It is worded like that because people would upload sunset.jpg and inevitably write over a completely different file. I'm sure you folks don't think that is a good thing. :) Please suggest better wording on the talk page (and don't forget conciseness is key). pfctdayelise (说什么?) 04:35, 1 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
As long policy and practice is in line. Also, just to make it clear, the section "Taste may differ" was added when I was discussing this on IRC... →AzaToth13:33, 1 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
November 30
Commons' logo wack
Gentlemen, that goofy logo in the upper left corner of the screen has got to go.
Looks like some birth control device.
Replace it with a Wikipedia style globe, with pictures instead of letters.
Jidanni20:41, 19 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I don't think replacing the current logo with a variation of another project's logo would be a good idea. I never would have thought of birth control when looking at it, and I still can't bring myself to think of it as such... EVula// talk // ☯ //20:50, 19 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Well I see male symbols ♂ looking like sperm fighting over one egg in the middle. In fact it is all one big ♂ symbol too.
It's all very sexual and I am getting queasy. Jidanni21:40, 19 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]
And mainly its chunky crudeness doesn't do justice to all the neat
graphics and historical images stored in commons. I would get more
enjoyment from a 7-Eleven banner. Looks like a pointer to the Kids
Room at the cafeteria. {{speedydelete}} I say. :-) Jidanni21:48, 19 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Well, you're welcome to design a new one... Personally, my biggest problem is that there appears to be more emphasis on stuff coming into Commons (the red dot) than going out (giant blue arrow pointing upwards notwithstanding). EVula// talk // ☯ //21:55, 19 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]
If you don't like the official Commons logo, then complain to the Foundation. It's not our fault it looks like this. 哦，是吗？(User:O) 23:05, 19 November 2007 (GMT)
As long as it is not a nuclear orgastic explosion, it's ok... :-) That might be the weirdest thread I've read on Commons, and the funniest too. This logo seems to bear a lot of unconscious meanings that are anything but close to the author's original intentions. If anyone is welcome to design a new logo, why not organize a logo contest to celebrate the recent 2M milestone? — Xavier, 00:07, 20 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Most ridiculous thred on all wikimedia projects ever. No offense intended. -- Catちぃ？ 01:20, 20 November 2007 (UTC)
Wikiaddiction: great birth controlHuh. It does resemble the pill package on the bottom right →. I wonder how many teenage pregnancies we've averted by getting people completely wikiaddicted and hence staying out of the back seat (unless there's wireless in the back seat).
Personally, I was kind of relieved that there are people out there who see sex in even more stuff than I do. ^^ Now I'll never be able to look at the Commons logo without thinking of the pill, heheh. Arria Belli | parlami17:26, 20 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I've never liked the commons logo much, and while I can now see Jidanni's point, I think it's not worth changing solely for that reason. If someone can come up with a better one, more power to them.Rlevse12:59, 2 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I would put them into Category:Patterns. I think striped and dotted might make better category names. Especially dots makes me think of something like this. Or did you mean to include images of single dots, as opposed to dot patterns? --rimshottalk17:20, 26 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]
again that is hot Topic still in in discussion as I see above ... and it is obvious that there is no consensus about that , I can add also that it makes nonsense to ask for source when I'm sure that this PD-art and PD-old in the same time ... that applys to some islamic mosaic pics I have uploaded but some requested for source ... everybody must know that knowing source for some of these pics are really hard cause they are distributed over the net and they were clear that they are hundereds of years old and in the same time faithfull reproduction of 2D-images . and actually if you wanna apply this request you should delete most of PD-art category some examples :
That the Commons file is a copy of a photograph taken by someone other than the uploader;
That the photograph was a mere record copy (a faithful reproduction) of a two-dimensional work of art which is itself in the public domain; and
That the photograph was taken in the U.S., or another country that does not grant such photographs protection (see below).
puttng a Pd-art tag is kind of ohnesty that shouldn't be dealt in harsh manner as some Copyrights fanatics here make . again it is nonsense to ask for source when it is obvious that those are really old and and really old-art.
العربية: لول، أرى أسلوب النقاش تغير عنه في غرفة الدردشة أو صفحة نقاشي -مما لا يمت لآداب الحوار بأدنى صلة-، قوانين ويكيميديا كومنز واضح جدا، لا يوجد أي مبرر لإلغاء مصادر الصور على الرسومات، خصوصا عندما تكون الصورة غير مشهورة كالتي قمت برفعها، ربما لن يمانع المجتمع من رفع صورة المانوليزا بدون مصدر لأن الصورة مشهورة كفاية ولا حاجة لمصدر يثبت أنها صورة قديمة أو أن الصورة بالفعل صحيحة. لا يهني شخصيا بقائك معنا في مجتمع ويكيميديا كومنز -المضيع للوقت كما تقول-، لاسيما إذا كنت لا تمتلك أسلوب نقاش صالح لمشروع تعاوني مثل مشروع ويكيميديا كومنز. وداعا كاوس!
English: Sorry for writing in Arabic my Enlgish isn't the best, and we don't have an Arabic "village pump" ;), in short you don't know how to talk in a project like Wikimedia Commons, I don't care about your staying with us!
Chaos you quoted the motivation for a source yourself "That the photograph was taken in the U.S., or another country that does not grant such photographs protection." unless you can prove thats the case you can't apply PD-Art. Still however I suggest requiring this for new uploads first and then to slowly deal with the older uploads (with older I mean before the rules fro PD-Art were made explicit). /Lokal_Profil15:48, 1 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Chaos, you are confusing copyright in the old artwork itself (which will often have expired or never have existed in the first place) and copyright in the photograph. In some countries the photographer may retain copyright in the photo even though it simply shows an old work of art. To avoid Commons being liable for copyright infringement, we have to make sure either that the photographer has given his or her consent, or that the photo was taken in a country (such as the USA) where photographers get no copyright in their image for this type of photo. If you have taken the photo yourself, there is no problem - just use {{PD-Old}}. --MichaelMaggs13:46, 2 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Osama ..you think that Monalisa is more famous than my Pic .. simply cause maybe you have visited the Louvre museum while you obviously havn't visited the Ummayad mosque .. if you come some day to Damascus I can show you this mosaic by ur eyes .
LOkal_Profile and Miceal ... I hope if I can take this Pic my self .. the problem it is kinda high so I cannot take a Picture on the same level ... anyway this Picture is taken in Syria by a Syrian ..that is for sure .. it was distributed on some websites .. the Syrian Law of Copyrights says that if any artisitic work has no personal addition , which mean kind of creativity or some position ( shadows , view ) then no copyrights could reserved .. that equals saying that fathfull reproduction of OLD WORKS couldn't be copyrights reserved ... I,m sure that none of my addition could in anyway harm the liability abd verifiability of Commons copyrights status ... but some Exceptions should be made for some countries where the documentation is not a distributed Phenomenon like syria and arab countries . moreover even the copyrighted Picsin syria becomes PD after only 10 years . Thanks for understanding--Chaos10:05, 3 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
December 1
What is THIS?!
I like to think I'm reasonably up on the current copyright thought around here but {{FOP}} completely blew my mind for several reasons, the first being its strange sentence structure and hard to decipher meaning, the second being its questionable formatting. Could someone check the meaning and correctness of this template and maybe clarify it (Once that's done the formatting will deal with itself)? 68.39.174.23804:11, 1 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
This work contains material which is copyrighted, but which fall under freedom of panorama. The copyrighted object and its context may not be modified or used for derivative works, the work shown may not be reproduced, independent in which legal system the photo was taken originally. This work can be used legally only in countries with a respective legal exception (see COM:FOP). Some countries permit only the noncommercial use. Before using this content, please ensure that you have the right to use it under the laws which apply in the circumstances of your intended use. You are solely responsible for ensuring that you do not infringe someone else's copyrights. See our general disclaimer.
I have no idea what it is trying to say. The first and the last bit seem OK, but we should clarify the bit in the. Maybe:
This work contains material which is copyrighted, but which we believe falls under freedom of panorama. The allowed usage of this picture, if any, depends upon the laws of the country in which the image was created. Before reusing this content, please ensure that you have the right to do so. You are solely responsible for ensuring that you do not infringe someone else's copyrights. See COM:FOP and our general disclaimer for more information.
There are many images that do not show up as orphans that perhaps ought to, for example, images that are only categorised by, for eg, license, such as Category:CC-BY-SA-3.0,2.5,2.0,1.0. Many of these images have no other category, but because they have a category, they aren't orphans. I'd suggest that any image that is not in a category with less than some number of images should be flagged as either 'orphaned' or 'under-categorised'. I don't know what the limit should be, perhaps 1000 or 500 or maybe even 250? Regards, Ben Aveling23:23, 1 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I agree with the first half, but not the second. I agree that license categories and categories which places the images into a user's own archives shouldn't count, and the image should therefore be tagged as not/under-categorised. As for linking categorisation into how many other photos are in that category: I disagree. 250 images in a category means that it's cluttered and could likely do with more specific categories or some purging of redundant images. In my opinion, a category should have at most a couple dozen photos... most categories I work with when adding photos of locations contain perhaps 6 photos or so. However, if I left each of those 6 photos in a less-specific category, then it gets filled up with too much clutter. Some examples of what I find to be good categorisation are Graz, Salzburg, and Zermatt. --Bossi (talk • gallery • contrib) 00:36, 2 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Ben, if you use the OrphanImages tool, it ignores these "maintenance" categories. If you are talking about a Special page of uncategorizedimages it will definitely get it wrong because it has no way to know which categories "count" and which don't. --pfctdayelise (说什么?) 14:08, 2 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Doesn't a bot tag images which are not categorised? If that's correct, then couldn't we just give that bot some parameters to look for -- such as stating that the assorted maintenance categories are not to be counted as a category? I'd think that could be done by manually inputting each exception to the bot, or perhaps creating a category for maintenance categories (though I suspect one already exists) and having the bot read from that category for exceptions. Taking care of gallery categories for individual users might be a bit tricker, but usually those have some general name pattern such as "Images by Thisisbossi". A bot might be programmed to look for common naming patterns and automatically put them in a category for user galleries -- then that one could also be a directory read by the uncategorisation bot. ...Did that make any sense? I've never worked with bots, so I'm not sure what exactly they're capable of. --Bossi (talk • gallery • contrib) 18:22, 2 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
December 2
Respect PD-restricted??
Hi all,
Many organizations offer digitized books from let's call it "our joined heritage library". Most of these books are clearly in the Public Domain as by {{PD-old}}, but many (if not most) orgs that offer them put do this with all sorts of usage restrictions, either technical (making it cumbersome to retrieve the whole book) or with some text that could be interpreted as a "license", usually stating restrictions such as "non-commercial" or even "personal use only" etc.
There are some issues with this that I would like to find a clear "guideline" for. I cannot imagine that this would not have been discussed to great length here, but I'd rather spend my time actually reading than searching for it:
In what countries is there a legal basis for claiming copyright restrictions on the basis of the digitalization effort or such.
If there is no real legal basis for this, do we want to honor the "digitizers" wishes in thankful respect for their efforts (probably resulting in not being able to use interesting parts (mostly images) in our projects).
If the work is offered as 'Public Domain', but watermarked with the digitizers name or other info, do we respect that and leave the watermark in place, or even transfer it to crops etc?
Do we even want to 'copy' entire books or large parts to our own servers, or do we basically only "want" specific crops etc that have a better chance of being reused.
I think that legally in most cases the "service" that the library provides is restricted, and not the material itself. I'm not really sure about the other stuff, I'm not into that enough. TheDJ13:45, 2 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I know that there is the "datbase copyright law" thing in the EU which might be argued to apply but I'm not sure. Basically that means that each page is PD with no restrictions but the collection of all pages (or a significant proportion of the database) is copyrighted. /Lokal_Profil14:13, 2 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
(edit conflict) It has been discussed a few times. It would be good to write up a summary policy page, but I don't think we have one yet. Maybe you could start it? :)
AFAIK these are the conclusions: for faithful 2D scans of 2D works because of Bridgeman v Corel we assume no copyrights are earned during the scanning, and only pay attention to the copyright status of the original work. We don't honour false copyright claims. We don't honour watermarks of any kind, let alone digitisers. (You don't have to make a big fuss about it and announce to whatever library or museum what you plan to do, but so far this is how we act.)
As for copying entire books or whatnot, you should probably talk to Wikisource. If they want it, we accept it. It's generally not that useful to just upload dozens of pages in the vague hope that someone may, one day, find them useful. Do a bit of scouting around and see if you can get someone else interested in the first.
I usually mention such restrictions, but I always tag the image as PD-old (see Image:Van Loon Mediæval Trade.jpg for an example). I think that we should generally mention "non-commercial" or "personal use only" restrictions, so that our reusers can decide for themselves. --Kjetil r14:44, 2 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks to all of you for your thoughts. I'll be happy to put in some effort for a guideline, once I'm confident what that guideline should be. What I can/will do in the mean time (but not today) is start the Talk-page for such a guideline with a number of selected examples to discuss. More than anything just to have a compilation of possibly problematic cases, hoping that at some point someone who actually is an international copyright lawyer may react to it. From my experiences on the dutch wikipedia we could easily have terribly long discussions to no avail, simply because many people have thoughts on the matter, but no one really knows how the dices will roll ones a judge would be asked to make a decision :o|
@Lokal: The DB-thought is a good, point - I hadn't thought about it from that angle.
@pfctdayelise: I assumed, as you do, that "Bridgman vs Corel" would apply for the United States. What I wanted to find out here is if there are any known differences regarding this issue in other countries (mainly EU), and maybe - if so - if we feel that US-law should prevail as the servers and/or WikiMedia Inc are US-bound or that say German law should apply if I intend to rip the pages from a German University site or so.
@Kjetil: Certainly, even if tagged as "Public Domain" by the source, I would alway credit the source and if tagged with restrictions those should be mentioned here too. The problem however is that even with that normal level of politeness it might still upset the 'source'. To me it shouldn't make one bit of a difference if that is a single hobbyist or a larger 'player' such as Google books, Microsoft or a university, but we should at the very least decide if we want to run the risk of upsetting people who made a real effort to make our heritage library available in digital form.
