One of the other legal fights they've started is to put online public domain artworks that have been scanned by museums at great expense since (at least in the US) "effort" alone is not enough to grant you copyright protection.
This seems to me to be exactly the kind of thing Wikipedia should be doing, though similarly there are some people outraged that the poor museums don't get to exploit a monopoly on the cultural works they control.
Just sparking debate about exactly what copyright is for is a good thing in my opinion, and helpful in fulfilling their mission:
"The mission of the Wikimedia Foundation is to empower and engage people around the world to collect and develop educational content under a free license or in the public domain, and to disseminate it effectively and globally."
With emphasis:
"The mission of the Wikimedia Foundation is to empower ... people ... to collect ... content ... in the public domain, and to disseminate it."
If you don't believe in that mission then donating to Wikipedia is probably not a recommended action.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Portrait_Gallery_and_W...
This seems to me to be exactly the kind of thing Wikipedia should be doing, though similarly there are some people outraged that the poor museums don't get to exploit a monopoly on the cultural works they control.
Just sparking debate about exactly what copyright is for is a good thing in my opinion, and helpful in fulfilling their mission:
"The mission of the Wikimedia Foundation is to empower and engage people around the world to collect and develop educational content under a free license or in the public domain, and to disseminate it effectively and globally."
With emphasis:
"The mission of the Wikimedia Foundation is to empower ... people ... to collect ... content ... in the public domain, and to disseminate it."
If you don't believe in that mission then donating to Wikipedia is probably not a recommended action.