Re: Re: fair use policy in other languages

Timwi wrote:

> Tomos at Wikipedia wrote:
>
>> I have heard that German wikipedia does not accept fair use images 
>> (and even texts?). But I don't know the reasonings behind it. That 
>> would be interesting to know.
>
> My understand of it is that:
>
> - Most German speakers come from Germany
> - Hence, most people who would want to re-use the German Wikipedia
>   content, would likely be from Germany
> - There is no such thing as Fair Use in Germany
> - Hence, they wouldn't be able to use Fair Use images, even if the U.S.
>   server on which de.wikipedia.org is hosted would be.
>
> So, if I haven't gone wrong anywhere, they disallow Fair Use images in 
> order to maximise the reusability of their content.

There may very well be no fair use provision in German law, but to the 
extent that Germany is a signatory to international conventions, such as 
the Berne Convention, which provide for something like fair use, it is 
incorporated into German law.

The absence of a provision about something in the law is very different 
from an existing provision which bans that practice.  One view of law is 
that everything is permitted that is not specifically prohibited by the 
law.  How do the German courts treat this?

Although caution is advisable around fair use images, there is no need 
to take the matter to extremes.  With fair use text, it would be 
impossible to function without it since we would be unable to quote 
anybody directly.

Ec