Public Domain

Reading about all these issues people have with Wikipedia the main point of why Wikipedia is ‘good’, is that it is a valuable public domain resource. I’ve seen Dave Winer hammer about this-and-that, but I bet the main problem he has with Wikipedia is that someone else wrote his biography. Big deal. It’s politics created by characters who want to be listed in the history books. Get over it: if you (say) thought up the Relativity Theory, Uncertainty principle, The Laws of Motion, humanity owes you a book. In other cases, like making up ambigious specs, you’re not even worth a footnote.

I, for example, will never claim that Wikipedia is authorative (I wouldn’t say the same of a library either). But on this Internet, where information is slowly being locked up behind obnoxious rules and regulations, I’m glad that there’s at least a Wikipedia where I canlook up public domain images and information about the digestive system.

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5 Responses to Public Domain

  1. Marcos says:

    I’m curious to see examples of censorship in the US and Canada. Can you point me to some? BTW, I enjoyed watching “V for Vendetta” last night. The government’s motto: “for your protection”. I couldn’t eat afterwards.

  2. Arthur says:

    I’m curious to see examples of censorship in the US and Canada. Can you point me to some?

    Would you consider media that ‘only brings the government line’ a form of censorship? (but that wasn’t the point of my write-up about Wikipedia: I generally think Wikipedia is a ‘good enough’ resource to look up stuff)

    As for ‘V for Vendetta’: I haven’t seen it: To be honest, I’ve not set a foot in the cinema since 2004…

  3. Arthur says:

    (Also, by default I remove people’s surnames from comments, just so you know…)

  4. Marcos says:

    surnames… thanks, I should know better. I was aloof… a bit spacey

  5. Arthur says:

    That’s a free service at XSamplex! ;-)

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