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I have created a graph of data from an external source, who gave me permission by email to use the data, provided the data source is acknowledged, which I have done in the Summary and in the graph itself. Will this graph be a candidate for deletion? Sorry if this issue has been discussed before. FW (talk) 15:55, 22 November 2014 (UTC)
Abstract ideas and raw data are not generally copyrightable as such. Rather, only realizations or expressions of such ideas fixed in a particular form are copyrightable, so you seem quite safe... AnonMoos (talk) 08:26, 23 November 2014 (UTC)
Compilations of data are encumbered by copyright-like restrictions in EU. Thus the permission is important. You could send the email (including also normally not visible headers) to OTRS, to archive the proof. --LPfi (talk) 10:06, 28 November 2014 (UTC)
Also note that it is unclear whether CC licences with version number less than 4.0 can be used for licensing databases. --Stefan4 (talk) 15:42, 1 December 2014 (UTC)
Commons material being sold on commercial stock sites
I've noticed some images being sold on commercial sites with no proper attribution which are straight copies of CC by SA 3.0 SVG images I've made and uploaded to Commons or clearly derived from the same with minor changes. Usually someone else is actually taking credit as the author and claiming copyright. What is the best way to deal with this? If this is happening to images I've created, it must be happening to material created by other users. Cfynn (talk) 00:19, 26 November 2014 (UTC)
Post the links to the sites here. I'm sure many other copyright holders here would be interested in recouping their losses. —Psychonaut (talk) 11:06, 26 November 2014 (UTC)
The best way to deal with it depends on the circumstances and the results you want to achieve. Anything from sending an informal complaint to telling your crack team of bloodthirsty lawyers to haul the copyright violator in front of a judge is technically an option. If it looks like an honest mistake, I might start with an e-mail stating that you are the rightful copyright holder and that you're glad to see that your work is useful, but that failure to abide by the licensing terms constitutes copyright infringement. I would also give a date by which I'd expect any continued use to be compliant, at which time I'd re-evaluate the situation. If they don't get their act together, I might start discussing compensation or legal action, and if it looks like they've been making money from the copyright infringement, I might go to there right away. You also have to consider who your counterpart is. Is it an individual user or the site itself? If the site is a serious operation, they'll be quick to take the content down and probably ban the user, but for compensation, they may try to shift the blame. When it comes to other people's content, do keep in mind that only the copyright holder has the right to take action, and that it is possible that other licensing arrangements were made. So please do notify people of things you come across, but make as few assumptions as possible and don't go policing on their behalf. Cheers, —LX (talk, contribs)19:46, 26 November 2014 (UTC)
@LX, Psychonaut, and Yann: A good example is one of the SVG images I've created and uploaded to Commons : File:OM MANI PADME HUM-bw.svg and its derivative File:OM MANI PADME HUM.svg (which were uploaded here in Oct. 2008) - copies of these images are now found all over the www. Just one example of a site using these images for commercial purposes with no proper attribution is Zazzle.com - they are selling scores (maybe 100s) of their products directly using this image, or clear derivatives, printed on them (while looking at this I also noticed products with many other images taken from Commons on that site as well). This particular image on their products is individually credited to at least six of their so-called "creators" (BuddhaGift, livingzen, SupportforTibet, [AsianOrientation, martstore2014, and SeleneArielleZombie - not one of these people contacted me to make "other licensing arrangements". Just a few of the literally 100s of pages on that site where this image is used are: [1], [2], [3], [4], [5], [6], (I've already taken the precaution of taking screen shots and saving copies of these and many other pages.) The same thing is happening on Zazzle's UK, Canadian, German, Spanish, French, Portugese and several other international sites Someone from the Wikimedia Foundation should really look at all these Zazzle sites as, while checking this out, I saw there innumerable other images from Commons being used in the same way. In this case the scope of infringements really seems to be on quite a global industrial scale and Zazzle and some of there "creators" must be making an awful lot of money by leaching images off Commons and using them on their products without giving proper attribution. This is particularly galling to me as I have been working as a volunteer in a developing country (Bhutan) for the past ten years living only on a local salary. Some of the T-shirts with this image these people are selling are being sold for more than many people here earn in a month. I was starting to try to get local photographers, and artists to contribute to Commons and local high school and college students to write articles for Dzongkha Wikipedia - but if their voluntary contributions are simply going to be exploited like this by people in rich first world countries, I now think the whole effort would be counter productive and just leave them all feeling used and violated.
Of course Zazzle Inc. is only one, but particularly egregious, example of this behaviour. (Looking at some of the comments on this PC Mag article it seems Zazzle treat some of their customers badly too.)
Good to know that the WMF can't, or won't, stick up for their contributors. As I said I live in a developing country and here there are no fancy lawyers - let alone any with experience in copyright matters. Anyway seriously how much do you think I should send a bill for? (Trouble is that, from here, I suspect the chances of successfully taking on some rich American corporation and getting any sort of compensation may be virtually nil.) Cfynn (talk) 12:17, 27 November 2014 (UTC)
Don't tell them where you live. They most probably don't know. Make a reference to the law where the offender is situated. Tell them to send some money to some international payment system (i.e. Paypal, etc.). Of course, if you have a bank account in the country where the problem occurs, it may help. Some companies would rather pay a few dozen dollars than get engaged in court. Regards, Yann (talk) 12:58, 27 November 2014 (UTC)
Telling where you live could have both advantages and disadvantages. The copyright violator could assume that a person located far away won't be able to sue and that it therefore is unnecessary to pay any compensation. On the other hand, under Swedish law, the copyright violator would typically have to pay for some of the copyright holder's expenses if the copyright violator loses in court. These expenses would typically include at least the copyright holders travelling costs for attending the court. If the copyright violator faces the risk of having to pay for a return flight from Bhutan to a Swedish court, then the copyright violator may be more willing to pay you promptly. You will have to carefully consider how revealing your country of residence would affect the copyright violator's willingness to pay you. --Stefan4 (talk) 16:39, 1 December 2014 (UTC)
CFYNN, some of your images may not qualify for copyright under US law (simple geometric shapes + text). In any case, so-called licences like these open-source ones are badly drafted and not easily enforceable in law against commercial infringers. HRA1924 (talk) 13:11, 27 November 2014 (UTC)
* @HRA1924 This raises a very interesting point. Actually it is not quite a "simple geometric shape" as it may appear to the eye - each of the petals is ever so slightly different (not just one petal design rotated) and the control points on each petal were placed differently for a reason. The letters, and the control points on them, are also modified from the font (which was my own design). Now font _designs_ are not protected under US law (the US considering letters to be "utilitarian") but the US Copyright Office since determined that digital outline fonts have elements which can be protected as software - notably they found that the choice of placement or position of the control points on the outline constituted originality. Since SVG graphics use exactly the same kind of outline instructions and control points as outline fonts, by extension, the same thing should apply. In other words SVG graphics are just as much a "computer program" as are digital outline fonts. (In fact even more so, as it is possible to include things like shading instructions and Java script in SVG). So I suspect the rules which apply to SVG and other forms of vector graphics are not the same as those applying to bitmap graphics. Vector graphics, like vector fonts, should qualify as computer programs or software. Chris Fynn (talk) 08:37, 28 November 2014 (UTC)
Digital fonts are only protected when they are stored in a vector file format, for example TTF or SVG. If the person uses the material first converts the font to pixel graphics (for example PNG) or prints them out on some physical material (paper, t-shirts, mugs etc.), then the person who created the font file can't claim any font copyright protection. --Stefan4 (talk) 16:39, 1 December 2014 (UTC)
You fail to understand the law. The only thing that protects reusers from the full force of the copyright acts is having a license; if it's a so-called license, the reuser doesn't have that protection. It's not the license that is enforced against infringers; it's the copyright.--Prosfilaes (talk) 15:22, 27 November 2014 (UTC)
I probably understand it quite well, but nonetheless, the poor text of the so-called licence will constitute a part of the infringer's defence. HRA1924 (talk) 16:38, 27 November 2014 (UTC)
If it is a so-called license, then what defense does the infringer have? They don't have a real license, so it's just plain copyright infringement, and nitpicking the poor text is about as useful as nitpicking the latest novel. Free licenses are just as real as any other license.--Prosfilaes (talk) 13:00, 28 November 2014 (UTC)
Thanks. The text in the images is from a font I also made - but that font was licensed under the Open Font Licence so anyone can use it. Would I stand a better chance where they have directly copied the multi-coloured version? I also noticed quite a lot of instances where they used File:Om Mani Padme Hum.jpg which is a photograph (though not mine) - and as well as many other photographs from Commons. Perhaps the authors of those files would stand a better chance than I. They are also using my images (and other Commons images) on their sites in Germany, UK, Australia, France, Spain, Australia, NZ, Korea, Japan, etc. and they seem to be manufacturing and shipping some of their products from these different locations. Cfynn (talk) 13:38, 27 November 2014 (UTC)
Let me be quite blunt, you (or the other (uploaders) have a very faint copyright claim for either compensation or damages. You have a somewhat better claim for "attribution". What goes against you is the wording of the "licence" you used on Commons. If I were representing the infringers (and I often do) I would straightaway ask WMF to disclose / confirm the identity of their anonymous uploader before the complaint is even taken on record. "You" wouldn't be able to prove you are the creator of these files, unless you had published it elsewhere under your own name previously. HRA1924 (talk) 14:20, 27 November 2014 (UTC)
So you're going to walk into court and say that my clients knowingly stole this file from someone else and are actively committing copyright infringement, but the court should ignore this and ignore the fact that you have no evidence against the other party being the copyright holder? Ballsy, but I suspect you'll set most judges against you from the start. I have the camera, and I have an affidavit from a third party that I was there at the time timestamped on the photo, and I have photos I took immediately before and after this photo, should do great for establishing the preponderance of evidence that I took this photo.--Prosfilaes ( talk) 15:22, 27 November 2014 (UTC)
Don't troll. The onus of proof is on he who alleges the fact. That you have a camera and only an affidavit from a stranger who I have the right to cross-examine in person proves nothing until all procedural elements are complied with, especially if it is a digital photograph, does not make the publication of the photograph a fact. HRA1924 (talk) 16:30, 27 November 2014 (UTC)
The burden of proof in a civil case, at least in the UK and the US, is preponderance of evidence. I have evidence that I took the picture; you claim that you stole the picture but you don't know from who, you're going to lose.
