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"Blurbs"

Do we have a coherent policy for "blurbs"? I'm talking about things like the plot summaries from the backs/dust jackets of books, the standard blurbs that appear when films are released or on their DVD covers and similar things. They are widely reproduced whenever the book/film is listed anywhere but I guess are still copyrighted to the original publishers/film studios. Do we have any policy on them? Do we delete on sight? Do we allow reproduction? Do we require some kind of attribution? Exxolon (talk) 13:06, 2 July 2010 (UTC)

Yes, they are under copyright, and, yes, we delete on sight. These are analogous to Press Releases, really. Many people think that because press releases are engineered for wide distribution, we can reproduce them here, but our licensing requirements permit both commercial reproduction & modification. Intent to redistribute does not address these needs. --Moonriddengirl (talk) 13:10, 2 July 2010 (UTC)
(edit conflict) The policy is Wikipedia:Non-free content. We don't allow them if a "free" plot summary can be written. Theleftorium (talk) 13:13, 2 July 2010 (UTC)
Thanks - I've rewritten the one in question and advised the article creator. Exxolon (talk) 16:21, 3 July 2010 (UTC)

Is the intent of this policy to address links to pages, not whole websites? That is, is it referring to sites only in the context of links to copyrighted material? If so, I'd like to change the phrases

  • "linking to a site" to "a link to a page on a site".
  • "directing others to a site" to "directing others to a page".

The case law mentioned was all about copyrighted material on pages and links to pages, not whole websites. (I think the intent is self-evident, but as written it has been interpreted by others to refer to whole sites.) --Lexein (talk) 03:46, 16 July 2010 (UTC)

I think this is one of those situations where ambiguous language is intentional. There is no blanket ban on websites that contain copyright infringements - or we could never link YouTube - but there have been cases where entire sites have been blacklisted at Wikipedia due to rampant copyright concerns. This is particularly true of many lyrics hosting sites. Some of the lyrics they host may be public domain (particularly through age), but the concerns they represent have been judged sufficient to make them an unworthy risk. --Moonriddengirl (talk) 17:39, 17 July 2010 (UTC)
Thank you. Your second sentence expresses my interpretation exactly. Because of the ambiguous language in LINKVIO, I would appreciate your (or others) weighing in at Talk:The_Pirate_Bay#HTTP_vs._HTTPS. Or what's the appropriate place to request that? --Lexein (talk) 14:03, 20 July 2010 (UTC)

images of book covers

Does a book cover come under copyright such that it cannot be reproduced in Wikipedia without the permission of the book's copyright owner? (Assume the book and its cover are under one copyright, which is what the single notice found in most books implies.) Or does its reproduction come under fair use on the ground that it constitutes only a small portion of the book of which the cover is part?

I'm confused by the only on-point discussion I found on Wikipedia (another discussion is on old covers, but old involves public domain). The fair-use discussion seems to rely on covers having separate copyright; perhaps they have that but I don't usually see a separate copyright note and it's possible that many covers are works made for hire so that copyright is the employer's (i.e., publisher's or author's) intellectual property.

I'm considering whether to challenge a couple of images now on Wikipedia. Possibly publishers granted permission but I can ask about that if and when I challenge the presence of the images. If copyright on the cover is separate from copyright on the body of the book then probably fair use does not apply. While copyright law may allow copying of a press release by the press (I'm not sure but let's say that's true), unless book publishers are sending book covers to Wikimedia Foundation I doubt that sort of permission would apply. Some websites reproduce a great many book covers, but the ones I know of are book sellers, including distributors and retailers. They may have permission, and the larger ones probably do, included in their contracts with publishers. So those websites' practices may be irrelevant to Wikimedia.

Does Wikimedia have a clear policy for Wikipedia?

Thank you. Nick Levinson (talk) 17:07, 17 July 2010 (UTC)

Wikimedia Foundation leaves the development of non-free content policies to local projects, provided they meet the licensing resolution (Wikimedia:Resolution:Licensing policy). Current non-free content guidelines on English Wikipedia specifically permits cover art (WP:NFCI) in articles about the product in which it is being used (thereby providing critical commentary on the product); it does not permit copyrighted cover art in other contexts. But this isn't so much an issue for WP:C, as there is no disputing that the images are copyrighted. You might want to raise it at WT:NFC, the page at which the English Wikipedia's approach to non-free content is discussed. --Moonriddengirl (talk) 17:35, 17 July 2010 (UTC)

Those of us who work copyright know that under the U.S. law that governs Wikipedia (and precedence of all other copyright investigations), lists are copyrightable to the extent that they are creative. Sometimes, determining creativity of lists is complex. There is currently a case open at WP:CP of two lists. 1976 Lady Wigram Trophy is opened on 8/8; 1976 Rhodesian Grand Prix is opened on 8/9. The copyright owner vigorously objects to our use of the content. The matter has been through OTRS (Ticket:2010080810004046), where two different agents have declined to delete the material on the basis of Feist v. Rural, but he asserts that there is creativity involved. Please see Talk:1976 Lady Wigram Trophy and help clarify there the creativity of these two lists, if you can. The copyright holder has been advised via OTRS and through Wikipedia that he should write to our designated agent to request take-down if he disagrees with the OTRS outcome, but he would prefer to resolve it through community consensus. --Moonriddengirl (talk) 12:35, 13 August 2010 (UTC)

To clarify why I haven't taken the route of a take-down request, I don't doubt that it would work and see off these pages but there's nothing to stop other contributors targeting other pages on my site. I'd rather reach a consensus that this isn't what Wikipedia should be doing. Even if there is a wafer-thin justification using US copyright (I maintain that there isn't), this isn't what Wikipedia is about. If the contributor had added something, it could be said that the sum of human knowledge had moved forward but a straight copy of a web page from one place to another isn't any sort of advance. Instead of trying to find a justification, I think Wikipedia should be frowning on this activity, deleting the page and telling the contributor to try again. Allen Brown (talk) 14:44, 14 August 2010 (UTC)


I have recently acquired all the above magazines (104 editions) for the years 1911 and 1912. Is it OK to scan and upload some of the photographs to Wikipedia or are they still covered by copyright?  Giacomo  20:57, 26 August 2010 (UTC)

Good score! :D All (Well, for our purposes) content published before January 1, 1923 is public domain under the US copyright laws that govern Wikipedia. You can upload any of them on Wikipedia. You probably can and should upload them to Commons as well, but the tags are more complicated. It depends on whether or not an author is identified. Commons:Commons:Public domain#United Kingdom says that if the author is unknown, the copyright expires 70 years after publication. In that case, you'd tag them Commons:Template:PD-US and Commons:Template:PD-UK-unknown, I think (note: these are Commons templates; I am not that familiar with them), though I'm not sure how much research you're supposed to put into tracking the photographer. If the photographer is identified, the situation is slightly different; copyright expires 70 years after the death of the author. They're only PD if the photographers died in 1939 or sooner. In that case, the template is Commons:Template:PD-old-70-1923. I'll verify this with a Commons admin. --Moonriddengirl (talk) 21:13, 26 August 2010 (UTC)
Yep, that's right. They're definitely OK to upload on Wikipedia, and probably OK to upload on Commons. If the creator of the image is not identified in the magazine itself, I'd be inclined to say you're good to count them as anonymous, but be sure to note that when you upload them to Commons. Of course, the same rules would apply to any pictures in the magazines, if there are any- there may be a few useful little gems hidden among them. J Milburn (talk) 21:21, 26 August 2010 (UTC)
  • Thanks, there are literally millions of little photographic gems in those magazines - not just my architecture, but cricket, rugby, royalty and some pretty stern and miserable looking "girls in pearls." Thanks again.  Giacomo  08:16, 27 August 2010 (UTC)

Kits with logos

Opinions of File:Kit_body_RBNY_1011.png can this be in the PD if the logo is copyrighted ? Gnevin (talk) 23:14, 19 September 2010 (UTC)

Camp Williams map - Opinions requested

Camp Williams, a USMC and Utah National Guard training facility in Utah, has on their website a map of the camp, at http://www.ut.ngb.army.mil/campwilliams/Interactive_Map.htm. Surprisingly, it is marked "Copyright 2004 Camp W.G. Williams ( all rights reserved )". To the best of my knowledge both the USMC and the Utah National Guard are instrumentalities of the United States government and their work-product is public domain. The camp's website is clearly a US Army website. Does anyone have an idea how "Camp W.G. Williams" can copyright their map? --Bejnar (talk) 19:03, 20 September 2010 (UTC)

