Commons:Village pump/Archive/2010/07

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illegal in some jurisdictions

G'day all - I recall a few templates similar to Template:Nazi symbol which carry legal disclaimers detailing the fact that the media may be illegal in certain jurisdictions. I am interested in making sure media which is illegal in the UK and Australia, as the contents of the 'erotic activities involving children' category would seem to be, are likewise templated. I thought I'd bring it here for discussion first (please do suggest a better venue, if this mightn't be it!) cheers, Privatemusings (talk) 05:54, 27 June 2010 (UTC)

Yes it is a good idea to tag media which is illegal in some jurisdictions, in order to warn content reusers. A better analogy than {{Nazi symbol}} is actually {{Australian Commonwealth reserve}}. However we'd want to identify the specific law and create a tag detailing the specific circumstances under which it applies and linking to the article on it, which presumably exists. Dcoetzee (talk) 00:15, 28 June 2010 (UTC)
Don't forget the small breasts...[1] Wnt (talk) 14:04, 28 June 2010 (UTC)
Good idea in principle, but where do we stop? Heaven Forbid we neglect Jesus of Nazareth and anything connected with the Roman Catholic Church, for instance. Possession and distribution of this drawing, which has become something of a cause celebre here recently, would earn you 1-6 months in prison in Malta, according to article 163 of Malta's Criminal Code ([2]). Should we have a template to warn our Maltese users? The list could be extended almost indefinitely. Wnt gives one example from Australia, but there is another proposal on the cards Down Under to ban native peoples ("aborigines") in Northern Territory from possessing any kind of pornography: shouldn't we warn them as well? Please don't think I'm being counter-productive, but we should seriously consider whether this is a direction we want to take: isn't our own compliance with US law enough? Anatiomaros (talk) 23:59, 28 June 2010 (UTC)
We're only concerned with laws that actually exist, not proposed ones. We're also mainly concerned with larger and more populous jurisdictions with substantial Internet-using populations, as a matter of return on investment for our maintenance effort. It's also a matter of personal interest - they're just warnings and warnings nobody on Commons cares about won't get implemented. Dcoetzee (talk) 12:58, 29 June 2010 (UTC)
Fair enough, I guess, but I still think this would be a waste of resources even if applied as you suggest (assuming we can agree on what constitutes "larger and more populous jurisdictions with substantial Internet-using populations" - do we include the People's (apparently...) Republic of China which has strict censorship laws, including politics of course?). How about a general template simply stating that an image may not be legal in some jurisdictions. A disclaimer as well as a warning, perhaps? Even then the potential list of subjects is considerable. Should we apply it to categories - and if so, which? - or just individual images? Anatiomaros (talk) 22:55, 29 June 2010 (UTC)
(In reply to Anatiomaros) The ban on porn in Aboriginal camps and communities exists (It is part of the Northern Territory National Emergency Response) and has since 2007. Bidgee (talk) 13:46, 29 June 2010 (UTC)
...wow. Dcoetzee (talk) 13:57, 29 June 2010 (UTC)
...and double wow. Apologies for the outdated information. Perhaps we should borrow their template? Anatiomaros (talk) 22:55, 29 June 2010 (UTC)
That is remarkable. Responding to a report about rampant child sexual abuse by ignoring 95/97 of its findings, putting signs on all the roads about pornography and presumably police to enforce them... and hiring one full time employee to deal with child sexual abuse. This is why free speech believers have to start taking on these unpleasant issues regarding the abuse of children - because it's being used with such extraordinarily cynicism to serve unrelated agendas. Wnt (talk) 00:39, 1 July 2010 (UTC)
Yes, Northern Territory Police (including Aboriginal Community officers), police officers from other states (I think the AFP/ACT Policing as well) officers to the NT to help the NT Police and the Australian Defence Force were also involved. The Northern Territory National Emergency Response (also known as the Intervention is very must disliked by a number of people, groups and I think even the UN questioned it). The Australian Government is also trying to bring in a internet filter (with no opt out) which will be forced at an ISP level[3][4][5][6], blocked those who don't have a firewall and/or anti virus[7] and recently announced that they want to have the power to log on what people do online[8][9]. Yep, Australia has lost the plot. Bidgee (talk) 01:31, 1 July 2010 (UTC)

Graffiti

I have requested at Commons_talk:Image_casebook#Graffiti 3 that public works of graffiti be treated as any other public artwork rather than as automatically copyright-free. I welcome any suggestions. (Please reply at image casebook). -mattbuck (Talk) 11:34, 1 July 2010 (UTC)

Copyright issue

After too much searching and not finding an answer, I'm giving up and hoping someone here can help.

I'm interested in making large prints of some images found here to place in public venues (offices, shops, restuarants etc.) These would include the photographers information. They would not be for sale but to show the capabilities of my equipment in hopes of gathering business.

Any problems with doing this?

Thanks. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 65.29.4.66 (talk • contribs) , 2010-07-01, 16:22 (UTC)

Photos uploaded to Commons must be sufficiently free for this. The most restrictive license is CC-BY-SA. However, there may be non-copyright restrictions, especially for photos with recognizable people. (Remember the Virgin girl.) /Pieter Kuiper (talk) 16:37, 1 July 2010 (UTC)
(w/edit confl.) As long as you observe all license issues, you're free to use those pictures! axpdeHello! 16:40, 1 July 2010 (UTC)
By all means, this is one of many commercial uses we wish to enable. Just make sure for any Creative Commons licensed image that you mention the author and license name. Dcoetzee (talk) 17:30, 1 July 2010 (UTC)

Are these two fruit pages necessary?

Cucumis metuliferus‎ and Horned melon fruit‎. I have attempted to merge them by putting a section in Cucumis metuliferus‎ named "Horned melon as fruit" and redirect Horned melon fruit‎ to it. I'm reverted because a user wants to do as (s)he pleases, which is irritating me. This was an issue with the categories too (Category:Cucumis metuliferus and Category:Horned melons), but was successfully merged per Category talk:Cucumis metuliferus. The user now wants consensus like there was when merging the categories, which is why I'm posting this here. ZooFari 14:27, 25 June 2010 (UTC)

The original discussion was on Category talk:Horned melons. It is not because you avoid that and start a splinter discussion elsewere on Category talk:Cucumis metuliferus that you reach a consensus. To me, it is essential that you find in category:Fruit or category:Tropical fruit an entry for each fruit we have with its common name. Don't expect that people can precisely spell all the names of the fruits, even less with their species names. On top of that, we have to prepare for all fruit that is commercialised the needed infrastructure for the product that comes on the market (such as Category:melons and Category:banana), for its cultivation, distribution maps, use in the kitchen, associated tools, recipes, presentation, packaging, transport, folklore, decoration, in art ... --Foroa (talk) 15:09, 25 June 2010 (UTC)
We are talking about pages right here. There's room in Cucumis metuliferus‎ for all the stuff you put in Horned melon fruit‎. A redirect can be directed at the appropriate section, that's what they are there for. Categories should of course be treated differently, sometimes. ZooFari 15:20, 25 June 2010 (UTC)
Agree with ZooFari, they should be merged. There is a good case for splitting out pages like this where there are numerous images (e.g. Apple), but not in a case like this one where there are only a small handful, and with a something like 90% overlap in the content of the two pages. - MPF (talk) 16:29, 25 June 2010 (UTC)
The earlier versions of the two pages (Cucumis_metuliferus, Horned_melon_fruit) don't even seem to qualify as galleries in addition to Category:Cucumis metuliferus. -- User:Docu at 16:45, 25 June 2010 (UTC)

(Indent reset) I personally don't care about the horned melons, but this is a question of principle. Moreover, horned melons is a border case by now, but there are hundreds of horned melon images on the web about its use as a commercial product and in the kitchen. What I care about is that:

  • There should a least be a way to make a gallery that has the common name of the fruit so that it appears somewhere in a category under that name
  • It is not acceptable that people that create galleries under such (or any name) see their galleries deleted because of "so called merges" in the gallery with the scientific name. A gallery is a personal work and one has not the right to delete or rename it without very good reason. In the past, some people made several galleries with exotic fruit (and their common names) and they have been systematically deleted (merged). There is no commmons rule that allows for that, and an excellent way to chase contributors away. --Foroa (talk) 05:56, 2 July 2010 (UTC)
Isn't the idea that "[a] gallery is a personal work and one has not the right to delete or rename it without very good reason" inconsistent with "COM:OWN"? I would have thought that all galleries and categories are subject to merger and renaming, subject to discussion on the matter if there are opposing views and, hopefully, consensus being reached on what should be done. Like the discussion that is taking place here. — Cheers, JackLee –talk– 06:14, 2 July 2010 (UTC)
Maybe Foroa meant a page User:Foroa/horned melons (currently non-existent)? -- User:Docu at 06:19, 2 July 2010 (UTC)
Could be, but nothing in the above discussion suggests that galleries in user pages are being discussed. — Cheers, JackLee –talk– 07:21, 2 July 2010 (UTC)
Is there a difference between Cucumis_metuliferus, Horned_melon_fruit and Category:Cucumis metuliferus other than title and namespace? -- User:Docu at 06:18, 2 July 2010 (UTC)

There can be several pages: in Latin, in English, in Chinese. There is no reason to merge them. /Pieter Kuiper (talk) 07:27, 2 July 2010 (UTC)

Why put the same things on three pages and one category? -- User:Docu at 07:33, 2 July 2010 (UTC)
Nobody talked about user pages. The need is to have a gallery with a common name (and a specific entry in a category) of a specific fruit that concentrates on the fruit and its uses: not the plant, the leaves, ... --Foroa (talk) 07:41, 2 July 2010 (UTC)
It seems to me that the issue is whether we should have a policy preferring scientific names or common names, or whether we can come up with some arrangement where both types of names are used. — Cheers, JackLee –talk– 15:48, 2 July 2010 (UTC)
I have suggested several times that Foroa's thoughts about having two distinct categories/galleries can be (wisely) made subcat as Category:Cucumis metuliferus as fruit (or Category:Horned melon as fruit) and a section named "Horned melon as fruit" under Cucumis metuliferus. Then the page Horned melon fruit can be redirected to that section, and perhaps a category for that redirect so that it can appear on Category:Cucumis metuliferus, to meet Foroa's needs. ZooFari 16:01, 2 July 2010 (UTC)
Tens of categories with names other than the scientific name have been violently deleted/redirected in the past, why my fallback is at least a gallery with the specific common name; nobody can forbid the creation of a gallery with a well defined purpose/scope and name, that corresponds to a clear need for at least 90 % of the people. This is not a question of "owning" it. --Foroa (talk) 16:32, 2 July 2010 (UTC)
You seem to ignore my advice. The reason for people deleting/redirecting common names is obvious. We are trying to keep Commons a multilingual project, and free of duplicates that cause confusion to our guests. Our guests are not going to know that pages under the common name are for agriculture reasons. ZooFari 16:41, 2 July 2010 (UTC)
These are all good reasons for coming up with a policy on how and when scientific names and popular names for plants and animals should be used as category names. — Cheers, JackLee –talk– 17:01, 2 July 2010 (UTC)
Fine. I'll be going on Wikibreak for a few weeks so I'll write one when I get back if no one else does. ZooFari 17:30, 2 July 2010 (UTC)
I think we actually have that already. I guess I'm still lost with me attempt to see a difference between Cucumis_metuliferus, Horned_melon_fruit and Category:Cucumis metuliferus. If someone would at least make a reasonable gallery we could discuss. -- User:Docu at 17:33, 2 July 2010 (UTC)
Foroa thinks we should have Cucumis_metuliferus and Category:Cucumis metuliferus for Horned melons as biology in general, while keeping Horned melon fruit for horned melons as food. I disagree because this can be better arranged as I already explained above. Personally I am one of those people who think galleries should not exist on Commons especially for small ones like these, but since that's how things go then I insist things should run as I suggested above. If there's already a policy, great. If it needs to be changed, then that shall be done via a proposal. ZooFari 17:42, 2 July 2010 (UTC)

← Where is the existing policy dealing with the issue of when categories using scientific names and popular names of animals and plants should be used? Also, the second issue that needs resolving is whether a gallery is appropriate in this case. We already have "Commons:Galleries" for that, and I think this passage from the policy is particularly pertinent: "Categories should contain all files related to the subject while galleries should contain a sample of files related to the subject. Ideally, galleries should contain the best of what we have. All files should be in at least one category, but not all files should be in a gallery." — Cheers, JackLee –talk– 17:57, 2 July 2010 (UTC)

Why are we splitting up births and deaths by month?

I just came across Category:February 1893 births and it looks like someone has split up a lot of year categories by month (example 1, example 2 & example 3). Why did we do this? How useful is this? Was this discussed somewhere? Making categories for birth and death year makes sense to me (this also happens on a lot of Wikipedia's), but splitting them out by moth doesn't make much sense to me. This is just making the category tree more complex. Multichill (talk) 13:46, 27 June 2010 (UTC)

I tend to agree with Multichill. AFAIK, there was some discussion about its implementation for creator pages on Template talk:Creator#Change categorization, but not much else.
It might make sense to do them by day/date rather than by year, but I can't see an advantage to do them by month. -- User:Docu at 13:55, 27 June 2010 (UTC)
I think that it is a waste of energy and resources while creating a maintenance problem. Moreover, most of the very old birth dates are hardly precise and even incorrect, so next to impossible to exploit such categories. --Foroa (talk) 15:53, 27 June 2010 (UTC)
Sounds interesting. I think we should take that in account. -- User:Docu at 16:06, 27 June 2010 (UTC)
In my opinion it is indeed a waste of time to create up to 9000 or more subcategories for births and deaths and to check for each individual whether months are mentioned and if so recat. More important to me is that in my opinion the user of Commons trying to find information is not helped by the split in months. A better alternative - if somebody wants to make a subdivision by month - is to make a gallery of for example the year of births, there mentioning all months and including only one image of each person.Wouter (talk) 22:14, 27 June 2010 (UTC)
I agree that this is neither desirable or practical, for a variety of reasons. Most importantly, the maintenance would be horrendous and never complete and it does nothing to help those whom our categories are intended to aid, i.e. people who come here to browse Commons. Needs nipping in the bud? Anatiomaros (talk) 23:14, 27 June 2010 (UTC)

Depending on how it's done, I don't think (manual) maintenance is an argument in favor of one or the other solution. Categories could easily be based on dates from WP and needn't be added or created manually. The precision of dates is obviously always an issue too.

The question is more how people will be using them. Today the gallery 1 July is linked from the Main Page. This is somehow based on Category:1 July. That category just includes a few random categories of people born that day. If the structure was done (and maintained) differently, we could improve on that. -- User:Docu at 21:20, 1 July 2010 (UTC)

Vehicle license/registration plates

I'm not entirely sure when license plates of vehicles should be "blanked" out, and when its not an issue. My understanding of the situation would be:

  • It doesn't matter for photos taken with the consent of the owner.
  • It doesn't matter for business and government vehicles.
  • It probably does matter for private vehicles.

I'm a little concerned by some of the images currently in Category:Plymouth, especially as the vehicle number is in the file name (not just shown in the picture). Most of the vehicles shown are of large companies, however some like File:MKM Catering WL57EUK.jpg are vehicles belonging to small businesses. That company is not notable (by WP standards) and its conceivable that the vehicle is used for personal purposes and not just business ones. That's making the line between "business" and "private" fuzzy, so I'm wondering if images like that should have the plate removed.