Now, I guess it is possible that these leaflets were not prepared within the US military/intelligence establishment, but rather were contracted out. And, if they were contracted out, the copyright would belong to Blackwater, Titan or CACI. If I can't supply a site that clearly attributes the images to the US Federal Government, or an employee thereof, do we have to assume that it may not be public domain?
I am writing to the individual the site says the images are "courtesy of". I hope he or she recorded where they downloaded the images from, and that they will cooperate by offering those sites.
I have come across a fair number of images that have been credited to AP, or getty, that later turn out to have been in the public domain. The first time I saw Image:Administrative Review Board hearing room.jpg it was credited to a wire service.
If the consensus opinion here is that it is not safe to count on PD I will ask for deletion about this one. If consensus is it is okay I'll upload more of them.
When I delete an article here I get to choose from a drop down menu common reasons for the deletion, these include „vandalism“ „copyright violation“ „spam“ and others. Is it possible to great a similar drop down menu for when an admin deletes an image? --Steinninn ♨21:56, 2 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Some few days ago, I've stated some problems with images that could be derivative works (see above). Then I decided to open a deletion request, but shortly after I've received a message by the uploader telling me the texts are free because works of the Australian Government. Therefore I want to know:
Mention that comment on the DR page, but let the DR run. Australian governmental works are not automatically PD; they've got this thing called "Crown copyright"... Lupo12:45, 3 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
You can see the problem with this diff: I have edited nothing, and an invisible (no difference in the edit window) line has disappeared. The previous version was created in substituting the template above with appropriate parameters.
Er, are you referring to the whitespace above the # redirect bit? I'm not sure what would be creating that; perhaps put the redirect code in an <includeonly tag just to eliminate potential extra whitespace? EVula// talk // ☯ //22:35, 3 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Can someone translate this to Español, or even find the original massege?
"The Spanish Wikipedia only accepts free images, and has rejected fair use since 2004, after a public vote. In 2006, it was decided to phase out the use of local image uploads and to exclusively use Wikimedia Commons for images and other media in the future." - the enwiki article on eswiki.
"La Wikipedia en español sólo accepta imágenes libres y ha prohibido el «uso legítimo» desde el 2004, después de una votación pública. En el 2006, fue prohibido subir archivos localmente y se obligó a usar a Wikimedia Commons exclusivamente para almacenar imágenes, videos, etc." --Boricuæddie00:48, 4 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks :-) I found the "No fair use" articles in the português & español wikipedias, so I've added notes to Commons:Upload/es & Commons:Upload/pt. I'm beginning to feel like the babysitter from Jack-Jack Attack movie... :-]
I hope this is the proper place to post this. I would like to upload an image to be used to illustrate the possible curvatures of the universe. To do this, I took three snapshots (using PrntScrn) of the Windows screensaver "3D Flowerbox", which I set to "Cube" -- that is, I have three images of distorted cubes (one is just a normal cube, one has the corners being stretched outwards, and one has the corners being pushed inwards), rendered by the screensaver program. Would this pciture be a copyright violation? The cubes have a colored checkerboard pattern; there is no logo, artwork, or design on them. Thanks! Korossyl02:44, 4 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I think most likely these images would not be allowed on Commons. If you can do it with an xscreensaver one, or with some 3D rendering software, that would be more acceptable. ¦ Reisio05:54, 4 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Let's install gadgets !
Hello,
On de.wikipedia and fr.wikipedia, there is a new extension installed called Gadgets, see mw:Extension:Gadgets. Basically, it creates a new thumb in Special:Preferences called "Gadgets" (see fr:Special:Preferences if you have an account there), and allows you to select some JavaScript or CSS tools without the need to edit your monobook. This makes it very user-friendly for beginners. I think it would be very useful on Commons as we have a lot of those user scripts (thanks Magnus and the others !). It also allows to de-activate some scripts, for instance one can de-activate the WikiMiniAtlas and the special character box on fr.wikipedia.
Now, while I have managed most of it on fr.wikipedia, I don't feel very confident doing it on Commons as I'm not so aware of how MediaWiki:Common.js works and so on. So, if people here agree to activate it, maybe an admin could manage this ? Thanks, le Korrigan→bla13:34, 1 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
What's the usual way to import public domain files from Wikipedia.en to Commons? I'm doing some work in textile arts and noticing a lot of inconsistency between these two projects. Advice would be welcome about how to fix this part of it. Best, Durova15:48, 4 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
And be careful. The English Wikipedia works under U.S. law exclusively and applies the U.S. rule "published before 1923, hence PD" even to non-U.S. works. Only a few such pre-1923 non-U.S. images are tagged correctly as {{PD-US-1923-abroad}}. The Commons applies {{PD-US}} only to U.S. works. Non-U.S. works claimed to be PD because of having been published before 1923 are deleted here, unless we can determine that the author died more than 70 years ago. Lupo16:44, 4 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I thought Wikipedia.en policy was to observe the copyright law of the originating country, but I'll be particularly careful in light of that advice. Thank you. Durova20:09, 4 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I cleaned it up some more for you :-) You should use CommonsHelper instead. It requires more work, but the work ends up much better. --Boricuæddie20:36, 4 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Seems like the scripts are having trouble with section headers. These apparently don't work (or have gone broken). There are also extra }} chars and the end of the en template for a reason that i'm not entirely sure. I think we should inform Magnus ... TheDJ03:20, 5 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
You can use CommonsHelper to get the info whitout using it to automatically uplaod the file. That should give better results. Also please remember to edit text like "Author: Original uploader was Velvet-Glove at en.wikipedia" and "Source: Transfered from en.wikipedia Transfer was stated to be made by User:Durova." to display usefull information such as "Author: en:user:Velvet-Glove" "Source: Photograph by en:user:Velvet-Glove". Obviously only do these changes if the original page on en.wiki states that Velvet-Glove took the picture (rather then just uploaded the picture). /Lokal_Profil12:37, 5 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I'm not entirely sure that is the best example... both cases appear to be property of the same entity. Can you locate another example? --Bossi (talk • gallery • contrib)
This question is mostly hypothetical at this point, but can open modes of searching for some nice classic photos. For example [1] has 6 stamps with 12 photos. Stamps are in PD. I can probably find original photos of some of them in several databases of old Warsaw photos. Is that reason enough to claim that originals are in PD too? Or can one assume that original images of Image:BM-IntFilmschauspieler2001.jpg are in PD? --Jarekt14:09, 15 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]
That's an interesting question. As far as photos go, they can still be copyrighted even if it's simply a digital reproduction of a PD work. As for the images being on stamps, I pretty sure that doesn't make them PD (although they could be PD, anyway). For example, see these stamps. Rocket00014:41, 15 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]
In theory the maker of the purported derived PD image will have ensured that the original images will have been placed into the public domain or had their copyright assigned over. This is a common practice; for instance a US govt employee wanted to use one of my GFDL images in an official publication, thus it needed to be PD. I was agreeable, and in addition to retagging the image, sent them the explicit PD declaration in email that they needed. Is it safe to assume that a government secures the status of images it puts on stamps? I think it's a safe assumption for the US, but I don't know so much about other countries' practices. Stan Shebs18:36, 15 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Now that I think more about it, it's hard to image all the artwork on U.S. stamps is public domain. I mean, take a look at my link above, can I really modify those and upload them here. Can I legally take this and cropped out everything but Mickey Mouse (See w:Mickey Mouse#Legal issues for why I'm using this specific example), then reuse it in a derivative work as its status as PD would imply? Rocket00019:01, 15 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Not all US stamps are in PD, according to Stamps of the United States only stamps printed prior to 1978 are. That is why in last 25 years you see so much clearly copyrighted images on US stamps. However in other countries like in Germany all stamps are PD.--Jarekt22:21, 24 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]
It doesn't seem safe to rely on this. For example, a stamp may bear a very small, low-resolution copy of a high-definition original; the original won't necessarily have the same status.--Londoneye13:22, 6 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Images released into the public domain
Question: for images released into the public domain, do I have to credit the author? My understanding is that public domain does not require that, but I also know that all Wikimedia projects go by GFDL by default. In specific, I found a great image I'm using on an SQL forum for my avatar, and I want to know if I have to credit it. Patstuart (talk) 15:54, 22 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Nope. Anything in the Public Domain has no restrictions whatsoever since it's not copyrighted. (This has be upheld by the US Supreme Court[2]) Outside of copyright laws, there are moral rights which are inalienable and depend on the governing body, but none of these restrict how you use the work. Rocket00017:01, 22 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Two issues: 1)The law. When an item is in public domain, there is no legal requirement that you credit it or otherwise abide by any copyright. 2)Wikimedia Commons. Practice here on Commons is that everything uploaded here ought to have credit information. Sourced information helps provide verification of copyright status, and images with information are generally more useful than images without. So if uploading to Commons, please do include author credit. Cheers, -- Infrogmation03:09, 23 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]
He wasn't asking if he should, he was asking if had to. Also, he wasn't talking about uploading to Commons (the image is already here). I'm pretty sure everyone knows that crediting the author is a good thing. Rocket00003:41, 23 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Yes, sorry; I wasn't just addressing my reply to the person who asked the question, but trying to be clear for anyone else who might read this and might wish to apply what was said in a different context. Cheers -- Infrogmation03:50, 23 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]
It depends on the jurisdiction of the work's author. In several European countries, for example, it is virtually impossible to waive the right to be credited, and authors (where known) have to be cited even for works for which the copyright has otherwise expired. I see no reason not to cite the author where possible. —LX (talk, contribs)09:21, 25 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I'm pretty sure there's no country that forces attribution against the author's will. There are many reasons for not doing so. Many things are published under a "publisher" name without ever giving credit to the individual authors (e.g. Wikipedia). Besides, they can always publish anonymously. I thought it may be interesting to point out Creative Commons has a license that doesn't require attribution (now retired). This creates a unique situation since it's a copyleft license. It restricts derivative authors from requiring attribution. All CC licenses also allow the author to demand their name be removed from a work. -Rocket00012:32, 6 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
If it's any solace: I'm a native English speaker and this one took a bit of thought for me, too. Basically, the former (Saint Lawrence's Churches) would be more possessive, implying that the churches are property of Saint Lawrence. The latter (Saint Lawrence churches) is more about Saint Lawrence and is not as possessive. Therefore, if the choice is between the two, I'd go with the latter. Mind you, I am an engineer and we're not necessarily renowned for our literary abilities... so I recommend waiting for a second opinion :) What about Category:Churches of Saint Lawrence? --Bossi (talk • gallery • contrib) 03:31, 28 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I would go with the latter. St Lawrence's churches imply the posessive i.e.the churches of [a particular] St Lawrence. St Lawrence churches means churches named St Lawrence. There may be more than one St Lawrence and the churches could therefore be named after any of thes saints. Hence, the former is more specific, the latter more general. Andrew massyn20:32, 5 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Number of items in a category
When I look into a large category, it says something like "Media in category 'Flowers'
There are 200 files in this category. ... (next 200)." What it actually means seems to be "there are 200 files from this category shown on this page". What would be nicer would be if it could say "This pages shows images 1 to 200 of 123,456 images in this category". Would something like that be possible? Or at least, something that is not misleading about whether the number refers to the number in the category or the number displayed. Regards, Ben Aveling23:23, 1 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
That would be category-media-count. There is also category-media-header, which I guess might have the same problem? subcategorycount also exists, but it has already been done: "There are 31 subcategories to this category shown below (more may be shown on subsequent pages).". As for text, currently we say "There are 165 files in this category.". We could just follow the existing format and say "There are 165 files in this category. (More may be shown on subsequent pages)". Or we could be a bit more terse and say something like "Here are 165 files from this category". It would be much easier if we knew how many files were in the category, or even if we just knew if there are any files not shown on the current page. Regards, Ben Aveling20:10, 2 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Support Yes it would help if you knew whether you were looking at all subcategories/pages/files or only a subset of them. Beyond that it is funny to spread subcategories over more than one page when (example) there are only 15 (sub)categories but 456 files. -- Klaus with K14:24, 6 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
One solution would be to move some files into suitable subcategories. Thus avoiding the problem. // Liftarn
Appropriate image?
This is listed as "Lisa Bonet Lookalike". It's a free image from Flickr, but I'm concerned about whether the model gave permission for it to be hosted here. Might be a school portrait of someone who isn't quite of age. Opinions? Durova22:31, 4 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I agree-- looks like a yoinked yearbook photo of someone who rather looks like someone else. Inappropriate for Commons, and possibly dubious copyright and permission. That said, I think listing it on Commons:Deletion requests is appropriate. -- Infrogmation03:56, 5 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Gadgets are now installed on Commons. To use them, go to your preferences, select "Gadgets", and choose any script of your choice ! I have added so far Magnus' toolsand a few others. Admins may change / add gagdets using Special:Gadgets, but be sure to read first the manual !
