German court says WMF is liable for libel in old revisions

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German court says WMF is liable for libel in old revisions

Post by badmachine » Sun Jan 20, 2019 9:11 am

i just noticed this upload to the Foundation wiki by JSutherland (WMF), a trust and safety employee named Joe Sutherland, if his user page is correct:
https://foundation.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Waibel_v_Wikimedia_Court_Order_December_17_2018.pdf


they haven't uploaded it to Commons, which is unusual i think. here is the upload summary:
[quote](cur | prev) 00:10, 11 January 2019‎ JSutherland (WMF) (talk | contribs)‎ . . (228 bytes) +228‎ . . (Court order finding that article history containing defamatory content violates previous court order to remove that content, even where it is not in the article. Category:Court documents)[/url]

(edited) poking around on Commons, i found this:
File:Urteil_im_Fall_Waibel.pdf. it might be the original complaint but it's in German so idk. Google apparently indexes something called "Governance wiki" which is a category on Foundationwiki. might be worth poking around in there.

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Re: German court says WMF is liable for libel in old revisio

Post by Graaf Statler » Sun Jan 20, 2019 12:34 pm

Thanks for the tip, Bad. Well, it makes a lot clear isn't it? it is posible it sue the foundation in continental Europe, it makes clear the national courts can judge about Wikipedia and licenses, and it makes clear the continental judge follows the local regulation and laws, whatever WMF claims in her terms of use, and not the American law.

What will happen from now on I don't know, maybe Arthur can tell us. I don't know what the impact will be for WMF. Because I never went to law school, i never went to school in general, it was a complete wasting of time of me and the teachers the time I spend there. Most of my father's Encyclopædia Britannica I had already read and I had now idea where they were talking about. Not even the siltiest idea and I still don't have. Tools are my best fiends, creating things, not copying things from others. Not books.

But, I am not the only one who doesn't fit very well in the society although I did very well life. Romaine for instance is deaf. Romaine I read in the newspaper where was a article about his Oal academic can't work, he has no job. He is not able to functional normale in our society. Edo, if I follow him on his social media is hopping constant from one job to a other, but he never keeps a job long. Sjoerd de Bruin, has a very simple, I suppose state protected job in a factory after a career as assistent rank filler in a Jumbo super marked. Jurgen-NL and Blooming, the same story. Ronnie, owner of Ronniebot and also a wikidate hero, I don't want to violent his privacy, but he fits in this line. Sysops, stewards, Arb's, Wikidata heros. Romaine was with a sock a very powerful sysop and a arb when I came in the house in 2009, or there must be two deaf persons, because the strange Blueknight was also deaf. Think of the very strange Mdd who even doesn't understand himself or the anthroposophist Lidewij who trolls herself constant in haven. Wikipedia is a magnet for what we call vreemde kostgangers including me.

But WMF expect to have legal experts and fact checkers in there house. And Maher is thinking thinks she is fighting with her team some not-existing battle. Because the battle they are fighting simple doesn't exist.
In March there beloved Piratenpartij will have (Zero!) seats in both most of the national parliaments and the European parlement. Because in March we haven European elections, and after this "hot summer" according Maher and WMF you should expect something else, isn't it? And after all that calls to Euro PM's.

No other party support there free source vision, both on European Parlement as on national level. And after this "hot European free source summer" I should a least expect half of the seats would be filled in the European parlement with Pirate party parliamentarians.
And we have elections too here in Holland in Februari, but still I didn't see Romaine and has friends on television all the time, something what you should expect after this "hot summer". Because this elections are very important for our national parlement, but no, I still didn't hear anything of his National Free Source Advocating Group sponsored by WMF. Because that is the place Where Romaine, Gelach, Dimi and Anna had to be from the first moment on if they wanted to change something, and not in Brussels.

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Re: German court says WMF is liable for libel in old revisio

Post by Dysklyver » Sun Jan 20, 2019 3:52 pm

I suppose the admins will have to be a bit more careful to revdel all the BLP violations, although en-wiki admins already revdel all copyvios (RD1), personal details, target harassment, and egregious BLP issues, so maybe this wasn't something they did on de-wiki, or maybe it wasn't considered to be a BLP violation by whatever admin dealt with it.

Interesting nonetheless, especially if I can figure out the context.

EDIT: Lol this is hilarious, I am going to do a blog post about it. :shock:

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Re: German court says WMF is liable for libel in old revisio

Post by Graaf Statler » Sun Jan 20, 2019 7:09 pm

O, please do so Arthur! And it is not only hilarious, it is exacte what I am claiming from 2012 on. Just sue WMF, the American Terms of Use have not any value in continental Europe because there is no common law, and take the bill and percent it to the local chapter. Here you are, you are the represent of WMF in my country. Please pay, you have fourteen days. They have no even a single change, because they are payed by WMF and are involved in the content. Again because freakish continental Europe has no common law. And a pay-or-I-shot-you system. There is no way out or any escape for them, they just have to pay.

Well, i think it was really a great idea of WMF to relay on there wiki lawyers with there wisdom of the crowd and swarm intelligence system. The only problem is Romaine, Edo, Ronnie, Sjoerd, Dimi, Gerlach, Ymnes boy, Alexander and the rest have all only one brain cell each. Some maybe two, but that is it. And before you have normal brain you need at about 700 billion braincells, so there swam intelligents simple doesn't work. Because who for the hell should lobby for a other copyright regulation in the Europarlement otherwise than if he had not more than one or two braincells? It is so absurd what has happend!