What difference does the publication matter? In the US, it's irrelevant except for increasing damages on infringers, and the Berne Convention covers unpublished works just like published works.--Prosfilaes (talk) 13:00, 28 November 2014 (UTC)
@HRA1924: Thanks for being blunt. I have always uploaded images here using my real name, so I'm not exactly anonymous. Anyway this whole thing is going to make me seriously reconsider contributing files to Commons in future. I also think not allowing "no-commercial" licences on Commons is a pretty major disincentive for many people to freely contribute a lot of educationally valuable material - however I was happy to contribute under the present rules as long as I thought I would at least be properly attributed. But if large commercial companies are simply going to use material leached from Commons without giving proper attribution, or attributing the work to someone else entirely, things do look very different and it hardly seems worthwhile. The stupid thing is that under CC by SA such companies could legitimately use such artwork if they properly attributed it. I'm sure they must know just what is going on and it would only take them a couple of minutes for such businesses to do a Google image search as a reasonable check to see if images submitted to them do not infringe copyright - but they are obviously not even making a simple basic check - or just don't care. Cfynn (talk) 14:57, 27 November 2014 (UTC)
I really doubt that someone who doesn't care about the existing licensing conditions (which are easy to comply with) would care about one more condition (NC). —LX (talk, contribs)15:54, 27 November 2014 (UTC)
I'm not really presuming anything. If they're not aware of the license, they have no business using someone else's work, since all creative works are copyrighted and non-free by default. My point stands: if Commons were to start accepting files with licenses restricting commercial use (which isn't going to happen), it wouldn't change how such people and organisations act. —LX (talk, contribs)16:24, 27 November 2014 (UTC)
I see, and how does Bhutan's copyright law permit assignation, renunciation, or licencing of an author's copyright in his Work ? HRA1924 (talk) 16:35, 27 November 2014 (UTC)
In copyright law 2 things are important, (a) proving you are the author, (b) proving the factum of first "publication" / "expression". The jurisdiction of the applicable copyright law flows from these. Obviously the copyright law for India or Nepal would be different to USA or Australia. The territorial jurisdiction of (a), (b) is more important than that of where the infringer is located. If you ask me, the publisher (WMF in your case) is ordinarily responsible for enforcing the licence they induced you to sign. See this for how we release our movement images for use on online encyclopedias.HRA1924 (talk) 15:15, 27 November 2014 (UTC)
The jurisdiction of the appropriate copyright law is where the infringement is happening. That country may or may not take into account various other copyright laws in various ways, but if your work is being infringed in the US, you can sue in a US court, and they would take Title 17 and US case law into account.--Prosfilaes (talk) 15:26, 27 November 2014 (UTC)
That is incorrect, the copyright of the work is determined by where it was first expressed. The jurisdiction for a copyright claim is determined by the infringer's location and/or the infringement's location. That is what we have international treaties and conventions for. HRA1924 (talk) 15:34, 27 November 2014 (UTC)
CFYNN. Bhutan's Copyright Law 2001, may just have a few loopholes in your favour re CC. Enforcing it is another matter. HRA1924 (talk) 16:21, 27 November 2014 (UTC)
And which provisions or "loopholes" are those? - I can't spot them. Because the image is a version of a Buddhist symbol I'm sure any judge in Bhutan would take a particularly dim view of some of the inappropriate products this image is being used on - and just to the idea of the crass commercialization and exploitation of such a symbol. However you're right, enforcing Bhutan copyright beyond the borders of Bhutan would be very difficult. Cfynn (talk) 18:07, 27 November 2014 (UTC)
eg. How did you validly "sign" this CC licence in 2008 under Bhutanese law? (I'm assuming you were then a "habitual resident" of Bhutan). Actually, its not too difficult to taken on infringers for a Bhutanese copyright holder. For instance curbing imports of these goods into the whole of SAARC is simple. The USA, Germany, and France would also honor your claim to block imports of any infringing goods you specify. These sites are probably importing these items from China or Bangladesh in any case. HRA1924 (talk) 18:32, 27 November 2014 (UTC)
HRA1924 Yes, I've been living here continuously since early 2005. Are you implying that, under Bhutanese copyright law, it looks like I can't validly "sign" a CC licence in Bhutan or for something I've created in Bhutan? If that is so, the CC licence of pretty well every file I've uploaded to to Commons would be void - and maybe Commons should take them all down because they don't have the valid licence they require. ☺ Cfynn (talk) 09:52, 28 November 2014 (UTC)
Article 5 of the Berne Convention, sections 2 and 3: "... the extent of protection, as well as the means of redress afforded to the author to protect his rights, shall be governed exclusively by the laws of the country where protection is claimed. (3) Protection in the country of origin is governed by domestic law. However, when the author is not a national of the country of origin of the work for which he is protected under this Convention, he shall enjoy in that country the same rights as national authors."--Prosfilaes (talk) 13:00, 28 November 2014 (UTC)
CFYNN: Let me list the steps (1) You must prove that you either uploaded this image here, or, that you published it earlier elsewhere. You can archive all your Commons pages (archive.today, webcitation, etc.) and take screenshots (full screen) (2) You must show that on the date of publication you were in Bhutan (your passport/visas) (3) Because Bhutan passed the ICMA law in 2005, your "signature" legally means a physical signature or a digital one (as defined in ICMA). (4) As your works are too complex to be out of copyright, and since Bhutan IPR law requires copyright assignation to be "signed" by the author, I would opine that your CC licences were never valid and you have every right to demand that your images be taken down immediately. (5) With all your rights then vesting in you, the process of demanding compensation and damages under the Berne Convention etc. can startHRA1924 (talk) 15:20, 28 November 2014 (UTC)
Given the situation as described here, I'm not even certain there's a problem.
It is commonplace, amongst commercial product developers who respect copyright and licensing, to produce products using resources from Commons. That is in fact, one of the things Commons is here to support (It's not maybe within COM:SCOPE unless it's also educational, but Commons generally acts to support and encourage such use, even when commercial).
Where an attribution licence is used, it is common to attribute with the product. It would be quite remarkable to start attributing a design component on an Etsy or Zazzle page, before the customer has even bought it.
Now on the whole, it's probable that these products are just taking the unfortunately common "If I can grab it, I will grab it" approach to IP and they're not attributing anything, anywhere. However before claiming that, it might be wise just to confirm that they're not crediting authorship on the purchased product. I usually do this on the packaging materials, along with the CE marking and the 3+ age restrictions, and sometimes I do even write it onto the product itself. I'm sure I'm not alone in that. I'd never think to credit such things on Etsy. I do credit them on Thingiverse, but only when it's a derivative of something also on Thingiverse.
Watch out also for "Copyright white knights" - idiots who've read a few pages of Commons DRs and then decided that your work is COPYVIO and will shout and bleat to Etsy or eBay to have it pulled off. Even when you're the original uploader. Andy Dingley (talk) 17:59, 27 November 2014 (UTC)
I don't know what it might say on the box. But they actually specifically credit the design to someone else (actually, on different pages, to at least six different "creators" in all) right on their website where the design is clearly shown on hundreds of different images - so the wrong attribution is taking place on their website. Cfynn (talk) 09:52, 28 November 2014 (UTC)
I've actually even seen people issue takedown notices for material hosted on our site, claiming it was their own. In this OTRS thread, he did just that, although it looks like he actually just hijacked a site name and uploaded his own site right over that, as everything is back to normal now. Kevin Rutherford (talk) 19:55, 27 November 2014 (UTC)
While we prefer to take screenshots in Linux whenever possible, taking screenshots in Windows when the software has no Linux version is a generally accepted practice, so I see no reason why it wouldn't apply to Mac OS. -- King of♥♦♣ ♠ 05:34, 2 December 2014 (UTC)
Toys are generally ineligible for copyright protection in Japan. See for example this case where an American toy (w:File:Furby picture.jpg or some variant thereof) was declared uncopyrightable as an artistic work. The dog might therefore be uncopyrightable in Japan.
The problem for Commons is that Commons demands that files also must be free in the United States. Toys are eligible for copyright in the United States even if they are ineligible for copyright in the source country (see this court ruling). --Stefan4 (talk) 18:39, 24 November 2014 (UTC)
URAA is only relevant for works published before 1 March 1989. All Japanese works created and published on or after 1 March 1989 are copyrighted in the United States, without any involvement of URAA. All of the files in Category:Aibo seem to be unfree in the United States. --Stefan4 (talk) 15:58, 25 November 2014 (UTC)
....Those are a lot of files to nominate. Can I just tirelessly nominate all of them at the same time, or just one-by-one? --George Ho (talk) 06:27, 26 November 2014 (UTC)
They should at least not be deleted without looking at the individual files. In some de minimis probably applies. --LPfi (talk) 10:11, 28 November 2014 (UTC)
@LuisV (WMF) and Yann: If I'm not mistaken, practically every site with user-generated content has a condition similar to Facebook's. Maybe for Facebook this is inconsequential, as it's mostly original content there. But what about a site like YouTube, where users often rely on others' work? This interpretation would imply that no CC-licensed material (under any of the licenses, free or not) can be shared on any such website.
I believe that Sections 8(a)-(b) in the 3.0 Unported licenses and Section 2(a)(5) in the 4.0 International licenses resolve this: Under these provisions, the copyright owner grants all recipients the same license.
