Commons:Village pump/Copyright/Archive/2023/02

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Item in a 1941 US newspaper

Assuming that it would be copyright, I uploaded this image to en:Wikipedia, pleading "fair use" in a single article there. But now I'm starting to wonder if it's copyright after all. Perhaps I could upload a bigger version here, under {{PD-US-no notice}}. Or could I?

If you have Wikipedia Library access to the Newspaper Archive, you should find the source newspaper page here. If not, well, it's on the first page of the "City Section", of the 1 January 1941 issue (vol 53, no 132) of The Bakersfield Californian. It's on page 33 (which the Newspaper Archive numbers "74"). Of course there's no mention there of copyright. However, I wondered if there was an assertion of copyright for the entire newspaper. When I tried to find out, I quickly became confused....

On the page of the same newspaper that the Newspaper Archive numbers "39", there's a formal, legalistic sort of statement of who does what, etc. I'd expect it to say something about copyright. It does not use the word (or "©"); but it does perhaps imply copyright. I quote:

Member of the Associated Press / The Associated Press is exclusively entitled to the use for publication of all news dispatches credited to it or not otherwise credited in this paper, and also the local news published therein.

I find this oddly opaque. In one interpretation: "Anything not credited elsewhere is AP." And although in my view this illustration isn't local news, I suppose that it could be argued that what, in a local newspaper, is both local and brand new is thereby local news. So possibly the paper is asserting the AP's copyright over this illustration. Or am I paranoid? -- Hoary (talk) 07:35, 1 February 2023 (UTC)

For what it's worth, the header texts at Category:Photographs distributed by Associated Press and Category:Associated Press articles assert that none of the articles and images distributed by the Associated Press until 1963 had their copyright renewed and are therefore in the public domain. So regardless of notice status, if it is an Associated Press illustration it would be eligible for PD-US-not-renewed. Felix QW (talk) 07:59, 1 February 2023 (UTC)
Thank you, Felix QW. I'll wait a little longer, and then, if nobody has discouraged me from doing to, will upload the thing here. -- Hoary (talk) 11:31, 1 February 2023 (UTC)
That AP statement is not a copyright notice. In terms of legal effect, it's an assertion of rights under the hot news doctrine, which isn't relevant here since content from 80 years ago isn't exactly "hot". The requirements for a valid copyright notice are fairly strict, it would have to contain the word "Copyright" or an abbreviation or very similar wording, or a copyright symbol. I checked the newspaper on Newspapers.com and found no copyright notice for the whole issue, so you should be good with {{PD-US-no notice}} and/or {{PD-US-not renewed}}. BTW, the illustration seems to be created by the newspaper itself, not by the AP. Toohool (talk) 18:27, 1 February 2023 (UTC)
Thank you, Toohool, for the education (and for the good news). Every time I think I've more or less got a grip on copyright matters, I read a little more about these matters and am reminded that no I do not. -- Hoary (talk) 22:04, 1 February 2023 (UTC)
Done: File:Past 1940, future 1941, and present Georgie Starbuck Galbraith, on 1 January 1941.jpg. -- Hoary (talk) 23:08, 1 February 2023 (UTC)

Question about beer labels etc.

Hello,

I have a question about the files contained in the Category:Beer labels and hope I'm in the right place. Is this kind of images really compatible with the "commons rules"? Are most of the illustrations really nothing more than "simple design"? Is there any (other) justification why these files are OK? I have considered possibly contributing similar files, but am not sure if I should actually upload them.... Similarly, Category:Beer caps Examples:

N8eule78 (talk) 15:28, 1 February 2023 (UTC)

@5snake5: as uploader.
The dubious claim of "own work" and lack of dates for when these designs were originally done don't help to resolve the question. - Jmabel ! talk 15:44, 1 February 2023 (UTC)
Pinging @Pan krzyżówka as uploader for the fourth one, and Pinging @Godewind for the fifth. That fifth one is at least mostly good (only a few of those are likely even to approach the threshold of originality). - Jmabel ! talk 15:47, 1 February 2023 (UTC)

Possibly PD-US-notice

This photo is lacking a copyright notice and, therefore, can be uploaded to Commons under a {{PD-US-no notice}} license, right? Is there a notice that I'm not seeing? The image is watermarked, but that appears to be because someone is trying to sell it and not because it was added by whomever took the photo or first published it. -- Marchjuly (talk) 01:24, 2 February 2023 (UTC)

Appears that way. There is no notice on the back, which is where the bulk of the text is. Carl Lindberg (talk) 07:29, 2 February 2023 (UTC)

legal question

In cases where the license for an image on Flickr was changed (to Commons-incompatible) on Flickr after it was uploaded to Commons, would a manual record of the license-review (LR) at time-of-upload by admin or license-reviewer be given the same legal value as a bot-generated (FlickrReview-bot) one?
The case at hand are these 2010-uploads from the same Flickr-account, which were now found to have been changed from CC-BY to ARR on Flickr:

While I didn’t hesitate to replace the speedy-tag by a {{Flickr-change-of-license}} for the latter file, I wonder whether in case of conflict at court the human-created LR-record would be sufficient as proof that the image was indeed freely-licensed at time of upload to Commons. Opinions? --Túrelio (talk) 08:43, 1 February 2023 (UTC)

Just to throw it out there the reason this came up is because I nominated the first image in the series for speedy deletion as copyrighted. Túrelio then reverted it because the bot had cleared the image as being licensed under the CC-BY. The problem as I see it though is that the Flickr user seems to have gone back and forth between CC-BY and "all rights reserved" multiple times and then eventually settled on "all rights reserved." Which makes me think they didn't understand the copyrights or mean to choose to CC-BY. IMO the bot shouldn't override common sense or the context. In this case, I don't think we can reasonably say the user wanted the images to be licensed under CC-BY and I don't think "well, the bot said they did" would hold up in court if it ever went there either. Although, I admit it's a grey area. But one where it would be helpful to clarify things. --Adamant1 (talk) 09:01, 1 February 2023 (UTC)
Flickr's licence history shows File:Vanessa 2.jpg was all rights reserved in 2006, changed to CC-BY 2.0 in 2009 and reverted to all rights reserved in 2016. That isn't an example of a short term mistake where it was under the wrong licence for a few minutes as the author played with the settings. We need to preserve the image here under the genuine CC licence to protect people who have reused this file from potential prosecution. From Hill To Shore (talk) 09:11, 1 February 2023 (UTC)
I was mainly talking about File:Vanessa 1.jpg since that's the image I originally nominated for deletion and looked at. Unless I'm reading it wrong Flickr shows that the license for it was changed four times within a minute on March 24, 2009. So at least in that case the author was clearly playing with the settings. It appears to be the same way with File:Vanessa W..jpg. Again, unless I'm miss-reading the license history. I don't really see why them settling on CC-BY 2.0 for a few years in the interim really matters. Maybe they just gave up since they clearly didn't know what they were doing. The fact that they eventually changed it back to all rights reserved and left it that way clearly indicates they didn't want the images to be licensed under CC-BY 2.0 though. I don't see how it's our job to protect people who have reused the files from potential prosecution either. We aren't an intermediary legal defense team here. Whatever legal issues someone might get into from using the images is between them and the Flickr user. I'm pretty sure the guidelines/policy even say as much. --Adamant1 (talk) 09:14, 1 February 2023 (UTC)
I can't see the licence history for File:Vanessa 1.jpg on my mobile, so I can't comment there. However, File:Vanessa W..jpg was also under a CC-BY 2.0 licence for 7 years. If the author came to us with a complaint about the file, then we could consider the case (though I have the strong suspicion that we would have consensus to Keep). I don't see any grounds for deletion on the argument of an unrelated user's suspicions about the potential motivations of the author. Whatever their intentions, the files were left licensed under CC-BY 2.0 for 7 years; that is a statement of fact. If you disagree, start a deletion discussion so we can gain a formal consensus. This is certainly too complex for the speedy deletion process. From Hill To Shore (talk) 10:24, 1 February 2023 (UTC)
I'm perfectly fine with Túrelio removing the speedy deletion requests. That's not what the discussion is about. Although it probably would have been good if you had of at least waited until other people commented on this before you removed the rest of them. Otherwise, it kind of comes off like a single person doing bad faithed POV edits. The disagreement isn't magically or instantly resolved just because you gave your opinion and reverted the deletion requests. --Adamant1 (talk) 10:33, 1 February 2023 (UTC)
Speedy deletion templates are dangerous in that an admin can delete the image at any moment. As long as they remain, there is a chance that an admin acting in good faith could mistakenly delete the files. Any user can contest a speedy deletion tag. If you think the issue remains, you can take this to a formal deletion discussion; I will be happy to start the discussion myself later today when I get access to a computer. The automated tools to start the deletion discussion aren't readily available on mobile. I would appreciate it if you avoid accusing me of acting in bad faith. From Hill To Shore (talk) 10:53, 1 February 2023 (UTC)
I'll quote Túrelio's original question "I wonder whether in case of conflict at court the human-created LR-record would be sufficient as proof that the image was indeed freely-licensed at time of upload to Commons." The reason I'm accusing you of acting in bad faith to the small degree that I am is because your making this about deletion discussions when that's clearly not what Túrelio started the conversation for. Also, your continuing to talk about starting formal deletion requests when I've already told I don't care that the files weren't deleted. If I tell you I'm fine with the speedy deletions being removed and your response is to continuing harping on me about it then I don't know else to think except that your being bad faithed. Otherwise, why not just drop it and let other people give their opinions about the actual thing this discussion is about instead of making it about something literally no cares about or mentioned? --Adamant1 (talk) 11:02, 1 February 2023 (UTC)
You stated above that my removal of the speedy deletion tags as "bad faithed POV edits." I then explained the process that anyone can contest a speedy deletion request. If you have a problem with removal of a speedy deletion tag then the normal process is to start a deletion discussion. If, as you say, you don't have a problem with removal of the speedy deletion tags, why did you accuse me of acting in bad faith and then accuse me of acting in bad faith when I explained the normal process? If you want this to stop, please desist from accusing me of acting in bad faith. I am not sure how I can "drop it" when I am not the one making accusations; all that is required is for you to stop making the accusation and the conversation will move on. Your edit to reduce your accusation of me acting in bad faith to a "small" accusation of bad faith[1] is still not particularly helpful. From Hill To Shore (talk) 11:21, 1 February 2023 (UTC)
No, I said it comes off as "bad faithed POV edits" if a single person comments on a discussion in a general talk page and then reverts the edits being talked about before other people can say what they think about it. "Comes off as bad faithed" isn't the same "is bad faithed faith" though. I'm sure you get the difference. Regardless, I told you I don't care that the speedy deletion requests were reverted and I didn't need the normal process explained to me. Especially after I had already told I could literally give a crap about it. In the meantime, the only reason this discussion hasn't moved on is because you won't allow it to. Your nitpicking about me changing my comment to say "small" is a perfect example of that. People can edit their comments after they post them. The only reason it's an issue is because your making it one. Just like the only reason the whole deletion thing matters is because your making it matter. This discussion isn't about your apparent need to be the center of of it. Seriously, get over it. Just stop beating the dead horse and move on. I'm not going to ask you to drop it again. --Adamant1 (talk) 11:32, 1 February 2023 (UTC)
I am going to ask you a final time to stop repeating that I am acting in bad faith. It doesn't matter if you tried to mask it behind weasel words like "seems," "comes off as" or "small," the accusation should never be made. Twice now I have asked you politely to stop making the accusation and yet you continue to repeat it. If you repeat it again, I will have to escalate this as a breach of our civility guidelines. From Hill To Shore (talk) 11:41, 1 February 2023 (UTC)
Short answer on the court question -- we don't know unless it actually comes up in court and we find out. The entire reason we have license reviewers though is for that situation, so policy is that is enough to keep -- there is someone, other than the uploader, who verifies that the license was that way at that time on the source website. By policy that is enough evidence for us to keep. If a re-user is not comfortable with that, then don't use it. But if it's not OK, the entire Commons:License review scheme is useless, and changes in source websites can force deletions here, so it brings into question how "free" such works would be. The reviewer evidence would certainly be brought up at court; I can't imagine it being entirely useless or ignored. In Flickr's case, the license history (which did not exist for outsiders until recently, but courts could probably find out) would be far more relevant.
In this case, File:Vanessa 1.jpg looks like it was changed to CC-BY in March 2009 (the same change made twice one second apart; probably a double click or something in the web interface), then changed to All rights reserved seven years later in April 2016. The other two have the exact same history, so the license changes were probably made account-wide at that time. They were marked CC-BY on Flickr for seven years; no reason for deletion.
Speedy deletion should never, ever happen with change-of-license situations. They are never obvious copyvios. Agreed that if a user was changing the license within minutes and we somehow noticed the license and uploaded in that meantime, we should delete. So sometimes regular DRs are appropriate. However that does not happen regularly -- we do not have bots looking to auto-upload Flickr photos as soon as they are posted (there once was one long ago, FlickLickr, but it wasn't polling for uploads even then I don't think). A user would have to notice the free license, want the photo, then upload it. While that can happen, it would be relatively rare, and was uploaded on good faith, so there needs to be a much better review of that situation than a speedy. Nobody likes their good-faith edits reverted without reason, but in speedy deletion's case, those are very very dangerous to leave in place. If you see experienced users reverting those, it is far more likely that you made a mistake. In this case, I think you did misread the Flickr license history. By all means try to figure out the reason why via discussion, but it was likely more important to revert inappropriate speedy tags before discussing. If you want to bring something up in a DR so it can be discussed (or better yet bring it to this forum before going the DR route to make sure the policy is understood), that is fine. But not speedy -- those are for when you are 99.99% sure that they are blatantly copied here without permission, and that other editors here would agree.
CC licenses are irrevocable; the user has a right to stop distributing under that license but they cannot change the rights of copies already distributed. If they used Flickr for seven years, seen the license they chose, and did not read what they are licensing -- they bear responsibility for that. We do tend to accept changes of mind if they happen relatively quickly (even for direct uploads here), but not years later. Carl Lindberg (talk) 17:01, 1 February 2023 (UTC)
"I think you did misread the Flickr license history." That's totally possible. I said as much early. I'm not the one who started this discussion thread and I don't think Túrelio removing the speedy deletion requests or having someone manually review them was necessarily wrong either. I'm not here to re-litigate his decision. I'm mainly interested in the legal aspects of having a bot decide if something is CC-BY 2.0 or not. Maybe it would be worth having some kind of review process since no bot is 100% accurate. I'd hate to see someone sue the Wikimedia Foundation just because the bot wasn't working 100% accurately one day and miss-licensed a file or something. That said, I appreciate that you semi-answered the legal question though. Obviously this isn't a super simple thing. There's lots of un-tested legal grey areas with some of this stuff and I'm not claiming I know what the best way to handle every situation is. Túrelio dealt with it perfectly fine though. --Adamant1 (talk) 21:16, 1 February 2023 (UTC)
Bots are 100% accurate -- better than humans, that way, unless there were bugs in the code (and that is pretty easy to test). Confirmed by the license history at Flickr (another bot). All they show though is that the file was in fact licensed that way on Flickr, at that time. There can always be mitigating circumstances -- if the Flickr account is just license laundering, it's meaningless and not a valid license. If the photo is a derivative work, it needs more investigation. If the file description makes clear the someone other than the Flickr user was the author, the account default license may not be valid. If a user ever puts that license however on their own work though, it's not meaningless -- you may regret it down the road but that does not change the fact it was licensed. If there were unanticipated consequences of it fairly quickly, or they change their mind quickly, we tend to respect that and delete it. Even if a judge rules that it was an accidental license and not fully valid, anyone who used the work under the license is likely an innocent infringer. You can't revoke an irrevocable license -- those words do have real meaning. It's part of why we have users use the email templates in the COM:VRT process when they are giving a license; really make sure they are aware what is in the license. But just like ignorance of the law is generally not an excuse if you break it, ignorance of what a license entails doesn't mean it's not valid. If it was unintended, that may be material -- but seven years is too long for it not to matter, as they certainly would have noticed their photos had that license along the way, so it'd be hard to argue anyways. Per Commons:License review however, it is policy that is all we need. If there are other mitigating circumstances, it could be worthy of discussion, but if it's just doubting the license review, you are really just arguing for a change of policy (well unless the review text was added by a non-reviewer; that should be apparent by the edit history). A DR should have additional information which demonstrates the fact of the license tag as not meaning what it seemingly does. Really, these files were relicensed CC-BY in 2009 (there was no back and forth), and changed back seven years later. If they were the Flickr user's own photos, there's not much to argue that I see. Carl Lindberg (talk) 00:50, 2 February 2023 (UTC)
I trust the bot, i remember early days they had issues and admins shut it off meaning Images were piling up and Licence Reviewers could not handle it, lets not go down that hole again..if possible, run a new bot which checks images and current licences on flickr and if licences have been changed, adds the "Flickr-change-of-license" template to it as well as a LR/Admin 're-check' category for LR and admins to review those images just incase there maybe a need to delete them or fix them as they may be used on a lot of projects across wikimedia.. I know a lot of Flickr users left or "angry" re-licenced their images to ARR when Flickr became greedy and did not allow non-paying users to upload more than 1000 images, so we could see a lot of images no longer hosted on Flickr or licensed changed, would be a good idea for us to run a script/bot to find those images and ensure if we want to keep most of those (if they are not in use or in a category)... Stemoc 22:38, 1 February 2023 (UTC)

You know since we are on the topic, I seem to remember reading somewhere that CC-BY allows for the license of a work to be changed or updated. If no one minds me asking, what would be the point in someone changing the license of a work if it's then still licensed as CC-BY 2.0 or whatever? Like I obviously can't license something as both CC-BY 2.0 and all rights reserved at the same time. Otherwise, what would be the point and how would that work in court if someone who changed the license sued for copyright infringement? I don't see how we could reasonable say legally that a CC-BY license can be changed or updated, but the work is still covered by CC-BY regardless. It's just nonsensical. --Adamant1 (talk) 21:48, 1 February 2023 (UTC)

