Added it and it works like a charm. Great job to all involved.

Cool! Thanks a lot.
Have you tried the plug in yet?　How does it work?

I've uploaded a newer version of the import plugin.  It's a bit less dodgy than the previous one.

Main difference is that you now start the import through a GUI menu, instead of it happening on every deck open.

It should work with RTK3 once there is an RTK3 deck for Anki.  If I get some time this weekend, I might make one.

Let me know if there are any undocumented features I should be aware of.

woelpad wrote:

What applies to RevTK and RevTK external scripts applies to Anki and its plugins as well, I reckon.

I don't think this is the case. This web page can easily replace the RtK books. Therefor you can not claim fair use for the copyrighted keywords.

This plugin on the other hand only displays the RtK keywords if you hover your mouse over a kanji. So the plugin is only useful to people that already own the book and know the Rtk meanings of the kanjis. It has no negative effect on the value of the books. For this reason I believe that distributing a list specifically for this plugin is fair use under the us copyright law.

As the keywords themselves for all 4 languages can be easily obtained by downloading the legal KanjiGym light from http://www.kanjigym.de, the impact of this plugin is relatively small.

Last edited by xaarg (2008 January 16, 7:50 am)

samusam wrote:

Okay sorry if this is a dumb question, but this "move schedule data to Anki" thing doesn't move the stories at all, right?  To access those would one have to log in to RevTK?

That's right.

xaarg wrote:

So the plugin is only useful to people that already own the book and know the Rtk meanings of the kanjis.

Fair enough. But once the data is available as a list, it's a small step to convert that list into a deck (small enough that anyone could do it), which would make Anki a competitor much the same way as RevTK for reviewing Heisig keywords in other languages.

xaarg wrote:

As the keywords themselves for all 4 languages can be easily obtained by downloading the legal KanjiGym light from http://www.kanjigym.de, the impact of this plugin is relatively small.

Your second argument however is that this list is already available. Did the copyright holders shoot themselves in the foot by allowing the release of this free software, if indeed they want to protect the usage of the keywords themselves in other products? I wonder...

Last edited by woelpad (2008 January 17, 3:02 am)

xaarg wrote:

They would still need the missing frame numbers and stroke counts.

In a glance, but correct me if I'm wrong, the list seems to be in Heisig order, in which case the frame numbers can be easily derived. The stroke count is not a part of the method AFAIK. KanjiGym Light does not provide directions to make stories and still needed to obtain a license (unless the license was required for the full KanjiGym only?).

I'll download KGL to check in what form they stored the keywords. Perhaps it's indeed a simple text file.

woelpad wrote:

In a glance, but correct me if I'm wrong, the list seems to be in Heisig order, in which case the frame numbers can be easily derived.

You would need to know the frame numbers to notice this, but fair enough I replaced the file with a new one that doesn't use the Heisig order. I also added the English rtk3 keywords.

woelpad wrote:

KanjiGym Light does not provide directions to make stories and still needed to obtain a license (unless the license was required for the full KanjiGym only?).

There is no full KanjiGym. The light version is the only one that exists. You also don't need a license. Well, KanjiGym includes animated stroke orders for most kanji, so if you know how to make stories, how to use a SRS and have a list of the non-kanji primitives, the book is not needed.

woelpad wrote:

I'll download KGL to check in what form they stored the keywords. Perhaps it's indeed a simple text file.

ADMIN: I'm removing the measly details there were here about the KanjiGym Light file containing the german RtK keywords, so that our pal Lars Grunswald, developer on Kanji Gym Light, can sleep tight tonight and have sweet dreams about copyright fairies and such.

I have notified xaarg that I removed the offending 3 lines of text here, and also forwarded him a copy of Lars Grunswald's complaint, along with a copy of a previous complaint from Robert Rauther, author of the german translation of RtK, so that xaarg can see the full picture.

I would like to point out also, that by editing xaarg's post, I do not in any way admit to beng responsible or even answerable at all to Lars's email complaint. He said he didn't even contact the author yet or the publishing house. In fact it's very possible that I am legally completely unanswerable to his demand, but like I said, I have better things to do than wrestle emails with them. I have forwarded the email addresses of Robert Rauther and Lars Grunswald to xaarg though, so he can contact them if he wishes to.

misha wrote:

I don't see how the form the knowledge is stored affects copyright.  Whether it's stored in a plain text file for all to see, or obfuscated/encrypted, the creator of the work holds the copyright to it unless he explicitly releases the work into the public domain.  It seems this has not happened with RTK1, in any language.

Nobody is arguing that Heisig or somebody else lost the copyright to the books, but in the USA you can use other people's copyrighted work without their authorization if specific criteria are meet. This is called fair use.