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Re: German court says WMF is liable for libel in old revisio

Post by Dysklyver » Sun Jan 20, 2019 7:30 pm

Ok, so with some translation help, I have converted those two PDF files and the article talk page into a reasonably coherent summary of what happened.

https://thewikicabal.com/2019/01/20/waibel-v-wikimedia/

Still shocking how the WMF basically ignored the guy for two years, and then ignored the first court order as well, resulting in him having to go court again just to get done what should have been done in 2016!

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Re: German court says WMF is liable for libel in old revisio

Post by Graaf Statler » Sun Jan 20, 2019 8:19 pm

Well done! And what happens is exacte what I predicted in 2013. The German court had nothing to do with the American terms of use of WMF, I was a troll when I pointed out there are tons of jurisprudence this way of presenting Terms of Use have not any value in our legal system. They are worthless because of the leak of common law. And the German court followed the laws of Germany and not of the state of California as Romaine was predicting all the time.
What is also clear is is his server story is nonsens, the judge didn't even take care there was no server in Germany, the German language was enough. And you can be sure other European courts follow this new jurisprudence, because that happens all the time in Europe.

This follows there "right" to use text of people who doesn't give permision to use a work anymore doesn't exist. Because they claim that because of there Terms of Use, but this judge made clear these have no value in continental Europe. People can withdraw easy there permision and Wikipedia has to remove there work, otherwise it can be very expensive for them in my opinion. Because in Europe you always keep the ownership of your work, and Wikipedia doesn't have that. They have in fact nothing, they must remove everything instantly otherwise it is copyvio and they can be trapped in the pay-or-I-shot system of continental Europe in this way.

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Re: German court says WMF is liable for libel in old revisio

Post by Graaf Statler » Mon Jan 21, 2019 7:44 pm

collect wrote:Absolutely predictable. Wikipedia would have to block all German access to avoid such results.

Source

A few remarks.

1) Most/all continental European country's have about the same no common law legal system, they have a Code Napoleon system. So you have to block not only Germany but the rest too.

2) All this country's have a pay or I sue you system, so one copy, one screenshot will do to sue someone. It doesn't make any difference if a side is on black or not, I have given examples enough on WO, but according midsize Jake it was all very funny. You remember? 15.000 euro for a 200PX picture on a blog of a 15 years old boy? And now in this case 25,000 Euro. Really, you can better steal a car or become a burglar in continental Europe, that is much cheaper at the end.

3) Although a well know Dutch ICT-lawyer wrote on his blog copyvio is hetzelfde als zonder achterlicht fietsen, is this not true. Dat had je laatst toch geschreven, Arnold? Heb het zelf gelezen.
On a large scale it is copyvio a offense, a crime. It is copyrightfraude. And that is the most worrying part of the whole story. You can end up in jail.

And yes, I am warning from 2012 on for this this legal danger with the best intention. And if you have SanFanBanned the one who was warning all the time because Romaine and Ymnes started to cry you have a lot to explane to the judge as a foundation, believe me.

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Re: German court says WMF is liable for libel in old revisio

Post by CrowsNest » Tue Jan 22, 2019 1:48 am

We appear to be getting ever closer to a Gawker-Hogan style extinction event.

https://raue.com/en/news/industries/med ... wikipedia/

To support factual claims, it is not sufficient for a Wikipedia entry to merely refer to television programmes or press articles in which the claims were first made or further disseminated. The decisive factor for the classification of a source as reliable is not the user guidelines of Wikipedia – according to the Berlin Regional Court in the oral hearing – but the rules established by the courts, according to which only reports from privileged sources, such as communications from authorities or recognized press agencies, can serve as evidence of an assertion. In particular, if the person concerned has denied an allegation, it may no longer be presented as an established fact in Wikipedia. The fact that the Wikimedia Foundation, as the operator of the platform, does not create the content itself and therefore cannot determine whether the authors have fulfilled their duty of care in their research is – according to the Berlin Regional Court – at their expense due to the structure of a free encyclopedia chosen by them.

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Re: German court says WMF is liable for libel in old revisio

Post by Graaf Statler » Tue Jan 22, 2019 3:09 am

The German court see Wikipedia just like a product what is offered within the German jurisdiction and that is it. WMF is responsible for there product, dot. End of discussion, the judge has spoken. Not a surprise in our legal system.
The judge judge the Terms of Use too, it is no common law. He will only accept them if he consider them as reasonable, and there are many, many extra conditions that protect the consumer. A professional organisation is always at disadvantage, the judge gives the citizen a head start. A judge can very easily reject terms of use, what often happens. And then there is nothing left and is a organisation a sitting duck.

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Re: German court says WMF is liable for libel in old revisio

Post by ericbarbour » Tue Jan 22, 2019 9:27 am

CrowsNest wrote:We appear to be getting ever closer to a Gawker-Hogan style extinction event.

Sadly this only applies to Germany. It would be nice if the WMF was in hysterics over it, but they seem to be pretending it never happened.....

Thanks for finding this, badmachine. We would have missed it otherwise. There was no public announcement that I can find, not even on de-WP.

Still shocking how the WMF basically ignored the guy for two years, and then ignored the first court order as well, resulting in him having to go court again just to get done what should have been done in 2016!

That is dead typical SOP for them. Ignore it until the legal department says "umm". They've NEVER had a problem with deleting revs and covering things up before! But HOW DARE this German court order them to do it, ooh some Wikinerds are not happy!! (ha ha)

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