Template talk:PD-because

link problems

This template doesn't work with external links. Does anyone know why? --Flominator 22:35, 4 November 2006 (UTC)

Try use {{PD-because|1=reason}}. The weblink you wanted to add probably contained a "=" so it didn't work. --Matt314 22:42, 19 December 2006 (UTC)

"In case this is not legally possible"

I have added the "In case this is not legally possible" provision which is present in PD-self, PD-author, etc.

I've found that it was needed in the case of a contributor who managed to obtain a PD-like licence from the copyright holders of images whose authors were deceased, in a country where putting a work in the Public Domain is not straightforwards . In plain text: the author dies, his heirs become copyright holders and grant authorisations to a Wikipedia contributor, and this happens in France.

PD-because was the best template we've found, but the provision was lacking, so I took the liberty of adding it. I hope that it's all right. Rama 22:02, 1 October 2007 (UTC)

@Rama: As I had to use this template here, I noticed the "In case this is not legally possible" provision and I think it doesn't really fit many cases. In most cases, "PD-because" will not be used when a PD-like license is obtained (wouldn't Template:Copyrighted free use better fit your case?), but when we at Commons consider a file to be in the public domain for some specific reason we don't have an individual template for (for example, because it's such a specific reason that it doesn't seem reasonable to create a template just for a few instances). In such cases, as in the Forssmann X-ray, the wording "the right to use this work is granted to anyone for any purpose" is misleading, because there is no one granting any rights. Maybe you could switch to Template:Copyrighted free use for the files you uploaded in 2007, which seems to perfectly fit your case? Then we could remove the "In case this is not legally possible" provision here. I will also ask for input at COM:VPC. Gestumblindi (talk) 10:45, 16 September 2016 (UTC)

In this discussion at COM:VPC (now archived), Clindberg suggested to change the bottom section header to "If copyright has not yet expired by law and this is not legally possible," but I think that the wording "The right to use this work is granted ..." even then remains strange / problematic in most cases because there is no "granting" involved (except in Rama's specific case, and maybe some similar ones I don't know of). Another suggestion based on Clindberg's: "If copyright has not yet expired by law and this is not legally possible, anyone may use this work for any purpose, without any conditions, unless such conditions are required by law", thus avoiding the "granted" wording? Gestumblindi (talk) 12:46, 2 October 2016 (UTC)

Edit Request June 29, 2021

{{Edit request}} Please remove the words "In case this is not legally possible: The right to use this work is granted to anyone for any purpose, without any conditions, unless such conditions are required by law."

Reasoning: per Gestumblindi above, there are various cases where the person who created the work has not granted permission to anyone for the use of the image. For example, in cases where the copyright has expired or where the threshold of originality is not met, no one has granted any rights. If people need to add that wording to the template, they can do it by themselves. It should not be built in, because this template is supposed to cover every possible PD work.  Mysterymanblue  19:02, 29 June 2021 (UTC)

If the copyright has expired, the work may still be protected by moral rights in some countries and there may be non-copyright restrictions to use the work, like {{Trademarked}} or {{Nazi symbol}}. I think that the he template needs to mention, in one way or another, that there may be restrictions on the use of the work.

If the file doesn't meet the threshold of originality, then it is not a work, so ideally you would not use templates which make references to works in that situation. --Stefan2 (talk) 21:31, 29 June 2021 (UTC)

@Stefan2: I think that's a fine idea, but I guess my ideal world one be one where this template would literally have no strings attached to it. This is the catchall template for explaining public domain status, so it shouldn't say anything other than "This is PD and this is why". You're right that there are obvious cases where other templates would be better than this one, and the TOO example is one where Template:PD-Ineligible would be better. Still, there are many below-TOO files that are tagged with PD-because because their uploaders didn't feel like finding the right template. In any case, no amount of chasing down wrong use cases can really refute the incongruity between the broadness of this PD tag and the text stating that its copyright holders have "granted" others to use it.

There have been many cases where I wanted to use this template but was unable to because of that line tacked on at the end. For example, I was uploading a large number of files from the U.S. Air Force Bands that were labeled as public domain by the Air Force. In addition to Template:PD-USGov-Military-Air Force, I wanted to add a template that indicated that the Air Force had considered these files to be in the public domain to serve as an extra defense in case it was discovered that the Air Force had outsourced the recording to a contractor who had assigned the copyright to the Air Force (in which case, the work would not be freely usable). I wanted to use something like Template:PD-author, but that wouldn't work because the Air Force hadn't really released their works into the public domain (they just labeled them as much), and the Air Force certainly did not state that it would "[grant] anyone the right to use this work for any purpose, without any conditions, unless such conditions are required by law." Template:PDMark-owner was closer to what I wanted, but because the Air Force had used the words "public domain" instead of the PD symbol, I couldn't use it. Naturally, I turned to this template to simply write out what I wanted to say in words, but there was once again that line about "The right to use this work is granted to anyone for any purpose, without any conditions, unless such conditions are required by law." The Air Force, again, did not state this (or anything similar to it) in providing the recordings, so I was out of luck.  Mysterymanblue  02:01, 30 June 2021 (UTC)

I think it's best if this template is used as little as possible. If there already is a {{PD-USGov-Military-Air Force}} template, then please use that instead. This template attracts a number of {{PD-because|I have no idea how copyright law works so it must be in the public domain. It's actually a copyright violation.}}, so it's useful if there are as few other files as possible in the category so that the obviously unfree files are easier to find.

