The present study covers the problem of rotation of a porous disk under a viscous incompressible fluid that fills the half-space above the disk, which is the generalization of the von Karman's problem. It is found that, instead of solving the exact problem, which is rather complicated by coupling the motions of the free fluid and that contained inside the permeable disk, it is sufficient to solve a much simpler problem of the motion of the free fluid placed onto a permeable plane. Assuming the flow in the permeable disk is described by the Brinkman equations, we obtain a self-similar formulation of the problem. Employing this formulation, we also show that the boundary condition associated with continuity of the tangential strains and tangential velocity components is satisfied at the fluid-porous body interface. The coefficient for the vertical velocity component is furthermore obtained. Various extreme cases are identified.