In general, they can't and most copyright notices for U.S. Government sources like that are incorrect. Anything they create during the course of their duties is PD. Some other organization could have created it, but then that "other" would hold the copyright. The only situation in which they would own the copyright is if someone else created it and then sold/gave the rights to them; but that occurs so rarely (from what I've been able to uncover) as to not be a legitimate concern in most situations. VernoWhitney (talk) 19:14, 20 September 2010 (UTC)

Wikia content reuse

While improving one of the articles, I reused some content from a Wiki hosted on Wikia, and wanted to ask if these edits will suffice for attribution purposes. [1] and [2] Feinoha Talk, My master 21:47, 12 October 2010 (UTC)

Hello

I am trying to write an article about a book by written by Longfellow which was publised in 1883, am i allowed to upload some of the illustrations from the book to use within this article? Thank you in advance for any advice Tentontunic (talk) 15:41, 21 October 2010 (UTC)

  • Were the illustrations published much later, like after 1923? or were they in the 1883 edition? The age of the text is not important to determining the copyright status of the illustrations which may have been made and published in another century. --Bejnar (talk) 03:02, 22 October 2010 (UTC)

Okay, here's one on which I need feedback. Directive 2001/116/EC is tagged as a copyright violation of [3]. The originating body claims copyright here. U.S. law doesn't recognize copyright in legal code: "Edicts of government, such as judicial opinions, administrative rulings, legislative enactments, public ordinances, and similar official legal documents are not copyrightable for reasons of public policy. This applies to such works whether they are Federal, State, or local as well as to those of foreign governments."(206.01, "Edicts of Government") Does this apply to legislation of the European Union? I was thinking so, but I am seriously second-guessing myself. --Moonriddengirl (talk) 20:35, 21 October 2010 (UTC)

Yes, I would certainly classify the EU as an governmental body.--Prosfilaes (talk) 21:20, 21 October 2010 (UTC)
I also agree. EU directives would be considered public domain in the US, which is good enough for Wikipedia. I have no idea what their status would be in the EU however. Dragons flight (talk) 21:25, 21 October 2010 (UTC)
Now that MRG tracked down the section, I see that Wikisource has precedent at s:Template:PD-EdictGov (see in use at the bottom of s:Consolidated version of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union). VernoWhitney (talk) 21:27, 21 October 2010 (UTC)
I think under the "edicts of government" provision of U.S. copyright law, it is fairly clear that EU law counts as an "edict of government", and so is PD in the U.S. I'm quite surprised that the EU publications office tries to claim copyright on this material: such a claim would surely be unenforceable in the 23 EU member states that refuse copyright for their own laws (including Belgium, where most of the EU institutions are based). Physchim62 (talk) 08:36, 22 October 2010 (UTC)
Thanks much. I had restored the text, but, as I said, started seriously second-guessing myself. I remain mindful that she who restores contributes. :/ We seem to have complete agreement at this point that laws of the EU would be treated as "edicts of government", so I will resolve this listing and restore the content. I really appreciate your feedback! --Moonriddengirl (talk) 10:35, 22 October 2010 (UTC)
Uh-oh, except there is a different opinion at the copyright problems talk page, where User:CactusWriter notes that the EU is not a "sovereign state", but an intergovernmental organization, like the African Union, OAS or UN. This was, as I indicate there, the question that had me second-guessing myself to begin with. If the EU is not treated as a "foreign government" by U.S. copyright law, then it may copyright its edicts just as any organization may copyright its bylaws. Sigh. This is the kind of thing I would ordinarily have asked User:MikeGodwin about, but given the recent announcement of his departure obviously have lost that resource. :/ --Moonriddengirl (talk) 10:43, 22 October 2010 (UTC)
The EU has the authority to pass laws ("regulations" in their terminology) that have immediate force in all member nations and override any contradictory local statutes. They also have an independent judicial system to enforce their laws and resolve disputes. As far as I know, neither the UN nor any of the others you mention have similar independent authority to enforce their resolutions. Personally, I see no problem with concluding the EU is a system of government (and not just an intergovernmental organization). Since the intent of the edicts clause is to make public the rules under which people are to be governed, I would say it does apply to the regulations and directives of the EU. Dragons flight (talk) 11:11, 22 October 2010 (UTC)
Sorry if I made this more complicated. The EU does function as a kind of hybrid form of government and intergovernmental organization. But like Dragons flight and Physchim62 have noted, the EU does pass certain law over member nations. It also has the ability to make treaties (which I think is a foundation of sovereignty). So, after considering those comments, I do believe that we can treat the directives and regulations of the EU as "edicts of foreign government" and the text can be considered PD. I definitely don't believe it's anything to which the EU would ever object. But I wanted to clarify that this may not include the other various EU papers which may be copyrighted -- in much the same way US law allows individual states and federal organizations to retain copyright. (At least until someone like Mike Godwin with better legal knowledge opines otherwise.)CactusWriter (talk) 15:48, 22 October 2010 (UTC)
Indeed, I was never suggesting that all EU documents were in the public domain. Most governments (and almost all intergovernmental organizations) copyright most of their documents. But the "edict of government" doctrine says that laws can never be copyrighted in the U.S. so, if this document is a law (and everyone seems to agree that it is), it can't support a U.S. copyright. Physchim62 (talk) 14:47, 23 October 2010 (UTC)
The general principle, I'm pretty sure, is that people have a right to know the law which affects them, so any text with a legal effect (treaties, laws, court decisions, etc.) are considered public domain in the U.S. (no matter what style the government, be it foreign or local). I don't think there is any question that EU directives would come under that, as while I don't think they are self-executing (they are not precisely law themselves) they do force local governments to change their actual laws to conform to them. There are many countries besides the U.S. which disallow copyright in that type of legal texts, although there are also many which do allow such copyrights, so in those countries the EU could hold copyright I guess. But not in the U.S. The principle actually comes from common law (many court cases over the years, including lots of them from the 1800s), and is not explicitly codified in law. But yes, that principle only covers legal-type documents, not *all* works, so the EU can certainly hold copyright over a lot of stuff. Carl Lindberg (talk) 06:14, 24 October 2010 (UTC)
Perhaps not important, but just becoming aware of MikeGodwin's depature upon reading this, the annoucement does say he will continue to be available for several months. I don't know if that includes questions from us peons :-P but if it really matters you could try (I presume he will update his user page anyway). Nil Einne (talk) 22:34, 24 October 2010 (UTC)
Thanks for the reminder, Nil Einne. I think the issue has been well clarified here and everyone is in agreement. EU legal directives qualify as "edicts of foreign governments" and are PD for our purposes. CactusWriter (talk) 16:10, 25 October 2010 (UTC)

A Riew Possibilities of CRF treatemnts in Ayurveda

Extended content

Chronic Renal Failure (CRF) is the progressive loss of kidney function. The kidneys attempt to compensate for renal damage by hyperfiltration (excessive straining of the blood). Over time, hyperfiltration causes further loss of function. Chronic loss of function causes generalized wasting (shrinking in size) and progressive scarring within all parts of the kidneys. In time, overall scarring obscures the site of the initial damage. Yet, it is not until over 70% of the normal combined function of both kidneys is lost that most patients begin to experience symptoms of kidney failure. Signs and Symptoms of Chronic Renal Failure Chronic renal failure (CRF) usually produces symptoms when renal function — which is measured as the glomerular filtration rate (GFR) — falls below 30 milliliters per minute (< 30 ml/min). This is approximately 30% of the normal value. When the glomerular filtration rate (GFR) slows to below 30 ml/min, signs of uremia (high blood level of protein by-products, such as urea & creatinine) may become noticeable. When the GFR falls below 15 ml/min most people become increasingly symptomatic. Uremic symptoms can affect every organ system in the body. Chronic renal failure nutrition should have a balance of fluids and electrolyte and adjusting the diet to prevent accumulation of toxic waste product to the minimum possible level.