Since the template can be used for so many different purpuses, I think that there needs to be a warning of some kind, but the current formulation is bad. --Stefan2 (talk) 10:37, 30 June 2021 (UTC)

Sure, I totally agree that this template should rarely be used. (I didn't end up using this template, by the way; I just used PD-USGov-Military-Air Force because it was easier.) And I could definitely support giving people a warning in some way when they use this template to try to get them to use something different. But I feel like this discussion doesn't really have to do with my edit request; the question of whether to warn people about using the template and the question of whether to remove the oddly narrow language from the template are different questions. If you'd like to advocate for your idea, maybe you should make another edit request?  Mysterymanblue  11:27, 30 June 2021 (UTC)

 Not done This change needs consensus. 1989 (talk) 16:00, 1 August 2021 (UTC)

I have posted this proposed change to Commons:Village pump Commons:Village pump/Proposals (heading Commons:Village pump#Remove "In case this is not legally possible..." from {{PD-because}}) with the hope of garnering more discussion and consensus one way or another.  Mysterymanblue  23:38, 1 August 2021 (UTC)

Hi @Mysterymanblue, Stefan2, and Gestumblindi: I can't find that page unfortunately.

I frequently use this template (e.g. here) because it's the only way to handle PD photos taken in Australia, and the granting of authority is so inappropriate it's embarrassing. There must be many similar uses. I support your comments and I really want us to succeed with getting consensus for this. Can you therefore consider the draft below before we post it to the village pump so it's the best it can be? You may be able to make it more focused/shorter, or advance the argument along different lines.

In the meantime, you'll see I've confined the draft to only one argument – that uploaders do not have the authority to grant anything and that where authority exists it ought to be done via a different template. You may not agree. Whichever way it goes, I suggest we make it easy for others to grasp the fundamental weakness we are trying to correct.

Here goes.

---

Edit request – {{PD-because}} template

Editors have discussed the need to delete a sentence in the {{PD-because}} template that is misplaced and consequently misleading. [Add result of upcoming consensus discussion here.]

The sentence was added in 2007 without consensus by an editor who wanted it to address an apparently very rare situation in France. The editor said "PD-because was the best template we've found, but the provision was lacking, so I took the liberty of adding it." It seems nobody noticed the change, and whether it served its specific stated purpose or not can't be determined.

What needs to be removed
The first sentence in the {{PD-because}} template simply says "This file is in the public domain, because", followed by a reason. The sentence we would like removed is the second one:

In case this is not legally possible: The right to use this work is granted to anyone for any purpose, without any conditions, unless such conditions are required by law.

Why it should be removed
Discussion didn't follow until 2016, when Gestumblindi observed "I noticed the 'In case this is not legally possible' provision and I think it doesn't really fit many cases" and "I think that the wording 'The right to use this work is granted ...' remains strange / problematic in most cases because there is no 'granting' involved". Nobody followed this up.

On 29 June this year, Mysterymanblue raised the issue, and during discussion with Stefan2 he said "This is the catchall template for explaining public domain status, so it shouldn't say anything other than "This is PD and this is why".

To summarise, the fundamental problems are:

• The uploader who chooses this template does not intrinsically possess any authority to grant the right to use the work.
• If the uploader does possess an authority, e.g. when uploading an image for which they own copyright, any granting can be conveyed via another template.
• Aside from its irrelevance, the sentence serves to de-emphasise the importance of the main reason(s) for PD conveyed by the first sentence.

Edit requested
It is requested that:

• these words be deleted from the template:

  In case this is not legally possible: The right to use this work is granted to anyone for any purpose, without any conditions, unless such conditions are required by law

• the comma be removed after "public domain"
• the words that follow "because" be disemboldened.

---

Looking forward to your feedback/changes before we send it to the Village Pump. – SCHolar44 (talk) 03:18, 5 August 2021 (UTC)

Apologies SCHolar44, I meant to say that I posted it to Commons:Village pump/Proposals. I have corrected my comment above, and I encourage you to share your thoughts there.  Mysterymanblue  03:24, 5 August 2021 (UTC)

No probs, Mysterymanblue. The exercise helped me to sharpen my thoughts on this and another template I'm looking at. As you'll have seen, I have added "support" comments at Village pump. Thank you for taking the lead on this.  :-) Cheers, Simon -- SCHolar44 (talk) 10:51, 7 August 2021 (UTC)

Consensus reached for amendment of template

{{Edit request}} Cc: @Mysterymanblue, Nosferattus, Gestumblindi, Ghouston, and Jeff G.:

Background
On June 29, 2021 an edit request was made to remove words that had been added by a Wikipedian in 2007 with no prior consultation (albeit in good faith) to address an obscure circumstance in France concerning copyright ownership of an image whose author was deceased. Nothing came of attempts to revert the change.

Central defect to be corrected
The words at issue are:

In case this is not legally possible: The right to use this work is granted to anyone for any purpose, without any conditions, unless such conditions are required by law.