I suppose another thing is in general if the vehicle is involved in an accident, or is clearly committing a traffic/parking violation, its probably best to ensure identification is removed - irrespective of the vehicle ownership.--Nilfanion (talk) 11:44, 29 June 2010 (UTC)

No one's ever been ticketed on the basis of photographic evidence. I think it's okay to show plates of these business vehicles, and even to include them in the filename (as a way of identifying the specific vehicle and distinguishing it from photos of other similar vehicles). It's true that they may be used for personal purposes sometimes but most likely not in these images. Dcoetzee (talk) 12:54, 29 June 2010 (UTC)
I see no issue if the uploader removes (photoshop/blur) rego plate, I also believe there is a country which bans photography of rego plates but can't remember where but it would be up to the uploader to remove not Commons. Bidgee (talk) 14:10, 29 June 2010 (UTC)
With respect to the images I referenced, agree no need to edit (or rename) really, but would be helpful if we had general guidance for photographers somewhere. Example I gave shows that the line is slightly fuzzy - the border between business and personal use can be tricky to judge. Clearly, Commons isn't liable if photo of a plate is taken in a country where it is illegal, but the photographer could be, so Commons should provide some guidance on this area IMO (point me to where it is if its already done).
Incidentally, "No one's ever been ticketed on the basis of photographic evidence" - isn't that the whole point of a Gatso? :) (And yes I get the point there, but its reasonable to encourage plate-blanking in those situations in particular, if not in general).--Nilfanion (talk) 16:30, 29 June 2010 (UTC)
IANAL but here is how to get some idea of the issue here in the UK.
Q: Why does one see a reg plate pixilated?
A: A car, (or light aircraft / jumbo jet / boat etc.) belongs to someone. It is their property or an organisation's property. So if a photograph is to be used commercially (or to promote something) then it needs a 'property release' from the owner. A verbal agreement is worthless! Some organisations therefore pixilate just to be on the safe-side as the number plate ( or aircrarft reg number etc) identifies the owner. However, there 'may' be something else about the vehicle that can also identify the owner -so beware. On the other-hand, if it is an oldish photograph taken before the current own got title to it, then both the current owner and previous oner(s) would have trouble getting a judge to find in their favour. The current owner could not argue that he was 'associated' with it back then and the previous owner could not argue that he is associated with it now.
If the vehicle (or light aircraft/ jumbo jet/boat etc.) was taken from public property and forms part of the panorama, then it comes under freedom of panorama (in the UK). If it has been permanently abandoned by its owner (but not in a scrap yard in which case it has a new owner) the situation 'may' be OK. UK law is grey around the edges where some things only get decided by going to court so it is not always possible to state something in complete confidence.
From the Wikipedia Commons point of view. It is up to the person/organisation using the photographs commercially or promotional to ensure that they have such a release if they need one (there are exeption when one isn't needed). On Commons, I would say that, as the photographs are licensed so that they can be 'altered' without the photographer's permission then there isn't any necessity to blur the plates. Leave that to the end user – together with the choice of cropping, sharpening etc.
Lastly: It might be useful to some people to be able to identify a car which is connected to some historical event. So there are disadvantages to permanent erasure on the original image.
I agree that it would be useful to have some guidelines for each legal jurisdiction. --P.g.champion (talk) 19:04, 29 June 2010 (UTC)
In the UK only the police can identify a car's owner from the number plate, so in general I think that showing number plates should not be problematic here. Number plates are shown on the television unless the vehicle is involved in high security. Snowmanradio (talk) 19:12, 29 June 2010 (UTC)
You have a superfluous word (only) in the first sentence.--P.g.champion (talk) 19:27, 29 June 2010 (UTC)
@P.g.champion: I'm skeptical about these claims that people can control usage of images of their personal property. Practically everything belongs to someone. If I take a picture of a person wearing a hat, should I get a "property release" for that hat they bought with their own money? If I take a picture of a man drinking in a bar should I get a "property release" for the glass of beer which is the organizational property of the establishment? This seems entirely silly. Also, freedom of panorama is about intellectual property, not ordinary property. Dcoetzee (talk) 06:44, 30 June 2010 (UTC)

@Dcoetzee: It's good to be sceptical and you have included your line of reasoning to show yours is a sensible query and where your coming from. So here is an expansion of what I started above.

The government has eroded many rights over the property we own but we still have a few.

People spend thousands of £'s so that their cars and aircraft (including balloons in Richard Branson's case) have personalised reg numbers [10] See this link for a UK photo library's point of view on property. [11] Notice that they too, make a point of featuring things that rich people tend to own and are often prepared to threaten legal proceeding over. Publishers for this reason take out insurance to cover the costs of defending themselves from people who unjustly believe they have a claim. However, own a prize wining dog and find it has been used in an advert for dog food without your permission. Lawyers will be begging to let them help you sue. You ask about a hat though. If it is such an ordinary mass produced hat, which makes it impossible for the general public to identify with the owner AND were no association was claimed. Then just to uphold the law (if the owner could prove something) a judge may award the owner a sum which is fair reward for the use of the image or hurt feelings from the use of this ordinary mass produced hat (no big damages payments like in the US). However, this would leave such frivolous litigants deeply out-of-pocket. To be more precise, the litigant who did not offer a reasonable sum to settle out of court or the litigant who did not accept the reasonable sum when offered would not get NO sympathy from a judge in a UK where courts are heavily subsidized by the taxpayer. Therefore, to the average property owner, it would cost more £'s just to speak with his solicitor's (lawyer's) tea-lady than he would ever get back. Get to know a bit about the law and it is easy for the end user (publisher) in practice to stay out of the grey areas.

Now, just to balance things up. Here is a lay guide to photography rights in the UK. Look for the PDF link FREE Download – UK Photographers Rights v2 (right click and save as) in the centre column.

People have also questioned why the paparazzi never seem to have any problem updating their VIP registration lists, I suppose the answer is that so many different organisations (not just the police) have access to the DVLA that gate-keeping is ineffective . On WC we don't have to ask ourselves the same questions that a publisher would have to but we must be careful not to libel someone in the image description. Example: This is Xxxxx's Rolls Royce parked outside a massage parlour again. However, the Original Poster was asking about reg plates on WC. So, my answer to that (note: IANAL) is that most images would also be OK for Editorial use meaning for use in education, news reporting and so on – regardless of where the Rolls Royce was parked becuase it is just a photgraphic record of an 'event' and nothing is being suggested. Therefore, the plates do not 'have' to be made unreadable on WC itself. The details are complicated but a page giving the UK position in plain simple language for up-loaders is possible and would be useful, but I don't feel qualified to write it.--P.g.champion (talk) 10:51, 30 June 2010 (UTC)

The document you cite is completely consistent with my understanding of copyright law in the UK, and inconsistent with your own statements. A person who takes photographs on private property may be trespassing, which does not affect the right to reuse the resultant photos, commercially or otherwise (see Commons:Non-copyright restrictions). Harassment and invasion of privacy are adequately covered under our Commons:Photographs of identifiable persons policy, including personality rights which may restrict some types of commercial use like advertising - and I'm pretty sure we have something against libellous file descriptions. There is no need for policy expansion in this area. Dcoetzee (talk) 17:57, 30 June 2010 (UTC)

As Nilfanion notes above, some of these vehicles are government ones, thus I wouldn't bother removing the license plates from the images themselves, but I don't see an advantage including them in filename and/or file description. In the series from Plymouth mentioned above, I would even remove them from description and filenames. This may be different for more unique vehicles, e.g. J4. -- User:Docu at 21:33, 1 July 2010 (UTC)

It would help to distinguish images of otherwise identical vehicles. Of course one may ask why we'd want multiple images of vehicles differing only in their license plate. Dcoetzee (talk) 05:27, 2 July 2010 (UTC)
Context, angle and image quality are rarely identical? -- User:Docu at 06:24, 2 July 2010 (UTC)

Rename three images

Hi, I've done a mistake while uploading these images. Please rename them to adapt to the standards of Football kit:

  • File:Rising sun blue.png should be renamed Kit body risingsunblue.png
  • File:Rising sun left arm.png should be renamed Kit left arm risingsunblue.png
  • File:Rising sun right arm.png should be renamed Kit right arm risingsunblue.png

Thanks.

✓ Done. -- Common Good (talk) 21:05, 1 July 2010 (UTC)

Rename another image

Sorry for mistakes, but I need the renaming of another image. It should be from File:Kit shorts risingblue.png to File:Kit shorts risingsunblue.png

Thanks. --Pnino (talk) 23:05, 1 July 2010 (UTC)

✓ Renamed. ZooFari 23:24, 1 July 2010 (UTC)
Do we have enough volunteers working on photographs tagged with {{Rename}}? I know this is often not high priority work, but my impression is that images can go weeks without being renamed. — Cheers, JackLee –talk– 15:46, 2 July 2010 (UTC)

July 2

Delete, undelete, redelete

On May 6, 2009 I uploaded a file. In December 2009 it was tagged for deletion and was subsequently deleted sometimes in March 2010. Around April 16, 2010 I requested the undeletion of the file. The discussion was open for 2 1/2 months till June 30, 2010 when the file was undeleted. However, less that 24 hours after the undeletion the file was retagged for deletion.

What is disturbing is that, the redeletion of the file was requested by wikipedians who had not expressed any views in the previous discussion. There were absolutely no voices against the undeletion of the file.

There should be a policy of preventing such cases. A continuous process of consecutive rediscussing deletion or undeletion proposals is extremely disruptive. It opens the door to abuses. We have a process of proposing deletions and discussing these proposals. In case a file was deleted, we have a procedure of appealing this decision and requesting an undeletion, which again can be discussed and following which the deleted file may be undeleted. But this should be the end of the process at least for some time. Proposing the redeletion of a file 24 hours after its undeletion should not be permitted, just as reloading a file after it was deleted is not permitted. Afil (talk) 04:11, 2 July 2010 (UTC)

I think deletion right after undeletion is just fine, and sometimes the preferred way of dealing with media, but - as I have done in such cases - the entire content of the undeletion discussion should be posted in the deletion discussion. This ensures that the closing admin has all the information they need to make a decision about current consensus. Dcoetzee (talk) 05:28, 2 July 2010 (UTC)
Afil is complaining about Commons:Deletion requests/File:Anna Timiriova 1954.jpg. /Pieter Kuiper (talk) 08:51, 2 July 2010 (UTC)

Large progressive jpegs

Following the problem discussed in June at #Rokeby Venus by Diego Velázquez, I filed a bug at Bugzilla:24228. -- User:Docu at 10:04, 2 July 2010 (UTC)

Search by file size

I was wondering if it possible to search by file size. If not maybe this would be a helpful tool.

Not, as far as I know, without extensive database-scouring. –Juliancolton | Talk 17:54, 2 July 2010 (UTC)
Maybe you find this tool useful.   ■ MMXX  talk  19:20, 2 July 2010 (UTC)

Licensing on these flickr videos

I was viewing these videos which are shared under CC-BY on Flickr by the original owner.[12] However, the owner's website[13], which also contains the videos, has no mention of this free license and as far as I can tell, her videos are copyrighted. I'm confused if these would be allowed on Commons. I think it's a mistake on the owner's part and it's probably a good idea not to upload them here. Mahanga (Talk) 04:19, 3 July 2010 (UTC)

If they're marked CC-BY on Flickr that constitutes a release, but it would be a good idea to contact the author to make sure it wasn't accidental, as we usually remove works accidentally released. Dcoetzee (talk) 04:57, 3 July 2010 (UTC)

Sexual content

There is a vote going on at Commons talk:Sexual content to promote it to policy.
Kameraad Pjotr 08:47, 3 July 2010 (UTC)

I was going to wait a little bit until it was clear that the vote was not premature before announcing it here... I would have liked to address any remaining concerns first. But I certainly invite anyone to take a look at it and give their opinion. Dcoetzee (talk) 09:07, 3 July 2010 (UTC)

experimental maps of suriname

here is the gallery of user:Esds - he uploaded several maps (nearly 50) with (for me) experimental design. mostly uncategorized, see [14] - for me this is in large parts not in scope. Cholo Aleman (talk) 20:55, 2 July 2010 (UTC)

They belong in Category:Locator maps of Suriname. /Pieter Kuiper (talk) 21:37, 2 July 2010 (UTC)

thanks to Pieter Kuiper Cholo Aleman (talk) 11:56, 4 July 2010 (UTC)

July 3

Category:Minerals of Mogok

this file has a wrong description

The content of Category:Minerals of Mogok was imported by bot from Mindat.org. But the page at Mindat.org is wrong: Mogok is not in Sagaing district (which is in Sagaing Division, on the other side of the Irrawaddy), but very far from there, in Pyin Oo Lwin District (in Mandalay Division, indeed).

I have fixed the category'description, but the description of every file in the category is wrong, too. How to fix them ? (there is 202 files, way to much to do it by hand) Chaoborus (talk) 17:06, 4 July 2010 (UTC)

— by the way, this map is wrong, too —

Ask for bot help at Commons:Bots/Work requests to replace the words
English: [...]Locality: Mogok, Sagaing District, Mandalay Division, Burma (Myanmar)[...]
and
Deutsch: [...]Fundort: Mogok, Distrikt Sagaing, Mandalay-Division, Myanmar[...]
with the correct location. Dont know if other languages are used, just toke a very few samples. According to your information above the German description is: Fundort: Mogok, Distrikt Pyin U Lwin, Mandalay-Division, Myanmar. --Martin H. (talk) 17:19, 4 July 2010 (UTC)
Thanks You. I could'nt find that page. Chaoborus (talk) 17:25, 4 July 2010 (UTC)
✓ Done --Schlurcher (talk) 18:16, 4 July 2010 (UTC)

Magic word for filename w/o extension

As some users tend to use "see filename" as description in {{Information}}, I figured it might help if they could just use {{subst:FILENAMEWITHOUTEXTENSION}}.

I filed a request for an enhancement at Bugzilla:24229. -- User:Docu at 10:26, 2 July 2010 (UTC)

I saw "see filename" e.g. used for the author of paintings in the author= field or the name of places in the description= field. Thats trash! If people are too lazy to add the descriptions they should simply leave the fields empty to allow automatic tagging with Template:author missing or Template:description missing so that other hard-working users can find that images in the maintenance categories and fix the mess. Adding "see filename" just removes the maintenance notification with trash information without resolving the problem. --Martin H. (talk) 17:02, 2 July 2010 (UTC)
P.s.: And it is not only trash, it is also a problem, the search brings some 30K files with incomplete or missing information which are not appropriately tagged for maintenance. So if I take a category intersection with catscan of a content category and Category:Media lacking a description I will only see that files without any descriptions, but I will not see the files with undescriptive, unnecessary descriptions like "see filename" (or some other equivalent examples with the same creativity and use like "aa", "asdfg", "y" or "its my photo"). --Martin H. (talk) 17:11, 2 July 2010 (UTC)
Some people do use filenames that could easily fit as descriptions and I can understand that they think it's redundant to copy that to the template.
I noticed others use {{subst:PAGENAME}}, but this leads to a stray extension. -- User:Docu at 17:12, 2 July 2010 (UTC)
Sample 1, sample 2. -- User:Docu at 11:19, 3 July 2010 (UTC)
I wouldnt encourage user to do this. Especially not in the author field, see search link above. --Martin H. (talk) 17:21, 2 July 2010 (UTC)
Obviously any feature can be used to create trash ;) -- User:Docu at 17:24, 2 July 2010 (UTC)
I think the name of magic word is too long (no less than 24 characters without brackets and "subst:"). Shorter name would be better. – Kwj2772 (msg) 04:46, 3 July 2010 (UTC)
I'm aware of that. I started out with "FILENAMEWITHOUTEXT", but EXT might not be understood. "FILENAMEWOEXT" would be even shorter. What do you suggest? Some magic words have a longer and a shorter version. -- User:Docu at 10:57, 3 July 2010 (UTC)
How about "FILENAMENAME"? (see w:filename). -- User:Docu at 11:19, 3 July 2010 (UTC)
What about "FILEBASENAME"? basename function in UNIX returns only base name of file (if the suffix is specified it will return without suffix). And w:filename explains that basename is the primary filename. – Kwj2772 (msg) 12:41, 3 July 2010 (UTC)
Would also fit in with the other conventions for magicword of pagenames. TheDJ (talk) 13:31, 3 July 2010 (UTC)
I strongly disagree with "FILEBASENAME", since the primary function of basename in POSIX systems is to remove any leading path, and optionally a specific extension, and not to remove filename extensions in general (please check en:Basename and [15] and [16]). May I suggest "FILEROOTNAME"? -- IANEZZ  (talk) 17:26, 3 July 2010 (UTC)
What do the others think of "FILEBASENAME"? Maybe "FILETITLE" could do as well.  Docu  at 13:00, 4 July 2010 (UTC)
Just to say that "FILETITLE" sounds good to me (it's also short). -- IANEZZ  (talk) 12:27, 5 July 2010 (UTC)
Thanks for your feedback. Re-reading myself, I think I should have written "FILEROOTNAME" instead of "FILEBASENAME" in my previous post. Anyways, I added the name suggestions to the feature request.  Docu  at 15:13, 2010 July 12

Unidentified Sciurus and Bird

Hello,

Please could you help identifying this squirrel species? Thanks, Yann (talk) 14:31, 2 July 2010 (UTC)

Wikispecies might be a good audience to help with this. --SJ+ 15:07, 2 July 2010 (UTC)
You've already categorized the photographs into "Category:Unidentified Sciurus". Often, someone actively maintaining categories such as this one will come along and recategorize the images. — Cheers, JackLee –talk– 15:44, 2 July 2010 (UTC)
IMO, Funambulus palmarum. Ark (talk) 16:01, 2 July 2010 (UTC)
Funambulus pennantii Shyamal (talk) 04:38, 5 July 2010 (UTC)
Thanks a lot. And a bird also:
Turdoides striata - MPF (talk) 00:03, 5 July 2010 (UTC)

MediaWiki:Gadget-mwEmbed.js

Hello, if we can watch the videos on the sister projects, it's not the case for their subtitles. Actually the namespace TimedText is not importable...
I suggest to get a consensus here in order to create a Bugzilla: ticket in this purpose. JackPotte (talk) 20:43, 4 July 2010 (UTC)