For YouTube as for everywhere else, you can only offer a work under a different license if the work is in the public domain, or if it is your own. Regards, Yann (talk) 10:17, 8 November 2014 (UTC)
I think this page is more appropriate for this sort of discussion, so I am moving it here; I hope to get further input.
I feel as if I'm repeating myself, but here it is: I understand the reasoning behind this interpretation of the CC licenses, but it seems rather strange. If taken to its logical extremes, it severely restricts usage of CC-licensed material created by others. For example, I would not be able to use CC-licensed photos in a presentation on YouTube, or in a blog post on Tumblr, if this interpretation is correct.
The question is not the interpretation of the CC license, but the interpretation of the Facebook license; "you grant us a non-exclusive, transferable, sub-licensable, royalty-free, worldwide license to use any IP content that you post on or in connection with Facebook" on the face of it is going to be problematic if you can not provide an unrestricted license. There is nothing in there that restricts Facebook to the terms of the CC license, nor is there any reason to think that Facebook will be aware of such a license.--Prosfilaes (talk) 09:47, 9 November 2014 (UTC)
Do the terms of YouTube and Tumblr, mentioned by Anon126, actually have such a condition to grant them such a license as Facebook requires? At least YouTube has a CC-BY (though not CC-BY-SA, I think) option for content posted there. Gestumblindi (talk) 20:04, 14 November 2014 (UTC)
Yes, and as far as I can tell, this is fairly standard. Check YouTube's terms in Section 6(C) and Tumblr's in Section 6 ("Subscriber Content License to Tumblr"). I'll throw in deviantArt's (Section II(16)) and even Flickr's (Yahoo's) (Section 9(b)) for good measure.
That's rather a vexing state of affairs, then. On the one hand, it's pretty clear: As a re-user of CC-BY(-SA) licensed material you didn't create yourself, you simply aren't able to grant a license of the kind Facebook etc. require for content posted there. You can only use it under the conditions of the CC license, but Facebook (and others) want more: They want you to grant them an unrestricted license to use the material without any kind of "BY" or "SA". So the answer to the question "Can you post CC-BY-SA content that a third party produced on Facebook?" in the Wikilegal post mentioned by Luis Villa was No, and it seems that this also applies to Youtube, Tumblr, deviantArt, Flickr etc. As these are extremely popular platforms, this is a huge restriction faced by re-users of CC-licensed content, and I also wonder what Creative Commons has to say about it - and what could be done to fix the problem; but I fear the only solution would be to convince Facebook etc. to create more CC-friendly terms, probably not an easy thing. Gestumblindi (talk) 00:50, 16 November 2014 (UTC)
This is neither a "problem" of CC, nor of FB, Youtube or Flickr. Youtube [8] and Flickr [9] explicitly stated in their community guidelines that do not post contents that someone else owns the copyright. FB terms are not that much clear; but I believe they too intended it. Jee02:52, 16 November 2014 (UTC)
Well, at least for the Creative Commons movement, I think it is a problem: The purpose of the CC licenses is to allow broad re-use, remixes and so on; the possibility to create free content based on CC-licensed content which you then can show to others. If that's not possible through the most popular platforms on the web due to their licensing requirements, it may not bother Facebook etc., but I suppose it should bother CC a lot. Gestumblindi (talk) 17:28, 16 November 2014 (UTC)
Nothing prevent us from sharing a link from another FB account, Commons or Flickr in Facebook (if I understand it properly). But some sites don't like we upload files whose copyright is not with us. (I think it is a good feature to prevent abuse. I upload a lot of my works in many FB groups and lot of my friends share those links. But if they download and upload it under their account, chances that credit information will loss, even if carefully handled.) And this is a generic matter applicable for every license, including CC/FAL/GFDL; nothing in particular to CC. Jee02:39, 17 November 2014 (UTC)
Without speaking for Creative Commons on this issue, I know they are aware of it, they agree that it is a problem, and they are thinking about how to handle it. I do wish that had been done as part of the 4.0 process, but such is life. —Luis Villa (WMF) (talk) 22:17, 17 November 2014 (UTC)
I personally think that there should be some effort/campaign to get these websites to at least be a little more nuanced in their copyright terms. CC's already working hard on internationalizing 4.0, so I'm not sure if they can do this on their end. Anon126 (✉⚒) 05:14, 18 November 2014 (UTC)
And as Jkadavoor (Jee) points out, this is a problem with other free/open licenses that forbid sublicensing, so I think it wouldn't make much sense to ask the developers of all these other licenses to add accomodations. Anon126 (✉⚒) 05:17, 18 November 2014 (UTC)
The CC licence says that you only are able to use the image under the CC licence. If you are uploading the image to Facebook, are you then attempting to use the image under the Facebook terms of use licence, or are you only trying to use it under the CC licence? If you are only trying to use the image under the CC licence, then I do not see how uploading the image to Facebook is a violation of the CC licence. It is a violation of the Facebook terms of use, true, but that is a matter between Facebook and the Facebook uploader.
I note that Facebook demands a worldwide licence. If I find a United States work which is {{PD-US-not renewed}}, then I am not able to give Facebook a worldwide licence, since the work is copyrighted in France.[10] Furthermore, I can not grant Facebook a worldwide licence to a photograph of the Category:Scottish Parliament Building, since I am not allowed to grant Facebook a licence to use the photograph in France. Furthermore, it is unclear whether I can upload an image to Facebook which depends on de minimis, since Facebook's terms of use may require me to grant Facebook a licence which allows Facebook to crop the image in any way Facebook wants. It seems that Facebook's terms of use limit you to only two sets of images:
Photos and drawings which you have made yourself, provided that there are no copyrighted works anywhere on the picture.
Pictures which are in the public domain in the entire world (or licensed under {{Cc-zero}} or equivalent).
Obviously, Facebook users upload lots of other images all of the time. It seems that Facebook's terms of use restrict users from uploading almost anything but that Facebook doesn't bother enforcing the terms of use (and Facebook would probably lose lots of its customers if an attempt were made to enforce the terms of use). Also, Facebook's users do not seem to understand what they are agreeing to when they agree to the terms of use. --Stefan4 (talk) 18:28, 20 November 2014 (UTC)
Well, you could also see it that way: If you upload an image to Facebook, you are supposed to have read and understand their terms of use. So, you are also supposed to be fully aware that Facebook wants you to give them an unrestricted license for the image you're uploading - so you're attempting to use the image under the Facebook terms of use, in violation of the CC license. - Of course, that's a bit unrealistic, as people rarely read terms of use at all... Gestumblindi (talk) 20:12, 22 November 2014 (UTC)
Why not just post a link to the Commons file on Facebook? Then you are not technically "uploading" though the image will still appear on Facebook. If a user clicks on the image they see on Facebook they will be taken to the file page here on Commons with the licence details. Cfynn (talk) 00:46, 26 November 2014 (UTC)
I suppose that would be an interesting workaround, but this doesn't address the larger issue of CC licenses on popular websites.
"Press Pictures: Copyright
Siemens press photos may only be used for editorial purposes. All copyrights belong to Siemens AG, Munich/Berlin, unless another copyright is expressly given. Copyrights remain undiminished if the pictures are incorporated into an archive, either electronically or manually. Pictures used for editorial purposes, modified, duplicated and/or electronically altered must bear the credit "www.siemens.com/press". Commercial use or sale of the pictures and data, even in electronically manipulated form, is prohibited.
Specific restrictions regarding the use of the pictures could arise from the picture caption.
The photos may be printed free of charge, but in the case of print media we would appreciate a copy for our records. If pictures are used in films or electronic media, brief notification would suffice."