The sentence is misleading and without foundation, because there are no rights to be granted beyond those of legislated copyright policy; and (hypothetically) if there were, the uploader would not be the person/entity with the authority to grant them.

This proposal
The main change needed is to remove the sentence quoted above, which was proposed on June 29, 2021. Discussion was wide-ranging but the edit request was declined: more consensus was required.

On the village pump proposals page, discussion continued for four weeks and a number of improvements were proposed, modified and agreed in addition to deletion of the above sentence. They were:

Change	Reason
{{Pd-because}} for own works was deprecated.	A common mis-use of the template.
CC0 (only) was specified as the appropriate dedication for own work.	Clear advice aimed at minimising mis-use.
Requirement was specified for works from a non-U.S. jurisdiction be accompanied by a justification for free use that is valid in the U.S.	A reminder; giving the reason for this (servers are based in the U.S.) should reinforce the requirement.
Wording simplified.	To aid comprehension, hence increase compliance.

In due course these changes were supported by discussion participants and another.

Template as proposed
This is a mockup of the modified template as developed:

This file is in the public domain because lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetaur adipisicing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. This template must not be used to dedicate an uploader's own work to the public domain; CC0 should be used. Since Wikimedia Commons servers are located in the United States, if this template involves a non-U.S. jurisdiction it must be accompanied by a justification for free use that is valid in the U.S.

– SCHolar44 (talk) 08:11, 9 September 2021 (UTC)

@SCHolar44, Mysterymanblue, Nosferattus, Gestumblindi, and Ghouston: Would anyone object to adding "instead" to form the following?

This file is in the public domain because lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetaur adipisicing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. This template must not be used to dedicate an uploader's own work to the public domain; CC0 should be used instead. Since Wikimedia Commons servers are located in the United States, if this template involves a non-U.S. jurisdiction it must be accompanied by a justification for free use that is valid in the U.S.

  — Jeff G. ツ _{please ping or talk to me} 13:54, 9 September 2021 (UTC)

I support the addition of "instead" to make the wording more clear. Nosferattus (talk) 15:26, 9 September 2021 (UTC)

No objections here.  Mysterymanblue  15:39, 9 September 2021 (UTC)

No objections from me either. Gestumblindi (talk) 18:49, 9 September 2021 (UTC)

Willingly supported! Funnily enough, I pondered adding "instead" just before I posted, but didn't want to prevail on people at the last minute. Much happier with it in. Thank you, Jeff.  Cheers, Simon  – SCHolar44 🇦🇺 💬 at 02:19, 10 September 2021 (UTC)

Hello User:1989, on 1 August you inserted a "not done" tag and said "This change needs consensus". After some productive discussions, unanimity was achieved and on 9 September an edit request was posted. Are you free to pick this up now? If not, could you give some advice on what might happen next and who to liaise with? With appreciation of your previous help, SCHolar44 (talk) 08:24, 3 November 2021 (UTC)

@SCHolar44:  Done in this edit.   — Jeff G. ツ _{please ping or talk to me} 12:45, 5 November 2021 (UTC)

Great, Jeff! Many thanks.  :-)) I see the first sentence is italicized and the reason is also emboldened -- could you tweak that, please? One suggestion, tentatively, for your consideration: on the template page, in the table under the heading "Template parameters" is "reason for public domain". Bearing in mind our earlier (unanimous) discussion on the essentiality of editors not using the template as a catch-all, would it be worth adding something like "(not provided by another template)"? Just a thought. Best wishes, and thanks again.  –  Cheers, Simon – SCHolar44 🇦🇺 💬 at 03:01, 6 November 2021 (UTC)

@SCHolar44: You're welcome. Italics and bold reason were in the original (since translation inception by Trixt 22:05, 8 August 2011 (UTC), and since template inception by Duesentrieb 17:19, 3 January 2006 (UTC)). I am not opposed to removing them, but I think we need consensus on removal since removal was not mentioned previously. We may all edit Template:PD-because/en and Template:PD-because/doc directly, as they are not currently protected (although the former may be template editor protected soon due to the potential for abuse affecting 14,720 transclusions).   — Jeff G. ツ _{please ping or talk to me} 06:23, 7 November 2021 (UTC)

Thanks for getting back, Jeff. Way back on the Village pump proposal page, when I posted the first mockup of the template's appearance I said: "I'm a visual person, so I made up a mock-up of what I thought the template might look like, especially after removing the comma after 'because', and the emboldening." I didn't mention de-italicizing because I had noticed most templates had the first sentence in roman format and I thought that was par for the course. Anyway, in that mockup and the subsequent four, the examples weren't itialicised or emboldened.

