Commons:Village pump/Copyright/Archive/2019/04

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Photo of a photo?

Could someone else take a look at File:Οικογένεια Διαμαντή Ι. Πατέρα.jpg and File:Οικογένεια Πατέρα.jpg? Both files seem to be of the same group of people, have the same EXIF data, and are being claimed as “own work”. The photos are dated 28 July 2009 in the EXIF data, but they pretty grainy for a photo taken with a digital camera even by 2009 standards. Digging a bit deeper into the EXIF data shows another date of 1 January 1970 which may actually be the date the original photo was taken with 2009 being when a photo of the original photo was taken. Does that seem like a possibility or are the dates in EXIF data unrelated? — Marchjuly (talk) 10:54, 1 April 2019 (UTC)

Yes, obviously not digital original images. The original pictures are even probably much older than that. Regards, Yann (talk) 11:31, 1 April 2019 (UTC)

Screenshots of Goggle image search with PD content

Can I check that File:Screenshot of Google Images search for 'Daguerreotype ' - 2019-04-01.jpg is OK, in that most of the content is PD daguerreotypes, and the rest is non-copyrightable and/ or de minimis? How would you tag it? Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 11:40, 1 April 2019 (UTC)

Is File:Yoshihide Suga announcing new imperial era Reiwa.jpg of no valid source?

Today, I received a warning from Roy17 concerning File:Yoshihide Suga announcing new imperial era Reiwa.jpg. I retrieved it from kantei.go.jp, and I added the URL of both the image and the archive. --WQL (talk) 11:50, 1 April 2019 (UTC)

@WQL: That photo is not at https://www.kantei.go.jp/jp/content/20190401am.jpg.   — Jeff G. ツ please ping or talk to me 13:39, 1 April 2019 (UTC)
@Jeff G.: Thanks and I will add a dead-link mark on it since the image on this URL seems to have been replaced. You can get it at an archive at https://archive.fo/YPDNU/40fa23de65a45b68289db20c556c932eaecefb2b.jpg .--WQL (talk) 13:44, 1 April 2019 (UTC)

copyvio photos

Hi, I have nominated some photos which were copyvio and they were deleted. However, more copyvio photos were uploaded for the Iran flood in EN Wikipedia page for I know because I have seen them a few days ago when I checked on google images. However, I could able to locate the URL now for google images would only show a limited number of photos. Is there a software/user script which would able to idenfify the copyvio photos against the photos in the internet by pixel identification or other methods of similar images identification? CASSIOPEIA(talk) 03:41, 2 April 2019 (UTC)

TinEye searches for similar images. You can sort the results by similarity, so that the most similar image will appear first. If you notice someone continuing to upload copyright violations, you can report them at COM:ANU, so that they can be warned or (if the copyvios don't stop) be blocked to give them some time to think. --rimshottalk 20:24, 2 April 2019 (UTC)
Rimshot Thank your very much for the link and info. Appreciate it. Cheers. CASSIOPEIA(talk) 14:24, 3 April 2019 (UTC)

Category:Coins of the Philippines

All of the files in this category appear to be scans of Philippine coins licensed as "own work". Photos of coins are considered COM:DW, right? So, I can see the photo being licensed as "own work". What about the coin imagery itself? According to COM:CUR Philippines, images of Philippine currency are not OK for Commmons, and it sepcifically makes mention of coins. It's possible, I guess, that some really old coins may by now have entered the public domain, but there should be some information about that and a PD license for the coin in such cases, right? It's not clear if the whole category of images are problematic, but it looks like most of them are. -- Marchjuly (talk) 05:05, 2 April 2019 (UTC)

@Marchjuly: Please see Commons:Deletion requests/Files in Category:Coins of the Philippines and Commons:Deletion requests/Files in Category:Banknotes of the Philippines.   — Jeff G. ツ please ping or talk to me 05:20, 2 April 2019 (UTC)
I'm not so sure that COM:CUR Philippines is correct. For coins, it explicitly refers to reproductions "in metal form" only. I don't see how that restricts photographs at all. Additionally, it is a non-copyright restriction, and would only apply inside the Philippines itself.
For banknotes, it's a little more ambiguous, but again the regulation refers to "objects" and only actual "printed illustrations" (which have a size), saying nothing about photographs (emphasis mine):
SECTION 8. No person or entity, public or private, shall design, engrave, print, make or execute in any other manner, or utter, issue, distribute, circulate or use any handbill, advertisement, placard, circular, card, or any other object whatsoever bearing the facsimile, likeness or similitude of any legal tender Philippine currency note, or any part thereof, whether in black and white or any color or combination of colors, without prior authority therefore having been secured from the Governor, BSP or his duly authorized representative.
SECTION 9. The reproduction and/or use of facsimiles or any illustration bearing the likeness or similitude of legal tender Philippine currency notes referred to in the foregoing section may be authorized by the Governor, BSP or his duly authorized representative, for printed illustrations in articles, books, journals, newspapers or other similar materials and strictly for numismatic, educational, historical, newsworthy or other purposes which will maintain, promote or enhance the integrity and dignity of said note, provided, however, that any such facsimile or illustration shall be of a size less than three-fifths (3/5) or more than one and one-half (1½) times in size of the currency note being illustrated and that there will be no deviation from the purpose for which the notes will be used.
So, printing out the photographs hosted here would be restricted, but I'm not sure that actually hosting them here violates those regulations at all. It's also something that Wikimedia could possibly ask for a blanket OK to host such images here to be sure, rather than deleting them. I may be unaware of how those regulations are actually enforced, but by a strict reading, it seems to refer to physical reproductions, or at least reproductions on some kind of paper, and not to virtual illustrations. We should refer to those limitations the same way that {{PD-USGov-money}} does for U.S. currency -- the situations seem similar to me. The U.S. regulations did refer to photographic reproductions specifically, though that may have now changed, but there was also a blanket OK for educational use while that was in effect. Carl Lindberg (talk) 17:32, 2 April 2019 (UTC)
All of what you posted makes sense. If this is truly the case, it would mean that lots of non-free files of Philippine currency uploaded locally to English Wikipedia could be converted to PD and moved to Commons. Moreover, many of these local files seem to have only been uploaded after they were deleted from Commons; so, perhaps instead of converting/moving those particular non-free files, they can just simply be restored with the local versions deleted per en:WP:F8. One thing though is that when it comes to Philippine governmental works being PD, there appears to be bit of disagreement between some editors of both projects, and local non-free files were previously kept because some felt they weren't not truly PD despite what some on Commons were claiming. So, I think it might be helpful (if such as thing is possible) to establish a cross-project consensus on this type of thing. -- Marchjuly (talk) 00:40, 3 April 2019 (UTC)
Yes, there is a bizarre part of Philippine law which seems to put some restrictions on government works, but in the same law it says there is no copyright on their government works. So there may be some other right, enforceable only in the Philippines, on that stuff -- could still be a non-copyright restriction. The only court case I found mentioning it was one about protecting the text of judicial decisions, which is one of the things supposed to be free of that secondary restriction in the first places, which was more than a little bizarre. Secondly, that secondary restriction was put in by Marcos, so stuff before the early 1970s would be unambiguously copyright-free. But there is some argument after that -- it's a weird bit of law. Carl Lindberg (talk) 04:48, 3 April 2019 (UTC)
Would not a reading of Section 9 basically mean that it excludes commercial works and/or derivative works, meaning it fails WMF's definition of "free"? While it offers ways to reproduce the currency ala US Gov, that's still restrictive of end use rights. --Masem (talk) 00:54, 3 April 2019 (UTC)
It's not a restriction based on copyright, so it doesn't affect the definition of "free". The U.S. anti-counterfeiting law has similar restrictions on facsimiles (see Regan v. Time, Inc.). They did mention photographic reproductions, but now have added stuff that one-sided reproductions are OK, so don't think we are causing any problems by hosting them here (I'm sure we would have heard about it if we did). Much like trademark, these restrictions exist regardless of the copyright status. Carl Lindberg (talk) 04:48, 3 April 2019 (UTC)
Looking a bit more, the law authorizing the bank to make those regulations says this:
Authority. — Section 50 of R. A. 7653, provides that:
"The Bangko Sentral shall have the sole power and authority to issue currency, within the territory of the Philippines. No other person or entity, public or private, may put into circulation notes, coins or any other object or document which, in the opinion of the Monetary Board, might circulate as currency, nor reproduce or imitate the facsimiles of Bangko Sentral notes without prior authority from the Bangko Sentral.
"The Monetary Board may issue such regulations as it may deem advisable in order to prevent the circulation of foreign currency or of currency substitutes as well as to prevent the reproduction of facsimiles of Bangko Sentral notes.
"The Bangko Sentral shall have the authority to investigate, make arrests, conduct searches and seizures in accordance with law, for the purpose of maintaining the integrity of the currency.
So, the restriction is explicitly about counterfeiting, and things which might pass as currency. In addition, they do give rights to prevent the reproduction and imitation of fascimiles of the *notes*. So for coins, it seems restricted to physical items which could pass as coins, which would jive with the "in metal form" part of the coin restrictions -- I'm pretty positive there is no issue with photos of their coins per this regulation. Banknotes are more gray, but again, the authorizing law does seem to be about physical reproductions (usually what a facsimile means). Bit more argument there, but it seems very very similar to the U.S. restrictions. Carl Lindberg (talk) 04:48, 3 April 2019 (UTC)
@Clindberg: Thank you for that information (in multiple places here). Would you please update COM:CUR Philippines with it?   — Jeff G. ツ please ping or talk to me 05:01, 3 April 2019 (UTC)
The regulation about illustrations issued by the Central Bank specifically refers to "legal tender" banknotes (and coins). If some series of notes have been demonitized (older than 20-30 years, certainly those issued prior to 1949 when the bank was founded) would they not be exempt from the current restrictions as they are no longer legal tender?--Godot13 (talk) 18:00, 3 April 2019 (UTC)
Yes, I think so as well. Coins are only restricted "in metal form" so I don't think they are an issue either way. I don't know if the Philippines still accepts older bills as legal tender, but if not, they would be outside the restrictions since there is nothing to counterfeit there. Carl Lindberg (talk) 20:13, 3 April 2019 (UTC)
Current banknotes and coin “in circulation issued by BSP” include coins (1995-present), New Generation Currency Coin Series (2018-present), and New Generation Currency Banknote Series (2010-present). [1] The Old Banknote Series (NDS), launched in 1985, was demonetized and replaced with the New Generation Currency (NGC) launched in 2010. [2] The last day for redemption of the NDS was 30 June 2017. As of 1 July 2017 the NDS had no monetary value. [3] Demonetized coin series include the English Series (1958–66), Pilipino [sic] Series (1969–74), Ang Bagong Lipunan (1975–82), Flora and Fauna Series (1983–91), and Improved Flora and Fauna Series (1992–94). [4] While I won’t make any assumptions, it may follow that paper currency series pre-1985 have also been demonetized.-Godot13 (talk) 20:37, 3 April 2019 (UTC)
Good info, thanks. That would remove a lot of images from being a problem, if it's only very recent bills which are still legal tender. Agreed that if they demonetized bills from 1985-2010, they would likely demonetize earlier bills as well. Carl Lindberg (talk) 21:04, 3 April 2019 (UTC)

Doc and Carpatho-Ukraine

Good day! What license for documents Carpatho-Ukraine? {{PD-UAGovDoc}}? Example, Constitution?--Чорний Кіт (talk) 00:00, 3 April 2019 (UTC)

Yeah, the Ukraine government probably inherited those copyrights, if they still exist. Probably the safest thing to use. Carl Lindberg (talk) 20:13, 3 April 2019 (UTC)

Reproduce this photo in whole or in part

Do you think files released under this statement, "anyone may, without charge or request for permission, reproduce this photo in whole or in part", would be compatible with Commons? Two files related: File:JoeDickson MPP OfficialHeadshot Ajax 001.jpg and File:Michael Coteau OfficialHeadshot 020.jpg.--Roy17 (talk) 16:47, 3 April 2019 (UTC)

@Roy17: No, commercial use must be addressed.   — Jeff G. ツ please ping or talk to me 16:54, 3 April 2019 (UTC)