This is all too abstract for a VP discussion. We have issues regarding licenses, changing of licenses, and whether to trust the veracity of the person or the bot who reviewed the licenses all in a single discussion. There will be no simple answer and all of this would have been better served with a DR rather than starting with a speedy template. We have a Flickr user who had an license on an account, someone else who uploaded here, (someone/something else) who 'verified' the claim, and now a current review of the page shows a different license so we don't know if the upload or the verification was/is correct. None of this can be determined in a single, simple analysis. If the bot was screwing up, that's an issue. If the person was messing around, that's an issue. If the person had a bad day, that's an issue. Otherwise, I presume we go with the fact that our verification system indicates that this was licensed with a compatible license at that time it was posted on Flickr based on numerous separate individuals (the uploader and verifying entity) confirming it but I could also see a DR going the other way if the image isn't important or has other criteria that makes this all questionable. Ricky81682 (talk) 22:11, 1 February 2023 (UTC)
Nothing in CC-BY allows you to change the license. You can't even add additional conditions to it. You can add additional rights of use, i.e. you can add as many other licenses as you want (the copyright owner is still the copyright owner). Other people may only use it under given licenses. You may be thinking of a clause when you are using a CC-BY-SA work in derivative works, the derivative can be licensed with a later version of CC-BY-SA (or another compatible license, which they list at their website). I.e. you can use a CC-BY-SA 2.0 and CC-BY-SA 3.0 work together in a single derivative, and license the result CC-BY-SA 4.0 or CC-BY-SA 3.0. You could not license it CC-BY-SA-2.0 though due to the second work. "All rights reserved" by itself is not a license -- it's just a declaration that copyright exists (from the old Buenos Aires Convention; where it was their version of the copyright symbol). So something can be "all rights reserved", or have a copyright notice, and yet still licensed in some way. But once you license with an irrevocable license, that can't be taken back. You can add other licenses like GFDL or Free Art License, or say change CC-BY-SA to CC-BY (the CC-BY-SA is still technically valid but pretty much subsumed by CC-BY). The "irrevocable" part is quite important though; without that you can revoke licenses. There are probably some aspects of free licenses which have not been tested in court, but some have, and so far they have worked as intended. Carl Lindberg (talk) 00:50, 2 February 2023 (UTC)
Can I Change the License Terms or Conditions "Yes — but if you change the terms and conditions of any Creative Commons license, you must no longer call, label, or describe the license as a “Creative Commons” or “CC” license." There's also Can I Waive license Terms or Conditions "Yes. You may always choose to waive some license terms or conditions." Nothing about that indicates that a CC license can't be changed or waived if the creator wants to change or waive it. Just that they can't keep saying the work is licensed under the CC or use the CC branding if they do. That doesn't have anything to do with derivative works either. --Adamant1 (talk) 01:02, 2 February 2023 (UTC)
On the first point I think you may be confusing, "Can I licence under a CC licence and later change to another licence?" with, "Can I alter the terms of the CC licence before I publish my work with that licence?" The text you point to is talking about the latter; you can copy the CC terms, change them into a custom-made licence and release your work under that new licence, but you must not claim your new custom-licence is a CC licence.
On the second point, you can always make your CC licence less restrictive than the original terms. For example, you could release a work under CC-BY-NC so the default position is no commercial use. If a commercial organisation wants to use that image, you can accept their payment and waive the NC clause for that one organisation. The licence hasn't changed, so it is still NC for the rest of the world but you have waived that restriction for a specific organisation you choose to work with. Personally, if I was in that situation, I would just issue the work under a new licence that names the specific organisation and the permissible uses alongside the unchanged CC-BY-NC licence. That way the commercial organisation has a suitable licence for their use and there is no later confusion about which users a proposed waiver of the CC terms was meant to cover. From Hill To Shore (talk) 05:29, 2 February 2023 (UTC)
I don't think it has anything to do with what the person does before they publish the work with the license. The text in the FAQ says "If you change the terms and conditions of any Creative Commons license, you must no longer call, label, or describe the license as a “Creative Commons” or “CC” license." To me "no longer" implies the work was already published and they were advertising it as CC before they changed the license to something else. That's why it says "call, label, or describe." Obviously no one is going to be calling, labeling, or describing a work as CC licensed before they have published it. Otherwise, why would anyone even care? Like if I'm sitting alone on my couch at home with a work I created but haven't published yet why would it matter how I use the CC-BY-NC logo, button, or other trademarks? It only Matters once the work has been publicly released, because then it would miss-lead costumers to use the CC-BY-NC logo, button, or other trademarks if the work isn't licensed under those terms. No one gives a crap if I slap a CC logo on my self-published zine that I'm never going to share with anyone or post anywhere though. --Adamant1 (talk) 07:12, 2 February 2023 (UTC)
@Adamant1 yeah but the point is, if I release a work as CC-BY-NC first, and it's published that way originally, then I try to revise the license to include special terms and conditions, now I've got a dual-licensed work with a secondary license that's not CC and can't be called CC because of CC's inherent terms. In fact my work is still indeed licensed CC-BY-NC and I can still assert that, because I first released under a bona fide CC license, but due to the dual licensing it's also licensed by something that I can't call CC... Elizium23 (talk) 07:17, 2 February 2023 (UTC)
"my work is still indeed licensed CC-BY-NC and I can still assert that" According to the FAQ you can't. Otherwise there'd be literally zero cases where the whole "you can't use the CC-BY-NC logo, button, or other trademarks if you change the license" thing would apply. The fact that you can't use the CC-BY-NC logo, button, or other trademarks if you change the license implies the work isn't CC-BY-NC licensed anymore if you change the license. Otherwise the clause is completely pointless and doesn't apply to anything. --Adamant1 (talk) 07:28, 2 February 2023 (UTC)
You aren't distributing it under CC-BY-NC anymore, in that case. Anyone who had already copied it can continue to use it under CC-BY-NC terms. Carl Lindberg (talk) 07:31, 2 February 2023 (UTC)
@Adamant1 I believe we're talking past each other because we're using the same term to mean two different things.
  1. "Change the license" as in modify the terms of a license with custom legalese.
  2. "Change the license" as in replace one set of license terms with another differing set with different rights and responsibilities. This is more accurately known as "relicensing" because of the irrevocability of most licenses such as CC.
If I modify a CC license, then it stops being a CC license, and I can't call it such. If I relicense a work, then it does not stop being licensed under the original.
You can certainly modify a CC license before publication, and slap it onto your work as you initially upload it. Then it's a modified non-CC licensed work! No ambiguity here.
If you upload a work as CC-BY-ND and then modify its license terms after some period, then you have "changed the license" in both senses of the term, but what you've actually done is relicensed a work, under a dual-license, one of which you can call CC, because it is bona fide CC, and the other you can't, because you modified the terms. Elizium23 (talk) 08:36, 2 February 2023 (UTC)
They are protecting their trademarks, in that you can't alter the license text and still call it "Creative Commons". The result may be a free license, or it may not. If it's licensed CC-BY, then the unaltered text is the license, and the only terms allowed. If you change the license text, you are basically stopping distributing the work under the old license, and have changed to a new license. That is allowed, of course. You can not revoke the rights for people who already copied the work under its old license, since that license is irrevocable. From the very same FAQ that you found: What if I change my mind about using a CC license? CC licenses are not revocable. Once something has been published under a CC license, licensees may continue using it according to the license terms for the duration of applicable copyright and similar rights. As a licensor, you may stop distributing under the CC license at any time, but anyone who has access to a copy of the material may continue to redistribute it under the CC license terms. While you cannot revoke the license, CC licenses do provide a mechanism for licensors to ask that others using their material remove the attribution information. You should think carefully before choosing a Creative Commons license. Carl Lindberg (talk) 07:22, 2 February 2023 (UTC)
Sure, but I think it's a little different with digital files since they can be infinitely copied and there's no reliable way to tell which copy is the original, let alone which copy was created before or after a licensed was changed. Realistically there is only one image and one license. Sure there might millions of copies of it out there, but no one is going to sort through them to figure out which are licensed under what terms. They are just going to look at the current license and assume that it applies to whatever copy they have at the time. I assume that would go for the court system to. There's no 100% reliable, fool proof way to tell when an image was created. EXIF information can be edited. Checking the file properties to see when the image was created, modified, or accessed isn't reliable either. So we can spend all day debating the minutia, but the whole thing about the licensed can't be revoked is a distinction without a purpose since there's zero way to tell if an image was copied when the original was CC licensed or all rights reserved. Except maybe in this case the fact that the bot checked it, but not every image with a changed license was checked by a bot beforehand and I still don't think the whole "but the bot said it was fine" thing would hold up in court anyway. --Adamant1 (talk) 07:48, 2 February 2023 (UTC)
It's no different with digital files. You just have to show the license was in fact valid. So you are correct, the fact you stop distributing it under a license does not matter a whole lot, because someone who copied it can continue to distribute it to others under that old license. You are merely reducing the number of people who might find it under the CC license; you are not substantially changing the rights that others have because those have been given out already. It might be a more interesting question if someone can copy an "All rights reserved" file off of Flickr, and claim they copied it earlier, and so were licensed (or claim that once licensed for a reasonable amount of time, it's still OK to copy off Flickr) -- that could get a bit more "interesting" in court. Primarily, you have to prove that the user licensed the work with a CC license (and that you have not violated the terms of that license), and not much else. Carl Lindberg (talk) 07:58, 2 February 2023 (UTC)
@Clindberg, woah, "You [the end-user] have to prove... in court" that a given license was valid and abided by the terms? That seems a high burden of proof for someone who innocently used a file under a given license!!! Are you sure about that legally, and in what jurisdictions would that apply? I would think that the plaintiff and copyright owner would need to disprove that the license was present and valid at time of usage. I would think that the copyright owner would need to prove misuse that violates license terms. I'm not sure, though. A legal system that placed all onus upon the end-user would be endlessly litigious, because any sufficiently large publishing house could endlessly pursue anyone they pleased. Elizium23 (talk) 08:40, 2 February 2023 (UTC)
If it's someone else's copyright, it's always up to you to prove you were within rights using it (or argue on fair use grounds, etc.). Simply showing that the license existed on the photo should be enough most of the time, which is why we have the license review process (and put the tags on for Flickr uploads). You can't just claim a license existed, you have to show it. Of course, if the Flickr account was not the actual copyright owner, the license is bogus, and while you may have been misled, it's still infringement. But yes, the other party would have to prove misuse of the license if it comes to that, once it's established the license was valid. Carl Lindberg (talk) 09:00, 2 February 2023 (UTC)
@Clindberg, it's no surprise that copyleft trolls have emerged, and it's easy to conceive of many, many ways in which a licensee could fall foul of the simple Creative Commons terms. All the time I see works used with insufficient attribution (or none at all.) So I suppose I believe you. This sort of structure would make me too afraid to distribute or display anything but works which are unquestionably, unimpeachably in the Public Domain. There's no way the average Joe could sustain liability if a sufficiently heavy gorilla came after us. Elizium23 (talk) 09:19, 2 February 2023 (UTC)
Elizium23, you can really believe Clindberg; he is one of our top-experts in legal things. --Túrelio (talk) 09:31, 2 February 2023 (UTC)
Well, this has been an extremely educational conversation if nothing else. @Elizium23 I totally agree with your last comment. If it were me I wouldn't screw with anything that isn't obviously PD-OLD. Otherwise it seems like you could get into some dicey legal territory pretty easily. Especially as an end user or smaller website. Although it's easy to image a large website getting completely screwed over to. --Adamant1 (talk) 03:08, 3 February 2023 (UTC)
@Elizium23: Yes, the copyright trolls are rather frustrating, as there are ways the license can be gamed in practice (it would require them registering the work in most cases). Of course, if someone sues for copyright infringement it is up to them to prove they own a valid copyright, and that the defendant used its expression. However if you admit to using the work in question but under a CC license, then that aspect pretty much is not a topic for debate. You would have to show why you thought it was licensed, and the plaintiff would have to show why it was not (if you can't present any evidence of the license being given at all, then their argument gets easy). The license being on Flickr for seven years should be ample evidence of that, but you would have to respond to the particular argument of the plaintiff on why it was not licensed. If the license was valid (and "irrevocable" should mean that any plaintiff argument that they no longer give out that license should not affect that validity), then it comes down to if your actions followed the letter of the written license. There are certainly some possible pitfalls there. Of course, most people won't bother to sue in the first place, even for blatant infringement. I have seen arguments that the copyright system mostly works only because most people don't :-) Carl Lindberg (talk) 15:39, 3 February 2023 (UTC)

FoP status of Northern Cyprus

Cyprus island has two countries: Cyprus and Northern Cyprus.

Cyprus has freedom of panorama(See also: {{FoP-Cyprus}}, but FoP status of Northern Cyprus is unclear.

How about FoP status of Northern Cyprus? Ox1997cow (talk) 17:50, 3 February 2023 (UTC)

1911 U.K. copyright law still applies in Northern Cyprus (source: [2]) which allows Freedom of Panorama. Borysk5 (talk) 18:59, 3 February 2023 (UTC)

V-Label trademark

Hi guys, looking for thoughts on these files: Can we assume they are below the threshold of originality, or do we have to delete them?

Creator and owner are not the uploaders, but clearly https://www.v-label.com/ for more info see https://www.v-label.com/press-materials/ and https://www.v-label.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/09/v-label-manual-for-licensees.pdf - but that is about licensing food for carrying the label, not about the use of the label as an image. What do you think? --SI 15:20, 9 February 2023 (UTC)

This is probably below US TOO. The PDF you linked says Copyright © 2019 V-Label GmbH, suggesting it's a German company (see en:GmbH). We'd need to consult Germany's TOO. --Matr1x-101Pinging me doesn't hurt! {user - talk? - useless contributions} 18:06, 9 February 2023 (UTC)
Thanks! What I found meanwhile: The "V-Label GmbH" has its office in Winterthur, Switzerland,[3]; and it is owned by the European Vegetarian Union, who are based in Fischbach, Germany and Vienna, Austria and were founded in Hilversum, Netherlands.
But more important, the leafed "V" symbol was first used by the Associazione vegetariana italiana (AVI) and with consent spread from there to many other veggie organisations: [4][5].
My humble conclusion would be: the "leafed V" is by AVI and all others regarded to be below ToO and PD. The rest of the "V-Label" is only text, so I feel bold to mark them as "Trademarked"&"PD-textlogo". Think it's solved here (anyone feel free to reopen with new facts). --SI 01:28, 10 February 2023 (UTC)
This section was archived on a request by: SI 01:28, 10 February 2023 (UTC)

Do smiley face emoticons have no original authorship?

An earlier discussion at Commons:Deletion requests/File:Asd.gif appeared to conclude that the File:Asd.gif smiley face emoticon is a {{Pd-shape}} as "common property and contains no original authorship". Looking through Category:Animated smilies, many other icons like File:Kopfschuettel.gif and File:Hase-0037.gif have been marked the same way.

Is this correct? Is it fair to say that because these kinds of icons have probably been around since the early days of the internet and copied from site to site without credit, they are now effectively "common property"? I'd have thought that COM:PRP's "it can be found all over the internet and nobody has complained" would suggest otherwise. Belbury (talk) 11:21, 2 February 2023 (UTC)

These are clearly complex enough to have a copyright. The claimed license is therefore wrong. See Commons:Deletion requests/Files in Category:Animated smilies Yann (talk) 13:01, 2 February 2023 (UTC)
From what I understand Unicode emojis are in the public domain. Otherwise, they are copyrighted. That said, I'm not sure pd-shape would be the right copyright license regardless, but at least Unicode emojis don't have copyrights. --Adamant1 (talk) 10:55, 3 February 2023 (UTC)
I don't think representations of Unicode are automatically public domain: Commons doesn't host the Apple Color or Microsoft Segoe UI emoji sets, and Category:Noto Color Emoji smilies are explicitly Apache licenced. Belbury (talk) 11:32, 3 February 2023 (UTC)
I explained that in the DR. Essentially what it comes down is that the Unicode Consortium assigns a shape outline and short description to the Unicode characters' corresponding emojis. The shape outlines and short descriptions are PD. So any emojis based on them will be to. The question then becomes is whatever emoji we are talking about close enough to the original outlines/descriptions. I assume Apple Color or Microsoft Segoe UI emoji sets aren't, which is why Commons doesn't host them. Regardless though, it would be completely ridiculous to say "X isn't hosted on Commons so Y shouldn't be hosted on Commons either." That's not a valid delete reason. Also, emojis obviously aren't a monolith. So the fact that the Apple Color or Microsoft Segoe UI emoji sets aren't hosted on Commons is completely irrelevant. We just need to figure out how close the emoji is to the original design. --Adamant1 (talk) 12:42, 3 February 2023 (UTC)
@Belbury, Yann, and Adamant1: perhaps this WIPO Magazine article by Professor Eric Goldman (of Santa Clara University School of Law, California) and IP Attorney Gabriella E. Ziccarelli (from Washington, DC, USA) may be of help. Also ping the respondent @Itu: from the deletion request mentioned; best all discussion is made here and I'll put the DR on hold. JWilz12345 (Talk|Contrib's.) 13:26, 3 February 2023 (UTC)
I'm not sure we should be drawing any connection to Unicode here. Many of these emoticons are from old web forums which wouldn't have been created with strict Unicode adherence in mind (and may even pre-date the Unicode emoji block?). It seems more like a case-by-case question of whether the geometry is simple enough to be considered {{Pd-shape}}; whether a web artist creating a pixel art smiley face in 1998 was being significantly creative in doing so, or was drawing something so simple that it couldn't have been copyrighted even if they'd wanted to. Belbury (talk) 13:40, 3 February 2023 (UTC)
The shape outlines are not normative, and explicitly aren't PD. Unicode explicitly says the code charts are made with commercial fonts that may not be extracted. Treat the Unicode charts the same way as any other commercial font; glyphs may or may not be PD-Text in the US.--Prosfilaes (talk) 15:29, 3 February 2023 (UTC)
Unicode explicitly says the code charts are made with commercial fonts There's obviously a difference between the fonts being used for the corresponding Unicode characters (I.E. the numbers and letters that triggers the emoji) in the charts and the emojis that are based on the shapes and designs created by the Unicode Consortium. The fact that they happen to use commercial fonts for the letters/numbers in their charts has nothing to do with if the emojis are PD or not and This has nothing to do with fonts. No one nominated fonts for deletion and/or thinks Commons should host images of the fonts. In the meantime, I agree that it's a a case-by-case question. But one that should be based on if the emojis are different enough from the Unicode Consortiums original designs to be original works. Not if they qualify for PD-shape or not. In no other instance where there is an image derived from another one that's public domain would that fact be ignored in favor of judging if the image is a basic shape or not. --Adamant1 (talk) 20:19, 3 February 2023 (UTC)
(I.E. the numbers and letters that triggers the emoji) That (-: may map to an emoji has nothing to do with Unicode. Unicode emoji are just characters; like F is U+0046 and अ is U+0905 and 𐀱 is U+10031, 🫢 is U+1FAE2. The glyphs in the standard, be they Latin, Devanagari, Linear-B or emoji, are all from commercial fonts.--Prosfilaes (talk) 21:04, 3 February 2023 (UTC)
UUnicode emoji are just characters; like F is U+0046Unicode So the Unicode Consortium designs a shape outline and description for the letter F? Sure dude. What they do is provide a basic shape and description for what the emoji for the unicode characters U+1F600 should look like, which in that case would be a round yellow smiley face with a closed mouth, and then people either adapt it or they don't. What they aren't doing is creating shapes and descriptions for basic font lettering. Which is exactly why the whole thing about the fonts being commercial fonts exists, because they aren't designing them. Not to be rude, but I don't think you understand what's being discussed here. --Adamant1 (talk) 22:07, 3 February 2023 (UTC)
You are being rude. I've been on the Unicode list for 20 years, and I wrote the first proposal for U+1DF5 COMBINING UP TACK ABOVE, so I'm a bit familiar with how Unicode works. F is defined in https://unicode.org/charts/PDF/U0000.pdf and U+1F600 is defined in https://www.unicode.org/charts/PDF/U1F600.pdf in a quite similar fashion. Note that U+1F600 neither has to be yellow or round; it is merely defined as "GRINNING FACE".--Prosfilaes (talk) 23:20, 3 February 2023 (UTC)
Yeah sure, but what you linked to is just an excerpt from the table and the basic shapes and descriptions still aren't for the letter F. They are for the "GRINNING FACE" or whatever emoji it is. Obviously the letter F isn't a "GRINNING FACE." So what's your point? I'm not even saying your wrong necessarily wrong about the font thing, just that are two separate things here, the fonts and the emojis. Whereas your treating it like the only thing they do is define the fonts and have nothing to at all to do with the emojis. Which is clearly wrong. BTW, that's not to claim I know more then you do about this either, but I assume the person who the Forbes article and the professor of Santa Clara University School of Law who wrote the one for WIPO Magazine would know what they were talking about when they say the emojis are public domain. I haven't seen any evidence that they are wrong either. Nothing personal, but if it's between some rando user on Commons who says they know something because they signed up for a list 20 years ago or a professor of law, I'm going with the professor of law. Sorry. --Adamant1 (talk) 08:15, 4 February 2023 (UTC)
In general, there is nothing special about being inside a font. If an icon is copyrightable outside of a font, it will be copyrightable inside of a font, I'm pretty sure. Anything based on actual letters has a pretty high hurdle to avoid being considered typeface in the U.S., but pictorial icons I don't think would be treated specially. (Well, there was a case where made-up alphabet for a game was considered uncopyrightable, since it was a "system of communication", but I tend to doubt that applies for these. Apple did try to register copyrights on several Apple Watch animated emojis here; the ruling was mixed in that some were allowed and some rejected as being too simple. The analysis seems to be based on standard pictorial/graphic work threshold of originality analysis; they did not bring up anything about fonts or typeface really. It's possible that if the Unicode spec has drawings in it, those may be considered free use, but each font or platform often defines those icons themselves, and much of the time those specific icons probably add enough expression to be copyrightable. I'm not sure if Unicode provides any drawings; their web examples shows how they look on various platforms so those are not Unicode-drawn. It's possible such icons will become commonplace enough that they are considered uncopyrightable standard shapes, but not sure we are there yet. If they fail {{PD-shape}}, they should probably be deleted. Carl Lindberg (talk) 20:59, 3 February 2023 (UTC)
https://unicode.org/charts/PDF/U1FA70.pdf is one of the sections of Unicode that have emoji. The first page says "The shapes of the reference glyphs used in these code charts are not prescriptive. Considerable variation is to be expected in actual fonts. The particular fonts used in these charts were provided to the Unicode Consortium by a number of different font designers, who own the rights to the fonts. ... The fonts and font data used in production of these code charts may NOT be extracted, or used in any other way in any product or publication, without permission or license granted by the typeface owner(s)." I think the Unicode Consortium would rather dodge any question about whether or in what way fonts are copyrightable. From that file, I'd say the image for e.g. 1FA86 NESTING DOLLS is copyrightable even if several others aren't.--Prosfilaes (talk) 21:11, 3 February 2023 (UTC)
Yep, clearly those aren't usable, unless PD-ineligible. Just not sure how Unicode defines new code points -- when they define one, there wouldn't be a commercial font to extract them from :-) I don't know if that sheet is the only specification that vendors get, or if there truly is something actually Unicode-authored somewhere, intended for font vendors to use as a basis (which would mean some sort of implied license, if not explicit). But I'm not sure one of those has been identified yet. Carl Lindberg (talk) 21:21, 3 February 2023 (UTC)
Non-emoji generally require the proposer to have a font available, with most scripts having a non-Unicode font available and Evertype and SIL being generally willing to create a font for a few specialized Latin characters or whatever. For emoji, I looked it up, and they demand images from the proposer and a license from them (or a free license) (https://www.unicode.org/emoji/proposals.html#image_licenses and https://www.unicode.org/emoji/emoji-proposal-agreement.pdf ), but nothing that makes it clear that we can copy their version of the symbol.--Prosfilaes (talk) 23:31, 3 February 2023 (UTC)
Ah, thanks. That first link also says:
The Consortium licenses its standards openly and freely under various open-source licenses found here and here. Under these licenses, vendors implement encoded emoji into their products to be used all over the world. Therefore, once an emoji is encoded, it can never be removed. For this reason, the Consortium requires a broad perpetual license in any rights you or others may have in your proposed emoji.
So your first step in this process is to read the Emoji Proposal Agreement & License that you will be required to agree to as part of your Submission. This is an important legal agreement in which you (1) warrant that your proposed emoji is available for free and open licensing, and (2) grant to the Consortium broad rights, specifically a non-exclusive irrevocable, perpetual, worldwide, royalty-free license to encode your proposed emoji and to sublicense it under the Consortium’s various open-source licenses.
So yes, it would appear their data files are likely offered under a free license. Carl Lindberg (talk) 15:22, 4 February 2023 (UTC)

Third-party Website Licensed Picture transfer

If i want to transfer a picture from a third partty website that says Content is available under License CC BY-SA 3.0 unless otherwise noted. How can i do it please? Jtyccoonn (talk) 10:21, 3 February 2023 (UTC)

Download the picture, upload the picture using Commons:Upload, add license info in file description. Borysk5 (talk) 13:12, 3 February 2023 (UTC)
Alright, Thank YoU. Jtyccoonn (talk) 19:47, 3 February 2023 (UTC)
The photo Jtyccoonn uploaded seems to originate from the subjects Twitter Trade (talk) 21:15, 3 February 2023 (UTC)
I already made respective clarification and proof at the nomination. Happy weekend, Peace and LoveJtyccoonn (talk) 10:28, 4 February 2023 (UTC)

On the copyright status of an anonymous German photography from 1923

Is it possible that File:Bundesarchiv Bild 183-R1215-506, Berlin, Reichsbank, Geldauflieferungsstelle.jpg is in the public domain in Germany already? I don't see a credited author, and from what I could read in Commons:Copyright rules by territory/Germany it looks like it is in the public domain, but I'm still a bit confused by it. It's obviously in the PD in the US as per {{PD-anon-expired}} or {{PD-US-expired}} (and probably {{PD-1996}} too). Lugamo94 (talk) 01:18, 5 February 2023 (UTC)

We don't really know when and how the photograph was first published. The German Federal Archive says it's from the Allgemeiner Deutscher Nachrichtendienst - Zentralbild image pool, and since it's from 1923, per [6], it should be one of the photos of the old Scherl news agency originally founded by de:August Scherl. So it might have been published in a newspaper or magazine in 1923 (naming a photographer or not), or it might be a photo that was part of the archive and unpublished until the 2000s. Without knowing any further details, we can't really determine the copyright status. Since we have the file under a CC license from the Federal Archive though, it should still be ok to use. --Rosenzweig τ 01:30, 5 February 2023 (UTC)
Thanks. Lugamo94 (talk) 01:35, 5 February 2023 (UTC)

Actions taken: Warn; Filter description: Cross-wiki upload filter

I get this message while trying to upload a picture. What does this mean? Rob de Greeuw (talk) 08:02, 4 February 2023 (UTC)

When uploading directly through a wikipedia like you tried, there are some restrictions regarding file dimensions and file size (files have to be above those to be accepted). This was introduced because too many of these files had to be deleted because of copyright problems (Commons:Administrators' noticeboard/Archive 58#AbuseFilter for cross-wiki uploads). Uploading the file directly here should work. --Rosenzweig τ 01:44, 5 February 2023 (UTC)
@Rob de Greeuw: I encourage you to upload your photo directly here instead of cross-wiki platform, since it is more reassuring that your file does not meet problems. You can choose among the uploading methods listed at Commons:Upload, whichever you prefer. As Rosenzweig pointed out (and in my personal experience of nominating many files for deletions), majority of cross-wiki uploads are problematic in terms of copyright. JWilz12345 (Talk|Contrib's.) 02:32, 5 February 2023 (UTC)
But by the way Rob de Greeuw, is the image you're going to upload your own self-made or self-photographed image or not? If not, you still need to contact the copyright holder of the image you are going to upload and ask them to release a commercial license through COM:VRTS correspondence. If it is an old photo, then things get more tricky, and involve U.S. copyright law as well as the copyright law of the country where the old image was first published or first made public. JWilz12345 (Talk|Contrib's.) 05:19, 5 February 2023 (UTC)
@Rob de Greeuw: Hi, and welcome. I am sorry to inform you that you have triggered Special:AbuseFilter/153 by trying to cross-wiki upload a png image as a new user. Such uploads of png images are not allowed at all. You indicated it's your own work. Usually when someone uploads a png image, it's a copyright violation taken from the web. Please upload the full-size original of it per COM:HR, including any metadata, but it may be judged too complex to be under TOO in the country of origin, so you may need to license it on your official website or social media or send permission via VRT. Also, any png image will look fuzzy when scaled down (due to design decisions discussed in phab:T192744) or jaggy when scaled up, so you may want to upload an svg or jpg version, too. If you can't get a compliant license, the image may still be uploaded to English Wikipedia in compliance with en:WP:F (but sadly not Norwegian Wikipedia) because we don't allow Fair Use here. If you use our Upload Wizard instead, you should be able to avoid that filter.   — 🇺🇦Jeff G. ツ please ping or talk to me🇺🇦 05:06, 5 February 2023 (UTC)