Treatment for renal failurePrevention is always the goal with kidney failure. Chronic disease such as hypertension and diabetes are devastating because of the damage that they can do to kidneys and other organs. Lifelong diligence is important in keeping blood sugar and blood pressure within normal limits. Specific treatments are dependent upon the underlying diseases. Once kidney failure is present, the goal is to prevent further deterioration of renal function. If ignored, the kidneys will progress to complete failure, but if underlying illnesses are addressed and treated aggressively, kidney function can be preserved, though not always improved. Since1998 Dr. Prasher has treated about 34000 patients of various Chronic Disorders by using ayurveda from all parts of the world, successfully with more than 90% patients’ satisfaction rate including 4 with AIDS, 34 Hepatitis-B, 54 Hepatitis-C, 67 Coronary artery diseases, 7 valvular heart diseases, 4560 Slip Disc. 150 Thyroid, 3570 Diabetic, 6250 Asthma/Chronic Bronchitis, 03 Liver abscess, 9 Prostate cancer, 2 Blood cancer, 3 Breast cancer, 6 Liver cancer,2 brain cancer,4 stomach cancer,6 lung cancer,965 BPH,916 Hypertension, 1200 Chronic renal failure, 3670 Arthritis, 132 Infertility,875 Obesity, 235 Migraine, and a large number of others suffering from common ailments.

Chronic Renal failure management in Vedanta A lot of herbal treatments are available for renal failure. The goals of treatment for renal failure are to: 

Correct or treat the cause of kidney failure. Support the kidneys until they have healed and can work properly. Prevent or treat any complications caused by acute renal failure To check any chronic renal failure, firstly we studying the ongoing disease process and identifying the state of disease and the nature of diseased .Dr Prasher provide personalized herbal formulations to check the further deterioration of renal functions. In lot of patients these herbal compounds reversed the disease process involved & improve the renal functions slowly & gradually; reduces the levels of S.creatinine & B. urea. These herbal products are in capsules forms & can be taken along with other types of medicines & treatments /procedures including dialysis.

Hi. At least some of this is copied from [4] (the part about Dr. Prasher). Some of it seems to be copied from [5]. Why is this here? Are you trying to ask a question? --Moonriddengirl (talk) 10:42, 28 October 2010 (UTC)

Reuse of Wikipedia content without attribution - where to report?

What's the venue for reporting the discovery of a website that apparently reuses Wikipedia text without attribution?

In cleaning up this edit from 195.60.77.1 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · filter log · WHOIS · RDNS · RBLs · http · block user · block log), I noticed that the text of their article on Lyme disease was substantially similar to ours. The smoking gun was in the passage on treatment, where a footnote marker was still embedded: "The antibiotics of choice are doxycycline (in adults), amoxicillin (in children), erythromycin (for pregnant women) and ceftriaxone, with treatment lasting 14 to 28 days.[116] Alternative choices are cefuroxime and cefotaxime."

There is no attribution to Wikipedia on the page; the license at the bottom reads "Copyright © 2010 info-medical.info. All Rights Reserved." I did leave a reply on that site noting the reuse and requirement of attribution.

I looked at WP:C and don't see where to report this. Does this need escalated beyond this talk page? —C.Fred (talk) 18:03, 4 November 2010 (UTC)

Thanks for your attention to this issue! You can check to see if they are already listed at WP:MIRROR. If they are not, please add them. You can also write to them about the issue, if you like, although you can only legally demand removal of the content if you contributed to it. --Moonriddengirl (talk) 18:08, 4 November 2010 (UTC)
I've listed them as a mirror. I've contributed to the article but not substantially enough to where I feel in a position to demand removal. Nor do I want the content removed, unless they persistently infringe. —C.Fred (talk) 18:50, 4 November 2010 (UTC)

Text from other language Wikis

Just wondering what the policy is here?

This edit (among many others made by the user with the same minimal comment 'expand'): [6] is an (automated? (there is odd wording such as 'The action of some indole alkaloids is known for ages. Aztecs used the psilocybin mushrooms which contain alkaloids psilocybin and psilocin.') translation of the matching featured article on Russian Wikipedia.[7] I know it's ok to re-use the text, but shouldn't there be a link back to the source? Sumbuddi (talk) 02:44, 7 November 2010 (UTC)

I see that there is a tag in talk there. Talk:Indole_alkaloids But not here: [8]. I'll leave the user a message to make sure he tags his sources. Sumbuddi (talk) 02:48, 7 November 2010 (UTC)

Plagiarism

In the section "Using copyrighted work from others", we have the paragraph:

"Note that copyright law governs the creative expression of ideas, not the ideas or information themselves. Therefore, it is legal to read an encyclopedia article or other work, reformulate the concepts in your own words, and submit it to Wikipedia, so long as you do not follow the source too closely. (See our Copyright FAQ for more on how much reformulation may be necessary as well as the distinction between summary and abridgment.) However, it would still be unethical (but not illegal) to do so without citing the original as a reference."

What the last sentence is referring to is plagiarism, isn't it; is there any objection to adding a link to WP:Plagiarism to that sentence? --JN466 19:34, 11 November 2010 (UTC)

Yes, I would object to citing WP:PLAGIARISM anywhere! The last sentence should really refer to article 10(1) of the Berne Convention: It shall be permissible to make quotations from a work which has already been lawfully made available to the public, provided that their making is compatible with fair practice, and their extent does not exceed that justified by the purpose, including quotations from newspaper articles and periodicals in the form of press summaries. Fair practice is generally taken to include attribution to the extent that this is practictable, which is always for Wikipedia. Physchim62 (talk) 20:09, 11 November 2010 (UTC)

Actually, that entire paragraph last sentence needs to be removed: it has no business being on this page. Physchim62 (talk) 20:23, 11 November 2010 (UTC)

I know your stance on plagiarism, but I think that the community at large would disagree. We can always try to get some of them to weigh in here, and good luck to us. :/ (By which I mean, of course, that getting people to talk about this is generally not easy. Either there's a lot of shouting and handwaving without much progress or, more typically, dead silence.) That text has been in this policy since March 2006: [9]. Before that, it did explicitly mention "plagiarism", though it linked to the article, having done so since 2002: [10]. So long as we have a guideline, linking to it in context would be appropriate. Especially since the last time I looked (a few days ago), the guideline seemed to be looking much better. :) --Moonriddengirl (talk) 12:22, 13 November 2010 (UTC)

Simple version

Is there any page that sets out the basic ideas of what copyright infringement means and how to avoid it. I'm putting a notice on a user talk page and looking for the best link, but all of the pages seem too technical. Do we have anything that a teenager could be expected to understand?   Will Beback  talk  11:18, 13 November 2010 (UTC)

Hi, Will. I'd send them to Wikipedia:Copy-paste. It seems excellent for that purpose. :) --Moonriddengirl (talk) 12:00, 13 November 2010 (UTC)
That's perfect. Thanks.   Will Beback  talk  21:19, 13 November 2010 (UTC)

Not needed

"While the United States government does not claim copyright protection on its own works (see below for specifics), it should be noted that governments outside the U.S. often do claim copyright over works produced by their employees (for example, Crown copyright in the United Kingdom)."