Annemarie Schwarzenbach

Hi, We have only one image of her, but I am afraid we can't keep it: Commons:Deletion requests/File:AnnemarieSchwarzenbach.jpg. Does anyone have a clue about who is the photographer? Regards, Yann (talk) 17:36, 3 April 2019 (UTC)

Question about PD-Saudi Arabia

I thought I would check here before I started a large number of deletion discussions. Template:PD-Saudi Arabia states that photographs considered public domain by Saudi rules are only public domain in the US if "published prior to 1979". As an example, assuming File:Majed Abdullah in Asia Cup 1984.jpg is actually public domain in Saudi Arabia, it was published in 1984 so it is not public domain in the US. Is this correct? World's Lamest Critic (talk) 16:48, 4 April 2019 (UTC)

@World's Lamest Critic: Please don't start any DRs for strictly URAA reasons.   — Jeff G. ツ please ping or talk to me 17:27, 4 April 2019 (UTC)
Why not? World's Lamest Critic (talk) 17:40, 4 April 2019 (UTC)
I am for keeping old files affected by URAA, but not recent files like this one. Actually the issue may not be URAA, as it may never have been in the public domain in USA. Regards, Yann (talk) 17:50, 4 April 2019 (UTC)

PD-because for File:Ratu Joni Madraiwiwi I.jpg

I'm always a bit skeptical about files licensed as {{PD-because}} since if a file is really PD then it seems there should be a more suitable license which can be used; so, I'm wondering if that's the case for this file as well. If the photo really was taken in 1907, then shouldn't it be old enough for {{PD-old}} or {{PD-US}}? -- Marchjuly (talk) 00:10, 5 April 2019 (UTC)

Yes, it is PD-old-50 (50 years past creation of a photograph in Fiji) and PD-US-expired (published in a 1907 book). I have cleaned this up and also removed the obviously invalid CC-0 tag. A faithful copy or scan of this photograph would not have created any new copyright that the uploader could have waived. If anyone feels uncomfortable with this, please feel free to change it to {{Licensed-PD}}. De728631 (talk) 00:21, 5 April 2019 (UTC)
Thank you for taking a look at this De728631. -- Marchjuly (talk) 02:24, 5 April 2019 (UTC)

Photo of an sculpture at a museum which allows photographs to be taken

Hello!

I took a picture of the Lobster Telephone at the Tate Modern museum in London last year. Taking photos is allowed in the main galleries at the museum according to Tate Modern's own webpage as long as flash or tripods are not used.

My question is: if I upload this photo here in commons as a free image, am I allowed to use it on the Spanish wikipedia to write the article about that piece of art? I know it would qualify under "fair use" in the English wikipedia but the Spanish wikipedia does not follow the same policy.

Thank in advance for the help! --Nasch92 (talk) 11:10, 4 April 2019 (UTC)

As this photo was taken in the UK you can upload the image to Commons under the Commons:Freedom of panorama rule, see COM:FOP UK. You could then use the image in Spanish Wikipedia. Verbcatcher (talk) 11:30, 4 April 2019 (UTC)
@Verbcatcher: thanks a lot. A couple more questions: which template should I use for the license? is there anything else I should add in the description? --Nasch92 (talk) 15:01, 4 April 2019 (UTC)
{{Licensed-FOP}} and put {{FoP-UK}} and whichever Commons compatible Creative Commons license you want for the photograph. Abzeronow (talk) 15:40, 4 April 2019 (UTC)

Nasch92, thank you for uploading the photo as File:Lobster Telephone Photo.jpg. Your condition as long as it's within any of the Wikipedias is an unnacceptable restriction on the use of the photograph, and is not allowed on Commons. See Commons:Choosing a license. Please delete this phrase, or if this is unacceptable to you then request that the file is deleted. Thanks, Verbcatcher (talk) 01:24, 5 April 2019 (UTC)

@Nasch92: FoP can't be used if it's a temporary exhibition. It's interesting that the handset is reversed in your photo, compared to the Tate's photo at [5]. --ghouston (talk) 02:54, 5 April 2019 (UTC)

@Ghouston: The summary on the Tate page you have linked suggests that this work is in a permanent exhibition: In the Studio: International Surrealism. The is shown as "Free entry" and temporary exhibitions at London museums and galleries usually have an admission charge, and the object is owned by the Tate, not on loan from another institution. Their 2018 temporary exhibition season[6] did not include a show that was likely to include this work.
@Nasch92: please set the date on the file page to the date you took the photograph, not the upload date to Commons. Verbcatcher (talk) 03:17, 5 April 2019 (UTC)
If "In the Studio: International Surrealism" is a permanent exhibition, then it's presumably fine. --ghouston (talk) 03:19, 5 April 2019 (UTC)
@Ghouston: @Verbcatcher: The item is in a permanent free exhibition, but would it be any different if it only had been available at a building with free access to public at the time it was taken? This is a genuine question. Sorry about the shabby description, I'm still getting the hang of this. I'll include the exact date as well right away.--Nasch92 (talk) 09:46, 5 April 2019 (UTC)
@Ghouston: Also, it appears you're implying that I'm lying about the artwork being open to public. I guess you can ask anyone else who was there at the time. Also, the Tate's own webpage states that entry to Tate Modern is free for everyone with a charge for special exhibitions. The item in question was not part of a special exhibition, it was in the main gallery.--Nasch92 (talk) 09:55, 5 April 2019 (UTC)
In UK law, "permanent exhibition" is normally interpreted to things like large statues or fountains which are permanently fixed in location, or highly unlikely to ever be relocated. Rotating exhibitions or similar, where the object may be on display for a period of months rather than years, are not normally argued to be "permanent". In this case the iconic Lobster Telephone (1936) was acquired in 1981 with Dalí's estate still having copyright over reproductions. As the Telephone has no documented loan history and does not seem to be moved around the gallery, in fact it may have been in the same location for many years, Freedom of Panorama appears justifiable.
To answer the implied question, if the object was only on display in a free exhibition for a time shorter than "years", then it would probably be a deletion candidate as the object is copyrighted. Effectively we would treat it like an advertising billboard, where copyrighted posters might be displayed for a year, but the intention is not permanent and fixed exhibition.
P.s. to avoid any doubt, the exhibition is free, you can wander in off the street and gawk at the lobster. --Fæ (talk) 10:10, 5 April 2019 (UTC)
@Fæ: Thanks for the input. So I guess it's safe to say it's definitely under FOP. Never thought a picture I took on a holiday trip would spark such a debate. It's a shame though, that the most objective way to deem if something is or is not under FOP in the UK is the subjective interpretation of how much time "years" is. Yet law is ambiguous like that, so that's all we have.--Nasch92 (talk) 11:46, 5 April 2019 (UTC)
Yes, in UK law we are normally waiting for case law to establish better definitions. Unfortunately the law is an ass, and even well considered case law can be contradictory, or become "ignored" in all practical respects. For FOP, this becomes very obviously confusing and uncertain for an artwork uniquely fixed in place but is designed to quickly erode or deteriorate (like a giant artwork of living plants [7]) or famous fixed publicly funded landmarks with changing art components (like the Fourth Plinth). Nobody has good answers to these questions. Anyway, a tangent so let's park it there. --Fæ (talk) 11:57, 5 April 2019 (UTC)

Flickrwashing?

Is this a case of Flickrwashing? It's the user's only upload but I cannot find the photo elsewhere. Surtsicna (talk) 20:53, 4 April 2019 (UTC)

This appears to be Edward Windsor, Lord Downpatrick himself aged 10 or so. Were selfies a thing back in 2008? Also, there is no EXIF dataset, so I'd rather not take this as an own photograph by the Flickr user. De728631 (talk) 00:29, 5 April 2019 (UTC)
Why do you suggest that this is a selfie? My guess is that it is a crop from a group photograph. He looks much older than ten. Edward Windsor, Lord Downpatrick was born on 2 December 1988 and the photo is dated 2 December 2008, so this may well have been taken at his twentieth birthday party. The main reason to question the license is that it is the only upload of its Flickr user, but I think that is insufficient grounds to reject this. The photographer may have set up a separate Flickr account for this photo to maintain her his or her privacy. Verbcatcher (talk) 01:08, 5 April 2019 (UTC)
@Verbcatcher: "her or her"?   — Jeff G. ツ please ping or talk to me 01:21, 5 April 2019 (UTC)
His or her. Verbcatcher (talk) 01:28, 5 April 2019 (UTC)

Thanks everyone! I have transferred the photograph. You can see it at File:Lord Downpatrick.jpg. In case there's any doubt about its copyright status, let it be known that I have consulted the wise elders :D Surtsicna (talk) 09:15, 5 April 2019 (UTC)

You consulted the wise elders and they made some speculations based on virtually no information at all. A low resolution image of a minor royal which has no EXIF data, appears t be cropped from a larger image, and is the sole upload of an unknown Flickr user? Smells like Flickrwashing to me, but that's just my personal opinion. Carry on. — Preceding unsigned comment added by World's Lamest Critic (talk • contribs) 23:10, 9 April 2019‎ (UTC)

File:Mariam Aslamazian.jpg

This file was uploaded a few days ago as "own work". The EXIF data is showing is was digitalized in 2017, but the subject of the photo en:Mariam Aslamazian has been dead since 2006. There is a non-free file with the same name which was uploaded back in 2013 which is "shadowing" the Commons file and stopping it from being used anywhere on English Wikipedia. If the Commons file is OK, the non-free local English Wikipedia file is no longer needed and can be deleted per en:WP:FREER. Any opinions on the licensing of the Commons file. -- Marchjuly (talk) 02:23, 5 April 2019 (UTC)

There are problems with the file page, but I don't think there is a good reason to delete this. It is in Category:Photographs by Andranik Kochar, who is an Armenian photographer who died in 1984,[8] but the author is given as Vahan Kochar, who is his son.[9] Presumably this is the uploader User:Vahan Kochar. The date and the author or category should be corrected and the English Wikipedia file should be deleted to make way for this file. If we cannot establish an reliable date then we should estimate the date based on the apparent age of the subject. I'd say she was about 70, she was born in 1907, so I suggest Circa 1977 (based on estimation of the subject's age as 70). Verbcatcher (talk) 03:48, 5 April 2019 (UTC)

M. C. Escher

Are the contents of this Category:O Mundo Mágico de Escher properly licensed? -- Tuválkin ✉ ✇ 20:34, 5 April 2019 (UTC)

These were apparently taken at an exhibition at Centro Cultural Banco do Brasil, so some of them may be okay per COM:FOP Brazil. Less sure about these ones, since they might be considered "reproductions" of the art rather than "representations":
clpo13(talk) 20:52, 5 April 2019 (UTC)

About abuse report of OTRS procedure

I reported an abuse of OTRS procedure on Commons:OTRS/Noticeboard#Abuse report of OTRS procedure yesterday, but no resopnse. It is extremely inappropriate for the threat phrase template to continue to be posted on the presume innocent user's talk page any longer. I think this is an abuse of OTRS procedure, because User:Wcam has shown no evidence that neither the original SVG poster User:Mukai does not have the copyright of building this SVG, nor Mukai has published the SVG on other than Commons, nor precedingly published the SVG other than Commons.

At the very least, please judge now whether this procedure is inappropriate. Or, please tell me where I can offer a petition of an objection to the OTRS procedure application.-Kyuri1449 (talk) 11:24, 6 April 2019 (UTC)

My inspection of File:Japanese_crest_Uwajima_Sasa.svg #filehistory found no trace of wrongdoing – three revisions look like sequentially edited in the same program (and presumably by the same person). Going to revert the disruption boldly. Unfortunately, this kind of disruptive editing is rather usual and, unfortunately, the community largely tolerates it. Incnis Mrsi (talk) 13:38, 6 April 2019 (UTC)
Pinging @Wcam.   — Jeff G. ツ please ping or talk to me 06:04, 7 April 2019 (UTC)

unDraw svg illustrations: are they OK for Commons ?

The unDraw website provides open source svg illustrations. The license ([10]) is as follows :

All images, assets and vectors published on unDraw can be used for free. You can use them for noncommercial and commercial purposes. You do not need to ask permission from or provide credit to the creator or unDraw.

