http://anarchivist.blogspot.com/2007/11/archival-quotations-recollectedre.html

I've decided to collect my oft-repeated personal sayings on archives and records management in one spot, so I can easily add to them. Here are the four I recall at the moment, presented in alphabetical order.

Email is the unprotected sex of records management.

Ironically, electronic records are both impossible to preserve and impossible to destroy.

Records management is only tangentially about the management of people; it is primarily concerned witht he management of people.

There are two types of people: people who want to save nothing, and people who want to save everything. The problem with archives and records management is that they require a third kind of person, one who doesn't exist.

A new mailing list hosted by Citizendum:

http://mail.citizendium.org/mailman/listinfo/sharedknowing

It is sad that Book People mailing list (moderated by Johan Mark Ockerblom) will end at the end of the month:

http://onlinebooks.library.upenn.edu/webbin/bparchive

It was the decision of the moderator.

From Archives-L:

I continually find web 2.0 technologies fascinating in the ways they connect people. One such instance is social networks and how they connect archivists from all over the world, showing that our profession is truly unique because we value collegiality, are usually not afraid to share our professional lives with others, and can have fun!

I have discovered three social networks where some (or a lot) of archivists already belong and wanted to share them with you all so that you too can have the opportunity to go and engage other archivists just like you in these settings. These are NOT places to get a date, to hook up, or to find a job. They are places for us to share our research, our common love of history and records, and our devotion to our chosen profession. I’m going to present these three in alphabetical order so no one accuses me of playing favorites:

Facebook – the adult answer to MySpace, some say. You can join with any email address, join college and city networks, create a unique page all about you, and even join an unofficial, unsupported-by-them Society of American Archivists group. http://www.facebook.com

Library 2.0 – a newer site where librarians and informational professionals are meeting to discuss things web 2.0 and their relationship to the information professions. There is a group, again unofficial and unsupported-by-them of members of the Society of American Archivists, and another unsupported-by-them unofficial group of members of the Academy of Certified Archivists, with potential for other regional archives groups to form. There is a forum just for discussion of web 2.0 and the archivist profession. http://library20.ning.com

Global Museum E-Community – another newer site where museum and other information professionals belong to share thoughts about all things museums. There is even a group for archivists where those of us who are not affiliated with museums may belong and still be a part of the discussions in the forum. http://globalmuseum.ning.com.

Social networks can be used by anyone for any purpose. For us professionals, it is a place to meet like-minded archivists who share a love of web 2.0 and its potential to reach millions. And not everyone in there is in the 20-something crowd, though more and more we are seeing young student archivists from the U.S., Canada, Great Britain, and even Sweden, join and become active members. I’m 36 and I’m a member (did I just err in giving my age?) and someone, though I won’t mention who, who is really famous on this list is also active in at least one of the above social communities (PK, ha!).

Try it out. I’ve found my understanding of how researchers use web 2.0 for their own social networking has made me understand them better. Along the way I have had a lot of fun, too.

Russell D. James, CA

With his soft voice and scholarly manner, Saad Eskander doesn't seem like a person fresh from the front lines of a war. But as director of the Iraq National Library and Archive in Baghdad, he has carried on his own four-year battle to preserve his country's cultural heritage. While most of his peers fled the country, and five members of his staff were murdered, he has stayed on.
more stories like this

"Every person has a cause to fight for," Eskander said in an interview during a visit to Boston this week. "This was my cause. If every one of us leaves the country, who will win? The forces of darkness, the extremists, the ignorant. It was important to stay and fight, and my sphere was culture."

Read more at
http://www.boston.com/lifestyle/articles/2007/11/08/in_baghdad_building_order_out_of_chaos/

Peter Hirtle writes in the Archives list:

A new version of the copyright duration chart, "Copyright Term and
the Public Domain in the United States," is now available at a new
URL: http://www.copyright.cornell.edu/public_domain/.

The biggest change is that, at the request of a user, two new
sections have been added. The first is on published and unpublished
sound recordings, and the second is on architectural works. Other
small changes have been made to clarify some of the problems other
readers have identified. In order to facilitate printing, a PDF
version of the file is available as well.

See also
http://archieven.blogspot.com/2007/11/welcome-to-live-search-books.html

http://www.earlham.edu/~peters/fos/2007/11/oa-and-derivative-works-continued.html

Peter Suber has answered to our disagreement on his position on derivative works. I appreciate the clarification.