Does a museum with opening hours count as "permanently located in a public place or in premises open to the public"?/FOP-UK

I'd say not as when a museum is closed it is not accessible to the public, therefore not permanently accessible to the public. But I see many files of artwork in the Tate Modern licensed with a FoP-UK. I'd say FOP relates to squares and parks but not the interior of museums and buildings with opening hours which count with limited access for the public.Paradise Chronicle (talk) 20:41, 4 February 2023 (UTC)

That is true for many countries, but current guidance in COM:FOP UK says museums are included. The "permanent" relates to the placement of the work of art itself; a temporary exhibition in a museum (with a scheduled termination date) would not be permanent, but a work displayed indefinitely would be. (Same for a work in a public square; if there just temporarily it's not OK to photograph.) Carl Lindberg (talk) 12:38, 5 February 2023 (UTC)
As Carl says, the current FOP guidance for the UK says that museums are included in "premises open to the public". Commons:Deletion requests/File:'The Visitation' by Jacob Epstein, Tate Britain.JPG states that it has been a long-running Commons practice that FOP in the UK counts in places that aren't open 24/7 and that charge admission. Abzeronow (talk) 16:24, 5 February 2023 (UTC)

Urheberrecht

Ich besitze eine große Zahl Bilder, die ich gerne unter der Lizenz CC0 veröffentlichen möchte. Überwiegend sind es selbst geschossene Bilder von Museumsstücken aus dem Vatikan, dem Louvre, dem Musée d´Orsay, dem British Museum, der Staatlichen Antikensammlung zu München und der Berliner Museumsinsel. Außerdem besitze ich zahlreiche Bilder von Sehenswürdigkeiten europäischer Städte. Was muss ich beim Hochladen beachten. Ist es möglich die Bilder unter dieser Lizenz zu veröffentlichen oder haben die Museen dafür spezielle Regelungen? -- Blidfried (talk) 17:57, 5 February 2023 (UTC)

Hallo Blidfried,
prinzipiell sind Fragen auf Deutsch besser im Commons:Forum aufgehoben, da lesen mehr Sprachkundige mit, auch Urheberrechtskundige. CC0 ist prinzipiell ok, siehe Commons:Licensing/de, wenn du keinen sonderlichen Wert darauf legst, als Urheber genannt zu werden. Falls doch, ist evtl. CC-BY-SA-4.0 oder so was besser. Bzgl. Museumsfotos: Unabhängig vom Urheberrecht gibt es da evtl. noch Hausrecht, das das Fotografieren womöglich ausschließt. Das tangiert wie gesagt das Urheberrecht nicht, aber es haben schon Museen (konkret: die Reiss-Engelhorn-Museen in Mannheim) Benutzer verklagt, die dort aufgenommene eigene Bilder unter ihrem tatsächlichen bürgerlichen Namen (und daher für das Museum greifbar) hier hochgeladen hatten. Die fotografierten Museumsstücke als solche sollten nicht mehr von Urheberrechten geschützt sein (also bspw. keine Gemälde von Picasso), es sei denn, es gilt auch in Museen die Panoramafreiheit (in Großbritannien ist das bspw. für Skulpturen der Fall, nicht aber für Gemälde). Die besagten Sehenswürdigkeiten (außerhalb geschlossener Museumsräume, also von der Straße aus fotografiert) sind u. U. auch noch urheberrechtlich geschützt (bspw. neuere Skulpturen oder auch Gebäude von Architekten, die noch keine 70 Jahre tot sind). Hier gilt in manchen Ländern die Panoramafreiheit, in anderen aber nicht oder nur so, dass sie hier nicht akzeptiert wird. Frankreich, Italien, Island und einige andere sind da problematisch. Commons:Urheberrechtsregeln nach Gebiet bietet einen Überblick und verlinkt Unterseiten zu den einzelnen Staaten. Gruß --Rosenzweig τ 18:34, 5 February 2023 (UTC)

Illustrations based on photographs

An ongoing DR which could probably use additional eyes: Commons:Deletion requests/Files uploaded by Waltercolor. — Rhododendrites talk |  19:31, 5 February 2023 (UTC)

Also relevant: Commons_talk:Copyright_rules_by_subject_matter#French_law_on_drawings_based_on_photographs (courtesy ping, Belbury). — Rhododendrites talk |  19:33, 5 February 2023 (UTC)

Permission given via Instagram link

Someone put an Instagram link as proof of permission for File:Chinese surveillance balloon over Billings, MT.jpg. But the link cannot be accessed without an Instagram account, and the link cannot be archived via archive.org or archive.is. Would the uploader have to submit other forms of verification? FunnyMath (talk) 20:14, 5 February 2023 (UTC)

@FunnyMath: Typically this would be handled by adding {{LicenseReview}} so an administrator can review and confirm the license. That seems to have been done already. – BMacZero (🗩) 01:28, 6 February 2023 (UTC)
Alright, if {{LicenseReview}} is good enough for people, then that's fine by me. I remember you used to be able to access Instagram links without an account, as well as archive the links. I used archive.org for an Instagram link to confirm the license for this file: File:Headshot_of_Esmé_Weijun_Wang.jpg.
Another point is that I'm worried that license reviewers could make mistakes when checking the license. For example, yesterday someone mistakenly confirmed the license for a file as CC-BY-SA 4.0 instead of CC-BY 4.0, which is the correct license. [7] If the Twitter link wasn't accessible without a Twitter account, then I wouldn't have been able to correct their mistake as easily. FunnyMath (talk) 05:04, 6 February 2023 (UTC)
Yes, these mistakes can happen. We're only human after all. :-)
However, they are usually quickly spotted due to the sharp eyes of our editors. Ixfd64 (talk) 20:19, 6 February 2023 (UTC)
@Ckdoak: Thanks for photographing and uploading it, and confirming the license on Instagram! @Bobamnertiopsis: Thanks for reviewing the license! @FunnyMath: Yes, that was possible! @BMacZero: Thank you for your answer! English Wikipedia editors and Admins: Thanks for documenting the incident at en:2023 China balloon incident and putting it on your Main Page!   — 🇺🇦Jeff G. ツ please ping or talk to me🇺🇦 05:15, 6 February 2023 (UTC)

License cleanup and duplicate files

Any ideas as to what's the best way to clean up the licenses of File:CyrusIrvingDitty.jpg and File:00000DITTY.jpg. They're certainly not the uploader's own work and they are duplicates; they also seem to be crops of File:C. Irving Ditty (1838 - 1887).jpg. Two pretty much identical crops aren't needed, but not sure which should be deleted. Marchjuly (talk) 10:32, 6 February 2023 (UTC)

Thanks to Bobamnertiopsis and Túrelio for helping to sort this out. -- Marchjuly (talk) 21:29, 6 February 2023 (UTC)

Copyrighted liveries

Is it fine to upload images of aircraft with complex liveries, which are definitely copyrighted?

And the second question is whether it is important from the POV of FoP, in which particular country such an aircraft would be photographed. -- AIpjanov (talk) 12:36, 5 February 2023 (UTC)

Yes, these are OK. See Commons:Deletion requests/Pokemon Jet for the discussion. Yann (talk) 12:42, 5 February 2023 (UTC)
I disagree. A similar picture of the Tiger plane was a picture of the day, but it was deleted as DW because the tiger was not de minimus. Glrx (talk) 13:30, 5 February 2023 (UTC)
@Glrx: Please be more specific about the filename or subpage name. BTW, on the subject of airplane nose liveries, I like the shark in Category:Antonov An-26 from The Expendables 3.   — 🇺🇦Jeff G. ツ please ping or talk to me🇺🇦 16:47, 5 February 2023 (UTC)
@Jeff G.:
Glrx (talk) 18:39, 6 February 2023 (UTC)
IMO these were deleted by mistake. One can be seen at [8] and the other at [9]. Yann (talk) 18:55, 6 February 2023 (UTC)
@Yann: Please see COM:UDR#Photos of Transaero (Siberian Tiger livery), EI-XLN, Boeing 747-412 by Leukhin Fedor (IRONHIDE).   — 🇺🇦Jeff G. ツ please ping or talk to me🇺🇦 12:37, 7 February 2023 (UTC)
It should have been "incidental", i.e. unavoidable when photographing the plane, a larger subject. Photos which focus on the livery get more problematic. Carl Lindberg (talk) 16:52, 5 February 2023 (UTC)
@Clindberg: Just to feel for the threshold: is this close enough to be considered as focused on the livery? --AIpjanov (talk) 17:02, 5 February 2023 (UTC)
Possibly. Stuff like that can be a harder thing to define, for sure. There aren't a ton of cases on the subject, but it's harder to identify the larger subject in that one. That photo, however, was taken in Australia which has freedom of panorama. That can also enter the conversation. Whether that counts as "two dimensional" or not is another interesting question. Carl Lindberg (talk) 14:38, 6 February 2023 (UTC)

Copyright

Hello! Is it possible to download images from pinterest to Wikimedia Commons? The site itself uploads pictures from other sites. Пётр Тарасьев (talk) 16:57, 6 February 2023 (UTC)

@Пётр Тарасьев: Most of the time, no. Exceptional cases are when the images in Pinterest are in the public domain due to age (probably anything after 1927 is under a copyright). Pinterest is not a reliable source anyway, so it is best to avoid it when another source is available. Yann (talk) 18:34, 6 February 2023 (UTC)
@Yann Thanks a lot for the clarification! Пётр Тарасьев (talk) 06:11, 7 February 2023 (UTC)

90125 album cover - threshold of originality

I was surprised to see the Yes 90125 album cover on Commons. The design seems more complex than any of the other album covers in Category:SVG covers of music albums. I am hesitant to nominate it for deletion in case my interpretation of the threshold of originality is incorrect, but I would be interested in some feedback from those more familiar with that threshold. Thanks, 28bytes (talk) 17:16, 6 February 2023 (UTC)

I'm not sure why the date of the given in the file's description is "1975" since that album came out in late 1983. The company that released the album is en:Atco Records (based in the US) and there's some content related to the cover art in en:90125#Sleeve design, but nothing to indicate the imagery was based on someone else's work from 1975. I think this would really be too close to call "PD-logo" per COM:TOO US. Moreover, all of the notifications on the uploader's user talk page and the fact they were previously blocked twice for "uploading non-free files after warnings", the last time for a month in June 2022, don't inspire confidence in their understanding of COM:TOO. On the uploader's behalf, though, this file was uploaded prior to their last block and perhaps just went unnoticed until you decided to take a closer look at it. This probably could be tagged with {{Copyvio}}, but maybe a DR would be good if there are users other than the uploader who feel it's PD. FWIW, the uploader doesn't seem to be the type that ever responds to talk page posts; so, I'm not sure there will be much to gain by asking them for clarification. -- Marchjuly (talk) 21:47, 6 February 2023 (UTC)
I'd say a DR might be reasonable, but not {{Copyvio}}. Threshold of originality in the U.S. is pretty high. I don't think I'd be able to say confidently whether this design reaches it. - Jmabel ! talk 22:10, 6 February 2023 (UTC)
Yes, after some further consideration, a DR is probably the best idea since the uploader is unlikely to respond to any tagging of the file and also because of COM:US#Algorithmic and AI-created works. -- Marchjuly (talk) 06:39, 7 February 2023 (UTC)

Photos of signs

It would seem that File:2022 - West Park - 7 - Allentown PA.jpg and File:2022 - Lehigh Parkway - Disc Golf Course - Allentown PA.jpg might be derivative works per COM:CB#Noticeboards and signs. Since there's automatic no FOP for 2D graphic works (even publically displayed ones) in the US per COM:FOP US (at least not for works installed after 1 Janaury 1978), this could mean that the imagery and text of the signs themselves would be subject to copyright protection of their own accord and this copyright would be independent of the copyright of the photos owned by the photographer/uploader. Would this be a correct assessment or are these files OK as licensed? Could it be argued that signs are de minimis if these are derivative works? I don't think that would be the case since the central focus of each photo is the photographed sign, but perhaps others feel differently. -- Marchjuly (talk) 01:34, 7 February 2023 (UTC)

@Marchjuly: in my opinion, only File:2022 - West Park - 7 - Allentown PA.jpg passes triviality test (US de minimis is based on triviality, not incidental or not-the-main-subject bases like those in European and Asian countries). But even if it passes US DM, the text at File:2022 - West Park - 7 - Allentown PA.jpg seems substantial enough, but it may be just below US TOO in literary works. File:2022 - Lehigh Parkway - Disc Golf Course - Allentown PA.jpg fails spectacularly: the image in the sign isn' trivial. COM:US#US States section does not list Pennsylvania as among states that default to copyright-free licenses for all categories of works made and owned by state governments (unlike California, Florida, and Massachusetts). JWilz12345 (Talk|Contrib's.) 07:45, 7 February 2023 (UTC)

Photos of yearbook covers

Category:Yearbooks of William Allen High School and Category:Yearbooks of Louis E Dieruff High School contain lots of photos of yearbook covers that are either {{Cc-by-sa-4.0}} licensed as COM:Own work or licensed as {{PD-US-no notice}}. I don't see how any of the "own work" claims could be valid since basically they are photos of yearbook covers created most likely created by others, with no new copyright be created by the photographer/uploader per COM:2D copying. In some cases, a {{Licensed-PD-Art}} wrapper could be used for the photos, but the copyright status of the cover itself would seem to be what needs to be assessed. Perhaps some are so simple, they could be treated as {{PD-textlogo}}, but quite a few seem too complex for that to be the case. For the ones licensed as "PD-US-no notice", it seems that some form of verification of that would be needed since any copyright notices would most likely be located on one of the inner pages of the yearbooks, wouldn't they? That would seem to be the common practice when it comes to stuff like this and that notice would cover all of the contents of the yearbook (including the cover art). So, I'm not sure it's sufficent to claim there's no notice simply because one isn't visible on the cover itself. -- Marchjuly (talk) 01:59, 7 February 2023 (UTC)

This is kind of tangential, but I've wondering myself if yearbooks from California, Florida, Massachusetts, and Puerto Rico qualify as PD or not since they are government works. At least I assume they are. I guess the reason I'm bringing it up to note that whatever the answer to your question turns out to be it would probably be dependent on the state, or maybe not. I'm not really sure, but I think it would. --Adamant1 (talk) 08:15, 7 February 2023 (UTC)
They aren't government works, except in the thinnest way. The photographs are all copyright by private photographers, and student work isn't government work. Anything by a teacher might be, but the stuff that's clearly the work of solely the teacher will be a small part of the work.--Prosfilaes (talk) 13:08, 7 February 2023 (UTC)
Even if yearbooks were 100% government works and even if these were yearbooks from high schools in Florida, they might not necessarily be PD because there are limitations built in to {{PD-FLGov}} that might somehow apply to them. For example, Florida statute allows Florida state universities and state colleges to claim copyright over their creative content. Perhaps schools below the university level aren't included in this, but perhaps they are. My guess would be if high schools and elementary schools are allowed to copyright their official websites, they might also be allowed to copyright other creative content originating from the school. -- Marchjuly (talk) 00:25, 8 February 2023 (UTC)

Does British or American copyright law apply?

Hello, so this image is probably public domain (made in 1786). However, I'm not sure if British or American copyright applies. If British copyright law applies, the 2039 rule may apply. This file was made after the Declaration of Independence, but before the Constitution. --Matr1x-101Pinging me doesn't hurt! {user - talk? - useless contributions} 13:28, 7 February 2023 (UTC)

The U.S. would be the country of origin regardless if it was before or after the revolution -- colonies always have a separate legal history. It's more what the modern country is for the territory where published, though of course British law is part of that history (Statute of Anne until 1790). You would follow any U.S. law developments thereafter to determine current status. At any rate, this is not eligible for copyright in the first place (blank form). The text from the government would be published, and the rest is just information, even if it was copyrightable under the Statute of Anne (doubtful, as that was mainly just for books; Crown Copyright did not really exist until 1911 even in the UK other than for specific works where they claimed privilege). The U.S. copyright law of 1790 replaced the terms of the Statue of Anne, and so on, so you'd trace the copyright status through those laws, to see if it ever expired, or even existed in the first place (or was since restored, though the U.S. never has for their own works). Carl Lindberg (talk) 15:39, 7 February 2023 (UTC)
This is PD-old-100-expired and PD-ineligible, so country of origin doesn't matter. Yann (talk) 16:27, 7 February 2023 (UTC)
For works that were truly unpublished, the UK and US both have some grandfathered terms that can still apply in extreme edge cases (overriding PD-old for the UK, for example). But, they are very unlikely -- it's rare that a work stays within a family for centuries. And the mechanics of it getting outside the family can sometimes be publication. Most of the time, I would not worry about it too much for extremely old works like this (even if was copyrightable), as you say. Assuming publication at some point long ago seems reasonable. If there is a specific claim from someone who says they own the copyright, we'd have to look at it more carefully then. Carl Lindberg (talk) 22:52, 7 February 2023 (UTC)

Copyright status of UK Government images on Flickr

Today, the UK Government uploaded four images of two newly appointed cabinet ministers to Flickr: [10], [11], [12] and [13]. These were originally uploaded to Flickr with a CC BY 2.0 licence but are now licensed under CC BY-NC-ND 2.0. It is to my understanding that the rights given by the original licence cannot legally be revoked and therefore still applies, though I may be mistaken. Furthermore, in the EXIF data for all four files a copyright notice is given that states "Crown copyright. Licensed under the Open Government Licence"; this is repeated under "Rights". Another part of the data gives instructions and usage terms which state "This image is for Editorial use purposes only. The Image can not be used for advertising or commercial use. The Image can not be altered in any form. All images are Crown copyright and re-usable under the Open Government Licence v3.0, except where otherwise stated". This appears to be contradictory, as the OGL v3.0 allows people to "copy, publish, distribute and transmit the Information; adapt the Information; exploit the Information commercially and non-commercially for example, by combining it with other Information, or by including it in your own product or application", which I understand allows the images to be used for both advertising and commercial use. I notice that the same discrepancies apply to many other UK Government images on Flickr ([14], [15] and [16] for example).

What is the copyright status of these images and if they are free what licence can they be uploaded to Wikimedia Commons under? ThatRandomGuy1 (talk) 19:11, 7 February 2023 (UTC)

While technically you are right that the original licence could apply, the fact that it was revoked in a matter of minutes/hours would leave you on shaky ground if you would ever go to court. You would claim that the licence was irrevocable while the copyright holder would claim it was an error that was immediately corrected. It would be down to the jurisdiction and judge which way they ruled in that situation.
In terms of the OGL 3.0, it includes the phrase, "unless otherwise stated" and they do state an alternative licence.
The named photographer, Rory Arnold, appears to be a UK government employee (shown on Google as being from Ministry of Defence) so we can rule out complications of a private sector photographer with their own copyright.
I'd suggest sending them an email asking them to clarify the licence before uploading here. From Hill To Shore (talk) 19:38, 7 February 2023 (UTC)
Yep, this is odd. I would not assume the CC-BY license at all; looks like CC-BY might be the account default but it was changed immediately upon upload to Flickr. We certainly would not be copying it off that site when that was the given license, which would should probably follow. I would normally say "advertising or commercial use" would refer to publicity/personality rights, and not copyright, which is not contradictory (but does seem to cause some Flickr site owners to add the -NC tag even though that is specifically about copyright). The "cannot be modified" though is at direct odds with the OGL statement. That might be referring to moral rights, but that clause goes beyond that. Sometimes their EXIF starts out with the more restrictive licenses, with OGL being added later, but having both in the same clause is weird. They do say "unless where otherwise stated", which is a phrase you would normally use on a website which might have an overriding license for particular image, but it makes no sense for an individual photo. It's either licensed OGL or it isn't. If it isn't, there is no reason to mention OGL in the first place. Maybe that was copy/pasted from a website usage. Getting clarification would not hurt, but if uploaded I'd probably say keep under the OGL tag given the explicit mention in the EXIF. Carl Lindberg (talk) 23:28, 7 February 2023 (UTC)
technically speaking you can't use that image "now", infact, it would be nice if people avoided mentioning those flickr accounts cause we don't want ppl mass loading images from there. In the case of Lucy Frazer, her Govt image right now is different and once they change it to the new one on that flickr then you can upload it from flickr to here but use her govt page as the source, its a work-around we have been using for years now, even though all images on their flickr are OGL, it can't be used directly...you can blame WikimediaUk for this issue as they have refused to talk to the UK Govt is straightening their policy when it comes to image use, trust me, had to go thru a few of those here....I understand why its NC-ND on flickr because first of all the image is crown copyright which is not free and secondly its OGL which is more free and unfortunately Flickr doesn't have an OGL licence so instead of ARRing (All Rights Reserved) that image, they choose a license which is closer to both crown and Creative commons..mind you this is not the same as how the US embassy whose images are all under the USGOVT-DOS license regardless of what embassies put it under, regardless of what the exif says in this case, which is infact NC-ND (This image is for Editorial use purposes only. The Image can not be used for advertising or commercial use. The Image can not be altered in any form), not all UK Govt images are free so we will not take it all into one category Stemoc 02:22, 8 February 2023 (UTC)

Scan of 1969 newspaper front page

Would some others mind taking a look at File:1969 - Moon Landing - 20 Jul MC - Allentown PA.jpg? It's licensed as {{PD-US-no notice}}, but I'm not sure that's correct. First of all, most of the content on that page appears to be stuff the paper received received from various wire services; in other words, it's not content that was originally created by the paper's employees themselves. So, it's not clear whether the paper would have any claim of copyright ownership over such content to begin with. Next, I'm not sure where copyright notices for newspaper typically required to be placed. Were they required to be on the front page somewhere (perhaos in the masthead)? Could they be located on an inner page along with other information about the publisher? So, even if the paper was able to claim copyright over the content found on it's front page in addition to the layout of the page, it's not clear from this photo that it would absolutely be a case of "no notice". -- Marchjuly (talk) 02:10, 7 February 2023 (UTC)