More precisely, unDraw grants you an nonexclusive, worldwide copyright license to download, copy, modify, distribute, perform, and use the assets provided from unDraw for free, including for commercial purposes, without permission from or attributing the creator or unDraw. This license does not include the right to compile assets, vectors or images from unDraw to replicate a similar or competing service, in any form or sell the assets in packs. This extends to automated ways to scrape, search or download the assets included on the website without our consent

Therefore, is this license compatible with Commons, even if it's not a Creative Commons one? Thanks! Skimel (talk) 11:12, 7 April 2019 (UTC)

Hrm, this restriction of compiling content for a similar service might actually spoil it for Commons. We usually require a licence that allows any kind of reuse. De728631 (talk) 15:07, 7 April 2019 (UTC)
Thanks for your input, that's what intrigued me as well. Otherwise, they would have released it under public domain or a creative commons license. Skimel (talk) 21:00, 7 April 2019 (UTC)

Usage allowed but no explicit license

Hi,

I uploaded a picture from a site where they say "The copyright holder of the file grants the right for free usage of the file to everyone as long if it stays unmodified and the copyright holder (»Reconquista Internet«), the campaign (»Standardcheck«) as well as the website (»https://standardcheck.de/«) are credited." which sounds like cc-by-sa-3.0-de, but the page doesn't explicitly say it. So how should I handle this?

Best regards
Minilexikon (talk) 20:42, 8 April 2019 (UTC)

"Unmodified" is a non-derivative type license and therefore it isn't allowed here. Sorry. --Majora (talk) 20:46, 8 April 2019 (UTC)

File:Rainbow-3312841 960 720.png

Not sure if this file's licensing is correct. Although the source does say "Free for commercial use No attribution required", the Terms of service page does seem to place some restrictions on commercial and derivative use. Moreover, I can't find where it explicity states the file has been released under a {{Cc-by-sa-4.0}} license; the file may be free, but not sure if it's "cc-by-sa-4.0" free. -- Marchjuly (talk) 04:45, 9 April 2019 (UTC)

Pixabay license is not compatible with CC license and not useable on Commons (1., 3. + 4. point of "What is not allowed?"). --Stepro (talk) 05:00, 9 April 2019 (UTC)
This has been discussed at Commons:Village_pump/Copyright/Archive/2019/01#Pixabay_license_renewal. Their license just changed, it used to be free. However this is a new upload so it can't rely on the old license. Nemo 17:02, 9 April 2019 (UTC)

London Languages Map

Does anyone know if any version of this map (about) – say, a screenshot – would be acceptable here? The geographic data, including the tube lines, is available from OpenStreetMap, which we use elsewhere, under the Open Database Licence and the census data is available under the Open Government Licence. ─ ReconditeRodent « talk · contribs » 16:23, 6 April 2019 (UTC)

Requirements for publication

Archie MD v. Elsevier has not been widely discussed but contains an interesting discussion of what constitutes publication (to determine whether a certain work was already published when it was submitted for copyright registration). The opinion of the Register is worth a read. Nemo 17:00, 9 April 2019 (UTC)

Hmm. Could you expand on what you find interesting? It seems like a narrow case; one can deliver to a company in-progress work without it being publication. Generally what I would have expected.--Prosfilaes (talk) 00:25, 10 April 2019 (UTC)
What the Register wrote is unsurprising (and I linked it because it's a useful summary in just ten pages), but the judge ruled that it was publication. Nemo 15:30, 10 April 2019 (UTC)

FYI: Mercedes Benz sues artists over Detroit murals

Via PetaPixel – maybe something to keep an eye on: Mercedes Benz USA claims murals in Detroit are (part of the) architecture and thus {{FoP-US}}. --El Grafo (talk) 11:32, 10 April 2019 (UTC)

If Mercedes is successful, I could see some murals being undeleted under an expanded understanding of FoP in the US. Honestly, would love to see FoP for 3D works in the US, but not sure if American politicians would be receptive to it or not. Abzeronow (talk) 16:37, 10 April 2019 (UTC)

PB - Copyright violation?

In response to a growing number of user requests on enwiki, this file was uploaded to commons as an alternative to the file that I uploaded here. This is pretty blatant copyright violation, right? I'd tag it myself, but I am decently involved here as I have a competing audio file. –MJL ‐Talk‐☖ 23:10, 8 April 2019 (UTC)

It doesn't seem like blatant copyright violation to me; it strikes me as {{PD-ineligible}}. I don't know if we want to go there, but a clip of someone saying their own name should be no more copyrightable than a signature, which is {{PD-signature}}.--Prosfilaes (talk) 23:47, 8 April 2019 (UTC)
I don't know what the current standards are for Commons:Threshold of originality as it applies to audio files. It's certainly probably is not as clear-cut as I presumed, but I don't think it is as simple as {{PD-signature}} or {{PD-ineligible}}. –MJL ‐Talk‐☖ 00:12, 9 April 2019 (UTC)
I can't imagine that this would be a copyright violation. It seems to be fair use inasmuch as the amount of material is very minimal, its effect on the potential market (of recordings of people pronouncing their own name?!) would be near zero, and the nature of the material is factual. In fact, this seems to be a pretty clear case of de minimis use.[11] - MrX 01:19, 9 April 2019 (UTC)
This would not not allowable as de minimis because the sound of the voice is a key part of the clip. Commons:De minimis is written from the viewpoint of images, but this clip has clear parallel with guideline #6: Copyrighted work X is a key part of the subject (eg it is the reason for taking the photo) [...], which makes it not ok. It also breaks most of the bullet point tests at the top of the Guidelines section. However, this clip may be allowable under a threshold of originality rationale. Again the guidelines are written for images, but this sound clip is arguably simple enough to be comparable to images that are acceptable under COM:TOO United States. Verbcatcher (talk) 02:51, 9 April 2019 (UTC)
Also, this might be considered to be the audible equivalent of a signature, which would be acceptable under US law, see When to use the PD-signature tag. Verbcatcher (talk) 02:56, 9 April 2019 (UTC)
It's hard to see originality in a single word, but I wonder if a more pertinent comparison might be sampling, in which case we'd be in a difficult position: some infamous court rulings have found even vanishingly short samples to be infringements. Nemo 17:11, 9 April 2019 (UTC)
I doubt that case law about music sampling is applicable to this case.- MrX 19:05, 10 April 2019 (UTC)

Just to broadly address some points: (1) we seem to mostly be speaking in terms of United States domestic law. I will point out that the U.S. is more lenient in terms of fair use content. (2) The majority of our guidelines seem to not account for audio files. (3) there are at least two free use alternatives to this file. –MJL ‐Talk‐☖ 03:07, 10 April 2019 (UTC)

US domestic law is the only law that matters with respect to this clip; Commons worries about US law and the source law of the clip, in this case the US. Fair use is irrelevant to Commons, as is other free use alternatives to a free file.
As for our guidelines, what guidelines need to account for audio files? They're rarer than visual or audiovisual files, but we should in general account for them.--Prosfilaes (talk) 05:53, 10 April 2019 (UTC)

What guidelines need to account for audio files?

In reply to Prosfilaes, the following guidelines should address audio (and video) files:

Verbcatcher (talk) 01:43, 11 April 2019 (UTC)

We still need a tag

Per this, the file is possibly going to be deleted unless we get this copyright tag thing sorted. Pinging Vital Transistor & Yann for notice. –MJL ‐Talk‐☖ 03:33, 11 April 2019 (UTC)

@Verbcatcher, Prosfilaes, MrX, and Nemo bis: Should we use a form of {{PD-because}}? –MJL ‐Talk‐☖ 03:37, 11 April 2019 (UTC)
Yes, {{PD-because}} is probably ok until we get a specific tag. For "reason for public domain" I suggest adapting the wording in {{PD-text}}. Verbcatcher (talk) 04:11, 11 April 2019 (UTC)
As an interim measure I have added a note to File:Pronunciation of Buttigieg by Pete Buttigieg.ogg, linking to this discussion. Verbcatcher (talk) 04:20, 11 April 2019 (UTC)
I agree that {{PD-because}} is the best tag to use for now.- MrX 10:37, 11 April 2019 (UTC)

COM:FOP Romania

COM:FOP Romania seems to state that there is bascially no FOP for works or art displayed outdoors or buidlings anywhere in Romania. If that's a correct understanding of Romanian law related to FOP then I'm wondering how it applies to files such as File:Magyarosaurus Dacus .jpg and File:Maison des volcans du Géoparc des dinosaures du pays de Hateg.jpg. Can Commons keep these file's as licensed or does the copyright of items being photographed also need to be considered? -- Marchjuly (talk) 01:50, 9 April 2019 (UTC)

Sure, this a DW and we will require evidence of permision from the copyright holder of the artwork. It seems the copyright holder of this photograph is "Marion". I am unsure if "N.Cayla" is the same person as "Marion". I think it's better to nominate the files for deletion per COM:PRP. T Cells (talk · contribs · email) 14:37, 11 April 2019 (UTC)

Blender-related Uploads "Copyright Infringement"?

Dear sir or madam,

I just received "copyright infringement" notifications on all Blender Institute-related pictures and video I have uploaded to this very site (File:Spring - Blender Open Movie.webm, File:Spring2019PillarPosterBlender.jpg, File:Spring2019AlphaPosterBlender.jpg, File:ElephantsDreamPoster.jpg, File:CosmosLaundromatYouTubeThumbnail.jpg). However, I believe EACH claim is false, due to the pictures and video being licensed under Creative Commons (which I believe I correctly attributed in the "Summary" and "Licensing" sections of each file) by the Blender Foundation (original creators). Because of this, I believe each upload should be restored.

Thank you for your understanding.
- Stinkyjaden (talk) 21:40, 10 April 2019 (UTC)Stinkyjaden

I'm curious about this as well. Patrick Rogel, what was the reason for tagging these for deletion, and Gbawden, for what reason did you delete these files? Looking at each:
Aside from the fourth item being potentially unclear (and yet, an OTRS is on file but just not reviewed), they all seems to be licensed appropriately. — Huntster (t @ c) 00:30, 11 April 2019 (UTC)
Huntster, on the Elephants Dream poster, I put in the correct attribution template it needed (Template:Elephants Dream) in a later revision if that clears anything up.
- Stinkyjaden (talk) 00:39, 11 April 2019 (UTC)Stinkyjaden
Huntster Patrick Rogel tagged them as "Films posters and stills: copyrighted. - Marking as possible copyright violation because fair use media are not allowed on Commons". I appear to have been mistaken in deleting them Gbawden (talk) 06:12, 11 April 2019 (UTC)
Gbawden Can the files be restored and can the strikes against me be revoked?
- Stinkyjaden (talk) 10:03, 11 April 2019 (UTC)Stinkyjaden
Done Gbawden (talk) 10:43, 11 April 2019 (UTC)
Thank you very much, Gbawden!
- Stinkyjaden (talk) 10:54, 11 April 2019 (UTC)
@Stinkyjaden: To avoid this in the future, please ask for {{Licensereview}}. Regards, Yann (talk) 11:35, 11 April 2019 (UTC)

Photos of ticket stubs

I have a question about the licensing of File:1987 NBA Western Conference Semifinals - Game 2 - Seattle SuperSonics at Houston Rockets 1987-05-05 (ticket) (cropped).jpg and File:1987 NBA Western Conference Semifinals - Game 2 - Seattle SuperSonics at Houston Rockets 1987-05-05 (ticket).jpg. Isn't a ticket stub like this a derivative work since it includes likely copyrighted content such as team and venue logos? So, I'm not sure if claiming the stub itself as {{PD-US-1989}} can be extended to also cover any copyrighted elements which are used on the stub. -- Marchjuly (talk) 02:26, 11 April 2019 (UTC)