So: can we use released picture or not? I'm not sure it's possible... If yes: which one is the proper license? Thanks in advance.--Ale Sasso (talk) 14:25, 7 December 2014 (UTC)
Hi Ale Sasso,
"press pictures" usually cannot be uploaded to Commons, as their use is usually restricted, i.e. "for editorial purposes" in your case. All uploads to Commons need to be free also for commercial use. --Túrelio (talk) 14:29, 7 December 2014 (UTC)
Hi, I would like confirmation that a logo published in France before 1935 is OK here. It concerns the small logo on this book cover. The rest is {{PD-ineligible}}. IMO the copyright belonged to the editor, and therefore it became in the public domain 58 years after the first publication (50 years + 8 years for war extension), i.e. in 1993, before the duration was extended to 70 years in 1996. What do you think? Regards, Yann (talk) 18:27, 7 December 2014 (UTC)
I've been unable to definitely identify the artist of the Archer logo used by Rieder. The earliest use of this logo by Rieder I could identify was Le Travail du Métal (1921). So you could definitely upload the book cover to EN.WP with a PD-US-1923-abroad copyright tag. Given the small size of the logo relative to the size of the book cover and the fact that the logo is incidental to the depiction of the cover, the logo is probably de minimis. If you choose to leave the file on Commons, it is probably best to add a {{De minimis}} tag noting the logo. —RP88 (talk) 20:30, 7 December 2014 (UTC)
Thanks for the research. The law was only retroactive for works for which the copyright did not expired in 1995. Therefore if the work entered into the public domain before the 1st January 1996, the new law didn't apply to it. Regards, Yann (talk) 20:37, 7 December 2014 (UTC)
Unfortunately the law was indeed retroactive, even for works whose copyright had expired by 1995. See my earlier references. A summary can be found at en:Copyright_Duration_Directive#Copyright_restoration. In particular, Article 16 III of the law says "Les dispositions du titre II de la présente loi n'ont pour effet de faire renaître des droits sur des œuvres, prestations, fixations ou programmes tombés dans le domaine public avant le 1er janvier 1995 que s'ils étaient encore protégés à cette date dans au moins un autre Etat membre de la Communauté européenne." —RP88 (talk) 20:58, 7 December 2014 (UTC)
(ec) That's exactly what I mean. If the copyright expired before that date, the new law does not apply. Regards, Yann (talk) 21:16, 7 December 2014 (UTC)
Perhaps we're talking past each other. The law revived the French copyright for public domain works whose French copyright term had expired, if the work was still protected in at least one EU Member State on 1 July 1995. Since Germany adopted life+70 in 1966 (which is more than 20 years before 1995), all works whose life+50 terms had expired before 1995 and thus PD in France (but were still less than life+70 and thus not PD in Germany) had their copyright restored in France when this law was enacted. See, e.g. European Court of Justice, Land Hessen v G. Ricordi & Co. Bühnen- und Musikverlag GmbH, 2002. —RP88 (talk) 21:39, 7 December 2014 (UTC)
If you think the logo authorship is anonymous, then it would be OK. Published before 1935 might well have meant it expired before the URAA came into effect, so its U.S. copyright would not have been restored, but since it sounds like it was published before 1923 that is moot anyways -- there is no U.S. copyright. The EU copyright directives were however fully retroactive, regardless if the work had expired or not, so you would need to show it was published more than 70 years ago to apply Anonymous-EU, which it sounds like it was. If folks feel we cannot claim an anonymous work, then its French status is ambiguous. Personally, I'm fine with Anonymous-EU for that logo. Carl Lindberg (talk) 01:11, 8 December 2014 (UTC)
Photo of Radford Electronics SPA50 amplifier
Could a high-resolution version of this photo be uploaded to Commons, assuming that the photo itself was released under a free license? The text labeling for the controls on the front of the depicted device seems minimal, though there is also the Radford logo display. (The manufacturer, Radford Electronics, is based in England, so the country of origin could likely be the United Kingdom.) --Gazebo (talk) 15:03, 8 December 2014 (UTC)
Copyright of photos taken by an organization or group of people
I am involved with a university that has taken a number of photographs that I would like to upload to commons. The photographs in question fall into three categories:
Some photos were taken by a university camera with a group of students under my supervision. I don't know who snapped the shot, but I helped select both the photographer as well as those who were being photographed. It was understood by all that this was for posting on the internet (and in most cases it was posted). If I can post it to commons, do I make it my own under CC by SA or public domain? (Either way is perfectly fine with me)
The second class of photos were made by staff members or students, and posted on the university website. Can I use oral permission from the person who took the photograph to declare it public domain?
The third class consists of photos taken by someone at the university, but nobody knows who took the shot. Can these be posted under public domain?
I'm going to take your categories in reverse order. With regards to #3, those photos are orphan works. As unpublished works by unknown authors, they will be copyrighted until 120 years from creation. With regards to #2, Commons will need written permission to use those photos. Follow the procedure at COM:OTRS. With regards to #1, in a typical situation where a person takes a picture, the person taking the picture is the author and copyright owner. However, the situation as you describe it is more complex. The Wikimedia Foundation has a page at meta:Wikilegal/Authorship and Copyright Ownership discussing this unfortunately complex legal issue. In my opinion, in the situation as you describe it most likely these photos are joint works and both you and the student photographer are co-authors with an equal copyright to the work. Commons would need permission from both of you. —RP88 (talk) 20:46, 7 December 2014 (UTC)
Wow! But after thinking about your response, I realized that the "reasonable" and flexible rules I was hoping for would create too much opportunity for the that exceedingly rare but weird and time-consuming lawsuit where people argue endlessly about who owns the photograph. The policy you describe forces people to get along and keeps such lawsuits as short and simple as possible. Thanks. --Guy vandegrift (talk) 04:36, 8 December 2014 (UTC)
In #1, if works are co-owned by you and students, I think either one can release the rights. If I remember well, LuisV (WMF) expressed such an opinion in a discussion about jointly owned copyrights. Jee04:50, 9 December 2014 (UTC)
I will publish the one co-owned by me and my students, explain on the pictures talk page, and let the hawks sort it out. Meanwhile, I have facebook contact with one of the actual photographers. Is a written message from him to me sufficient?--Guy vandegrift (talk) 14:22, 9 December 2014 (UTC)
Proceedings of the United States National Museum: Public Domain?
I have two related questions: one) would media from Proceedings of the United States National Museum be acceptable under {{PD-USGov}}? The volume in question is volume 71, 1928. The title page states "United States Government Printing Office" (in later volumes this is replaced by "Smithsonian Institution Press") and the Biodiversity Heritage Library summary for the volume in question states Copyright "Not specified", which according to their Licensing and Copyright page means Public Domain. The National Museum is administered by the Smithsonian Institution, so the template {{SIA-no known copyright restrictions}} could possibly be added as well, yet a PD-USGov would trump that (right?). My feeling is the volume in question is likely PD but want to verify. Secondly, assuming the journal was not PD-USGov, would articles within created by US government employees fall under PD-USGov, (e.g. this article? Thanks for any guidance. Animalparty (talk) 06:53, 9 December 2014 (UTC)
Works done by U.S. Government employees in the course of their duties are PD-USGov. The Smithsonian has a lot of federal employees, but does have some that are not, making their works a little on the murky side. For ones by known federal employees, we do have {{PD-USGov-SI}}. The one you link up there should only be used for works the Smithsonian posts to the Flickr Commons, and not any others. As for this work... at the very least it is {{PD-US-no notice}}. So, even if some works were not by federal employees (or by federal employees outside their work) it should still be OK. The article is probably done as part of their duties, so probably PD-USGov as well. That would be a reasonable assumption. I would guess many of these volumes are PD-US-no_notice, and if there was a notice for ones published before 1964, it seems unlikely they would have renewed the copyright, so if a search turns up nothing then PD-US-not_renewed can also come into play. This one had no notice to begin with though, so renewal is moot. Carl Lindberg (talk) 08:39, 9 December 2014 (UTC)
The year of first publication. If the work is a derivative work or a compilation incorporating previously published material, the year date of first publication of the derivative work or compilation is sufficient. Examples of derivative works are translations or dramatizations; an example of a compilation is an anthology. The year may be omitted when a pictorial, graphic, or sculptural work, with accompanying textual matter, if any, is reproduced in or on greeting cards, postcards, stationery, jewelry, dolls, toys, or useful articles.
The name of the copyright owner, an abbreviation by which the name can be recognized, or a generally known alternative designation of owner.
All three elements had to be there, except for certain types of works it was OK to omit the year. The original 1909 law defines it in Section 18, and the last version before being replaced by the 1976 law is here. They are more or less the same. There were some small variations allowed by the Copyright Office, but they were required elements per the actual law. copyright data.com has some good examples and documentation on further details (court cases, etc.) if you're interested. Carl Lindberg (talk) 18:36, 9 December 2014 (UTC)
A photo (File:Malcolmmaysfull.jpg) recently uploaded and used on en.wikipedia (uploaded here and added there by the same user) seems questionable to me. I'm not experienced with copyright problems, though, so I was hoping someone with more experience would be able to look into it. The picture appears to be taken from IMDb. --Fru1tbat (talk) 19:27, 11 December 2014 (UTC)
This image on Flickr is available under the CC-BY 2.0 license which is compatible with Commons. The question is, would the "Otis Elevator Control" nameplate on the depicted device along with the items of information on the nameplate (some of which are technical specifications such as voltage and amperage) be copyrightable? (As a side note, the photo information indicates that it was taken in the US.) --Gazebo (talk) 18:48, 5 December 2014 (UTC)
Thanks for the feedback. My impression was that the information on the nameplate was too minimal to be copyrightable (in addition to it incorporating uncopyrightable facts) but sometimes it seems useful to get feedback from others. In considering the image, the image page indicates that the image is licensed under CC-BY 2.0, but the profile page for the Flickr user who uploaded the image talks about reusing images within the terms of the CC-BY 3.0 license. Would it be accurate to treat the image as being licensed under CC-BY 2.0? --Gazebo (talk) 04:13, 7 December 2014 (UTC)
Maybe the photographer updated his profile later, but didn't touch the license for older pictures—that would be a good strategy. Just in case, I was curious and downloaded the _o (original) image, if you got something smaller I'd upload this over a smaller copy. –Be..anyone (talk) 15:16, 7 December 2014 (UTC)
This section is resolved and can be archived. If you disagree, replace this template with your comment. File:Old-Otis-elevator-controller.jpg is nice, thanks. –Be..anyone (talk) 22:57, 12 December 2014 (UTC)
Uploading CC BY-SA 2.0 image
I have found an image on geograph.ie which is licensed under CC BY-SA 2.0 and I would like to upload it for use on en.wikipedia. Form what I have read here and on wikipeida, it seems to be an acceptable licence. However when uploading here the earliest version I can select is 2.5. Can someone please advise me as to what license to use. Thanks. Sarahj2107 (talk) 14:24, 10 December 2014 (UTC)