So, given that I mentioned the disemboldening (and punctuation) explicitly in addition to implementing that in the mockups, I believe it can be fairly said that participants in the discussion were fully cognisant when they supported the proposal -- and that consensus on emboldening doesn't need be sought afresh. As to the italics, I'm not really fussed. In support of roman I'd only say that italics serve no purpose there, and the majority of templates don't use them. I would imagine that our participants took the roman formatting in the mockup for granted too, but I won't press the point if you think otherwise -- the main need is to remove the purposeless visual disruption occasioned by emboldening. Looking forward to your further comments, Jeff. Cheers, Simon  –  SCHolar44 (talk) 07:14, 7 November 2021 (UTC)

@SCHolar44: Remind me in a week.   — Jeff G. ツ _{please ping or talk to me} 07:21, 7 November 2021 (UTC)

@Jeff G.: I've now looked again, more carefully, at the template and I saw that the misplaced comma had also remained. In view of your observation above -- "We may all edit Template:PD-because/en and Template:PD-because/doc directly, as they are not currently protected (although the former may be template editor protected soon...)" -- and given my specific mention of both the emboldening and the comma in the previous discussion, I have actioned those two elements. However, since I did not previously mention de-italicizing explicitly, and mindful that you may want to seek consensus before changing that element -- or may prefer just to let it go -- I did not remove the italics. Although I personally favour roman for reasons of visual clarity, I'm happy to support whatever you prefer in that regard. I'll give you a reminder next weekend as requested. Cheers, Simon – SCHolar44 🇦🇺 💬 at 08:37, 7 November 2021 (UTC)
Jeff, reminder as promised.  :-)   – SCHolar44 🇦🇺 💬 at 13:11, 14 November 2021 (UTC)

@SCHolar44: Go ahead, it seems no one else cares.   — Jeff G. ツ _{please ping or talk to me} 22:03, 14 November 2021 (UTC)

Further discussion

 Info The translations also need to be adjusted. Currently, most still show the old wording. I changed the German translation now. By the way: I suggest removing the part "Since Wikimedia Commons servers are located in the United States ... " from the newly added sentence "Since Wikimedia Commons servers are located in the United States, if this template involves a non-U.S. jurisdiction it must be accompanied by a justification for free use that is valid in the U.S." Just If this template involves a non-U.S. jurisdiction it must be accompanied by a justification for free use that is valid in the U.S. is enough and avoids the difficult legal questions of physical server location vs. location of the operator. AFAIK it's not the physical location of the servers that's crucial anyway (I think not all of them are in the U.S. nowadays), but where the legal seat of the Wikimedia Foundation is. But such matters don't need to be discussed in the template; the simple fact that Commons requires media to be free in the U.S. as well is enough. Gestumblindi (talk) 20:26, 11 November 2021 (UTC)

I support removing this language. I also suggest that we just say something like "The justification placed in this template must explain why the work is freely usable in both the United States and its country of origin." This would make the warning all encompassing.  Mysterymanblue  20:36, 11 November 2021 (UTC)

I think that's a very good, reasonable proposal, keeping things simple. Gestumblindi (talk) 22:39, 11 November 2021 (UTC)

Well, as I think this is an uncontroversial change, I rephrased the text per Mysterymanblue's suggestion. Gestumblindi (talk) 13:27, 14 November 2021 (UTC)

@Gestumblindi, Mysterymanblue: I also support this.   — Jeff G. ツ _{please ping or talk to me} 06:04, 15 November 2021 (UTC)

Hello Gestumblindi, Mysterymanblue, Jeff G. and other colleagues,
My suggestion to include "Since Wikimedia Commons servers are located in the United States" was made quite early in the discussions about this template. I put it forward because in classes on writing for Wikipedia that I run, this requirement frequently results in adverse comments about US control of intellectual property, such as "Why does something that's clearly PD in Australia have to pass the test in the US?" I suspect the attitude may be quite widespread: currently, for example, there is someone on the PD-Australia page who is very active in Wikipedia copyright discussions who forcefully expresses the opinion that Australian PD overrides the validity of US copyright and therefore eligibility to be published on Commons. There was no querying of my suggested wording as discussion proceeded. More generally, as a principle I believe it's good to give reasons for situations, especially if that can be done in 10 words; this wording will help to reinforce more widely the over-arching relevance/importance of US copyright policy in non-US jurisdictions as far as Commons is concerned.

I don't agree with adding "The justification placed in this template must explain why the work is freely usable in both the United States and its country of origin." The explanation of why the image is PD in the US should lie within the chosen, valid US PD template. Including it in the PD-because template will only encourage ad hoc wording, which will often/sometimes be invalid – which was observed in other contexts within this template.

For the time being at least, pending discussion, I have reverted the edit. Cheers, Simon – SCHolar44 🇦🇺 💬 at 08:01, 15 November 2021 (UTC)

@SCHolar44: Commons provides services on equipment in the US owned by the WMF, which is a US corporation with headquarters and employees in the US. Some reusers are also in the US. As a matter of policy, even though it legally could as fair use, to avoid lawsuits against all of the above in the US (but especially the reusers), the WMF chose for Commons not to host files which, while PD in their source countries, are not in PD in the US (see COM:FU). If you or your students wanted to start a similar service in Australia, you would probably run into the same issues with Australian copyright law.   — Jeff G. ツ _{please ping or talk to me} 08:25, 15 November 2021 (UTC)

@SCHolar44, Mysterymanblue, and Jeff G.: I don't mind a different phrasing than the one proposed by Mysterymanblue, but in my opinion, at least "Since Wikimedia Commons servers are located in the United States ..." shouldn't be part of it; if you think that a reason needs to be given in this template, something like "Since the Wikimedia Foundation is located in the United States ..." would be more appropriate. The WMF as the owner/operator could be sued in the US for copyright infringement no matter where the servers are physically located, be it in the Netherlands or wherever... Gestumblindi (talk) 11:00, 15 November 2021 (UTC)

@SCHolar44, Mysterymanblue, and Gestumblindi: That is ok, but would removing "located" be better?   — Jeff G. ツ _{please ping or talk to me} 13:38, 15 November 2021 (UTC)

Jeff, I agree with your first comment. (Personally I'm not at all averse to WMF including US copyright requirements; it's an indisputably obvious necessity. I simply reported a reaction that may be common enough to consider, which I felt you and our colleagues should be aware of.)