Yes, that would certainly be a derivative work of the team logo. Unless the team logo is freely-licensed this is a copyvio in my opinion. The layout of the ticket itself could also be copyrighted, though that may be covered by the {{PD-US-1989}}. BMacZero (talk) 04:43, 11 April 2019 (UTC)
The team and venue logos consist of letters and simple shapes and fall below the US Threshold of originality. Verbcatcher (talk) 05:17, 11 April 2019 (UTC)
@Verbcatcher and BMacZero: For these two particular stubs, the logo does seem it just might be below COM:TOO#United States, but I'm not so sure about some of the other files in Category:Basketball tickets from the United States. For example, I don't think the logos/graphic elements in File:Atlanta Hawks at Dallas Mavericks 1986-03-21 (ticket).jpg and File:1988 NCAA Men's Division I Basketball Tournament - National Semifinals (ticket).jpg or the photo in File:Utah Jazz at Golden State Warriors 1988-12-06 (ticket).jpg are as clear when it comes to the TOO though I guess it could possibly be argued that they are only incidental elements of the stub photo. -- Marchjuly (talk) 05:57, 11 April 2019 (UTC)
@Verbcatcher and Marchjuly: The first two are very uncertain TOO for me. The ones with more complicated pictures certainly are not, and I don't think they're COM:DM because they are a component of the ticket that is clearly the subject of the image. BMacZero (talk) 14:30, 11 April 2019 (UTC)

File:Vunivalu of Kubuna - NLC Family Tree.pdf

I can't find this particular image at pdphoto.org to verify it's licensing or anything about the photo from that person being released into the public domain. I'm also not sure if the licensing of the photo itself would even be applicable to the document which is photgraphed. -- Marchjuly (talk) 05:46, 11 April 2019 (UTC)

Hi, The content is probably {{PD-ineligible}}, but what are the point and the scope of this file? It is of very bad quality, barely readible, and it should be PNG or JPEG. Regards, Yann (talk) 11:15, 11 April 2019 (UTC)

Confirm: Non-free licenses if the file is multi-licensed with at least one free license

I tried to double-license one of my images under CC BY-SA and CC BY-NC-ND. According to the Commons licensing policy, this is okay. However, the page tells me that my file has been tagged for speedy deletion. Should I just ignore the message, or is there something I am doing wrong? Kestreltail (talk) 01:02, 8 April 2019 (UTC)

@Kestreltail: Which image?   — Jeff G. ツ please ping or talk to me 01:29, 8 April 2019 (UTC)
@Jeff G.: I didn't save the edits; that was what I saw on the preview when I tried to add a non-free license to https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Boston_Skyline_from_Arlington.jpg. Kestreltail (talk) 01:39, 8 April 2019 (UTC)
@Kestreltail: You could try one of the custom licenses like {{GFDL-CC-triple}} or {{FAL or cc-by-nc-nd}}, or roll your own.   — Jeff G. ツ please ping or talk to me 01:53, 8 April 2019 (UTC)

Thank you! Kestreltail (talk) 02:10, 8 April 2019 (UTC)

@Kestreltail: You're welcome!   — Jeff G. ツ please ping or talk to me 02:23, 8 April 2019 (UTC)

@Kestreltail: I'm not quite sure what CC BY-NC-ND adds to the copyright licensing. Sure, CC BY-SA requires you to "share alike" any derivative works - but BY-NC-ND doesn't allow any derivative works anyway, so everything you can do with CC BY-NC-ND you can do under CC BY-SA. You're welcome to do it, of course. I just don't see why you'd want to. Adam Cuerden (talk) 07:56, 12 April 2019 (UTC)

Mismatch credit on an old picture / photograph

The image on Wikicommons dated 1877 seems to be a drawing made from a photograph, supposedly copyrighted. See File_talk:Graphic2-1877.JPG Mascarponette (talk) 23:51, 11 April 2019 (UTC)

  • Looks like an instance of copyfraud by Getty Images. Images from 1877 could conceivably be under copyright in the European Union if the creator lived past 1948, but the Commons file notes the creator of the drawing died in 1891 making it public domain worldwide. Only conceivable way that the photograph would be under copyright would be if it was unpublished until very recently but I'm pretty sure a 1877 photograph from the Royal Geographic Society would be out of copyright anyway. Pinging @Fæ since they know quite a bit about British copyright. Abzeronow (talk) 01:57, 12 April 2019 (UTC)
(Edit conflict) Getty is notorious for that, but it could also be the RGS trying to monetize their collections. Anyway, I’m not sure that’s actually a death date; at the link provided it’s said to be the end of the artist’s career. Given that he started producing in 1844, though, there’s scarcely room for reasonable doubt that the UK copyright has expired, while the 1877 publication date obviates URAA concerns for the USA. Unless someone wants to argue that the engraving, being a derivative work, might have been published without the photographer’s permission …Clin—Odysseus1479 (talk) 02:20, 12 April 2019 (UTC)
The picture on wikicommons seems to be a drawing of Horace made from a photograph taken by somebody else. So it is a potential derived work but we don't know who took the photo and when he or she diedMascarponette (talk) 06:54, 12 April 2019 (UTC)

Free in France: Is it free enough for America?

[12] is from Gallica (the Bibliotheque Nationale de France's web portal). It is clearly named as public domain by them if you check the info. It's from 1926, and, as only a publisher is credited, presumably counted as anonymous for copyright purposes.

Is this alright for Commons? I'm not hugely conversant in French law, so I'm not sure how to determine any URAA issues. Adam Cuerden (talk) 07:51, 12 April 2019 (UTC)

Hi Adam,
Yes, this is free of URAA. As no author is mentioned, French copyright lasted for 58 years, so it was already in the public domain before the law changed, and the US copyright is therefore not restored. You can use {{PD-France}} and {{PD-1996}}. Regards, Yann (talk) 08:04, 12 April 2019 (UTC)
Great! Uploaded as File:Colette and Maurice Ravel's L'enfant et les sortilèges, 1st scene - Original.jpg

Stephen Peel image

Please review here. I don't have the appropriate copyright policy understanding, but hopefully someone else will. - Wacomshera (talk) 19:59, 12 April 2019 (UTC)

Don't generally be too afraid of hitting that "Nominate for deletion" button on things like this, unless it's already gone through an RFD. Also, it helps to link directly to the image File:Stephen Peel .jpg.--Prosfilaes (talk) 21:42, 12 April 2019 (UTC)

Blackhole image

Please feel free to review this black home image below if you know its license.

The source is apparently not {{ESO}} and the uploader typed in a license review. Best Regards, --Leoboudv (talk) 01:34, 13 April 2019 (UTC)

Uploading Model UN photos

Hello, This is my first time attempting to upload something to Commons. I recently had a Model UN conference, and the organizers had uploaded some pictures of it on their website : https://swcmun.wordpress.com/ . I would like to upload some of those photos to Commons, but there is no license on it as far as I am aware of, and I do not know who the photographer is. Furthermore, I am worried about the people in the photo and potential privacy concerns. Could you please help me in determining whether these photos are appropriate to upload? Here are the links to the photos: https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1G0GyzuxGYrDoMRCddPNph-O2aQevGe1_ https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1JFp2T7Q2VEM8HYygXE72lb01vwIMAuOr https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/19L6EFDeD0n18pModHcNyt__05EF8atuk https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1O7yAJAlYfrhFwYo4tHZfOFL82-hupfJ6

Thank you! The war moose (talk) 19:31, 13 April 2019 (UTC)

@The war moose: to upload these pictures you need evidence that the copyright owner has released them with an acceptable licence, see Commons:Licensing. The copyright owner is normally assumed to be the photographer. I can see no indication of an acceptable licence on the websites you have identified. As you do not know who the photographer is you are unlikely to be able to upload these photographs. Verbcatcher (talk) 12:22, 14 April 2019 (UTC)
@Verbcatcher: Thank you for responding quickly. I will not upload the photos if that is the case then. The war moose (talk) 21:05, 14 April 2019 (UTC)

File:Thomas Polus.jpg

The painting shown in this photo is clearly not "own work", but it'S almost certainly COM:PD-Art because of its age, etc. The photo itself, however, is just a slavish reproduction so it's not eligible for it's own copyright per COM:DR. No information is provided about the actual painting, but the file is being used in fi:Tomas Polus. Anyone know how to best sort this out? -- Marchjuly (talk) 01:30, 14 April 2019 (UTC)

It seems to be a duplicate. --ghouston (talk) 02:09, 14 April 2019 (UTC)
Thanks for checking on this Ghouston. -- Marchjuly (talk) 08:05, 14 April 2019 (UTC)

Photo taken in Paris in 1900 – what licence?

Advice please: I'm thinking of uploading this historic photograph (found on this page). I know from here that the photograph was taken in Paris in 1900, but have no idea who took it. Is it old enough to be safely out of copyright? And if so, what is the right licence to upload it under? Thank you, Justlettersandnumbers (talk) 18:13, 14 April 2019 (UTC)

Hi, It is probably OK with {{PD-France}} and {{PD-US-expired}}, but ideally we need to know where it was first published (some book or newspaper?). Regards, Yann (talk) 19:23, 14 April 2019 (UTC)

Portraits of Jean-Baptiste de La Salle

Should we have concerns about the portraits of Jean-Baptiste de La Salle (1651–1719) in Category:Jean-Baptiste de La Salle? These are declared to be public domain. While they may be old enough for this, no artist or creation date is specified.

I have most concerns about these. These are of the same painting, which could be 20th-century.
These look older, and are probably 18th or 19th century.
This appears is a modern redrawing of File:DeLasalle Leger.jpg above

The De La Salle Brothers may have released these images into the public domain, but I cannot see any evidence of this on their website. Verbcatcher (talk) 12:49, 14 April 2019 (UTC)

 Comment This is a big mess. None of these images has a proper date, source, author, and license. There is always some information missing. Regards, Yann (talk) 14:59, 14 April 2019 (UTC)
I have found some more information
  • The first three images are details of an oil painting shown here, without date or attribution. This looks like a 19th century painting, but could be later.
  • File:DeLasalle Leger.jpg is on a De La Salle Flickr page here, attributed to Pierre Léger (1658-1733). {{PD-Art}} is applicable.
Verbcatcher (talk) 19:46, 14 April 2019 (UTC)
I just wanted to jump in to point out that {{PD-Art}} is not a license. PD-Art indicates that the photograph of the art does not create an additional copyright (over whatever license actually applies to the art itself). Commons:WikiProject Public Domain/PD-Art review @Verbcatcher: BMacZero (talk) 19:43, 15 April 2019 (UTC)

All files in Category:Renovations in the House ten Bosch are not allowed

The pictures in Renovations in the House ten Bosch are uploaded from https://www.rijksvastgoedbedrijf.nl/vastgoed/projecten-in-uitvoering/den-haag-paleis-huis-ten-bosch. But there is written very clearly that commercial use of the photos is not allowed (De foto's zijn vrij te gebruiken, ook voor de pers. Commercieel gebruik van foto's van paleis Huis ten Bosch is niet toegestaan.). Could you please take care of this issue? JopkeB (talk) 16:03, 14 April 2019 (UTC)

@JopkeB: ✓ Done, please see Commons:Deletion requests/Files in Category:Renovations in the House ten Bosch.   — Jeff G. ツ please ping or talk to me 17:04, 14 April 2019 (UTC)
@Jeff G.: Thanksǃ JopkeB (talk) 14:58, 15 April 2019 (UTC)
@JopkeB: You're welcome!   — Jeff G. ツ please ping or talk to me 17:20, 15 April 2019 (UTC)

Stills from the European Union

Until today stills from the European Union are deleted because they are copyrighted. However several have been uploaded today according to this policy. So are these stills suitable for Commons? --Patrick Rogel (talk) 10:34, 16 April 2019 (UTC)

 Comment There is no mention of commercial use, modifications, etc., so I doubt it is OK. Any example? Regards, Yann (talk) 11:00, 16 April 2019 (UTC)
Yes there is: Art. 3, section 2 on the PdF file. --Patrick Rogel (talk) 11:06, 16 April 2019 (UTC)
OK, then it seems to be OK. And it apparently applies to "public documents produced by the Commission or by public and private entities on its behalf" (article 2, 1), and "any content whatever its medium (written on paper or stored in electronic form or as a sound, visual or audiovisual recording)" (article 3, 1a). Great! Yann (talk) 11:16, 16 April 2019 (UTC)
The policy applies to European Commission documents (and websites), not to other institutions of the European Union. It can be overridden by a copyright notice that applies to particular content. Article 6.2b says that conditions can include "the obligation not to distort the original meaning or message of the documents". Would this be a problem? Verbcatcher (talk) 11:34, 16 April 2019 (UTC)
@Verbcatcher: Yes, that would be a problem.   — Jeff G. ツ please ping or talk to me 14:25, 16 April 2019 (UTC)
But note that that condition is one that may apply. In the case of the European Commission Web site mentioned above, the only condition applied is 6.2(a), the requirement to acknowledge the source. --bjh21 (talk) 14:42, 16 April 2019 (UTC)

GFDL and authors

In it Wikipedia we have a lot of photos uploaded before 1996 with both a GFDL license and a CC-BY-SA license with exif datas and apparently with no copyright issues. The only problem is that that many have no author indication so the CC BY SA is not a valid license. About this kind of files we had the same rules than Commons during the same period. Do you think that the GFDL is enough to keep that files? Thanks--Pierpao.lo (listening) 17:48, 17 April 2019 (UTC)

I suppose you mean 2006. In 1996, Wikipedia didn't exist. Regards, Yann (talk) 18:09, 17 April 2019 (UTC)
@Pierpao: I don't understand why CC BY-SA is not a valid licence. Version 2.0, for instance, explicitly allows for the possibility that the author might be pseudonymous, or might have supplied their name. Can you point us to a file that has this problem? --bjh21 (talk) 18:22, 17 April 2019 (UTC)

Copyvio?