These materials don't need to be owned by newspaper. It is only required that they were published with consent of copyright owners without notice to be in public domain. Borysk5 (talk) 10:42, 7 February 2023 (UTC)
... and for it to be more than a relatively small number of copies. If the articles were sent out to hordes of newspapers, not sure that one newspaper without notice would qualify to lose the copyright. Especially if the contract with AP or whatever said to have one. However, we'd need to see the entire paper to see if there was a copyright notice anywhere. It did not need to be on the front page itself. File:1972 - Boulevard Drive-In Ad - 16 Jun MC - Allentown PA.jpg is {{PD-US-no notice advertisement}}, since specific copyright notices were needed on ads, but the front page was different. To me, there is not enough evidence. The photos are fine (they are PD-USGov) but I'm not sure even a lack of copyright notice on the entire paper would serve to inject the AP stories into the public domain. Carl Lindberg (talk) 15:01, 7 February 2023 (UTC)
@Clindberg: Is there something wrong with the file link in your above post? Is "Fișier" supposed to be "File" -- Marchjuly (talk) 22:24, 7 February 2023 (UTC)
Yes, whoops, thanks. Not sure where I copied that from. Carl Lindberg (talk) 22:47, 7 February 2023 (UTC)
I think your response Borysk5 could possibly apply in certain specific cases, but I don't think such a thing would automatically apply in all cases. The paper could perhaps claim copyright ownership over any original content or the layout of the front page, but I'm not sure it can claim copyright ownership of any third-party created content just because it publishes it. So, if they don't own the copyright over it, then it would seem, at least in principle, that they can't either void said copyright or transfer it to someone else. If such a thing were possible, then that would seem to provide a way to legally launder someone else's copyright by simply publishing it without a notice. Moreover, as Clindberg mentions above, I don't think copyright notices were required for the front page or any particular page of a newspaper at that time any more than a copyright notice would be required for every page of any other type of print publication. You could probably open to almost any page in pretty much any book or magazine published during that same time period and not find a visible copyright notice somewhere on it, but that wouldn't automatically mean the entire work or even that particular page wasn't copyrighted. Similarly, you can't just look a photo from that time and say it's automatically "PD-US-no notice" just because there's no visible copyright notice on the front of the photo. Copyright notices at that time seem to have been added to pages or places where they would be valid and visible, but where they'd also be less intrusive on the work they were protecting. -- Marchjuly (talk) 22:24, 7 February 2023 (UTC)
Copyright notice could be located on the first page or in the masthead (usually found on the editorial page). I checked this paper on Newspapers.com and didn't find any copyright notice.
Virtually all AP articles and photos in that era were distributed and widely published without copyright notice. Most newspapers of the time had no copyright notice. The exceptions would be articles of special interest, like an exclusive interview or a piece of hot investigative reporting. In those cases, newspapers were supposed to print the copyright notice with the article, but they often failed to do so. So, the extra cautious approach is to look at many different newspapers that published the same article, and verify that none of them had copyright notice on the article. But those cases were quite rare, and none of the articles on that page seem to be anything special, so I think it's safe to assume that {{PD-US-no notice}} is valid (and {{PD-USGov}} for the photos). Toohool (talk) 04:48, 8 February 2023 (UTC)
Verifying that all copies have no notice is actually not necessary. If a substantial number of copies omit the notice, then it falls out of copyright. So if an article was reprinted in, say, 10 newspapers, then checking 2-3 random ones will suffice. -- King of ♥ ♦ ♣ ♠ 05:20, 8 February 2023 (UTC)
The issue is whether the publication was authorized. An unauthorized publication does not divest copyright. If you have a license to republish a work with copyright notice, and you omit the notice, that is an unauthorized publication. Distribution of a work with copyright notice (arguably) implies that notice is required on republication. Thus, one needs to be confident not only that many copies were published without notice, but also that the wire service distributed the work without notice. (But this is all rather moot, since the AP was certainly not in the habit of copyrighting articles like the ones under discussion here.) Toohool (talk) 06:05, 8 February 2023 (UTC)

"ANL" as abbreviation for photographer name

Does anyone know what "ANL" may stand for in regards to a UK press photographer? It is mentioned on https://www.rexfeatures.com/preview/printable/3777120001 in relation to our file at File:Lord and Lady Lovat, 1942.jpg. From Hill To Shore (talk) 01:19, 8 February 2023 (UTC)

@From Hill To Shore: Associated Newspapers Limited I suspect. Borysk5 (talk) 10:07, 8 February 2023 (UTC)

Media creators are deceased/incapacitated

I am working on an article about an individual and would like to reference the speech made at his memorial in 1986. The family members who created the speech are deceased and one is incapacitated because of a stroke. (The writers of the speech are not identified in the document.) Can this document be uploaded to Commons and referenced in the article? Thanks. Slim8029 (talk) 01:22, 8 February 2023 (UTC)

Which country does this relate to? That may affect the advice you receive as copyright rules vary around the world. From Hill To Shore (talk) 01:24, 8 February 2023 (UTC)
The memorial was held in Beijing, China. That's where the family members were at the time. Slim8029 (talk) 20:54, 8 February 2023 (UTC)

Photograph of road signs and a plaque

I have a picture of the lamppost containing these road signs and a close photo of the plaque featured in this picture. Is it legally safe to upload them to Wikimedia Commons? I mostly ask because of the quote featured in the plaque. Lugamo94 (talk) 15:15, 8 February 2023 (UTC)

The road sign is likely below the ToO. The photo of plaque is a quote and quotes are explicitly allowed by the copyright law. Ruslik (talk) 18:28, 8 February 2023 (UTC)
Which one of the PD-ineligible templates should I use for the road signs? Or I shouldn't use any? Lugamo94 (talk) 18:38, 8 February 2023 (UTC)
Probably {{PD-sign}}. Ruslik (talk) 20:05, 8 February 2023 (UTC)
Oh... thanks. I didn't noticed it in the category. Lugamo94 (talk) 22:29, 8 February 2023 (UTC)

File:Bela Lugosi as Count Dracula 1931.jpg

File:Bela Lugosi as Count Dracula 1931.jpg is obviously licensed incorrectly and is a probable copyright breach. Admins Achim55 and King of Hearts (KoH) have taken actions which, while not in themselves incorrect, and have the practical effect of supporting a probable copyright/license breach which has been applied to multiple wikis. KoH has claimed the file might be PD but given the creator claims "own work" and has licensed it "Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0 International license" then it does not seem the creator has a clue or care about licensing. In all event the the discussion at Commons:Deletion requests/File:Bela Lugosi as Count Dracula 1931.jpg has been in place for near 168 hours and I would be grateful this get sorted as soon as possible. I'm here because of disruption to this which has spread to Wikiquote and strongly feel experts at commons need to sort it out ASAP. Thankyou. -- User:Djm-leighpark(a)talk 12:11, 9 February 2023 (UTC)

@Djm-leighpark: Nothing trump edit-warring. Let the DR finish in due course. Yann (talk) 12:19, 9 February 2023 (UTC)
I would appreciate someone who actually knows about copyright having a look at it. In the meantime I have socks I might photo and load to commons next. In the meanwhile someone get on with the "due course". -- User:Djm-leighpark(a)talk 12:26, 9 February 2023 (UTC)
✓ Deleted. Thank you for your kind words. --Achim55 (talk) 16:00, 9 February 2023 (UTC)
@Yann, you claim that "nothing trump edit-warring" and I am just a simple country editor, but where I come from there are indeed several exemptions from the 3-revert-rule. Now perhaps a license dispute may not fall under such exemptions, but I feel it is debatable whether "nothing trumps it" is a true statement.
Since you yourself are an administrator here on Commons, you are positioned much better than I to know the local policies, so perhaps you could enlighten me and others as to whether there are indeed zero exemptions to 3RR here, as oppose to enwiki's list of eight exemptions, particularly #5: removal of clear copyvios. en:WP:3RRNO. Elizium23 (talk) 21:45, 10 February 2023 (UTC)
The word "clear" is hard to define, but generally it means "any reasonable person would agree". So if an admin indicates that something is not a clear copyvio, then by definition it is not a clear copyvio. If you think an admin is repeatedly off-base here, you can treat it as a conduct issue and report it at COM:AN/U, but it's still not an excuse to edit-war against an admin who removes a speedy tag. (Note: The OP did not edit-war here, but they made an ill-advised speedy tag when 1) a DR was already ongoing; and 2) they were not sure themselves that it was a clear copyvio.) -- King of ♥ ♦ ♣ ♠ 21:59, 10 February 2023 (UTC)
@Djm-leighpark: You yourself claimed that it might be PD: "Marking as possible copyvio because Pragmaticaly a snapshot from a 1931 film that is either public domain or in copytight. As uploader has claimed CC-BY-SA-4.0 that is obviously invalid". We do not speedy delete files simply because the license is wrong. Whoever tags a file as copyvio must be sure that it is a copyvio, rather than "either public domain or in copytight". -- King of ♥ ♦ ♣ ♠ 16:40, 9 February 2023 (UTC)
. -- User:Djm-leighpark(a)talk 16:47, 9 February 2023 (UTC)

Template to record residual copyright issues on simultaneous publication cases

I have recently been dealing with some cases of simultaneous publication in the U.S. and other countries where an editor in good faith nominated the files for speedy deletion. Normal practice on Commons is that we treat cases of simultaneous publication in the U.S. and elsewhere as if the U.S. is the source country. This means we record a PD licence tag for the U.S. and ignore the status in every other source country. The good faith user who nominated the cases for deletion has asked if we can make this simultaneous copyright issue more visible on files to prevent mistaken nominations,[17] which I think makes sense. I asked at Commons:Help desk#Base template for indicating simultaneous publication if there were any existing templates for this but it looks like we don't have anything at the moment.


This work was simultaneously published in the United States and
  • United Kingdom

Wikimedia Commons normally treats works published simultaneously in the U.S. and elsewhere in the same way as works first published in the U.S.
While the U.S. copyright has been shown to have expired, the copyright in one or more of the other source countries remains. Reusers of this file outside of the U.S. should take care that restrictions on usage may remain in their country.
This work was previously discussed by the Wikimedia Commons community and a decision was taken to keep the file here. The previous discussion can be found at Commons:Deletion requests/Files in Category:Works by Ernest Howard Shepard

I have therefore drafted up a template in my sandbox at User:From Hill To Shore/sandbox 2 and User:From Hill To Shore/sandbox 3 with example usage shown in User:From Hill To Shore/sandbox 4 to explain the situation. A copy of the template is transcluded above for reference. Does anyone have any views on this before I copy it to the template namespace? From Hill To Shore (talk) 16:30, 5 February 2023 (UTC)

I have now copied this over to {{Simultaneous US publication}}. I am not sure how to build in the translation functions, so any help there would be appreciated. Also, are there any suggestions for categorisation? From Hill To Shore (talk) 20:51, 12 February 2023 (UTC)

Template:PD-MO-old-photo

For the copyright duration of photos from Macau, the template referenced Article 155 of Decreto-Lei n.º 43/99/M (25 years after completion), but this was repealed in 2012.[18] I believe the general rule for {{PD-MO}} (life + 50 years) now applies to photos as well. How should we update the template to reflect the change? Does it "restore" copyright for File:MacauAvenidaDeDemetrioCinatti63 MoHB1983.jpg or similar photos? Thanks.——HTinC23 (talk) 23:47, 8 February 2023 (UTC)

It makes sense.
For those photos whose copyright expired before Article 155 was repealed, I think the repeal did not restore copyright, just like Article 65 of Copyright Law in mainland China but I cannot find any similar article in 43/99/M. If so, we should create a new template and clarify that {{PD-MO-old-photo}} should not be used for photos created in 1987 or later. Teetrition (talk) 14:37, 10 February 2023 (UTC)
There is also the additional matter of URAA Restoration, so photos first published in Macau will usually not be in the public domain in the US unless they have been completed before 1971 regardless of whether Article 155 still applies in Macau or not. In particular, the example image should probably be nominated for deletion on grounds of its US copyright status in any case. Felix QW (talk) 17:58, 10 February 2023 (UTC)
The example file was uploaded in 2011 and {{Not-PD-US-URAA}} can be applied, maybe? Teetrition (talk) 10:41, 11 February 2023 (UTC)
If we know beyond a significant doubt that the work was restored, then no. Carl Lindberg (talk) 18:47, 12 February 2023 (UTC)

Category:Mack Bulldog Magazine

Lots of photos of magazine covers found in Category:Mack Bulldog Magazine dating from 1923 to 2019. The really old ones published prior to 1928 are probably OK as {{PD-US-expired}}, but the ones published after Janaury 1, 1928, probably need some assessing. Most of the pre-1978 files seem to be licensed as {{PD-US-no notice}} which might be true, but there's nothing to indicate why. It seems that the uploader may have assumed that these were all "no notice" because there was no visible notices on their cover pages. Those possibly published before Janaury 1, 1963, might be {{PD-US-not renewed}} even if they had notice, but once again the uploader doesn't seem to have made any attempt to verify this. Those published between January 1, 1978, and March 1, 1989, are licensed as {{PD-US-1978-89}}, but again there's no information stating why this is the case other than the boilerplate text of the copyright license. Everything published after March 1, 1989, is licensed as {{Cc-by-sa-4.0}} which seems completely wrong since the photos are just COM:2D copying and the only justification given for this in each file's description is "own, document photographed by author in Mack Trucks Historical Museum, Allentown, PA".

What's the best way to proceed here? Tag everything after 1989 as a copyvio based upon the assumption that copyright on the magazine cover is owned by the publisher? Tag everything after 1989 as "no permsision since" to give the uploader a chance to get the necessary consent? Do separate DRs for all the files after 1928, perhaps mass DRs according to the type of license, to allow further discussion? -- Marchjuly (talk) 01:19, 9 February 2023 (UTC)

https://onlinebooks.library.upenn.edu/cce/firstperiod.html is a list of copyright renewals of periodicals. So pre-1963 works are probably fine.--Prosfilaes (talk) 16:23, 9 February 2023 (UTC)
If the uploader could see the entire magazines, which they probably could even if just photographing the cover, I could believe the no-notice. Everything since March 1989, might be grounds for DR. Carl Lindberg (talk) 18:51, 12 February 2023 (UTC)
@Clindberg: Simply assuming good faith would be OK in general, but not sure if that should be done here for a couple of reasons: the number of file's uploaded, the number of licensing related notifications which have been previously posted on the uploader's user talk page and the number of this uploader's files which have been deleted. -- Marchjuly (talk) 01:05, 13 February 2023 (UTC)
That's a fair point, too. 1963 could be the line. Probably a separate DR though since that is a different reason. Carl Lindberg (talk) 01:23, 13 February 2023 (UTC)
And to your point, here is a 1986 issue for sale on eBay, and the back cover has a copyright notice. So yeah, we should probably delete the 1964-1989 ones too. Carl Lindberg (talk) 02:59, 13 February 2023 (UTC)
@Clindberg: Thanks for finding that link. If it's fair to assume, based upon what you found, that similar copyright notices could reasonably be expected to be found on the back pages of the other issues of the magazine from that time period, then that would be 16 more files needing more discussion in a DR. -- Marchjuly (talk) 01:29, 14 February 2023 (UTC)
See Commons:Deletion requests/Files in Category:Mack Bulldog Magazine for 1990 to 2019 covers. Yann (talk) 21:07, 12 February 2023 (UTC)

Freepik images

I have come across several images published on Freepik, such as File:Mom and boy.jpg. The license terms said it is allowed for use on commercial and personal projects, for an unlimited number of times and without any time limits, anywhere of the world (include U.S. and the source country), and make modifications and create derivative works. The only restriction is to attribute the image, which Commons is OK on this. Therefore I changed the license from default CC-BY to attribution. Is it OK on Commons? Feel free to correct me if I'm wrong. A1Cafel (talk) 06:28, 13 February 2023 (UTC)

Where on Freepik does it say any CC licence applies? Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 12:31, 13 February 2023 (UTC)
The Freepik license is not a simple attribution license (with no restrictions apart from attribution) and it certainly is not a CC license. If you look at the terms in detail, you will find requirements like these: Does not use the Freepik Content in printed or electronic items (...) aimed to be resold, in which the content in the Freepik Content is the main element (...);. This looks like a (partially) non-commercial license to me, which I think is not free enough for Commons. --rimshottalk 16:17, 13 February 2023 (UTC)
I'm not alone in that assessment, apparently: there is already a template {{Freepik}} that you can use to mark Freepik images for deletion. --rimshottalk 16:20, 13 February 2023 (UTC)

Question about beer labels etc.

Hello,

I have a question about the files contained in the Category:Beer labels and hope I'm in the right place. Is this kind of images really compatible with the "commons rules"? Are most of the illustrations really nothing more than "simple design"? Is there any (other) justification why these files are OK? I have considered possibly contributing similar files, but am not sure if I should actually upload them.... Similarly, Category:Beer caps Examples:

N8eule78 (talk) 15:28, 1 February 2023 (UTC)

@5snake5: as uploader.
The dubious claim of "own work" and lack of dates for when these designs were originally done don't help to resolve the question. - Jmabel ! talk 15:44, 1 February 2023 (UTC)
Pinging @Pan krzyżówka as uploader for the fourth one, and Pinging @Godewind for the fifth. That fifth one is at least mostly good (only a few of those are likely even to approach the threshold of originality). - Jmabel ! talk 15:47, 1 February 2023 (UTC)
Does that mean most of the beer labels here would have to be deleted? Then I will probably rather not upload any... --N8eule78 (talk) 08:31, 9 February 2023 (UTC)
@N8eule78 and Jmabel: COM:UA? At the very least, {{Useful-object-US}} has Skyy Vodka image on the right. Liuxinyu970226 (talk) 03:25, 15 February 2023 (UTC)
@Liuxinyu970226: but that is a bottle, not just a label. - Jmabel ! talk 16:01, 15 February 2023 (UTC)

ToO

Does this picture exceed the Threshold of Originality or is it public domain? Utfor (talk) 20:23, 5 February 2023 (UTC)

@Utfor: For me, that image is in the grey area for TOO in the United States. Why do you ask, since it has a CC license? – BMacZero (🗩) 05:46, 6 February 2023 (UTC)
User:BMacZero I have created this picture. I ask because I would like to know whether use of [[File:Blyant og Vinkelhake.svg|link=]] is allowed. Utfor (talk) 21:23, 10 February 2023 (UTC)
I'm not sure I fully understand you, but taking a wild guess, are you concerned about the attribution requirements of the CC license not being followed? That may be the case. If you are concerned about it you should raise the issue on the wiki where the image is being used, re-add the links, or replace the uses with a replacement with a non-attribution license. – BMacZero (🗩) 22:04, 10 February 2023 (UTC)
User:BMacZero Yes, you are correct. Thank you! Utfor (talk) 18:52, 15 February 2023 (UTC)

Can terrorist organisations own copyright?

This is regarding File:Amaq News Agency logo.svg. I had reverted the removal of a permission tag by a user who essentially claimed that, since Islamic State was a declared terrorist organisation, in multiple countries, any works by them are public domain. I haven't been able to find any evidence that declaring an organisation a terrorist organisation automatically removes their and all their affiliates intellectual property rights. Did I just not look far enough? Mako001 (C)  (T)  🇺🇦 05:09, 11 February 2023 (UTC)

User:RowanJ LP seems to frequently upload files with this particular rationale as the reason for them being public domain. Mako001 (C)  (T)  🇺🇦 05:13, 11 February 2023 (UTC)
No they can't. Any copyrights to works belong directly to person who created them. Borysk5 (talk) 07:41, 11 February 2023 (UTC)
Ok, I probably messed up the question, but the point is, that (if that work met the ToO, which it most likely doesn't) copyright is still held by someone. Mako001 (C)  (T)  🇺🇦 08:39, 11 February 2023 (UTC)
"Any copyrights to works belong directly to person who created them" Not necessarily. Copyrights can be assigned. Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 12:33, 13 February 2023 (UTC)
Assignment doesn't invalidate the copyright. In addition there are "works for hire" provisions in some jurisdictions. Anyway, a copyright owner or their principal being declared a terrorist or terrorist organisation has little bearing on copyright in most jurisdictions. Applicable jurisdictions have to be specified to be able to make such a claim. For IS, the matter is made more complicated by them regarding themself a jurisdiction; should we treat them as such? Then questions about copyright relations would appear (not member of the Berne convention, no copyright relation with the USA, and thus no need to respect their copyrights - but Commons might still respect them). If we treat them as just another criminal organisation, then some other country of origin has to be the relevant one. In some cases there may be an implicit PD dedication, by an organisation not believing in copyright. We usually do not honour such implicit declarations, as few countries regard them legally valid. –LPfi (talk) 17:00, 14 February 2023 (UTC)
  • This can happen, but it's really quite rare, and for it to happen internationally (which is what Commons would need) so that copyright isn't held under any jurisdiction would be extremely rare (there is no terrorist group so heinous that there isn't one of a handful of recognised states who'll still support them).
In general, of course terrorist groups can hold copyright. To prevent this, they would be have to given some form of "outlaw" status, such that not only are they in obvious breach of one law, but they're also denied the regular protection of other laws (including copyright). Last time I recall the UK doing this was in pursuit of pirates.
Note that confiscation of a copyright is a different matter. This sees copyright as a property right, preserves it, and hands it (as an item of value) to someone else. It's still in copyright. The USA is pretty strong on preservation of freedom of speech, even for its political enemies (although it may simply shoot them first). Look at the issues over the Unabomber's copyright. https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2007/01/who-owns-the-unabomber-s-writings.html Andy Dingley (talk) 17:18, 14 February 2023 (UTC)
One complication, though, is what the definition of "organization" is. The vast majority of foreign organizations are not incorporated in the United States, but the US recognizes them anyways because they are incorporated in some jurisdiction recognized by the US. But the Islamic State was not incorporated according to the laws of any internationally recognized country. So they don't have to be declared persona non grata (blacklisting), but merely not be recognized (lack of whitelisting). -- King of ♥ ♦ ♣ ♠ 04:42, 15 February 2023 (UTC)

Odd PD rationale

The file File:Flag of Lehav.svg has been given the licence template {{FoP-Israel}}. I'm a bit newer to Commons, but I didn't think that Freedom of Panorama applied to vectorised flags. Mako001 (C)  (T)  🇺🇦 07:57, 13 February 2023 (UTC)

Well spotted, but probably just an honest mistake by @RowanJ LP: My guess would be that they went to COM:TAG Israel and accidentally copied {{FoP-Israel}} instead of the {{Insignia-Israel}} that's right above it? El Grafo (talk) 08:17, 13 February 2023 (UTC)
Should I replace the FoP-Israel for Insignia-Israel instead then? RowanJ LP (talk) 20:49, 13 February 2023 (UTC)
@RowanJ LP thanks for responding. Taking a closer look, the description says it's the Flag of the Israeli-Extremist organization Lehav. I'm not an expert in Israeli copyright law, but I doubt that would be covered by {{Insignia-Israel}}. El Grafo (talk) 08:01, 14 February 2023 (UTC)
Would it better to just use PD-textlogo? RowanJ LP (talk) 21:24, 14 February 2023 (UTC)
That would certainly be better, but I'm not sure it would be correct. Depends on how the threshold of originality works in Israel ... El Grafo (talk) 09:01, 15 February 2023 (UTC)

TOO inquiry

Based on the precedents at Commons:Threshold of originality#United States, would this and this iteration of the Press Your Luck logo fall under {{PD-textlogo}}? Fourthords | =Λ= | 15:06, 14 February 2023 (UTC)

The first one is actually {{PD-shape}}. Ruslik (talk) 19:52, 14 February 2023 (UTC)
The first one's not just "simple geometry", though? Also, given they're nearly identical, I don't understand why the former would be a different license than the latter. Fourthords | =Λ= | 21:44, 15 February 2023 (UTC)

File:Minto logo.jpg

The claim of "own work" for File:Minto logo.jpg seems questionable, but perhaps this can be relicensed as {{PD-logo}} per COM:TOO US and COM:TOO India. The file is currently not being used anywhere, but it belongs to this company so perhaps it has the potential to be used someday, Can this be relicensed and kept or does it need to be deleted? -- Marchjuly (talk) 01:57, 15 February 2023 (UTC)

 Comment PD-textlogo is fine, however this is of very poor quality, and it may not even be notable. Yann (talk) 19:14, 15 February 2023 (UTC)

PD-NCGov-legislator photo

I cme across File:Representative Patsy Keever (2011-12 Session).jpg via a en:Wikipedia:Help Desk question and have a question about it's licensing. The file was uploaded under a Template:PD-NCGov-legislator photo, but it's not clear whether this license was ever vetted. The Harvard Univeristy's State Copyright Resource Center's website shows en:North Carolina being a "yellow" state with unclear copyright status for government works, and the individual state's page also doesn't clearly state things one way or another.