The link for "below" is not needed (and in fact, inaccurate) as the sentence is already in the section linked. Thanks for fixing - CETTALK 04:33, 23 November 2010 (UTC)
Sorry for the delay; fixed. I've also added a link to the relevant section of WP:PD, which is a bit more detailed. --Moonriddengirl (talk) 11:48, 5 January 2011 (UTC)

+cy

Please add cy:Wicipedia:Hawlfraint. Diolch/Thanks. -- Xxglennxx (talkcont.) 03:47, 5 January 2011 (UTC)

Sure thing! I did not know we had a Welsh Wikipedia. :) --Moonriddengirl (talk) 11:41, 5 January 2011 (UTC)

Charts and graphs

What the policy on recreating charts from a source? I have an article from the New York Times that includes a chart. It's nothing very involved, just a simple line graph showing the total air crash fatalities between 1960 and 1971. The article itself includes a note that says "Source: National Transportation Safety Board" with regards to the chart itself. Is it OK for me to create a new chart, using those same data points, and include it in the article? --Mûĸĸâĸûĸâĸû (blah?) 13:43, 16 January 2011 (UTC)

Diference between work and image of work

Which should be the subject of the copyright tag, the underlying work such as a painting or essay, or the image thereof? This becomes an issue when both are produced by different entities that may be covered under different copyright statuses for different reasons. For instance, a picture taken of a really old work (PD-old or PD-ineligible) by a US Government employee yada-yada (PD-USGov), that may or may not be copyrightable in and of itself (PD-ineligible). Should both tags be included? Int21h (talk) 17:35, 8 February 2011 (UTC)

Civil war photo tags

I happened to run across some photographs of the American Civil War, and noticed that the copyright tags are not consistent. Many of them seem to be done by Mathew Brady, dowloaded from the US Library of Congress. Some use the "US Army" tag, but that seems wrong, since I think Brady was doing it unofficially, or was he a real employee of the government? Also some use the "Published in US before 1923" tag. But they not really "published"? No evidence to that effect, e.g. not in a specific magazine or book - these are original negatives. So my guess is that the "death plus 100" is the right one. I would also think that they should generally go on Commons, but many are just on English wikipedia so I will ask here. Thanks for any suggestions. W Nowicki (talk) 22:52, 10 February 2011 (UTC)

Hi. I think WP:MCQ might be a better place to ask. Contributors familiar with image copyright tend to congregate there. :) --Moonriddengirl (talk) 23:05, 15 February 2011 (UTC)

Yes, thanks, I already did, and someone already replied. That is not an obvious TLA; perhaps I am just acronym challenged. W Nowicki (talk) 23:43, 16 February 2011 (UTC)

During a recent AfD (in which I was not a participant), it was pointed out to me that the sources behind List of highest-grossing Bollywood films are copyrighted. It is not a raw compilation of data, but rather a subjective analysis included a variety of factors (akin to CCC Information Services v. Maclean Hunter Market Reports and CDN Inc. v Kapes). I've currently got a conversation started (well, I'm attempting to start one) about how we can safely include in a list of these elements at Talk:List of highest-grossing Bollywood films#Copyright concerns. Input would be welcome! (But some admin will need to stay uninvolved to close the conversation :)). I am seriously wondering if this is the time for me to see if I can introduce myself to our new attorney. :/ Please give feedback there, so as to keep conversation in one place. I am also raising this at WT:C and WT:COPYCLEAN. --Moonriddengirl (talk) 23:05, 15 February 2011 (UTC)

Meaning of linking?

The policy tells us we should not link to web sites that are known to infringe copyright. However, is it also forbidden to give the URL in a manner that clicking on it would not cause the browser to navigate to that site? For example, if the Wikimedia Foundation's site were infringing copyright (which it isn't, this is just hypothetical) could I still cite it by writing http://www.wikimedia.org ? Jc3s5h (talk) 00:24, 16 March 2011 (UTC)

I don't know that it's explicitly mentioned in policy, but I'm pretty sure it's definitely against the spirit of WP:ELNEVER since it could still be contributory copyright infringement. VernoWhitney (talk) 13:13, 22 March 2011 (UTC)
The external links guideline only applies to sites that are not being used as references. Jc3s5h (talk) 16:18, 22 March 2011 (UTC)
WP:LINKVIO refers to all uses, though, and I'm afraid it would be against the spirit of that for the same reason. The purpose of the prohibition is to make sure that we are not guilty of helping other websites misappropriate content. Even if it's not a linkthrough, we can still be guilty of that if we tell them where to find it. --Moonriddengirl (talk) 12:31, 24 March 2011 (UTC)

A discussion about plagiarism

Perhaps editors here might be interested in this discussion.--Andrew Lancaster (talk) 21:24, 18 March 2011 (UTC)

I've done some work on that policy page. Full disclosure of what I did is at Wikipedia talk:Copyright violations/Archive_1#Changes to policy page. Feedback, positive or otherwise, is welcome. :) --Moonriddengirl (talk) 12:38, 24 March 2011 (UTC)

Should we explain user liability?

One thing I've been thinking about lately is that while our policies are engineered to protect Wikipedia, there is not so much information for good faith users who may think that following our copyright policies will protect them from prosecution. This may be true, in the United States...and may not be, since of course the question of whether material really is "fair use" and whether or not infringement really exists can be settled only by a court. It certainly may not be true in other countries with different laws than ours. We accept material that is PD in the U.S., but not in other nations. Should we advise contributors somewhere that while this policy is built to try to keep the website compliant with US copyright law, they are themselves responsible for their contributions and need to determine if their usage violates particularly laws of other localities?

Without giving details, for privacy reasons, some time back a contributor sent me a panicked e-mail when a publisher in his nation came after him (he was editing under his real name and had plenty enough identifying material on his user page) for uploading images under our WP:NFC. His nation is more restrictive. I sent him on to Mike Godwin, but I've always wondered how that situation came out. This man was gobsmacked to realize that he may have placed himself personally in the line of fire. --Moonriddengirl (talk) 12:38, 24 March 2011 (UTC)

New shortcut

I boldly created WP:COPYOTHERS, which points to Wikipedia:Copyrights#Using copyrighted work from others, since I've needed to point editors directly to that section in the past. However, I can't add the {{shortcuts}} template to the target section. I would appreciate it if a mop wielder would do so on my behalf. Regards, Orange Suede Sofa (talk) 01:53, 25 April 2011 (UTC)

Done. :) --Moonriddengirl (talk) 01:55, 25 April 2011 (UTC)

Other wikis

I am having trouble wading through all of this, so if you can point me to the right page I'd appreciate that. I am trying to clean up bunches of baseball player articles that use a wiki as a cited reference (wiki: www.baseball-reference.com/bullpen, but I noticed the first few I was going through were copied straight from the other wiki several years ago(the first edit summary in the article history states this). My question, if a wiki is copied verbatim, is that a vio? If not, does it even need to be given credit? I know this wiki copies from us and we from them, so circular references are almost a guarantee. Any pointers would be appreciated. (Sorry for my ignorance on navigating these vio pages.)

Secondly, can you point me to a page that tells me how to clean up these references. I'm not planning on deleting any content, but I wasn't sure if I should just delete the citation to the wiki and leave it uncited, or what. (Dynamic IP, will change when I log-off) --64.85.221.28 (talk) 13:15, 29 April 2011 (UTC)

It depends on what the licensing is of the other wiki. :) In this case, the answer is going to be pretty complicated, I'm afraid. Because we underwent a licensing transition, they used to be compatible; they aren't now. Any content copied from their pages before our transition is legally retainable, as long as they get proper credit. Any content copied after, we can't have. Any text copied from that website and added to Wikipedia on or after November 1, 2008 should be removed as a copyright violation, whether it is attributed or not. If it was added prior to that date, it can be retained, but it needs to be properly attributed with a license template: template:GFDLlegacy. We should not be citing to the other Wiki; it's not a reliable source. With the attribution template in place, removing the citation does not put us in the position of plagiarizing their content. --Moonriddengirl (talk) 13:27, 29 April 2011 (UTC)
Wow, thanks for the quick response. In that case, I guess I should point out Template:Bullpen, which is included on most of these articles. Should that template be updated to include language from template:GFDLlegacy? The documentation for the template has the GDFL disclaimer, but the template itself does not. No big deal, but I thought I should bring that template to your attention. Thanks for your advice Moonriddengirl. (Dynamic IP, will change when I log-off) --64.85.221.28 (talk) 13:47, 29 April 2011 (UTC)

Congressional record?

Hi. I was asked at my talk page about the copyright status of this note from Ester Jusuf in the Congressional Record. I'm unsure, but a bit concerned about it. Congressional Record About says, "With the exception of copyrighted articles, there are no restrictions on the republication of material from the Congressional Record." Ester Jusuf is evidently an Indonesian human rights attorney, so she is not a US federal employee, and this is published in the "Extension of Remarks" section and thus was not presented before Congress. Any feedback? --Moonriddengirl (talk) 23:52, 23 May 2011 (UTC)

I was the one who asked Moonriddengirl, and I would just like to make it clear that Ester Jusuf is indeed an Indonesian attorney and head of the NGO Solidaritas Nusa Bangsa, which deals with the human rights violations in Indonesia in May 1998 (and maybe other human rights issues; most of their books are about the 1998 riots). Crisco 1492 (talk) 09:49, 24 May 2011 (UTC)

The validity of Template:PD-US-record

At Wikipedia:Media_copyright_questions#Template:PD-US-record there is a discussion of the validity of {{PD-US-record}}.--TonyTheTiger (T/C/BIO/WP:CHICAGO/WP:FOUR) 22:41, 2 June 2011 (UTC)

Proposed overhaul for {{copyviocore}}

Hi. There's a proposal to update {{copyviocore}} at Template talk:Copyviocore#Propose replacement. Please weigh in, if you have interest. --Moonriddengirl (talk) 19:58, 11 June 2011 (UTC)

Wikipedia includes a number of articles that reproduce lists previously published elsewhere. If the content is creative (in composition, selection, arrangement), there can be copyright concerns. The purpose of this RfC is to determine how we can fairly cover creative lists in accordance with WP:NFC. (Note: this does not apply to uncreative factual compilations, although sometimes what appears to be a factual compilation is actually creative; see below.)