I think, perhaps, this image is a copyvio. In its metadata info, there's a Copyright holder information in which is written: "Copyright 2018. Todos os direitos reservados" ("All the rights reserved" in Portuguese). Is it alright or the image is a copyvio?--SirEdimon (talk) 08:02, 18 April 2019 (UTC)

@SirEdimon: I've marked it as "No permission" (and notified the uploader). In the case the uploader is also the photographer, he can clarify the copyright status of the file via e-mail. --Ruthven (msg) 08:13, 18 April 2019 (UTC)
The copyright notice was likely added automatically by the VSCO app (see here), but the lack of camera metadata is still a concern. clpo13(talk) 08:26, 18 April 2019 (UTC)
Could it be an overzealous EXIF stripping by the app for the purposes of anonymization? Nemo 13:22, 18 April 2019 (UTC)
Thank you for the answers. I'll watch the image to see what happens.--SirEdimon (talk) 19:11, 18 April 2019 (UTC)

CC-BY-NC-4.0 as secondary license

{{Cc-by-nc-4.0}} produces a copyright warning, as it is not allowed alone, but it could be added as a secondary license. I think we should change the warning. See File:CDNJS Logo - Web, Dark Variant.png and User talk:MattIPv4#Copyright status: File:CDNJS Logo - Web, Dark Variant.png. Regards, Yann (talk) 18:37, 18 April 2019 (UTC)

Images from the Mueller Report

Over at Wikisource, we've been transcribing the complete Mueller Report. The report has images: see wikisource:Page:Report On The Investigation Into Russian Interference In The 2016 Presidential Election.pdf/39 and wikisource:Page:Report On The Investigation Into Russian Interference In The 2016 Presidential Election.pdf/42.

I was wondering under what license they would need to be released under. Would it be PD, or fair use (especially for the Facebook image in the second example)? Thanks! EggOfReason (talk) 19:31, 19 April 2019 (UTC)

I would not upload the images separately. As part of the report, you can argue they are de minimis matter. It's harder to argue that they would somehow become public domain by means of incorporation in a PD-Gov document, and it's unlikely that a court would ever get to rule so since ruling fair use is much easier. (I've only performed a cursory check on court rulings though.) Nemo 16:55, 20 April 2019 (UTC)
I agree with Nemo.- MrX 17:52, 20 April 2019 (UTC)
There seems to be a common misconception that copyright magically vanishes once a Government official touches it. Copyright remains that of the original creator/owner, regardless of whether an FBI official takes a snapshot, or it appears on a Federal website, or it is placed in the Library of Congress, or displayed in a post office, etc. {{PD-USGov}} only applies to works originally created by Federal employees in the scope of their duties. Non-free images may need to be removed from the PDF, and should not be reproduced at Wikisource. --Animalparty (talk) 18:04, 20 April 2019 (UTC)

c1933 Scan of Afghanistan

Can I upload this scan at https://www.artsy.net/artwork/anonymous-bamiyan-large-buddha ? Which tag can I use?--BevinKacon (talk) 08:35, 20 April 2019 (UTC)

Hi, I would say yes. {{PD-Afghanistan}} + {{PD-1996}} seem to be OK. Regards, Yann (talk) 08:59, 20 April 2019 (UTC)

Which licence tag for Canada's TSB material?

I would like to upload PDF accident reports (and pictures contained therein) produced by the Transportation Safety Board of Canada (TSB), a governmental agency. Their website states: "Unless otherwise specified, you may reproduce the materials in whole or in part for non-commercial purposes, and in any format, without charge or further permission, provided you do the following: - Exercise due diligence in ensuring the accuracy of the materials reproduced; - Indicate both the complete title of the materials reproduced, as well as the author (where available); and - Indicate that the reproduction is a copy of the version available at [URL ...]" Note that commercial redistribution instead requires Crown copyright clearance.
Can someone please suggest which licence tag I should use? I doubt it's {{OGL-C}}, because the TSB website does not mention "Open Government Licence"; and it's not a CC licence either, by the sound of it. I thought of using {{Attribution}}, but that includes commercial use, prohibited by the TSB. Any suggestions? Thanks. --Deeday-UK (talk) 14:01, 20 April 2019 (UTC)

If TSB material can not be re-used commercially, it can not be uploaded to Commons. Ruslik (talk) 18:47, 20 April 2019 (UTC)

Copyright correct?

Moved from Commons:Village_pump#Copyright correct?: -- Rodrigo Tetsuo Argenton m 15:12, 20 April 2019 (UTC)
Derivative works of this would be useful, but the metadata is inconsistent.

Can anyone help me fix the copright statement here? HLHJ (talk) 01:23, 16 April 2019 (UTC)

Still image from free documentary

I took a still image, File:JohnHRees.jpg, from a free documentary to provide an identifying photograph for the individual. The documentary, No Place to Hide, has been released for free by the copyright holder, so I believe the still falls under the category of public domain. It may be relevant to add that no other photograph of the individual can be found.

Would someone be so kind as to help me out with the proper copyright tag to include with the image? Thank you for your time, I’m still a newbie learning my way around here.

Neighborhood Nationalist (talk) 09:29, 22 April 2019 (UTC)

Why do you think the video on YouTube is free? The description says licensed to Youtube, You can watch with ads or adsfree with premium or order a dvd. Seems commercial to me? OTOH: If it is free (creatice-commons or else) you can use it here and without "fair-use". actually fair-use is not allowed on commons (at en.wikipedia, but with restrictions). You will either need a proof, that the video is free or the picture will have to be deleted. --C.Suthorn (talk) 09:41, 22 April 2019 (UTC)
I apologize, I neglected to mention that the YouTube user who uploaded the full documentary for free viewing (Reality Zone) is in fact the current copyright holder. The bit that you’re looking at in regards to premium content and ads is actually not in reference to the documentary itself, it is about the music featured in the film and a separate premium music service YouTube provides; the documentary itself is available in full, high-resolution without a single advertisement. Would a screenshot of the video featuring Reality Zone’s user profile suffice to demonstrate this? — Neighborhood Nationalist (talk) 15:05, 22 April 2019 (UTC)
The end of the video states "Copyright 1982, Western Goals Foundation, Alexandria, Virginia". The YouTube video does not have a Creative Commons license, so {{YouTube CC-BY}} doesn't apply, and in any case the video clearly predates the existence of YouTube, so anything on YouTube should be taken with a grain of salt. In order to upload any portion of the video to Commons, proof that "Reality Zone" is the legal copyright holder of the film and grants permission for usage under a free license must be forwarded to Commons:OTRS. Note that any third party footage from the film (stock footage, news broadcasts) may have different status that preclude Western Goals Foundation's right to copy. --Animalparty (talk) 16:20, 22 April 2019 (UTC)

Public domain, but scanned with watermark

Moved from Commons:Village pump#Public domain, but scanned with watermark: -- Rodrigo Tetsuo Argenton m 15:14, 20 April 2019 (UTC)

The Hong Kong government sells old Ordnance Survey maps from the colonial period on one of its websites. However, the map previews (which are watermarked) can be viewed for free. I don't know if it would be appropriate to use them in Commons or for OpenStreetMap.

  • Maps published before the start of 1969 are now in the public domain worldwide per {{PD-UKGov}}. (It's rather odd that the current Hong Kong government – which is decidedly not British – is selling them in the first place, but presumably they obtained the rights to the maps.)
  • However, the Hong Kong government digitized them more recently. Presumably this doesn't matter on Commons per {{PD-scan}}, although I have no idea whether this matters for OpenStreetMap (it's possible that this hasn't ever come up).
  • Furthermore, the map previews have the Lands Department logo plastered all over them. The logo is still copyrighted in Hong Kong, although it might be possible to argue that it's {{PD-text}} in the US because the entirety of the logo is a negative-space version of "
    地
    ".

Would removing the watermarks from maps published in December 1968 make it acceptable to upload them to Commons under PD-UKGov and PD-scan? Jc86035 (talk) 16:08, 17 April 2019 (UTC)

Hi,
Watermarks do not change the copyright status. If the maps are in the public domain, you can upload them, but be sure that they are really in the public domain before (I don't know in this case). Regards, Yann (talk) 16:23, 17 April 2019 (UTC)
If the logo is copyrighted, I believe it is not ok to upload the watermarked preview version, but ok to upload the full version without watermark. --Wcam (talk) 00:13, 24 April 2019 (UTC)

Plaques

Do plaques attract copyright? If so, are we prohibited from hosting photos of US plaques (for which we don't have permission by the plaques' artists) by US copyright laws and COM:FOP US? I think the answers to both are "Yes" because I respect the copyrights of those artists, but @Binksternet appears to disagree. There are four DRs hanging on the resolution of these questions:

  — Jeff G. ツ please ping or talk to me 01:37, 21 April 2019 (UTC)

Jeff G. is assuming that the author of an explanatory plaque is an "artist", when there is no indication the same person sculpted the art and wrote the didactic text. He is arguing that a plaque accompanying a piece of art deserves the same copyright treatment as the piece of art. I have been arguing that a plain text plaque is a peripheral part of the installation, just as the plinth or base or foundation of the artwork might be considered peripheral, and not accorded copyright status. Binksternet (talk) 01:45, 21 April 2019 (UTC)
Is this the same as a plaque with plain text?
I imagine that Jeff G.'s position could be extrapolated to gravestones in the US, such that all recent gravestones would be disallowed. Binksternet (talk) 01:47, 21 April 2019 (UTC)
In that case no -- it just has a name, dates (both just facts), and a short phrase (not copyrightable in the U.S.). Once you start getting into full sentences, other than very perfunctory ones, it is more likely to be copyrighted. Book authors and poets have copyrights on their text, and the copyrightable level is quite low, so some of the other examples above would be copyrightable text. There is likely no real legal issue with having them here (they would be fair use in virtually all circumstances Wikimedia projects would use them in), so they are not copyright violations exactly, but it is a question of "free" and the site requirement to only host free works (i.e. we cannot use fair use as a rationale to host images on Commons). I don't think we can point to a court case which says these are definitely a problem, but on the other hand there is often clearly copyrightable text, and we just as clearly don't have an explicit license for it, which will make many folks nervous about the free status (quite understandably). It's possible a court could rule that there is an implicit license for photographic reproductions, but it would have to allow even commercial uses (say selling a postcard of the photo), and we haven't found an example of that type of case either. Carl Lindberg (talk) 14:55, 21 April 2019 (UTC)
If the text or art on a plaque is significant enough, then they are copyrighted. Gravestones are no exception, but the text will usually be below TOO and the art often PD or de minimis. In those four cases, the art or text is the focus of the photo and looks to be sufficient to be copyrightable.--Prosfilaes (talk) 06:42, 21 April 2019 (UTC)
Relevant: COM:CSM#Noticeboards and signs. clpo13(talk) 01:24, 24 April 2019 (UTC)

Paintings by Hans Emmenegger

I just want to make sure that there would be no copyright issues if I upload some files with the paintings by Hans Emmenegger (1866—1940). His works are available, e.g., here and here. Would it be safe to use {{PD-Art-70}} license template? In particular, do I need to indicate something for the US copyright? I am a bit worried because no single work of this artist has been uploaded so far. Thank you, — Adavyd (talk) 14:40, 22 April 2019 (UTC)