The "PD-NCGOV-legilator photo" license appears to be based on this disclaimer which states as follows: "Photos of House and Senate Members on the individual NCGA Website member webpages are not published on the NCGA Website until we receive copyright release from the photographer so these specific photos are considered in the public domain once they are published on the NCGA Website." That seems fine, but the meaning of "until we receive copyright release part" seems unclear.

Does this mean the original copyright holder's have released their works into the public domain? If that's the case, then why would a license for the NCGA be needed. Does it mean they've just given their consent for the photo to be used on NCGA website? If that's the case, then it seem the NGCA wouldn't be valid and the NGC would be doing some unintentional COM:LL. Does it mean they've transferred their copyright to the NGCA who then released them to be in the public domain? This is the only case which seems applicable to me with respect to this license.

Anyway, from the "What links here" link on the license's page, it looks as if more than 300 files are currently using this license. If the license is fine, then great; if it's not, however, than many of those files might need to be reassessed. -- Marchjuly (talk) 00:58, 14 February 2023 (UTC)

To me, the disclaimer clearly intends to state that the images are in the public domain. Both mechanisms for this are reasonable: Either the photographers released the images into the public domain or they transferred copyright to the NGCA which then released it into the public domain. For our purposes, I don't think we necessarily need to know as long as we believe that the NGCA did their due diligence in securing the copyright release they claimed to have secured. Felix QW (talk) 13:51, 14 February 2023 (UTC)
Agreed completely. The tag is named because the presence on that particular website is the evidence we have (and will apply to other ones in the future, given that is the website's process). Don't see any problem here at all, whatever the actual path to public domain status -- it got there in the end. Carl Lindberg (talk) 14:15, 14 February 2023 (UTC)
Thank you Felix QW and Clindberg for the input. Based upon what you both posted, my concerns have been addressed. -- Marchjuly (talk) 01:18, 17 February 2023 (UTC)

Canadian city flags

Category:SVG flags of cities of Canada many seem complicated enough to have copyright and not old enough to be pd. am i missing something else? RZuo (talk) 20:47, 14 February 2023 (UTC)

There are lots of different flags in this category. So, anyone of them may be different. Ruslik (talk) 20:14, 16 February 2023 (UTC)
Each specific drawing is a separate copyright -- see Commons:Coats of arms. Were they copied from somewhere, or self-drawn by Wikimedia contributors? Carl Lindberg (talk) 00:02, 17 February 2023 (UTC)

Licensing

Public domain
This work created by the United Kingdom Government is in the public domain.

This is because it is one of the following:

  1. It is a photograph taken prior to 1 June 1957; or
  2. It was published prior to 1974; or
  3. It is an artistic work other than a photograph or engraving (e.g. a painting) which was created prior to 1974.

HMSO has declared that the expiry of Crown Copyrights applies worldwide (ref: HMSO Email Reply)
More information.

See also Copyright and Crown copyright artistic works.

Deutsch ∙ English ∙ Español ∙ français ∙ italiano ∙ Nederlands ∙ polski ∙ português ∙ sicilianu ∙ slovenščina ∙ suomi ∙ Türkçe ∙ македонски ∙ русский ∙ українська ∙ മലയാളം ∙ 한국어 ∙ 日本語 ∙ 简体中文 ∙ 繁體中文 ∙ العربية ∙ +/−

</nowiki>

Now, how do I set up the voting system? Hmm … anyway, please comment, thanks. --Minoa (talk) 14:12, 16 February 2023 (UTC)

Flickrwashing?

Does anyone else think File:Ww5ne.jpg might be a case of Fickrwashing? It sure looks like a derivative work, at least it does to me. — Marchjuly (talk) 09:39, 16 February 2023 (UTC)

It's a derivative work of File:Swra2.jpg, which comes from the same source. The whole Flickr stream looks more like a collection of television screenshots rather than a photographer's profile (compare File:Swra22.png and [19]). Smells fishy indeed. El Grafo (talk) 10:39, 16 February 2023 (UTC)
Right: Commons:Deletion requests/Files uploaded by Samer787‎. I added the Flckr account to Commons:Questionable Flickr images/Users. Yann (talk) 12:24, 16 February 2023 (UTC)

Munich Security Conference

It seems that the Munich Security Conference has changed its license recently. The original CC license was revoked, and now it imposes a non-commercial use restriction, which is not accepted on Commons. The CC license version was last noted in January 2023. A1Cafel (talk) 02:07, 18 February 2023 (UTC)

Creating a new copyright tag

Hi, I want to make a specific copyright tag for the free-lisenced works of Government of West Bengal, a state of India. It state that its works can be redistributed if it is properly attributed. Can I do it? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Ku423winz1 (talk • contribs) 12:34, 14 February 2023 (UTC)

There is the common caveat that the permission

is subject to the material being reproduced accurately

which I seem to remember we take as excluding derivative works. In that case, this would sadly not meet the requirements of our licensing policy. Felix QW (talk) 13:53, 14 February 2023 (UTC)

@Felix QW: , actually it doesn't restrict derivative works, by saying accurately it means that it should not be use in misleading and disrespectful manner, which is mentioned just after that line. And also copyright tags having the same copyright string are there in commons, like Template: Indian Army, PIB and PMO India under Template: GODL-India and picture uploading with these tags are allowed. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Ku423winz1 (talk • contribs) 02:54, 15 February 2023 (UTC)
I image not being able to recreate an image in a misleading or disrespectful manner (however either of those things are legally determined) probably doesn't meet the requirements of our licensing policy either. Nor should we allow images with such a ridiculous copyright term to be hosted on here since IMO it's extremely antithetical to the goals of the project. Commons:Licensing clearly says "Wikimedia Commons only accepts free content, that is, images and other media files that are not subject to copyright restrictions which would prevent them being used by anyone, anytime, for any purpose." I assume that last bit means anyone using an image in a misleading or disrespectful manner if they feel like it (Just to be clear my main contention here is the "disrespectful" part since it's way to obtuse and vague wording for anyone to reasonably follow. Although, not using an image in a "misleading" way isn't to great either. Regardless though, both clearly go against the goals of the project). --Adamant1 (talk) 06:13, 17 February 2023 (UTC)
@Adamant1: I have given templates as examples in my last reply and those websites have the same copyright string, so if they can be used, then a new copyright tag can also be created for government of West Bengal.
Ku423winz1 (talk) 08:09, 18 February 2023 (UTC)
Just because other templates exist that shouldn't have been created doesn't mean we should make similar ones. Also, at least for Template: Indian Army the template says "This image, which was originally posted to Indian Army, has not yet been reviewed by an administrator or reviewer to confirm that the above license is valid." So it's not really a good example of there being a valid precedent for similar tags to be created. Maybe after it's reviewed and confirmed to be correct though. Can't essentially anyone who has the user right create a copyright template anyway? I'm sure there's plenty of factually incorrect or otherwise wrong tags out there. --Adamant1 (talk) 09:02, 18 February 2023 (UTC)

British Birds stamps from 1966

I am exploring the possibility (guarantee not included) of uploading my own scans of the 1966 British Birds stamps, and maybe the folder that came with it (source). I wonder if someone can confirm whether the author credit "J[ohn] Norris Wood" on these stamps affect the public domain status that usually applies to stamps issued before the breakup of the GPO in 1969? --Minoa (talk) 17:19, 15 February 2023 (UTC)

According to his obituary in The Guardian the stamps were specifically designed for the Royal Mail (so not an earlier work that was relicensed for use on the stamps). I think it likely that they were works for hire and the Royal Mail would have the authority to licence the stamps under their normal terms. From Hill To Shore (talk) 18:36, 15 February 2023 (UTC)
In 1966, the Royal Mail was a government department. If the works were commissioned by them, then I think they became Crown Copyright with that term. In 1969, it became a statutory corporation (and is today fully privatized). Unless the laws creating the corporations actually transferred copyright back out of Crown Copyright, then they should remain Crown Copyright (which would have expired in 2017, I think). The named author would mean that it's not anonymous, and the regular copyright would last 70 years past the author's lifetime (so would expire in 2086 I think in this case, as John Norris Wood died in 2015). But Crown Copyright would have applied in this case, unless the drawings/paintings had been previously published. Crown Copyright has its own term unrelated to the lifetime of the author. Unless there was a mechanism to transfer that back to Royal Mail somehow, it seems like they are fine. Carl Lindberg (talk) 19:10, 15 February 2023 (UTC)
Wouldn't the images have to follow both Crown Copyright and United States copyright rules though? If so, that would mean the stamps would be PD in the United Kingdom due to the Crown Copyright expiring but not PD in the United States due to it not being 2086 yet. --Adamant1 (talk) 08:52, 17 February 2023 (UTC)
Expiry of Crown Copyrights usually applies worldwide, but the situation in this case is complicated, in my opinion, by a named author on the stamps. --Minoa (talk) 09:09, 17 February 2023 (UTC)
While the US copyright does still exist in theory for many UK Crown Copyright works, the copyright holder (UK Government) has told us that their expiry of Crown Copyright applies worldwide. Even if a theoretical copyright does remain in some regions, the copyright holder has declared they will not enforce it beyond the timescale of the UK copyright. From Hill To Shore (talk) 17:07, 17 February 2023 (UTC)
If there was a special contract between the artist and the government at the time, that would be a problem. If that was the case though, the Royal Mail could not try to claim copyright today. At the time, Crown Copyright controlled any work made by or under the direction or control of Her Majesty or a Government department, and also any work first published by or under the direction or control of Her Majesty or a Government department. It was more stringent than today, where (since 1989) Crown Copyright is mainly works performed by government employees as part of their duties. If Crown Copyright, the private copyright no longer existed (at least without some other stipulation in a contract). Carl Lindberg (talk) 13:14, 18 February 2023 (UTC)

Proposed licensing

I am proposing to license the scans of the stamps with the following description: 

=={{int:filedesc}}==
{{Information
| description = Pictorial series stamps, ''British Birds''
| date        = 8 August 1966
| source      = Scan from my collection
| author      = John Norris Wood for the {{w|General Post Office}}
| permission  = Based on {{plnk|https://web.archive.org/web/20090317005703/http://www.museumscopyright.org.uk/crown-a.pdf|this flowchart}}, the Crown Copyright expired on 31 December 2016, because:
* The stamp(s) were created and published before 31 July 1989
* There is no evidence that the artwork was previously published on a work not subject to Crown Copyright ({{plnk|https://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/2015/nov/08/john-norris-wood|source}}, {{Wayback|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20151125010354/https://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/2015/nov/08/john-norris-wood}} on 25 November 2015)
}}

Suspecting copyright violation in the Portuguese Periodic Table

todamateria.com.br had the original image ("Sc Y Lu Ac" in 2017 and the current "Sc Y * *" in 2018) [20] and the vector PDF image [21] before it was uploaded by user Rottoni.

Image in question: File:Tabela_Periódica_de_2019.webp

I wanted to do some changes to the image, so I searched for the vector image and I stumbled into this matter. I just sent an email to todamateria.com.br questioning about this, if Rottoni is one of them or works with them, and also questioned if we could use the vector image, but I don't know how long it will take to get their reply.

-- Arthurfragoso (talk) 21:07, 17 February 2023 (UTC)

Good question. I would hesitate to assign an independent copyright to this though, to be honest. The text and its arrangement are not due to todamateria.com.br, neither are the general boundaries of colours. The colours themselves and the typeface could well be below the high Brasil threshold of originality. Felix QW (talk) 14:29, 18 February 2023 (UTC)

De minimis review requested

File:Joe Biden in 2023 - P20230216CS-0130 01.jpg ----- I thought this was de minimis, but I want to get other opinions here to see if it can be kept or will need deletion. I would prefer to have the copyright material in the image pixilated or blocked out, instead of a full deletion, if possible.

I did upload this photo as being de minimis, because: 1. the President is in-focus, while the projected screen image is slightly blurred and farther away., 2. The President is larger in size than the projected screen image behind him, 3. the President is the "intended" primary subject of this photograph, unlike the other two photos that I did not upload below.

I did not upload two other recent photos at the same Black History Month event held recently at The White House. (See the two links below) I would appreciate advice if I can upload those as well, either as originals or pixilated/ blocked out versions.

https://www.flickr.com/photos/whitehouse/52695313569/ https://www.flickr.com/photos/whitehouse/52694531927/

Thanks in advance, -- Ooligan (talk) 06:05, 18 February 2023 (UTC)

I think this is de minimis because the image is focusing on Biden speaking. The screen behind is secondary and seems to be blurry. --A1Cafel (talk) 07:42, 18 February 2023 (UTC)
I would concur with Ooligan's judgement here. For the image currently on Commons, the video screen is not the main focus and should be de minimis, while the two other images on the Flickr stream focus on the film being shown on the screen and would therefore probably not pass the test. Felix QW (talk) 12:10, 18 February 2023 (UTC)
The focus of the photograph is on Joe Biden, and the photograph would still be useful even if cropped. I think it would be de minimis. Abzeronow (talk) 16:19, 18 February 2023 (UTC)

Looking to confirm suitability of photos from "Snapshots from the Vietnam War" and "USAF Police Alumni Association" websites

I recently found a blog called Snapshots from the Vietnam War concerning the photographic recollections of one Richard Udden who served with the US Army in Vietnam during 1970; as might be expected from the title, all photos in the blog appear to have been taken during Udden's time in Vietnam. I also found a "USAF Police Alumni Association" website with an extensive collection of photos (e.g. https://www.usafpolice.org/operation-desert-shieldstorm.html ). As much as I want to simply assume that both of these fall under PD-USGov-Military, something tells me I should get independent confirmation of this, with the USAF site in particular seeming like it might require special care. - Dvaderv2 (talk) 11:08, 18 February 2023 (UTC)

I think the key requirement here for PD-USGov-Military is that it is taken or made as part of that person's official duties.
Someone's private images made while serving in Vietnam are absolutely that person's private copyright and would not fall under the PD-USGov clauses. Felix QW (talk) 12:06, 18 February 2023 (UTC)
What Felix QW said. PD-USGov is basically like work for hire; if the photos were not taken as part of assigned duties that day, they are not PD-USGov but are normal private-copyright photos. Carl Lindberg (talk) 12:53, 18 February 2023 (UTC)

Graphic portraits - Permission request

My graphic portraits are asked for mass deletion for being derivative works. So I asked for permission from the authors of all the photos I was inspired by. I got an answer from one of them and it was positive. But then VRTS sent him a mail asking him to give a free licence to his photo so I could quote his work + my work.

As far as I understand, this shift to a free licence of the photo should be done by all the different photographers I was inspired by for just one single drawing representing the same person. If at least one of the photos gets a free licence, then, you will agreee that it's no more necessary to have a graphic portrait, because a photography will always be better to illustrate a Wikipedia article that any good graphic portrait. So does this derivative work permission rule make sense ?

In fact, there are two cases : if the permission is given by the photographer but the concerned photo has no free license, the drawing that you consider as derivative cannot be published on Commons because the source has no free licence. And if the photo gets a free licence, then, the drawing gets useless.

So you could perhaps explain more clearly the consequences of the permission request in order that people do not loose time with that. Do you have examples of succesfull licensed derivative works published on Commons ? I would be happy to look on them.

That said, what has been drawn can be redrawn and I would be happy to have at least 10 examples of correct graphic portraits that fulfilled the rules of Commons. This would allow me to draw acceptable portraits for Commons and illustrate biographies which do not have any portraits on the article. Thanks for these examples. Waltercolor (talk) 09:54, 11 February 2023 (UTC)

As far as I understand it, the purpose of the email template on the VRT page is specifically to allow giving permission for the derivative drawing without giving a free license for the source photo. This is like in the case of freedom of panorama, where the photo can be licensed by the photographer however they please but this does not take away from the rights associated with the original architecture depicted. Felix QW (talk) 17:37, 11 February 2023 (UTC)
Yes. They can give a free license for their contribution to the derivative work without free-licensing their original work. - Jmabel ! talk 18:24, 11 February 2023 (UTC)
Ok. Thanks @Felix QW and @Jmabel Waltercolor (talk) 09:11, 13 February 2023 (UTC)
@Waltercolor, Felix QW, and Jmabel: Our guideline COM:DW states that we need permission for source works, so only one of Waltercolor's graphic portraits has a chance at staying here (assuming we get valid permission from the photographer). Without specifics, I will not speculate on that one.   — 🇺🇦Jeff G. ツ please ping or talk to me🇺🇦 12:14, 16 February 2023 (UTC)
Pinging @Mussklprozz as Agent concerning File:Claude Grison.jpg.   — 🇺🇦Jeff G. ツ please ping or talk to me🇺🇦 14:07, 16 February 2023 (UTC)
Pinging @Jeff G., Waltercolor I don't see that this strict interpretation follows from COM:DW. It should be sufficient that the photographer agrees that the derivative work (in this case the drawing) be published under free license, wihout him needing to consent to put his original work under free license. Cheers, Mussklprozz (talk) 19:59, 16 February 2023 (UTC)
@Mussklprozz Perhaps but then you should explain it clearly to all the VRT people who answer, in order that they do not ask for something that is not the rule. What the photographer got from VRT was a request for giving a free license to his work and then my work would be "co-licensed" as a sub-product (means : the original work is not quoted in the drawing, the drawing is double of the photo).
And in a certain way, this VRT was right. If you consider my work as a derivative work and not an independant one, so the first licence where it derives from becomes de facto the master license for the second one.
It's the heart of the discussion : a derivative work is not independant but a copy linked to a main work. It's considered as a subproduct and not an original one. So, for that, you're not asking for a permission but rather a declaration for a subproduct, which is absolutely not the same status.
For me the authorship of a work always remains to the author. So if there is a legal concern of copyright, it will concern me, the author of the drawing, and not the publisher who use free licensed works.
I you don't want to use it, it's ok, but asking to authors to mak an agrreement where the author of a photography has to refer to VRT directly is too much. Authors are independant.and the free licence is not Commons related and you should not interfer here.
If I concede my authorship to a so called "master" work (what you call a "permission") via a inner VRT process, I'll loose the originality of my work and it will be dependant from the work just because it's supposed to be derivative art, a decision take by people and other people could decide differently. There are no strict criteria about this as far as I saw.
For you, it's the same image with unsignificant changes, as you claim, so it's a subproduct of the photo and not an independant work. But other could judge differently.
I can fully understand that the image policy of Commons is not a benefit/risk policy but only a risk policy, with a copyright violation risk factor always at 100% and a benefit risk factor always at 0%,
But please, don't call a permission what is a sub-licence. Be transparent and clear and explain what it means for the author.
And again, nobody can give me any examples of successful graphic portraits on Commons. Am still waiting for it and really wondering how it looks (if it ever exists..)..
Waltercolor (talk) 10:55, 17 February 2023 (UTC)
I think there is some misunderstanding regarding the nature of a "derivative" work.
Let me try to explain how I see it:
A derivative work definitely has its own copyright and authorship - you, as the painter, clearly and unambiguously have copyright over your drawing, even if it is "derived" from another work.
However, part of copyright protection is the right to control how other people use your work within their own works, in varying limits defined by copyright law.
In the case of a drawing from a photo, for instance, the photographer has the right to take a fee for commercial use of a drawing made from their photo. In order for the drawing to be on Commons under a license that also allows for commercial use, the photographer has to state his agreement, which we style a "permission". In no way does the photographer need to waive any other rights regarding his work, but merely acquiesce to the use of his work in a painting whose authorship is clearly with the artist. Felix QW (talk) 14:15, 17 February 2023 (UTC)
Thanks for the explanation @Felix QW but I clearly disagree about that. The author rights have nothing to do with the licence. An owner of a photograph can only take a fee for commercial use of his own work, not the supposed derivative art. Concerning the copyright issue, he can only sue me for counterfact if he wants, but it's to him to prove the counterfact not you. Plus : my authorship on this work is inalienable, I bear the responsability for it and it can be reused on any platform or support outside Commons. It's no "Commons related". So what you call falsely a " permission" should be given, if necessary (but I believe it's not necessary) exclusively to the owner of the authorship and not to any platform, be it Commons. It's me and not you who will claim my authorship for all uses.
I formally contest the principle of that "permission" that passes by VRT to a third person for my own work. You, as a platform, have no right to interfer in my author rights. I take the responsibility for them and will be suited anyway if there is a problem and not you.
Notice that, under the pressure of Commons, I already personnaly got from the photographer itself the famous "permission" you asked for. But that was not enough. You inteferred more and more in this copyright issue by not accepting this first correct proof and asked for a second one directly addressed to the third party by VRT. This is based on supposed bad faith from me (eventual forgery of a false permission) and is contrary to Wikimedia's principles.
I will check the legal aspect of the rules you apply here. One point is troubling : if a drawing is inspired by severakl photographs as I did for drawing Claude Grison"s portrait (I've put the list on the deletion request's page and have also asked for your famous "permission" to all these photographers), it should be testified by all these photographers that they give a "permission". This may be an abusive request for permission as the derivative aspect has not been proved or even approved by these photographers themselves (Thibaut Vergoz said "inspired" not "derivative" when giving the permission).
Waltercolor (talk) 11:44, 19 February 2023 (UTC)
Thanks @Jeff G.for the information.
Personally, I've found only one example on Wikipedia of a co-licensed graphic portrait, but the permission shows as a VRT ticket number on Wikipedia and cannot be opened by persons who don't have the VRT rights. I should have wanted to see the licence and the photo.
You can delete the "only one of Waltercolor's graphic portraits has a chance at staying here" (!) cause I myself asked to the concerned photographer that gave me by mail the permission not to answer to the request of VRI requesting to him to change his licence for a free licence and then to co-licence my work. I, as a professional illustrator and creator of my own work, do not want such kind of licences.
I participate since a certain time to illustrating campaigns on Wikipedia and I never got a correct info about this co-licencing, despite the fact that factual infos exist about it. So I'm happy to know now how it looks and cannot explain why this process is not communicated in a more transparent way.
I discussed with a fellow illustrator who is member of an Union. Thus there are nearly no legal cases for that kind of drawings and nearly all illustrators work with visual sources, he, as a professional, said he would never draw for Wikipedia cause it's too exposed. I believe he is right and will not do it anymore (also seeing if I can ask for deletion for all my graphic work that stays here).
For me, if a photo has switched to a free licence, then, it can illustrate the article as well and there is no need for a graphic portrait. I suggest that it's perhaps wiser to campaign to obtain free licenses for photographs instead of playing a cat & mouse game or distorting the face ident in a graphic portrait just for the sake to illustrate articles where everybody can have all visual information displayed on the results of their researches on Internet (in clear : people already see visual portraits of the concerned biography before consulting the Wikipedia article)..
Also, as far as I understand, the treshold of originality can never be reached in a graphic portrait or it would be an imaginary portrait, a portrait that is not sourced, or the portrait of anyone else, that is, it would not represent the concerned person, and not be encyclopedic enough but just a useless and confusing illustration.
Notice that original drawings done in a cartoon style are often refused by the editing community because they do not look like the person represented.
But just for my information, could you give me some examples of successfull graphic portraits that you accepted for illustrating biographies ? I just wonder if they exist and how they look, and see if I could do the same in the respect of the rules. I have asked for such examples to a lot of persons and never got an answer. Do they exist or not ?
Waltercolor (talk) 14:19, 16 February 2023 (UTC)