Background
Extended content

In January and February, after copyright concerns were raised about several unconnected list articles, I exchanged a number of e-mails with our interim attorney in the hopes of clarifying what position we should take with these. Based on her letters, these are factors we should consider here:

  • With respect to copyright, she indicates that in addition to lists of obvious creative nature ("most important X"), lists of uncertain creation criteria and surveys constitute a copyright concern.
  • She says, "Unless you know the criteria involved in creating the list, it is impossible to even gauge the potential of a court finding that it warrants copyright protection. And unfortunately, even if you do know the criteria, it is very hard to predict what a court will say (especially because the courts vary in their opinions in different circuits on this matter) when there is a degree of creativity involved. You are really only safe if the list is purely formulaic."
  • It is her opinion that polls, also, are likely to be protectable because the parameters of the survey are chosen by those who conduct the polls and the selection of respondents indicates "at least some creativity." She says, "Because I believe survey results can be protected under copyright law, any use of them should be guided by fair use principles" and reminds that "Merely republishing them without any commentary or transformation is not fair use."

The need for certainty in creation criteria protects us from inadvertently misusing those lists that may look like fact but that may instead be based on expert opinion, which is creative.

  • With respect to the fair use of creative lists, she says:
  • The more we use, the greater the risk; the more important the material we use; the greater the risk. "if you list the top 5 out of a top 20 or even top 100 list, it's less likely to be fair use because the top 5 is usually what the public is the most interested in. Whereas if you give #2, #6, and #18-20, even though you are giving up the same percentage, it is more likely to be considered fair use." No "safe" percentages can be assumed because of the variety of factors involved.
  • Our republishing such lists "appeals to the same audience as the original" and is not likely to be seen as transformative.
  • using older lists that are out of publication may help a finding of fair use.
Guidelines

What the NFC guideline says now, based on our interim attorney's feedback, is that "unusable text" includes "A complete or partial recreation of "Top 100" or similar lists where the list has been selected in a creative manner, such as AFI's 100 Years...100 Movies. Articles on individual elements from such lists can discuss their inclusion in these lists. Complete lists based on factual data, such as List of highest-grossing films, are appropriate to include." This is a good distillation of her advice, but a strict application of this would make even The 500 Greatest Songs of All Time, which I have always used as a good example, a problem.

Can we devise a workable approach to incorporating elements from lists that does not require us to remove all such partial recreations (or limit them to the bottom 5)?

This is not an intellectual exercise, but will impact a number of existing lists, both those that include material in their entirety and those that include samplings of various sizes. They are many. --Moonriddengirl (talk) 12:32, 2 July 2011 (UTC)

Life of author +70

I recently wanted to add a photograph of Louis Victor Baillot, who was the last surviving veteran of the Battle of Waterloo. He died in 1898. But since I did not know the authorship of the photograph, I could not be certain that the photograph was out of copyright. If the photograph was taken around 1895 by a 20-year-old photographer, and the photographer died at a normal age, that would be around 1950, and then the photograph would still be under copyright protection until 2020. So in accordance with policy, I did not upload the picture.

But Wikipedia seems to have a large number of pictures whose status is similar, as one would expect, because a strict interpretation of the policy would rule out the use of most photographs taken after about 1880.

For example, File:Maria Goeppert-Mayer.gif depicts a young Maria Goeppert-Mayer, taken perhaps around 1930 or so. (Goeppert-Mayer was born in 1906.) Unless the photographer died before 1941, the photograph is still protected by copyright in the United States. The image's information page says that the author is unknown, so this photograph is in violation of Wikipedia's copyright policy because for all we know they may actually still be alive.

I bring this up not because I want action taken on the Goeppert-Mayer image, but because it is representative of a very large class of images that appear to violate the policy. I would like to understand the policy better. Am I misunderstanding it?

Thanks for any light you can shed on this. —Mark Dominus (talk) 16:29, 12 July 2011 (UTC)

Current U.S. copyright law does indeed protect a work for life+70, but this is not retroactive. Back when copyright durations were shorter, many works lapsed into the public domain, and updates to U.S. copyright do not restore copyright to a public domain work. (This is not true for all countries.) For this reason, any work first published before 1923 is considered out of copyright (and in the public domain) in the United States. This is true regardless of where the work was first published, or when the author died. For more info, see my helpfile at User:Quadell/copyright. All the best, – Quadell (talk) 17:12, 12 July 2011 (UTC)

Knowing

The use of the word know in WP:LINKVIO ("If you know that an external Web site...") has been put forward at WP:ELN as proof that merely strongly and rationally suspecting a copyvio isn't a sufficient reason for editors to refuse to link to the website in question. I admit that there's a tiny chance that any given "highly probable" copyvio is actually a legal use—there's no way for editors to rule out the existence of secret, unpublished contracts between copyright owners and website owners—but perhaps we could refine the wording here to be a little less absolutist. WhatamIdoing (talk) 17:00, 9 June 2011 (UTC)

Sounds like a good idea to me. We can't "know" anything without a court of law passing down judgment. What about altering "However, if you know that an external Web site is carrying a work in violation of the creator's copyright, do not link to that copy of the work." to "However, if you know that an external Web site is or is likely to be carrying a work in violation of the creator's copyright, do not link to that copy of the work."? --Moonriddengirl (talk) 19:58, 11 June 2011 (UTC)
Or perhaps "know or reasonably suspect"? It's a smaller change. WhatamIdoing (talk) 16:42, 18 June 2011 (UTC)
Done. :) --Moonriddengirl (talk) 16:44, 18 June 2011 (UTC)

If the site you are linking to has a copyright compliance policy in place, I don't see why we should second-guess those policies. We could keep a list of reputable hosts, similar to a list of reputable sources. – SJ + 17:43, 13 July 2011 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Copyrights#Linking_to_copyrighted_works seems to encourage copyright paranoia. The idea that linking to YouTube videos (for instance) could pose a copyright problem for Wikipedia, is a stretch. Of course we should link to the most freely available information we can - but that doesn't mean not linking to publicly available information when no explicit license for use is visible.

The link to Intellectual Reserve v. Utah Lighthouse Ministry seems tenuous - can someone point to a more compelling discussion of this section? – SJ + 17:33, 13 July 2011 (UTC)

The problem is linking to a known copyright violation. You are helping to increase the damages that particular copyright violation does, as you are directing more people to bypass whatever the real copyright owner has set up, which then allows those people to copy/view the content illegally. There is no problem whatsoever in linking to fully copyrighted material, provided it seems to be a legitimate source of that material (i.e. present with permission of the copyright owner in some form or other). That doesn't need a license. But if you find a copy of some Hollywood movie online illegally for example, do not link to it, particularly from that movie's article. Song lyrics are another example; those are rarely ever online with permission of the author of the lyrics. This is potentially contributory infringement (a form of secondary liability and different than normal copyright infringement); while not settled (there seem to be cases going both ways depending on the individual facts) there is really no good defense to these type of links. There is a summary of some relevant court cases here; the case you mentioned above was about a website which directly copied copyrighted material, and then after an injunction prevented them from doing so, they replaced the actual content with links to other sites which were also hosting the content -- the judge decided that was also not OK, mainly because the site "actively directed users to the infringing sites." Using a site as a reference, maybe that's defensible, but almost certainly not as an external link, link in the main body of the article, or something like that. At least, that is the indication of that court case, and I'm not sure there is a counterexample. Carl Lindberg (talk) 02:05, 14 July 2011 (UTC)
That's an implausible interpretation of Lighthouse; as far as I can tell, the judge made note of the fact the the infringing material had been uploaded by the defendant, before said defendant linked to copies alleged to have been copied from the defendant's web site. It's still not a good idea to link to known copyright violations, but there are no court holdings that it can actually be contributory infringement unless the linker had something to do with the original infringement. — Arthur Rubin (talk) 19:38, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

Essay for linking

I have an essay on copyright-versus-trademark issues realting to logos at Wikipedia:Logo Copyright/Trademark. I'd like this to beinserted in the "Further reading" section if an adminstrator sees fit.BillTunell (talk) 16:31, 15 August 2011 (UTC)


Using Print Screen to "create own copyright"?