Hi Sarahj2107, The answer above is the simplest, however also note from creativecommons.org "...any work that is licensed with a BY-SA or BY-NC-SA version 2.0 or higher can be used with any later version of the license", so if its a CC BY-SA 2.0, you should be able to upload to commons as any later version of CC BY-SA. Cheers KylieTastic (talk) 14:58, 10 December 2014 (UTC)
The license change does not apply to the original, it has to use the original license version. Only the copyright holder may remove a NC or ND restriction. Even the SA part may not be changed unless done by the copyright holder. --Denniss (talk) 20:40, 12 December 2014 (UTC)
The file Analog_TV_EMI.jpg was uploaded by Shaddack who attempted to license it under public domain, and has tagged it as such. However, the author states in the description that it is a screenshot of Superman Returns, which can only be licensed under fair use at best, under which I assume it should be deleted; or that it is to be considered de minimis infringement (especially since it is almost unrecognizable). There is also the "Prima" bug in the upper left hand corner which can be considered a logo, but probably does not exceed threshold of originality. The purpose of the screenshot is not to depict the copyrighted content, and the low quality itself is not a reason for deletion--rather, the quality issue the purpose of the screenshot. Aside from the bad license, does the inclusion of copyrighted material jeopardize this file's presence on Commons? --ChrstphrChvz (talk) 05:29, 14 December 2014 (UTC)
Since the main goal here is to demonstrate the phenomenon of electromagnetic interference and the quality of the background image is from low to unrecognizable, this background image can be considered de minimis, in my opinion. Ruslik (talk) 12:44, 14 December 2014 (UTC)
You have proof that it was published in 1919 and not in 1930 as the Getty description says. This is in the public domain because it was published before 1923. What I would do is to provide a link to the page as you did here and cite the book on the template. HTH, We hope (talk) 22:55, 28 November 2014 (UTC)
I don't have access to the book you refer to, and Google Books only has a table of contents. If the picture indeed was published in 1919, then you can upload it to Commons using the copyright tag {{PD-1923}}. If possible, try to obtain a copy without Getty's watermark. --Stefan4 (talk) 16:48, 1 December 2014 (UTC)
What I don't understand is why I can see the full book with photo on the linked page and you can't. Can say that yes, the book is from 1919. We hope (talk) 01:23, 8 December 2014 (UTC)
A lot of Google Books content is not available to European users, presumably for various legal reasons. They may not have vetted European copyright status, and a lot of their actions depend on the U.S. fair use exception, which doesn't exist in Europe, at least not universally and not to the same degree (and even the U.S. usage has been argued; court cases are still going on I think). Carl Lindberg (talk) 02:00, 8 December 2014 (UTC)
From what I have undestood, Google doesn't bother checking for death years but simplifies things by just assuming that all books made before a certain year satisfy {{PD-old-70}} and that everything else is copyrighted. If the death year is unknown, {{PD-old-70}} requires a much earlier cut-off year than {{PD-1923}}. --Stefan4 (talk) 23:48, 14 December 2014 (UTC)
Yet we are allowed full view of magazines such as Life, which rarely missed a renewal and full access to Billboard, even though the magazines are still protected. Not sure why books are treated one way and apparently magazines another. We hope (talk) 00:11, 15 December 2014 (UTC)
Magazines are treated another way because you can do anything if you have permission of the copyright holder, which I assume they do for Life and Billboard.--Prosfilaes (talk) 14:56, 15 December 2014 (UTC)
Don't get me started on that. :) In the US, it used to be a great tool because you could search until you either found what you wanted or ran out of patience. After they stopped adding to it, they started limiting the number of hits, newspapers began disappearing, never to be seen again and so on-this is when you have to use it in the US. We hope (talk) 00:56, 15 December 2014 (UTC)
Note: The original source is http://www.sammlungen.hu-berlin.de/dokumente/12041/ - Copyright law confuses me, so I wasn't sure what usage was possible to help DeistCosmos when they asked[14]. The US law appears to need the image to be first published in the US over 100 years ago (and possible that the author is dead?), however how can we know if the image was ever published in the US? Cheers KylieTastic (talk) 10:06, 10 December 2014 (UTC)
On their "Impressum" they claim a copyright on everything they've published, unless there's an explicit statement about rights by 3rd parties (not applicable for this photo.) Especially they say that any use not covered by copyright law requires a written permission. The latter would be useless for commons, because commons only hosts free media. But if the image is old enough to be anyway free under German copyright law you should be able to upload it here, maybe {{PD-anon-1923}} does the trick in this case. If the photographer died in 1970 (plausible example for age 20 in 1910), you actually shouldn't upload it here now. –Be..anyone (talk) 23:32, 12 December 2014 (UTC)
In the United States, the copyright has expired if the picture was published before 1923. You should keep in mind that some things, in particular family photographs and private letters, tend to remain unpublished for a very long time. If the picture wasn't published at all before 2003, then the copyright expires 120 years after creation, provided that it indeed was taken by an anonymous photographer.
In Germany, the copyright term normally expires 70 years after the death of the photographer, but if the photographer died more than 70 years before the first publication, the copyright term is extended to 25 years from publication. If, as claimed on German Wikipedia, the photographer indeed is anonymous, the term is reduced to 70 years from publication. If the photograph wasn't published within 70 years from creation, the term is further reduced to 25 years from publication. --Stefan4 (talk) 00:09, 15 December 2014 (UTC)
Reason enough, I'd gather -- for I don't see how this could be a family heirloom type photo and yet Humboldt claiming copyright ownership. Most surely this was taken by behest of the institution during Prof. Weinstein's employ there, and by a photographer-for-hire whose identity was unimportant to the enterprise and so forgotten immediately thereafter. And surely this was published by posting in some public place where prospective pupils might view the visage of their potential professor. 23:59, 16 December 2014 (UTC)
if it's in the public domain, then it's not copyrighted, so the proposed tag would be wrong. Anyway, as the depicted packaging contains probably copyrighted artwork, the public-domain claim is likely wrong. Let's wait for the outcome of the ongoing DR discussion. --Túrelio (talk) 20:05, 15 December 2014 (UTC)
The existing tag is fine. However, there might be derivative works issues, since you are not the author of the artwork on the packaging. Photos like that can be a close call as to whether that would be a derivative work or if the use is incidental. Carl Lindberg (talk) 20:07, 15 December 2014 (UTC)
(By the way, it appears there are already 3 versions of OGL, but our template has a generic name, although it points to v1 license. We might want to look into this.
I have seen quite a few questionable images tagged as a only text and simple shapes logo therefore ineligible for copyright. But this image clearly is more than "simple geometric shapes and letters". So I am asking for some more concrete details about where it can be used, and maybe adding them to the template page. Thanks EoRdE6 (talk) 19:40, 12 December 2014 (UTC)
@EoRdE6: , in my point of view, the threshold of originality in commons is COMPLETELY governed by administrators. Therefore the criteria of TOO only reflect their understanding, without concerns of cases in different regions and culture background. I'm not optimistic about this case unless Wikimedia Foundation met true law suits. - Siyuwj (talk) 15:58, 17 December 2014 (UTC)
Does not match my observations so far, users are free to add {{Vk}} {{tl|PD-textlogo}} on a deletion request, and the closing admin (or user for keep) is free to use "no consensus to delete" in the summary. –Be..anyone (talk) 20:45, 17 December 2014 (UTC)
Exif contradicts flickr license
I'd like to clarify the following case: Consider File:Kinderfest in Liesing (4983089086).jpg. According to flickr this is CC-by-sa/2.0. Fine for us. But according to Exif data (Urheberrechte: Veröffentlichung honorarfrei bei Namensennung ausschliesslich für nicht-kommerzielle Nutzung.; meaning something like by-sa-nc) which is not a compatible free license. Is this ok? Or is this Flickr-Washing?
As the photographer is an employee of the party uploading his images to flickr, or he at least depends on the party for additional jobs, I feel, he will not complain.
So can it be kept? Or has it to be deleted due to copyvio?
author=Werner Faymann makes no sense, that could be fixed with the EXIF data. Changing licenses (is this a configured camera default?) to something less restrictive is okay. IANAL: Be..anyone (talk) 22:54, 16 December 2014 (UTC)
With this contradicting data I'd actually request a usage permission from the Flickr uploader. Somebody with a Flickr account send them a mail/notification? --Denniss (talk) 03:46, 17 December 2014 (UTC)
I have downloaded to the Commons a photo I scanned from Dagens Nyheter, 16 May 1945: File:Reginald Oliver Gilling Urch.jpg.
I was asked about the copyrights of the photo, however I have no single idea how to answer. As a result I was given seven days to solve the problem, otherwise the photo will be deleted. Can anybody help?
Thanks in advance. — Preceding unsigned comment added by DavLan762 (talk • contribs) 12:31, 18 December 2014 (UTC)
Under most circumstances works are protected for 70 years from the death of the author, so recent works like that photo are unlikely to be public domain. However, the newspaper Dagens Nyheter is a Swedish newspaper. You can refer to the summary of Swedish copyright at Commons:Copyright_rules_by_territory#Sweden. Do you have access to this issue of the newspaper to check to see if they identify the photographer or other source for this photo to confirm that File:Reginald Oliver Gilling Urch.jpg is of Swedish origin? Sweden had an interesting distinction between photographic works and photographic pictures (See sv:Upphovsrätt_i_Sverige#Fotografier). It is possible that that this press photo meets the requirements of a photographic picture (fotografiska bilder). If it does, then as a Swedish photographic picture published before 1994 and created before January 1, 1969 it is in the public domain, and you can add the {{PD-Sweden-photo}} copyright tag to the licensing section of File:Reginald Oliver Gilling Urch.jpg. —RP88 (talk) 17:27, 18 December 2014 (UTC)
Yes, I do have a digital version of the obituary made from a microfilm of Dagens Nyheter. In the newspaper there is no name of the photographer, not even the name of the one who wrote the obituary. (A translation of the obituary, done by Larsmunk, as well as the photo, appear at the page devoted to Reginald Urch.) The photo is no doubt of Swedish origin. In 1939, when the Second World War broke, the man, a correspondent of The Times, was stationed in Warsaw and from there he escaped to Stockholm. Except for several months when he was sent by his newspaper to Finland to report about the Finnish Winter War, he stayed during the whole war in Stockholm, writing from there about the various stages of the fightings. He died in 1945 soon after the war was over. The press photo obviously was taken at that time, as it reflects his age, so there could be little doubt that it meets the requirements of a photographic picture (fotografiska bilder) and is in the public domain. Dear RP88, I’m quite a beginner in these matters and the time is short. How about if you help by inserting this {{PD-Sweden-photo}} in the right place? Thanks. DavLan762 (talk) 15:55, 20 December 2014 (UTC)
Question about a tune
Hello
I am quit new at Wikimedia, and I have some questions, which may be silly, but I will really appreciate some help. (I am not even sure, that this is the right place to ask, but now I will try).
