Talk:Karl Shuker
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[edit] Text lifted from Shuker's website
To whoever is adding text lifted from Shuker's website, posting anonymously from IP address 195.93.21.5, thank you for your interest in this article, but please be aware that you cannot just lift copyright material and incorporate it into Wikipedia. To do so is illegal and detrimental to Wikipedia. Thanks. Flapdragon 00:33, 15 January 2006 (UTC)
- Hi to Flapdragon. As I am Dr Karl Shuker, I am able to lift text from my own website without infringing copyright, as I obviously own the copyright to my own website.
Hello. It's not quite as simple as that actually. You need to send a message to the licensing dept at permissions at wikimedia dot org, from an address associated with the original publication (presumbly Karlshuker at aol dot com), to assert the fact that you are Karl Shuker (after all you could be anyone) and that you own the rights to the text, and lay on record the fact that you're officially releasing the text into Wikipedia. If you just post anonymously and without explanation stuff that's marked copyright elsewhere people will naturally revert it as a copyright violation. (After all it's fair enough people will take steps to ensure the legality of Wikipedia content as well as protecting your copyright for you.) Also, you need to be aware that you will be effectively losing all control of the text you orginally cared about enough to mark as copyright. It will be instantly mirrored all over the internet and you may come across it quite legitimately in all sorts of unexpected places. Wikipedia content is licenced under the GNU Free Documentation License (GFDL), which as I understand it basically means you can use the stuff for any purpose at all as long as you credit it to Wikipedia. I don't even know whether strictly speaking you would be in the right in continuing to label it copyright on your own website. I'd advise you to look at the details of that and make sure you're happy with the terms under which you're releasing the text. Or of course you could avoid the whole problem by just rephrasing the content so it's not identical to the text on your website. Finally it would be helful to finish the job by "wikifying" (marking up) the text rather than leaving it as a screed of raw text. You also need to ensure that the tone of the text is appropriate to an excyclopaedia as opposed to an author's personal website, which is likely to be a lot less neutral in tone (for example "countless articles" isn't very encyclopaedic, and it should be "Shuker" rather than "Dr Shuker") To be cynical, you might wonder if it's worth the effort to reproduce verbatim that which was one click away via the "External links", but don't let me put you off! Best wishes, Flapdragon 02:32, 15 January 2006 (UTC)
- Hi there, Thanks for your message, which I have taken on board. Following your advice, I have indeed rephrased my previous contribution to the Karl Shuker entry, as I naturally wish to retain copyright of my own website's text. Re my identity as Dr Karl Shuker: please feel free to email me at karlshuker@aol.com requesting confirmation of this, and I will be happy to do so. Best wishes, Czbiker 21.17, 15 January 2006
I think rephrasing was the right choice. The article could still use some editing (more wikilinks, italics, toning down into a more encyclopaedic style) but it no longer looks like a copyvio. Flapdragon 23:02, 15 January 2006 (UTC)
