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Nielsen Sends Wikipedia DMCA Takedown For Station Descriptions
RockMFR writes "A DMCA takedown notice sent by Nielsen Media Research to the Wikimedia Foundation has resulted in the deletion of over 300 pages on the English Wikipedia. The pages were 'templates' and categories that listed television stations within various geographical markets in the United States. Discussion of the deletions has focused on whether this type of information can actually be copyrighted, though the content of the takedown notice have not been made public."
Because if there's one thing an encyclopedia must have, it's a list of all the television stations in the United States.. and every single episode of every single show, all with original reseach about each.. and show schedules... :)
For every problem, there is at least one solution that is simple, neat, and wrong.
While I don't agree with the DCMA, nor most copyright laws in most countries, I do wonder why this hasn't happened before, and indeed is not a regular occurrence. Wikipedia is absolutely full of plagiarized material. Almost every single movie page is more or less ripped verbatim from imdb, just as one small example.
I would have thought that wikipedia was a lawyer's wet dream come true. I mean sure, they don't have a great deal of money (especially since Jimbo keeps dipping his hand in the cash register), but there's still some money to be made there. I really can't understand why Wikipedia has had such a free ride so far.
You might be thinking about the situation in Europe, where database compilations are copyrightable; but this doesn't apply in the US.
Until the secret treaties go into effect.
For great justice.