Logos

We've got a new article on the German Wikipedia that consists almost solely of logos. Can you please check those for threshold of originality? Do they need permission by the graphic designer? Logo #1, Logo #2, Logo #3. Thanks, --87.150.6.73 20:31, 9 February 2023 (UTC)

The third one is just text and certainly below ToO. Ruslik (talk) 20:35, 9 February 2023 (UTC)
In my opinion, the green ball image contained in the first two logos could well be above the threshold. Felix QW (talk) 16:29, 13 February 2023 (UTC)
 Comment: For the first two logos, the uploader's username does suggest they are the copyright holder. However, this should ideally go through VRT because anyone can claim to be anyone. Ixfd64 (talk) 20:19, 20 February 2023 (UTC)

Opinion on 1970 AP image

Hi - am I correct in my understanding that this image credited to Associated Press of Cambodian leader en:Lon Nol is in the public domain under {{PD-US-no notice}} as I can find no citation of the image in the Library of Congress copyright registrations for 1970. Searches of the AP archive do not show the image. Thoughts? Thank you and regards, Goldsztajn (talk) 23:23, 18 February 2023 (UTC)

Unlikely. Renewals were not required, so there may be nothing at the Copyright Office. Renewals were required for works published before 1964, but the initial registration could be done at any time, including when filing the renewal 27 to 28 years later. After 1964, works only needed a copyright notice when published; they keep their copyright even if never registered. In a newspaper or magazine, a single copyright notice can cover every work in the newspaper. For PD-US-no_notice, you would need to find a copy actually distributed (on its own) without a notice, at the time. I'm not even sure printing out a wire photo would count -- would need to be a copy actually distributed by AP, at the time. And preferably, showing no notice on the back side, or on anything it was distributed with, that sort of thing. Carl Lindberg (talk) 23:52, 18 February 2023 (UTC)
Hi @Clindberg - thanks. What about this image from UPI, from the same event in 1970? The EBAY item shows the front and back as distributed. Regards, Goldsztajn (talk) 00:11, 19 February 2023 (UTC)
That is much closer. I do worry about wire photos -- for example, if that was just a copy printed at a newspaper, and never actually distributed but kept in their archives, then only sold many years later, not sure the lack of copyright notice means anything since that physical copy was not actually made and distributed by the wire agency itself. That one has the name of a California TV station on the front though, and was in the archives of a Philadelphia newspaper, and obviously existed in 1970. And there was the ability to put a copyright notice in the caption that they pasted on, and there is none, though of course you never know if that part just wasn't clipped. I'm borderline on that one. Carl Lindberg (talk) 17:15, 19 February 2023 (UTC)
Hi @Clindberg - many thanks for your responses. One final question - the same 1970 UPI photo of Lon Nol appears as redistributed on 3 December 1972 without copyright notice - does that shift things in your opinion? Regards, Goldsztajn (talk) 21:22, 20 February 2023 (UTC)
How was it distributed? With wire photos, newspapers (or other clients) had a machine on their end to print out a copy sent over phone lines. Thus, the physical copy could stay private to the newspaper. That particular copy was only much later sold out of the Philadelphia Inquirer archives, so it was likely not distributed at the time. Sending the photos over the phone lines is a form of distribution, but I'm not sure what kind of copyright notice requirements would come with that. If they sent over credits and a caption, you'd think there would be a place for the notice. Whether it existed and wasn't on the caption pasted to the printout, or whether it didn't exist at all, hard to say. It's far more clear when the physical copies were actually distributed by the copyright owner (like publicity photos). Wire photos have all sorts of untested gray areas. I'm sure UPI would argue limited publication (which did not require notice) over the wire, but not sure that would hold up. On the other hand there may be contractual stuff which controlled such operations, which may then speak to the "limited publication" vs "general publication" question. Courts did often try to find arguments to avoid loss of copyright. I'm not sure this particular situation was ever litigated, frankly, so I could see things going either way. I'm not sure there is a clear answer. It would come down to whether the transmission over the wire was considered "general publication", and if so was there a reasonable way to include a copyright notice which was not present. The physical copy in this case doesn't help much, since that was in the private possession of the newspaper. Carl Lindberg (talk) 21:48, 20 February 2023 (UTC)

UK OGL-3 photo within a UK OGL-3 report from another agency

File:BA 38 aerial view with ground scars.png I took this photo from an air accident investigation report by the UK's Air Accidents Investigation Branch. That report has Crown copyright all over it, and it came from the AAIB's website, so it's OGL. However, the image I uploaded is noted in the report as "courtesy of" the Metropolitan Police, another public agency entirely, yet still covered by OGL 3.0. I think I did the attributions correctly, crediting the Met as the author and using their status as a local government or other public agency for OGL 3.0 licensing. Was that correct? Or would it have transferred to the AAIB when it became evidence in their case? Does "courtesy of" mean they donated it along with its rights to the AAIB? "Photo courtesy of" isn't exactly the same as saying "Photo copyright held by," is it?

I enjoy editing air crash articles, and photos in the crash reports come from a variety of sources. I can't use a lot of them, but I'm sure this one's ok to use. I'm really interested in whether I attributed it correctly, and of course whether "courtesy of" has any actual meaning for our purposes. Thanks! Dcs002 (talk) 05:32, 19 February 2023 (UTC)

The attribution appears to be fine. However, the document was published in February 2010 under Crown Copyright with no reference to the Open Government Licence. OGL 1.0 was not released until September 2010 and 3.0 didn't arrive until 2014. Do you have some evidence that the report was re-released under OGL 3.0 at a later date? UK Crown Copyright works are not automatically released under OGL, so there needs to be a clear declaration of release for each document (either in the document itself or in an accompanying letter/web page). From Hill To Shore (talk) 06:57, 19 February 2023 (UTC)
Oh my - I've been using AAIB reports for some time under OGL. I wasn't aware that the license only applied to documents published after September 2010.
There is a permission granted under the Crown copyright statement on page ii of the report, saying "Extracts may be published without specific permission providing that the source is duly acknowledged." That describes our use. If that's not covered under the OGL license, it does appear to be explicit permission from the publisher to use properly-attributed content, which would be free, not fair use. But then my other question becomes more important - does that permission extend to the image provided "courtesy of" another government or public agency? Did the copyright of that image transfer to the Crown? Is there a system for determining the copyright owner of an image? Dcs002 (talk) 22:38, 19 February 2023 (UTC)
@From Hill To Shore Ok, the website from which the report is downloaded says, "All content is available under the Open Government Licence v3.0, except where otherwise stated." Nowhere on that web page, in the AAIB report, nor specifically concerning the photo, is it otherwise stated - that the content is not covered by OGL 3.0. That seems to be a clear declaration of release on the accompanying website, as you described. I think that makes it clear that this is all OGL 3.0 content. Do you agree? (I hope! This could affect a lot of images I've uploaded, all of which were part of the report, and not attributed to another person or agency.)
Added note: I have checked the AAIB download pages for all other reports from which I've taken images for use here, and all download pages contain the same statement, that all content is OGL 3.0 unless otherwise stated, and it isn't stated pertaining to the images I've used.
Another added note: The AAIB web page from which this report was downloaded itself contains the notice, "Published 10 December 2014." That might be the derivation of OGL 3.0 specifically. Dcs002 (talk) 23:22, 19 February 2023 (UTC)
@Dcs002: Unfortunately that tag line on the website is standard text that appears on all gov.uk web pages, including many with documents not released under OGL. The 2010 report document predates OGL, so the absence of a note telling us that OGL doesn't apply is not really an indicator of consent. The report also gives us alternative conditions for release which are "Extracts may be published without specific permission providing that the source is duly acknowledged." That statement is silent on whether derivative works are allowed, which means we are missing one of the key permissions for hosting files on Commons. Also, the report includes a mixture of public and private copyright material (such as Google Maps aerial photography) so we need to be careful in determining whether the Crown has the ability to licence the content (for later works, the OGL makes explicit note that some content in Crown Copyright works is not subject to the OGL if the copyright is held by a third party). Finally, I have tried to identify where the Metropolitan Police fall within the rules of UK government copyright; they are not listed as a Crown Body (the ones that produce Crown Copyright works) and their own copyright page makes no reference to Crown Copyright or similar provisions. Other editors may take a different view but I don't think the Metropolitan Police's photograph is subject to Crown Copyright and can't have been released under OGL, even if that licence did apply to this report. From Hill To Shore (talk) 00:17, 20 February 2023 (UTC)
The document was not originally released under OGL, but it was re-released in digital format in 2014, on an official govt web page that says, however broadly, that all content is OGL 3.0. I have spent several hours now looking around UK govt websites and the UK Natl Archives, and I haven't found anything that says OGL applies only to documents released after OGL itself was implemented. All I see are references to public sector information (PSI), not PSI released after 2010. Everything I read about it suggests it should be applied as broadly as possible.
I did, however, see that, while OGL is mandatory for Crown documents, it is only recommended for other public sector documents, so the police photo is certainly in question, but for additional reasons. I see Stemoc's post below, which makes that photo's use seem almost dead (does "courtesy of" have any legal meaning? I think it could just as easily mean "thanks for the donation"), but I'm still working on it. That policy refers to materials on the Met website. I've sent an inquiry to the UK National Archives, asking for clarification and for the authority governing material pre-dating 2010. (An open government law that doesn't apply to anything the government's done doesn't make sense to me.) I have found that PSI covered by the Click-Use license automatically transferred to OGL, but the database listing agencies that used Click-Use licensing has been removed from the Internet. Did the AAIB use that license? Click-Use was not acceptable by itself for our purposes, but the transfer of Click-Use documents to OGL would make them available.
"The absence of a note telling us that OGL doesn't apply is not really an indicator of consent."
We have more than an absence of that note. We have an official statement, a newer statement, which should in law preclude anything prior, that says the document is covered by OGL 3.0. If they give that statement, they have to be bound by it. The intention of OGL is to make every government document public except those documents for which there is a reason to keep them protected, so of course that OGL statement is on every govt page. I don't think that negates its effect. I think that validates its effect.
I know we'll probably lose the police photo, but I think it's worth pushing this a bit more in order to keep the AAIB reports. They're invaluable in our articles - the diagrams, charts, and photos. Thanks for your comments, even if they're not what I wanted to hear. Dcs002 (talk) 03:04, 20 February 2023 (UTC)
Additional - newer AAIB reports look the same as the BA 38 report. They are not marked with OGL on the report itself (example), only on the download page (example). The reports say Crown copyright, and the download page says the content is OGL. I think that's just how they do it. Why would an accident report (which concerns public safety) not be OGL? Why would they maintain the archive and the public website, label them as OGL on the download page, but not actually be OGL? Dcs002 (talk) 04:25, 20 February 2023 (UTC)
Additional, again - I just sent an inquiry to the UK Department for Transport with this question, asking not just for an opinion, but something official that we can all verify. They have a 20-day response time. The UK National Archives has a 10-day response time. Dcs002 (talk) 05:59, 20 February 2023 (UTC)
speaking as someone who has dealt with OGL images, i concur with FHTS, this image is definitely crown copyright but it doesn't fall under OGL, infact the wording used in that document was "courtesy of" which actually kinda makes it not free, had they used the term "Released by" instead then it would imply rights to that image has been waved and if you look at Met Pol's website, they are very strong on copyright protection and the wording does make their site more 'non-commercial and non-derivative" which as you already know isn't allowed on wikimedia... Stemoc 01:59, 20 February 2023 (UTC)

@From Hill To Shore, @Ste, I've received a response from the Copyright Team at The National Archives of the United Kingdom. It has a "Public sector information enquiry - Ref" number attached, and it verifies the AAIB report is covered under OGL, with specific references and a justification. It also addresses the Metropolitan Police, naming them as a Crown body, but one that is specifically exempt from releasing their information under the OGL. Their content can be released under a license, but I doubt that license, if granted, would be suitable for our use. The response specifically said the image in question from the AAIB report was held under copyright by the Met, and not covered under OGL. I would be happy to forward that email (with all headers intact) to anyone in an official capacity here for reference, but it contains my name and personal email address, which I would need to redact if I were to upload a copy that would be available to the public.

So... AAIB report, yes, Met Photo, no. Dcs002 (talk) 21:40, 20 February 2023 (UTC)

I nominated the photo file for deletion, then tagged it for speedy deletion as soon as I learned how to do that. I also deleted it from the Wikipedia pages I'd used it on (article and talk). As far as I know, there is no other content of concern that I'm involved with concerning AAIB reports. This was the only item I'd ever uploaded with 3rd party attribution because I was convinced the Met was also covered by OGL, one way or another. I think I've done what I can to clean up my error. Lesson learned. Dcs002 (talk) 01:04, 21 February 2023 (UTC)

File:Mizu-logo.png

File:Mizu-logo.png was uploaded as "own work" which it most likely isn't per this, but it might be OK to relicense as {{PD-logo}}. It would seem to be PD per COM:TOO US, but COM:TOO Turkey isn't as clear. Any opinions of whether this would be PD under Turkish copyright law? -- Marchjuly (talk) 06:02, 21 February 2023 (UTC)

"The Turkish copyright laws depend on that the work bears the characteristics of creator while deciding whether the work is original ... ", which is a relatively high bar. So, it is likely to be Ok. Ruslik (talk) 20:08, 21 February 2023 (UTC)

Licensing for country of origin AND the USA in one formula

I am currently adding licenses to my uploads of paintings like this: PD-art|PD-old-auto|self|deathyear=1642 (I remove the {{}} as I do not know how to present the formula otherwise). I'd also like to include a tag for the USA, similar as this: PD-old-70-1923, but like an all-in-one formula so I only need to adjust the death year for each artist. Could anyone help? Paradise Chronicle (talk) 15:03, 22 February 2023 (UTC)

In this particular case, you can use {{PD-old-auto-expired}} instead of PD-old-auto, which is a combination tag. Carl Lindberg (talk) 15:40, 22 February 2023 (UTC)
@Clindberg Thank you, I then also found this: PD-old-auto-expired|deathyear=1920. Is that one also an applicable license for US copyrights for paintings created before 1928? Paradise Chronicle (talk) 16:12, 22 February 2023 (UTC)
Technically, it's published before 1928. If there is documentation that a painter kept a painting, and it ended up in their estate such that it may not have been published right away, that might be a problematic difference. Usually though we assume they were published around when they were created. So in most cases, yes that should work. The "deathyear" argument is passed through that tag, correct. Carl Lindberg (talk) 21:42, 22 February 2023 (UTC)

Heads up: very first copyright law of Timor-Leste

East Timor: Approved the first Code of Copyright and Related Rights by Investa.com: according to the article, "on November 29[, 2022], the Parliament of East Timor approved the country's first Code of Copyright and Related Rights.... This law, which will come into force 180 days after its publication,..."

So far, I cannot find a copy of this first copyright law of Timor-Leste at WIPO Lex. Perhaps it might have not yet been published as of this writing, or although published the elapsed days have not yet reached 180 days. JWilz12345 (Talk|Contrib's.) 23:57, 22 February 2023 (UTC)

So far, what needs to change on COM:East Timor? --Liuxinyu970226 (talk) 03:38, 23 February 2023 (UTC)
@Liuxinyu970226: without a copy of the law, we cannot change it for the meantime. Also, the article does not indicate the date of publication. The law becomes effective 180 days after its publication. JWilz12345 (Talk|Contrib's.) 04:09, 23 February 2023 (UTC)

On Argentine buildings whose architects died more than 70 years ago (or were built 120 years ago)

Given that the Argentine copyright law in its first five articles establishes a general term of 70 years p.m.a. for copyrightable works (among them buildings), and then explains the exceptions (buildings being not mentioned), is it okay to use the {{PD-old-auto-expired}} (for architects who died in 1952 and earlier) or {{PD-old-assumed-expired}} (for 120 years-old buildings) templates for Argentine buildings? Lugamo94 (talk) 01:00, 23 February 2023 (UTC)

@Lugamo94: I suggest you use {{PD-old-architecture}} for Argentine architectural works that are likely in public domain. JWilz12345 (Talk|Contrib's.) 02:28, 23 February 2023 (UTC)
Thanks. Lugamo94 (talk) 16:56, 23 February 2023 (UTC)

File:Lukas Stratmann 1 (51509990867).jpg

File:Lukas Stratmann 1 (51509990867).jpg was imported from Flickr. The Flickr user states in the description on flickr explicitly "cc-by-4.0". This has also been copied to the description in the File page on commons. the license section however says "cc-by-sa-2-0". What is the correct license? C.Suthorn (talk) 09:08, 23 February 2023 (UTC)

May be license has changed? Ruslik (talk) 09:55, 23 February 2023 (UTC)
This image has always been available on Flickr as CC-BY 2.0 (as shown in the licence history). I am not a Flickr user but others have said previously that the site only has 2.0 implemented as a selectable option; later versions of the licence can't be chosen. In this case, a statement has been inserted into the image's description on Flickr that it can be used with CC-BY 4.0. For most sites, the text about the 4.0 licence would be sufficient (most sites don't have a fancy licence selection tool). There is a danger here that if the file description is changed to remove the 4.0 licence, Flickr's "Licence history" tool showing only the 2.0 licence would contradict any reusers working with the 4.0 licence. The copyright holder could point to the licence history tool and say, "It has always only been available under 2.0," while the reuser will claim it was available under 4.0 but without any evidence. If it is possible to get an Internet Archive Way Back Machine link to a version of the page showing the 4.0 comment, I don't see any problems with showing both 2.0 and 4.0 on our file page. Others may be less risk averse and may suggest adding 4.0 without the archive link. From Hill To Shore (talk) 10:32, 23 February 2023 (UTC)

Sanborn maps

The licensing on some of the newer Sanborn maps like File:Sanborn Fire Insurance Map from Kaysville, Davis County, Utah. LOC sanborn08855 003-1.jpg seems incorrect. This one is a 1930 "correction" but really is a new map (compare with File:Sanborn Fire Insurance Map from Kaysville, Davis County, Utah. LOC sanborn08855 002-1.jpg) but the licensing was tagged as PD-USGov. I don't think that en:Sanborn maps could qualify as US government work since it was and remains a private entity but these are likely Template:PD-US-no notice. Do we go by the individual map pages or have to check the entire volume of maps for the year? Does anyone know? Ricky81682 (talk) 09:30, 23 February 2023 (UTC)

These are almost certainly not PD-US-no notice. https://archive.org/details/catalogofcopyrig3126libr/page/27/mode/1up?view=theater shows seven pages of renewals for circa 1930 Sanborn maps. It's possible some of them could be out of copyright; I don't see a renewal for this one. If they didn't bother with a separate renewal, it might just be covered by the older copyright and likely out of copyright now.--Prosfilaes (talk) 19:26, 23 February 2023 (UTC)

Possibly PD-simple report page

en:File:Glaxo study Cover RANITIDINE-plus-nitrites-becomes-NDMA.jpg (source url) was uploaded locally to English Wikipedia as non-free content, but the uploader has asked whether it could possibly be relicensed as {{PD-simple}} in a discussion at en:WP:MCQ#Proactive request for input. If the file is OK for Commons because it's PD, then it could be relicensed (probably with a {{PD-scan}} license for the image and a {{PD-text}} license for the report) and moved to Commons. Any opinions on whether this is OK for Commons? -- Marchjuly (talk) 13:49, 23 February 2023 (UTC)

Remastering

I was planning to improve the quality of this file, under cc 1.0, can I improve the quality of the image? I followed The Username Policy (talk) 20:33, 23 February 2023 (UTC)

  • @I followed The Username Policy: Yes, as long as you make it clear what was the original image (and credit it accordingly) vs. what is your work. Given that any effort to "enhance" a blurry image in this manner involves some choices that are conjectural rather than documentary, you should certainly upload your version under a different filename, and mark it with {{Retouched}} or a similar template. - Jmabel ! talk 00:22, 24 February 2023 (UTC)

Taking a fee for commercial use of a drawing made from their photo

I recently started a discussion about the problem of the so called "permission" asked to a photographer for a so called "derivative work".

One of the answer was "In the case of a drawing from a photo, for instance, the photographer has the right to take a fee for commercial use of a drawing made from their photo. In order for the drawing to be on Commons under a license that also allows for commercial use, the photographer has to state his agreement, which we style a "permission". In no way does the photographer need to waive any other rights regarding his work, but merely acquiesce to the use of his work in a painting whose authorship is clearly with the artist. Felix QW (talk) 14:15, 17 February 2023 (UTC)"

Can someone explain me what kind ot fees could the photgrapher ask for for the drawing that you estimate being a derivative art work and how would these fees be calculated (which proportion and how these proportions could be calculated ?)