Suber writes:

"Hence, I should say for completeness that a license which does prohibit all derivative works would not be OA within the BOAI definition. I regret leaving the impression that prohibiting all derivative works would be OA."

The implication seems clear to me: Content licensed under CC-BY-ND (which prohibits all derivative works without consent) is'nt within the BBB definitions and thus not OA.

I respect that scholars wish respect for their moral rights but I do not think that a legal license formula can solve this problem.

There was a long discussion on Wikimedia Commons on the "moral rights" clausula in the CC 3.0 deed:
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Commons_talk:Licensing/Creative_Commons_3.0

I agree with the position at
http://sciencecommons.org/weblog/archives/2007/11/07/cc-oa-moral-rights/

(To be continued.)

Date: Fri, 02 Nov 2007 19:10:47 +0100
From: Florence Devouard
Subject: [Foundation-l] [Announcement] French lawsuit against WMF won
in court
To: foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org

An injunction was sought against WMF to force it to remove content from
the french wikipedia, that the plaintiffs deemed defamatory and
infringing on their privacy. The plaintiffs also sought 63,000 Euros in
damages, and requested from the WMF to provide contact information of
the anonymous editor responsible for the edit.

The court stated that the Foundation is a hosting provider in the sense
of article 6 of the LCEN ("Loi pour la confiance dans l'?conomie
num?rique") and as such has no obligation to keep watch on the content
that it hosts and can not be held accountable for the content added by
contributors to the encyclopedia.

The same law states that hosting providers must remove illegal content
when notified it exists. In this case, the dispute centred largely
around when the Foundation was notified. The plaintiffs believed they
had notified the Foundation via e-mail, although the Foundation has no
record of the e-mails having been received. The court did not consider
e-mails sufficient notification.

Also, the court stated that when a hosting provider is notified about
libelous content, it only has to remove content that is obviously libelous.

In this case, the lawsuit was filed before the Foundation was officially
alerted. As soon as the Foundation received official notification, it
immediately removed the content in question.

The court also stated that once the Foundation was notified of the
problem, it acted swiftly and removed the content. As a result, WMF won
the lawsuit and will not have to pay for any damages. The request to
provide the contact information of the editor responsible for the edit
was also dismissed.

--------

This is very good news for the Foundation. We maintain that WMF is not
the publisher, owner or monitor on any of the Wikipedia projects (and
obviously not the WP FR). We are pleased to have our position upheld and
supported in a court of law.

In general, it is extremely important that we get used to quickly remove
any defamatory content, or privacy-invasive content, as soon as it is
brought to our attention. "We", in this case, mean "all of us". Editors
of Wikipedia, volunteers on OTRS, staff members. The more we care about
people requests of this type, the more we will be recognized as a
community caring about the truth and caring about the individual. Whilst
we must not fall into easy censorship and let ourselves be pressured to
remove information which should be available to humanship just because
it does not please a couple of people, it is also important to remember
that we are a top 10 website, widely read everywhere and that any
erroneous information on people may have huge consequences in their
private and professional lives.

Being available to answer readers concerns *is* important. There is no
gain for anyone to get in a court to solve such issues (except for
lawyers in fact). Most conflicts of that sort could be solved through
communication.

Whilst the current case was not strictly speaking a biography page, it
involved living people. So, my email is also a reminder that policies
such as the "biographies of living people" in the english wikipedia are
very helpful to both protect our projects and help making sure our
content is as reliable as possible.

Let us seek to avoid violence when violence can be avoided :-)

I suggest that every project get a look at
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Biographies_of_living_persons
And consider building such policies in the near future.

A few links for more information
*
http://wikimedia.fr/index.php/Communiqu?s_de_presse/La_Wikimedia_Foundation_reconnue_comme_h?bergeur_de_Wikip?dia
(in french)
*
http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikip?dia:Le_Bistro/2_novembre_2007#Proc.C3.A8s_gagn.C3.A9_par_Wikimedia
(in french)
* http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Privacy_policy (in english)


Florence Devouard


The following firm represented the Foundation in this lawsuit:

HUGOT AVOCATS
www.hugot.fr

http://www.bl.uk/collections/britishnewspapers1800to1900.html

British Library is damaging the Public Domain by offering the digitized British Newspapers 1800-1900 TOLL ACCESS via Gale.