My interest is about a tune: Le chant des partisans by Anna Marly, and I have searched the Internet for many hours to try to find the copyright owners of the melody, until I finally discovered, that the tune was uploaded to Wikimedia, and registered under Public Domain by a Hungarian user called OsvátA.
I an earlier version of the upload of the song, OsvátA wrote: "I, the copyright holder of this work, hereby publish it under the following licenses: ... GNU Free Documentation License ..."
My questions are not intended to be offensive, and I must emphasize, that I have ABSOLUTELY NO REASON to mistrust OsvátA, but still:
- How can I know, whether this Free License - statement actually is authentic?
- Does "I, the copyright holder" mean that OsvátA is the copyright owner of the music?
- I want to use Anna Marlys music to Le chant des partisans with a Danish text, but of cause only if it is legal. Would you experienced Wikimedia-uses recommend me to investigate the copyright-issue further (how??) before doing so, or can I just trust, that some "authority" at Wikimedia has granted, that the tune is free to use?
@Søren hammer jacobsen: Own work was completely incorrect, and neither is the current tag on the file. From what I have found from a quick search (you might know more than I do about the actual circumstances, this is based on information from a few Wikipedia articles) this was written by her sometime prior to 1942, and sung by her on the BBC. This is (presumably) a recording of the BBC broadcast. Under UK copyright law [15] a 'sound recording or broadcast' is copyrighted for 50 years from the end of the calendar year in which the work was first released, which would mean (if this attribution is correct) that this recording entered the public domain in 1992. As far as the actual song itself, the UK protects 'musical works' for 70 years after the death of the author. Since Anna Marley died in 2006, the actual song itself is going to be under copyright for a very long time. I'm not going to mess with the tagging on the actual file right now.. hopefully someone who speaks Russian can verify this attribution from the source and fix it. Revent (talk) 10:19, 20 December 2014 (UTC)
On the source (anna-marly.narod.ru/music.htm), some recordings are marked as "Le chant des partisans (1958)", but I couldn't find anything which could be called "attribution" or any license state on them. Narod.ru is old free hosting with very poor copyright moderation, that's why it is in the spamlist. Ignatus (talk) 16:06, 20 December 2014 (UTC)
To be a little more specific, after looking at the actual license... these are not 'font software', but 'documents' that illustrate modified versions of glyphs from the font. What restrictions are in the Open Font License only apply to actual font software, you are allowed to use the glyphs themselves freely. Revent (talk) 17:07, 20 December 2014 (UTC)
Suggest new copyright template: PD-nature
The US does not recognize copyright in works created by nature (see pg. 8 in this document: "The office will not register works created by nature, animals, or plants"). However, there is no copyright tag on Commons for uploaded works that were created by nature. When uploading an audio recording of underwater noises, the most fitting copyright tag I could find is PD-because. However, this is a copyright issue that is probably common enough to merit its own template. AHeneen (talk) 07:14, 18 December 2014 (UTC)
While I suppose you could create a specialized tag akin to {{PD-animal}} for nature sounds, I think it is perfectly acceptable to use {{PD-ineligible}} for media such as your example that are in the public domain for lack of original human authorship. —RP88 (talk) 07:31, 18 December 2014 (UTC)
There are two different copyrights to consider when uploading a sound file: The performers copyrights and the copyright for the recording. The text you refere to talks about the performer. A sound recording is of course copyrighted. --Martin H. (talk) 21:06, 18 December 2014 (UTC)
Yes, if I wasn't clear, I agree that it isn't appropriate to use {{PD-ineligible}} for sound recordings where there is an original human contribution with respect to capturing and processing the sounds to make the final recording. The cases where it would apply would be recordings of nature sounds captured by devices like traffic cameras. —RP88 (talk) 21:26, 18 December 2014 (UTC)
Are these two heavily watermarked images OK for use in Commons? I ask it here because they need a heavy work to restore them for use in Wikimedia projects.--Carnby (talk) 11:40, 21 December 2014 (UTC)
Unfortunately since the uploader provided links to the images themselves, instead of to a page that gives any description, we aren't really given any way to 'know' that's the case. Revent (talk) 21:21, 21 December 2014 (UTC)
It seems that the Melomics a paid service being a source of computer-generated music. They declare to give their clients exclusive copyright for the music, but marking their files (C) MELOMICS. Personally, I doubt that the music can even be copyrightable (as they declare the music to be created fully automatic, without any human author), but noticed an OTRS ticket concerning mass deletion of melomics.com sourced files without even notifying uploader about reasons.
AFAIK:
they declare that their client paying for the computer generated music receive full exclusive copyright to the music,
they declare the music is generated fully automatic with no human author involved (like monkey selfie?).
Any hints how should we treat such music and, if a permission is required, who should be considered the copyright owner? Ankry (talk) 19:40, 21 December 2014 (UTC)
Not being able to see the ticket, I would imagine their 'claim' is that the music is legally not the output of a purely mechanical process, but a derivative work of the algorithm that they have created. Given that it was the 'creative intent' of the authors of the computer program to produce music in this fashion, my guess would be that it would be upheld. In the case of the monkey selfie, it was in no way the 'intent' of the author to create such a work... he simply 'found' what the animal had created through pure accident.
@Revent: The ticket contains no claim, only a request to undelete the contents deleted as copyvio (but whose copyright is violated in this case I cannot imagine). The music was declared by the uploader as CC0. However, as it has no human author, I doubt it is even copyrightable; it should be PD by default. But unsure, as I am not US copyright expert; nor have an idea which template might be appropriate. And if they are not copyrightable, nobody can set any license to them. Any comments in this matter? Ankry (talk) 18:04, 22 December 2014 (UTC)
@Ankry: (disclaimer here, I'm not a lawyer) This is interesting, as has motivated me to do a bit of research. Apparently, the 'original' Melomics was a research project in Spain, and explicitly stated that the works of Iamus and Melomics109 were 'freely downloadable under CC0' at melomics.com (see [16] ) This would have been the '1.0' version of that website, which no longer exists. The 'current' version of the melomics.com site is owned by 'Melomics Media LLC', a company out of New Jersey, and is apparently attempting to monetize the original project. That being said, if the copyright is 'valid' then the material originally released under CC0 is 'still' under CC0 to anyone who obtained it under that license (since CC licenses are not revocable) and to anyone they distributed it to.
The other question, and the more interesting one, is... is it copyrightable? Here, the guideline is the Copyright Compendium issued by the US Copyright Office, specifically chapter 300 located here. We can disregard the question of Spanish law, because, as stated in the compendium, "The U.S. Copyright Act is the exclusive source of copyright protection in the United States.... In determining whether a work is copyrightable, the Office applies U.S. copyright law pursuant to title 17 of the U.S. Code, even if the work was created in a foreign country". The material is being published from the United States (a New Jersey company, remember) so even if it's copyrightable in Spain, we don't need to care. In section 306, the 'Human Authorship Requirement', it is specifically stated that ' the Office will not register works produced by a machine or mere mechanical process that operates randomly or automatically without any creative input or intervention from a human author', and gives as a specific example 'a claim based on a mechanical weaving process that randomly produces irregular shapes in the fabric without any discernible pattern.' The Melomics music is created, by their own statement, through an automatic process without human intervention, and seems to me to be the direct 'auditory' counterpart to what the USCO specifically says they will not register. (Yes, this is somewhat contradicting my earlier 'guess'.) At this point, I don't think it can be copyrighted, and would be something like {{PD-music-ineligible}}, since it has 'no original creative input'.