If you want to change something at a sister project to make the namespace available there, you should create a thread there.
If it's just broken, go ahead and file a request.  Docu  at 20:50, 4 July 2010 (UTC)
This is clearly a bug & you don't need consensus to file a bug. But thanks for noticing--DieBuche (talk) 21:22, 4 July 2010 (UTC)
✓ Done https://bugzilla.wikimedia.org/show_bug.cgi?id=24265. JackPotte (talk) 12:13, 5 July 2010 (UTC)

July 5

File:Transparent.gif

Anyhow this File has been lost. Only the description page is existing but no File behind. This is now leaving ugly error-messages on a lot of pages like "Error: image is invalid or non-existent". People already starting to upload it on local projects like here. As the File is blocked could an admin repair this please. thx. --Jutta234 (talk) 12:43, 5 July 2010 (UTC)

Fixed. Seems to the same problem as the one I had this morning (also a gif).  Docu  at 12:50, 5 July 2010 (UTC)
Reverted to old version; No idea how that happened--DieBuche (talk) 12:52, 5 July 2010 (UTC)
Oh, so easy. Thx a lot. Perhaps it was caused by the power outage tonight. --Jutta234 (talk) 12:54, 5 July 2010 (UTC)

ColorIURIS licenses

Hello, on IRC an user contacted me to ask if this license can be used here, searching I've found here that the whole green and whole blue icons (licenses) are some kind of copyleft, the green allow commercial use and derviated work, the blue the same but need to be released under the same license (like CC-BY-SA) So... those can be used here? (in case of yes) We need to create new templates for them? --by Màñü飆¹5 talk 21:23, 5 July 2010 (UTC)

It seems so... Those people really need a better English translator. I can't make heads or tails of it. TheDJ (talk) 22:33, 5 July 2010 (UTC)
You have to wonder though why these people are reinventing Creative Commons. Anyway, it seems that
  • contract means license
  • copyright means "right to copy"
  • "public communication rights" means "publishing rights"
  • "transferred" means a whole slew of things it seems.
I'd prefer it if a Spanish editor could make new English translations based on the original licenses, because these translated versions are pointless. TheDJ (talk) 22:40, 5 July 2010 (UTC)
Indeed. Worse than machine translation, which is quite a perverse achievement.
I couldn't quickly find the relevant Spanish text. I'm a pretty good Spanish-to-English translator; if someone can aim me at the relevant Spanish text, and if it is not too voluminous, I'll be glad to take a shot at it. - Jmabel ! talk 05:30, 6 July 2010 (UTC)
This might be a good place to start. —Ilmari Karonen (talk) 07:32, 6 July 2010 (UTC)

OK. It's all painfully complicated, and there are an insane number of variants so I'm not going to translate the whole thing, just the parts that look to me like they would work for us.

All green
Permite la reproducción, distribución y comunicación pública con o sin ánimo de lucro.Permite la realización de obras derivadas para usos comerciales y no comerciales. Permits reproduction, distribution and public communication, whether it is for profit or not. Permits derived works, for commercial and non-commercial uses.
All blue
Permite la reproducción, distribución y comunicación pública con o sin ánimo de lucro.Permite la realización de obras derivadas para usos comerciales y no comerciales; siempre y cuando la obra derivada se ceda en las mismas condiciones en las que se recibió (cesión en cadena). Permits reproduction, distribution and public communication, whether it is for profit or not. Permits derived works, for commercial and non-commercial uses; all derived works must preserve the same conditions as the work from which the derive (chained grant of rights).

Oddly, despite all the complexities and subtleties offered, there seems to be nothing here about attribution. Also, there are two different phrases that seem to me to make a subtle distinction. Here they are with the respective translations I've given them:

con o sin ánimo de lucro
whether it is for profit or not
para usos comerciales y no comerciales
for commercial and non-commercial uses

To me this seems offhand like a distinction without a difference. Perhaps the a distinction between (on the one hand) whether the person who makes changes for derived work is paid for their work and (on the other) how the work is used and distributed? But the former seems impossible to monitor. - Jmabel ! talk 16:33, 6 July 2010 (UTC)

Logo's of Wikipedia's used on pages on several projects

Recently the logo of several Wikipedia's have been updated, and others will follow later this month. With this update the updated logo's got a new file-name, while the old logo's kept their old file-name. The logo's of many Wikipedia's are also used on many many articles, a lot of templates and other pages on many projects. All this use of the old logo's has to get updated as we now will use (in short future) only the new logo. I hope this can be done by some bots, otherwise it would be a lot of handwork to get all this done. Who can help? Romaine (talk) 23:22, 5 July 2010 (UTC)

Can't CommonsDelinker do most of this replacement work? Dcoetzee (talk) 02:10, 6 July 2010 (UTC)

July 6

Bot upload problem

Note : due to a third-party tool mishap, my bot transfered several dozen images last night from flickr to Commons without description. If you see a "description" like this: 

Catchable fatal error: Object of class FlinfoRaw could not be converted to string in /home/www/kunden/ramselehof.de/wikipedia/flinfo/FlinfoOut.php on line 128

then, before deleting, please take a moment to search the image name on flickr. If you're lucky and find it, paste the flick URL here and you'll get a pre-formatted wiki description, ready to paste. Thanks, Magnus Manske (talk) 08:04, 6 July 2010 (UTC)

Date confusion on Deletion request pages

Has anybody an idea why todays deletion requests (see time tags) are on tomorrows deletion review page? There shouldn't be anything on tomorrows page yet. I've observed this already a few days ago. Theres seems to be something wrong with the "open deletion request" script. --PaterMcFly (talk) 08:44, 6 July 2010 (UTC)

You should ask User:Wknight94, they're the one who put them there. Apparently those are all old incomplete DRs that weren't actually listed on any log when they were originally filed. Which doesn't really explain why Wknight94 is adding them to tomorrow's log, but at least it explains why the timestamps are all over the place. —Ilmari Karonen (talk) 09:16, 6 July 2010 (UTC)
There is nothing wrong with "Nominate for deletion" link, it seems User:Wknight94 listed old incomplete DR request in that page.   ■ MMXX  talk  09:21, 6 July 2010 (UTC)
Thanks for the Hint, didn't see that. I've posted on Wknight94's talk page. --PaterMcFly (talk) 09:31, 6 July 2010 (UTC)

Weiss

Hi. I'm very dubious about the pictures this user uploaded. I left a message in French (because this user is surely French) explaining that we needed more proof for licencing and authorization, but I have no answer and this user seems to be inactive since s/he uploaded them and contributed to the French article about this brand of chocolate. --TwoWings * to talk or not to talk... 08:59, 6 July 2010 (UTC)

(1) remove the braces of {{Template:Service marketing Weiss}}, that template not exists and will never exist, the user replaced the content of {{Own}} with something different. (2) Tag the files as missing permission with {{subst:npd}}. --Martin H. (talk) 09:04, 6 July 2010 (UTC)

relation to equator

The beautiful map of Tanzania shows latitude and longitude lines, but no numerical values. How far is Tanzania from the Equator? Bob Mittelstadt rm@RMArch.net

I dont know what map exactly you mean with "the beautiful map". If you refer to the set File:Tanzania map-fr.svg: The numberical values including, in this original french language version, the Èquateur. Also the translations of the french map have values. File:Tanzania Topography.png has values too and finaly the UN map File:Un-tanzania.png has also numberical values. --Martin H. (talk) 16:52, 6 July 2010 (UTC)

Uploading when an organization owns the rights

I would like to upload images of our organization--we're absolutely comfortable with the CC-BY-SA--but all that I have read on Wikimedia Commons re licensing and uploading seems predicated on the contributions of individuals. Can an organization have its own Wikimedia Commons account? (My colleague took the photos--should he establish his own account? He'd rather that the images were considered our organization's photos.) Thank you for your help! MtRainier7

Hello, just see Commons:OTRS and follow the instructions. It's easy :)--Gaeser (talk) 16:26, 2 July 2010 (UTC)

Wonderful! Thank you. I will follow through.MtRainier7 (talk) 21:23, 6 July 2010 (UTC)

How To Delete a Category

Would like to delete a category i created Category:Henry_Delforn...but forgotten how to do so Henry Delforn (talk) 00:02, 4 July 2010 (UTC)

Only administrator can do it.--Juan de Vojníkov (talk) 05:27, 4 July 2010 (UTC)
Tag the incorrect category with {{Bad name}} if the reasons for deletion are uncontroversial, or {{Delete}} if the reasons for deletion need to be discussed (follow the instructions stated in the template). — Cheers, JackLee –talk– 08:12, 4 July 2010 (UTC)
{{Bad name}} is only for files, don't use it for categories please. You probably want to use {{Move}}. Multichill (talk) 08:48, 4 July 2010 (UTC)
Oh, that's new to me. I noticed that if {{Bad name}} is applied to a category the wording changes to "This category has an incorrect name", so I assumed that it was applicable to such pages. I suppose if an editor wants to delete a category and not merely move it to another name, then {{Delete}} is appropriate? — Cheers, JackLee –talk– 11:23, 4 July 2010 (UTC)
Correct, {{Bad name}} or {{Duplicate}} works for speedy deletion of categories that are no longer used/empty and moved elsewhere. --Foroa (talk) 16:19, 4 July 2010 (UTC)
Ummm, OK, so should {{Bad name}} and {{Duplicate}} be used on categories or not? Is there any guideline on this we can look at? — Cheers, JackLee –talk– 16:53, 4 July 2010 (UTC)
See cat redirect template as for example in Category:Fumariaceae. --Foroa (talk) 21:46, 4 July 2010 (UTC)
Most speedy category deletes are through {{Bad name}} or {{Duplicate}}. --Foroa (talk) 07:31, 7 July 2010 (UTC)

Missing: File:4-Stroke-Engine.gif

File:4-Stroke-Engine.gif is missing. But I cannot find any deletion in the log files. Does anybody know what's going on? --Saibo (Δ) 18:54, 6 July 2010 (UTC)

That's weird. Looks like the database is messed up somehow. It seems the latest version is still available from [17], and I hope that the earlier versions may be recoverable too. But it looks as if the database records are just gone. Oddly, they still show up on the toolserver, though. —Ilmari Karonen (talk) 19:17, 6 July 2010 (UTC)
These cases are now showing up after the downtime; a normal purge though fixes everything in mos cases--DieBuche (talk) 19:18, 6 July 2010 (UTC)
OK, thanks. I was afraid to try anything like that before downloading copies of all the revisions; sometimes poking at slightly broken files fixes them, sometimes it can break them beyond recovery. Anyway, glad that it's solved now. —Ilmari Karonen (talk) 19:24, 6 July 2010 (UTC)
Thank you all! "can break them beyond recovery" - Really? I thought the databases here are safe and consistent and such things. Cheers --Saibo (Δ) 19:38, 6 July 2010 (UTC)
Consistent? Our databases? Seriously, we have all sorts of inconsistent crap in our databases, like links from pages that never existed or file records pointing to nonexistent files. Mostly such inconsistencies are caused by old bugs or DB failures, and just linger long after the original problem has (hopefully) been fixed because it's safer and easier to let them be than to try and force everything into a consistent state (which could risk losing data that, while inconsistent, could still be useful for manual recovery later).
Anyway, the real risk was that this looked to me like acute database corruption — specifically loss of file records from the DB. (Fortunately, it turned out it wasn't that after all.) If it had been that, I was hoping that the actual files might've still been on disk, and thus recoverable, even though the DB records pointing to them seemed to be gone. But if that had been the case, and someone had gone and purged or reuploaded those files, then the software might've just decided to wipe out or overwrite the old files since it had no record that they really existed. I don't know if that would've really happened, but I wasn't ready to risk it before I had a safe copy of them somewhere.
Ideally, MediaWiki probably should do (even) more consistency checks and abort any edits or uploads if it finds anything unexpected. Then again, sometimes that just isn't very practical. For example, action=purge is meant to wipe the thumbnail cache, which is supposed to be redundant and regenerable. The fact that it sometimes isn't — for example, we have several hundreds of images on Commons for which thumbnail regeneration is currently broken — isn't something the software can easily detect, since it by definition implies a bug in the software. —Ilmari Karonen (talk) 11:17, 7 July 2010 (UTC)
Is it possible to let a bot scan and purge all non working files? --Saibo (Δ) 19:40, 6 July 2010 (UTC)
I just did a similiar thing (scanning all SVG file for image w/o thumbnail). A positive side effect would be that we would also find images which are corrupted. The scan would take a few days though. --DieBuche (talk) 21:12, 6 July 2010 (UTC)
What did you do with the svg without a thumbnail? Did you tag them with something similar to {{InvalidSVG}}/Category:Invalid SVG?
I would say that's a good idea. Of course you need to exclude the images which have too big dimensions for MediaWiki. --Saibo (Δ) 21:46, 6 July 2010 (UTC)
I put them here & have fixed most of them. Yes, the Png with over 12 MP have to be sorted out. Shouldn't be too hard though--DieBuche (talk) 22:23, 6 July 2010 (UTC)
One thing you will also find are obviously medium big jpegs in progressive mode (see the old versions of File:Dorfkirche_Oberstenfeld_1-2.JPG). --Saibo (Δ) 23:15, 6 July 2010 (UTC)
Ilmari Karonen, could you run the python script from the toolserver? I don't really wan't to have to leave my pc running 24h for some days--DieBuche (talk) 12:33, 7 July 2010 (UTC)
Sure, I guess could do that. Maybe we should continue this discussion on our talk pages, though? :) —Ilmari Karonen (talk) 14:01, 7 July 2010 (UTC)

Image turned on its side

I uploaded an image which arrived to me by email from the photographer and was rightside-up. But when I uploaded it to Commons, it appears on its side. Just wondering how this happens and how to fix it? The image is File:Theophilus Levett monument 1746 Whittington Staffordshire.JPG. Thanks much! MarmadukePercy (talk) 20:50, 6 July 2010 (UTC)

How to fix: COM:FAQ#How do I fix the orientation of an image?.  Docu  at 20:57, 6 July 2010 (UTC)
Many thanks. Already fixed thanks to speedy response by an admin! MarmadukePercy (talk) 20:59, 6 July 2010 (UTC)
To answer your original question: some images contain rotation information in the EXIF data. Some viewers use this data, and some do not. This can lead to confusing unexpected rotation. Dcoetzee (talk) 10:18, 7 July 2010 (UTC)
There is bugzilla:6672  Docu  at 14:34, 7 July 2010 (UTC)

July 7

No permission since (file description pages) and Image permission (uploader talk page)

AFAIK, these templates are also to be used if the uploader is the author, but published the files elsewhere before. Both messages aren't that clear on this though.

I suggest to add, e.g. "This also applies if you are the author yourself." to both.

Other language versions might need to be updated too.  Docu  at 08:09, 7 July 2010 (UTC)

Category:Andy Eick

At Category talk:Andy Eick, I have asked the question:

 Question A general question. We don't allow main category tree categories for User photographs -- they must be categorized under a User category which is, by default, hidden. While some of the images here are useful, both their number and their quality pales besides those of some of our colleague editors. Why, then, do we allow a Flickr user, unknown to us, to have a category which we may not have.

It occurs to me that it may be more useful to discuss it generally here.      Jim . . . . Jameslwoodward (talk to me) 15:58, 7 July 2010 (UTC)

Probably because nobody realized this category existed? — Cheers, JackLee –talk– 16:01, 7 July 2010 (UTC)

Bad Old Ones

Why are some images tagged quite some time ago not being deleted or untagged? For example, File:Bogota legal.JPG is one of them. PleaseStand (talk) 16:10, 7 July 2010 (UTC)

Corel Professional Photos CD-ROM

I have to ask whether the images that were uploaded from the "Corel Professional Photos CD-ROM" are acceptable as public domain images? I understand the paintings themselves are in the public domain, but are the contents of that disk PD as products of a photographer? Perhaps the category should clarify the license? Thanks.—RJHall (talk) 17:16, 3 July 2010 (UTC)

I agree with RJHall that there should be a usage note on the category page explaining why the images are regarded as being in the public domain (and referring to Corel v. Bridgeman). — Cheers, JackLee –talk– 18:02, 3 July 2010 (UTC)
Thank you.—RJHall (talk) 17:36, 8 July 2010 (UTC)

July 4

Any one think I should nom this for "Quality" pix?

I am though the Sun had screwed up the shot but now it looks like some divine light (which oddly appropriate for this new religious movement). Thoughts?