There are no images for the video game Cave Story that are allowed by the copyright laws on the English Wikipedia. If I were to turn on the game on my computer, and use the Print Screen key to save a picture of the title screen, would I be allowed to upload that image? Grenadetoenails (talk) 20:51, 26 July 2011 (UTC)

No. MER-C 02:46, 8 August 2011 (UTC)
It might still be allowable under fair use, but would fail WP:NFCC#4, so couldn't appear in en.Wikipedia. The copyright would still be derived from the game copyright. — Arthur Rubin (talk) 03:56, 8 August 2011 (UTC)

Lighthouse revisited

I am still not a lawyer, but the discussion at Wikipedia talk:Copyrights/Archive 13#A bad light still indicates that we (at WP:LINKVIO) are misinterpreting the court's reasoning in issuing preliminary injunction in Intellectual Reserve v. Utah Lighthouse Ministry. I think it would be better if we removed the example, noted that it was a preliminary injunction (later vacated), or that it was a trial court ruling, vacated before/without any appellate review. If the foundation or its lawyers would step itin, I wouldn't comment further, but, if we're going to use a legal argument, it should be, well legal. — Arthur Rubin (talk) 17:15, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

This makes sense to me. If the sentence beginning "Knowingly and intentionally directing others..." were removed, it would not change policy at all. The page would still say not to link to copyvios, and would explain that doing so sheds a bad light on Wikipedia. It would merely remove the incorrect legal interpretation, which would (in my view) be a good thing. – Quadell (talk) 19:37, 7 August 2011 (UTC)
I think it would be better to clarify that legal interpretation, which is not substantially incorrect. As I noted when this came up a year ago, while preliminary injunction in Intellectual Reserve v. Utah Lighthouse Ministry was vacated, the court's tendency there was clear. It was not vacated because they reversed, but because the parties settled privately. (And to that, Point 4 of the permanent injunction - incorporating terms agreed upon by the parties - seems pertinent here.) Since the parties reached settlement on their own, the court did not firmly decide the matter, but by no means did their final decision indicate a reversal of their earlier inclinations. --Moonriddengirl (talk) 19:45, 7 August 2011 (UTC)
Although the court didn't fully explain its reasoning for the preliminary injunction, the claim that Lighthouse first uploaded the copyrighted material, and then, after deleting from their website, then linked to copies on other websites, was made by IR and noted by the Court. Nothing like that is happening here. (At least, I don't think any of the people linking to questionable Youtube videos actually uploaded the videos.) — Arthur Rubin (talk) 04:16, 8 August 2011 (UTC)

Anders Behring Breivik

A discusion has developed here [[11]] as to whether or not posting a link to Mr Breivik's manifesto violates copyright because it plagiarises portions of other peoples work. Is this a valid argument?Slatersteven (talk) 13:13, 10 August 2011 (UTC)

I just (2 hours ago)

got permission (via email) from an artist's wife (he is very old) to use my images of his work on wikipedia. How do I mark the images so that they don't get speedily deleted? Einar aka Carptrash (talk) 00:31, 3 September 2011 (UTC)

I'm afraid that getting permission to use an image on Wikipedia is not enough. Wikipedia prides itself on being a free content encyclopedia, where anyone can reuse our content without getting specific permission from anyone. As such, we only use images if they are released under a free license. A free license allows anyone (not just Wikipedia) to use the image for any purpose, even to making derivative works or commercial uses. One such license is the Creative Commons attribution license, which only requires that the copyright holder be credited. If the copyright holder is willing to release their images under such a license, then we can use them. If not, I'm afraid we probably can't. You may try reading Wikipedia:Requesting copyright permission for more information and guidance, and I'm very willing to assist you in this. All the best, – Quadell (talk) 11:26, 3 September 2011 (UTC)

I think that I understand what you are saying. if I explain this to the artist and he agrees, then what do I do? I posted the images in 2004 or so, they were removed a couple of years later, but are still in the wikipedia system. They can be found in the page's history. The artist, and/or his spouse saw them there and approved my re-posting them. I will make sure that they understand the implications. Since they wish to use the pictures on their web-site i am foreseeing no problem. Thanks for getting back to me. Carptrash (talk) 16:16, 3 September 2011 (UTC)

"Gene Wiki" partnership with an academic journal

The Gene Wiki is an initiative to improve Wikipedia articles related to human genes. See Wikipedia:Bots/Requests for approval/ProteinBoxBot for historical context. Recently I started a discussion at the village pump about a partnership we are trying to set up with an academic journal (GENE) to improve gene-related articles. Basically, we would recruit academic scientists to write review articles for GENE, and upon acceptance to the journal, the content of those articles would be integrated into WP.

The publisher of GENE is Elsevier, and their copyright and authors' rights policies are described here. In talking with the publisher and lawyers, they have stated that they would not consider posting text from one of their articles on WP to be a copyright violation provided it is the authors who initiate the process. Given that agreement by the lawyers, the editors are very excited about this partnership as a way to improve WP content on scientific topics.

Over at the village pump discussion, Colin raised the issue of whether media (figures, images, etc.) would require more explicit permission from the publisher. Comments and guidance about this issue (or any other copyright issues that need to be discussed and addressed) would be appreciated.

(To keep discussions reasonably organized, please post non-copyright discussion points at the village pump). Cheers, AndrewGNF (talk) 17:36, 12 September 2011 (UTC)

I posted a media-specific question at WP:MCQ ([12]). If anyone here has thoughts, I'm still interested in potential copyright issues of a more general nature as well. Cheers, AndrewGNF (talk) 16:29, 13 September 2011 (UTC)

Bulletproofing PD upload

I have re-uploaded a PD photo that was deleted from the Commons. The original image, and supporting discussion of changes were added to justify uploading. Is this is an acceptable and reasonable way to use the photo, at least on EN/WP? --Wikiwatcher1 (talk) 20:03, 19 October 2011 (UTC)

I would recommend asking at WP:MCQ. --Moonriddengirl (talk) 22:33, 8 November 2011 (UTC)

Copying from Conservapedia

I recently found six articles copied from Conservapedia by User:Nobs01, listed at Wikipedia:Copyright_problems/2011_November_1#Copyright_investigations_.28manual_article_tagging.29. The articles at Conservapedia appear to have written by Conservapedia user RobSmith at the time of copying.

See Conservapedia's copyright terms. These terms make just about zero sense - they claim that "Conservapedia grants a non-exclusive license" yet nowhere does it explicitly say contributors transfer copyright to Conservapedia, so how could they? It claims they can be used without attribution, yet they require a link. It says contributors irrevocably release rights, but say their license is revocable. This is all very confusing. My questions:

  1. Does Conservapedia transfer copyright from contributors to the Conservapedia project? Or do contributors retain copyright to their own contribution?
  2. Assuming Conservapedia retains copyright to the contributions, is their license Wikipedia-compatible? (I suspect not, since it's revocable)
  3. Assuming contributors retain copyright to their own contributions, we would still need to confirm that User:RobSmith and User:Nobs01 are the same person. What's the best way to prove this? Note that Nobs01 seems very reluctant to affirm a public connection, so maybe OTRS should be involved?
  4. What if the articles on Conservapedia had other substantial contributors at the time of copying? (I can't check this right now, it's down)

Thanks! Dcoetzee 03:24, 5 November 2011 (UTC)

I've requested help from Mr. A. Schlalfy, owner of Conservapedia and author of its copyright policy. Thank you for your patience. nobs (talk) 21:06, 8 November 2011 (UTC)
I can answer point two immediately. Conservapedia is not compatibly licensed according to advice from our attorney: [13]. Their revocable license is not acceptable here. In terms of confirmation of authorship, they would need to go through OTRS if they cannot prove the link on the userpage on Conservapedia, but the inability to see the history of the article is likely to be a deal-killer. --Moonriddengirl (talk) 22:29, 8 November 2011 (UTC)
I've done as suggested. I hope this helps and resolves the situation. Thank you very much. nobs (talk) 23:17, 15 November 2011 (UTC)

Cropping images from the BBC

If I crop an image from the BBC website (or other news outlets) is it okay to use? I would like to upload a cropped image of Alasdair McDonnell based on the image in this article: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-northern-ireland-15607201

Apologies if this seems a rather obvious question (I imagine the answer is no). If I cannot use the image then where/how on Earth am I supposed to get an image without either taking a photograph myself or somehow tracking down the copyright holder and asking for permission?