Thanks

Waltercolor (talk) 14:49, 21 February 2023 (UTC)

The existence of a fee and the amount is entirely the choice of the creator and the person wanting to create the derivative work. The two parties negotiate until either they reach agreement or the original copyright holder refuses their permission.
Creator: "I want £10,000 before I give you the right to create a derivative work."
Reuser: "I am only prepared to pay £100."
Creator: "No deal."
Some creators may be willing to allow reuse without a fee but the power is held entirely by the creator. The reuser can try to get a better deal or they can back out, they can't force the creator to accept. From Hill To Shore (talk) 15:18, 21 February 2023 (UTC)
If a work is a derivative of another copyrighted work, then the copyright owner of the original controls whether you are allowed to distribute the derivative work. If you do that without permission, it's a copyright violation. The copyright owner has all the control; they are not obligated to give a license at all. In the real world of course, the copyright owner usually will try to get as much money as they can -- either one big license to one party (they will pay for it to be an "exclusive" license, such that nobody else can license it separately, which is tantamount to actually buying at least part of the copyright), or many small licenses to many parties. It's entirely up to the copyright owner, if they want their work used in this particular way, and it doesn't have to be based on money -- whatever gets them to agree to a license. In the case of a free license, of course you have to offer that to everyone, so not sure a small fee would make much sense, though in this case it would just apply to your drawing. But, this situation is exactly why we are so careful about such things here -- you could be exposing re-users to the copyright owner of an underlying work, if courts deem it derivative, and we don't have a license. So drawings which are dancing on the line of derivative or not, can be troubling. If it's not derivative, or you only copied a de minimus amount of expression, then we don't need to worry about the underlying copyright. Such things are inherently subjective, and courts could rule different ways, so it's best not to be close to that line if you can't agree on a license. Carl Lindberg (talk) 17:06, 21 February 2023 (UTC)
@Waltercolor: You may be interested in the pending U.S. Supreme Court case Andy Warhol Foundation v. Goldsmith which deals with this issue specifically. A decision is expected by the end of June. Nosferattus (talk) 19:52, 21 February 2023 (UTC)
This is the question of the transformative nature of fair use under U.S. copyright law, but as you know, Commons does not allow fair use arguments : "Fair use arguments are not allowed on Commons". Waltercolor (talk) 22:53, 21 February 2023 (UTC)
We don't normally accept fair use because there is no use associated with our hosting it in the database. If the fair use is embodied in the work itself as a derivative, it's a harder question which I don't think we have fully fleshed out. I think we have allowed parody works, which is a type of fair use (though is generally a complete defense even for commercial use). If it's possible to use the derivative itself in a commercial context without being copyright infringement, there is an argument there. The counter argument is that U.S. style fair use is only in the laws of a few countries, and it may not be "fair dealing" or the equivalent elsewhere, if it's close to the U.S. borderline. Carl Lindberg (talk) 01:58, 22 February 2023 (UTC)
@Clindberg Derivative works concern rather photos of artworks not photos of living persons. For photos in general as the Copyright Law states, only the artistic part in the photo, not the utilitarian one (identity of the person for example) can be the object of a copyright. Waltercolor (talk) 22:58, 21 February 2023 (UTC)
Derivative works concern any copyrightable photos. Note, for example, the Obama Hope poster that was ruled a derivative work of a photo of Obama.--Prosfilaes (talk) 00:16, 22 February 2023 (UTC)
If there is copyrightable expression in a photograph (i.e. the photograph is copyrightable), it's generally possible to copy that expression in a drawing. In terms of copyright law, "based on" means "copied expression from". In a drawing, the expression is the actual lines that you draw. In a photograph, the expression is usually defined as the specific angle chosen, the framing, possibly the timing, and that sort of thing -- creative choices available to the photographer. If in a setting where the photographer can create the scene, pose a person, or evoke a particular expression, then those too become part of the copyrightable expression. It's definitely possible to create a drawing which is not derivative, by using photos as a reference for what a person looks like, but then creating a new angle etc. But they can copy, as well. One example was the Barack Obama "Hope" poster; it was clear which single photograph was used as the basis. The judge ruled it to not be fair use (it was not really transformative), and made it pretty clear the artist was going to lose, so the parties settled out of court. Another example was Rogers v. Koons, where a sculptor saw a photo of a couple holding many puppies, and created a sculpture of the scene. Since the photographer had worked for a while on the posing, the pose itself was deemed to be copyrightable expression, and the sculpture was derivative (and not fair use). When it's obvious that one particular photo was used as a basis for a drawing, it can be right in that risky area. Carl Lindberg (talk) 01:58, 22 February 2023 (UTC)
@Clindberg I fully agree with your definitions of derivative art versus fair use. It's certainly up to us, as illustrators, to "copy a de minimus amount of expression" from several photographic portraits of one person we inspired us from to draw portraits for Wikiunseen and so on.
Concerning the Obama hope poster, notice that the result is obtained by a mechanical process of applying filters. That's not the case with a free hand drawing where each line is the personal choice of the artist and the gesture is not reproductible, often not by the artist itself. The lines do not take in account all the traits of the form as in mechanicial processes, but they are a non-previsible result of some specific choices and is rendered by strokes, not levels of contrasts or color.
We are here at Wikipedia and sister projects to share free knowledge. If it's important for people to know how a person nearly looks and we have several corroborating sources that have nearly the same angle, framing, with no specific creative choices from one photographer to the other and the photographs can be superimposed and show nearly the same face identity (this is a test I do before drawing someone's portrait), then we can reasonably think that the common features of these photographs are also the "utilitarian" part of the photo that deliver the objective information about the person.
I think we can reasonably take this as a basis for a drawing. But there should not be necessary to get specific permission from all the photographers for this as it would mean the photographers themselves should ask for permission from each others.
And yes, that's ok for not drawing specific features as clothes, jewelry, lock of hair....
Hoping we can find alltogether some correct guidelines for doing "safe" drawing for portraits and better illustrate Wikipedia.
I'm conscious it's not simple for Commons which has to apply the rules in a zero risk way for legal reasons and not in a benefit/risk one to fill the gap of portraits in biographic articles.
Waltercolor (talk) 15:33, 23 February 2023 (UTC)
Concerning the hope poster, Wikipedia says "National Portrait Gallery ... acquired Fairey's hand-finished collage (stencil and acrylic on paper) version of the image". So it's not simply a mechanical process of using filters. Taking several photos that have nearly the same angle and framing and making an artistic work with that angle and framing is very risky; if it came to a court case, a court might rule it was a derivative work of all original photos, or the photographer might successfully argue that some details show the drawing is the derivative work of their photograph. It's just not a clean way of doing things.--Prosfilaes (talk) 19:12, 23 February 2023 (UTC)
I think there is a misunderstanding here. The photos of a same person's face taken by different photographers frequently do overlap as I tested it. That's an objective fact which has nothing to do with a would-be drawing. Even with nearly different angles and framings, the facial identity of the person remains nearly the same, and traits overlap when superimposed in layers. This comes as no surprise and shows the lack of originality of the pictures. For photographic portraits, framing doesn't play a great role as the pattern of the face is the same, whatever the framing. And as a portrait is generally a facing, there are nearly no differences in angles, at least not enough to modify the face identity.
If a court might rule that a drawing is a derivative work of all original photos of a person, there is no proof it has been ruled in that way since then. It's an hypothesis at this stage. There should be at least 5 or 6 court cases. Where are these cases ?
Because that judgment should also mechanically imply that each photo is also a derivative from the other one.
Concerning the Barack Obama Hope poster, it's a single photograph that was used as the basis. It's not inspired by several photos made by several photographers.
If you fear a photographer might successfully argue that some details show the drawing is the derivative work of their photograph, why not proposing to the artist uploading a graphic portrait to Commons to change or erase some details ? That's easy to do and all drawings and paintings can be changed by the artist. That's not a problem.
I'm surprised that in many cases, the only proposition of Commons is : deleting the picture, thus it would be very easy to modify the picture and make it acceptable.
Waltercolor (talk) 14:22, 24 February 2023 (UTC)
Unfortunately the "guidelines" are copyright law itself, which can get quite messy. As mentioned above, there is a Supreme Court decision pending which might give some guidance (or they may rule along contractual lines instead). Fair use for this type of thing is difficult, because in the end you are trying to make a portrait of somebody with a drawing, which can compete directly with a photographic portrait. Having precise lines of the drawing match up with a photograph may make for a better portrait, but you are running a much bigger risk of it being considered a derivative work. It's definitely possible to do -- the photographer doesn't have any ownership over what a person looks like in general -- but (particularly in posed portraits) matching up the lines generally means matching up the angle, and that sort of thing. We all want portraits to be available, but making a "free encyclopedia" is much harder than just an "encyclopedia". That implies no real encumbrances by copyright law, even making money off of them. So there is no getting around it -- we can disagree with court rulings on what "should" be allowed, but we do have to follow those court rulings. Your drawings are not as easy to decide as the Hope poster, but they aren't obviously OK either. Some looked OK to me, but I didn't go through all of them. Carl Lindberg (talk) 04:39, 24 February 2023 (UTC)

USSR AK-47 manual

To illustrate the article, I would like to use title page of the original AK-47 rifle manual. However, I have a problem with the interpretation of copyright. The manual was issued in 1949 by the USSR ministry of defence, and it seems to me that therefore it is in the public domain (correct me if I'm wrong). But what about the rights of the person who made and publish the scan? The scan of the manual comes from this address (someone's private site or blog). The illustration has a watermark, but on the same page there is a [www.ak-info.ru/ak/ak47krs49/ak47krs49.zip link to download] the full manual without any markings (in DJVU format). Can this manual (whole or fragment) be upload on commons? Sumek101 (talk) 09:13, 23 February 2023 (UTC)

Commons does not believe in new copyrights on scans of documents. You can use Template:PD-scan Borysk5 (talk) 10:53, 23 February 2023 (UTC)
The whole document may still have a copyright, but for the cover only, PD-ineligible applies. Yann (talk) 10:56, 23 February 2023 (UTC)
I read here (information supported by sources) that USSR copyright law covered: "Only creative works expressed in some objective form were subject to copyright". Manual does not belong to this type of creation, nor does the cover (it is not some artistic form made by the artist, but a simple cover of the document). It is an old military document issued by the ministry of a non-existent country, it has no author, it is not an example of creative work, etc. Therefore, there are probably no contraindications to upload it on commons? Sumek101 (talk) 11:14, 23 February 2023 (UTC)
I don't know the details of Soviet copyright law, but the copyright we have to worry about is Russian Federation, not Soviet. That language, "creative works", is used in similar copyright laws and generally covers anything but a pure data compilation or a simple copy. The cover probably is PD-ineligible, but given the life+70 laws of the Russian Federation and the fact the manual has author's names at the end, I suspect the manual itself is still under copyright.--Prosfilaes (talk) 19:39, 23 February 2023 (UTC)
I overlooked at the end a three-person editorial team. Indeed, I did not take into account Russian regulations (as the heirs of the USSR). I got acquainted with PD-Russia-1996 and in this case it should be 70 years since the death of the creators. But I think, to the same cover it will not be a problem. I just want to illustrate with two cover of manuals of this type that the Soviets used both names of this weapon ("AK" and "AK-47") in their documents. Sumek101 (talk) 06:38, 24 February 2023 (UTC)

File:Banaue Rice Terraces viewpoint rocks (Banaue, Ifugao; 11-27-2022).jpg

Is the enwiki file w:en:File:Banaue Rice Terraces viewpoint rocks (Banaue, Ifugao; 11-27-2022).jpg OK for transfer to here? The intended subject, the chair fixture made of carefully-assembled rocks, seems plain for me but other users may disagree. Is that artistic enough or original enough to be copyrightable? JWilz12345 (Talk|Contrib's.) 04:07, 25 February 2023 (UTC)

It looks like a trivial arrangement to me. Ruslik (talk) 12:46, 25 February 2023 (UTC)

Image licensing by User:Arne Müseler

The user is using a license teplate located in their userspace and he "silently" changed the licensing of his images from CC-BY-SA-2.0-de to CC-BY-SA-3.0-de in 2011. I think, it is not allowed: both licenses should be present in the image descriptions. They are also changing credits requirements the same way (I assume both credits variants should be OK then). I am also unsure if such userspace-based license templates should be allowed as they complicate retrieving of the image description history changes for reusers. Ankry (talk) 19:04, 22 February 2023 (UTC)

Hi Ankry, I wasn't aware that there was a problem - thanks for pointing that out. what is the best way to solve this? I would now specify both licenses, right?--Arne (talk) 19:37, 22 February 2023 (UTC)
@Arne Müseler: I do not know. That is why I am starting this discussion. Ankry (talk) 01:31, 23 February 2023 (UTC)
@Arne Müseler: This situation violates COM:USER#Regarding licenses because User:Arne Müseler/License is transcluded 1673 times (it must be substed instead).   — 🇺🇦Jeff G. ツ please ping or talk to me🇺🇦 17:21, 26 February 2023 (UTC)

Logo Image

Hi there. I was told to ask here for help regarding this thread, in which I was asking about the copyright status of an image. In summary, would en:File:Kingdom-two-crowns-logo.png be eligible for uploading on Commons under threshold of originality similar to File:Paper Mario Logo.png? I was told that the image may be under a gray area for U.S. copyright law. Thanks, The Night Watch (talk) 14:51, 23 February 2023 (UTC)

It is certainly not a standard font. So, likely not ok. Ruslik (talk) 12:44, 25 February 2023 (UTC)
Non-standard fonts don't matter in the US (though may well matter for the UK). It's still lettering. Any copyright would be based on any elements which are independent of the general shape of the letters, either if they are original drawings on their own, or the the selection and arrangement of them is copyrightable.
I don't really see anything in File:Paper Mario Logo.png, for the US at least. There is an additional outline, and shadow effect, and a gradient coloring, but the US Copyright Office (from what I've seen) has not considered that level of stuff copyrightable in their decisions. UK logos have a much lower threshold of originality, so I doubt it would be OK there, but it seems to be a US logo. For en:File:Kingdom-two-crowns-logo.png, there are a bunch of diamond-like elements on the surface of the letters, plus other lines and dots unrelated to the shape of the letters. While individually those aren't copyrightable, that is plenty for a selection and arrangement copyright, to me. Additionally the coloring is not a straight gradient, but looks to be somewhat randomly-placed chunks of colored areas gradually changing. If those chunks are hand-placed and hand-drawn, that could be a selection and arrangement item itself. Carl Lindberg (talk) 12:59, 26 February 2023 (UTC)

File:Webb Uncovers New Details in Pandora’s Cluster (weic2305a).tiff

File:Webb Uncovers New Details in Pandora’s Cluster (weic2305a).jpeg and File:Webb Uncovers New Details in Pandora’s Cluster (weic2305a).tiff are tagged with {{ESA-Webb}}. The copyright notice on the source website says that this is correct. However the images page on webbtelescope.org says in the copyright note that "material on this site may be freely used as in the public domain in accordance with NASA's contract". Followed by: "Unless otherwise stated, all material on the site was produced by NASA and the Space Telescope Science Institute (STScI). Material on this site produced by STScI was created, authored, and/or prepared for NASA under Contract NAS5-03127. Unless otherwise specifically stated, no claim to copyright is being asserted by STScI and material on this site may be freely used as in the public domain in accordance with NASA's contract."
So {{PD-USGov-NASA}} then? Does anybody have an idea what the correct licence is? --D-Kuru (talk) 08:41, 26 February 2023 (UTC)

Yes, {{PD-Webb}} would be correct. The rule of thumb that's pretty consistently followed these days by NASA and ESA is that if the credit line starts with NASA, then it's PD-Webb; if it starts with ESA, then it's {{ESA-Webb}} (or {{PD-USGov-NASA}} and {{ESA}} for general stuff). Basing the license template on where it is published is problematic because many times both Webb sites will publish the same image. — Huntster (t @ c) 09:09, 26 February 2023 (UTC)

weird metadata

This image has a cc-by-2.0 license on Flickr but in its metadata the "Copyright holder" is {{Crown Copyright}} and it is stated in the "Usage terms" that "This image is for Editorial use purposes only". Is it a multi-licensing issue and acceptable for Commons or must be deleted? Hanooz 07:39, 25 February 2023 (UTC)

@Hanooz: similar issue also surfaced at Commons:Deletion requests/File:Liz Truss official portrait (cropped)2.jpg. JWilz12345 (Talk|Contrib's.) 08:23, 25 February 2023 (UTC)
Thanks. Although it seems to be a different problem (contradictory license/reuse information on Flickr and metadata). But it comes from the same source (UK government). Hanooz 10:37, 25 February 2023 (UTC)
regarding their flickr, if they put an image on a 'free' licence, you can upload it here freely, regardless of what the exif says..technically all images on that flickr feed is free but we have loopholes to jump because either they don't understand their own OGL or because Flickr lacks the ability to allow more licenses or allow users to add their own version of an existing licence..remember flickr is still stuck on cc2.0 while the rest of the world is on cc4.0.. Stemoc 03:19, 27 February 2023 (UTC)

Maps/plans based on diagrams

I'm trying to get my head around the question of making diagrams (specifically, in this case, maps and plans of archaeological sites).

Essentially, if someone has drawn a map or plan of something in a copyrighted work, and I want to make my own map or plan of that thing, to what extent am I able to do so, and what do I have to do to make sure it isn't considered a derivative work?

(And does that change if their map/plan includes conjectured or reconstructed features?)

At the moment, my sense of the problem is something like:

1. Presumably, if I find a map/plan in a copyrighted work, and simply scan it, I can't upload that - it's under copyright.
2. If I simply copy that diagram by hand, that's a derivative work, so still under copyright - I can't upload it.
3. However, 'bare facts' cannot be copyrighted, so the simple fact of where each thing was found, how big it is and so on cannot be copyrighted. Therefore, I should be able to upload a diagram which shows exactly the same information about these objects/finds as the original diagram.
4. There seems to be a clash between 2. and 3.
5. What happens if some things in the diagram are conjectured or reconstructed by the author - so not 'facts', but something which would be fine to cite (with attribution) in a piece of text?

Thanks in advance, UndercoverClassicist (talk) 10:24, 26 February 2023 (UTC)

You are generally right though I do not see any conflict between 2 and 3. As to 5, conjectures or hypotheses are also not protected by copyright. So, you can depict an object in your own diagram in the position conjectured by some other person. Ruslik (talk) 19:34, 27 February 2023 (UTC)

Brief filed in the U.S. Supreme Court not by the federal government

File:SCOTUS-Oct_03_2022-Main_Document-Brief_amicus_curiae_of_The_Onion_filed=20221006144840674_Novak_Parma_Onion_Amicus_Brief.pdf is tagged with {{PD-USGov}}. But the file is a brief written by a private attorney's office (not a U.S. Atty) for a private company. The only reason I can see for the licensing tag is if there exists a rule that any submission to SCOTUS enters the public domain, but I can't find anywhere that documents such a rule. Ilex verticillata (talk) 02:20, 27 February 2023 (UTC)

There's no such rule. Courts are essentially relying on fair use to (re)publish briefs. Submissions by non-government entities are simple private copyrights and can be assessed using the normal rules for copyright. Fair use content is not permitted by Commons' policy so it can't be hosted here. Xover (talk) 08:52, 27 February 2023 (UTC)

File:Julian Onziema at 2015 GLAAD Media Awards.jpg

File:Julian Onziema at 2015 GLAAD Media Awards.jpg was uploaded without a copyright license and will be deleted in about a week if it reamains as such. I was able to find a similar file here that looks like was taken at the same event. The other file is attributed to Getty which makes me think this file might also be from Getty. Other files from the same event of the same person can be found here on a site owned by the Patrick McMullan Company. What's the best thing to do here? Wait to see if the uploader adds a license? Tag the file as a copyvio? My guess is that this is perhaps a misunderstanding of COM:NETCOPYVIO by the uploader and not their COM:Own work. -- Marchjuly (talk) 06:22, 27 February 2023 (UTC)

Scan of 1971 newspaper article

I've got a couple of questions about File:1971 - Arners Diner Moving - 19 May MC - Allentown PA.jpg. The first is about the file's {{PD-US-no notice}} licensing. Can it really be determined that this article has no notice just because their no notice visible in this clipping? It would seem that there could be a notice for the paper itself (which I think is "MC" or en:The Morning Call), right? So, it would seem that we would need to see the entire edition of the paper or at least one from the same year to determine whether there were notices on some other page of the paper. The next question has to do with the COM:SCOPE of this file. It's not currently being used, but it's of such poor quality that it's educational value seems pretty limited at best. Would this fall under the last bullet point of COM:SPAM since there are quite a number of other photos in Category:Pennsylvania Power and Light Building that seem to be better images of the building. -- Marchjuly (talk) 06:52, 27 February 2023 (UTC)

Photographer Requested That I Post His Photo on Wikpedia

The photographer is a busy fellow and didn't want to have to learn how to post on Wikipedia. If he had posted the photo, the documentation of the source would have been "my photo." I've tried to explain what happened, but I've still not figured out the right category to cite in order to stipulate this situation. Any guidance, please? Gobigtrain (talk) 20:50, 27 February 2023 (UTC)

Yes, never do this. It will only end up deleted.
Photographers should upload their own material here (under your guidance, if helpful). Otherwise Commons' culture is simply to delete it, and quite possibly to block you for breaching copyright too.
It is (in theory) possible to use VRT to do this, with your upload. But that's more complex, and much less obvious a process, than just getting the photographer to do it. Andy Dingley (talk) 21:05, 27 February 2023 (UTC)
Also this: File:Shirley Povich Interviewing Walter Johnson Sculpture.jpg There's just no licence at all. Licences on Commons need to be one of the standard licences (by adding a template), not some text that you write yourself (if it's "unusual", it gets deleted).
Although the photographer transitive permission-by-proxy you mentioned is a problem, this image is tagged for deletion already because of the licence (and it not being recognised as such), not who added it. Andy Dingley (talk) 21:29, 27 February 2023 (UTC)
Also, even if the photographer granted permission, the file would still be deleted as there is no freedom of panorama for sculptures in the United States. See COM:FOP US. The sculpture is described as being "dedicated" in November 2021, so it is presumably a recent work that is still in copyright. For this photograph to be retained, we would need evidence of permission from the sculptor for the photographer to create a derivative work and then evidence of the photographer releasing the photograph under a free licence that is acceptable to Wikimedia Commons. From Hill To Shore (talk) 00:44, 28 February 2023 (UTC)

Big problem with existing GODL-India images

The Gazette Notification associated with the GODL-India says (on section 5):

Unless the user is citing the data using an internationally accepted data citation format, an attribution notice in the following format must be explicitly included:

“[Name of Data Provider], [Year of Publication], [Name of Data], [Name of Data Repository/Website], [Version Number and/or Date of Publication (dd/mm)], [DOI / URL / URI]. Published under [Name of License]: [URL of License].”