Hi,
These works are in the public domain in Switzerland, the country of origin, and in USA if they are from before 1924. After that date, the usual URAA shenanigans apply. Regards, Yann (talk) 14:50, 22 April 2019 (UTC)
Switzerland non-retroactively increased from 50pma to 70pma in 1993 (since they are not in the EU they are not subject to the retroactive restorations); any Swiss works where the author died 1942 or earlier were not restored by the URAA, so works from this author have always been able to be uploaded (unless they were known to be first published in another country). Carl Lindberg (talk) 15:57, 22 April 2019 (UTC)
Thanks for the explanations! To begin with, I uploaded images of three pre-1924 paintings, see here. — Adavyd (talk) 17:35, 22 April 2019 (UTC)
Yes, that's an important "quirk" of Swiss copyright that often gets overlooked, thanks for mentionining it, Carl Lindberg! Hans Emmenegger's work became public domain in Switzerland on January 1, 1991 (50 years p.m.a.), Switzerland did not restore already expired copyrights with the extension to 70 years which came into effect on July 1, 1993 (confirmed by the Swiss Supreme Court in the "Sternheim" case where the heirs of writer Carl Sternheim, who died in 1942, unsuccessfully claimed copyright), and so Emmenegger is not affected by the URAA. Gestumblindi (talk) 21:32, 23 April 2019 (UTC)

USA Copyright Office on moral rights

The long-awaited study is out at https://www.copyright.gov/policy/moralrights/ :

The Copyright Office concludes that the U.S. moral rights framework (which includes a variety of federal and state laws) continues to provide important protections, despite there being some room for improvement. Should Congress wish to strengthen this framework, this Report provides possible avenues to do so. Possible legislative changes for consideration include amendments to the Visual Artists Rights Act (VARA) and the Lanham Act to better protect attribution and integrity interests, along with suggestions to expand authors’ recourse for removal or alteration of copyright management information in section 1202 of Title 17. Congress may also wish to consider adoption of a federal right of publicity law as a means to reduce uncertainties and ambiguities created by the diversity of state right of publicity laws. The Office further suggests some areas where preferred interpretations of judicial decisions could boost the landscape of protection for authors.

Nemo 16:45, 23 April 2019 (UTC)

Copyright for the Guy Fawkes mask

At least according to The Guardian the copyright for this mask design is held by Warner Bros. I'm not sure that many, if any of these images would fall under COM:DM. I'm also not sure that I see a strong argument that this mask in particular is a utilitarian item. This wasn't (at least to my mind) originally designed "to clothe" or for that matter to be even produced as a three dimensional work; it was first designed by David Lloyd (living) for the 1982 graphic novel V for Vendetta. That seems to make this primarily a derivative work of a design for a fictional character, and I'm not sure I see a reason it should be treated differently than Mickey Mouse for our purposes. Thoughts? GMGtalk 14:33, 22 April 2019 (UTC)

Hi,
I think it is much more complicated than that. First the modern version of the mask, designed by David Lloyd, predates the film by 23 years. Then Warner Bros has certainly a license to use the mask for the film, but is is much less certain than it owns the copyright. But then David Lloyd didn't create this mask out of nowhere. en:Guy Fawkes mask#Origins mentions a long tradition which dates back to the 17th century. How much original it is the current version compared to previous creations, that IS the question... Regards, Yann (talk) 15:17, 22 April 2019 (UTC)
Well, the design in the 2005 movie would be derivative of the character design in the 1982 graphic novel. Everything that I'm seeing is that "Guy Fawkes masks" go back centuries, but "the Guy Fawks mask" (i.e., the currently popular design) traces squarely back to the 1982 novel and to Lloyd.
  • The iconic version of the Guy Fawkes mask owes its popularity to the graphic novel and film V for Vendetta[13]
  • Varied masks on the Fawkes theme had some popularity in the 20th century, some including a wide-brimmed hat, others bearing a fuller beard. The range of interpretations eventually coalesced around one depiction - the mask worn by the revolutionary protagonist of Alan Moore's V for Vendetta comic book.[14]
  • Activist group Anonymous has been at the forefront of the push to wear the masks as an anti-capitalist statement, but this specific mask’s history dates back to the 1980s.[15]
Keeping in mind that the "design" is not for "a Guy Fawks mask", it is for the DC Comics character V, who wears a particular version of the mask. There are many depictions of Thor throughout history, many of them in the public domain, but there is one particular version which is Marvel Comics character Thor. GMGtalk 15:41, 22 April 2019 (UTC)
Yes, but the copyright of the modern version depends on its originality compared with previous versions. I would like to other versions prior to 1982 to see the differences. Then the modern mask creators say they are pleased by its use by protestors, so they obviously won't start a court case about its copyright. Regards, Yann (talk) 15:57, 22 April 2019 (UTC)
This is supposedly from 1883 and bears no resemblance whatsoever. Neither does this from 1830. This says it's from the 20th century, although that's almost certainly wrong. With unknown dates, we have this and this. And from 1954 we have this. It could also be noted that the Lloyd mask doesn't actually resemble the historical person either.
From what I see, it doesn't look like there was any standardization at all prior to Lloyd. Yes, DC Comics and Warner Bros are probably not going to sue anyone at the moment while they're counting all their money, but there's no guarantee that won't change, and its not a valid argument under Commons policy anyway. GMGtalk 17:11, 22 April 2019 (UTC)

Please check out

Dubious copyright claims by uploader here. Johnbod (talk) 16:07, 22 April 2019 (UTC)

What is exactly dubious about them? Ruslik (talk) 20:29, 22 April 2019 (UTC)
The uploader claims the images as their own work even though they are derivative works made by other artists without any evidence the artists have given any permission. Ww2censor (talk) 21:26, 23 April 2019 (UTC)
The photos are works of the photographer, so the licenses are correct. Ruslik (talk) 20:46, 24 April 2019 (UTC)
No, most of the photos are of works by David Hockney, Lari Pittman, Yoshitomo Nara, Michael Rikio Ming Hee Ho, and others, and thus are derivative works. I have tagged some of the clearest cases and notified the User:DustyLosAngeles. Evidence for some files has apparently been submitted to OTRS: unless the uploader has valid claims to the copyrights of others or can indicate free license, I predict the OTRS request will be insufficient. --Animalparty (talk) 21:41, 24 April 2019 (UTC)

Question about licence with restriction

Yesterday I uploaded 8 pics from an Orchestra from their Official Website, licence: "Use of these photos by media, presenters, and information portals is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International license." Today I´m not sure if the upload agree with the Commons policy, because the use is limitated for "media, presenters, and information portals". Delete or Keep? Example: File:Mikhail Pletnev 2007.jpg --....HMS (talk) 05:30, 20 April 2019 (UTC)

Hi,
This is a contradiction. It is not possible to license under CC-BY-SA-4.0 and, at the same time, to restrict use to "media, presenters, and information portals" only. May be a message to them would clarify. Regards, Yann (talk) 07:15, 20 April 2019 (UTC)
Thanks for answer, I will try to contact them.--....HMS (talk) 07:47, 20 April 2019 (UTC)
They have changed the text on their Website: "Use of these photos is allowed under the terms of Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International." Thank you for your advice. --....HMS (talk) 19:06, 25 April 2019 (UTC)

Simple album covers

Hi, I would like another opinion about these album covers. Are they simple enough for {{PD-textlogo}}? Regards, Yann (talk) 14:31, 25 April 2019 (UTC)

  • The third one looks to be just an arrangement of simple shapes. The first two are debatable. They don't appear to be a standard font. GMGtalk 14:50, 25 April 2019 (UTC)
I'd be hesitant on all three. The first has a sort of underline which is made up of many strokes and may qualify for copyright, plus the shading stripes in the bottom right half may also qualify. The second has a bunch of strokes or marks which don't seem to be related to the shape of the letters. The third... may not have copyrightable elements, though the scroll may have enough customizations, and the selection/arrangement may also have enough elements to qualify. Carl Lindberg (talk) 15:57, 25 April 2019 (UTC)
Eh... this type of two-sided double-fold banner is commonplace enough that it's one of the standard shapes in Microsoft Office. In fact, you could just about recreate the entire cover in Powerpoint. GMGtalk 16:40, 25 April 2019 (UTC)
I'm more concerned about the selection/arrangement copyright, honestly. Carl Lindberg (talk) 19:10, 25 April 2019 (UTC)

All these come from Category:Covers of music albums. I guess half of these files should not be on Commons. :( Regards, Yann (talk) 19:03, 26 April 2019 (UTC)

I have checked all subcategories, and the main one upto M, and from T to the end. I have accepted most PD claims, and the borderline cases are mentioned above. Please help review them. Regards, Yann (talk) 11:49, 28 April 2019 (UTC)

I've started to go through these. Deleted one and struck one that were obvious (in my mind). Most of these are certainly borderline as already mentioned by Yann. However a few of them I think we can land on a PCP delete due to country of origin issues. File:Marina and the Diamonds - Froot (logotipo).png is a UK registration and as we all know the UK is a little crazy with what they will grant copyright to. File:Avicii - True (logo).png is obviously Swedish and Sweden also has a rather low TOO per COM:TOO Sweden. I think that is how we need to proceed here. First, determine what country of origin each of these are from as that might actual simplify some of them if the TOO of that country is really low (it would turn borderline cases into delete cases). I've started to do this but it might take me a while since there are so many of them. --Majora (talk) 16:07, 28 April 2019 (UTC)

File:ARIAL PATH.png, Is not simple enough. Based on following reason :

  1. White circle inside red box is not simple enough as its often used on several logos and also National flags. And as we know National flag have their own copyright status despite its often in public domain, so we should treat them the same (the not simple status, not the public domain).
  2. The arrow come in set with the word, not separable, if it separable then yes it can be PD text, but as we can see it stuck with the word (connected) so its not simple.

Thank you.--AldnonymousBicara? 16:31, 28 April 2019 (UTC)

Ok below is the countries of origins for what I could determine. A few groupings and then a miscellaneous section. The last three I either couldn't find or in the case of the Sia album it is incredibly convoluted as to the country of origin. I think we can call the two UK albums over TOO. Most of the US albums are probably fine. I'm really bad at French TOO and the miscellaneous section will need more investigation on what we know each country's TOO is. --Majora (talk) 18:03, 28 April 2019 (UTC)

Extended content





There's nothing in the US section I'm wonderfully comfortable with. Scribble seems clearly over the copyrightable line; it is not simply describable.--Prosfilaes (talk) 23:55, 28 April 2019 (UTC)

How do Logos Work with Commons?

I'm trying to write a Wikipedia article for a group, and I want to use their logo in the infobox. I've been in contact with the leader of the group, and they are uncomfortable with the clause of "free to use, sell, or copy without permission". Is there a special rule for cases like this? If not, what is the proper way to proceed?

ShakurasEnder (talk) 03:29, 28 April 2019 (UTC)

@ShakurasEnder: Please see en:WP:F.   — Jeff G. ツ please ping or talk to me 03:43, 28 April 2019 (UTC)

Image of person on scoreboard at sporting event

Is an image taken at a live sporting event of a scoreboard displaying a publicly notable person who is in attendance treated the same as Commons:Screenshots? Trying to understand what are the limiations on scoreboard images given the existence of Category:Sports scoreboards. I recently had a scoreboard image of a person speedy deleted as being a "screenshot". Thanks.—Bagumba (talk) 09:49, 28 April 2019 (UTC)

Bagumba: Yes, generally, whoever operates the cameras that capture the images displayed on jumbotrons makes creative decisions that make those images eligible for copyright protection, so you can't just take photos of their work and distribute them as your own. —LX (talk, contribs) 13:00, 28 April 2019 (UTC)

Photos of non-free paintings with frames

Hi! Please take a look at Special:ListFiles/ЯГВ — there are a lot of photos of non-free paintings that were taken during an exhibition (like this one: File:«У старому Аштараку. Вірменія».jpg). Afaik, they're not allowed here, but I might be wrong. I'd also be grateful if someone commented on whether such photos may be used on (uploaded to) a Wikipedia (and under what conditions, if the answer is positive). --Piramidion (talk) 10:22, 28 April 2019 (UTC)

Asking for opinions: Reviewed file, but perhaps copy fraud

The file Best Commercial Spot RENAULT The Postman Animated CGI Spot by NKI.webm, uploaded by Eatcha, has been reviewed by me, but unfortunately I noticed an important potential issue too late. So I ask about your opinions:

  • It has been uplaoded to Youtube in 2018-02-12 with CC4.0 (see in video description), but not by the video producers.
  • The potential issue is that the video has been uploaded some days earlier on Vimeo on the channel of the producers NKI: RENAULT / The Postman on Vimeo. Uploading date according to mouse hover tooltip is 2018-02-07 (09:06 EST). I cannot discover there any CC license granting.