Caption: "Members of the Twelve Tribes Community Malak and Roah Mcgee share their first ever kiss at their wedding at the Yellow Deli in Chattanooga, Tn on April-11-2009 (Note: the bright light is the sun coming out" B. Gibson Barkley (talk) 17:33, 7 July 2010 (UTC)

File renamed. -- Common Good (talk) 19:39, 7 July 2010 (UTC)
Honest opinions I like that, as i understand it Quality Pix is high quality Shot, IMHO it is that. I am i misunderstanding something here? B. Gibson Barkley (talk) 18:06, 7 July 2010 (UTC)
Why don't you just nominate it and let the editors who participate regularly in such debates decide? — Cheers, JackLee –talk– 18:19, 7 July 2010 (UTC)
I am new on the commons thus i was hoping for pointers, as the Guide is terribly unhelpful and confusing. I am not sure if that is the right place to nom it to or if there is a step below or even if there is a peer review to look at before any noms are made? B. Gibson Barkley (talk) 18:23, 7 July 2010 (UTC)
You could try to put it on Commons:Photography critiques for comments, even if that page is not heavily trafficked. --Myrabella (talk) 19:01, 7 July 2010 (UTC)

Unique image id

Hi, is it possible to obtain unique id (a number, hex hash) of an image on wikimedia which would allow referring to it regardless of potential future name changes ? Thanks, Wmigda (talk) 18:06, 7 July 2010 (UTC)

Even if there is no rename, I don't think it's possible, see bugzilla:24108.  Docu  at 18:14, 7 July 2010 (UTC)
You can compute an MD5 of the image file itself, but this will change if a new version of the image is uploaded in the future. You can also use the Mediawiki API to check the history for moves and retrieve the original filename and original upload time, which you can hash into a unique identifier even if the original filename was later reused for another image. Writing a script to compute this identifier would be straightforward. Dcoetzee (talk) 20:34, 7 July 2010 (UTC)
The software already calculates and stores SHA1 hashes for all files. You can even locate files by hash using the list=allimages API query. I don't believe MediaWiki currently has any way to link directly to an image by its hash, but such a feature shouldn't be hard to implement. Special:FileDuplicateSearch already does almost what you want, but as currently written only allows searching for duplicates of existing images (and only searches the latest versions of files). —Ilmari Karonen (talk) 20:51, 7 July 2010 (UTC)
Should be possible to find some ID here (file name not relevant). --Foroa (talk) 22:12, 7 July 2010 (UTC)
Yes, the revision ID of the earliest revision can also be used as an identifier. These are guaranteed to be stable because they are used in permalinks (which are of course intended to be permanent) and they do operate appropriately with moves. e.g. 420870 is the revision ID of the oldest revision of File:Gustav_Klimt_029.jpg and the permalink is [18]. Dcoetzee (talk) 22:50, 7 July 2010 (UTC)
Isn't it possible to change the file without changing the file description page? BTW CatScan2 outputs SHA1 checksum. Docu  at 22:55, 7 July 2010 (UTC)

July 8

Text change by a bot

Hi, is there a way a bot can replace

English: Drawing of the Codex Vallardi acquired by the Louvre in March 1856 to the Milanese antique dealer Giuseppe Vallardi
Français : Dessin du Codex Vallardi acquis par le Louvre au mois de mars 1856 auprès de l'antiquaire milanais Giuseppe Vallardi
Italiano: Disegno di Codice Vallardi acquisito dal Louvre al mese di marzo 1856 presso l'antiquario milanese Giuseppe Vallardi

by {{template:Codex Vallardi}} in the notes section of all the files in category:Codex Vallardi ?--Zolo (talk) 08:04, 8 July 2010 (UTC)

if all the files have exactly the same text than it should not be a problem, a bot could easily do it. A better place for requests like that is Commons:Bots/Work requests--Jarekt (talk) 12:49, 8 July 2010 (UTC)

How to inform others about an image

Hi you all, I'm "new" to Commons and I'd like to know if there is a template which warns users to check the image about a problem, because I'm not sure if some images could stay here. Thank you --→ Airon Ĉ 09:15, 8 July 2010 (UTC)

Hi Airon. Most problem templates (no source, no licence, no permission, deletion request, speedydeletion, etc) list a message template to be substed onto the uploader's talk page. Is this what you meant? -mattbuck (Talk) 09:36, 8 July 2010 (UTC)
If you seek feedback on your own images, you can try Commons talk:Licensing for questions related to that. There is also Photography critiques. For general questions, try Commons:Help desk.  Docu  at 09:40, 8 July 2010 (UTC)
I explain the problems, so that you can understand:
Should they be deleted? --→ Airon Ĉ 09:49, 8 July 2010 (UTC)
PS: Before I tried to describe this kind of template :)
File:Tesouros439.jpg is a picture from 1710 and because of it's age clearly {{PD-old}}. If you scan or take a picture of an old painting its normally not enough to invoke new copyright.--DieBuche (talk) 10:21, 8 July 2010 (UTC)
The second one is not that clear, and you should probably open a deletion request, by clicking on the button in the left toolbar. PS: Could you maybe make your signature a bit less colorful? --DieBuche (talk) 10:25, 8 July 2010 (UTC)

Category:River power plants

Isn't this category "River power plants" wrong? River power plants are the same as "Hydroelectric power plants" and this cat is existing with a well reasoned category tree. --93.211.94.186 07:47, 4 July 2010 (UTC)

Not all (in fact, a relatively small proportion of) hydroelectric plants are river plants, so it sounds like it ought to be a sub-category rather than a merge. There are also coal and nuclear plants that use rivers for cooling, so we might even wish to clarify the definition and the naming, so that it's clear the cat is for low-head river hydro. Andy Dingley (talk) 07:51, 4 July 2010 (UTC)


Actually the correct name is "Run-of-the-river Hydroelectric Plants" (see . The images in Commons are all of Run-of-the-river Hydroelectric Plants. The name River power plants could be confusing.Afil (talk) 19:23, 8 July 2010 (UTC)

How is this "rolgordijn" called in English

I had problems to find the English word for this windscreen and to find the right category. I have put the 3 photos I had now in the Category:Window blinds but that is not the right one. Any suggestions? Thanks, Wouter (talk) 08:55, 7 July 2010 (UTC)

See en:Windbreaker (disambiguation) (I'd call it a roll-down windbreak myself). Man vyi (talk) 12:18, 7 July 2010 (UTC)
en:Louver/fr:Persienne and via the "see also" and en:Window shutter to en:Roller shutter might get you on the right track. Enjoy. --Foroa (talk) 15:04, 7 July 2010 (UTC)
Thanks. I created Category:Windbreakers (sheet of material) as subcat of the new Category:Wind protection as subcat of Category:Wind. Wouter (talk) 21:59, 8 July 2010 (UTC)

Recordings from Church

I attend a fundamentalist Southern Baptist church and realized there may be some educational and aesthetic value in the sermons given and hymns sung. I was wondering whether uploading recordings thereof would be in accordance with Commons policy. The sermons are given spontaneously "under the influence of the Holy Spirit" publicly in a church with open attendance, so I don't think there's any copyright claim to them. Most of the hymns sung are probably public domain. If permission is needed I could probably obtain it. Would uploading recordings of a church singing hymns or preaching spontaneously be okay? Abyssal (talk) 19:18, 8 July 2010 (UTC)

From a legal point of view, I believe the first person to "fix" a work (in this case, an ex tempore sermon; or the performance by a choir of a hymn, the music and lyrics of which are in the public domain) into some tangible medium is regarded as the author of the sound or video recording and thus gains copyright in it. However, the preacher or singers may have some separate performance right protected by law that may be infringed by the making of the recording. I am not familiar with this aspect of US law, so perhaps someone else can comment on whether performance rights exist in US law and whether this is something that the Commons concerns itself with. — Cheers, JackLee –talk– 21:10, 8 July 2010 (UTC)
This has always been a hazy area to me. This kind of right is called performer rights, and is a type of neighboring right, rather than part of copyright proper. These rights are protected by the WIPO Performances and Phonograms Treaty, which in the United States is implemented by the DMCA, Part 1, the WIPO Copyright and Performances and Phonograms Treaties Implementation Act. In particular, I have sources that say that the provisions of the DMCA apply to unfixed performances, which are not copyrighted in the usual sense; but that such provisions "presupposes that at some point the work becomes 'fixed' - and therefore copyrighted - under the performer's authority."[19] To spell it out, it remains unclear to me whether a performer who does not at any point fix their performance acquires any rights to it in the United States. Obviously if the hymn itself is still copyrighted by its author then a recording of a performance of it constitutes a derivative work. Dcoetzee (talk) 21:38, 8 July 2010 (UTC)
Spontaneous preaching is probably out of the scope of Commons, except as a short sample. I would get the permission of the group before doing any recordings--it's safest legally and ethically. If you've got a large enough church and sound-system, you want to be tapping directly into the choir mikes. As for the hymns, I'd be careful; they're going to need to predate 1923, and even then Commons rules about copyright of the country of origin will get hairy. I'd try to link to a hymn at Wikisource, to make it clear that it's a PD hymn and more clearly in scope.--Prosfilaes (talk) 22:40, 8 July 2010 (UTC)
Hmmm, looks like maybe we need to determine more definitively whether the Commons should take note of performers' rights or whether this is to be regarded as a non-copyright restriction (like trademark, patent and privacy rights) that the Commons is not directly concerned with. — Cheers, JackLee –talk– 07:05, 9 July 2010 (UTC)
I don't think it's one we can ignore in practice. We do in fact pay quite a bit of attention to privacy rights.--Prosfilaes (talk) 10:45, 9 July 2010 (UTC)

Russian speaker needed!

This user have uploaded many images form this website, but permission is not clear, the user is inactive since June 17 so I guess they didn't saw any of warnings, someone who speak Russian and who is familiar with Commons guidelines should contact them by email and ask them to provide an appropriate permission for their content, if the user is from mentioned website, perhaps the best way is to add few lines to their about page, explaining the license and permission for their uploaded content. thank you.

P.S. I've also posted same request at Russian village pump.   ■ MMXX  talk  08:26, 9 July 2010 (UTC)

Source for high-resolution FBI photographs?

At dewp, there are several photographs connected to en:Rudolph Abel (cf. de:Datei:Rudolf Abel Foto.png). They seem to stem from the FBI's webpage on his case. Before transferring those to Commons, of course it would be very nice to have them in a high-resolution version. Are there processes or friendly contacts established to do so? Filing a formal FOIA request would be out of (my) scope. --Tim Landscheidt (talk) 11:41, 9 July 2010 (UTC)


http://upload.wikimedia.org/robots.txt

Currently there is no such file.

Personally, I think there should be one to make sure that files at

are not indexed.

As a sample, for File:Clock vienna.jpg this would include the first two versions of the image, but not the most recent one.  Docu  at 11:46, 9 July 2010 (UTC)

I have requested this at bugzilla:24319. TheDJ (talk) 13:59, 9 July 2010 (UTC)

Admins: Move File:Escudo de Quilmes.PNG to File:Quilmes Coats of Arms.png

Hi commons admins, please move File:Escudo de Quilmes.PNG to File:Quilmes Coats of Arms.png (the last redirect to first), i changed the links in all wikipedias, so next moving, delete Escudo de Quilmes.PNG. Thanks Shooke (Talk me in spanish, english or italian) 13:08, 9 July 2010 (UTC)

There's really nothing wrong with a file having a Spanish-language name. That said, if you want to rename a file, see Commons:File renaming. No need to bring this to the Village Pump. - Jmabel ! talk 18:32, 9 July 2010 (UTC)

GlobalUsage and ProofreadPage

On Special:GlobalUsage it is mentioned This special page doesn't include usage through the ProofreadPage extension at Wikisource. Yet if I visit something like Special:GlobalUsage/A Beacon to the Society of Friends.djvu, s:Index:A Beacon to the Society of Friends.djvu shows up. Can somebody point me to what exactly the problem is? -- Bryan (talk to me) 17:21, 9 July 2010 (UTC)

s:Page:A_Beacon_to_the_Society_of_Friends.djvu/90 doesn't  Docu  at 17:47, 9 July 2010 (UTC)
ok, thanks. -- Bryan (talk to me) 17:53, 9 July 2010 (UTC)
bugzilla:24322 -- Bryan (talk to me) 18:07, 9 July 2010 (UTC)

July 10

in scope or not?

User:Violetaferrero did upload about 30 files with some kind of artwork in April 2007 , see the gallery at [20] all are unused and forgotten until this time - can someone add categories, or make a mass deletion request? - for me these files are all out of scope (or the result of a misunderstanding of the commons), but I want to hear other comments. Thanks Cholo Aleman (talk) 13:00, 7 July 2010 (UTC)

Looks like an attempt to use Commons as a file server, which would make them out of scope. However, you might want to see if some of the photographs shown in the pages uploaded are worth saving. If so, they can be cropped out and saved. — Cheers, JackLee –talk– 13:16, 7 July 2010 (UTC)
✓ Done They are out of scope. I opened Commons:Deletion requests/Files of User:Violetaferrero. --Jarekt (talk) 15:01, 7 July 2010 (UTC)
THANKS to Jarekt Cholo Aleman (talk) 10:55, 10 July 2010 (UTC)

Collective rename

Could there be a collective rename of images and categories with "Unites States in their titles?

Not sure whether there's a way of doing this that's less tedious than individual renames for each... AnonMoos (talk) 23:48, 8 July 2010 (UTC)

How do you want to rename them and why?  Docu  at 08:32, 9 July 2010 (UTC)
I guess he would like the misspelling Unites changed to United. — Cheers, JackLee –talk– 08:48, 9 July 2010 (UTC)
And if the names would be in Chinese or Korean with plenty of spelling errors, we would not rename them. Rename is only needed when misleading, which is not the case. We have better things to do. --Foroa (talk) 15:28, 9 July 2010 (UTC)
I don't see why we have to take such a rigid stand. The images can be tagged with {{Rename}}, and an editor will get to them eventually. — Cheers, JackLee –talk– 15:56, 9 July 2010 (UTC)
Simple, the more you have unjustified renames, the more there are requests and useless work. It is easy to issue a request, it takes several minutes of work per request to handle them. There are very good reasons for the rename rules, so please respect them. --Foroa (talk) 18:58, 9 July 2010 (UTC)
One happens to be the sample on Commons:File_renaming#What_files_should_not_be_renamed.3F  Docu  at 21:06, 9 July 2010 (UTC)
Guess we'll have to find a new example. Having a ridiculous spelling error on thousands of pages doesn't seem like a good idea to me in any case. --Dschwen (talk) 21:14, 9 July 2010 (UTC)
Especially since the thousands of pages only involve replacement in a handful of templates. --Dschwen (talk) 21:18, 9 July 2010 (UTC)

Anyway, I just did the files (partly because the presidential emblem images had multiple title issues); I may get around to the categories (but probably not this week)... AnonMoos (talk) 19:00, 9 July 2010 (UTC)

Categories are done. Took me less than 5 mins. Talk less, work more! --Dschwen (talk) 19:08, 9 July 2010 (UTC)
Rest is renamed and queued for universal replace. --Dschwen (talk) 19:25, 9 July 2010 (UTC)
Please do not delete redirects after renaming. --DieBuche (talk) 20:26, 9 July 2010 (UTC)
I will delete redirects if all uses are replaced. --Dschwen (talk) 14:18, 10 July 2010 (UTC)
Image redirects really shouldn't be deleted unless the file was uploaded only a short time ago. How do you know if a file is used in non-Wikimedia projects? Wikipedia etc.. are not the only MediaWiki-based wikis that use Commons as a source (see Commons:Reusing content outside Wikimedia#Own MediaWiki installation). They don't get notified when a file is moved, so images in their articles will be broken.
See also Brion Vibber's comment here: "*Not breaking links* helps everyone, ESPECIALLY US FIRST AND FOREMOST. [...] The user-hostile attitude of "well you can hunt around for hours trying to figure out why the link broke, nothing we can do" is completely unacceptable for a project like Wikimedia which has the explicit aim of getting useful and interesting material into peoples' hands. Sometimes it's necessary to let a suboptimal situation go for a while when there's limited attention, but this isn't one of them -- this is a case where you're advocating *spending active effort to hurt users* by breaking links, and this is not a position the Wikimedia Foundation can support."--Kam Solusar (talk) 14:57, 10 July 2010 (UTC)
Ok, makes sense, --Dschwen (talk) 15:15, 10 July 2010 (UTC)
Btw. I didn't delete all of the redirects, see: File:Standard Of The President Of The United States Of America.svg --Dschwen (talk) 15:16, 10 July 2010 (UTC)

July 9

Deleted picture and Commons delinker

I recently noticed (from looking at pages on en-Wikipedia) that File:Menin Gate.jpeg had been deleted here on Commons, and I had two questions:

  • (1) Would it be possible to be told who the uploader was so I can try and get the permission sorted if they are still around? I tried using "what links here" to find a notification left on the uploader's talk page, but found nothing.
  • (2) Is there a reason Commons delinker delinked the usages on some projects but not on en-Wikipedia? See here and here.

There is also this database report which might also include instances where Commons delinker didn't delink following deletion. Though as I'm not sure what happened here, I might have that wrong.