So, not quite a monkey selfie (since it was intentional) but similar. No creative input from a human, no copyright. Revent (talk) 19:52, 22 December 2014 (UTC)
I noticed that @Jkadavoor: marked this for archiving, but I'd rather we tried to kickstart the discussion again, because these changes are (potentially) important: they impact how we present information about reuse to millions of people, on millions of pieces of content. In particular, they impact how we present information to unskilled reusers - the people who we'd really like to (1) use more of our content and (2) comply more with our license. That's too important to let this discussion go away. So maybe the right question is: does anyone *object* to @Multichill: , WMF, and others creating a more fleshed-out mockup based on @MGalloway (WMF): 's mockups above? —Luis Villa (WMF) (talk) 15:42, 21 November 2014 (UTC)
No objections from me, too. I fully agree that it's very important that "unskilled reusers" will be enabled to comply with our license(s) as intuitively as possible. People just don't read lengthy terms; you can tell them a thousand times to read the actual license, they won't... so the big challenge is to create a summary that is on the one hand very compact, but on the other hand precise enough to make license-compliant reuse more likely. Gestumblindi (talk) 14:39, 23 November 2014 (UTC)
No objections, just one Question: Is the "must provide a link to the license" a new thing of the CC-4.0 or has that always been there? If it's new, we may need different wordings for different versions? --El Grafo (talk) 09:36, 1 December 2014 (UTC)
The proposed licence templates do not link to the licence itself but to CC's simplified explanation of the licence. Is this compliant with the licence. Instead of linking to the licence, you can satisfy the requirement by including a copy of the licence, but maybe the template shouldn't mention that as the template otherwise risks being too long. Several of the suggestions already seem to be too long. --Stefan4 (talk) 15:33, 1 December 2014 (UTC)
@Stefan4: Option 6 links to legalcode; so I'm striking off Option 3. The new layout has a collapsible "read more" feature; so we can expand the text if required. Do you have any additions to the proposed text? Jee 16:00, 1 December 2014 (UTC) We already provided several links to CC FAQs to explain the brief wording in detail. For example, CreativeCommonsWiki:License_Versions#Detailed_attribution_comparison_chart well explains every attribution parameter in detail. Jee16:06, 1 December 2014 (UTC)
I think it is OK to link to the summary rather than the legalcode; you're right that a literal reading of the license probably requires pointing to the legal code, but I've never seen that done in the wild, even by CC themselves. (See, for example, the suggested links in this attribution guide from CC Australia.)—Luis Villa (WMF) (talk) 01:46, 6 December 2014 (UTC)
Luis Villa (WMF): It may be legally OK to link to the summary; but there is a difference in our perspective. In all other sites (like Flickr), they give a simple notice stating "this media is CC XX license and linking to the deed. But in our case, we are not mentioning any think near the usage; just hyper-linking to the "file page" where we state the license and terms of use. It will add one more layer of complexity, keeping the actual license one more step away. That's why we prefer to provide a summary of the license there (in the file page). Since this summary (license tag) is almost exact duplicate of the CC deed, linking it again to the deed (which again linking to the license code) is very redundant and useless (as Colin stated earlier). Jee14:21, 8 December 2014 (UTC)
Comment. All of my work is PD, but I do have to use another license when that is what I am updating, so my preference is to make it shorter than the current version, not longer. A link can be used for details, but taking up more real estate on every image page is not a good idea. Delphi234 (talk) 05:38, 5 December 2014 (UTC)
Comment Maybe I should have asked Jee to hide the first round of options :) A reminder that May posted some proposals, which I think reflect some thinking on how to do this in a way that is both cleaner and more informative. Copied them in-line here for reference. —Luis Villa (WMF) (talk) 01:46, 6 December 2014 (UTC)
I have some initial thoughts and mock-ups to illustrate. Thanks for being so patient! Wikimania prep has been taking up pretty much all my time. Here
(1.0)
is an attempt to connect the usage and terms more than we previously did, by stating in one place and sentence "Under this license terms*, you are free to…:" and then a list of things you're free to do and what you must do after, which is to attribute and sharealike. But I began by questioning why we care about CC license banner and the purpose of the license. Because people tend to be unaware of their boundaries, a CC license is there to protect the work of the creator and the fair usage of the user of the work. Since CC license permits users to do a lot of things (which they already have no problems with) so long as they are in compliant with license. I thought it was more important for users to know know what they must do if they choose to use the work, because without following terms, they risk getting in trouble. Here
(2.0)
, I made the entire banner look like a single important message with a very clear hierarchy of info, as if saying: Attribute and Sharealike and you'll be fine. Same thing here
(2.1)
, just with different language that's more actionable, "You are free to share & adapt…as long as you…Give attribution, Share Again." I've moved around some sentences here and there but don't claim to for them to be more appropriate for legal purposes, but is what I think could be more understandable. A more condensed version could look like this
(2.2)
. On a side note, I really like how The Noun Project has done to educate icon downloaders to properly attribute the author. When you click on the Download button, you are required to agree to attribute the author (3.0). Once downloaded, you are directed to a page where you get pretty specific instructions on where to attribute the author depending on popular medium usages. We should do something similar!MGalloway (WMF) (talk) 13:56, 7 August 2014 (UTC)
Being bold is a great attribute for Wikipedia itself; for Commons, though, it may be more useful to be cautious. From what one can tell, it is almost certainly OK for CC-BY material to be combined with uncopyrighted material or material that is ineligible for copyright. With regard to the depicted Xanadu Home sign, assessing as to whether the sign itself is likely to be copyrightable would seem to be useful if it reduces the chance of having to delete the image later on, especially if the image gets put to use in multiple Wikimedia projects. --Gazebo (talk) 04:05, 22 December 2014 (UTC)
I don't think the sign could be called an 'artwork or sculpture', so all that matters is the 'logo' (if you want to call it that) and it's purely a semicircle and some text. Well below the threshold of originality... the 'photo itself', on the other hand, is legitimately CC-BY. Revent (talk) 20:16, 22 December 2014 (UTC)
Ah ok. It is weird that they do not have exactly the same size, so the UploadWizard didn't detect the duplicate. I deleted my version. Regards, Yann (talk) 10:00, 24 December 2014 (UTC)
That nit fascinated me, too. Flickrbot got it right, the lossless optimization and expanded EXIF should still match. But the Uploadwannabewizard got it wrong. ;-) –Be..anyone (talk) 11:04, 24 December 2014 (UTC)
The documentation of the template itself (at {{Cc-by-3.0-BollywoodHungama}}) clarifies it...apparently their intent is that only actual 'photos' (not film stills) taken on sets or at promotional events in India are CC-BY, and excludes photos taken at such events that are marked as being copyrighted by someone else (they might share a picture someone else took at one of their events, but would presumably attribute it). Revent (talk) 20:06, 22 December 2014 (UTC)
Unfortunately, I don't see an obvious way to verify that from the site itself. My thought is perhaps Googling for some details about the specific event (tedious, I know). For that particular photo, this says it was at the Reliance Digital store in Juhu (which enwiki tells me is a suburb of Mumbai) so it, and others from that same event, would be fine. I suspect it would be easiest to try to deal with them in batches from specific events, as much as possible. Revent (talk) 16:55, 23 December 2014 (UTC)
Yes, it is much easier if you know the place. I will look into these. People know that Juhu is in Bombay, like others know that Malibu is in LA. ;o) Regards, Yann (talk) 17:01, 23 December 2014 (UTC)
Being bold is a great attribute for Wikipedia itself; for Commons, though, it may be more useful to be cautious. From what one can tell, it is almost certainly OK for CC-BY material to be combined with uncopyrighted material or material that is ineligible for copyright. With regard to the depicted Xanadu Home sign, assessing as to whether the sign itself is likely to be copyrightable would seem to be useful if it reduces the chance of having to delete the image later on, especially if the image gets put to use in multiple Wikimedia projects. --Gazebo (talk) 04:05, 22 December 2014 (UTC)
I don't think the sign could be called an 'artwork or sculpture', so all that matters is the 'logo' (if you want to call it that) and it's purely a semicircle and some text. Well below the threshold of originality... the 'photo itself', on the other hand, is legitimately CC-BY. Revent (talk) 20:16, 22 December 2014 (UTC)
Ah ok. It is weird that they do not have exactly the same size, so the UploadWizard didn't detect the duplicate. I deleted my version. Regards, Yann (talk) 10:00, 24 December 2014 (UTC)
That nit fascinated me, too. Flickrbot got it right, the lossless optimization and expanded EXIF should still match. But the Uploadwannabewizard got it wrong. ;-) –Be..anyone (talk) 11:04, 24 December 2014 (UTC)
The documentation of the template itself (at {{Cc-by-3.0-BollywoodHungama}}) clarifies it...apparently their intent is that only actual 'photos' (not film stills) taken on sets or at promotional events in India are CC-BY, and excludes photos taken at such events that are marked as being copyrighted by someone else (they might share a picture someone else took at one of their events, but would presumably attribute it). Revent (talk) 20:06, 22 December 2014 (UTC)
Unfortunately, I don't see an obvious way to verify that from the site itself. My thought is perhaps Googling for some details about the specific event (tedious, I know). For that particular photo, this says it was at the Reliance Digital store in Juhu (which enwiki tells me is a suburb of Mumbai) so it, and others from that same event, would be fine. I suspect it would be easiest to try to deal with them in batches from specific events, as much as possible. Revent (talk) 16:55, 23 December 2014 (UTC)
Yes, it is much easier if you know the place. I will look into these. People know that Juhu is in Bombay, like others know that Malibu is in LA. ;o) Regards, Yann (talk) 17:01, 23 December 2014 (UTC)
At Commons:Форум#Материалы mos.ru и stroi.mos.ru I asked about the availability of resources from the official sites of the Moscow Government for Commons. I would be grateful if some expert (likely with a knowledge of Russian) could answer that. The terms of use in question are [17]:
All materials on the website of the Mayor and the Government of Moscow may be reproduced in any form of media, on Internet servers or any other medium without any restriction on volume or time limits for publication. The only condition for the reprinting or retransmission of materials is that a reference to the source must be provided (if copying information onto an Internet site this must be an interactive link). There is no need to gain prior consent from the Press Service of the Mayor and the Government of Moscow in order to reproduce materials.
... Direct indexed link means that the link should be without redirects and should not be hidden from indexing and ranking by search services.[18]
I disagree, that license is not acceptable for use on Commons. While it does permit republication and distribution (including for commercial purposes), it does not permit modification. As a license that does not allow the creation of derivative works, it is incompatible with Commons licensing requirements. —RP88 (talk) 20:59, 24 December 2014 (UTC)
You mean that the possibility of modification has to be stated explicitly? Lack of its prohibition won't do? YLSS (talk) 21:11, 24 December 2014 (UTC)
Unfortunately, yes. The creation of derivative works is one of the rights granted exclusively to copyright holders by modern copyright law; without a license no one else is permitted to prepare derivative works based upon a copyrighted work. If a copyright license makes no mention of modification (i.e. derivative works) then the licensee is not granted that right, that right is retained by the copyright holder. For example, if I, as a copyright holder, give you a license that permits you to distribute copies of one of my copyrighted works, you are still forbidden to prepare and distribute modified versions of my work. —RP88 (talk) 21:29, 24 December 2014 (UTC)
Now that I read your question again, it's possible I didn't answer your actual question. It is not required that a license explicitly mention "modification", as other phrases that incorporate both reproduction and the preparation of derivative works are acceptable. Commons accepts phrases like "the copyright holder of this file allows anyone to use it for any purpose" as incorporating both reproduction and modification (see {{Attribution}}). Unfortunately, the Moscow website license is very clear that they are only granting the reproduction right. —RP88 (talk) 21:45, 24 December 2014 (UTC)
Besides the mentioned problems with derivative works there always is one other issue with such permissions: It is not a public license and therfore fundamentally different from a cc-by or cc-by-sa or any other free license. I refere to section 6c of cc-by 4.0 for example. The licensor of mos.ru can stop distributing under aforementioned conditions. Someone who reuses content from mos.ru at that time will have no problems. But someone who seeks to start reusing content will be prohibited from doing so. Commons always is both: Reusing (in Wikimedia) and offering for reuse. When mos.ru stops distribution we must delete the files from Commons because we can no longer offer it to new reusers. Thats impossible under Commons:Project_scope#Required_licensing_terms (must be irrevocable). --Martin H. (talk) 02:54, 25 December 2014 (UTC)
I don't know what the logos mean, but the ATF can't legally create copyrighted works, and if someone else transfered copyright to them, they should have clear copyright notices on them. I'd say they're safe to upload.--Prosfilaes (talk) 10:47, 25 December 2014 (UTC)
Screenshot of Propietary software for educational purpose.
