User talk:Nyitguy

New York State Environmental Facilities Corporation

Hi Nyitguy.

I have deleted the above article as a blatant copyright violation under section G12 of the criteria for speedy deletion. I saw your message on User:DragonflySixtyseven, but nevertheless, I visited the EFC website where the material comes from and see that it displays prominently at the bottom of the page "Copyright © 2005 NYSEFC". Accordingly, I had little choice but to delete. None of this is malicious. We take copyrights very seriously and cannot allow material that is copyrighted to remain here. We cannot use copyrighted material (even by permission) unless the material is released into the public domain or under a free license such as the GFDL or another compatible with the GFDL. Though we do have a page explaining how to donate copyrighted material to Wikipedia, here, I can't imagine that the State of New York is going to release the material, as is required for our use of it. You are welcome to recreate the article using your own words (and citing to sources).--Fuhghettaboutit (talk) 15:44, 2 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Oh, and welcome to Wikipedia...

Hello, Nyitguy! Welcome to Wikipedia! Thank you for your contributions to this free encyclopedia. If you decide that you need help, check out Getting Help below, ask me on my talk page, or place {{helpme}} on your talk page and ask your question there. Please remember to sign your name on talk pages by clicking

or using four tildes (~~~~); this will automatically produce your username and the date. Finally, please do your best to always fill in the edit summary field. Below are some useful links to facilitate your involvement. Happy editing! Fuhghettaboutit (talk) 15:49, 2 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

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Follow-up on copyrights

As far as I now, FOIL (that's ... Law, not ...Act; FOIA is for Federal information requests) allows disclosure of previously unreleased information and documents and doesn't bear upon whether the documents are copyrighted or not. Your counsel will know more of course. The point is that for our own purposes, we require that all information used here be under a free license or in the public domain, and the material is clearly copyrighted per the website.

Please understand that this does not mean you can't write about the subject, in detail, and cite to the material you were copying as a source (though note that secondary sources are much preferred). As is often repeated here: "You may use external websites as a source of information, but not as a source of sentences. This part is crucial: say it in your own words. A quick search turned up the following statement, from our page, Wikipedia:Copyrights: "most state and local governments in the United States do not place their work into the public domain and do in fact own the copyright to their work." And from Wikipedia:FAQ/Copyright: "Most state governments retain the copyright on their work (California being a notable exception)." I will duplicate this to your talk page.--Fuhghettaboutit (talk) 18:41, 2 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]