Alternatively, could I use the images from the NI Assembly website? http://www.niassembly.gov.uk/members/membership11.htm It is a government source, afterall.

P.S. To be honest the Wikipedia guides seem largely inaccessible to novices like myself. A simple FAQ which would get more hits from search engines would be very useful.--Jonesy1289 (talk) 17:50, 7 November 2011 (UTC)

Sorry, but, no, you can't crop an image from the BBC website unless you have specific reason to know it is freely licensed. I'm not sure about the Northern Ireland Assembly website; not all government websites are freely released either. I think perhaps the best place for you to go to ask questions about image copyrights is the media copyright questions board, which is typically manned by people very experienced in these matters. :) --Moonriddengirl (talk) 22:32, 8 November 2011 (UTC)
Thanks a lot for the information. I will ask over there regarding the Northern Ireland assembly stuff - to me it looks like it is essentially in the public domain, but I'll see what the experts say.--Jonesy1289 (talk) 23:03, 8 November 2011 (UTC)

An image with a lot of corporate logos

One of the Occupy Wall Street protesters in New York City

The image to the right is one taken by David Shankbone and uploaded to Wikimedia Commons with a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported license. However, it is being challenged at Talk:Occupy Wall Street as disallowed by the lack of freedom of panorama in the USA. The various logos are the focus of the image, including those on the flag and poster showing a copyrighted composite image that belongs to The New York Times—the image of the girl signing "shhh" surrounded by media logos. Is the image okay to use on Wikipedia without limit? Does the image require a fair-use rationale? Should the image be ignored by English Wikipedia because it is not allowed to be seen in the USA? Binksternet (talk) 23:14, 12 November 2011 (UTC)

You might want to ask for feedback at WP:MCQ. This page doesn't see a lot of traffic; that one is specifically to discuss the copyright status of images. However, you might want to clarify your last question if you do go there. I can't quite follow what you mean by it. :) It sounds like you're suggesting we should willfully overlook the existence of the image on Wikipedia in spite of US copyright law, but you might also mean excluded? Too, it's less an issue of allowance to see and more an issue of allowance to license. :) --Moonriddengirl (talk) 12:12, 13 November 2011 (UTC)
Okay, I will take the question to MCQ. Thanks for the advice! Binksternet (talk) 21:03, 13 November 2011 (UTC)

cross-posting for Query I posted to Wikipedia_talk:Public_domain

Being unsure where to post this query, I opted for Wikipedia_talk:Public_domain. Any advice would be appreciated. --Ohconfucius ¡digame! 02:59, 24 November 2011 (UTC)

Need to change

The following phrase needs to be changed in this policy as it does not reflect the realities of copyright law with respect to the public domain.

  • "Images, photographs, video and sound files, like written works, are subject to copyright. Someone holds the copyright unless they have been explicitly placed in the public domain. Images, video and sound files on the internet need to be licensed directly from the copyright holder or someone able to license on their behalf."
    This should be rephrased into "Images, photographs, video and sound files, like written works, are usually subject to copyright. Someone holds the copyright unless they have been explicitly placed are in the public domain. Copyrighted images, video and sound files on the internet need to be licensed directly from the copyright holder or someone able to license on their behalf." Under the old definition, it gives the impression that a photo published in 1922 would somehow be copyrighted, but under the rephrased rule, that photo is properly accounted for and can be listed as a PD image (anything published in the U.S. prior to 1923 is automatically in the public domain).

This nuance is properly reflected in the first sentences of the same section:

  • "All creative works are copyrighted, by international agreement, unless either they fall into the public domain or their copyright is explicitly disclaimed."

I understand we want to discourage copyright infringement, but we must account for media that fall into the public domain and not give users the false impression that some creative works are copyrighted when they aren't. Buffs (talk) 23:06, 10 December 2011 (UTC)

I can see where you're coming from, but I'm not too convinced your new wording is more helpful than the old one. For one thing, if we're going to be picky, there are so many different ways something can enter the public domain it would be impractical to cover them all explicitly in this one sentence. On the other hand, the very generic "are in the public domain" does too little to dispel the misunderstanding that "being in the public domain" is something one can simply take for granted (given that most people don't actually know the difference between the technical meaning of "public domain" and the everyday meaning of being "freely and publicly available"). The point this sentence needs to drive home is that public domain status is something that cannot simply be assumed by default, or because an item seems unimportant, because everybody has access to it anyway, because "nobody would care about it", etc. The important thing is that one needs to be able to point to a specific, positive reason for how and why an image is in the public domain. The current wording of it being "placed into" the public domain correctly points in that direction. Fut.Perf. 22:54, 13 December 2011 (UTC)
It may point somewhat in that direction, but it is wrong and needs to be fixed. Most stuff in the public domain isn't labeled as such. Using the example above, if I create a website and use an image from a 1922 New York Times article, the guidance here says that image is copyrighted when, in fact, it isn't. This is a clear case of copyright paranoia and this phrasing actively adds to that myth.
So how do we rephrase it? I think the first sentence should be rephrased to state: "Images, photographs, video and sound files, like written works, are subject to copyright law." Delete the next two sentences as they are outright false.
Your thoughts? Buffs (talk) 00:52, 14 December 2011 (UTC)
I agree with Future Perfect. There are other references earlier to copyright expiring (though in other contexts), so there is an implicit assumption here that we are only talking about unexpired copyrights. Moreover, one can argue that copyrights that have expired have been explicitly placed in the public domain by the law that stipulates this expiration. Hans Adler 01:31, 14 December 2011 (UTC)
I do not consider the suggested replacement text to be an improvement. Neither the original, nor the latter are "perfect", and as others have said, it is necessarily a short summary of the key point. The existing isn't wrong per se, it is a limited summary of a complex topic. The suggestion is equally "wrong" in saying, usually subject to copyright - because everything is 'subject to' the law, it just depends which specific laws apply. Typically,[citation needed] works such as "video and sound files" that people come across are under some specific copying conditions but are most subject to copyright? You say an image from 1922 New York Times isn't copyrighted...but that isn't necessarily always true; it could be. Copyright is incredibly complicated. With regards to "have been explicitly placed" v. "are in" [the public domain] - it depends; the way I see that is, regarding recently-created works - and we're trying to convey to the user that, typically, such works will be (c) unless someone has made a concious choice to put them into PD. I can see that you are reading it as regarding the corpus that is PD due to age/expiry, but that's not how I read it.
If a user has e.g. taken a photograph, then we are trying to convey that that image is indeed likely "subject to copyright" at the time they read this notice - but, that does not mean we cannot use it, because the user could decide - now - to explicitly place it in the PD, and we could.
Over all view: it's immensely complicated to get this "exactly right", and might not even be possible. And I haven't yet seen a suggestion that I consider an appropriate improvement.  Chzz  ►  07:55, 14 December 2011 (UTC)

Would this be too legalesey? :)

Images, photographs, video and sound files, like written works, are subject to copyright. In most cases, someone holds their copyright, unless they have been explicitly placed in the public domain or for legal reason are ineligible or no longer eligible for protection. Public domain status cannot be assumed, even if an image is openly published and reproduced on the internet. Almost all images, video and sound files on the internet need to be licensed directly from the copyright holder or someone able to license on their behalf. (Wikipedia:Public domain provides guidance on determining when images may be public domain.) In some cases, fair use guidelines...