One other question I have is how to avoid similar "permission" problems with the uploads I've made. When I'm no long actively contributing to the WMF projects, what will happen if the standards of information required increases and extra paperwork is needed for Commons to keep the photos I've uploaded? i.e. What is the best way to avoid future questioning of whether permissions are sufficiently documented? I'm asking this because I see people's uploads from years ago being steadily deleted because standards now are higher then they were back then, or not enforced properly back then, and I don't want to see the same happen in future to my uploads. I would prefer to be alerted to problems now, rather than in several years time. Carcharoth (Commons) (talk) 02:59, 10 July 2010 (UTC)

It was uploaded by a bot at the behest of Khayman (talk · contribs). You're right that there was no notification here - unfortunately, that is pretty common for the bot uploads/transfers. Any suggestions for fixing that process are welcome - I've had to save a few images myself because of that.
Regarding permission, current standards are to have permission logged on the COM:OTRS system. That is how to prevent future deletion. For older files, if you cannot get the permission anymore - e.g., the web site is down or the copyright holder is no longer reachable - your best bet is to claim a grandfather clause, i.e. that your upload pre-dated the OTRS standards.
As for Commons Delinker behavior, you would have to ask one of its maintainers. Wknight94 talk 03:43, 10 July 2010 (UTC)
The original uploader (on en.wiki) was Duncharris who retired in 2006. The source is http://www.battlefield-tours.com and the photographer is stated as James Power. Other free-use photos do exist in Category:Menin Gate and on Flickr. Bidgee (talk) 03:50, 10 July 2010 (UTC)
Thanks to both of you for your replies. It would be nice to be reminded of what the photo looked like (the most annoying aspect of all this in some ways), but I guess that would be difficult. I may be visiting Ypres at some point, so I may take my own pictures and upload them, or I might go the Flickr route (thanks for the link). Regarding the OTRS point Wknight94 made, I was talking about my own pictures that I have uploaded, which I think are tagged with {{Own}}. Am I right in thinking that logging OTRS permission for those is not required to avoid future problems if I can't be contacted? I suspect that to be 100% sure, it is best to release all uploads into the public domain if you know you are leaving, and to log that with OTRS, but I hope that {{Own}} is sufficient to avoid problems with any later changes at Commons. Will wait a bit and see if anyone else comments about Commons delinker and whether what I describe above has happened before. Carcharoth (Commons) (talk) 04:15, 10 July 2010 (UTC)
Oh, maybe I misunderstood. For own photos, no OTRS is needed. The exception would be if you have published those photos elsewhere with an unfree license. OTRS is needed to verify that you are the same person as the one that posted them with the unfree license. Although with a known long-term user such as you, OTRS would probably be overkill (in my opinion anyway). But other people who claim to post stuff from their own unfree web site need to confirm that they are the owner of that web site. Wknight94 talk 04:35, 10 July 2010 (UTC)
Thanks. What I was getting at was trying to avoid a situation (say, in five years time) where someone says that section 5.a.iii of the upload form (I'm gently spoofing the paperwork requirements here) was not filled in correctly, and thus a set of images (from users who are no longer around) need to be deleted. I'm talking about images like File:Adam Hart-Davis.jpg, File:Dr Jim Al-Khalili.jpg, File:Mark Thomas Guinness World Record.jpg, File:Alistair Reynolds.jpg (and several more). I'm guessing that at the time those were uploaded, OTRS permission was required but no-one got around to asking, which is a great pity (a bit of a wasted opportunity). Also, File:LeonandFearne.jpg seems to be an "own work" image. Why was that tagged as needing permissions verified? I found these by looking through Category:Media missing permission - if I find more, what is the best approach, to ask the editor who tagged the image? Carcharoth (Commons) (talk) 05:37, 10 July 2010 (UTC)
The the image deleted (Menin Gate (Today 4).jpg) is from this page. Bidgee (talk) 05:58, 10 July 2010 (UTC)
@Carcharoth, those older images are indeed unfortunate. The problem is that our system is so easy to game. If all people had to do was say "With thank from <copyright owner>", then we would get wave upon wave of images saying "With thank from <copyright owner>". As for the uploads of Ray Yallop (talk · contribs) - which you linked to above - there is a question of reputation. Many of us know the name "Carcharoth" - we know that you would not knowingly violate rules here or try to game the system. We don't know "Ray Yallop". We don't know that he properly communicated the implications of our licenses, i.e. that their photos could be used for any purpose, including commercial, including derivatives, etc. We don't even know if he found out exactly which license the owners agreed to - GFDL, Creative Commons, Public Domain, etc. As for File:LeonandFearne.jpg, the uploader there has a long list of deleted contributions, and even a block from last December. Again - reputation. If someone has burned us before, we're less likely to believe that person in the future. His few surviving non-Flickr images all have different EXIF data - a red flag for any user, let alone one with a checkered past. BTW, those permission tags are speedy deletion tags. If you think they are incorrectly placed, you can remove them and require that a COM:DR be done instead. Wknight94 talk 13:32, 10 July 2010 (UTC)
Thanks, Bidgee for the link! And thanks for the more detailed explanation, Wknight. My point about older images is that it would have been better to ask the uploader at the time to verify things. Does Commons do better now at asking people questions like that before they leave, remembering that most people only stay on one site for 18 months to 2 years? In other words, does Commons try and deal with such problems within a set period of time, or does Commons have backlogs going back years? If the latter, is the problem being tackled systematically (e.g. from both the older and newer ends) or is it a case of things being tagged as people find them? Carcharoth (Commons) (talk) 14:32, 10 July 2010 (UTC)
I wish I had good answers to those. Since those Ray Yallop photos from 2007 were only just recently tagged, you probably already guessed the bad news on older files. If someone snuck in some questionable ones long ago, they are probably still out there. Maybe things are better since the patrolling system was put into place - but then again, maybe not. Someone more in tune with recent change patrol might have a better answer. Wknight94 talk 15:01, 10 July 2010 (UTC)
OK, thanks. I've now fixed the six links on en-wikipedia (see here) and will now try and find out what went wrong with Commons delinker. Carcharoth (Commons) (talk) 15:13, 10 July 2010 (UTC)

Weird problem with image

Hello,

there seems to be a rather weird problem with the image File:SS-571-Nautilus-trials.gif. It got history, description, no entry in its deletion log, but.. it's gone. It is qiute heavily used and shown as "red link" currently. See also User_talk:Bukvoed#File:SS-571-Nautilus-trials.gif. Is there anything you can do to restore the image? Thanks, --Florian Adler (talk) 08:25, 10 July 2010 (UTC)

Click the "purge" link on the file description page. See also Commons:Help_desk#Missing_file.2C_description_page_without_image.  Docu  at 08:29, 10 July 2010 (UTC)
Didn't think it was that easy :-) Thanks --Florian Adler (talk) 08:37, 10 July 2010 (UTC)
Maybe the solution at MediaWiki talk:Filepage-nofile-link makes it easier.  Docu  at 13:36, 10 July 2010 (UTC)

in scope ? - Advertisements for software tools, SAS-programmes

here is another gallery of strange, mostly uncategorized files [21] von User:Sytruongus - In scope or not in scope - that is the question (for me). More or less they look like copy violations too. Some may be useful screenshots. Cholo Aleman (talk) 10:59, 10 July 2010 (UTC)

I've deleted some of them which was out of project scope. but I couldn't find anything about copyright condition of software. it seems this is the same user as this one which have uploaded same contents to www.sascommunity.org but the source and copyright condition of screenshots is still unclear.   ■ MMXX  talk  11:31, 10 July 2010 (UTC)

Missing image

What happened to File:Apparent retrograde motion of Mars in 2003.gif? It's a featured image at English Wikipedia, it has an image description page here, but no such image exists. Its log says nothing about having been deleted. —Angr 13:17, 10 July 2010 (UTC)

I see it in my browser... See section "Weird problem with image" immediately above. -- AnonMoos (talk) 13:23, 10 July 2010 (UTC)

Pornographic content in FPC: poll

A poll is running in FPC talk page about pornographic and explicit sexual content (here). Please participate. -- Alvesgaspar (talk) 13:19, 10 July 2010 (UTC)

User Boxes

Does anyone know how to display a wikipedia userbox in the Commons? For example, want to display User:Henry Delforn/userboxing3/

V/R Henry Delforn (talk) 17:17, 10 July 2010 (UTC)

You can't transclude pages from outside commons. Just copy the code to a subpage of yout userpage--DieBuche (talk) 17:20, 10 July 2010 (UTC)
okay, i'll try it, thx. but you do realize that you can link to outside articles with the "w:", right? Henry Delforn (talk) 17:31, 10 July 2010 (UTC)
Yes, but you can't transclude from them.--Prosfilaes (talk) 17:33, 10 July 2010 (UTC)
right on...ok i'll give it a shot and be back to ask where i went wrong because i don't have much confidence in the following code working in the Commons.

Henry Delforn (talk) 17:38, 10 July 2010 (UTC)

i got the template working and fixed the hyperlink but i can't get the two images to work inside the userbox. any more help? Henry Delforn (talk) 18:00, 10 July 2010 (UTC)
okay, got one pic to work, but not the second...maybe can't have two pics in one Commons userbox?? why not? Henry Delforn (talk) 18:27, 10 July 2010 (UTC)
Here's a help source: Commons:Userboxes. Apparently can't have two pics. Henry Delforn (talk) 18:44, 10 July 2010 (UTC)

July 11

Category:Maksutov telescopes - Category weirdness

Tried to add 7 images to this category making it a total of 16 by adding Category:Maksutov telescopes tag to the other related images. All seemed to work fine but now when ever I go back to the cat its shows the old cat with "The following 9 files are in this category, out of 9 total". If I bring up one of the image pages I added Category:Maksutov telescopes, preview, and then click Category:Maksutov telescopes on the preview, It shows a page with all the new images saying---> "The following 19 files are in this category, out of 19 total".  ??????????????????????????????? MrFloatingIP (talk) 15:34, 5 July 2010 (UTC)

Did you clear your browser's cache? Category:Maksutov telescopes currently displays fine (19 files). -- IANEZZ  (talk) 15:44, 5 July 2010 (UTC)
Tried clearing the cache and using Firefox, Chrome, IE, and IE on another computer. Still does not work (still showing only 9 files). If I click on your link or "force" my browser by, for example, clicking a link generated in an edit preview, I see the new version, now showing 22 files. closing the browser, opening it, and going back to the cat makes it show 9 files again. Strange. MrFloatingIP (talk) 02:46, 6 July 2010 (UTC)
Weird. Could you post the exact URL displaying the wrong count? (just copy&paste what's in your URL bar) -- IANEZZ  (talk) 10:24, 6 July 2010 (UTC)
[22], still the same. MrFloatingIP (talk) 16:43, 6 July 2010 (UTC)
It displays the right count here, and the URL you posted is the very same as the one you get by clicking on the wikilink I posted. Sorry, I really have no idea. -- IANEZZ  (talk) 06:33, 7 July 2010 (UTC)
I find a null edit works. Click edit on the category, and then click save. It seems to force a refresh that clearing the browser cache doesn't always do (probably because you are jumping the job queue or something for updating of server-side stuff). Carcharoth (Commons) (talk) 15:04, 11 July 2010 (UTC)

category: "pronounciation"

Has anyone noticed this is misspelt? Should be "pronunciation." AFAIK. Tooironic (talk) 00:02, 11 July 2010 (UTC)

Redirected. Thanks. Man vyi (talk) 05:56, 11 July 2010 (UTC)

Looking for advice on Template:PD-CERN-CMS

Quick note that I am looking for advice on what to do about Template:PD-CERN-CMS, which no longer appears to be valid. Please leave comments at CT:L#Template:PD-CERN-CMS still valid?. Thank you. Wknight94 talk 01:40, 11 July 2010 (UTC)

CR in category list

On file description pages, is there a way (e.g. by javascript) to put categories starting with "Photographs by" on a new line?

I recall that MediaWiki:Gadget-Tag.js managed to move to the sidebar categories starting with "TAG:".  Docu  at 10:44, 11 July 2010 (UTC)

Shouldn't categories like "Photographs by User:Foo" be hidden cats anyway?--DieBuche (talk) 11:04, 11 July 2010 (UTC)
User: categories might be hidden, but generally not categories for photographers who don't upload them themselves.
Even in the "hidden" part, it could be useful if they were on a separate line.  Docu  at 11:09, 11 July 2010 (UTC)
Right, I only thought of the user categories...Are you using vector? --DieBuche (talk) 11:35, 11 July 2010 (UTC)
Ideally, I think this should work for all users.
Yes BTW, with the "Categories above content, but below image on file description pages" gadget.  Docu  at 11:44, 11 July 2010 (UTC)

Pontiac Pursuit G5

I need to remove the linkage on a manual transmission on a pontiac pursuit G5 at the transmission. Plastic clip ends and do not want to break them — Preceding unsigned comment added by 67.71.30.83 (talk • contribs)

Once it's done, don't hesitate to take a few pictures and upload them for Category:Pontiac G5 Coupe.  Docu  at 14:22, 11 July 2010 (UTC)

Royal Museums discussion

I propose to rename the category Musées royaux des Beaux-Arts: de Belgique into Royal Museums of Fine Arts of Belgium. Redirect categories are kept in both Dutch and French: Koninklijke Musea voor Schone Kunsten van België and Musées royaux des Beaux-Arts de Belgique. This is in line with Wikimedia policy to have names of categories in English. Moreover it avoids discussions between the two peoples of Belgium on how to name a federal institution. Please use this page for this discussion. AdMeskens (talk) 15:35, 11 July 2010 (UTC)

Category naming issue.

Currently, we have a category called "Personal flags", which is then broken into subcategories such as those for Prime Ministers, Presidents, and Monarchs. However, there are a small handful of flags that don't belong in any of those subcategories, and are rather the personal flags of dictators, such as the "AdolphHitlerStandarte". I feel they should have their own category, but I'm having trouble trying to come up with an appropriate name. "Standards of Dictators" os my first choice, but I wanna know if there's a better one that could be used. To view the flags in question, see HERE. Any suggestions would be appreciated. Fry1989 (talk) 00:38, 7 July 2010 (UTC)

Please do not use dictators as this is a POV. You can use head of states, monarchs, ... --Foroa (talk) 06:44, 7 July 2010 (UTC)
Well, that's the problem I'm trying to avoid. However, Hitler, Fransisco Franco, and the others, are/were for all intensive purposes, dictators. That aside, I want to have a propoer name for a category to put these flags in. Obviously, These people were not monarchs, or presidents in the normal sense, infact they often had their own grandiose titles. I just want to create a category for them. If it's not possible, I guess I'll have to leave them where they are. Fry1989 (talk) 07:23, 7 July 2010 (UTC)
There are still plenty of dictators around, so I would classify them in head-of states or presidents. See en:President definition: should be OK. --Foroa (talk) 07:40, 7 July 2010 (UTC)
I agree. I suggest using a subcategory of "Category:Head of state standards" such as "Category:Standard of Adolf Hitler" or, if you do not use to wish names (since none of the other subcategories in that category do so), "Category:Standard of the Leader and Chancellor of the Third Reich" or something along those lines. A category like "Category:Standards of dictators" may be a magnet for people to put images of standards of national leaders they dislike. — Cheers, JackLee –talk– 07:53, 7 July 2010 (UTC)
I see what you mean, and I agree it could be like opening up a bee's nest. I'm gonna leave them where they are for now, but I'm hoping in the future I can find a neutral but accurate category name to group these flags of dictators and facist leaders, such as Hilter, Mussolini, and Franco. I'm sure there's a term out there, I just can't think of it. >.< Fry1989 (talk) 22:03, 8 July 2010 (UTC)
The difficulty is finding a collective term that is relatively neutral. That's why I think it may be better to stick to grouping the standards in categories named after the offices that those people occupied (e.g., "Category:Standard of the Leader and Chancellor of the Third Reich"). — Cheers, JackLee –talk– 07:09, 12 July 2010 (UTC)

unicode license

we have license template about unicode charts? see [23] --shizhao (talk) 13:34, 9 July 2010 (UTC)

The license to the code-chart PDF files seems to be more restrictive (see http://unicode.org/charts/About.html ), and I'm not sure what else on the Unicode.org site would be very useful if copied over over to Commons... AnonMoos (talk) 18:36, 9 July 2010 (UTC)
But, unicode license in GPL-Compatible Free Software Licenses: [24]--shizhao (talk) 03:51, 12 July 2010 (UTC)
see Category:Unicode--shizhao (talk) 12:11, 12 July 2010 (UTC)
And see [25]--shizhao (talk) 14:52, 12 July 2010 (UTC)
The license on the data files is GPL compatible. Not the license on the code charts. As far as I can tell, Category:Unicode doesn't have any files sourced to the Unicode consortium.--Prosfilaes (talk) 14:53, 12 July 2010 (UTC)
Ops, see {{Unicode-expat}}--shizhao (talk) 15:25, 12 July 2010 (UTC)
What possible use is this? When would we ever upload "the Unicode data files and any associated documentation" or "Unicode software and any associated documentation" to Commons? You've dropped the top part that says "Unicode Data Files include all data files under the directories http://www.unicode.org/Public/, http://www.unicode.org/reports/, and http://www.unicode.org/cldr/data/ . Unicode Software includes any source code published in the Unicode Standard or under the directories http://www.unicode.org/Public/, http://www.unicode.org/reports/, and http://www.unicode.org/cldr/data/." After a quick search, I find only one file of a type eligible to uploaded to Commons that falls under that license: http://www.unicode.org/reports/tr6/tr6-example1.gif.--Prosfilaes (talk) 15:37, 12 July 2010 (UTC)

Personality rights template - when is it needed?