Gestumblindi, I proposed the "servers" wording because non-compliant foreign material could be published via US-based servers regardless of who owned them. The owner could be an entity incorporated outside the US, but the fact that any of its servers carrying the published information are in the US would be the crucial factor in determining whether or not the material was subject to US copyright law. Conversely, if the WMF had no servers carrying Wikimedia information in the US, then the material would not be subject to US copyright law.

All: If discussion resolves my wording in the negative, I would suggest as the alternative: "Since the Wikimedia Foundation, Inc. is incorporated in the United States ...". Cheers, Simon  –  SCHolar44 🇦🇺 💬 at 06:26, 16 November 2021 (UTC)

Correct me if I'm wrong, but couldn't the Wikimedia Foundation be sued in any country for breaking the copyright laws of that country because it serves web content to the residents of that country? Isn't this U.S./country of origin thing essentially just a restriction we put on ourselves to make things easier? So I don't think any explanation is really necessary at all—we just need to explain what the rule is, not why we have it.

Also, SCHolar44, I would request you change your alternate wording to either read "the Wikimedia Foundation" or "Wikimedia Foundation, Inc." I don't think you can mix the two, as "the" is not part of the Wikimedia Foundation's legal name.  Mysterymanblue  09:17, 16 November 2021 (UTC)

@SCHolar44, Mysterymanblue, and Gestumblindi: Anyone can sue or prosecute anyone else for anything anywhere. However, for a judgement to be enforceable, the defendant has to be in the jurisdiction of the appropriate court; in the cases of the WMF, employees, and servers thereof, most of those courts lie in the US.   — Jeff G. ツ _{please ping or talk to me} 09:33, 16 November 2021 (UTC)

@SCHolar44, Jeff G., and Gestumblindi: Relevant information about enforcing foreign judgements in the U.S. and the meaning of personal jurisdiction; proper jurisdiction is required for a foreign judgement to be enforceable in the United States. While this is interesting, we need to consider several things. First, Wikimedia Commons has some presence internationally, so it isn't exactly immune from foreign judgements. Second, Wikimedia Commons will generally not be liable for content uploaded to its site - the uploader will. So really, if this were about preventing lawsuits from happening, we should be requiring the file to be freely usable in the uploader's country. The country of origin part of the restriction also has no real basis in legal requirements because Wikimedia Commons, the uploader, and the acessers of a file may all have no connection to the country of origin of the work. Really, I think this is more of an arbitrary "good enough" choice we made instead of an airtight legal defense.  Mysterymanblue  10:03, 16 November 2021 (UTC)

@SCHolar44, Jeff G., and Mysterymanblue: I basically agree with Mysterymanblue. For copyright purposes, the crucial thing is where something is accessible - if I can access a work (file) online in e.g. France, French courts can say that it will fall under their jurisdiction, or Japanese courts in Japan etc., and there were such cases in the past (some lawsuits in Germany concerning works hosted on Commons come to mind). It is, however, sometimes not the (often not identifiable) uploader, but the Wikimedia Foundation as the provider of those files that is sued, such as in the Loriot stamps decision where a German (Berlin) court judged against the WMF. In theory, that means every file must be free in every country of the world, as Wikimedia Commons is accessible everywhere (except the few countries where the site is blocked). That is not practical, and so Commons has resorted to the common-sense approach "free in the country of origin and in the U.S., seat of the WMF, is enough". To repeat it, the physical location of the servers is rather irrelevant in all of this. Gestumblindi (talk) 11:02, 16 November 2021 (UTC)

Mysterymanblue: I agree with your comment about the definite article; thank you for that.

Gestumblindi: your hypothesis "so Commons has resorted to the common-sense approach 'free in the country of origin and in the U.S., seat of the WMF, is enough'" is one of many hypotheses that could be stated about this. The fact is, we don't have any information about WMF's thinking nor the facts on which the policy has been based.

