Commons talk:Licensing/Ecoport copyleft

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Ecoport copyleft[edit]

Ecoport has a large collection of images that are explicitly copyleft. Their license is here. Is it possible to add their license to the list? I've just added Image:Moringa_seed_pods.jpg, and would love to add many more images. Waitak@en (talk)

Sadly, no: This is a non-commercial license, which is not compatible with Commons Policy. It states: If you want to use resources found in EcoPort for financial gain or commercial purposes, e.g. in commercial databases, websites, printed publications, products such as CD-ROMs or advertising of commercial services, then you must contact the original EcoPort contributor for (a) permission and (b) to negotiate terms of use and revenue-sharing.
Please list any images you copied from there for deletion - or better, ask the copyright holder to release it under a fully free license like CC-BY-SA. Thank you -- Duesentrieb(?!) 10:02, 17 May 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Ah, I see. Is it required that images be able to be used for commercial gain to be includable in Wikimedia? I hadn't realized that... I've emailed the copyright holder, as per your suggestion, and will either tag the image or update the copyright, depending on his response. Perhaps the license tags and Commons:Licensing page could be updated to include EcoPort? I'm almost certainly not the person to do so... Waitak@en (talk)
Yes, that is neccessary. It's in the very first section of the policy page: Commons:Licensing#Acceptable_licenses; As this comes up time and time again, we should probably have an FAQ entry for that...
I do not understand why you want to include EcoPort on policy pages, if their license is not acceptable on the commons?...
One of the main rasons for allowing commercial use is this: one of the main goals of Wikimedia is to provice knowledge to the under-previleged, i.e. handicapedpeople, third world countries, etc. This often means transferring information to another medium, like print. This again is often only feasable if it is possible to charge (some) money for it. Also consider that the German Wikipedia has been published on CD/DVD, and excerpts have been published as books - some people like hardcopies, but handing the mout for free isn't really possible.
basically: we aim to distribute free information as widely as possible - this is much easier if people are allowed to earn a bit of money doing that. Since all information is also available free of charge (though perhaps only "dynamically" on the web), and the "commercial" versions are required to make that clear (most free licenses require this in soem way), I see no problem with that. -- Duesentrieb(?!) 11:17, 17 May 2006 (UTC)[reply]

It might be an appropriate addition to Commons:Copyright tags#Unfree copyrights. I'd have found it there with a search for EcoPort, for example, and there wouldn't have been the need to have the conversation we're having now... Waitak@en (talk) 12:14, 17 May 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I don't think it's a good idea to start listing all websites that are have terms of uses that are not compatible with our requirements... maybe if it's "copyleft" but still not complient... hm. But I don't really see a neeed for it. -- Duesentrieb(?!) 12:20, 17 May 2006 (UTC)[reply]
I think that a case can be made for including this one. It's a major site, it has a lot of images, and it explicitly calls itself copyleft... I'm not a novice when it comes to copyright, but it wasn't obvious to me that it didn't fit. I think of it as capturing the value of the work you've already done in examining the license, by recording what you found in a place that others who need to know will find it. I don't see any disadvantage in not adding it, really. It's a pretty good bet that there are other EcoPort images in the Wiki Commons... Waitak@en (talk) 15:33, 17 May 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Duesentrieb is dead right with his arguments. It is absolutely essential that Commons be entirely "for commercial purposes, too." Also, I get sometimes very angry when popular websites (like archive.org label audio and video files under "open source licenses" when in reality it is only for non commercial purposes). We should not contribute to this confusion. Non commercial uses only is neither free nor open source. Longbow4u 15:47, 17 May 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Sorry, I think you misunderstood my point. I'm not arguing against Commons policy at all. I'm just suggesting the EcoPort be added to the list of unfree copyright tags so that people like me, who want to know whether it's okay to add EcoPort images, can easily discover that it's not. Tagging an image with {{EcoPort}} would be used to explain why an image is about to be removed. Waitak@en (talk) 00:58, 18 May 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Hm, we don't really have a list of unfree sites/licenses. There are "non-free" CC licenses mentioned on Commons:Licensing#Well-known_licenses, but that's about it - and the terms of use of EcoPort are not a generic license that people would apply to their own images, right? We have some templates or template-redirects for "bad" tags that exist on other projects and are thus likely to be "guessed" by users transfering images. Do you think anyone would ever guess that a {{EcoPort}} template exists?

No, but I'll bet people will type "EcoPort" into the search box and see what happens. And if somebody adds an image anyway, you'll have a way to tell them why it's going to be deleted.

There's also Commons:Public domain and free image resources - perhaps that would be the right place to list sites that "look good" on a first glance, but are not compatible with the commons?

Anyway - the knock out criterium "commercial use must be allowed" is at the very top of the license policy page - if you don't look there, I don't think you'd find the relevant info anywhere else either... -- Duesentrieb(?!) 10:43, 18 May 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Again, no argument... except that you do have a list of "important" unfree licenses. It's at Commons:Copyright tags#Unfree copyrights, like I said at the beginning of this thread. I'll stop asking after this, but the request is - add {{EcoPort}} to the list, which currently contains:
I suggest adding EcoPort right after Agência Brasil. Waitak@en (talk) 12:26, 18 May 2006 (UTC)[reply]
As I said, these are tags that exist on other wikimedia projects, or that where deemed acceptable at some point. I.e. they exist for historical or compatibility reasons. Explicitely creating templates for "bad" licenses seems pointles to me - i'll not object if someone does it, but i won't. Also note that per default, pages in the Template: and Commons: namespaces are 'not searched when you type something into the search box. -- Duesentrieb(?!) 12:45, 18 May 2006 (UTC)[reply]

For requesting permission for pictures, please only use Commons:Email templates, and don't refer to commons/wikipedia etc. since it's a license for anyone you are requesting, not for wikipedia/commons only. --Rtc 11:03, 19 May 2006 (UTC)[reply]

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