How about instead of ranting about the Wiki in whole, since some of you have such a zealot interest in this, you actually go through it and find what documents are going to pose a problem so we can talk about why or why not it would be a problem? I bet you will not find much, and I also reckon what you can find is trivial and nothing more.
The major finding would be someone who is a thief and would like to copy a bunch of the documents and publish them in a book or collection of those documents or in other words the expression of a idea in writing. The idea is not protected by a copyright, but instead the expression of that idea in writing is. Now how many ways do you think someone could write about one idea? A LOT. TOO MANY. THOUSANDS. However some people might not be that great at writing something and would rather steal it and make money from it.
Plus we have copyrights, patents, and trade secrets. You guys are operating system developers you should care nothing about copyrights. You should care about patents since that is actually used to hold rights to a method. Such as a tutorial I wrote called "Quick And Dirt Virtual Address Space Scheme". That should actually have to classified under a copyright, and a patent. The copyright would encompass the express of that idea in writing, while the patent would hold the method or scheme not really the idea.
Public domain comprises the body of knowledge and innovation (especially creative works such as writing, art, music, and inventions) in relation to which no person or other legal entity can establish or maintain proprietary interests within a particular legal jurisdiction.
This means my writing and the method I used if valid (if it has never been done before). Of course I must submit a patent application for the method which I have not done and will never do because it would simply halter the advance of technology and prove to be nothing that anyone else could not have thought of may already be doing. So that leaves..a little brain power...I almost figured it out...ummm.... my writing. The expression of that idea in writing is copyrighted because that is important because it does not halter the advancement of technology. What it does do is keep little weasels who want to copy it and include it in a book and make money while I pay eight hundred a month in bills and make eight hundred and eighty a month. Seems logical right? For some apparently not because I keep hearing this "public domain! public domain! public domain!". I am sorry but if a operating system developer can not be happy with having the method used free of charge and instead needs to actual expression of the idea in writing then something is wrong.
So the main point is what you guys are wanting, trying, thinking about, or going to do is take away the hard work all these people did writing those articles to help you guys learn. You guys are going to throw that down the drain and basically spit on their work and say its ours now and we can make money. But why.. Why does a operating system developer need rights to a writing instead of the method, they do not. But converting everything in that wiki to public domain is ignorance at it's best OR maybe it is my ignorance in not knowing that the "public domain" does not include the expression of a idea in writing? You now give a company the ability to take what we wrote and sell it in a book, or most likely a individual who can not write and wants to write but can so they copy and sell it since it is public domain and remember I am talking about the expression of a idea in writing not a patent!
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Public_domain
So who are you to decide that all that in there that was written with countless hours is just... free to make money from? Yeah. We will use the slight of hand and rewrite everything. You might have just written it all on your own. Are you going to rewrite it while looking at someone else's work? I mean there is most likely no harm, but I think a moral issue is at hand here and it actually makes you no different from the companies that use a underhanded approach themselves.
Like I said. If you want to find problems find it in the methods explained on the Wiki not in the actual writing since I doubt anyone who actually contributed it and made it publicly available in the first place would mind. What they would mind is
you making money from their expression of that idea, not the actual method which as I said two times already needs a patent not a copyright and of course the public domain includes the expression of a idea in writing.
This expression of a idea in writing is most likely why it applies to source code. Since I should be able to write source code that does exactly what yours does as long as it is not exactly the same or so similar that it is obvious that I copied it. The source code copyright is not protecting the idea you have in that code but instead the exact way you wrote it.
My tutorial I may write is a "work" in whole, and of course if a partial is made that is
clearly plagiarism then of course.... go figure! I would assume that you by copying tutorial code are not reproducing the document as a whole when it is clear that the original intent was the document or the writing not the source code but the actual document as a whole.
You guys are making a mud puddle over nothing really. I know Microsoft got sued over something that seems like it was common sense to do but I doubt changing the Wiki would help you prevent that sort of problem since you are going to have to perform a
patent search instead.. You might keep someone from posting something to the wiki if it is forced into "public domain" but I doubt it would actually help? I mean since you would have ended up writing the same thing and if you did not and you are that worried why not just write any tutorial code in your own way..
So people saying "public domain" are comprehended by me as saying, "I do not care nothing about the author that wrote this in a attempt to help
me learn.. and let me read it for
free."
You also have to understand that it takes money to sue something over a copyright infringement. Then that work has to actually be worth that amount used to sue them let alone if the person or company getting sued can actually pay it up. You think the government hands our settlement checks or pays the balance when someone owes money in a suit. I think not, and I think the person who got sued pays it. There would have to be a lot of money at stake for someone to sue the owner of osdev.org. Instead the work would most likely be removed since in this wiki we are not making and selling thousands of copies.
The wikipedia.org could get sued since they
do have a lot of currency with in their organization.. think about them and us. Is chase a millionaire? And even so the solution to this problem is not a conversion but something more along the writes of someone assuming responsiblity them selves for submitting copyrighted work instead of osdev.org assuming the responsibility if this is even possible and I have no clue.
If someone is going to change a tutorial I submit...THAT MUCH. They should have just written their own.. I mean is that logical? The wiki means ease of editing not public domain by definition. There is no reason the wiki can not include both types if wanted. Of course I generally do a good job on spelling when its a final draft, and someone making a couple of spelling changes is no big deal..I keep the original. I store a original and only use the original. I might include modification with my original if someone edited it on the wiki thus creating those modifications and they have copyright for the modifications if they are actually significant enough to copyright however it would be wrong for me to keep modifications in my original copy thus ... common sense prevails and the world turns instead of someone who must be incapable of understanding something much more primitive than laws and legal speech with two words called, "Right And Wrong"
So I think the first two words in that "Project:License" page of whatever it is -- should be, "Right And Wrong". Maybe just duplicate it about one-thousand times in the page.
"Right And Wrong Right And Wrong Right And Wrong Right And Wrong"