I've recently been adding {{Personality rights}} to some images I had uploaded with people in them, but I'm unclear whether this template should be used in all pictures with identifiable people in them, as I've seen lots of pictures of people that don't use this template. Would I use it on this image for example? I'm also unclear on what to do when you don't know whether the people are still alive or not. I presume that the "recently deceased" bit in the template means that you don't need to apply the template where the person is no longer alive, but how recent is "recent"? Would it be needed on this image for example? And would a personality rights template eventually be removed at some point after the people in the picture have all died, or will we have pictures in 100 years time with the template still on them? Finally, I seem to remember there are cases where the estate of a dead person still exercises rights over that person's image (e.g. Einstein), so what is done in those cases? Carcharoth (Commons) (talk) 16:02, 11 July 2010 (UTC)

  • It's very loose, and might be a good idea in the first case you mention. With or without the notice, the rules always obtain; it's a matter of which pictures most require a reminder. Usually I use this template on pictures that might likely cause embarrassment to the subject if used in a disrespectful fashion (e.g. this picture of myself wired up for a sleep study or this picture of Julie Atlas Muz in performance, in which she is semi-naked and bound with rope). But it may also be worth putting on any image (such as the one you indicate) that clearly shows an emotional moment in someone's life. So I wouldn't use it on the second image, which is just an innocuous portrait. - Jmabel ! talk 17:07, 11 July 2010 (UTC)
    • Thanks. That does help. I think I will restrict my usage of it to pictures of celebrities in a public place (where others were taking photos as well) where I've just seized the opportunity to take a photograph. Or, as you say, potentially embarrassing photos you want to remind people not to (for example) print on a T-shirt. But I do actually tend to avoid uploading pictures of people to Commons for various reasons (and with some exceptions), so this shouldn't come up too often. Carcharoth (Commons) (talk) 01:04, 12 July 2010 (UTC)
It is not that people cannot, if they want to, use such embarrassing photographs on a T-shirt or in other contexts. They may do so without infringing any copyright. However, they must be aware that if found out by the persons shown in the photograph, action may be taken against them on non-copyright grounds such as defamation or breach of privacy (if such causes of action are available in the jurisdiction). For example, I recall from a previous discussion that Germany seems to have fairly strict laws relating to breach of privacy. — Cheers, JackLee –talk– 11:13, 12 July 2010 (UTC)
Personality rights template should be applied as soon someone in an image can be (or is) identified. That's just a reminder for the potential re-user that associated personnality rights independant from the copyright status are existing and that agreement might be seeked in some cases. Technically, even photograph of known personalities in a promotionnal activity might need this template: Sure such an image can be used to talk of this particular person, but it cannot be used to sell 'soap' box without his/her aggreement. Esby (talk) 11:30, 12 July 2010 (UTC)

Categories relevance

Could somebody explain the need for this category please:- Category:2010 in England. Also its subcategories? As placed by another editor on my recent uploaded image here:- File:M62 Scammonden Bridge to Windy Hill.jpg. I don't understand the need for categorising photographs by the month and year taken. Is this to be further expanded to have them further subcategorised by day! Surely having them simply listed by their locations is sufficient? Richard Harvey (talk) 22:05, 11 July 2010 (UTC)

Because a spring picture is different from a summer picture, and because you may want pictures from a specific era and not location; Category:1945 in Dresden is more interesting than Category:Saxon State Chancellery. When you have this many pictures, it's easy to subcategorize narrowly, and what's the harm?--Prosfilaes (talk) 22:49, 11 July 2010 (UTC)

July 12

George Pal

The file at File:George Pál (1979).jpg and similarly-named files should be renamed, since they use a misleading spelling of en:George Pal's name, a solecism that is now making its way into articles in multiple languages. Born György Pál Marczincsak, Pal used the anglicised version of his name, "George Pal", throughout his career, as attested to by common usage and multiple sources including the posters of his own films, his Hollywood Star Walk star, and his various records at the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences. See en:Talk:George Pal. Neither Hungarian nor English, "George Pál" is a nonsensical version of his name, that he does not seem ever to have used. -- The Anome (talk) 08:48, 12 July 2010 (UTC)

Just tag them with {{rename|new name.jpg|misspelling}}  Docu  at 14:48, 12 July 2010 (UTC)

Copyvio François Hesnault, Philippe streiff

(merged two sections) Already tagged the files. --Martin H. (talk) 13:33, 12 July 2010 (UTC)

Category creation wizard

It would be nice to have an easier way to create new categories, e.g.

  • Create a subcategory with one click (prompt for the new name and add the current category as a parent category)
  • Create a category for people with Category:People by name and maybe interwiki to existing WP articles included.

etc.  Docu  at 14:48, 12 July 2010 (UTC)

New JS Quick Delete

Right now every user gets a "Nominate for Deletion" link in their toolbar. I was a bit dissatisfied with the script, since it opens 3 or 4 new windows/tabs, which afterwords have to be saved. Especially new users might forget to save (thus we have on more incomplete RfD) & the sudden flood of pages might be confusing or irritating. I wrote a new script, which doesn't use the normal edit functions, but the wiki API. This has the following advantages:

  • Inline progress indicator
  • No new tabs/windows
  • Should be a bit quicker in execution time
  • Less incomplete RfD

I tested it in IE 7&8, Firefox 3.6, Chrome 4&5, Safari 4&5 in Vector and Monobook. Right now there are no localizations & the summary doesn't mention the file, but these will be added soon.

To use i add importScript('User:DieBuche/delete.js'); to your vector.js or monobook.js

If no mayor problems arise, I'd propose changing the current "Nom for Del" button with this. --DieBuche (talk) 11:56, 7 July 2010 (UTC)

Autosaving with the current script works for me. BTW, (based on the test edits on your user talk page) your script doesn't seem to mention the filename in the edit summary. I think it's an advantage if it's included.  Docu  at 12:34, 7 July 2010 (UTC)
I'm wondering if it is a good idea for the script not to open any new tabs or windows. The tab I'm thinking of in particular is the one which contains the deletion discussion. I find it useful to have this open as I usually add it to my watchlist so I can follow and contribute to any discussion that takes place. Would it be possible for your script to provide an option for users to add the deletion discussion to their watchlist? — Cheers, JackLee –talk– 13:01, 7 July 2010 (UTC)
Certainly. I didn't think of it since i had Settings>Watchlist>Add pages I edit to my watchlist enabled--DieBuche (talk) 13:11, 7 July 2010 (UTC)
I realize that option is available but I prefer to do it manually, otherwise my watchlist gets filled up really quickly with all sorts of c**p! Maybe, for greater flexibility, you could allow users to decide which tabs they would like to leave open (for instance, if they intend to leave a personalized message). Thanks. — Cheers, JackLee –talk– 13:17, 7 July 2010 (UTC)
Watchlisting for the RfD is now default (you need to purge the cache obviously). I'll have to think about an easy solution for the second suggestion--DieBuche (talk) 13:29, 7 July 2010 (UTC)
Not that I use it frequently, but one thing that annoys me about the standard script is that the page for the day gets watchlisted too (if you use the "Add pages I edit to my watchlist" option).  Docu  at 10:00, 13 July 2010 (UTC)

@Docu: A link to the file is now included in all edits (excluding the file page itself). you need to purge the cache obviously.--DieBuche (talk) 13:43, 7 July 2010 (UTC)

Hmm, it seems I'm not the only one working on a replacement script. Mine is at User:Ilmari Karonen/ajax quick delete.js. I haven't had time to compare it with DieBuche's version yet. (I still have a long list of things I'd like to fix in my script, but I do use it myself and it basically works.) —Ilmari Karonen (talk) 13:52, 7 July 2010 (UTC)
Cheers for that! I combined them here, mine is now 90% based on Ilmari's, because his script is cleaner. See User talk:Ilmari Karonen#Various for details of the changes--DieBuche (talk) 23:44, 7 July 2010 (UTC)..

Categories: Masonic structures, etc.

Resolved

We have a Category:Masonic structures by country but, oddly, not a Category:Masonic structures. I'd be inclined to slide that latter category above Category:Masonic structures by country and below Category:Buildings by association.

I wanted to come here first in case there are objections: in particular, is there a problem with having a "structures" category under a "buildings" category? I understand the distinction, but I think that in general it has not been made consistently; in any event, these are overwhelmingly buildings. - Jmabel ! talk 01:10, 10 July 2010 (UTC)

Shouldn't the hierarchy be Masonic structures > Masonic buildings? Buildings are a type of structure, but the term structure is not limited to buildings and includes things like bridges and statutes too. — Cheers, JackLee –talk– 09:28, 10 July 2010 (UTC)
Maybe, but that would mean reworking several dozen existing categories of the form Category:Masonic structures in COUNTRY, a much larger task than I am willing to undertake. - Jmabel ! talk 19:02, 10 July 2010 (UTC)
Since the photographs are mostly (entirely?) of buildings, why not list all the categories at the CommonsDelinker for moving from "Category:Masonic structures in XYZ" to "Category:Masonic buildings in XYZ"? That way, you avoid the problem of structures not being a subset of buildings. — Cheers, JackLee –talk– 19:08, 10 July 2010 (UTC)
Mostly, but not entirely, so it was about 2 hours of work, but it's now done. - Jmabel ! talk 23:08, 12 July 2010 (UTC)

Video speed

Why does File:Rymdbörje skapar konto.ogv play the video faster than the sound in Google Chromium 5.0.375 on Linux? My voice continues for quite some time after the video has stopped playing. What's different in this video from others that play in normal speed (e.g. File:Recordmydesktop-svenska.ogv)? Which tools let me know the difference without playing the video? --LA2 (talk) 12:06, 10 July 2010 (UTC)

I confirm your findings on Windows Vista: both Chrome 5.0.375.99 and Firefox 3.6.6 on Vista plays File:Recordmydesktop-svenska.ogv perfectly, but Chrome alone plays File:Rymdbörje skapar konto.ogv too fast.
When I gave up testing OGG videos on Chrome a few months ago (see here and here and with Chrome 4 here) Chrome was still exhibiting audio sync errors (it used to be much worse, but had improved, just not quite perfect). There just might be an obscure problem with the encoder you used, what was it? For videos on Vista I use the Unix based oggz-tools suite: oggz-validate tells me there are no errors with that OGG video. I also used a nightly build of ffmpeg2theora (from here) and its --info command told me the duration was 141 seconds and oggz-scan.exe -k tells me the last keyframe was at 2:21.933 which is consistent with Firefox.
I would be interested in any feedback from experts because I have also experienced wrong-speed errors on some platforms when playing OGG videos from certain theora encoders. -84user (talk) 02:16, 11 July 2010 (UTC)
Both screencasts were created with Recordmydesktop on Ubuntu Linux, using the --full-shots option, but on two different computers with different Ubuntu releases. File:Recordmydesktop-svenska.ogv (that plays okay) was recorded in October 2009 using Ubuntu 9.10 on a desktop computer, while File:Rymdbörje skapar konto.ogv (which plays too fast) was created in June 2010 using Ubuntu 10.04 on a laptop. --LA2 (talk) 10:37, 13 July 2010 (UTC)

Photographs of people whose articles have been deleted

When an article about a person has been deleted in one or more Wikipedias, should his or her photograph be kept indefinitely on Commons ? Three examples related to articles deleted on FR:WP : (1) File:Gildas billard.jpg, article deleted in 2009, (2) File:Guillaume Ducrotte.png, article deleted in 2009, and (3) File:Patriziokelly.jpg & File:Patriziokelly2.jpg, article deleted in 2008. Is there some sort of special purgatorial category for such cases, or should the photographs be put up for deletion ? - Mu (talk) 19:52, 11 July 2010 (UTC)

Photos of not-so-notable people often go to COM:DR with a reason that it is out of scope. Wknight94 talk 20:05, 11 July 2010 (UTC)
Regretably most images not go this way but crowd the uncategorized files instead. --Martin H. (talk) 21:07, 11 July 2010 (UTC)
But let me chime in that there are a lot of people who don't merit a Wikipedia article but still merit a photo on Commons. For example, I think it's worth having a photo of virtually any elected official or even serious candidate for office, but (for example) the average small-town mayor doesn't merit an article, nor does the average failed candidate for even a major a city council. Similarly, there are many artists and musicians who don't merit an article, but where I'd want to keep any reasonably good photo against the possibility of later fame. - Jmabel ! talk 22:58, 11 July 2010 (UTC)
IMO, there are some people who get Wikipedia articles whose pictures I would not consider in scope on educational grounds (as opposed to being in use). Having articles deleted is a good sign that the picture is not in scope as a picture of a notable person. I suppose what this most shows is that there is no general agreement here.--Prosfilaes (talk) 01:22, 12 July 2010 (UTC)
No, there is no golden rule here. But I've started very few COM:SCOPE DRs that ended with "Kept". In the case of a recently-deleted article, you might want to wait a while before DR. Maybe some other Wikipedia will keep an article on the subject. Wknight94 talk 01:32, 12 July 2010 (UTC)
Remember that different projects may have different standars about notability, and that lack of notability is not the only reason that could make an article be deleted. For example, it may had been created as an attack page and be deleted as a violation of the policies on biographies of living people; or with a text copied-and-pasted from some web page protected by copyright. But if the photo is not inapropiate and have a correct licence, there would be no reason to delete it. Belgrano (talk) 02:00, 12 July 2010 (UTC)
No rules to measure notability, which might be very different between the "big" wikipedia (En, Fr, De, Es) and even more so with the more local ones focussing on a smaller language in a smaller region (Basque, Catalan, Occitan, nds, ..). It looks that for example "Gildas Billard" will come back; I am under the impression that if the first article on an item is well written, it has more chances to stay and pass "objective" notability criteria. --Foroa (talk) 09:09, 12 July 2010 (UTC)
We have rules demanding that images be reasonably useful for an educational purpose, which is related to the notability requirement. Images like File:Gildas billard.jpg are very problematic; the image page tells us nothing about the person, and there's no Wikipedia article to provide information. There's no way for an arbitrary user to know this picture from a vanity shot uploaded by someone without the vaguest claim of notability.--Prosfilaes (talk) 15:22, 12 July 2010 (UTC)
File:Gildas billard.jpg does seem rather useless without a context. On the other hand, I have no idea whether we'd keep an article on music critic Charlie Bertsch or not—probably right on the edge of encyclopedic notability as an individual—but I believe my photo File:Charlie Bertsch 02.jpg is perfectly appropriate. - Jmabel ! talk 00:34, 13 July 2010 (UTC)

Thanks to all for your input. The consensus seems to be that "photographs of people whose articles have been deleted" are not considered as a special category and should be treated on a case-by-case basis. In practical terms, my own tentative conclusion is that photographs of people who have been assessed as non-notable and appear unlikely to ever be in scope, may be submitted for review via a deletion request. - Mu (talk) 17:50, 12 July 2010 (UTC)

Translating templates

How do you translate templates ? Documentation says that it is done on translatewiki.net, but when I click the link in any of the templates I get a message that ""MediaWiki:Foo" is not a translatable message", I figured the file name is wrong or something, but I couldn't find the message by browsing all messages available either. It just keeps ticking me off that someone has translated "source" as "exit code" ~~Xil (talk) 17:23, 12 July 2010 (UTC)

Which template? -- ChrisiPK (Talk|Contribs) 21:20, 12 July 2010 (UTC)
Template:Information, but I tried some related template and it didn't work either ~~Xil (talk) 22:56, 12 July 2010 (UTC)
I found how to correct this mistake, other translations for this template are still mising, though, and there are no files for translating them, am I supposed to create new file ? ~~Xil (talk) 01:03, 13 July 2010 (UTC)
See here and here. Multichill (talk) 09:21, 13 July 2010 (UTC)
Thank you! Couldn't something be done to make this more obvious though - probably other people also would try to get there directly from template documentation and with so many untranslated messege groups as we got it is hard to find this without knowing what it's called ~~Xil (talk) 12:08, 13 July 2010 (UTC)
This should somehow be added to Template:Information/doc. Easier said than done I guess..... Multichill (talk) 12:15, 13 July 2010 (UTC)

better English

Resolved

I created a new category, Category:Kindertransporte - please correct my English in the description. I can be renamed to "memorials for kindertransporte" too. Cholo Aleman (talk) 21:46, 12 July 2010 (UTC)

July 13

Lighter version of image not shown

I made a lighter version of File:Ascain Eglise 5.JPG. I tried several reuploads of this lighter version. Those show as thumbnail, but the upper (last) thumbnail is always the dark version, which also shows as full image. Can someone have a look, what is going wrong? --Havang(nl) (talk) 10:18, 14 July 2010 (UTC)

I see the lighter version; you should try purging your browser's cache (Shift-Reload in Firefox). –Tryphon☂ 10:25, 14 July 2010 (UTC)
This is a common issue in the Commons. Newly uploaded files often take a while to show up, and you normally have to purge your cache. (Ctrl-F5 works as well.) — Cheers, JackLee –talk– 10:40, 14 July 2010 (UTC)
Problem solved by Ctr-F5 and closing reopening commons. Thanks --Havang(nl) (talk) 10:59, 14 July 2010 (UTC)

A category still showing pages removed one week ago

Hi, Majority of the pages in maintenance category Category:Creator templates without home category were removed from it a week ago; however the category still lists them. Is there a way to purge or somehow force it to refresh? Most pages in Category:Creator templates without home category does not list it as a parent directory creating confusing situation when the parent category thinks it has 100 pages but none of those pages think they are in the parent category. I occasionally see this kind of inconsistency but it usually corrects itself within hours. --Jarekt (talk) 14:36, 14 July 2010 (UTC)

Have you tried ctrl+f5? -mattbuck (Talk) 14:56, 14 July 2010 (UTC)
We haven often such a problem with template generated categories. I did a dummy edit on {{Creator}} and that should settle the things in half an hour or so, but it does not. Probably too many complex conditions that are not evaluated again. --Foroa (talk) 15:33, 14 July 2010 (UTC)
Touchy touchy of all pages in Category:Creator templates without home category solved it. Multichill (talk) 15:43, 14 July 2010 (UTC)
Thanks, What is the "Touchy touchy" technique?--Jarekt (talk) 16:09, 14 July 2010 (UTC)
Probably a blank edit or purging the page--DieBuche (talk) 16:49, 14 July 2010 (UTC)
Page -> edit -> don't change anything -> save. Also known as a null edit. If all else fails..... Multichill (talk) 18:13, 14 July 2010 (UTC)

Vehicle identification

Hello fellows!