But on the other hand:

All in all this is contradictory to me, hence my question: What do you think? Can we keep this file on Commons? — Speravir – 19:11, 29 April 2019 (UTC)

Ooooh, arrgh, the article is not by the video publishers. Embarrassing error … — Speravir – 19:14, 29 April 2019 (UTC)

Borderline {{PD-textlogo}}

I nominated for deletion File:KIX logo.jpg in one batch with another logo which is almost certainly above ToO. A gradient fill (hence not a “simple text” strictly), but it may be considered rather trivial. Experts, provide some feedback please. Incnis Mrsi (talk) — Preceding unsigned comment added by Incnis Mrsi (talk • contribs) 13:11, 5. Jan. 2019‎ (UTC)

Images from National Digital Archive

Hi, this template

Photographs available at www.audiovis.nac.gov.pl are public domain or the owner of the copyrights is the State Treasury of Poland, represented by the National Digital Archive and which grant free of charge licence for free use of the materials on all known exploitation fields.

suggests that images found in the National Digital Archive are public domain or the owner of the copy rights is the State Treasury of Poland and can be uploaded to commons. Is that a correct assumption? Meaning, am I a liberty to upload to commons any image? Cheers — Preceding unsigned comment added by MisterBee1966 (talk • contribs) 16:23, 11 April 2019‎ (UTC)

How can I proof to Wikipedia, that I have the right to use fotos from an artists work?

Situation: I am just creating an article about an artists work. The artist was my father and died 1997. He was a well known modern artist and made lots of fountains and sculptures. Besides the long list of his artistic works I would like to add some fotos. These fotos were made by my father and some time ago I digitised them. Wikipedia does not allow me, to upload the fotos. How can I proof, that my use of these fotos is legal?

Thanks a lot in advance for the answer(s) !

--Atina B. (talk) 13:20, 30 April 2019 (UTC)

@Atina B.: Hi, and welcome. I am sorry to inform you that you have triggered Special:AbuseFilter/153 by trying to cross-wiki upload smaller (<50KB or <5MP) jpg scans of photos as a new user while leaving the summaries intact. Each jpg scan of a photo you tried to upload is smaller, and you said it's your own work. Usually when someone uploads smaller photos, they are copyright violations taken from the web. Please upload the full-size original scans, including EXIF metadata, and you or someone else can then use CropTool to crop them later, if necessary. If you are not the sole heir of your father's intellectual property, please see Commons:Licensing for why we can't accept them, and have the heir(s) send the photos and permissions via OTRS with carbon copies to you. If you change the summaries or use our Upload Wizard instead, you should be able to avoid that filter.   — Jeff G. ツ please ping or talk to me 13:44, 30 April 2019 (UTC)

Dear Jeff G. , thanks for your answer. I see... much more difficult, than I thought it would be, to take "wikipedia-care" of my fathers works. I changed the size of the fotos, because I thought it would be easier to get them into. Anyway ... I was not able to upload the full-size digitised photos neither. Tomorrow is a new day and I will try again. Thank you again ... Atina --Atina B. (talk) 15:01, 30 April 2019 (UTC)

Photos from MTur Destinos

I would like to draw your attention to https://www.flickr.com/people/mturdestinos/ . This flickr account is commissioned by the Brazilian Ministry of Tourism. It tags its photos with PDM. Its user page says Todas as fotos com a tag MTurDestinos são de domínio público e tem permissão de uso livre e por tempo indeterminado para uso total e irrestrito e gratuito em praça nacional e internacional, exceto as imagens com a tag “fotos humanizadas 2018” que possuem pessoas onde o direito de uso é pelo período de 05 (cinco) anos a contar do dia 03 de Abril de 2018. I believe its photos (except the fotos humanizadas 2018) can be hosted on Commons with the tag PD-author. What do you think? Prior discussions are Commons:Deletion requests/File:GleidsonSantos Igreja de Sao Francisco Paulo Afonso BA.jpg and Commons:Undeletion_requests#photos_from_MTur_Destinos.--Roy17 (talk) 16:48, 21 April 2019 (UTC)--Roy17 (talk) 00:07, 5 May 2019 (UTC)

Third-party copyright material included in PD-USGov documents

A recent deletion discussion (about the Mueller report) has brought to light what I believe to be an unaddressed in Commons policy copyright issue. I may, of course, be mistaken, in which case I apologise in advance for wasting everyone's time. The issue is this:

Several kinds of documents produced by the US government, including the courts, are clearly and unambiguously PD-USGov in themselves (produced by employees of the US government as part of their official duties), but include various materials that are covered by a pre-existing copyright. In the above referenced example, the report from the special prosecutor includes photographs taken by the Trump campaign organisation, a poster for a rally produced by a different organisation (the so-called "IRA"), and (a screenshot of an) email from one of the subjects of the investigation. A similar example, brought up by a commenter in the deletion discussion, is the Supreme Court's majority opinion in Campbell v. Acuff-Rose Music, Inc.. The case is a copyright infringement case involving Roy Orbison's hit song "Oh, Pretty Woman" in which the lyrics of the song are included in full in the court's opinion.

So far as I am aware, the government uses such copyrighted material in these cases under the fair use doctrine, for which the government has exceedingly wide latitude based on public interest. As I understand it, it is a relatively common occurrence for parties to a judicial proceeding to use a copyright claim to attempt to prevent something from being entered into evidence (the canonical example is, I believe, a written murder confession), and the attempts are, obviously, always summarily dismissed under fair use.

However, since Commons policy does not permit fair use, and we would not have the same fair use claim as the courts or government in any case, these documents raise one primary and one dependent issue. The primary issue is how to deal with the included third-party copyrighted material included in such PD-USGov documents. My conclusion so far is that such copyrighted material must be removed, analogous to cropping background copyright material out of photographs, and, to preserve the integrity, be replaced with some kind of clear indication of what was removed and why (the Mueller report, for example, is controversial, so alterations should not be made silently). However, this is a somewhat ridiculous state of affairs and several commenters have argued against the approach. At a policy / principle level, it would probably be a valid choice to allow such material based on a risk assessment. In practice, nobody's gonna sue us for hosting the Mueller report unredacted; but Acuff-Rose Music might conceivably sue us for hosting the lyrics to "Oh, Pretty Woman".

A secondary issue, which pops up as a necessary distinction from the primary issue, is how to deal with the myriad shorter quoted textual material in court records and reports. The Mueller report includes (a screenshot of) an email in full (10 lines including greeting and signature), with very little, but not none, creative expression. At the other end of the scale it includes in its running prose single words, sentence fragments, and whole sentences, quoted from emails, facebook posts, meeting minutes, public remarks, or statements made to the special prosecutor and his team. A lot of this will be de minimis, but at some point that will no longer apply. Possibly that limit is the whole email already mentioned; or possibly it permits less (sentence fragments but not whole sentences?) or more (a short email with a lot of factual information but not a longer email with more creative content). Redacting images can be done relatively cleanly, but once you start in on shorter bits of running text it's going to get… unwieldy… pretty quick.

I believe both these issues have wider applicability than this single deletion discussion, and that both are insufficiently addressed in existing policy. --Xover (talk) 17:12, 29 April 2019 (UTC)

