Talk:Regional Trial Court

Text of the law
While appropriately quoted and attributed text does not fall under the definition of a copyright violation, it does run afoul of WP:Non-free content, which reads in part: "Brief quotations of copyrighted text may be used to illustrate a point, establish context, or attribute a point of view or idea. ... Extensive quotation of copyrighted text is prohibited." I feel strongly that the text of that entire section is extensive and not brief. While you are correct that paraphrasing may depart from the intent of the law, the same holds true for any content derived from any source; laws are no exception. As long as the content is non-free it must be restricted to brief quotations.

All that said, I recall a conversation some time ago (a few years, I think) among the editors who work text copyright about the legitimacy of any claimed copyright of actual statutes. If I can find it and it indicates that they are PD in the U.S. then I'll restore the text. I'll be searching for it later today. VernoWhitney (talk) 14:44, 28 August 2012 (UTC)
 * Don't tire yourself as it's not copyrighted anyway: PD-PhilippinesPubDoc. – H  T  D  15:01, 28 August 2012 (UTC)
 * As far as I know, Philippine laws aren't copyrighted... --User 50 15:27, 28 August 2012 (UTC)
 * Copyrighted or not, it is absolutely essential that the entire section of the law be added to the article. This is the law and can't be paraphrased. What alternative do we have? A long list of brief "per sentence quotations"? – H T  D  15:31, 28 August 2012 (UTC)
 * Most official government works from the Philippines require permission for any commercial use, which would make them not free for purposes of Wikipedia, but it does appear that there's an exemption for statutes and other such works. I did also track down the conversation I mentioned above and it established that it would be PD in the U.S. regardless, as an edict of government. I've restored the text. For future reference, if something's PD it might be quicker to mention that up front rather than getting into NFC and quotation guidelines, but don't tire yourself Howard the Duck. VernoWhitney (talk) 15:35, 28 August 2012 (UTC)