About adding them to categories, is it really useful, as they are all on Special:Gadgets ? I haven't included everything from the category: some tools seem obsolete, and some are really too complicated for me ! I am not a programmer... Also, maybe some stuff from MediaWiki:Common.js can be transferred (like de-activating default scripts, or the link in the preferences "show a subpage link in toolbox"), but that's beyond my abilities. Sorry. le Korrigan→bla14:16, 5 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Great addition - much more friendly. However some of the tools do not seem to work for me: AddInformation gives some error mesage, and one of them (I will try to figure out which one) caused Firefox to crash twice today and rebooted my PC once. Is it just my machine? --Jarekt03:49, 7 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Should Cartoons banned from a gallery on Ariel Sharon
What is the difference between this and George W. Bush#Cartoons and Caricatures? ~ Riana ⁂ 16:19, 5 December 2007 (UTC) expanded: Mind you, I'm not arguing for the inclusion or exclusion of parody material on either page, just concerned about the double standard. I do not see why it was so urgent to remove this material that an admin edited a sysop-protected page to remove the very material which caused the debate and the protection. Admins on enWP are (rightly) chastised quite strongly for this sort of action. ~ Riana ⁂17:00, 5 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
There is a general problem with these Carlos Latuff images. We have 82 cartoons of him just because they are free, not because they are appropriate for encyclopedic use. Commons can't store every file with fitting license. We don't keep every porn picture and we shouldn't keep every propaganda. Code·is·poetry16:48, 5 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
So we should reject good, free images just because the artist is overrepresented? // Liftarn
You are taking the problem the wrong way around. Why is it that these images were on the gallery in the first place ? Beside being distasteful, these images are authored by a fringe cartoonist, and are not representative of the critism that Bush and Sharon receive. Their proper place is on the page of the author, maybe on a specific page on "cartoons regarding such and such person", but absolutely not on the main galleries.
However repugnant the policies of such or such politician might be perceived, directly associating these cartoons with the people they are criticising is a way to echo the original message of the drawings, something which Wikimedia projects are absolutely not bound to do. Commons is a vast project which cares little about these petty politics, and we will not be drafted by any group. Rama17:12, 5 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I agree that we should take care to present such images in good taste and with proper context/commentary. However, coartoons/propaganda about/against a person should be findable via that person's page, in some way. -- Duesentrieb⇌20:15, 5 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
It seems to be problematic holding conversations on the same subject in different places, better to bring it all together in one forum where all can participate. --Tony Wills04:58, 6 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
A separate gallery of Hitler kissing babies or one of Hitler bayoneting babies are both biased representation, is not the most neutral stance to present all images relating to a subject, together, without fear or favour (or censorship?). Would not having a separate gallery consisting of just cartoons against a person be seen as un-balanced? Yes, the cartoons or caricatures should be notable in at least a small way, ie by an established cartoonist, not un-circulated drawings done by some random person, but this is not wikipedia, there is no requirement to be 'encyclopaedic', for instance many of the cartoons might be used in a wikinews context. --Tony Wills20:58, 5 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
In my opinion any cartoons that directly relate to the policies, words or work of a person as for instance the "shock and awe" cartoon for Bush should be acceptable. Contrast this with the "We kill for FUN!" cartoon, that says more about the person who created it than that it is actually "critical commentary" of the persons represented. That is where I draw the line with such kinds of things personally. At least when it comes to galleries instead of categories. Very subjective of course, but I think some commons sense should be able to handle this, shouldn't it ? TheDJ21:40, 5 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
"Common sense" is not something innate, it is about a common experience, things one assumes everyone agrees about - of course there really is no such thing :-) One person's 'common sense' is not the same as that of another person from a different culture/history/ethnicity/country ... :-) --Tony Wills04:58, 6 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I can see what TheDJ means, but it is a fine distinction, and frankly if the image is acceptable to commons, and is relevant to the subject (whether it be about the person or using the person to make a point), then it is acceptable on the gallery page. Who is the one to define what a gallery page should or should not contain? It has always been a matter of negotiation between the maintainers of a page, for some reason there is contention about these sort of images being on Ariel's page, but the identical images on Bush's page have drawn no edit war - so is this really a point of principle or just a personal distaste for these images on Ariel's page? Either this discussion should be about the contents of these galleries in general (formulation of a policy?) or should go back the the galleries talk page, and be a negotiation between maintainers of the particular page. --Tony Wills04:58, 6 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
It is an interesting issue. Should unflattering photos be censored? Let's say the famous photo of Kissinger picking his nose[3] would be made available under a free license, could it be included on Commons or not? We also have unflattering cartoons of for instance Charles Lindbergh (ok, they will probably go, but not due to their content, but because they're perhaps not free). Several other also have cartoon sections, for instance Adolf Hitler and George W. Bush. // Liftarn
The issue is wider than particular galleries, and does deserve to be discussed, but I fear the discussion is spreading (gallery talk pages, two pages of the administrator's noticeboard and the village pump, as far as I know). I started drafting something in a subpage of mine, but have not come up to the point of formulating proposals. You're all welcome to do so, and improve the text that's already there. I hope we can come up with a guideline about what is NPOV on Commons. Patríciamsg13:15, 6 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Agree with Riana, we can't have a double standard on who does and doesn't get a cartoon section. Either they're allowed or not. As for whether a certain image has a correct license and is appropriate (has encyclopedic value) for commons is a separate matter. — Rlevse • Talk • 13:15, 6 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
And as Tony Wills suggested on Talk:Ariel Sharon a statement from Anthere (Foundation chair that removed the cartoons last) would be appreciated. My guess is it was simply a response to that email on commons-l (linked above) and not necessarily a policy thing.
I thought Anthere did made a statement[4] and it looks like it was not a policy thing. There may ofcourse be some secret star chamber meetings going on that I don't know about. // Liftarn
Well, I meant here, but thank you for bringing that to my attention. I guess I need to stay caught up on the mailing lists. Anyway, I would say more but I would just repeat what I've said on Talk:Ariel Sharon. My centralization plan didn't work : ( Rocket00010:41, 7 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
This isn't just an issue with Ariel Sharon, but the wider issue of potentially offensive images should be used in the galleries. // Liftarn
Hello, i request you for a derivative work possible problem.
I tag all this images copyvio, because all come from gamekult and we dont have agreement of them. Ubisoft allow user to take free screenshot, not to say screenshot of another person are free.
But any way, is this screenshot can be free, because its a derivative of Naruto. Must we know the agreenment between Naruto owner and Ubisoft to know if the only template {{Attribution-Ubisoft}} can be use?
Is there any originality from the screenshoter in taking a screenshot of a copyrighted game? All angles, lightings movements etc. have been created by the game so there isn't anything the screenshooter can add to the work... therefore he cannot claim any copyright. Or am I wrong here ? /Lokal_Profil15:30, 4 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
The position of the camera, the sychronisation of elements of the screen. Taking a good screenshot is not so easy. ~ bayo or talk16:50, 4 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
The exact relationship between Ubisoft and the Naruto owner isn't important; it's Ubisoft who holds the copyright to the game, and they're the ones that can (and have) state we may use their screenshots under a free license. Although my initial reaction was to delete them all, reading Commons:Deletion requests/Template:Attribution-Ubisoft convinced me otherwise. EVula// talk // ☯ //16:53, 4 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Actually thinking about it I wouldn't be surprised if the rules are similar to those of PD-art i.e. in some countries the screenshot might aquire it's own copyright and in others it wont. Anyhow why did the category suddenly get deleted?.
How do you know Ubisoft is the copyright owner of Naruto characters and artwork? I thought we needed Kishimoto Masashi permission to admit these images... --Dodo12:02, 8 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Doesn't look like it was ever uploaded here. It looks like only the info was added[6], and that's why there's a page. Nothing in the logs either. Rocket00003:35, 9 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I was looking at some FP panoramas, and noticed some didn't really look that good, so I decided to go through them all. →AzaToth19:44, 8 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I haven't looked at all of them in detail yet, but so far, I agree. They no longer meet FP standards. It's hard to believe some of those were even promoted in the first place. Maybe it was the panorama thing that threw people off? Rocket00021:02, 8 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Question
Hey there, I found this image. Now, it says the copyright has expired, but if you squint a bit, you can see below the cross a copyright claim. Should it be deleted? Is it okay to use it? Thanks in advance! Raystorm17:42, 8 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
That's just the watermark for the website it came from (I would assume). It can be touched out easily enough, but I don't think that they can lay actual claim to the artwork itself. EVula// talk // ☯ //17:49, 8 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Perhaps you think that it is an ancient icon, but no. It is a modern work from Nicolas Papas as you may see here and it costs 27$. Please, are you sure that it is a legal image? Thanks again.--Egaida19:44, 8 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
It does appear copyrighted.[7] Not by the website, but by the author, Nicholas Papas. He may have released this under different licensing if he made this for a church or something, but unless someone can find more info, I suggest deleting this. Rocket00021:58, 8 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Thank you. In my quest for more info, I ran to this image being used a lot. Mostly without the website's copyright on it. It may be freely licensed. Please let us know if/when you get a response. Cheers, Rocket00002:58, 10 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
outdenting I've received a response, I'll send it to OTRS if need be. I'll give you the relevant excerpt here:
This is in fact a copyrighted image and I am the original's artist who is in fact still alive and well thanks be to God.
I do recall that I may have given permission for limited use for this image to someone within the past year or so for what I thought to have been scholarly purposes. This may have caused the mix up?
I have concerns with Image:レーウェンフックの単式顕微鏡.jpg, which looks that it might have been taken from a book; especially because of the caption. The license attatched claims PD Japan, but is that enough for general Commons use? What is the opinion of other users?KTo28822:45, 8 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
It very well may have been taken from a book. Books fall into the Public Domain too. Is it because the caption's in English? Or is there something else that makes you think it's not Public Domain? The uploader should have provided a source. Rocket00003:17, 9 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
The license claims PD because "This photographic image was published before December 31st 1956, or photographed before 1946 and not published for 10 years thereafter". The typeface looks fairly modern, and because the caption is not in Japanese I presume that its not a Japanese book. Can PD Japan be claimed for something published elsewhere. If thats the case whats to stop Commons or anyone claiming PD under the laxest copyright laws it can find. Of course this is all speculation as the uploader did not provide a source; thats why I'm raising my concerns here rather than simply nominating it for deletion. KTo28810:13, 9 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
No, I think you were right in your thinking, I wasn't questioning that. I was just wondering if we were on the same page here.
It could just be the image is PD and truly originated from Japan. The caption could have been added later (that contribution would be ineligible for copyright).Or maybe, based on the description "recreation of a Leeuwenhoek type microscope", the uploader incorrectly assumed the photograph wouldn't be copyrighted since it was merely a recreation. Claiming PD in Japan doesn't really affect anything since we're following U.S. law here. And you right, this is just speculation, to really know the situation here we need a source. Rocket00003:40, 10 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
There are a lot of copyright violations in this category. Part of the problem is we don't have a solid policy on Cuban copyright. A PD-Cuba template would be nice (even if it just used the maximum values under Cuban law, since very little information is known on varying dates things might be PD under older laws). Where are you Lupo? -N19:11, 9 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
¡Viva el Che! :-) Cuban Copyright Law ([8] and [9]) is confusing. As far as I understand, a work enters the public domain 50 years after the death of the author. But, apparently, it is not as simple as that. Please see w:Template talk:PD-Cuba. --Boricuæddie21:12, 9 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I would like to request for {{Cc-by-sa-2.5-cn}}, as I will upload an image which is licensed under cc-by-sa-2.5-cn. The image can be found at [10]. I also ask for further suggestions that I need to pay attention when I upload this image. Thank you very much! Baycrest(Talk) 15:35, 10 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
some days ago, I proposed a picture for deletion because I think it is displaying a false information so as to serve pov-pushing purposes on wikipedia. I contacted the author as required. Problem is this author then violently attacked me twice on the vote page, accusing me of censorship and asking for... my exclusion. You may find details here : Commons:Deletion requests/Image:OpCondorParticipantsMap.png. Excuse me in advance if this page is not the better place to complain about this behavior. I hope administrators may cool down this stuff. Apollon15:27, 10 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Yeah, I can add translations. Check the Mayflower meta page, I just added a section to propose the button translations. They'll have to be handled in javascript as opposed to the other Mayflower interface translations. I'll be gone for Thanksgiving though, but we could make it work next week. --Dschwen16:43, 21 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Ok, I quick-fixed it in. I'll beautify the code when I'm in more of a Javascripting mood ;-). Also I'm inclined to automatically add a Please help translate this button link when no translation is found. That way I bet we could speed up the localization process. Or is it too obstrusive? --Dschwen21:08, 28 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]
e
I just added a link asking for a translation if none has been given yet. So far only en,de,fr are provided. I'm really interested if this kind of nagging works :-). If so we might try it in other places as well. --Dschwen16:06, 29 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]
DO keep us posted on that, it would be good if it worked. I've done some wheedling to get m:Template:AdminWelcome/en translated over on meta and I even did a de version to embarass the native de speakers to do better. :) ++Lar: t/c17:02, 29 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]
This morning I just found three new translations from three different IP users on the mayflower meta page. Seems to work, although not as fast as I hoped, but then again, I guess the majority of users here probably has their interfaces configured to one of the three big languages en/de/fr. Now with no/it/es added I expect the next translations to take even longer. --Dschwen 14:35, 1 December 2007 (UTC), and two more today. --Dschwen18:56, 3 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Now we are at 15 translations. Compare that to the Subpages link which has only been translated into 9 languages despite being online for several months now! --Dschwen19:40, 10 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Wrongly decided deletion debates?
I came across a couple of deletion debates which appear to have been wrongly decided, concerning two images of L. Ron Hubbard (of Scientology fame). Both images are very obviously derivative works of copyrighted original photographs; the first (see Commons:Deletion requests/Image:L. Ron Hubbard Life & Death.jpg) comes from a 1970s British TV documentary on Hubbard, and the second (see Commons:Deletion requests/Image:L. Ron Hubbard - crop.jpg) is derived from a widely distributed official Church of Scientology portrait.
The original nominator correctly stated that the images are "a derivative work of a photo. The derivative work was created without permission of the photographer." The closer's decision to keep and statement in both cases, that "Independent creativity. Themes, facts, ideas and such can't be copyrighted", seems to miss the point totally; digitally repainting/retouching an original copyrighted image isn't an act of independent creativity, since it necessarily involves using the original image as a source. And if you don't have the permission of the original image's copyright holder, you're violating his copyright in doing so.
