Talk:Total War Speech

This speech had been added before but deleted & replaced with links to a badly edited version. I couldn't find the previous version on wikisource but have readded the speech, albiet without editing & paragraph spacing. As this is a valid historical speech please do not delete.

This was deleted because it goes by another name: Sportpalast Speech. As that speech was delivered by Goebbels, it is possible that that speech is protected by copyright. Also, since he would have given the speech in German, and this one is in English, it is possible that this translation is protected under copyright as well. Zhaladshar 12:49, 6 Jun 2005 (UTC)

The copyright point is fair enough from a technical/legal point of view but who is ever going to enforce the copyright? I would suggest no one.

Also if copyright applies to public speeches doesn't that mean that every speech on wikisource for the last 70 years or so shouldn't be there? Do you know if there are specific copyright laws regarding public speeches? I would think that, unless speeches have been published (in which case copyright of published works would apply), then any public speeches are fair game to be placed on wikisource & it is unlikely that anyone would ever enforce the copyright (if it applies) on them. AllanHainey 15:36, 6 June 2005

I really only have a basic grasp on copyright for speeches. I do know that King's "I Have a Dream" speech is protected under copyright, so I'm extrapolating that to assume that any speech can be copyrighted. A good number of the speeches that are 70 years or younger were done by people in the service of the United States government, meaning they are by definition in the public domain. I don't know what other governments' (e.g. Britain) stances are on that, though. I think it's a bit of a dangerous precedent, though, to simply allow a work to stay on Wikisource because no one will enforce the copyright of the work; Wikimedia (and Wikisource) could still get in legal trouble if someone did care.

I think it would be best to determine the copyright status and protection for speeches, due to their nature of being delivered out in the open, and specifically for this speech. Although, I still would imagine that this speech (at the very least because it's a translation) would constitute a copyvio. You wouldn't by any chance know an intellectual property rights lawyer, would you :) ? Zhaladshar 18:55, 6 Jun 2005 (UTC)