I realize that WP:PD is linked already, earlier in the text, but it won't be obvious to newcomers. Does this help? Not help? --Moonriddengirl (talk) 11:36, 14 December 2011 (UTC)

Not sure, MRG. Can we get Geoff Brigham to have a quick look, if he can spare any time?  Chzz  ►  12:35, 16 December 2011 (UTC)
I take issue with the way this one is phrased. I offer the following alternative:
Images, photographs, video and sound files, like written works, are subject to copyright law. In most cases, someone holds their copyright, unless they have been explicitly placed in the public domain or for legal reason are ineligible or no longer eligible for protection. Public domain status cannot be assumed even if an image is openly published and reproduced on the internet and justification for declaring an image to be in the public domain must accompany all such file uploads. Almost all images, video and sound files on the internet need to be licensed directly from the copyright holder or someone able to license on their behalf. (Wikipedia:Public domain provides guidance on how to determine when images are in the public domain.) In some cases, fair use guidelines...
I must admit I like the general phrasing though. Nice work, MRG. Buffs (talk) 00:08, 18 December 2011 (UTC)

A detail

Someone made me realize that your Copyright pages do not exactly mirror what's in the official document. I am referring specifically to the sentences "If you are the sole author of the material, you must license it under both CC-BY-SA and GFDL and "text for which you hold the copyright yourself must be licensed under both CC-BY-SA and GFDL" (here) about imported text, clauses which are nowhere to be found in the Terms of use. --Elitre (talk) 08:54, 16 December 2011 (UTC)

Sorry that nobody picked up on this earlier! It does accurately reflect Terms of Use. The terms are here:

Therefore, for any text you hold the copyright to, by submitting it, you agree to license it under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License. For compatibility reasons, you are also required to license it under the GNU Free Documentation License (unversioned, with no invariant sections, front-cover texts, or back-cover texts).

The Terms of Use allows an exception if you share copyright:

If you want to import text that you have found elsewhere or that you have co-authored with others, you can only do so if it is available under terms that are compatible with the CC-BY-SA license. You do not need to ensure or guarantee that the imported text is available under the GNU Free Documentation License.

--Moonriddengirl (talk) 18:31, 8 January 2012 (UTC)

Status of logs from IRC channels with "no public logging" as a channel rule

There's some debate about IRC on User talk:Jimbo Wales in which two admins apparently asserted that an IRC channel with a "no logging" rule was copyrighted. In a quick search, apparently there was a DMCA issue about copyrighted ? logs of a non-public IRC channel with Wikipedia Review [14]. Meanwhile Wikiversity contains copies of logs from IRC (not sure if that's no-logging or not) [15].

As uninformed guesswork, I'm thinking that IRC involves consent to have your text copied from server to server between many different computers, each of which has an unknown list of users; so far as I know there is no legal restriction implied, when you post, that an IRC server has to have a particular composition. So if someone chooses to run an extra server (a logging script) and make its output available to new channel readers only after a long delay (i.e. as a web page) it would seem within the implicit license. And I'd think that a channel operator's rule to ban public logging would have no special relevance to the copyright status, because he doesn't run the machine or control the service and he isn't a party to the implied contract the IRC user makes with the server he logs into. Besides, everyone knows what the penalty is for violating an IRC channel's policies - you get kicked from the channel, sometimes for as long as three minutes.

On the other hand, it is a body of creative work and its distribution was intended by the author to be limited.

I think it's time for people here who know the law to work out a legally considered policy regarding reposting of IRC logs from channels with no logging permitted (regardless of affiliation). Please note that I am not asking for a restrictive policy in order to protect the "privacy" of the Wikipedia IRC channels in particular (what a quaint idea!). I just want Wikipedia to have a reasoned position on when and how much of IRC logs in general people can post before we're arguing it out in front of a judge. Wnt (talk) 16:27, 8 January 2012 (UTC)

I do not often use IRC. Are there uniform Terms of Use somewhere? --Moonriddengirl (talk) 18:33, 8 January 2012 (UTC)
Well, for example with the Wikimedia IRC chat on Freenode there's http://freenode.net/policy.shtml but it doesn't talk about copyrights. Note that Freenode "strongly urges" people to follow channel guidelines but it doesn't sound like a contract. But that's just one site anyway. Wnt (talk) 22:49, 8 January 2012 (UTC)

Linking to subpages of DGM violates terms of service

The terms of service of Discipline Global Mobile (DGM, a record company) expressly prohibit links to any page except the DGM homepage, warning that copyright violations will be pursued legally with tenacity. There is discussion at the talk page of WP's article on DGM's founder, Robert Fripp:

Thank you for your attention.

Sincerely,  Kiefer.Wolfowitz 20:04, 21 February 2012 (UTC)

Discussion should be carried out at Wikipedia_talk:Copyright_problems#Linking_to_subpages_of_DGM_violates_terms_of_service. Thanks,  Kiefer.Wolfowitz 21:16, 21 February 2012 (UTC)

Pasted from WT:C

This page has the shortcut WT:C, but yesterday someone broke the shortcut and put some stuff there. I'm moving the information here so that the shortcut can be fixed, but it should maybe be somewhere else instead.

Attribution: User:Gorobay, User:Incnis Mrsi & User:Tra

Edit request on 23 February 2012

Please add {{R from Unicode}}. Gorobay (talk) 16:48, 23 February 2012 (UTC)

For several minutes I try to guess where to find redirects from something else than Unicode… Incnis Mrsi (talk) 17:59, 23 February 2012 (UTC)
 Done Tra (Talk) 09:11, 24 February 2012 (UTC)

Image help

I am in discussion with Wobbyprop (talk · contribs), son of this individual, who wants to upload images of his father. Wobbyprop took the images, so per Wikipedia:Image use policy#User-created images he has the right to them. How does he 'release' the images to Wikipedia? Images are something I struggle with still, even after 6 years... GiantSnowman 22:28, 9 March 2012 (UTC)

Simply upload them under a compatible license. Buffs (talk) 03:34, 10 March 2012 (UTC)

Postage stamps

Currently the guidelines for uploading images of vintage postage stamps are not well documented in the English Wikipedia, and it is hard to find which copyright tag to use. But for uploading in Wiki Commons, the Commons:Stamps/Public domain page provides background information, and specifies which tag templates to use there. So it is in fact much easier to create a commons account and do the upload.
When I recently uploaded a stamp inmage in en.wikipedia space, I couldn't find the correct tag to use. In my case, Commons specified using PD-IrishGov, but the equivalent tag in en.wikipedia seems to be PD-IrelandGov.
Certain countries have stringent laws regarding photocopy or scanning paper currencies, and they may be applicable to postage stamps or revenue stamp images. Also, crisp images of mint stamps with significant catalogue value might be misused for online auctioning purposes, so digital watermarking rules might be considered.
Also it would be nice to see some procedural guidelines for vintage picture postcards. Postcards are usually not printed with a publication date, though they may indicate printer or publisher, so a link to tips on how to date them might be needed. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Kiyoweap (talkcontribs) 19:35, 18 March 2012 (UTC)

Free images are preferably uploaded to Commons instead of Wikipedia. Uploading them here just creates an extra backlog for people moving images from here to there. If an image can't be uploaded to Commons, it may still be allowed on Wikipedia, for example as {{PD-US-1923-abroad}} or as fair use. Stamps should preferably only be uploaded to Wikipedia instead of Commons if the stamp isn't allowed on Commons. I'm not sure how to date a postcard. Cards can sometimes be dated by looking at buildings and people: are the buildings still standing and are the people still alive and do they look old or young? Copyright information is often only on Commons and not on Wikipedia. I believe that this is by design; there is no need to duplicate information, and images which are free enough for Commons should be uploaded there anyway. --Stefan2 (talk) 14:41, 20 March 2012 (UTC)
Basically many country's modern stamps are copyright and can only be uploaded here under a fair-use claim but there are additional restrictions where they can generally only be used in stamp articles not not just to illustrate the subject or merely to show the topic honoured by the stamp's issuance. As Stefan points out freely licenced stamps should be uploaded to the commons and you found one of the relevant stamp licence pages but may have missed the template. You can always ask at the Philately WikiProject of you have any other stamp questions. I can't assist you on the postcards. ww2censor (talk) 18:13, 22 March 2012 (UTC)