipedia content, none of the content I create around it can ever have value as Intellectual Property.
I don't think you are going to have any trouble provided you publish the material from Wikipedia on it's own page, or in a table, or in some way which clearly identifies it as a complete work. You should publish the credit below as follows. In the example the article is about France. This article is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the Wikipedia article "France" as of 4/1/06. As another poster pointed out, things get a lot blurrier when you change the article content, known as a derrivative work. Just publish the article as you found it, without changing a word, linking back to both the GNU license page, and the article from which you got the material. If you start putting your own stuff around it and blur the lines about what's yours and what's from Wikipedia, I think it's understandable that this might be questionable. NationMaster.com seems to have the best part of the entire encyclopdia on their site, and I've been looking into exactly how to do that for mine. You can download and publish the entire encyclopdia, but it's about 300 gigs. We also publish entire articles from other web sites, but only with the site owner's explicit permission and high visibility credits with links back to their site. You would find a lot of site owners are more than eager to cooperate with you, but only if you are willing to promote their site in return for the articles. I usually write and ask permission to dummy up one page to demonstrate how the material will be presented, complete with the credits. The answer is nearly always yes once they see the page. I mean, it's good for your site to have the material, and makes their site more authoritative for having been used as a source. Others, of course, prefer to keep their material private. Just be sure to keep and file hardcopies of the emails you received granting permissions if you are dealing with a company official of some kind who might quit later. You want a clear statement of permission --- after you have published with materials --- and you have to work with them until you get it to their satisfaction. The main thing, of course, is to never publish so much as even a little image from some where not in the public domain. Even publishers who's stuff is in the public domain like lots of stuff on NASA sites or the CIA World Factbook seem to appreciate a notification that you have used their material.
I couldn't agree more. You can still be charged for copyright infringement even though you never had the intention to plagiarize another entity's work.
That's right pixie dust. Copy a sentence or two and you can get away with it. Copy a whole copyrighted page and you're asking for trouble. Copy a whole copyrighted site and make it available on your own URL and you're a 100% crook. Unless you're a search engine. If you're an SE it appears the rules are different: they can copy whatever they want and show the entire site in their cache unless you specifically instruct them not to do it (via your robots.tx) That's so unfair there should be a law about it.