I intend to speedily delete these images as copyvios, but I thought I'd raise the matter here first; does anyone have any views on this? -- ChrisO20:22, 8 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
As a keep voter in the original debates I am of course biased, but I cannot see these as copyvios. These are independent impressionist paintings. These are not just photoshop filter additions to photographs, these are actual drawings. -N20:46, 8 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
They are merely based on the photos, not derived. They do not use any part of the original works, thus not derivatives. Furthermore, how much do you expect images of people to deviate while still accurately resemble the person? Unless you can copyright a human's likeness, these are not copyvios. Rocket00021:17, 8 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Another thing, I noticed some refer to this as a reason to delete. This would only apply if L. Ron Hubbard was a made-up character and not a real person. The photos were not "original works" in this sense, Hubbard, the physical being, was (and not copyrightable). Rocket00021:23, 8 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Again, I'm afraid this is a misunderstanding of what copyright law requires. Drawings based on original copyrighted photos are about as definitive an example of a derivative work as you could get. Indeed, the US Copyright Office web page that you cite lists "Drawing (based on a photograph)" as an example of a derivative work. There's no serious contention that the images are not based on copyrighted photos. As for Hubbard "not being copyrightable", it's not Hubbard's image that's being copyrighted; it's the original work of the photographer that's under copyright protection. The bottom line is that these are amended copies of original copyrighted material, and that isn't permitted on the Commons. -- ChrisO08:27, 9 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I draw a picture of you while someone snaps a photo of you at the same time, which one's the derivative? I draw the Statue of Liberty from memory, is that a derivative? If I draw sketches of L. Ron Hubbard while he's making a movie, what then? What exactly are you suggesting is copyrighted here? The photos, or any part of the them, are not being used. Or you saying that the photographer now owns that exact expression of L. Ron Hubbard? Well, then I'm not getting my picture taking anymore. Rocket00010:03, 9 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Those aren't very good analogies, to put it mildly. I hate to say it, but you really don't seem to understand copyright. I'd suggest that you go and learn more about it (better yet, take a course in it) before you offer further opinions on the subject. -- ChrisO22:27, 9 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Actually, I have taken a course on intellectual property, granted this was not specific to copyright law and only a three-week class (interim), but I feel comfortable in my knowledge about it. I'm not saying I know everything, but I do know better than to have huge arguments over it. Everyone has different ideas about copyrights; even our governments can't decide what is and isn't covered. Feel free to continue to offer your legal advice, but please refrain for personal attacks. Thank you. Rocket00003:16, 10 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Not being a lawyer I hesitate to step forward here, but I studied writing in graduate school where a course in related law was required curriculum. Copyright and derivative works were, of course, covered. So I'm not qualified to offer legal opinions or advice, yet I think it's fair to say that if I were one of L. Ron Hubbard's heirs I would object. And I would probably be showing these to my lawyer and saying, "These depict the same poses as the photographs, the same hair, the same expression. If the artist had studied several portraits and then depicted him frying an egg or riding a bicycle then that would be different, but I think I may have a claim here. What's your professional opinion?" So to put my editorial hat back on, I don't think we want to encourage that conversation. Go find a creative synthesis of L. Ron Hubbard frying an egg and delete these. Durova09:43, 9 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Personality rights certainly aren't an issue here. It's not the rights of L. Ron Hubbard or his heirs that are being infringed here; it's the rights of the photographers who took the original images on which these derivatives are based. For the sake of comparison, the cover of the UK paperback edition of Bare-Faced Messiah is a true original portrait of Hubbard (I'm pretty sure there are no photos of Hubbard wearing a Star Wars costume while being caressed by nubile nymphets); by contrast, these two images are direct derivatives of two existing works, which is where the problem arises in the first place. -- ChrisO22:27, 9 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
(ec)I agree. Perhaps I didn't phrase this clearly enough. These images depict the same angle, same pose, same facial expression, same hairstyle, same age, etc. as particular copyrighted photographs. This discussion has focused on whether they were photoshopped or sketched by hand. If my education in copyright is correct, that distinction is immaterial. An artist cannot evade copyright by freehand sketching a copyrighted likeness. Substantial creative input requires more than cosmetic alterations. As I suggested above, show the subject frying an egg. Or perhaps bending over a typewriter. Or looking at his shoulder in consternation after a bird left its colon card on his shirt. Show him laughing from three-quarter profile. In short, show the same man at a different moment and under different circumstances. Who he was, or who his particular heirs are, has no theoretical significance (although it may have practical significance). Durova22:34, 9 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
There is no question about it: without permissions these images do indeed infringe copyright in the originals photographs, for all the reasons Durova lists above. It matters not whether the artist has added creative input of his own, and since the Deletion Requests appear to have been closed on that basis they were wrongly decided. If creative input has been added, the result is that the artist will have a copyright of his own on the end result. But that does not negate the original copyright, nor allow it to be 'overcome' in some mysterious way. Creating a copyright of one's own does not authorize infringement of someone else's copyright. The question is to what extent has the artist relied on or borrowed copyright features of the original images, and the reliance is almost total. --MichaelMaggs07:28, 10 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
These are a perfect example of images where a widely ranging fair use claim would apply in the US. They are probably perfectly legal under most circumstances in the US, and I dare say the painter could probably even use them commercially, but they are derivative works. Without invoking fair use (or similar rights) you can't overcome the fact they are based on someone else's work. Since Commons doesn't accept fair use as an argument, the logical conclusion is that these presumably aren't useable here, even though the artist may allow them to be widely used in the real world. Dragons flight07:43, 10 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I've Deleted these obvious derivative works. We've been through this umpteen times: a drawing created from a copyrighted photo is a derivative work. Perhaps we should mention this clearly at COM:DW? (Maybe it is already mentioned. I didn't check.) Lupo10:43, 10 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
First to Lupo, this wasn't simply about drawings created from non-free photos, which I agree makes the drawings also not free. This was about whether or not ideas not expressions can be copyrighted. No part of the expression (the actual photograph) was used. I truly don't believe any U.S. court would rule these drawings retain the original photographs' copyrights. However, I agree that Commons should never knowingly provide images whose copyright status is something that may have to decided in court. There's no need to get that close to borderline issues, nor do we (any of us) have the say on what exactly is the creative threshold between derivatives and "new works". It's better safe than sorry.
I just wanting to clear that up. Now I'm going to bring something else up while leaving my personal views out of it.
Image:Salvadorpoliceche0961.JPG is currently up for deletion, which is what brought my attention to the issue. I posted some comments/links there pertaining to that specific image, however, most of them apply to all the images in question.
The famous image of Che Guevara is surrounded by legal uncertainty. (I didn't even know it was based on a photo until now.) A past discussion can be seen at Che Guevara/deleted images. We have many similar images (including the original photograph). See Category:Che Guevara. I would expect most of these to be nominated for deletion after posting these. The question is how far does Alberto Korda's copyright extend. Are all two-tone silhouetted faces of Guevara considered direvatives? Any input would be appreciated. Rocket00002:22, 12 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Oh, yeah. And as you can see below, others have the same questions. Please don't respond to this here. Let's try to keep it in one spot. Thanks. Rocket00002:28, 12 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Looks shaky to me as well. Suggest wider discussion, if not satisfactory outcome, perhaps nominating the photo for deletion. It seems to have passed through the hands of the Detroit News at some point judging from comments... ++Lar: t/c12:29, 11 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
One point that the assertion misses is that what matters is the date of publication, not just creation. If this particular photo was first published on the Detroit News website, or in some retrospective article post-1977, then it's likely to be copyrighted. Unfortunately, the source web page no longer exists, and isn't in the Wayback Machine. --dave pape15:53, 11 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Thank you for mentioning that part of my concern. On several levels the uploader appears to have misunderstood copyright, and even the most generous scenario doesn't give us any actual confidence this is public domain. Durova16:39, 11 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Well, to complicate things even further, if the Detroit News did not have permission to publish the photo, it would still legally be non-published and possibly under copyright for anonymous unpublished works, or 120 years under current US legislation. I have started a deletion request at Commons:Deletion requests/Image:Viola-liuzzo.jpg. -N12:02, 12 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Inviting scrutiny
Three of the photos I've uploaded could have copyright issues so I'm raising this for discussion. During last October's California wildfires I volunteered with the relief effort and took photographs. Most of those photos were taken at emergency shelters and I regarded the activity basically as citizen journalism: I wanted copyleft documentation of the events to be available. I was in the midst of professional photojournalists documenting similar things to what they were documenting. Since this was California, two well-known copyrighted characters appear in three of those thirty-odd uploads. As noted in the caption, these characters were arriving to entertain children who had been sleeping on cots for days.
Permissions standards are usually lenient for photographers who are documenting a newsworthy event at a public place. This particular place was the Del Mar fairgrounds emergency shelter and relief workers are clearly visible performing chores in the same shots. Do these circumstances render these images permissible?
At the moment, there doesn't seem to be an issue with including the living. Granted, I see where this could become a slippery slope of kids posting their party pictures. I assume this is the reasoning as to why you are requesting such a rule? --Bossi (talk • gallery • contrib) 04:22, 14 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]
EDIT: I'm sorry! I didn't mean to make this about Che Guevara... I don't know how this got placed in that category. as I explain in this post, I'm new to Wikipedia and don't really know how to navigate the "village pump" yet, nor do I understand posting articles. I apologize about the mix-up! I'll try to figure out how to fix the error.
Hi everyone. I'm an extremely new member to the Wikipedia community, although I've used Wikipedia for research purposes for ages now. I'm the owner of an independent game development studio called MISoft Studios. We're gaining popularity in the indie community, having released three games and seeing one of those games getting actual media attention. I've been asked by quite a few people so far why MISoft Studios doesn't have an article on Wikipedia, and found out today that one of our fans tried to make an article but it was removed. I'm guessing it was probably not as neutral as it should've been, or that he violated some sort of rules. Regardless of what he did wrong, I'd like to make a Wikipedia article myself, if I can. I tried to write an article in MS Word that is as neutral as possible, only stating exact facts provable through links to various websites (including the MISoft Studios website), and also, I tried to link key words to other wikipedia articles. First off, I don't want to publish this article without approval. Even though I did everything I could to support the article with facts and remain completely neutral, I'd rather have it reviewed before it's posted to ensure that it's a valid, honest article. Secondly, I'm not entirely familiar with formatting techniques. I don't want to create an article that no one wants to read, or one that doesn't conform to design policies and formats on Wikipedia.
So, my question(s): How can I submit an article for approval? Where should I post it, and what does this process involve? Could I copy and paste the article here, or should it go somewhere specific? And if the article isn't as neutral as I think it is, or if someone with more experience should write the article instead of me, is there some way someone could write an article if I provide a series of links and other articles to support the writer?
I apologize if this comment/ thread is weakly presented, I'm used to standard internet forums and completely new to the Wikipedia format, so navigation is difficult. As an independent team, it's crucial that we establish our validity and have a source of neutral information that inquiring people can look at and say "okay, they're established, we can deal with them." And while it's easy to show how established we are, with three games released and one of those games reviewed by popular media sources, we're not always directly asked for credentials... someone might just perform a Wikipedia search about MISoft Studios, and not seeing an article about us here seems to be hurting our reputation. Anyway, that's why I'm so adamant about having an article published here. —the preceding unsigned comment was added byMaximus PT1 (talk • contribs)
Hi, Maximus PT1. This is the Wikimedia Commons Village Pump which I don't think can help you. Did you ask on the Wikipedia Village Pump? -Susanlesch12:42, 11 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Hi again. Sorry I won't be able to follow up (I see no reply to my question but just in case you do see this later, I hope you will ask someone else or that someone else might be able to give you a hand.) Good luck. -Susanlesch05:04, 13 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
We Need Your Help
Someone commented at en-wp that it would be nice to have the whole
This is a (belated) announcement that requests are now being taken for illustrations to be created for the Philip Greenspun illustration project (PGIP).
The aim of the project is to create and improve illustrations on Wikimedia projects. You can help by identifying which important articles or concepts are missing illustrations (diagrams) that could make them a lot easier to understand. Requests should be made on this page: Philip_Greenspun_illustration_project/Requests
If there's a topic area you know a lot about or are involved with as a Wikiproject, why not conduct a review to see which illustrations are missing and needed for that topic? Existing content can be checked by using Mayflower to search here, or use the Free Image Search Tool to quickly check for images of a given topic in other-language projects.
The community suggestions will be used to shape the final list, which will be finalised to 50 specific requests for Round 1, due to start in January. People will be able to make suggestions for the duration of the project, not just in the lead-up to Round 1.
Preserve the network location, if any, given in the Document for
public access to a Transparent copy of the Document, and likewise
the network locations given in the Document for previous versions
it was based on. These may be placed in the "History" section.
You may omit a network location for a work that was published at
least four years before the Document itself, or if the original
publisher of the version it refers to gives permission.
Thus, by deleting the image history on the previous wiki, the license seems to be void, as the links to the previous versions are lost. I would recomend stop transwiki images only defined by GFDL, and images with multiple licenses, remove the GFDL one. →AzaToth14:22, 13 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I too was under the impression that this was sufficient. As long as the file history is provided somewhere? (I've seen some people, who don't use the various helper tools, put it on the talkpage of the image, as well.) ~ Riana ⁂17:07, 13 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Preserve the section Entitled "History", Preserve its Title, and add
to it an item stating at least the title, year, new authors, and
publisher of the Modified Version as given on the Title Page. If
there is no section Entitled "History" in the Document, create one
stating the title, year, authors, and publisher of the Document as
given on its Title Page, then add an item describing the Modified
Version as stated in the previous sentence.