Hello, I've begun writing a book on Maya 3d and I'd like to use screenshot of the software. That should be permitted by US laws under the fair use but unfortunatly I'm not exactly an expert on the subject and what I've found in the help section only managed to confuse me further; so before making a blunder I'd preferred to ask here.
Sorry for the inconvenience and thank you.
— Preceding unsigned comment added by Kolty89 (talk • contribs)
Fair use (alone) is not good enough here, likewise NC and/or only for educational purposes won't fly here, it has to be really free incl. commercial uses and derivatives. If you find no better rationale such as "anyway public domain because…" you can upload the picture to Wikipedia following their slightly convoluted local rules. Among other things that adds a do not move to commons (or similar) tag. –Be..anyone (talk) 00:44, 24 December 2014 (UTC)
Just a minor point, Be..anyone: On the English Wikipedia, non-free files are usually marked with a specific non-free tag (list here), which suffices in indicating that it does not belong on Commons. {{do not move to Commons}} is usually only used for less apparent cases like "public domain in the U.S. only." Anon126 (✉⚒) 07:30, 24 December 2014 (UTC)
The original question seems to be unrelated to the Wikimedia Commons – Kolty89 seems to be talking about using the screenshot in a book that he or she is producing. If that is the case, Kolty89 may be able to rely on a fair-use defence depending on where the book is to be published, but he or she should consult a lawyer on the point since we can't provide legal advice here. — SMUconlaw (talk) 19:33, 24 December 2014 (UTC)
As a non-admin, I have finally gathered, after much confusion, that Fair Use can be used at Wikipedia but not at Commons. Sardaka (talk) 07:28, 26 December 2014 (UTC)
Authors have a right to be anonymous I'd think, so I don't think CC-BY-SA is invalid without mention of an author (only if an author's credit was requested, but not supplied). For the latter one, it appears to be an aerial photo of a water treatment plant in or near Ekeby, Eskilstuna, and the contact on the photo page is someone with an eem.se address, which is Eskilstuna Energy & Environment, apparently a municipality-owned company which runs their electricity, water, etc. So that photo would presumably be owned by that company, and they would be releasing the rights. Maybe just credit it to the company. Carl Lindberg (talk) 16:13, 27 December 2014 (UTC)
Well... "anonymous" is usually in respect to the human author. The company can be the copyright owner, but may not be able to technically be the author. That can depend on the country, and I forget what Sweden allows. Carl Lindberg (talk) 16:37, 27 December 2014 (UTC)
Hellow, NERIT mentions that it's contents are via CC-BY-SA 3.0 gr [19]. Is it safe to assume that images like this [20], [21] or [22] are availabe with a free lincece and upload them here, as long as it is not defined otherwise? --C messier (talk) 00:14, 31 December 2014 (UTC)
Based on how the translation of their page reads, that sounds right. Anything not specifically marked as belonging to a third party is CC-BY-SA. Revent (talk) 01:20, 31 December 2014 (UTC)
Thank you for the answer. My question came as result because I didn't see anywhere a notice of content belonging to a third party, but after more digging I found that some of the pictures in the original files (not the cropped ones) had in the EXIF information that they were work of a third party. --C messier (talk) 12:25, 31 December 2014 (UTC)
Implementing the accepted proposal
Looks like we have to work on the following items:
I noticed that @Jkadavoor: marked this for archiving, but I'd rather we tried to kickstart the discussion again, because these changes are (potentially) important: they impact how we present information about reuse to millions of people, on millions of pieces of content. In particular, they impact how we present information to unskilled reusers - the people who we'd really like to (1) use more of our content and (2) comply more with our license. That's too important to let this discussion go away. So maybe the right question is: does anyone *object* to @Multichill: , WMF, and others creating a more fleshed-out mockup based on @MGalloway (WMF): 's mockups above? —Luis Villa (WMF) (talk) 15:42, 21 November 2014 (UTC)
No objections from me, too. I fully agree that it's very important that "unskilled reusers" will be enabled to comply with our license(s) as intuitively as possible. People just don't read lengthy terms; you can tell them a thousand times to read the actual license, they won't... so the big challenge is to create a summary that is on the one hand very compact, but on the other hand precise enough to make license-compliant reuse more likely. Gestumblindi (talk) 14:39, 23 November 2014 (UTC)
No objections, just one Question: Is the "must provide a link to the license" a new thing of the CC-4.0 or has that always been there? If it's new, we may need different wordings for different versions? --El Grafo (talk) 09:36, 1 December 2014 (UTC)
The proposed licence templates do not link to the licence itself but to CC's simplified explanation of the licence. Is this compliant with the licence. Instead of linking to the licence, you can satisfy the requirement by including a copy of the licence, but maybe the template shouldn't mention that as the template otherwise risks being too long. Several of the suggestions already seem to be too long. --Stefan4 (talk) 15:33, 1 December 2014 (UTC)
@Stefan4: Option 6 links to legalcode; so I'm striking off Option 3. The new layout has a collapsible "read more" feature; so we can expand the text if required. Do you have any additions to the proposed text? Jee 16:00, 1 December 2014 (UTC) We already provided several links to CC FAQs to explain the brief wording in detail. For example, CreativeCommonsWiki:License_Versions#Detailed_attribution_comparison_chart well explains every attribution parameter in detail. Jee16:06, 1 December 2014 (UTC)
I think it is OK to link to the summary rather than the legalcode; you're right that a literal reading of the license probably requires pointing to the legal code, but I've never seen that done in the wild, even by CC themselves. (See, for example, the suggested links in this attribution guide from CC Australia.)—Luis Villa (WMF) (talk) 01:46, 6 December 2014 (UTC)
Luis Villa (WMF): It may be legally OK to link to the summary; but there is a difference in our perspective. In all other sites (like Flickr), they give a simple notice stating "this media is CC XX license and linking to the deed. But in our case, we are not mentioning any think near the usage; just hyper-linking to the "file page" where we state the license and terms of use. It will add one more layer of complexity, keeping the actual license one more step away. That's why we prefer to provide a summary of the license there (in the file page). Since this summary (license tag) is almost exact duplicate of the CC deed, linking it again to the deed (which again linking to the license code) is very redundant and useless (as Colin stated earlier). Jee14:21, 8 December 2014 (UTC)
Comment. All of my work is PD, but I do have to use another license when that is what I am updating, so my preference is to make it shorter than the current version, not longer. A link can be used for details, but taking up more real estate on every image page is not a good idea. Delphi234 (talk) 05:38, 5 December 2014 (UTC)
Comment Maybe I should have asked Jee to hide the first round of options :) A reminder that May posted some proposals, which I think reflect some thinking on how to do this in a way that is both cleaner and more informative. Copied them in-line here for reference. —Luis Villa (WMF) (talk) 01:46, 6 December 2014 (UTC)
I have some initial thoughts and mock-ups to illustrate. Thanks for being so patient! Wikimania prep has been taking up pretty much all my time. Here
(1.0)
is an attempt to connect the usage and terms more than we previously did, by stating in one place and sentence "Under this license terms*, you are free to…:" and then a list of things you're free to do and what you must do after, which is to attribute and sharealike. But I began by questioning why we care about CC license banner and the purpose of the license. Because people tend to be unaware of their boundaries, a CC license is there to protect the work of the creator and the fair usage of the user of the work. Since CC license permits users to do a lot of things (which they already have no problems with) so long as they are in compliant with license. I thought it was more important for users to know know what they must do if they choose to use the work, because without following terms, they risk getting in trouble. Here
(2.0)
, I made the entire banner look like a single important message with a very clear hierarchy of info, as if saying: Attribute and Sharealike and you'll be fine. Same thing here
(2.1)
, just with different language that's more actionable, "You are free to share & adapt…as long as you…Give attribution, Share Again." I've moved around some sentences here and there but don't claim to for them to be more appropriate for legal purposes, but is what I think could be more understandable. A more condensed version could look like this
(2.2)
. On a side note, I really like how The Noun Project has done to educate icon downloaders to properly attribute the author. When you click on the Download button, you are required to agree to attribute the author (3.0). Once downloaded, you are directed to a page where you get pretty specific instructions on where to attribute the author depending on popular medium usages. We should do something similar!MGalloway (WMF) (talk) 13:56, 7 August 2014 (UTC)
This section is resolved and can be archived. If you disagree, replace this template with your comment. File:Old-Otis-elevator-controller.jpg is nice, thanks. –Be..anyone (talk) 22:57, 12 December 2014 (UTC) 
and 
were then modified from another glyphs). This font, based on "Modern" garnitures of the 19th century, uses the SIL Open Font License. Was I right to upload this all here, and how to specify the license? Ignatus (talk) 15:47, 20 December 2014 (UTC)
Question: Is the "must provide a link to the license" a new thing of the CC-4.0 or has that always been there? If it's new, we may need different wordings for different versions? --El Grafo (talk) 09:36, 1 December 2014 (UTC)
Comment Saffron Blaze (talk) 23:44, 1 December 2014 (UTC)
.jpg){kind=link}
.jpg){kind=link}
.jpg){kind=link}
.jpg){kind=link}