If Heisig released all the keywords with a free tool, he can not claim, that somebody would misuse my list to get the benefits of the book without buying it, but this would be required to argue against fair use in court.

misha wrote:

Thus the copyright on translations of the book "Remembering the Kanji 1" into non-English languages belongs to the companies that published the books.  Redistributing the book in any form -- paper, digital, tattooed on the back of your head -- is breach of copyright, and those companies could, in theory, come after you.

That's not true. Copyright does not grant such absolute powers. They might still try to come after you, but there is a good chance, that they will lose in court.

misha wrote:

Using Heisig's keywords in a language other than English isn't necessarily breach of copyright, however.  An English-German bilingual could easily take Heisig's English keywords and translate them into German.  I wouldn't be at all surprised if the result that person achieves would be similar to the official German translation of RTK 1.

That's wrong. Translating copyrighted work does not create your own independent work. This translation would have a shared copyright between you and the owner of the original work.

misha wrote:

Whether or not it is breach of copyright, many dictionaries include references to the Heisig index (WWWDIC, for instance) and keyword.  Whereas they acknowledge the source, this act alone is not enough to avoid breach of copyright.

This is fair use. Heisig can use not copyright to disallow people to make references to his work.

Last edited by xaarg (2008 January 18, 4:39 am)

misha wrote:

I doubt that is necessary, as it would be trivial to deduce the frame numbers using WWWDIC or similar tool anyway.

Better be safe than sorry. A person with enough evil intent can just google for "Remembering the Kanji" to find a few page, where you can download all the books for free, but linking to such a page is still illegal in a few countries.

misha wrote:

Are you trying to say that redistributing a copyrighted work is not breach of copyright?      I have a feeling that we weren't on the same page here.

Yes, it is no always a breach of copyright. You can create a parody of Heisig's book, which would allow you to use parts of them for this purpose. You can add Heisig's index numbers to a kanji lexicon. You can quote parts of his work to praise or to criticize him. There are a lot of situations, where you can use other people's copyrighted works, especially if you don't try to make money.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fair_use

misha wrote:

Although I agree with your point about translating copyrighted works, I think you've missed my point here.  I wasn't referring to the translation of the copyrighted work itself.  I was referring to the individual keywords.  My point was that if it's OK for English speakers to refer to 愛 as "love" in English, then I think that it's OK for a German speaker to refer to it as "Liebe".

Yes, the translation for a single word is not protected by copyright law, but a list of such translations can be. You can lookup phone numbers in your phone book (and redistribute this number), you can lookup a translations in your dictionary (and use it in a text), but you can not copy a phone book or a directory and sell them to other people (without getting into trouble).

misha wrote:

I don't see what makes the English keywords so special compared to non-English keywords.  Am I perhaps missing some crucial detail?

I never claimed the English keywords were special. This page is allowed to use them, because Heisig allowed it.

Last edited by xaarg (2008 January 18, 7:44 am)

Xaarg, you edit your posts faster than I can reply to them

xaarg wrote:

This page is allowed to use them, because Heisig allowed it.

Last edited by xaarg (12:44 pm)

Ah, that was the piece of information that I was missing.  Thank you for clearing that up.

It seems to me that this discussion is no longer relevant to the original topic of this thread.  I think it would be appropriate to continue this discussion at a different location.

If people can copy the keywords from the book (and they do, because most certainly use an SRS), then people can copy the keywords from KanjiGym without my "hacking guide". So I don't care much, if it has been removed, but Lars Grunewaldt's points are not convincing.

ファブリス wrote:

I disagree with your statements, the RevTK website does NOT replace the books.

Using the website without a book doesn't seem to be a smart idea, but it is possible without doing a lot of extra work, so a judge could argue, that using the keywords without authorization on this page is a violation of the law. That was my whole point. I believe, just like you, that having this website increases sales of the book.

Lars Grunewaldt wrote:

If you consider german copyright law, this is a clear breaking of copyright laws (circumventing "encryption").

Please read ? 95d UrhG. Your program is not protected, because you did not mark it as having copy protection. There is also ? 95a Abs. 2. You don't use encryption, but only store the content in a silly way. This scheme is not effective and therefore not protected by the law. Last but not least this is a German law valid only in Germany and is not part of the international treaties for copyright protection.

Lars Grunewaldt wrote:

While it's not a hard to obtain this knowledge for a programmer, I don't think the publishers will like this freely available "hacking guide" (if you want to call it like that), or any supported republishing of the word lists.

What they like or what they don't like does not matter that much. German law does not ban publishing descriptions to circumvent copyright protection, but only programs and similar tools.  Again it won't affect a website that is not based in Germany.

Last edited by xaarg (2008 February 01, 4:58 pm)

I imagine the original poster was just trying to help, and I can't imagine anyone thinking they could avoid buying the book if they had that list. But like Fabrice, I'm not too keen on the idea of receiving threating emails, so I have removed the link from the wiki. Strike another blow against fair use.