I know we have {{Project scope}} to let users know they uploaded an image out of our scope, but what one for galleries? I see a lot of pages created in good faith but happen to be encyclopedia articles. It seems some users confused us with Wikipedia. So before I create a new template, I thought I'd check here first. Also, do we ever do transwiking or simply delete these pages? Rocket00017:25, 13 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I have noticed that NASA copyright requires credit for it's images, therefore this is not the public domain, it is more like CC-BY. This is stated on the NASA copyright page - "NASA should be acknowledged as the source of the material," which means it is not in the Public Domain. --Anonymous10116:39, 12 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
No, it's PD according to the U.S. government. It says should, not must. Even if it's PD, people can request attribution. Also, we can't apply any CC (or other) license to images unless the author explicitly releases them that way. Rocket00001:55, 13 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Why should a PD work not be re-licensable under CC? You could certainly license a derivative work under CC; then why could you not relicense the work itself under CC? -- Ddxc03:22, 13 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Because for one thing, we can't relicense someone else's work. And secondly, these are Public Domain, which means there is no copyright. You can't place restrictions on it outside the law. CC licenses only work if they are copyrighted. And yes, derivatives can be CC, but only for the modifications. The original image is still PD. Rocket00003:48, 13 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Well technically, you can make a copy and distribute it as CC. Since it is PD you can legally attach whatever license and restictions you want, but since the image is PD in actuality, you'd have no legal right to enforce any of those conditions. Its the same thing when people reprint 19th century books and slap a copyright notice on them. There is nothing in (US) law that makes attaching a copyright notice to public domain works illegal, but it would be unenforcable. Dragons flight21:27, 13 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I want to use a Wikimedia Commons picture on Wikipedia but I don't want to use the full screen. If I just connect it up it appears full screen. There is only one picture on the Commons site that would suit this effort. Is this not possible?
Munkey20:36, 13 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Source: [11] at [12]: "This article contains copyrighted material. Further dissemination is prohibited without permission of the author and the Center for the Study of Intelligence." The image looks as if it was shot from the spectator gallery, so it is (just barely) possible that it was taken by a U.S. diplomat. Don't know if any were present, though. According to [13], it was a "three-day open trial". Might just as well be a Soviet photo. Why not just ask the CIA? They should know, shouldn't they? Lupo11:53, 14 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
This is not a US gov photo. This photo was taken by a member of the press at Powers' trial.
Category:Jewelry in Iran
Would somebody mind going through Cat:Jewelry in Iran? Nice pictures but it looks like none of them have an actual source at all, so how to tell if these photos were taken before 1979? ValentinianT / C12:11, 14 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Redirect "Article" => "Category"
What's the policy about redirecting an Article to a Category with the same name. Regularly those redirects get deleted, although I find them quite handy. Gugganij13:30, 4 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I think they should stay, as it can aid in searching for items on Commons. After all, what good is a collection of free images if you can't find anything? :) EVula// talk // ☯ //23:32, 4 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I think you 'doth protest too much' typing in the page name to the search box will find the category of images even if no gallery (article) exists. Personally I see no great advantage to redirecting non existant galleries to categories but I tolerate their existance. Anyway a gallery is meant to be a selection of good images from our collection, arranged in some useful order with brief descriptions, to save people wading through the category. So the solution is to create a gallery :-) --Tony Wills18:41, 16 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
December 4
JSTORy and the Bridgemen
Question: JSTOR has published a articel on some of the pirate-engravings of Hogarth's "Rake's Progress", and claimed copyright on them. However, these are unretouched copies of 2D artworks that were themselves never copyrighted (Which is why they were made, etc). While Hogarth's works are everywhere, images of these plagiarisms are EXTREMELY hard to find. Given the above explanation, if I extracted the images and removed all additional work (captions added later, etc), could someone upload them and legitimately tag them {{PD-Art}} ? 68.39.174.23803:20, 15 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
JSTOR is not a publisher but a repository of scanned journals subscribed libraries have access to. However, if you have unretouched scans of artwork of the 18th century (as in the case of Hogarth), you are free to upload them and tag them as proposed as {{PD-Art}}. You should provide, however, a reference to the article and a hint that you retrieved it from JSTOR (adding the URL, if possible). This is perfectly fine then for Commons but it could be a legal problem for you, the uploader, if you agreed before to JSTOR that you would not distribute any material obtained from them. I do not know their terms and conditions, so I do not know if this an issue. But this does not affect Commons or anyone else who downloads it from Commons and distributes it. --AFBorchert17:53, 15 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
The first point is that, if I am not mistaken, this list has been automically generated by some script which checked just three attributes: length, width, and file size (number of bytes). Hence, it is not impossible that two images are considered as duplicates which actually differ. The next point is that is has to be decided which of these images have to be marked as {{Duplicate}}. Thus, it is necessary to check the usage of all duplicates.
BTW, has anyone ever considered to include strong checksums in the file summary of the Wikimedia software? This would avoid the first problem. Given that check usage has already been scripted, it seems feasible to create a bot for this task once we have checksums. --AFBorchert19:45, 15 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Reinventing the wheel, User:Siebrand has created lists of images with identical checksums, look at User:Siebrand/dupes. If using Emijrp's lists please check very carefully that they are indeed identical (best to download and do a binary comparison). Generally we have no problem keeping different edits of the same image as one persons improvement is another's degradation! In cases where the files are not binary copies please do not use {{Duplicate}}, use a normal deletion process so that others have a chance to examine the differences. When deciding which image to mark as {{Duplicate}} on either list, I do not think the main criteria should be image usage, the bot can easily change the links.
I think we've got to be careful that we don't mark 'duplicates' in haste in an effort to be tidy and 'cleanup' commons. We are at great risk of just undoing other peoples hard work, for no great gain (we're not into saving space here, but building an media bank). Here is the outline of the process I go through when marking files as 'duplicates'. others may wish to amend this process :-) -
The rules of thumb I have been using are:
If one of the images is uploaded by the image's author, then keep that one (regardless of which was uploaded first). This helps validate the image licensing and maintains the image in the authors upload gallery.
If both are uploaded by the image's author, then keep the latest UNLESS it has been changed to a more restrictive license.
If neither are uploaded by the image's author then keep the one with the best trail to the original image.
But sometimes if the file has a very poor filename (eg a cameras sequenced number) and would need renaming (which can currently only be done by re-uploading the image and deleting the original), I choose the better named version.
In all cases, I copy any useful data from the other, especially info relating to the origin and licensing of the image (but also info box and category and history info). And check the talk-page for any discussion that should be kept. --Tony Wills20:54, 15 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Ooops, CommonsDelinker has been doing its job and replacing duplicate image references, including on your page, so now a lot of your pairs of images are both of the same file, so those entries can now be deleted :-). --Tony Wills00:25, 16 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
AFBorchert raises a good point though. What about strong checksums ? Might definitely simplify finding the majority of pure duplicates... TheDJ14:51, 16 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Hi there. This image from the English Wikipedia has a 'It's in Commons' tag. However, when you click on the link it says the image doesn't exist. Help please? :-) I need it for an article... Raystorm(¿Sí?)18:17, 15 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
En:user:Moni3 also over-wrote the original 3MB 1712x2560 image with a hugely scaled down version - 67kb 334x500. User:Moni3 on commons hasn't done anything here since October, perhaps he/she re-uploaded a copy there thinking he/she was uploading it here?. I suggest reverting to the earlier version, and/or transwiking the original image to commons yourself. --Tony Wills20:26, 15 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
December 16
Parameterised SVG
Perhaps this has come up before; I'm not sure where to look for it.
One of the things I really like about MediaWiki is the ability to upload SVGs and have them converted to PNG on the fly, so we get all the advantages of a lovely format and not have to worry about whether older browsers can handle them. But here is something I'd like it to do as well: I sometimes create an image and it contains writing, and I want to put it on both en: and cy:. So I have to edit the file in Inkscape and change that string, and then save it again. What I am thinking is that perhaps we could have it so if a string was "{{ocean}}" and the Welsh wiki markup said "[[:Image:whatever.svg|ocean=Môr]]" then the text "{{ocean}}" would be replaced with "Môr" before it got to rsvg or whatever the backend was. I think it would save time. What do you think? Marnanel07:23, 16 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Has come up before, and it's definitely a good idea. I'll see if I can find something of what became of the previous proposals. ¦ Reisio09:16, 16 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I think what we're looking for is the swich function inside the svg. Then one file can include legends in several languages and which is displayed depends on the given parameters. As far as I know that svg function is currently not supported by the mediawiki software so until then I'd recommend going language neutral where possible and putting legends on the image page. /Lokal_Profil16:55, 16 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Other possible application - to keep flags in textile and computer colors in same SVG and choose required image by parameter. At least flags geometry will not be duplicated. --EugeneZelenko17:19, 16 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Picture of Neri Cardozo
I've found this picture here (Neri Cardozo of Boca Juniors celebrating a goal in the 2007 FIFA World Cup semi-final, in Japan), and I personally doubt it is "own work", considering the uploader is a brand-new user who registered only to insert this picture here, and the picture itself looks like being a press photo. Thoughts? --Angelo12:48, 16 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Hi folks, some time ago I uploaded the picture Image:Jeu de Marine.jpg, now I noticed that the description doesn’t feature a source and that I’m not able to provide this information, because I can’t find it any longer on the web. Since the quality of the reproduction —size and resolution— aren’t really good either, I’m thinking of requesting it for deletion.
Question 1: Is a missing source information generally a reason for a deletion (even if the image is public domain because it’s obviously older than 70 years)?
Question 2: If not, should this image anyway be requested for deletion for poor quality, or keept because it’s used?
How do you know it's "obviously" older than 70 years if there's no source given to verify that claim? Anyway, I've added the source. It should be kept. Lupo12:13, 14 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Sure, you knew. My question was more about verifiability. How could someone else know this without a source? He couldn't, unless he managed to research this independently. Lupo13:17, 14 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
That’s exactly why I asked here if it should be delete having no such source recorded. That brings me back to question 1: is there a general wikimedia policy, that pictures without annotated source should be deleted? Greetings --Gepardenforellenfischer13:44, 14 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
letter written on 6 November 1940 by Fidel Castro Ruz to US President Franklin Delano Roosevelt
It is pretty well-established that copyright of a letter is held by the author of a letter, and just because the US government republishes something, doesn't mean it's in the public domain. Shouldn't this (and Gary Powers's Moscow trial photo above from yesterday) be moved back to enwiki? 209.77.205.905:05, 16 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Posting a letter to one individual doesn't usually count as publication. For the publication to count, it should also have been done with the copyright holder's consent (or maybe his parents, in the case of little twelve year old Fidel :). --dave pape22:02, 16 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Once upon a time there was a font ("Galludet-TT")[14] which produced a picture of the handshape for each letter in American Sign Language. The licence of the font was:
The enclosed Gallaudet font is copyright (c) 1991 by David Rakowski. All Rights Reserved. The full alphabet and number keys contain graphic representations of the corresponding American Sign Language alphabet for the deaf. The font may be used for learning sign language, correspondence using sign language, or whatever purpose you dream up. You may distribute the font freely, providing all the files you found in this archive are included. If you like and/or use this font, please make a substantial contribution to the charity of your choice. (The files in the archive are the font, this licence file, and an advertisement for a dialup BBS.)
It was the understanding of the user Ds13 on en: that "whatever purpose you might dream up" included making a chart of all the ASL handshapes, and they went ahead and did so: [15] They further believed that this did not constitute "distributing the font", but rather using it, and were thus at liberty to place this image in the public domain (and did so).
For myself, I think this was not an unreasonable view: you don't accuse someone of having copied Times New Roman simply because they make a high-resolution scan of a pangrammatic page. Perhaps there are subtleties I have overlooked, however.
Anyway, someone came along a bit later and annotated the image and improved it a good deal, and put it on commons as Image:Asl_alphabet_gallaudet_ann.png:
Someone else came along and said "oh, that image contains a lot of line drawing: it should be an SVG". So I made an SVG out of it here (I know I need to make the Latin-alphabet text text soon, but let's ignore that for now.)
So, the conclusion: It seems to me that what we have here is a scalable version of every glyph in the original font, and therefore we have merely recreated the original font in a new form. This seems to be a matter different from merely using the font to make a chart. If we ARE distributing the original font in a new form, presumably we are required to distribute advertisments for dialup BBSs along with it, which seems a rather crazy conclusion. Marnanel20:15, 16 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
The programming of the original font is long gone. The actual computer programming behind the font is what the font copyright covers (at least in the US). The SVG version should be fine (although attribution would be morally correct in doing). -N20:20, 16 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
December 17
Canvassing
We do not have a clear policy/guideline on canvassing, good, bad or indifferent. The issue arose in the recent Ecemaml RfA. It probably merits some discussion. As I said then I'm personally not opposed to the notion of it as long as it doesn't unduly skew results and as long as the people notified have some standing to comment and aren't just being "hauled in off the street" to make a false consensus. Thoughts? —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Lar (talk • contribs) at 00:00, 17 Dec 2007 (UTC)
I think there maybe could be something. I accept the notion that Commons is rarely a "home" wiki (although I feel it probably is mine). I accept the fact that trust elsewhere is a valuable aspect of any request. I am not happy when the majority of votes I see are from people whose names I do not recognise. Plenty of admins get the rights here with 5/10 votes - canvassing really isn't needed? --Herbytalk thyme08:08, 17 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Mm, interesting issue.
Advertising ones RfA per se is maybe not a problem, because it can have the opposite effect. Just as people shouldn't be encouraged to support, they also shouldn't be encouraged to oppose. So with Ecamaml's RfA I wondered whether the effect was just amplifying the result, or skewing it. It felt like amplifying to me, but how could you tell the difference?
If there was a standard that all relevant RfAs were "advertised" in some discussion page in es.wp (and no concerted effort elsewhere), that would be OK I think, because it would be the same effect on all those RfAs.