Can anyone identify this vehicle? Greetings, High Contrast (talk) 18:54, 13 July 2010 (UTC)

The logo is hard to discern, but I very strongly suspect it to belong to GAZ of Russia, and the vehicle's design feels like it's from the 1980s. That said, I've been looking for the past two hours, using every keyword combination I can think of, and have seen nothing even close to that design. So I'm thoroughly frustrated and still wondering what it is... — Huntster (t @ c) 09:35, 15 July 2010 (UTC)

July 14

How to redirect to commons users that have files released using OTRS?

Hi guys,

I'm trying to rework the upload process at ro.wp. I want to redirect people that choose the option "The file belongs to someone else and the author agreed to release it under a free license" to Commons, but I'm not sure at what page I should point them. I want to make it as simple as possible to them, so Commons:Upload is not really a solution. --Strainu (talk) 08:03, 15 July 2010 (UTC)

Best way imho would be to point them to COM:OTRS for instructions how the process works, and ask them to upload the file with {{OTRS pending}} and warn them that their files will be deleted if they don't send permission--DieBuche (talk) 09:31, 15 July 2010 (UTC)
Well, you see, that's the kind of thing that puts people off! I was hoping there was a version that already has all the templates in place and it has a warning like "you should send the file to permissions-commons@wikimedia.org". This link will go in the equivalent of Commons:Upload, so I can't really go into details. I'd rather keep the process we have now, which uploads the files on ro.wp/--Strainu (talk) 11:16, 15 July 2010 (UTC)
I kinda wondered that we don't have a upload form for that, I'll look again--DieBuche (talk) 11:40, 15 July 2010 (UTC)

Request

Is there someone?

Is there someone who can make a better version of this file (better quality and probably svg-formatFile:Smeltveiligheidbinnenkantschematisch.png? The sand colored piece in the image symbolises sand, so maybe grains can be drawn on that part. Ischa1 (talk) 16:59, 15 July 2010 (UTC)

Post a request at "Commons:Graphic Lab/Illustration workshop". — Cheers, JackLee –talk– 17:14, 15 July 2010 (UTC)

July 16

WANTED, ASKED: slide show representation menu function included in categories

Hello, Commons still doesn't have a menu function standard incorporated in all category pages for a dia representation of images in categories on demand? Other image sites have. Such a function is greatly wanted, asked. Who is capable to programm it? --Havang(nl) (talk) 07:19, 16 July 2010 (UTC)

What is a "dia representation of images"? — Cheers, JackLee –talk– 10:39, 16 July 2010 (UTC)
Sorry for my bad english: Slide show... --Havang(nl) (talk) 12:10, 16 July 2010 (UTC)
There is an option available in the gadgets tab of Special:Preferences. "Slideshow: create a slideshow of all images in a gallery. ". I haven't tried it recently though.  Docu  at 13:27, 16 July 2010 (UTC)
That slideshow only works for isolated sets of images in one gallery at a time in gallery pages; but no slideshow exist for categories. But it means that it seems possible to programm category images to get into one single gallery and to get this gallery be slideshowed. (I can't prograam such things) --Havang(nl) (talk) 14:21, 16 July 2010 (UTC) Comment added: It works also, but badly for category images, shwoing often just a little x in a box.--Havang(nl) (talk) 15:07, 16 July 2010 (UTC)
Further comment aded: such a slideshow should be accessible for users and visitors, as it is especially usefull for those latter.--Havang(nl) (talk) 14:28, 16 July 2010 (UTC)

No MOTD today

It appears there is no Media of the day today and for the next three days. Could someone please look into this? (I am not aware enough about the media we host to find something suitable).

It is kind of strange, since there are media chosen between the blanks. If nobody steps in I guess I will move these media to be featured earlier (damn their naming, cannot use mass subpage rename...)

Jean-Fred (talk) 11:53, 16 July 2010 (UTC)

Possible bug on image transfer form

I am not sure of the programmers intent, but I think there is a minor but annoying bug ON THIS FORM. Multiple category selections in the Upload options of this page wipe out all previous data specified in the Information box after completion of an upload. This doesn't happen when a single category is selected. I am uploading numerous images from Wikisource which belong to the same multiple categories and where only the images source and the description are need to be changed. I prefer to see all categories before uploading an image because if I place an additional category directly in the Information box, it's hidden by the box size, often forgotten, and uploads are wrongly categorized and require additional edit.Ineuw talk page on en.ws 17:30, 16 July 2010 (UTC)

Images of obsolete currency

Is it ok to upload images of obsolete currency (i.e. already void currency)? What does the copyright rules say about it? In particular I was interested in uploading images of currency of defunct Hyderabad State, India. These notes and coins are no longer in circulation for last 60 years. Is it okay to use images available on net since these currency are of a country which no longer legally exists ? Regards

Sarvagyana guru (talk) 13:19, 15 July 2010 (UTC)

Obsolete = not the same as not copyrighted. You need to find out if they are copyrighted. (British) Hyderabad merged into India, so it could be assumed that the copyrights moved also. Still complicated. feydey (talk) 14:42, 15 July 2010 (UTC)
I think that it is OK in this case. The original copyright was transfered to the Indian Government, and it lasts 60 years after publication, so it has expired by now. Add {{PD-India}} to your files. Yann (talk) 09:48, 17 July 2010 (UTC)

"Or fewer"?

I'm a little confused here. I just noticed that a number of copyright tags have text of the form: "This work is in the public domain in the United States, and those countries with a copyright term of life of the author plus x years or fewer" (my emphasis). For example Template:PD-old-100. Shouldn't these tags read "x years or more? Gatoclass (talk) 01:35, 17 July 2010 (UTC)

"life of the author plus x or fewer years" might be a better phrasing? It's so life+70 includes life+60, life+50, etc, fewer years than 70.--Prosfilaes (talk) 04:03, 17 July 2010 (UTC)
"... or fewer" seems perfectly correct to me. - Jmabel ! talk 05:28, 17 July 2010 (UTC)
Yes, you're right, I was misreading it. The hazards of posting before one's morning cup of coffee I guess :) Gatoclass (talk) 09:09, 17 July 2010 (UTC)

Problem with old picture version

I'm trying to access the original version of File:Louis-Alexandre Berthier bust (Chateau de Blois).jpg which was the version before I cropped it. That version had some information in the writing on the plaque (which I cropped out) and I'm trying to read that information, but when I click on the link, I get a 404 error: file not found. Anyone know what the problem is? Carcharoth (Commons) (talk) 15:09, 17 July 2010 (UTC)

I have the same problem and some other users confirmed they also have this problem. Bug at bugzilla. Multichill (talk) 15:59, 17 July 2010 (UTC)

Regarding photos in articles from http://dermatology.cdlib.org/

I see at the bottom of the journal's main page that they are using a CC license. Does this mean I can use photos from their journal on Wikipedia? ---Kilbad (talk) 17:12, 17 July 2010 (UTC)

Unfortunately not. The journal is licensing its material under CC-BY-NC-ND-3.0, which means that it cannot be used for commercial purposes (NC) and no derivative works are allowed (ND). The Commons only accepts CC-BY and CC-BY-SA licences, because all content must be freely usable for all purposes including commercial purposes, and users must be allowed to create derivative works. — Cheers, JackLee –talk– 17:16, 17 July 2010 (UTC)

Unidentified animals from India

Hello, I have some images of unidentified animals from India. I asked on Wikispecies, but I didn't get an answer. Thanks for your help, Yann (talk) 10:10, 17 July 2010 (UTC)

  • Unidentified dragonfly. This is quite big: the bamboo stick is about 1.5 cm diameter.
    Unidentified dragonfly. This is quite big: the bamboo stick is about 1.5 cm diameter.
  • Unidentifed insect. About 5 cm long.
    Unidentifed insect. About 5 cm long.
  • Unidentified scorpion.
    Unidentified scorpion.
  • Unidentified ants.
    Unidentified ants.
  • Unidentified ants.
    Unidentified ants.
  • Unidentified ant.
    Unidentified ant.
  • Unidentified toad.
    Unidentified toad.

Do you have any information about where these insects were in India (I presume Katni and Jaura - there seem to be two places called Jaura in India, though from the categories, I presume it is the one in Madhya Pradesh) and what habitat? Forest, river, marsh? For the ants, do you know what the tree is they are on? Maybe there should be a guide for people to follow if they are taking pictures of animals, to help them get the information needed at the time to identify them? Carcharoth (Commons) (talk) 15:20, 17 July 2010 (UTC) If it helps, I agree with the identifications you did when uploading, and have annotated the gallery above. But I couldn't be more specific than 'ant', 'dragonfly' and so on. 17:08, 17 July 2010 (UTC)

What is the closest university to you that has a biology department, or a museum of natural history? Someone there should know how to identify all the local fauna. Local expertise is most important here. A government department of wildlife may also help. Searching with Google for Insects of India finds the aptly named site called Insects of India and other links which may help. See the various WikiProjects under Wikipedia:WikiProject Council/Directory/Science#Biology such as Wikipedia:WikiProject Insects. The project lists several members and their specialties such as:
However, I see you already asked at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Insects#Unknown insect, Katni, MP, India. And note to Carcharoth, the images are geocoded with the {{Location}} template, so it should be possible to identify the political region name(s) where the pictures were taken. --Teratornis (talk) 23:06, 17 July 2010 (UTC)
@Carcharoth: The images are geocoded. All images from Jaura are taken with a radius of 40 meters, within the Mahatma Gandhi Seva Ashram. The tree is a en:banyan, but these ants are all over the place there. Yann (talk) 07:38, 18 July 2010 (UTC)

Voltaire category

I was considering tidying up Category:Voltaire, but wasn't sure where to put the djvu files. Also, we have four pictures of the same statue (Standing Voltaire in the Pantheon in Paris, by Jean-Antoine Houdon) and I was wondering if creating a category just for photographs of a single statue was overkill? I've created it anyway (Category:Standing Voltaire), but if I should have put them on the Voltaire page instead, I can do that. I presume the category would be for all four, and the page would have one of those four in the 'statues' section? Carcharoth (Commons) (talk) 17:27, 17 July 2010 (UTC)

I usually work on the principle that as long as there are at least two images on the same subject they can be placed in a category of their own, because that helps to keep the main category tidy. Yes, I'd choose the best photograph of the statute to display on the "Voltaire" page. In my view gallery pages should be reserved for high-quality images and not just everything we have (or even a large selection) on a particular subject. — Cheers, JackLee –talk– 07:04, 18 July 2010 (UTC)

Where is this picture?

Article zh:汶川大地震 use this picture. But this file is disappear and I can't find any deletion log for it. Where is it? What is Happened?--Dingar (talk) 06:12, 11 July 2010 (UTC)

I purged my cache (press Ctrl-F5) and the image appeared. — Cheers, JackLee –talk– 06:38, 11 July 2010 (UTC)

File:King Tiger rammed.jpg

Hi all

I need some advice on the above file; the two sources that use the file leave the original author uncredited however one, Daglish, notes what pages he has used Crown copyright material on and thanks one Philippe Wirton for access to the collection of post battle photographs that he has. One is left to conclude therefore that the above photo comes from Wirton's collection however it does not state if he is the original author or owns the copyright to them.

Can we still use the photo for Operation Goodwood?

The image description suggests to me that the photograph was taken by a British soldier. If I am correct in thinking that Crown copyright applies to such photographs, then {{PD-UKGov}} since the photograph was "created by the United Kingdom Government and taken prior to 1 June 1957": see {{PD-UKGov}} and http://www.museumscopyright.org.uk/crown-a.pdf. — Cheers, JackLee –talk– 14:55, 18 July 2010 (UTC)
Thanks for the advice, i will add the info to the image. :) Regards EnigmaMcmxc (talk) 21:20, 18 July 2010 (UTC)

New image shit image

For smaler (languges) Wikiprojekts, chanchen wich you have maked, chanchen of the Wikis face is not only "chanche of face" but much more. You are destroing all the help refereces. I can understande thate for english, german, franch iusers is a game but this is not valid for ather 200 versions of Wiki. --Kurreshtja (talk) 18:25, 16 July 2010 (UTC)

Are you saying that you do not like the way Wikipedia now looks? (This is called the "Vector skin".) You can change it back to the old way by going to "My preferences", clicking on the "Appearance" tab, choosing "MonoBook", and then clicking the "Save" button at the bottom. — Cheers, JackLee –talk– 18:31, 16 July 2010 (UTC)
Here is a Google translation of my message into Albanian, in case it is more helpful: A jeni duke thënë se ju nuk më pëlqen mënyra Wikipedia tani duket? (Kjo quhet "Vector lëkurës".) Ju mund ta ndryshoni atë përsëri në rrugën e vjetër duke shkuar tek "Preferencat e mia" ("My preferences"), duke klikuar në butonin "Paraqitja" ("Appearance"), duke zgjedhur "MonoBook", dhe pastaj duke klikuar "Save" button në fund. — Cheers, JackLee –talk– 09:40, 17 July 2010 (UTC)
From here in Albania on wikipedia nr 66 from 271. --Foroa (talk) 21:29, 16 July 2010 (UTC)
If you look at the Albanian interface you see that Take me Back, and New features are still in English- not very helpful.--ClemRutter (talk) 21:50, 16 July 2010 (UTC)

Help page's are with references and old picturs of the Wiki. If you chanche there look then they are not so heplfull. For english project this is not a problem but we don't have so mane iusers too make this chanches. This is "interlanguge" part of the Wiki. The iuser interface is importen, not for my but for the new iusers.--Kurreshtja (talk) 18:37, 19 July 2010 (UTC)

Category:Maintenance

Some cleanup is required here. A bad² interwiki in fr:Catégorie:Maintenance des articles caused the catbot to

  • (1) attempt to categorize to our maintenance categories, thats evil because categorizing something to maintenance categories with the intention to categorize the content is a mistake (maintenance is the Commons tree in Category:CommonsRoot, not the topic tree)
  • (2) Add something to the topic category "maintenance", so the evil interwiki was not even correct and lead to a topic category instead of the intended maintenance category.