Thank you, Xover for creating this discussion. As someone arguing for the other side of this I very much appreciate your even-handed, clear, and concise summary of the issue as it currently stands. - PaulT+/C 17:35, 29 April 2019 (UTC)
I'm not sure I understand what part of this is not already covered in principle by COM:DW. GMGtalk 18:00, 29 April 2019 (UTC)
Just remove the copyrighted content from the work. We deal with this sort of situation all the time. Maybe some more guidance should be added to COM:DW so it's clear what to do in these cases (and people don't waste their time having debates about it). Kaldari (talk) 18:07, 29 April 2019 (UTC)
@GreenMeansGo and Kaldari: Thank you both! I think COM:DW needs to be expanded with a section discussing the specific case of court records or government reports that include copyrighted material: even looking at it again now I can't find any direct guidance for this situation, and I certainly would never have thought to go looking there before you pointed me at it. Granted I'm properly a dunce, but this seems like a very relevant category of issue to explain specifically there (and on COM:CB). Is there existing guidance for a de minimis determination for quoted bits of text too? COM:de minimis is very photo-oriented in its guidance. --Xover (talk) 18:37, 29 April 2019 (UTC)
(Edit conflict)I think it is complicated, in the case of the Mueller Report at least, by the size and significance of the document. It is quite large - ~450 pages - with a wonky combination of De minimis guidelines 3, 4, and 5 (in my view, but I've only just learned of this concept and I'm still relatively new to Commons guidelines generally...), with varying degrees of severity depending on how closely you review the document. Of those ~450 pages there are 5/6 that have been identified to have potentially problematic images/passages. It wasn't immediately obvious that there were problematic parts of the report to begin with, but even those parts are so minimal that when compared to the rest of the document it seems excessive to have to modify it from the "officially released" document for a handful of images/passages that don't really add anything significant to the overall report. What is de minimis for if not for this situation? Where do you draw the line? I think ~1-2% of the content of the report having unknown copyright status is not a problem so significant that the report needs to be modified. - PaulT+/C 18:44, 29 April 2019 (UTC)
 Comment I closed this DR. A few copyright images in a 450 pages document are obviously de minimis. We can't have the images extracted here, the whole document is OK. Regards, Yann (talk) 19:04, 29 April 2019 (UTC)
Wow, thanks. That was a surprise. I suppose the closure emphasizes that the written guidelines about these kinds of large PD-USGov documents have some room for improvement. (Easy thing for me to say, but a whole other project to actually implement...) - PaulT+/C 19:17, 29 April 2019 (UTC)
@Kaldari and Yann: Your advice here appears to be directly contradictory. The specific reason for that discrepancy would be useful to tease out and document somewhere. For example, does one apply de minimis to the document as a whole where the other considers it in terms of each copyrighted work (each included image), and, if so, which one applies under what circumstances and why? At least, in light of this I feel I am no wiser and lack the tools to make this determination in the future (let's say I wanted to upload the PDF of Campbell v. Acuff-Rose Music, Inc.). --Xover (talk) 19:43, 29 April 2019 (UTC)
Uhh... I'm not sure I'm super comfortable claiming DM on this. I mean, I'm not lighting fires and sharpening swords, but I'm not super comfrotable. GMGtalk 22:14, 29 April 2019 (UTC)
Neither am I. I think all the potentially infringing images an one email should be redacted or blurred per pcp. I continued discussion from DR section "Deciding which images need to be removed" at File talk:Report On The Investigation Into Russian Interference In The 2016 Presidential Election.pdf#Deciding which images need to be removed.   — Jeff G. ツ please ping or talk to me 00:14, 30 April 2019 (UTC)
@Xover: It's not de minimis. The report is a collective work so each work contained within it must be separately evaluated. At least some of the photos and screenshots are copyrighted, so they simply need to be obscured. Kaldari (talk) 00:57, 30 April 2019 (UTC)
From COM:PCP The precautionary principle is that where there is significant doubt about the freedom of a particular file, it should be deleted. Is there really significant doubt when COM:DM#3 Copyrighted work X is identifiable, but is a small part of a larger work, so that the larger work cannot easily be shown without showing X. X is a part of the larger work, and its inclusion is unavoidable., COM:DM#4 Copyrighted work X is identifiable and an unavoidable part of the image subject, but is not essential to the subject (blacking it out would not make the file useless), and COM:DM#5 Copyrighted work X is identifiable and an unavoidable part of the subject, and is essential to the subject (e.g. blacking it out would make the file useless) but the work is shown in insufficient detail and/or with insufficient clarity, so de minimis may apply. seem to pretty easily apply to the images in question? The document is almost 450 pages long and there are *at best* 5/6 portions of those pages that might require some kind of additional redaction.
Furthermore, the point of this post was *not* to debate the specific situation regarding the Mueller Report, it was to point out the lack of guidance and documentation on this issue in general. Clearly there is room for debate on this and there is a gap in current policies/guidelines to adequately explain it. Xover has done an excellent job trying to keep the discussion focused on this point and I don't think it is helpful to re-litigate the closed deletion discussion here. (But, of course, guilty as charged...) - PaulT+/C 03:21, 30 April 2019 (UTC)
 Comment All comments above about removing some images completely misunderstand the point of Commons:De minimis. If only a small portion of a document is under a copyright, it is OK. You can see several examples on that page. Regards, Yann (talk) 03:28, 30 April 2019 (UTC)
@Yann: You make this assertion, but you do not provide your reasoning, making it hard to extrapolate guidance for other situations. The matter is also clearly not without controversy judging by the dissenting opinions you refer to, and, as mentioned, I've been unable to find any specific guidance in established policy for this issue. Absent the reasoning on which you base this conclusion it is impossible to assess.
For example, COM:DM contains the following: In determining whether the copying was sufficiently trivial, the court will consider all the circumstances. So, for example, if the poster forms an essential part of the overall photographic composition, or if the photograph was taken deliberately to include the poster, there is likely to be copyright infringement, and it is no defence to say that the poster was 'just in the background'. If the existence of the poster was the reason the photograph was taken in the first place, copyright infringement cannot be avoided by additionally including within the frame more of the setting or the surrounding area.
What's the basis for concluding that the entire document is the relevant context for determining de minimis, rather than, say, the page or the image? For a fair use determination (a different but related question), factors that will be determinative include how much of the copyrighted work was used and what impact the use is likely to have on the (commercial) value of the original. Both these suggest it is the original image and not the setting it is placed within (the whole document) that should be assessed.
How do you see this reasoning applying to other similar situations; for example a PDF of the Supreme Court's opinion in Campbell v. Acuff-Rose Music, Inc. which includes the complete lyrics to Roy Orbison's "Oh, Pretty Woman"? The entire document is (depending on which version you view) around 30 pages, 2–3 of which are the lyrics of Orbison's original and the derivative version by Campbell. --Xover (talk) 19:00, 30 April 2019 (UTC)
Contrary to @Yann: , I do not believe De minimis applies to external images prominently and purposefully embedded in a text document, and substantially discussed by the text. From a licensing perspective the Mueller document is more of a collective work incorporating works by different authors, and some under fair-use. Unfortunately, the examples on Commons:De minimis only discuss graphical elements within other images, and the applicability to other copyrightable media (sound, video, books, etc) remains unresolved, as indicated by stale discussions on Commons Talk:De minimis. If I uploaded a 3 hour-long self-made animation with a 5-minute-long Mickey Mouse cartoon in the middle, or a PDF consisting of 1000 blank pages and 1 page with a large picture of Mickey Mouse, the number of pages or film frames that aren't Mickey Mouse doesn't change the underlying copyright. That's substantially different from an image depicting people at a party, one of whom happens to have Mickey Mouse on their t-shirt, which is what Commons:De minimis primarily discusses. Incidental use is DM, purposeful use is probably not. --Animalparty (talk) 20:10, 30 April 2019 (UTC)
I think this is fairly well along the lines of what I've been thinking as I've been mulling over the situation for the past day or so. Despite its name, I'm not sure DM is primarily an issue purely of proportionately "minimal" use, but rather of use that is incidental and accidental. That "minimal" is a normal prerequisite for something to be incidental and accidental doesn't necessarily mean that is it the most important measure. That's why, at least in my experience, we are much more strict on DM claims with screen shots than we are with photographs or...hypothetically, someone making an audio or video recording of a public event. Everything in the screen shot (with comparatively rare exceptions) is assumed to be, on some level, intentional and essential. On the continuum from a screen shot to a public photo, it's hard not to see a document being a great deal more like the former. GMGtalk 20:28, 30 April 2019 (UTC)
Thank you, my thoughts exactly. De minimis is about recognising copyrighted elements that just happen to be present and exist without any intent to draw attention to them. Think about a broad photograph of a park...there may happen to be a random sculpture over in that yon corner, but the point of the photograph isn't to draw attention to it. We've absolutely deleted images where a copyrighted element may only have been a small portion of the overall image, but where that element was a central focus or attention was otherwise easily drawn to it. This document is a perfect example of what isn't de minimis. Whole works of potentially copyrighted items are present in it with the intent that they be seen and considered as an integral part of the whole document. Better guidance needs to exist on this topic, and the offending images simply removed. — Huntster (t @ c) 21:43, 30 April 2019 (UTC)
Well I wen't to the gym, and ran a few miles and thought about it, and this was the thought experiment I came up with. Suppose I attended an unveiling of a portrait by a famous painter (leave FOP out of it). She was there at an auditorium, in front of a large crowd to pull the chord and unveil her work for the first time. I get to the back of the room and take a wide shot photo as soon as the curtain drops. I get the painting, the artist, the stage, the crowd, the whole nine yards. The two-dimensional representation of the image takes up...say...three or four percent of the total pixels in the image.
To my mind, that would still not be DM. The painting is not incidental or accidental; it is intentional and essential. If you blacked it out, it would seriously diminish the worth of the photo, because I'm not just taking a photo of an artist in front of a crowd; I'm taking a photo of an unveiling of a painting.
If three or four percent bothers you, then ratchet it down to whatever doesn't. The point is that what determines DM wouldn't be the proportionality, but the intentionality. If proportionality was the deciding factor, then we could in theory upload any sufficiently large work so that it could contain any amount of copyrighted elements under a claim of DM, and obviously we can't really do that. But that's what a primary focus on proportionality means if followed consistently. GMGtalk 23:00, 30 April 2019 (UTC)

Conclusion and next steps

Ok, the discussion appears to have petered out. Would it be fair to say that the consensus is that the original copyrighted material is the relevant frame of reference relative to which de minimis must be assessed; that the core aspect of de minimis that applies here is the incidentality and extensiveness of the use; and where a document specifically includes whole copyrighted works (images, emails, song lyrics) and comments or references them inn the text, de minimis does not apply?

I would like to update COM:DM with some specific guidance along those lines, but I don't feel the number of participants or the relative extensiveness of the discussion supports such a change on its own. What would be the appropriate process to do that? Post a proposed text for discussion at the COM:DM talk page? Or here? Should COM:DW reference the issue somehow too?

Anything else I haven't taken into account? --Xover (talk) 09:59, 5 May 2019 (UTC)

I noted the discussion, but didn't feel like I had much to add beyond the rather sound points already made. Your conclusions and proposal seem reasonable. —LX (talk, contribs) 10:30, 5 May 2019 (UTC)
I agree with your conclusions, but would like some solid case studies or court decisions to back them up. We shouldn't base official policy (which COM:DM is) on the hunches and opinions of the masses: me, I'm just some yahoo on the Internet: not a lawyer, not a copyright expert. --Animalparty (talk) 02:29, 7 May 2019 (UTC)
That just about sums up my feelings as well, which was why I was kinda hoping this discussion would draw out either some solid legal analysis or sufficiently large participation. I'm absolutely willing to call what we have sufficient to provide guidance on this additional use case in COM:DM, but more because "it's what we got and it's needed" then because I think it's ideal. If anybody has suggestions on how to bring this on a stronger legal footing than "a consensus of Internet yahoos" I'm all ears. I notice MichaelMaggs was the author of COM:DM. Would it be worthwhile to ask him to chime in? Is there any chance at all we could get WMF Legal to make a statement on this, and do we have an established process for requesting that? --Xover (talk) 05:02, 7 May 2019 (UTC)

Missing EXIF metadata

An SPA uploaded a few pics of a seemingly non-notable individual few years ago. My query is regarding this pic, which is tagged for deletion. It was first uploaded at the Commons, and a day later, its lower resolution copy was uploaded at the Facebook. In short, the Commons' pic is the oldest and the highest resolution version on the net. Is it fine to delete the pic because of its missing EXIF metadata? BTW, I cropped its unnecessary part, as it was used for promotional purpose at Krishan Pal Gurjar. - NitinMlk (talk) 22:45, 25 April 2019 (UTC)

The permission is present. So, there is no reason to speedily delete it. Ruslik (talk) 19:54, 27 April 2019 (UTC)
Lack of EXIF metadata is not in itself sufficient cause for deletion. People may choose to scrub certain identifying data, scan their old slides or photographs, and/or upload modified files that lack complete EXIF for whatever reason. While the presence or lack of EXIF data might be one bit of evidence to weigh in assessing potential copyright violations, its presence is not required by any policy, and we should assume good faith unless sufficient evidence points to the contrary. --Animalparty (talk) 01:41, 28 April 2019 (UTC)
Thanks to both Ruslik0 & Animalparty for the clarification. The uploads of this SPA might be useful for some en WP articles, e.g. cropped version of this file can be used at Mamta Sharma (politician). So they also seem within scope of this project. - NitinMlk (talk) 22:01, 29 April 2019 (UTC)
Image taken in 2019 with a 1997 Sony Mavica MVC-FD7
The same view, image taken with a Nokia 8 at the same time

I think that Animalparty is pointing out a very important matter. I often think, when processing deletion requests, that people nowadays tend to suspect copyright violations too quickly if an image is rather small and/or doesn't have EXIF data. Context is important. Yes, low resolution and missing EXIF data can be reasonable grounds for suspicion. But this is only the first step. Then we have to check: Did the image appear anywhere else on the web prior to the Commons upload? Maybe it is an old image, taken with an old digicam or mobile phone that doesn't produce better images? Especially in developing countries, older equipment may be still in use. Or maybe a crop from a physical photograph taken before digicam time and later scanned? Images that were considered of fairly high resolution when Commons was created in 2004 may now be at the lower end of the spectrum. And so on - it all boils down to plausibility and the individual case.

As I find this matter quite important, I considered this thread an opportunity to create an example, and dusted off an old Sony Mavica MVC FD-7, an early digital camera from 1997. It's a fascinating piece of technology - saving images on floppy disks (and yes, I still have a 3.5" floppy disk drive to read these :-) ). It saves around 50 images with a maximum resolution of 640x480 pixels on a floppy disk, and doesn't generate any EXIF data for the JPEG files. On May 1, I went to a village nearby and took some images with it. And then I also took some images using my current smartphone, a Nokia 8. Here I proudly present the comparison: Images of the cemetery chapel of Oberdorf, canton of Solothurn, Switzerland. Both taken on May 1, 2019, from the same point of view and at about the same time (shortly after the sun set behind the Jura mountains). One with the Mavica MVC FD-7 (on "fine" quality setting, creating a larger file size than the standard setting: a whopping 57 KB in this case!), one with the Nokia 8. I think this serves as a good example for the progress of digital camera technology in the last 20 years... and of how we should keep that in mind when looking at older pictures. Gestumblindi (talk) 21:26, 3 May 2019 (UTC)

Gestumblindi, thanks for putting efforts to give us a practical example on the issue at hand. And I have same views as that of Animalparty and you on this matter. In fact, this issue has been rankling me for a long time, as I have seen files being deleted solely on the basis of missing EXIF data in the past, although I can't recall the exact instances now. At least now we can cite this thread to strengthen our argument.
Generally speaking, the files which are tagged for deletion can be tackled properly if admins go the extra mile, but the situation is more complex in deletion requests (DRs). I guess the main problem lies from the fact that the deletion requests here mostly have no participants, unlike, say, AfDs of en-WP. So, most of the times, admins on this project are left with just the rationale of the nominator. This in turn leaves them with two options: to go with the nom's rationale or to do their own research on the nominated file. Now, speaking in terms of en-WP policy of INVOLVED, if they do their own research on the nominated file then they already have a bias, which makes them more suitable for !voting rather than to close the DR. So I guess they often go with the nom's rationale which is at times half-baked and flawed. In short, the situation here is both unfortunate and complex. I guess it will only get fixed when the DRs will start getting ample inputs from competent participants. Till then, the non copyvios will keep on getting deleted along with the copyvios. - NitinMlk (talk) 00:07, 9 May 2019 (UTC)
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