IMO, writing a guideline to address this issue may well cause more problems than it fixes. As a Community we trust the person closing the RFA to understand the overall dynamics of the RFA. This includes evaluating the meaning of a large influx of support/oppose after a RFA is "advertised", I think. FloNight♥♥♥15:17, 17 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Family photos
Hi all, I've been reviewing the pictures uploaded by Ainaud. He's uploaded about sixty pictures related to the Ainaud family in Catalonia, Spain. Most of the pictures are quite old and I'm almost sure about the uploader being the son of one of the members of the family (otherwise it would be difficult to access such material). However, I do think that "personal conviction" is not enough. Should it be necessary a formal authorization (I think so, but I'd thank any advice)? Best regards --Ecemaml (talk to me/habla conmigo) 12:55, 14 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I've taken at look at two of these pictures, Image:Ainaud de lasarte, joan - conferencia roma (WinCE).jpg and Image:Ainaud de lasarte, joan - carrer montcada bcn (WinCE).jpg. Both give Family as author and as source. This is not sufficient. We need the name of the photographer and, if this isn't the uploader, a confirmation of the license via OTRS by the photographer. At least some of these images were inserted through this edit by 84.77.244.26 into this article of the Catalan wikipedia. This editor has been at the Catalan wikipedia under this IP address active from October 12th to December 8th. He has already been contacted there on his discussion page by Lohen11 who tried to convince him to register. In summary, it could be quite difficult to contact him and we do not know which languages he might understand besides Catalan. Anyway, I've contacted Lohen11 who is an English speaking adminstrator at the Catalan wikipedia and asked him for support. Independent from this, I think, we will have to file these images for deletion unless Ainaud is able to resolve this quickly. --AFBorchert20:55, 18 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I believe this is to quick link to wikis where the image is in use. You are free to set them to wikis where the image is used, if you want. -N11:42, 17 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
The interwikis in the above mentioned image are actually somewhat strange. Usually you would have interwikis to articles about the depicted subject. Interwikis to show the use of an image make little sense as they are hardly up-to-date and as you can easily check the current use by clicking on the usage tab. -- Túrelio08:00, 18 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Hi all, I'm a newby administrator and I'm trying to deal with derivative works. I know that legislation in each country is different, mostly derived to the way they handle freedom of panorama but... well, it seems to me that many times, defining a photograph as a derivative is a quite arguable issue, and no objective rule of thumb is available.
For example, let's take this photograph: Image:Lewis Hamilton 2007 USA.jpg. It's obvious that, if I crop the Vodafone logo, I cannot claim that it has a free license, but I've tagged a number of photographs as derivative and such tagging has been unanimously denied:
Image:Sr flg.jpg: it's a logo stamped on a flag. The original photograph has been cropped to leave only the logo. Even if the logo in itself contains some elements that are in the public domain, it's copyrighted and the image is a derivative work (in fact a reproduction)
Image:I-mobile 1.jpg: the picture shows two different objects: a mobile phone and its packaging. The logo of the manufacturer is quite obvious in the packaging (although not as prominent as in the Hamilton's photo aforementioned) and almost insignificant (and with a far low resolution) in the mobile phone in itself. Even if the logo in the package makes the image a derivative work, I think that a cropping of the image removing the packaging and leaving only the phone should be OK (it can be compared, for instance, to Image:Calculadora gráfica TI 82.jpg, with its Texas Instrument logo quite clear).
Image:Paris_Hilton_fragrance_by_Paris_Hilton.jpg: a photograph of a Paris Hilton scent with a prominent Paris' photo (even if Brazilian FOP legislation allows the photographs of "Works permanently located in public places")
These questions depend mainly on the location where the pictures have been shot. See COM:FOP and COM:DW. This is one of the reasons why I dislike the {{Information}} template as this does not include an entry for the location where the picture was shot. --AFBorchert08:20, 18 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
It may also be a question of trademark vs copyright. We allow trademarks because it only restricts its use not distribution. Many logos are too simple for copyright in addition to their trademark, however, they can have both. As for {{Information}}, I think the "description" is where the location should go. Rocket00016:29, 18 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Rocket000, take for example Image:I-mobile 1.jpg. Do you find the location within the description of the {{Information}} template? I don't. And I do not wonder that this is missing here as in so many other image descriptions simply because the location is not an explicit field. There are, however, cases where the location information is essential as the question whether we can keep an image possibly depends on the legislation of the country where it has been shot. This is particularly important if we want to take advantage of the special protection of freedom of panorama.
Regarding trademark vs. copyright: Some works are covered by both. Under some legislations, the existence of a trademark might take precedence over copyright law as a case of lex specialis. This is, for example, under some conditions the case in Germany according to a recent judgement of the Federal Constitutional Court of Germany, see here (in German) and this image which is public domain thanks to this judgement but still protected by trademark laws. But I have no idea how this is seen in other countries. --AFBorchert17:56, 18 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Well, true, but that's more of an issue of photographers not giving a full description. It shouldn't be a separate field because it only applies to photographs not all images. Feel free to propose it on the talk page, though. I'm not very clear on the logo thing myself, so more comments would be appreciated. Like why did I delete File:HBO Logo jpeg.jpg? Rocket00020:12, 18 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
However, legislation on FOP is only relevant (I think) in items 1 and 4 above. Items 2 and 3 are not covered by it, since the items photographed are not publicly exhibited. I mean, we have thousands of images with logos in there (item 2), while we usually delete photographs of objects carrying a likely copyrighted design ocuppying a prominent position in the photo, as with a beer bottle (item 3). --Ecemaml (talk to me/habla conmigo) 21:40, 18 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I don't think so, because it is not implemented in MediaWiki, so the extra tab you are referring to is added via Javascript. --Matt31420:12, 18 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Tibetan pictures
All of the images in categories related to Tibet are categorized as Chinese, when Tibet is an autonomous, oppressed nation. I guess, there are so many idiots out there, who, I guess, can't comprehend the concept of "liars" or "oppressors". What do we do about the idiots who do not know the lies of the PRC? --liberator22:48, 18 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
The photos I sampled appeared to be categorized under Category:Tibet. That, in turn, may also be categorized under Chinese categories. We don't organise according to politics; we organise according to how people think of things. Items can fit into multiple categories: an image may be under both Tibet and China. As for your language: keep your flames out of here if you can't control yourself. This is no place for political drivel. --Bossi (talk • gallery • contrib) 23:12, 18 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
You call oppressed nations and people "drivel"? You can talk shit all you want, but if you were the one screaming in pain, you would want freedom too. liberator
I think it would be very useful if photos of real-life objects had EXIF geotagging data included in the file. Any project then using the file would be able to geotag things it was talking about. In some cases we can do checkusage on the file, and then the article itself will be geotagged; we could then have a bot include a template on the image's page on Commons suggesting the geotag of the photo. That could be approved by a human operator and then another bot could add the geotag to the file and re-upload it. (Similar considerations apply to taking geotag information for photos taken from Flickr which are geotagged there.)
Example:
is not geotagged; checkusage says it appears on the page en:Nelson's Column which is geotagged 51°30′27.8″N, 0°07′40.7″W, so that would be written back into the jpg.
Please do not automatize this. You are apparently assuming that images are always from the very same location as the article. This works out nicely for Nelson's column but fails unfortunately in many other cases. Some examples:
In articles about works of art it is not uncommon to show also pictures of other works for reasons of comparison. All of them might have permanent locations and hence all of them could be geotagged.
Do you want to geotag articles about countries in dependence of a single image?
Would you like to have articles like hammer to be geotagged just because one of its images happens to be geotagged?
However, it might be helpful to automatize geotagging of images once this has been approved by an editor, as suggested.
Photos shall be geotagged according to the location of the photographer, not the location of the subject. Thus the two locations are not identical, not even for a statue. By using the heading parameter in the location you indicate the direction of the subject relative to te photographers position. The heading is, e.g. used to indicate a pointer, when the location of the photographer is shown as an icon on Google maps and so on. Thus, you can have, e.g. a series of photos of a mountain, all taken from different locations but all pointing towards the subject (the mountain), which has different location. -- Slaunger07:42, 20 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Yes, while it might make sense to have one set geo location for a subject of an article (not ever sure that is so). Images should not have just one as you point out because the key point is the location of the photographer. FloNight♥♥♥19:03, 20 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
We have been here before. The Camera is tagged because it has a unique position definable to within 30cm, the mountain occupies area so has an infinity of positions. Take this image , the camera was at 51.4466°, 0.2635° WGS84, while the piers of the bridge were at 51.4631, 0.2573 and 51.4667, 0.2604. Which do you choose? Knowing the cameras location allows me to replicate the photo. There is a discussion at Commons talk:Geocoding and en:Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Geographical coordinates.ClemRutter16:35, 21 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
This appears to be an image stitched together from screenshots, they bring copyrighted themselves and this effectively being a collage of non-free media. I contacted the uploader (PS2pcGAMER (talk·contribs), but not no reply. I'm not nominating for deletion right off, because I'm unsure of my deduction here. — pd_THOR|=/\= | 17:18, 19 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I'm going to side with the user on this one. The author asked on this very forum some months back whether uploading pictures of a movie set he visited would be a copyright violation. Screen shots wouldn't be nearly as high resolution, so perfectly seamless, and include such obvious features as the scaffolding and workman installing the door in front of City Hall. The user took these photos himself. -N17:30, 19 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Awesome, that's why I brought it up here. I couldn't find anything about this being a set specifically, so the only thing I could think was that they were screenshots of some fashion (the show itself, or something documenting it). For my curiosity, could you direct me to that convo? I'd like to see what was discussed. — pd_THOR|=/\= | 21:09, 19 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
This user has uploaded a lot of dubious files with "confirmed" OTRS permission. User has added the number in the initial edit, and the OTRS number is the same on dozens of files. Could someone with access look into this? -N15:04, 20 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
See this too. The user has been blocked in the meanwhile. The OTRS ticket isn't good enough and the author was giving false info about authorship. Everything under control now ;). Patríciamsg16:16, 20 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Has anyone else been experiencing issues with images not showing up. Just today I've noticed random images (both thumbnail and full view) are not appearing, instead all I see is a gray checkerboard pattern. This not the same as the transparency checkerboard but that is also visible as it alternates with the gray. For example, Image:Padlock-zebra2.svg and Image:Nuvola mimetypes vcalendar.png. Is this the same for everyone else? Rocket00023:45, 20 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
For NASA jpl image use (which is supposedly in the public domain), the following is stated
By electing to download the material from this web site the user agrees:
2. to use a credit line in connection with images. Unless otherwise noted in the caption information for an image, the credit line should be "Courtesy NASA/JPL-Caltech."
I wouldn't call this the public domain. I know I have contested this before (unsuccessfully) but now I have better evidence.
You mean this. Again, it is Public Domain. I don't agree with your interpretation, but let's say they really do mean attribution is mandatory. So what? People falsely claim copyright all the time. We go by what the law says. Simple as that. (Though, I believe NASA is just requesting credit - not saying it's legally required.) Rocket00013:07, 21 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
That is correct. NASA says a lot about many of their PD images, and much of it is not related to copyright or licensing. Most are requests, other things concern personality rights, usage of emblems and logos (insignia) and yet other things concern impersonation and falsification. These are not really things we take into account on mediawiki. This brings me back to my request that we should clarify this in our PD-NASA template. The only exception really are some images from ESA, CSA, JAXA and Russia that are hosted and used on NASA websites. These are not NASA PD of course, but many are uploaded as such. TheDJ18:22, 21 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
FPC process is too bureaucratic.
I would propose that the whole idea of having "votes" on FPC is scrapped, as it makes no sense and is too bureaucratic. It promotes braindeadness from closing admins and isn't really statistically functional as there are not enough people making fully votes (as some only makes positive OR negative votes, it opens a big window of inconsistence). I say scrap the voting and try to make consensus instead. →AzaToth18:53, 21 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
December 22
Does somebody know why doesn't video run?
Image:Surya namaskar.ogg
Hi there. There is this video that doesn't run. Does somebody have an idea why it doesn't? I first thought that it had something to do with my computer installation, but I have noticed that I can run other video's. Also, I tried at friends and it's the same thing there. When I start it, the status bar tells that it's buffering. But it doesn't start at the end. But when I choose to download it to my desktop, I can view it without any problem. I would be very pleased when somebody has expertise on that. Thanks in advance! Davin719:19, 19 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Is it repairable? Because the bug doesn't appear when I play other video's. Resaving maybe? Or in another extention? I'm not good with that personally. Davin710:31, 22 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Movies published after January 1, 1978 can be retroactively registered for copyright for I believe 20 years. I don't think the community is ready to accept such works as PD just yet. -N01:51, 23 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
December 23
Picture of the day is not good SVG
While I agree that today's Picture of the day, here, is a good clear diagram with a tasteful choice of colours, well chosen line weights and all that, it none-the-less qualifies as bad SVG because it actually consists mostly of imported bitmap images. This completely flies in the face of the principles of Transition to SVG. Is this important or not? Globbet17:34, 12 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Yes, it's very important. Embedded bitmaps aren't scalable, of course. Unfortunately, most people aren't aware of this. They see it ending in SVG and assume it's better. Rocket00001:48, 13 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Hmm. You are right in general of course, but this particular SVG doesn't seem to suffer too badly from bitmaps; when zooming in, the only significant aliasing I see is at items 10, 11, and 12. -- Ddxc04:30, 13 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Well, scalability is not the only issue. The point is it's not a vector. You can't edit it like a vector. It kinda defeats the whole purpose of SVG. Rocket00005:54, 13 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
11 and 12 could easily be recreated as propper svg. 10 is harder but it shouldn't be impossible. Although I'm generally against vector images containing embeded raster images I have lately realised that there are some cases where it is usefull. Such a case are e.g. maps where the underlying map is raster but roads etc are vectors. Keeping the image as vector makes derivatives and possible corrections easier. However for most such images uploading a pure raster version would be better since it doesn't give people the false impression of scalability. Those images that are uploaded as svgs should bear a warning saying that they contain raster images and that the max resolution of the image is 'x' pixles. And where suitable it should probably also carry a request to make the image entierly rastor. /Lokal_Profil00:53, 24 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Hello ! 11 and 12 are not vector : I have make an image with Gimp, and make a "texture" with. But i think i'ts not a problem. For the wick, I could note to make a SVG file.. si if everyone have a solution, i take it with enjoy (sorry for my english) -- Walké17:45, 24 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
December 13
Image use permission
Ershad Ahmed, the creator of Dhaka Daily Photo website and owner of the images posted on it has sent me the following mail:
Dear Aditya,
Thank you for your mail and valuable suggestions. I will certainly go through it in my spare time and let you know if I need your help. Meanwhile, If you think any pic of my blog useful for Wikipedia you may do so giving pic credit to me.