The vast, vast majority of images on Category:GODL-India do not have this attribution statement, neither do they have an "internationally accepted data citation format". This is >100K images. What should happen? --Matr1x-101Pinging me doesn't hurt! {user - talk? - useless contributions} 18:10, 24 February 2023 (UTC)

As first measure I would change the template to include fields for the required attribution parts. If these and the current attribution string ("1=") are missing or empty, there should be a prominent warning and the file put in a maintenance category. If only "1=..." is provided, instead of the warning box a prompt to check the attribution should be displayed, and another maintenance category added. A new parameter, "citation format" should be added, for specifying that the 1= parameter indeed is in a specific valid format (probably free text, but an official name of the standard if possible).
Next one should check whether there are some large subsets for which a valid attribution can be added (or he existing one confirmed to be valid) by bot, and those bot batches run. I assume that many GODL-India files have been uploaded by bot, so the number of upload batches are probably much lower than the number of files, and how to identify the necessary details can probably be sorted out with the uploaders. When these big categories have been taken care of, we hopefully have a significantly smaller number of offending images.
–LPfi (talk) 14:03, 28 February 2023 (UTC)

On File:Mencken In Defence of Women.djvu

I can't check the details of the deleted item, but it seems that it's a scan of British print of a pre-1928 American novel by an American author who died in 1956. It doesn't seem to be categorized in any "Undelete in X" category. Is there a chance of having it categorized in the "Undeleted in 2027" category or there are other issues that make this not possible? Lugamo94 (talk) 03:00, 26 February 2023 (UTC)

Yes, I just added the deletion request to the category, Commons:Deletion requests/File:Mencken In Defence of Women.djvu. It is also possible to directly list a deleted file to the descriptive part of the category as you can note on Category:Undelete in 2027. Thanks for your question. Ellywa (talk) 07:30, 26 February 2023 (UTC)
Thanks. Lugamo94 (talk) 04:16, 28 February 2023 (UTC)

Question about my grandfather's photos

Hello everyone. Before I get to my question, I'd like to give some background. My grandfather, who was born in 1917, served in the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers in South Korea from 1946 to 1947. While there he took a lot of photos (in 1946 and 1947), either of his camp where he lived, local Koreans, his friends, and other items of interest (like temples and shrines). He died in April 2005 and his photos fell into my possession at that time. After reading COM:L, COM:FAQ, and Commons:Copyright rules by territory/Consolidated list Northern America#United States of America, I am under the impression that I could scan in, and upload, these photos, especially those of his camp, the local Korean people, temples, shrines, and more (not necessarily his friends, as some are probably still alive, or even photos of himself), on here. Is this impression correct? Can I upload those photos on here? I'd like some comments about this before proceeding. If this is the wrong place to post, let me know, as I can post this there instead. Thanks and hope you all have a good day. Genealogymanextraordinaire (talk) 20:11, 21 February 2023 (UTC)

@Genealogymanextraordinaire: Two separate rights issues here: copyright and personality rights.
Copyright: if you are the heir to his intellectual property rights, then you can do this. You'd use an "heirs" license template, like {{Cc-by-sa-4.0-heirs}}. If his will was unclear about the intellectual property rights, then they would go to whoever has the residuum of the estate, and if that's not you then you'd need that person to go through the COM:VRT process. They could do it just once, a blanket statement about you being allowed to upload your grandfather's works. If there is no will, then I'd guess it is reasonable to assume that inheritance of the photos includes inheritance of the rights, but someone else here might know better.
Personality rights:
Jmabel ! talk 00:05, 22 February 2023 (UTC)
Jmabel, thanks for your comment. That's very helpful. I'm pretty sure my grandfather didn't have a will, as he died pretty suddenly (I mean, people weren't expecting it and weren't as aware of his health problems), but I'd be fine with going through the COM:VRT process. Good to know about the pictures in Korea. I mean, only a smattering of them are of people, as most are of landscapes and other monuments, shrines, etc. Genealogymanextraordinaire (talk) 14:52, 22 February 2023 (UTC)
@Genealogymanextraordinaire: . If your grandfather did not have a will, then I would work on the assumption that the intellectual rights to the photographs passed on jointly to his children (ie one of your parents and your uncles and aunts) rather than to you. You would then need to get agreement from your parent (and his/her siblings) to publish the photos under creative commons. If any of your uncles and aunts have died, then you would need to get permission from their surviving spoise of their children (your cousins) as appropriate. If however your parent was an only child and has since died, then you will need to get permission from your siblings (if you have any) before publishing. Martinvl (talk) 21:03, 27 February 2023 (UTC)
@Martinvl: That's not always true. For joint copyright holders, some countries require all to agree, while others require just one to agree (usually with some provision that any economic proceeds have to be shared equitably). -- King of ♥ ♦ ♣ ♠ 21:26, 27 February 2023 (UTC)
Do you have a guide for what countries require all to agree, while others only require one to agree? I mean, I could just ask my dad if he would be ok with it. I mean, I would like to proceed with this, if at all possible, and want to make sure I take the required steps, so that there aren't any licensing issues in the future with the photos, if that makes sense. Genealogymanextraordinaire (talk) 00:54, 28 February 2023 (UTC)
I suppose that makes sense. My dad has a sister and I don't have any siblings, as I'm an only child. Like with any estate, the possessions were divided, and as I've been researching my dad's roots, I ended up with the photos, and became the family historian. Genealogymanextraordinaire (talk) 00:52, 28 February 2023 (UTC)
@Genealogymanextraordinaire and King of Hearts: [this website] explains the situation in the United States. My reading of the article says that under US law any copyright holder can charge somebody for using the copyright without consulting the other copyright holders, but they will have to share the proceeds of such an authorisation with the other copyright holders. However a copyright hold may not render the copyright worthless without the consent of the other copyright holders. It is my understanding that by posting an image on Commons under Creative Commons you will render the copyright as worthless (if I use your image for my own purposes, even for a profit, I do not need to pay you - see for example this photo which is free and this photo for which you have to pay).
Therefore you will need to obtain permission from all the copyright holders. From what you have written, it appears that your father is still alive which makes him, not you as one of the copyright holders. The other copyright holder is your aunt, or if she is no longer alive, then whoever inherited her estate (your uncle or cousins as per your aunt's will or as per local law). Martinvl (talk) 16:35, 28 February 2023 (UTC)
The page you shared links to two posts that seem to argue the opposite; it's not a settled issue. In practice, at COM:VRT we've never required permission from all of the joint copyright holders. Nor, in the case of receiving an email from a representative of a company, do we actually ask to inspect its incorporation docs to make sure the employee is authorized to act on behalf of the company; instead, we just check that the domain matches and trust that they know what they're doing. -- King of ♥ ♦ ♣ ♠ 18:14, 28 February 2023 (UTC)
So, if I understand you correctly, could I could make a similar post on COM:VRT about this topic, then receive permission for posting the images? I know my dad would definitely be ok with it, but is there some specific form I need to send him for permission, or can it be something more informal, like an email from him, saying that it be ok with me posting the images on here? I just haven't done this before. Genealogymanextraordinaire (talk) 19:49, 1 March 2023 (UTC)

Peruvian municipal coat of arms

I've come across File:Escudo de Ilabaya.jpg which appears incorrectly tagged as CC-BY-SA. COM:Peru#GOVERNMENT suggests that since it was produced by/for a local government authority it should be illegible for copyright. Would {{PD-PE-insignia}} then be the appropriate tag for the image? Addendum: And also File:Escudo de Tacna.png. —chaetodipus (talk) 04:49, 26 February 2023 (UTC)

  • @Chaetodipus: No way for me to know on this particular image, but there is a distinction between a blazon, which is typically public domain, and any actual visual representation of that blazon, which some artist has to create and which can usually be copyrighted. - Jmabel ! talk 06:47, 26 February 2023 (UTC)
    • Neither I can comment on the specific case, but in Finland it used to be the practice to include a visual representation in the decision, with the effect that that realisation became PD. –LPfi (talk) 13:56, 26 February 2023 (UTC)
      I'm pretty unsure about the image. It does differ from the only version I can find online from any government source ([22]; which should be PD), but I'm not totally sure where its uploader found it from. The quality is very grainy and probably from elsewhere. —chaetodipus (talk) 08:39, 28 February 2023 (UTC)
  • Each drawing of a coat of arms has its own independent copyright (unless it copied actual drawn elements/lines); usually the general design is an "idea" with each drawing being distinct "expressions". See Commons:Coats of arms. That said, usually contributor-drawn versions are .png or .svg files, not .jpg like that, so it's very possible it was copied from a source which would have a different copyright status (be that PD or fully copyrighted). This was the updater's only contribution here. Carl Lindberg (talk) 12:16, 28 February 2023 (UTC)
    I came across this image when I came across several of User:Kanepla's uploads that I marked as copyvios. I took a look at their old website via the Internet Archive but they seemed to have used a more corporate logo previously. The municipal Facebook page does have a similar coat of arms, with some different coloration. It could just have been from a government source but it's just lost/difficult to locate I suppose. —chaetodipus (talk) 18:28, 1 March 2023 (UTC)
    The Facebook page, and the archived website you found, have the same versions I think. They are graphically related to this one, as the branches on the sides and the upper part of the shield are the exact same delineations (which is the copyrightable part), just slightly different colors. The rose and maybe the other portion of the shield has been redrawn, but one of those versions started from (and is derivative of) the other. There is a version of this one here, so the image was out there somewhere to be copied at some point. Internet Archive on the government website unfortunately does not go back to the time period when this was uploaded. If the user's other uploads were copyvios, then this one was almost certainly copied as well, and its license is bogus. I would guess it was the one from the government website at the time though, so if we think that one is PD-PE-insignia, we could just use that license. Or overwrite with the current one, if that is sourced better. Carl Lindberg (talk) 14:13, 2 March 2023 (UTC)

UPenn Scholarly Commons usage

Could I have some views on uploading https://repository.upenn.edu/sims_video/28? I have started an article on this document and the video on Scholarly Commons would be very useful for readers. Looking at the related policies, https://repository.upenn.edu/policies.html, this reads as if the intention is to make free content, though this depends on the copyright of objects. As the object is public domain by age, and the person making the video is doing it as a full time curator at the Penn library, there is no claim of copyright for the video. Can this be uploaded as CC0 on that reasonable presumption? Anstil (talk) 12:20, 28 February 2023 (UTC)

No. Unless you can show a clear license, you can't upload it. The fact that the person doing it works for a private university doesn't change anything.--Prosfilaes (talk) 13:20, 28 February 2023 (UTC)
I have contacted the curator and asked if they are interested in making a release statement. --Anstil (talk) 14:11, 1 March 2023 (UTC)
They've got back to me, confirming their intention is to provide the content copyright free. I've suggested a standard release statement unless they update the website policy. Hopefully that will make many interesting and high knowledge value UPenn digital contents available for upload. --Anstil (talk) 15:12, 2 March 2023 (UTC)

Finnish postage stamps

See the discussion at Commons talk:Copyright rules by territory/Finland#Copyright status of stamps. The question is whether a postage stamp is a decision issued by a public authority or other public body, and therefore free of copyright. The design of the stamp would of course by decided by a public body and may be included in the document recording the decision. Any input to that discussion would be welcome. Aymatth2 (talk) 15:31, 28 February 2023 (UTC)

Stamps are not decisions, the question is whether they are covered by copyright even having been included in decisions by public bodies. For other points, see the discussion. –LPfi (talk) 16:11, 28 February 2023 (UTC)
So far the consensus seems to be leaning towards stamps not being decisions issued by a public body and therefore not free of copyright. The whole thing about them being included in decisions by public bodies is obviously a strawman, one that LPfi came up with after the whole thing about stamps being decisions by public bodies fell through. In case anyone is wondering, the reason it's a strawman is because something can be included in a decision by a public body and still be copyrighted, or visa versa. In otherwards, it's a distinction without a purpose and one that has zero relevance. Except that it's easier to defend then just outright saying stamps are decisions when they clearly aren't. As a side to that, at least from what I've seen there's zero evidence individual stamp designs are included in decisions by public bodies. Sure, a government employee probably provides written feedback on the designs of the stamps, but that doesn't mean it's part of a decision by a public body. At least not in the way the law is talking about. But again, it's not like it would somehow make stamps magically free of copyright if they were included in decisions by public bodies anyway. --Adamant1 (talk) 04:42, 1 March 2023 (UTC)
Please don't move the argument to here, and please don't put words in my mouth. I have never said that stamps are decisions, and I have at least twice explicitly said they are not. About the straw man: the only reason I know for them being in the public domain is that they were included in statements by a public body. I will ignore the rest of what you say here for now, concentrating on the linked discussion. –LPfi (talk) 14:41, 1 March 2023 (UTC)
So far I can see no consensus in that discussion. There are still only the original three participants, and none of us have changed their mind. –LPfi (talk) 14:50, 1 March 2023 (UTC)
Please don't move the argument to here You were the one doing that by staying "the question is whether they are covered by copyright even having been included in decisions by public bodies." If your going to pose a question, don't be surprised when people answer it. To your other points, as I've said else there's zero evidence that individual stamp designs are included in statements by a public body. Otherwise, be my guest and provide some. Until then though simply stating that they are included in statements by a public body without actually showing the exact statements that the specific stamps are included in is a none starter. At least it is in my opinion. Otherwise we could spend all day speculating about this. Personally, I rather stick to the facts, what we actually have evidence for, and there's zero evidence that they are included in statements by a public body or that it would even make them public domain in the first place if they were.
As to if there is a consensus in the original discussion or not, there's zero consensus that stamps are decisions. Which is what I started the discussion to find out. I don't really care about the other post-hawk minutia that you brought up after the fact. I didn't start the conversation to endlessly wax poetic about increasingly obscure, irrelevant legal definitions or whatever. The conversation would have ended there if you hadn't of steamrolled the conversation by Gish Galloping and miss-representing things though. But in my mind at least it's settled that stamps of Finland aren't copyright free, at least not on the grounds that they are decisions. Maybe they are for other reasons, but the onus is on the people who disagree that they copyrighted to present valid and compelling evidence that aren't. I don't currently see anyone doing that and we don't just default to something being PD purely because there's an ongoing discussion about it though. --Adamant1 (talk) 16:40, 1 March 2023 (UTC)
I don't think that there is consensus related on that. You continuously repeat your argument in the discussion but it doesn't make it consensus. It just makes lot of text to read. --Zache (talk) 16:56, 1 March 2023 (UTC)
I'm not sure what your talking about. Pretty much everyone in the discussion agrees that stamps aren't decisions. Including LPfi and the person who originally drafting the article that added the part saying they were. It would help if you were more specific about what exactly your referring to though. As to the last bit of your comment, there's naturally going to be lot of text when one side is forced to repeatedly counter loads of obviously false information from the other. Maybe tell LPfi to stop with the Gish Galloping if it's something you really care about. I'm going to keep correcting clearly wrong information as long as people keep repeating it though. --Adamant1 (talk) 18:51, 1 March 2023 (UTC)
Ok, you can count me as second opposing your interpretations in addition to LPfi. I don't know what is the correct answer related to if stamps are under Finnish copyright law 9 § exception, but least we seem to be able to read Finnish and have some understanding on history of Finlands copyright law. -- Zache (talk) 19:17, 1 March 2023 (UTC)
All I've done is quoted the documents that LPfi told me to read. So I'm not really sure what "interpretations" your talking about. What exactly about what I quoted do you disagree with though? Also, not to be rude but you don't get to claim your somehow automatically right and the other person is wrong just because you speak the language, know the history of the country, and they don't. Sorry, but that's not how this works. It's based on evidence, not who is native to the country being discussed or whatever. I don't get to tell everyone in the world to piss off when it comes to anything having to do with English or the United States just because I'm America, have a history degree, and speak English more fluently then they do. Get rule dude. More on topic, what evidence do either of you seriously have that Finnish stamps are copyright free? Because I don't see any. Even LPfi has said it's their "opinion" that stamps are copyright free because the designs are included in decisions. Where's the evidence of that being the case though? --Adamant1 (talk) 19:27, 1 March 2023 (UTC)

I think we need more participants in the discussion. My impression is that we are not understanding each other's arguments, and would need an unbiased voice, perhaps somebody who could make the argument more structured. –LPfi (talk) 18:01, 2 March 2023 (UTC)

Image from EPA website is credited to someone else

File:Graniteville derailment, aerial view closeup.jpg is sourced to an EPA website, [23] which would mean it is a U.S. government work released to the public domain. But while searching the web for a higher resolution version of this photo, I found several websites that attribute it to a Todd Sumlin. [24] According to his LinkedIn profile, [25] Sumlin is photojournalist and was never an EPA employee. Anyone have an idea what's going on here? Is this photo still kosher, copyright-wise? Ixfd64 (talk) 17:30, 20 February 2023 (UTC)

@Ixfd64: No, as it appears that epaosc.org is not properly attributing the photos it hosts.   — 🇺🇦Jeff G. ツ please ping or talk to me🇺🇦 17:24, 26 February 2023 (UTC)
What's up with that website? If you click the link on top marked "An official website of the United States government - Here's how you know"
It says:
Official websites use .gov
A .gov website belongs to an official government organization in the United States.
But this is not a .gov website. It's a .org site. Anyone can get a .org domain. (I've even got one.) Is this whole website a spoof? Dcs002 (talk) 00:34, 27 February 2023 (UTC)
Ok, maybe not a spoof, but do the On-Scene Coordinators subcontract their media to the private sector? Is this an official EPA website? Is an EPA On-Site-Coordinator website different from an EPA website? I'm really concerned about the .org, and it seems to be nationwide. Dcs002 (talk) 00:56, 27 February 2023 (UTC)
its an old site so probably trying to keep its original name to avoid deadlinks..i believe that .gov TLD was not in existence when the site was setup back when we had like 3 options (com/net/org) and we expect poorly kept records and poor attribution because photographers back then weren't greedy lol and would happily share disaster related images with the USGovt.. i think we can keep the Todd image but give him credit in the author section Stemoc 03:01, 27 February 2023 (UTC)
Thanks! I've seen good spoof websites before, and this seemed far too well interconnected to be one of those, so I'm glad there's an explanation. It had me a bit spooked though. The US federal government is really tight on security issues... I thought. They go through the trouble of having that "Official websites use .gov" warning, but it's on a .org website? That's silly enough to be a government job! Dcs002 (talk) 09:47, 27 February 2023 (UTC)
@Stemoc: I don't think that's an acceptable solution. If the photograph wasn't taken by an EPA employee, then publishing it on the EPA website does not put it in the public domain. Arguments such as "The copyright owner will not mind/should be pleased that we have disseminated their work" go against the precautionary principle. Ixfd64 (talk) 18:42, 27 February 2023 (UTC)
This image is suspected to be 3rd party content, right? If we know it's 3rd party content, we have procedures for that (as I recently learned...), but do we really know that? Isn't the real question whether it's the reasonable assumption that an image that's not marked or attributed to a 3rd party within the US govt document or webpage is government owned, and that assumption must be overcome with reliable evidence that's more persuasive than a government source that treats it as if it's not? How reliable are those other websites? Do they predate the EPA use? Might the owner have assigned the rights to the lower resolution photo to the EPA once it was no longer in the news cycle? (Do photojournalists do that?) Not an argument for either position, just trying to be thorough. Dcs002 (talk) 23:19, 27 February 2023 (UTC)
And then I read the precautionary principle. Dcs002 (talk) 23:24, 27 February 2023 (UTC)
Update: I've contacted the EPA to confirm the source of the image, and am now awaiting a response. Ixfd64 (talk) 18:10, 6 March 2023 (UTC)
@Ixfd64 Could you explain the steps you took to contact the EPA and the questions you asked in your effort to get a clarification about this photo? Have you contacted other agencies successfully in the past? -- Ooligan (talk) 17:39, 8 March 2023 (UTC)
@Ooligan: I used their online contact form and asked them to confirm the source of the image. However, I haven't heard back from them beyond an automatic reply email. Ixfd64 (talk) 18:30, 8 March 2023 (UTC)

Black History Month DR's

File:Martin Luther King, Jr. Memorial at nightfall.jpg

This National Park Service photograph has been nominated for deletion, by coincidence, during Black History Month. Not a surprise is the reason- No Freedom of Panorama (FoP) for 3-D works. But there are three other Martin Luther King, Jr. Memorial files also nominated by the same User:

File:Martin Luther King Jr in November.jpg on Commons since November 2020.

File:Martin Luther King, Jr. Memorial.png on Commons since October 2020.

File:ThestoneLutherking.jpg on Commons since September 2016 and uploaded during "Wiki Loves Monuments 2016 in the United States"


However, these similar files in the same category have NOT been nominated.

File:I Still have a Dream.jpg

File:Martin Luther King, Jr. Memorial at night -04- (50866537733).png

File:Martin Luther King, Jr. Memorial at night -03- (50849924651).png

File:Old Guard, MLK Memorial promotion ceremony -Image 1 of 3- (6103464621).jpg

and maybe this File:Martin Luther King Jr. Memorial (777c244c-cb74-4ced-9c29-ab3d06a406da).jpg (depending on de minimis determination).


Why are arbitrary files chosen after years of existence on Commons (not my more recent National Park Service file), while others are allowed to temporary exist until they are chosen to be deleted.

It seems is that this FoP issue is evolving. So, when this category's "NoFoP-US" tag was added in 2021, could there just have been a mass Deletion Request (DR) process to have a more robust community discussion and comments about removing any files not compliant with FoP all at one time and in one place?

What about the other categories with this tag added? What about all the future categories where this tag will be added? Is there a better way or is it possible to make better one. I think there is a missed opportunity to a have a more comments and discussion. Can or should a "whole category FoP DR" process could be done? All file unloaders could be notified at one time and all could share their perspectives and read other comments, which may not happen when files are deleted one or a few at a time.

I don't want any of these great photos deleted, but it seems unlikely they can be saved here on the Commons. I've seen 100's of files from around the world be deleted because of FoP. Now it is the Martin Luther King, Jr. Memorial statue's turn to be deleted during Black History Month.

If possible, can all deleted FoP MLK Jr. Memorial statue files be pixelated or edited to mask the statue, but still show what is missing within the same photograph? These photos will be educational in the future to many people that do not know about this FoP issue and how it effects The Commons. Thanks, -- Ooligan (talk) 12:05, 24 February 2023 (UTC)

We could keep the images if sculptor Lei Yixin gives his permission to allow them to be published under a free license. Unfortunately, I haven't been able to locate any contact information. Ixfd64 (talk) 23:22, 24 February 2023 (UTC)
Can ORTS members send an email about how to give permission, if someone was able to find a artist contact? -- Ooligan (talk) 23:57, 24 February 2023 (UTC)
@Ooligan: it is the obligation of the Wikipedian photographers or Flickr importers to get licensing permit from Lei Yixin, not the VRTS members. The only job of the members is to authenticare or verify permissions, but the duty of getting permissions from artists falls on uploaders. JWilz12345 (Talk|Contrib's.) 02:32, 25 February 2023 (UTC)
Also don't rely on public domain claims by the U.S. government, like in U.S. government-sourced photos. The government itself has committed copyright infringement against the late sculptor Frank Gaylord, in the case Gaylord v. United States, concerning Korean War Veterans Memorial sculptural ensemble "The Column" designed by Gaylord. US Postal Service even tried to escape by claiming fair use but failed. JWilz12345 (Talk|Contrib's.) 02:35, 25 February 2023 (UTC)
Just a shower thought: maybe if enough artists sue the U.S. government for using pictures of their sculptures without permission, the government will introduce FoP for their own selfish needs. Ixfd64 (talk) 06:31, 25 February 2023 (UTC)
@Ixfd64: there were already two notable cases. One is the case I mentioned and the other is Davidson v. United States, concerning the Vegas replica of Statue of Liberty. JWilz12345 (Talk|Contrib's.) 08:20, 25 February 2023 (UTC)
I doubt that February being Black History Month in the US (I believe it's October in the UK) had anything to do with the nomination of these files, but only the user who nominated the files can say for sure. It's kind weird that this is the second time this month that a user (a different user) has suggested in a VPC discussion (a different discussion) that concerns raised about a file's licensing were somehow related to it being Black History Month in the US. These kind of not too subtle attempts to switch the discussion from the validity of a file's licensing to the motives of those questioning said licensing aren't very helpful in my opinion and probably should be avoided. Unless you're willing to start a discussion about such a thing at COM:ANI, you probably shouldn't be making an such statements here. -- Marchjuly (talk) 12:00, 26 February 2023 (UTC)
My main point was the timing of this mass Deletion Request regarding a high profile MLK, Jr. statue at the Martin Luther King, Jr. Memorial in Washington, D. C. I conceded the deletions per FoP when I wrote, "... it seems unlikely they can be saved here on the Commons." So, this DR timing issue is not "... attempts to switch the discussion from the validity of a file's licensing..." I could have written my comments more clearly.
Last year I first noted purposeful timing another mass deletion request here: Commons:Deletion requests/Files in Category:Goddess of Democracy (San Francisco). I commented at that time, "I assume good faith, but note these multiple deletion requests for the "Goddess of Democracy" related to 1989 Tiananmen Square protests and massacre were submitted on October 1st, the National Day of the People's Republic of China" That category has been emptied of images for which the category is named. Does the category there- "United States FOP cases/kept" need changing to "United States FOP cases/deleted?"
I brought this issue to this page, because I knew that the DR above was related to copyright, so I commented here. -- Ooligan (talk) 22:55, 4 March 2023 (UTC)
They were deleted because Liuxinyu970226 tagged them as {{Permission received}} after I closed the DR as "keep", but no one familiar with the situation noticed so it was deleted by Krd in a sweep of 30-day-old expired VRT tickets. I have restored the images. @Liuxinyu970226: In the future, please don't tag images that already have confirmed valid permission with the {{Permission received}} template, because it puts them on a 30-day timer for deletion. Instead, just ask any VRT agent and they can add the necessary permission templates. I've added the ticket to Category:Goddess of Democracy (San Francisco), so I don't think the template is necessary to include on individual photos (and may mislead people into thinking the ticket covers the permission for the photo). -- King of ♥ ♦ ♣ ♠ 05:50, 9 March 2023 (UTC)
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