@Mysterymanblue, Jeff G., and Gestumblindi: Although I don't think "the physical location of the servers is rather irrelevant in all of this", I am far from confident that we have sufficient facts to decide -- ourselves -- one way or the other. In view of that, I will support deletion of the 10-word preamble. I recommend referring the matter to the WMF legal people for a clarification based on their known facts and legal expertise that (correct me if I'm wrong) we don't have here. It would be very useful for editors to know the background. Cheers, Simon – SCHolar44 🇦🇺 💬 at 12:29, 17 November 2021 (UTC)

@SCHolar44: I'm pretty sure that the "must be free in the source country and in the U.S." principle was a pragmatic Commons community decision and not mandated by the WMF. The section "Interaction of US and non-US copyright law" on Commons:Licensing, then named "Interaction of United States Copyright Law and Foreign Copyright Law", was introduced in 2006 with this edit by David Newton, starting with "It is important to remember when uploading a material from a country outside the United States that the copyright laws of both that country and the United States apply to the upload." The current phrasing in the box at the top of the page, "... in the public domain in at least the United States and in the source country of the work" was added with this edit by Lupo in 2008. More digging would be needed to establish the development history of this practice. From a legal point of view, the WMF certainly could say that "free in the U.S." is enough for them - for U.S. users it can be seen as an additional restriction that a file must also be free in the source country. There are works that are free in the U.S. but not in source country XYZ, and vice versa. Furthermore, the WMF is protected in the US by the DMCA, so they can avoid U.S. litigation if they honor DMCA takedown notices, which they have done in the past. The WMF even accepts "fair use" in English-language Wikipedia and some other language versions where the community has introduced a fair use policy; I think we'll also not be able to find an official WMF statement forbidding fair use on Commons, and it is a community decision too, but I may be wrong. Lupo will probably not chime in here, as they were last active in 2020, but, as you're asking for legal expertise, I take the liberty of pinging Gnom - he's not from the WMF's legal team, but a lawyer, Wikipedian and current chair of the board of Wikimedia Germany, dealing a lot with such matters. Still, as you agree with removing the "server location" preamble, I think that's how we could proceed for the time being, if there are no dissenting opinions after a few days. Gestumblindi (talk) 21:30, 17 November 2021 (UTC)

I have nothing to add to @Gestumblindi's points for the moment. Gnom (talk) 21:59, 17 November 2021 (UTC)

Thank you for this information, Gestumblindi. Avoiding the issue by deleting the preamble is looking a better and better option!  :-) SCHolar44 (talk) 22:51, 17 November 2021 (UTC)

My point in phrasing it that way was to remind uploaders that the copyright law of the country they are located in and the copyright law of the United States apply at minimum to their uploads. The file is being uploaded from a machine physically located in a particular legal jurisdiction to the Wikimedia servers which are located in the United States. The uploader's copy is not a transitory copy made by a caching service, so copyright applies to it. So if something is out of copyright in the United States, but in copyright in the uploader's country of residence then the uploader cannot legally upload it to Wikimedia servers and claim it as public domain. David Newton (talk) 00:51, 21 November 2021 (UTC)

Hello David, @Gestumblindi, Mysterymanblue, Jeff G., and Nosferattus:

David, I follow (and agree with) your thinking. Gestumblindi's suggestion of removing the words "Since Wikimedia Commons servers are located in the United States" arose from uncertainty surrounding which of two possible factors required compliance with US PD (i.e., location of servers or place of incorporation). I therefore withdrew my preference for including the words. However, I noticed today that the official policy, Commons:Licensing#Interaction of US and non-US copyright law, states:

Commons is an international project, but its servers are located in the U.S., ...

When uploading material from a country outside the U.S., the copyright laws of that country and the U.S. normally apply. If material that has been saved from a third-party website is uploaded to Commons, the copyright laws of the U.S., the country of residence of the uploader, and the country of location of the web servers of the website apply.

So it looks like the official policy is based on the location of the servers. The current template continues to have the "servers" wording since Gestumblidi's compromise hadn't yet been enacted.

One other thing I've noticed, having come back after a month's absence, is the words:

... it must be accompanied by justification for free use that is valid in the U.S.

Since this is Wikimedia Commons and not English Wikipedia, "fair use" shouldn't be mentioned. Taking the lead from the wording of {{PD-old-warning-text}}, I think suitable words would be:

... it must be accompanied by a tag that states why this work would be in the public domain in the U.S.

If these two points were agreed, the result would be:

This file is in the public domain because lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetaur adipisicing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. This template must not be used to dedicate an uploader's own work to the public domain; CC0 should be used instead. Since Wikimedia Commons servers are located in the United States, if this template involves a non-U.S. jurisdiction it must be accompanied by a tag that states why this work would be in the public domain in the U.S.

This would require the following changes to be made to the current PD-because template:

• de-italicising the words above the line (to make emphasis wording or names of Acts more easily readable, as recently mentioned; templates aren't uniformly italic or roman so it doesn't contravene practice)
• changing the words, as above, that follow "accompanied by a".

Comments, anyone?  :-)    Cheers, Simon – SCHolar44 🇦🇺 💬 at 13:18, 20 December 2021 (UTC)

@Gestumblindi, Mysterymanblue, Jeff G., David Newton, and Nosferattus: : Can we tick this one off and get on with 2022?  ;-) I'd like to make this an agreed proposal; unfortunately the template is now fully protected so we'll need to get an Admin(?) on side – and unanimity on the part of the original participants (if you choose to be unanimous) will help to whistle it through. Best wishes, Simon – SCHolar44 (talk) 11:18, 31 December 2021 (UTC)

I support the proposed changes to the template. Nosferattus (talk) 00:12, 1 January 2022 (UTC)

I still think that including the "servers" wording is misleading and other places where this is used here on Commons are based on misunderstandings as well, but it's not that hugely important to me. Gestumblindi (talk) 11:27, 4 January 2022 (UTC)

Oppose changes. I'm sorry to keep you waiting and laud your dedication to getting this done. Addressing your comments...