Regards,
Ershad
He was responding to the following mail I sent him:
dear sir,
i have been watching your trmendous blog for some time now, and i can only express my deepest respect for the amazing work you are doing. i also am proposing to take the work one step further.
i am confident that you have heard of the Wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Main_Page) the online free encyclopedia that already has become the ever largest encyclopedia in human history. it may be worth noting that while the Encyclopedia Britannica has fewer than 100 bangladesh related entries, the Wikipedia has over 5,000 already and the number is growing everyday.
if you are interested, you can help the project by contributing your photographs to the project. if you upload them into the central photo and media repository of the project (http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Commons:Welcome), every contributor who is tirelessly and selflessly trying to develop the bangladesh related article will be enormously empowered. those images will not only be used by the english Wikipedia, but also by the bangla Wikipedia.[16]
if you need any help or naswers in this regard, sir, you can always ask me or post to the Wikipedia help pages.
yours
aditya
(phone number edited out)
an editor at the Wikipedia
His images are plentiful and fills in a lot of gaps in the repository of Bangladesh related images. Can this mail be considered as a permission? If not, what is explicitly required? If yes, do I need to forward this mail to some address? If yes, which address do I forward this to? Aditya Kabir03:31, 14 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Hi Aditya,
It sounds like he might be talked into using a free license, but that email doesn't count as one yet. Please check out Commons:Email templates. To be acceptable, an email should mention (by URL) which specific images are under discussion, and which specific license, and it should be clear that the person - who it should be clear is the copyright holdaer :) - understands that the license allows for use beyond Wikipedia, and allows commercial use and derivative works to be created.
Thanks for you answer. But, as I understand it requires individual permissions for each of the images uploaded. That may be a bit of hassle for some (particularly for people who are not registered users here). I was actually looking for something like this. It doesn't make the owner of the images work so much to grant permission. Ideally we are more interested in his work than he is interested in us. Is there some way we can keep the hard work off the owner and still make it work? Aditya Kabir11:16, 24 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
From Talk:Main Page
I have not been uploading images lately, and will sometime, but not now. I now officially admit that User:Liberator1 and w:simple:User:Liberator and User:Liberator1 (which I list the password to), are my sockpuppets. The commons account was a single purpose account: to defend the freedom of the oppressed without tarnishing my already torn apart reputation. Since my privacy has been compromised my ChinaMinions, vandals, and power-hungry admins Ryulong, Barliner and Arccher7, who have betrayed me on wiki, I decided to finally reveal the truth. A new wireless router was installed in my home for my mother's new laptop. And my IP address changed, so the Contributions/68.224.117.152 IP is me, same on en which I have been an asshole to w:User:Thatcher131, but have apologised and made good edits to w:Accra, Ghana removing a POV. Jonas Dalton Rand@ 22:42, 22 December 2007
It seems you don't know the definition of "vandal". Vandalism is being destructive (not disruptive [of course it is disruptive, but SPA creation and other disruption is not necessarily vandalism]) to pages, which I was not. I was telling the truth that Tibet is an autonomous nation. --Ionas Rand
Published user-created commons images
Is there any place here that keeps track of user-created commons images used in major publications? I was reading the December 10 2007 issue of Time magazine and noticed that Image:Absinthe-glass.jpg is used on page 72 (with proper attribution, even). Jwillbur18:37, 23 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I'm not aware of such a place. Some Commons contributors/photographers ask for courtesy-notification on their user page for all or some of their images in case of usage outside of the Wikimedia world. -- Túrelio19:37, 23 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I'd probably put a note about it on the images talk page. Possibly with a link if it's an online publication. If there is a template for it then one could find such images by either a category or "what links here" for the template. /Lokal_Profil21:29, 23 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
That would be neat if someone started a page to track all sightings. I know en.WP has a page like this for when they're quoted in major publications (I can't find it right now). Rocket00021:40, 23 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
We were discussing this just now on the mailing list, actually... dammit, that is NOT proper attribution! Where is the mention of the license?? --pfctdayelise (说什么?) 01:28, 24 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Is there a standard template for attribution etc. that someone wishing to use commons material can include? I think we need to try and make it as easy as possible to attribute properly. For what its worth I created this template: Template:AttribSVG to help within wiki attribution. If Time gets it wrong with a photo, how can we possibly expect proper attribution of some complex SVG (with multiple authors for each component) by say, a school teacher?
For the few among you who can read Italian, I would like to call your attention on the debate currently open in the "Village pump" of Wikipedia in Italian here.
In it you will also find a reference to the ALMOST definitive (which means the law has not been approved yet in a definitive way) approval by the Italian Senate of a new law allowing the use of "downgraded" or "low resolution" (whatever this means!) images of copyrighted items (and texts as well) for non-commercial (ouch), educational or "scientific" use: the debate is here and the norm is quoted in full within this page.
For those of you who can't read my language, I shall call the attention on the fact that the debate in that page shows that the Italian community on it.Wikipedia is now planning to go around the lack of a "freedom of panorama" rule in Italy, and to the prohibition to publish without prior written permission images of art objects owned by the Italian state, taking images from Commons, downsizing them, and re-uploading them in the "degraded" version in the Italian Wikipedia. I ask you all what do you think about this idea since I am currently "patrolling" all images concerning Italy, and if a change in policy is possible I am interested in knowing about it (we could simply "degrade" the copyvio images from Italy in place of deleting them, for instance). Please note: since I am now working 99% on Commons and only 1% on it.Wikipedia, here I am only concerned on the impact the new rules can have in Commons). I am a bit dubious about the practice of "degrading" images: from a formal point of view, this is but creating a "derivate" image, which the licenses we use allow. But I am not certain that this will solve all problems, actually, it may create a false sense of self-trust that may lead to court in some extreme cases. Actually, I can think of a couple of cases where such a practice could create troubles (but it would be too long to deal with them here). I shall therefore read with interest any advice by other commoners about the matter.
By the way: it must be noted here that the "derivate" images thus uploaded in the Italian Wikipedia will NOT be transferable back in Commons: they would be (1) mere duplicates of images that (2) from the point of view of the Italian law should not have been online in the first place...
Furthermore, the page I linked to, furiously debates about the all-Italian problem ot the "Legge Urbani" (approved by Berlsconi, who not by chance is the biggest publisher in Italy, and owns the most important art publishers in Italy, which "by chance" won that monopoly...), that actually gave the legal right to the "sovraintendenze" (state offices devoted to caring about art objects and buildings) to grant a monopoly of exploitation to a publisher concerning the images of any object under their tutele, even if this object be in the Public Domain. This creates clashes with International copyright laws, but it is a valid law in Italy until it is tested in a court. Wikipedia Italy already received two warnings from the sopraintendenze of Rome and Florence asking for removal of ALL object under their tutele, which include, for instance, Michelangelo's David & re.
I've more and more frequently encountered situations where issues with an image here on Commons has required the action of an Administrator on another wikimedia project. Some examples:
An image is universally replaced but cannot be replaced on an edit protected page. de.wiki admin needed
An image is transwikied and tagged with "no permission"/"no source" but the original image has been deleted.
An image is transwikied without source/author and the original image has been deleted (and the deletion log says "Image has the same name on Wikimedia Commons" or something similar) en.wiki admin needed, zh.wiki admin needed
Or he most common an image has been transwikied using CommonsHelper and the only author information is "Original uploader was ...", and source info is "Originally from xx.wikipedia". (and the deletion log "Image has the same name on Wikimedia Commons" or something similar). In the current situation the only thing one can do (if not an admin on the project in question) is either tag the image as "no source" (author isn't given) or try to go through userpages in hope that he finds one which says "this user is an admin on xx.wikipedia". Examples of images where uploader is not the author Image:ClausPlt.JPG and en:Image:ClausPlt.JPG (not deleted), Image:Anders.jpg and sv:Bild:Anders.jpg (deleted but not for being on Commons).
Bugging the deleting admin is usefull in that they then know what not to do in the future, however many local admins don't really know enough about copyright/source/author issues to be able to help with these things. Thats why I think that a Commons based forum would be preferred. It's also useful for cases when an image transwikied from sv.wiki say is found to have been copied from en.wiki in which case two admins are needed. /Lokal_Profil16:41, 22 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Maybe just a category-via-userbox system? I'm pretty sure the vast majority of commons admins are also admins on at least one other project, so we should be able to cover most of them. --SB_Johnny | PA!17:14, 22 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Bryans suggestion is good but I'm guessing not straight forward o implement (would probably require a new type of user class). Category-via-userbox is handy for one of requests but I'm guessing not everyone who is an admin on another wiki would like to be hassled about every problematic image (there are lots). A request page has the benifit (and downside) that only those admins who want to help need to be hassled. However category-via-userbox might be usefull even if such a request page was implemented. /Lokal_Profil20:03, 22 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Thatlist is good (hadn't seen it) but limited to administrators who are also admins on Commons. And once again contacting perople is good for a one of request but i don't think anyone would be to happy of having their talkpage turned into a list of problematic transwikied image s from en.wiki say. /Lokal_Profil14:27, 25 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Well, I suppose such tracking could be done with categories (I'm agreeing with SB_Johnny above), so that anyone (not just our local admins) could be found rather quickly (sort by project or language). Just an idea. EVula// talk // ☯ //17:15, 25 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
flac audio codec
what about use flac (the free losless audio codec) for audio files. ogg is poor audio codec. What do you think about?
Ogg is not a codec at all. If we can't upload .ogg files that are Ogg containers with FLAC audio, though, or even just .flac files, there should be a bug (or two) made. ¦ Reisio01:11, 25 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
It's essentially as free as Ogg, AFAIK - if there was a conscious decision to not include support, it was probably because FLAC, being lossless, renders much larger filesizes. ¦ Reisio06:52, 26 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
The good news is that we have 470 NOAA images using the http://www.photolib.noaa.gov/htmls/ URL structure. The seven I found seem to have been leftovers. My next question is whether there is a NOAA source template? If those 470 images could be converted to a template calling the NOAA photo library ID number, then future updates will be easy to do. Carcharoth (Commons)16:09, 24 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
December 25
Over 8000 Library of Congress photos
I was playing around with the links tool, and I found that we have 8349 images from the Library of Congress (not all verified as PD, of course, and not including non-linked ones). I was comparing this to the 2 million + figure on the front page, and wondering whether similar figures are available for other sets of images. For example, NASA pics (several different photo libraries within NASA), and other such sets. Are there any such stats available? Carcharoth (Commons)15:24, 26 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
A request was posted here Commons:Deletion_requests/Image:9094_-_Milano_-_Museo_storia_naturale_-_Diorama_McNeil_river_-_Foto_Giovanni_Dall'Orto_22-Apr-2007.jpg_-_.jpg to delete pictures of a diorama I shot in Milan, defining it a "Photograph of a copyrighted painting". Apart for the fact that a diorama not always contains paintings (although some do indeed), the status of dioramas is somewhat difficult to define to my mind. They are faithful rendering of something that existed or exists, i.e. derivate works, however they may contain sculpture, painting, taxodermy and much more. Also the posture of an assembled dinosaur in a museum is a creative reconstruction. Are therefore dioramas covered by copyright laws? The answer is important since it affects the whole category:Dioramas. Please give your opinion in the above linked discussion page. Thanks --User:G.dallorto21:57, 25 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Short answer: if the diorama is of something copyrighted, then it should be deleted. It would be nice to have a way to automatically undelete things when they come out of copyright, but until then, we can't host it. Same goes for most of the images in the MiniEurope category. Regards, Ben Aveling10:22, 26 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Of course if it's copyrighted it should be deleted, that's easy. The question, however, is how do we know what's copyrighted? Where's the line between copyrightable replicas of real life and non-copyrightable replicas. (For example, purely scientific representations, replicas of real life buildings, the way things happen to be arranged in a museum—are these all automatically copyrighted?) Rocket00002:43, 27 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Firstly the image is not the original, it is cropped from the original, also the licensing has been changed by User:Gridge. And it is doubtful that the original user created the photo(s), IMHO. feydey(talk)21:13, 26 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
December 27
Calkin Science Center Image
Well I been waiting for some response on this image and regards to emails I exchanged with GRCC. I do not want to upload the file again when somebody sees it is past it time. So can somebody check out the image and the posts I have done give me some help please. --Mihsfbstadium06:51, 27 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Image:VOA Logo.jpg is marked as PD although the VOA website says "The VOANews logo is a trademark for the Voice of America’s web portal. Use of the VOANews logo is to be used only as a pointer to the VOANews.com home page or the home page of a VOA language or program." Is their any alternative to getting it deleted as it is used on 84 pages and I don't want 84 pages on 11 Wiki' s to lose a valuable image like this . I will mark it as copyvio (as I need to remove copyvio's if I see them) but please remove the template if an alternative is found --Anonymous10108:48, 27 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Fantastic page. I was able to add an image to three different pages rather quickly. :) (though I did change the edit summary to be language independent) EVula// talk // ☯ //17:10, 27 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Hi everyone. Is there any picture of someone with a gun for a race start? (I don't know if there's a special name for that...) Thanks. --84.97.11.11511:54, 24 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
"The Luxor hotel in the US city of Las Vegas would also not be affected because it was not an exact copy of a pyramid and its interior was completely different" hehe So I guess the inside has to be the same. Tombs and all. I was just thinking what if the pyramids were made in a time copyright existed. Wouldn't they be PD-ineligible because it's a simple geometric shape. Rocket00022:10, 26 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
One would think that only the creator of the item could copyright it. Seeing as the Egypt of today bears pretty much zilch relation to the Egypt of antiquity... and the time lapsed since then... and the complete lack of a potential for international enforcement (I just can't see Interpol acting on this one)... and... and... if it weren't for this being on the BBC, I'd add a {{cn}} tag onto it. It's like Zawi doesn't realise that April Fool's is in April. --Bossi (talk • gallery • contrib) 04:12, 27 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Under the new law, any reproduction of exact replicas of ancient monuments, be they photographs, online videos or pictures or statues for commercial purposes, would require the approval of the Egyptian government, Zahi Hawas, the head of the country's Supreme Council of Antiquities, explained.[17]
There is no universal copyright law. Egypt can set whatever laws it likes - within Egypt - even if it can't directly enforce them elsewhere. It's unlikely in the extreme that any other country will agree to enforce those laws on Egypt's behalf, but does that mean we can ignore them out of hand? I don't think so. Legally, we don't need to do anything until we know how they intend to try to enforce it. Morally, this opens up a whole can of worms about world heritage vs cultural heritage. If America can extend the length of copyright to suit itself, why can't other countries? Regards, Ben Aveling07:28, 27 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
This is a lot more than extending copyrights thousands of years, this is claiming copyright on work done by others. It's a poorly timed April Fool's joke. Rocket00008:48, 27 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Hear, hear! There was a very similar problem some months ago with a decision by the Greek government which tried to (retroactively) enforce copyright on antique artefacts. IRC, foreign schools at Athens had to pay a fee for the publishing in reasearch papers of pictures taken by themselves of artefacts they had themselves excavated. I guess the Greek government will end by suing Italy for all the derivative works after ancient Greek originals made by the Romans. Jastrow (Λέγετε) 12:15, 27 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
These are all examples of what can happen if we try and honor every country's laws. Soon we'll have nothing. This is why we should only follow the laws we have to (i.e. U.S. laws). Rocket00022:08, 27 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
PD paintings
I noticed that User:OsamaK is adding "no source" on hundreds of reproductions of PD paintings. Should we really require mentioning the person/institution who scanned/photographed for such paintings? IMO, the source is the painting itself, there's no originality involved to require this. Bogdan18:35, 27 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I tend to avoid tagging images that are evidently in the public domain to due their age (as in 16th century paintings and so forth), unless the age of the image is ambiguous. The source of an image often reveals potentially useful information that may have been wittingly or unwittingly omitted. RedCoat19:36, 27 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Personally, I don't like including the scanner/photographer. This just seems to complicate things for countries that think this is important. Rocket00021:51, 27 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
For content which you claim to be in the public domain, it is important to know the date the content was created to judge whether its copyright has truly expired already. Information on the lifespan of the creator is also useful. In cases of art which is many centuries old, this is obviously less important than for, say, a 20th century photograph.