When uploading material from a country outside the U.S., the copyright laws of that country and the U.S. normally apply. If material that has been saved from a third-party website is uploaded to Commons, the copyright laws of the U.S., the country of residence of the uploader, and the country of location of the web servers of the website apply.

This is not the basis of the policy. If this were the basis of the policy, we would require the work to be out of copyright in the country of upload and the United States. Policy is to require free usability in the country of origin and the United States.

Certainly, U.S. copyright law is important to the Wikimedia Foundation because it is a U.S. corporation. If the Wikimedia Foundation were to be sued, it would most likely be in the United States. Additionally, the Wikimedia Foundation has certain obligations under the Digital Millenium Copyright Act to remove content in violation of U.S. copyright law. This appears to have little to do with the physical location of the servers and more to do with whether the Wikimedia Foundation is in the jurisdiction of the United States (it is).

Again, it is also not particularly important to include the justification for the rule; we just need to say the rule. {{PD-US-expired}}, for example, does not provide a justification for its warning. If we are going to provide a not strictly necessary justification for the rule, we better make sure it is correct.

The other issue I have with this change is that it requires a tag that states why the work is public domain in the United States. Technically, there is no need for a work to be public domain in the U.S., it just has to be freely usable. (Note that the tag says "free use" and not "fair use" - they are different. Free use is a requirement for commons, while fair use is disallowed.) There are situations where a work may be in the public domain in the country of origin but freely usable in the United States due to free licensing, freedom of panorama, de minimis, or another exception to copyright. While this is not a particularly big issue, I see no reason why we should introduce ambiguity into the template.

An issue I have with the warning in general (not your specific changes) is that it presupposes that the template is being applied in a particular way by a user with particular knowledge. The warning is about including a U.S. justification when this template is applied to a non-U.S. work. But some people may, perhaps, apply the template to a non-U.S. work and fill in a justification that is valid only in the United States. The warning, unfortunately, is not worded in a way that urges them to include a justification valid in the country of origin. While it says that "it must be accompanied by a tag that states why this work would be in the public domain in the U.S.", there is no mention of including a justification that is valid in the country of origin. The warning should cover both omissions of a U.S. justification and omissions of a country of origin justification.

Furthermore, the use of a conditional ("if this template involves a non-U.S. jurisdiction...") seems to imply that there are situations where a work may be hosted on commons without a U.S. justification. But every Commons file must have a justification that is valid in the United States. So we should remove the conditional altogether because it is needlessly confusing.

Taking into account everything I have just said, I am again proposing a warning to the effect of "This work must carry justifications for freely usability in both the United States and its country of origin."  Mysterymanblue  08:10, 7 January 2022 (UTC)

Thank you for your responses, @Nosferattus, Gestumblindi, and Mysterymanblue: and hello to Jeff G. and David if you're around. I'm not sure why I didn't get to read a notification of your comments, but in any event I should have been checking this page. Anyway, I have now.  :-)

Gestumblindi, I've dropped the reference to servers.

I agree, Mysterymanblue, that "... it is also not particularly important to include the justification for the rule; we just need to say the rule". Let's do that.

My use of "fair use" instead of "free use" was a derangement between my brain and my fingers; I meant free use.  :-/

Turning to your thought-provoking comments on the warning, I definitely agree, and in furtherance of them I'd like to suggest a couple of ideas on implementation. We may have had a longish discussion but we've always made progress and our recent cooling-off period will prove beneficial.

To your comment ending in: "The warning, unfortunately, is not worded in a way that urges them to include a justification valid in the country of origin." I definitely agree. In addressing that, I'd like to propose a wording that keeps the conditional, but in a way that eliminates the confusion – shown in the mock-up below. In relation to "This work must carry justifications for free[ly] usability in both the United States and its country of origin", I prefer to paraphrase "free usability" since the terminology may be confusing to people outside the U.S. I've incorporated a suggestion for both these points here:

This file is in the public domain because lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetaur adipisicing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. This template must not be used to dedicate an uploader's own work to the public domain; CC0 should be used instead. If this template is applied to a work that is in the jurisdiction of the United States of America (U.S.), it must state why the work is able to be freely used within the U.S. If it is applied to a work that is in a jurisdiction outside of the U.S., it must: state a reason why it is in the public domain in that jurisdiction, and be followed by a separate template that states why it would be freely usable in the U.S.

Does this cover all the points you mentioned, Mysterymanblue? Can you (or anyone among us) improve on it? See what you think. Feel free to have your wicked way with it!  :-) Best wishes to everyone, Simon – SCHolar44 (talk) 12:59, 14 February 2022 (UTC)

I think we need to change "would be" in the last line to "is" to form "be followed by a separate template that states why it is freely usable in the U.S."   — Jeff G. ツ _{please ping or talk to me} 14:43, 14 February 2022 (UTC)

@SCHolar44: I oppose the latest version as it is becoming too complicated. (The more words are in the template, the fewer people will actually read it.) Please just replace the last section with "This work must carry justifications for free usability in both the United States and its country of origin." Nosferattus (talk) 18:18, 14 February 2022 (UTC)

I am inclined to agree with Nosferattus on this one.  Mysterymanblue  18:39, 14 February 2022 (UTC)

@Mysterymanblue, Nosferattus, Gestumblindi, and Jeff G.: I've been thinking seriously about this for a couple of days in view of your comments, especially the words that would achieve brevity. They gave me food for thought. Ultimately I came back to thinking about how the words address the needs of an uploader unfamiliar with copyright requirements, and how well the words encourage actions that don't need correcting.

Two abstractions in the proposed wording would pose significant difficulties in this regard, as underlined: "This work must carry justifications for free usability in both the United States and its country of origin". "This work must carry justifications" immediately brings the questions: what are justifications, and how are they accessed/implemented/expressed? I think those words would tend to encourage impromptu, "freehand" wording by which the uploader attempts to advance their own reason, whereas what's needed is a brief, explicit statement making reference to specific, well-established policies. "Free usability" is rather abstract too, especially in non-US jurisdictions where copyright legislation is simpler and more straightforward than in the US and there are few or no provisions for "free use" as such.

I have addressed this, and points raised by Nosferattus and Mysterymanblue, in the wording that follows. It states exactly what to do, without abstraction, at two-thirds the previous length (including extra words encouraging a specific template, without which it would be less than half). Note that I have emboldened the five words that follow the two bullets so that the uploader will be directed to the relevant provision and can ignore the inapplicable words. The exhortation to use a specific template if one exists is an important addition.

This file is in the public domain because lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetaur adipisicing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. This template must not be used to dedicate an uploader's own work to the public domain; CC0 should be used instead. Work originating in the United States: state explicitly why it is freely usable within the U.S; if a specific template exists, use it instead. Work originating outside the U.S.: state explicitly why it is in the public domain in that jurisdiction (if a specific template exists, use it instead) and follow with a separate U.S. template as above.

The reasons for the wording of the more significant elements are as follows:

• "Explicitly" is intended to discourage vague or invalid impromptu reasons (the template's vulnerability to this was a prominent concern in our earlier discussions). You might have a better word.
• Telling the uploader to use a specific template also discourages spontaneous, inauthentic reasons.
• "Follow with" prompts the uploader to provide a separate US template, rather than attempt to include US coverage in the PD-because template.

We also ought to say what "freely usable" means, preferably via a link to an explanatory article (I haven't found one yet – Wikipedia: Free use redirects to Wikipedia: Non-free content, which isn't focused on free use; Wikipedia: Free content is a page listing project pages associated with the title.)

I hope you'll agree that the needs of unfamiliar uploaders should be addressed in the template and will consider (and further amend) these ideas.

If you can nominate an article that describes what "freely used" means, we could link to it, which would be excellent!
SCHolar44 (talk) 07:42, 16 February 2022 (UTC)

@SCHolar44: The text on the template itself is intended for the file re-user and other editors, not the uploader. It's supposed to help the re-user decide if this file is actually freely usable in their jurisdiction and under what conditions. It also has the secondary function of helping other editors to determine if the template has been validly applied. The text you are currently proposing seems to be intended for the uploader. Such instructional text should be added to Template:PD-because/doc#Usage, not the template itself. I still think Mysterymanblue's wording is best, and I think you should go ahead and use it. The exact wording can be tweaked later. This discussion has gone on for quite a while and I think other folks have probably lost interest at this point. Nosferattus (talk) 23:39, 25 February 2022 (UTC)

OK -- I'll wind this up. May I ask a favour: could you (or someone else watching) please implement the change to the template, which I understand may now need an Admin to implement? I ask because I am unwell at present, with very low energy levels and I'm having difficulty concentrating. Thank you for your help during our discussions (I chuckle every time I see your Wikipedia name -- a clever twist). Cheers, Simon – SCHolar44 🇦🇺 💬 at 03:49, 26 February 2022 (UTC) SCHolar44 (talk) 03:49, 26 February 2022 (UTC)

Request to implement consensus version

• {{Edit request}}

After much discussion above, consensus was reached to replace the last sentence of the template with:
This work must carry justifications for free usability in both the United States and its country of origin.
Thanks. Nosferattus (talk) 18:01, 27 March 2022 (UTC)

 Not done @Nosferattus: You can edit the template yourself at its i18n version. Feel free to ping me if it appears to be uneditable. NguoiDungKhongDinhDanh 11:24, 28 March 2022 (UTC)

 Done Thanks! I've implemented the change to the English version. Nosferattus (talk) 01:51, 29 March 2022 (UTC)

Attention sign

It would be better to replace the attention icon with Manjiro91 (talk) 13:18, 31 October 2021 (UTC)

•  Question Why? Am I missing something obvious here? ℺ Gone Postal (〠 ✉ • ✍ ⏿) 06:39, 11 November 2021 (UTC)

Typographic cleanup

Please change "This file is in the public domain because" to "This file is in the public domain because:". Many people are apt to begin {{{1}}} with a capital letter, which looks like crap when the template renders. It will look proper after a colon regardless whether it's capitalized or not.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  21:50, 25 June 2023 (UTC)