As far as I can see, the creation date and lifespan of the creator are provided in your examples. Unless there is a reason to doubt that information, the source of those images are the painters, and no on else has contributed any copyrightable or visible elements of creativity or originality to the work. —LX (talk, contribs)21:59, 27 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I think for 16th century paintings the source is very obvious, and tagging it is a bit pointless, IMHO. I agree on this with LX very much. Maxim(talk)13:41, 28 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
This art v. kiddiporn discussion is rather polarized and could lead to the deletion of quite a number of images. Some other people's contributions to the deletion request would be welcome. --Simonxag20:08, 28 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Problem: If I click the link to commons on the dutch image page, or the image thumb in our own gallery I get an error, as these somehow end up trying to access Image:Weberknecht_E_Schuette_.jpg as opposed to Image:Weberknecht_(E_Schuette).jpg - strange all around as the opening parenthesis is just stripped (either that or the space/underscore before it is being dropped) and the closing one is replaced with an underscore/space.
I'm having trouble recreating your problem. Let me make sure I've got it right: if I open the image in the Dutch Wikipedia, then click on the link to Commons ("beschrijving van het bestand daar"), that's where I'm supposed to then get an error? It's working fine for me, unless I'm misinterpreting what your actions are. --Bossi (talk • gallery • contrib) 23:07, 11 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Hi Bossi, thanks for looking into it! Hmmmmm, it's all a bit strange ... I just tried clicking the image on the page Unknown Opiliones again, and now the first time the image page appeared correctly, then I went to the dutch image page - clicked through to commons (like you said - "beschrijving van het bestand daar") and got the error again. Next I try the thumbnail on Unknown Opilionesagain (three times) and now I get the error here too (three times). To make things easier I'll put in a little gallery here - should also generate the error me thinks.
Problem image
Error schreenshot
Okay, now it works fine (duh!) ... But ... (!) ... if I go through nl:Afbeelding:Weberknecht_(E_Schuette).jpg again, I get the error again and then the next tries on the thumbnail(s) herealso give me the error. Not sure what resets it to "proper" behaviour though - maybe the upload of the error screenshot I did in the mean time. I just noticed however that my "No Script" Firefox-extension gives me a cross-site scripting warning when going through the dutch page. I'm now thinking that may probably be part of the problem. I'll do some more testing later. Gotta go now. Thanks so far! Pudding4brains17:18, 12 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Update: So I've contacted NoScript author Giorgio Maone, he was very quick to respond and told me it is the script injection filter that's causing the behaviour, not so much the XSS-filter, which is, apparently, why it also comes into action on cross site calls even if both sites are whitelisted.. He suggested two work arounds. One is to de-whitelist commons, which indeed solves the problem, the other was to do some tinkering with the regexens that define exceptions to the XSS filtering. Somehow the regex-workaround did not work for me, the regex I constructed pretty much should have excluded all of wiki[mp]edia from being "sanitized", but the problem persists regardless. Well, it doesn't bother me much as I seldom try to get to commons through images displayed on wikipedia with parentheses intheir name and at least now I/we know what's causing it and maybe Giorgio will look at it closer for some future NoScript release ;o) Pudding4brains21:54, 23 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Several images, such as Image:02 XII 05 2 0331 01 0003.JPG, have been marked by User:MN19 for speedy deletion with the reason being "eigener Wunsch" (which is just German for "own wish"). At least those I've looked at were uploaded by this same person. I suspect someone who speaks German should communicate with this user and find out wheteher their is a valid reason to delete these. - Jmabel | talk21:33, 25 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Well, "own wish" by the uploader is valid reason in itself. These can be speedied. Without the uploader we won't have these in the first place, right? We normally honor their request even if they don't give a reason. Although, used images shouldn't be deleted because the uploader simply changed their mind. Those would need to go through the deletion process where the uploader can argue their case. Rocket00005:07, 26 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Looks like the uploader uploaded a bunch of stuff on one day[18], then decided to delete it a few days later. I think if it seems a genuine mistake was made we normally honour such requests. --Tony Wills12:01, 26 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Really? Because I've had people insist I go through the formal deletion process just to get rid of a clearly useless image with camera shake that I accidentally uploaded. I was informed at that time that the grant of rights is irrevocable and it is completely irrelevant that I was the uploader (though of course it was easy to get consensus to delete the useless picture). - Jmabel | talk03:41, 29 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Admins say that? It's true the rights are irrevocable, so we can keep it if we want, but if it was clearly uploaded by mistake, there's no reason to go through that lengthy process (which during that time the image can start to be used, causing more problems). As long as it's not use, these can always be speedied. If admins don't want to delete right away, they're the ones that should list it for deletion, not you. Rocket00010:10, 29 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
This image is used in the english wikipedia under fair use. But in the description says that, according to a Spanish Law, its copyright might have ended January 1, 2007 (25 years from the next January 1 after the picture is taken). Pictures like Image:Evaperoncasarosada.jpg made in Argentina are valid for Commons and tagged according to a similar law. But I haven't seen nothing about this spanish law here at Commons. I don't have much idea about laws, but it looks legitimate. ---- Fernando Estel ☆ · 星 (Talk: here- es- en)18:33, 28 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Wrong license. Already discussed, proven invalid and therefore deleted (Template talk:PD-Spain-Simple). I can restore for discussions. And just a remark, Spanish law explicitly talks about 25 years for works not covered in Book 1 (which, BTW, are any copyrighteable work). The discussion is whether, for simple photographs of works that are already in the public domain, a photo generates new rights. Best regards --Ecemaml (talk to me/habla conmigo) 21:55, 29 December 2007 (UTC) PS: I've deleted the template and therefore I'll begin to delete all linked images.[reply]
En efecto, sólo se trata de una excepción cuyo contenido no ha sido determinado todavía. El ámbito de aplicación del Libro I es, a decir de la única referencia del Tribunal Supremo, la norma. La doctrina establece como ejemplos posibles para aplicar el artículo 128 la reproducción de códices o textos en dominio público, o de las series fotográficas realizadas con técnica microscópica mediante sistemas automáticos, siempre y cuando no constituyan parte de un trabajo cuya propiedad intelectual esté protegida. Lo dicho: caso a caso y con pinzas. --Petronas 11:50, 21 December 2006 (UTC)
El artículo 128 es parecido al 118 de la ley anterior. Una estupidez legal. No hay una sola sentencia del Tribunal Supremo que haya reconocido a una imagen como "mera fotografía". Al contrario, las sentencias (pocas) son anteriores a 1996 y en ellas el pleito se plantea porque alguien usa una imagen y el titular o sus herederos reclaman. En sentencia del 18 de enero de 1990 el Tribunal se manifiesta a favor de los herederos, considerando la obra una "creación original", sin especificar qué sea eso. La Sentencia del 3 de diciembre de 1990 sigue el mismo parecer y la misma indefinición. Rodrigo Bercovitz Rodríguez Cano considera mera fotografía a la que "carece de originalidad o altura creativa" (una de ambas cosas), y completa el significado de "original" como "la hecha con el propósito de permanecer y en la que el autor ha puesto su inteligencia al servicio de la imagen" (¿¿??). Jose C. Erdozaín López habla de "impronta personal dada por el autor a su obra" para diferenciar la mera fotografía de las demás. "Impronta personal son los actos preparatorios y de ejecución de la fotografía realizados por el autor y que caracterizan y diferencian esa imagen de otra". En la misma línea se manifiestan Fernando Echevarría, Ramón Casas y Javier Ramírez entre otros. Así las cosas, la determinación del nivel de protección jurídica de la imagen depende, en realidad, de la voluntad de su creador. Por lo tanto, si este (o sus herederos) manifiestan ante un Tribunal que la imagen fue realizada con el propósito de permanecer y que el autor dejó su impronta (léase encuadre, iluminación, colocación de la cámara, etc), ¿quién se lo discute?. Los mismos autores han dado ejemplos de lo que sería una "mera fotografía": las obtenidas de series automáticas de reproducción de imágenes para proyectos técnicos en los que la finalidad no es la imagen, sino servir de soporte para un estudio, trabajo o servicio, y que tienen un interés limitado en el tiempo, siempre que no se encuentren incorporadas en una obra bajo la protección de la LPI por otros motivos (o sea, en el fondo las imágenes desechadas, por ejemplo, en una serie de fotografías aéreas para el control de infracciones urbanísticas). Pero, incluso en esos casos, si el autor manifiesta cualquier elemento subjetivo que justifique la "originalidad" y/o la "impronta personal", nos encontraríamos bajo el supuesto del art. 10. Conclusión: la plantilla no tiene sentido porque es un coladero. Lo tendrá el día que el Tribunal Supremo defina con precisión jurídica el alcance del art. 128 y sus diferencias con el artículo 10, porque en lo que todo el mundo coincide es que el 128 es excepcional y debe justificarse. --Petronas 11:44, 29 December 2006 (UTC)
I notice Category:Video was removed from Image:Shake Some Action! at Bumbershoot 2007 03.jpg; the removal was correct because that category is now clearly for actual videos. But after looking around a bit, I can't find an appropriate category to add related to the fact that this is a giant video screen, projecting the live performance going on inside the hall. The categories in this area are a bit of a mess (e.g. Category:Television technology is in a bunch of categories most of which don't exist; Category:Video and movie technology and Category:Television mutually include each other. Anyone have any suggestions? And if someone is looking for a bit of a project, I suspect that the categories related to these technologies could be much improved. - Jmabel | talk03:47, 29 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I posted a picture of Gisele Bündchen yesterday and somebody erased it. I really do not know why they did it. I also can't find who erased it and his/her reasons.
(edit conflict) The image you are referring to is Image:Gisele Brazil.jpg. It was deleted by Videmus Omnia (talk·contribs) because it was licensed under a non-commercial licence, which is not acceptable here. Wikimedia Commons only accepts free content, that is, images and other media files that can be used by anyone, for any purpose. For details on what is acceptable, please read Commons:Licensing. RedCoat22:58, 29 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
and 
. -Rocket000 22:33, 19 November 2007 (UTC)
Support :) pfctdayelise (说什么?) 14:23, 2 December 2007 (UTC)
Done — just remember to fill the {{Information}} template correctly :-) --Boricuæddie 15:55, 10 December 2007 (UTC)
Deleted these obvious derivative works. We've been through this umpteen times: a drawing created from a copyrighted photo is a derivative work. Perhaps we should mention this clearly at COM:DW? (Maybe it is already mentioned. I didn't check.) Lupo 10:43, 10 December 2007 (UTC)
is not geotagged; checkusage says it appears on the page en:Nelson's Column which is geotagged 51°30′27.8″N, 0°07′40.7″W, so that would be written back into the jpg.
Problem image
Error schreenshot.jpg)
.jpg&action=edit&redlink=1){kind=link}
![[5]](https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?title=Image%3ANaruto_rise_05.jpg&diff=8827483&oldid=8793131){kind=link}
![[6]](https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?title=Image:Terror_in_Braunschweig_Hans_Reinowski.jpg&action=history){kind=link}
![[10]](http://www.orangedo.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2007/11/metro-07-a4.jpg){kind=link}
![[11]](https://www.cia.gov/library/center-for-the-study-of-intelligence/csi-publications/csi-studies/studies/winter98_99/page13.gif){kind=link}
![[15]](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Asl_alphabet_gallaudet.png){kind=link}
.jpg&action=edit&redlink=1){kind=link}
.jpg&action=edit&redlink=1){kind=link}
.jpg){kind=link}
.jpg&action=edit&redlink=1){kind=link}