In any case regarding Wikipedia: Do NEVER add an {{Commonscat}} template that leads to a non-topic categories of Commons. That btw. also applies to license categories, to often the bot transfers create a mess with this categories too. --Martin H. (talk)

You should really discuss this with the bot's operator rather than require users to do such things. To avoid problems, you could simply edit the bot's exclusion list.  Docu  at 06:48, 17 July 2010 (UTC)
Two things need to happen
  1. Fix the source of the problem, that's done. No need for blacklisting this category.
  2. Fix the symptoms: Clean out the category. That's pretty easy for someone with a bot because all images with bot suggested categories contain {{Check categories}}. So the command in this case is: replace.py -lang:commons -family:commons -regex -dotall "(\{\{Check categories\|.+)\[\[Category:Maintenance\]\]" "\1" -cat:Maintenance -summary:"Removing category maintenance". That's done too.
Multichill (talk) 09:52, 17 July 2010 (UTC)
I updated the faq, feel free to improve. Multichill (talk) 10:06, 17 July 2010 (UTC)
Thanks a lot. @Docu, this is not only a bot issue but it also need the advertence of all users who place interwikis to prevent this and the knowledge of people who check categories to fix it and prevent it from happening again. Therefore I placed it in the public. In general the bot categorization is a great advance for Commons but sometimes wrong or missing interwikis cause wrong categorization, categorization to maintenance or to meta categories. That not necessarily requires to change the bot but to place better interwikis to the wikipiedia subcategories. --Martin H. (talk) 15:51, 17 July 2010 (UTC)
With some categories, it's just bound to happen and it's not sure if fr_wiki users will be reading this.
Some tweaks to the bot's configuration might help. A detailed report on User talk:CategorizationBot can help track such problems. If users are requested to fix them themselves, it's more likely to happen again.  Docu  at 11:57, 19 July 2010 (UTC)

July 17

upload fails, all information is lost (vector issue?)

I wanted to upload an image and had twice some errors in the filename. Filling out the whole upload form takes a while, with description in two languages, geo-location, categories and what else is needed. The error in the filename (once I forgot to set it so it was too numberous, the second time a ? in the name was forbidden) is reported and - ALL INFORMATION IS LOST. There is no way to go back in history and fix the filename and keep the rest? I remember for sure, this was possible in monobook as I used it to upload multiple images. But now with vector it does not work any more. Am I right to blame the new skin or is there something different? No matter what, this is bad usability and should be changed. I'm using Firefox 3.6.6. Thanks --Herzi Pinki (talk) 15:23, 17 July 2010 (UTC)

I blame Vector for most things, so I don't use it. My suggestions are copy/paste and the back button. -mattbuck (Talk) 20:09, 17 July 2010 (UTC)
in my case there is nothing to copy. Only the error message. And the back-button shows a bit of the filled form, but it is removed immediately for the sake of the standard form with only standard content prefilled (e.g. an empty {{Information}}). --Herzi Pinki (talk) 21:01, 17 July 2010 (UTC)
Does pressing Ctrl when clicking a link open it in a new tab for you? Try it with the submit button, should work!--DieBuche (talk) 11:05, 19 July 2010 (UTC)
I don't usually find buttons like that work with new windows. Try using the basic upload form. -mattbuck (Talk) 12:00, 19 July 2010 (UTC)
This sounds like an issue with the Commons Javascript upload tools. It definitely isn't a problem with 'vanilla' vector or mediawiki. TheDJ (talk) 12:39, 19 July 2010 (UTC)

ipernity.com PRO account

If somebody have a PRO account for this website, maybe it would be a good idea to upload new versions of these photos in their original sizes. Okki (talk) 05:07, 19 July 2010 (UTC)

Hrrm I dislike euro's since I can't work out the cost to AUD, unlike the USD or the Pound! I signed up an account but the euro bit is the sticking point, so I can't help you :S. Bidgee (talk) 05:51, 19 July 2010 (UTC)
€1.99 (per month) = 2.96 australian dollars (Yahoo! currency converter). I don't know but, perhaps, we have a lot of small photos from this website on Commons. Okki (talk) 06:06, 19 July 2010 (UTC)
The cheapest I can see is 1 year for 23€88. I have not idea what 23€88 means! Never learnt Euros as it came in after I completed my schooling. :S I'm guessing it is 23.88 which if correct is about AU$35.54, if so I'll try and upgrade my account tomorrow (AU time). Bidgee (talk) 07:01, 19 July 2010 (UTC)

July 20

Categorization statistics

Categorization stats

Hi guys, we have statistics on the total number of files since November 2008 at Commons:MIME type statistics (from 3,5M to almost 7M) and I kept categorization statistics since December 2008 at User:Multichill/Categorization stats (uncategorized from 190K to 101K and to be checked from 92K to 164K). The number of uncategorized files dropped from 5.4% to 1.4% and I'm quite happy with that. So it looks like all the hard work is paying off! It would be nice if someone could combine these statistics into a pretty area chart. Multichill (talk) 11:51, 17 July 2010 (UTC)

Sounds good, quite impressive numbers. In the meantime Jarekt added chart to this thread.
It seems odd that the absolute total remains stable, but maybe this is just a coincidence.
An interesting number might be number of files uploaders get notified for as being uncategorized.  Docu  at 21:32, 19 July 2010 (UTC)

user feedback on vector

Hi all, you guys and gals, I wanted to give you user feedback on vector skin via Special:UsabilityInitiativePrefSwitch (Please visit our feedback page), but it seems that only Bob Bruno and I found that page until now. Or could it be that the link wants to say: we are not interested in your feedback? Can somebody please explain and repair? Thanks --Herzi Pinki (talk) 14:57, 17 July 2010 (UTC)

Bob Brunos comment seems also not related to vector, it appeas that he joined Commons unintentended via SUL. --Martin H. (talk) 15:56, 17 July 2010 (UTC)
but Bob was the only one to write something to that page. Although it was not quite the feedback I would have expected. :-)
Can you fix the link in Special:UsabilityInitiativePrefSwitch? --Herzi Pinki (talk) 17:19, 17 July 2010 (UTC)
I think the correct link is Commons:Usability issues and ideas but I'm not 100% sure. If no counter answer I'll fix tomorrow. –Krinkletalk 21:16, 19 July 2010 (UTC)

2010 Wikimedia Study of Controversial Content

I can't see if it was already linked here, anyway that's quite important so one more link won't hurt. Read and comment! Nemo 01:33, 20 July 2010 (UTC)

Redbullcola.jpg

Can someone tell me what made Redbullcola.jpg a copyvio? I took the picture myself. TenPoundHammer (talk) 01:37, 20 July 2010 (UTC)

That would be File:Redbullcola.jpg. Its a photograph of a can whose graphic design is undoubtedly copyrighted, so it's derivative work. Nothing else of any significance in the photo, so certainly not de minimis. - Jmabel ! talk 02:15, 20 July 2010 (UTC)

Author and source?

When I am the photographer of a photo, why must I give as source ´own work´? Isn´t it unnecessary? Doesnt´t it reach just to give a name as the author and then it is clear anyway what the source is... Or did I understand something wrongly? Thank you for telling me the facts. --A.Ceta (talk) 09:45, 14 July 2010 (UTC)

If "source" is left empty, bots detect the image as having no source and send messages. Even if you are the source of the image, there may be co-authors, see f.e. filedesc of File:Sculptuur De Hoefsmid, Wijchen, Gld, NL.JPG. greetings, --Havang(nl) (talk) 10:28, 14 July 2010 (UTC)
Sorry for writing this late, but isn't it redundant? --A.Ceta (talk) 08:29, 21 July 2010 (UTC)

Village pump disappearing from Watchlist

As User:O (bot) edits the village pump once a day, it keeps disappearing from the watchlist if the option "Hide bots" is being used. A workaround could be to remove the bot flag from "O (bot)". Would there be any side-effects?  Docu  at 19:38, 14 July 2010 (UTC)

The bot also does other stuff, where a botflag is useful. Easiest way would probably be to create a separate account & run the task under the new (non-flagged) account--DieBuche (talk) 20:23, 14 July 2010 (UTC)
True, I didn't go back far enough in its edit history to remember that. In this case, this task would need to run under a separate account.  Docu  at 07:14, 15 July 2010 (UTC)
I asked him to look into this. It seems that the other tasks aren't that active.  Docu  at 09:57, 21 July 2010 (UTC)
Isn't this a bigger trans-wiki problem? When the "Hide bots" option is being used, bots hide even recently changed articles from the Watchlist. The option itself is the problem, not this particular instance.--Prosfilaes (talk) 21:48, 14 July 2010 (UTC)
I suppose you don't mind if I read "file description page" instead of "article" in your comment.
I think this bot's task is somewhat different from others: it operates only on this talk page and not in file namespace. Further, it operates once every day, not at (more or less) random moments. On recent changes, every edit replaces previous ones.  Docu  at 07:14, 15 July 2010 (UTC)
See Bugzilla:9790 –Krinkletalk 21:07, 19 July 2010 (UTC)
It's three years old and a bit stale. It would fix the problem for all bots though. In the meantime, we can still find a solution for VP.  Docu  at 09:57, 21 July 2010 (UTC)

July 15

7000000 files on Commons

Good news, we reached 7000000 files on Wikimedia Commons, See Special:Statistics...
The exact file is probably a map, see [26],
now if you look around the files that were imported by users, we can still have a selection of files uploaded by the users [27]
I don't believe the exact file that reached the 7000000th file is important, what is important is to show the variety of the uploads...
In this aim, I picked a few pictures around the 7000000th... See User:Esby/7Mio
The following criterii were considered when building this small list:

  • good diversity. (different subject theme)
  • good quality. (not too small picture, as we should encourage people to upload images that have an appropriate quality.)
  • legal status, assuming that FoP is respected and the image is really free.

Any comment or thought? Esby (talk) 20:47, 17 July 2010 (UTC)

Thanks for making us aware that we reached the 7000000th file :) I like the collection. However, I think that File:Sand sculpture, Pier Head, Liverpool - DSC06808.JPG is a derived work which does not fall under the privilege of freedom of panorama as it is not a permanent installation. Perhaps someone will argue that the entire lifetime of this peace of art is covered (we had at least this point during the DR discussion of some picture from Israel, if I remember correctly). In Germany, this is not the case (see Christo's Wrapped Reichstag). I am not familiar with the associated case law in the United Kingdom. --AFBorchert (talk) 21:21, 17 July 2010 (UTC)
Good point, Feel free to edit the list to add or remove picture. I don't know much the situation about this picture anyway. Maybe some other people know it better. Esby (talk) 21:24, 17 July 2010 (UTC)
There is no problem, see COM:FOP#Permanent vs temporary. /Pieter Kuiper (talk) 21:29, 17 July 2010 (UTC)
I added a few others pictures and sorted (approximatively) by upload time. Esby (talk) 12:52, 18 July 2010 (UTC)
Is anyone willing to write a press release? (Otherwise someone might add {{Historical}} to that page.) -- Common Good (talk) 19:12, 20 July 2010 (UTC)
Press release? Nah, do that when we hit the 10M. Multichill (talk) 19:28, 20 July 2010 (UTC)

July 19

Help rotating a photo

Hi there. My computer and I are disagreeing on which direction is up. Can anyone here please rotate File:Graham_Parker_listening.jpg and then delete all my mistakes? Sorry to make the extra work for you. I have tried "Save As...", saving over, and saving elsewhere, all in Apple Preview. -SusanLesch (talk) 00:39, 20 July 2010 (UTC)

Placed an {{Rotate}} tag on the file and will delete all attempts to keep the file history shorter. You probably had problems with the EXIF orientation tag, while on your desktop the image was shown correctly it is rotated in Wikimedia because of the EXIF, the EXIF tag says "Rotated 90° CW" - so the image will show up on your pc 90° rotated. Dont know this exactly too. I know the rotatebot will rotate it correctly and losslessly. --Martin H. (talk) 00:49, 20 July 2010 (UTC)
✓ Done I just managed to upload a rotated version just now: Losslessly rotated using Jpegcrop with Huffman optimized enabled. -84user (talk) 00:55, 20 July 2010 (UTC)
Martin H. and 84user, thanks very much for your help (some things I don't want to have to know but should :-). Cheers. -SusanLesch (talk) 00:57, 20 July 2010 (UTC)
I just discovered {{Rotate}} a few days ago. Marvellous. — Cheers, JackLee –talk– 07:29, 21 July 2010 (UTC)

Category move

Comic book writers

I have started a category renaming discussion here. Nightscream (talk) 03:50, 20 July 2010 (UTC)

Via Appia

I was unsure of how to handle it, but i'll just tag along, i think. I've started a simular discussion on Category talk:Via Appia. Kleuske (talk) 15:05, 20 July 2010 (UTC)

You guys might want to have a look Commons:Categories for discussion. Different forms of moves:
Multichill (talk) 18:30, 20 July 2010 (UTC)
Thanks! Kleuske (talk) 08:36, 21 July 2010 (UTC)

"Image-reviewer"?

What is this new right? I've never heard of it before... –Juliancolton | Talk 23:54, 20 July 2010 (UTC)

See Commons:Village_pump#Usergroup_for_OTRS_at_Commons.  Docu  at 06:43, 21 July 2010 (UTC)
It's not really a right, but just a group to identify the existing reviewers--DieBuche (talk) 08:36, 21 July 2010 (UTC)

July 21

Delete Request

Request1: Can someone please delete this file [28], as I duplicated it. I have removed the summary and licence ready fro deletion.--Rockybiggs (talk) 08:39, 21 July 2010 (UTC)

I've tagged the file with {{Duplicate}}. In future, you can tag redundant files with this template or with {{Bad name}} as appropriate. — Cheers, JackLee –talk– 09:52, 21 July 2010 (UTC)

user upload problems!

Hello together!

Need a help of an administrator!

Can please somebody have a eye on this useruploads [29]?--A.Ceta (talk) 08:52, 21 July 2010 (UTC)--A.Ceta (talk) 08:52, 21 July 2010 (UTC)

Autocad files

Bylbyl (talk · contributions · Statistics) loaded quite some interesting .dwg files orginating from Autocad. Problems are that the drawings include components made by the equation editor, that conversion via wmf or eps formats to svg drops quite some information and that conversions like dwg->pdf->svg are quite time consuming. Any suggestion that yields better results than .png files that are not scalable ? --Foroa (talk) 09:17, 21 July 2010 (UTC) ?

Category:Television by country

Is it normal that we have in / of / from categories, and some duplicates like Television of Argentina / Television in Argentina (same thing for Brazil and Serbia) ? Personally, I prefer when it is homogeneous. Okki (talk) 09:32, 21 July 2010 (UTC)

I suppose there is a slight difference. "Television of" suggests TV programmes originating from a particular country. "Television in" includes TV programmes that are viewable in the country, but not necessarily from the country (such as US TV programmes that are shown all around the world). However, if the content in the two categories is really the same and this distinction has not been drawn, then it is better to only keep one of the categories. I would suggest "Television of Argentina", because a programme that originates elsewhere (e.g., USA) but can be seen in Argentina should really be put in a category based on its country of origin. You can list categories for renaming at "User talk:CommonsDelinker/commands" (which has a bit of a backlog at the moment, by the way. Hint, hint). — Cheers, JackLee –talk– 09:56, 21 July 2010 (UTC)
Fully agree. I redirected some of the redundant categories. --Foroa (talk) 10:50, 21 July 2010 (UTC)

Blog entry on MediaWiki image metadata support

Planet Wikimedia has an entry from Bawolff on his GOSC project on metadata.

It's at http://bawolff.blogspot.com/2010/07/image-metadata.html

Cheers.  Docu  at 09:51, 21 July 2010 (UTC)

Rename file

I request that the file Bergen-2009_nynorsk.png is renamed to Bergen-2009_Nynorsk.png, I made an typing error when uploading it. --Eivindgh (talk) 12:23, 21 July 2010 (UTC)

✓ Done. Actually, I noticed you already tagged the image with {{Rename}}, which means that a volunteer would have eventually got round to renaming it. It's not really necessary to post a message here at the Village pump as well. :-) — Cheers, JackLee –talk– 15:16, 21 July 2010 (UTC)

Usergroup for OTRS at Commons

To make it easier to identify members of the OTSR team, I like to suggest to create a specific usergroup to be added to Special:ListGroupRights for Commons. This group would only include the "autopatrol" right, but make it easier to follow edits by non-team-members.

Users should probably only be added to that usergroup by those who can added users to the OTSR (that is staff). For corrections, local bureaucrats should probably also be able to add/remove group membership.  Docu  at 10:45, 13 July 2010 (UTC)

OTSR? I think you misspelled "OTRS". – Kwj2772 (msg) 11:44, 13 July 2010 (UTC)
Lol. I fixed the section header.  Docu  at 11:46, 13 July 2010 (UTC)
Good idea, it also enables us to put a "verify" link into the userbox template, and in future possible abuse filters could be based on it.
Easiest way to get it done is too file a bug, use type : Configuration change (or smt. similiar, not sure)--DieBuche (talk) 12:00, 13 July 2010 (UTC)
Since we're on it, create an "image-reviewer" group, rights can be given out by admins & the actual right would be autopatrol or none. This would make it easier to verify that only image reviewers place the flickr review templates etc.--DieBuche (talk) 12:03, 13 July 2010 (UTC)
Sounds good. Ok for me.  Docu  at 12:15, 13 July 2010 (UTC)
 Support to both --Jarekt (talk) 15:24, 13 July 2010 (UTC)
 Support Nillerdk (talk) 16:36, 14 July 2010 (UTC)
I filed a bug https://bugzilla.wikimedia.org/show_bug.cgi?id=24374 the wikimedia-tech guys say we should expect about a week for it to be implemented--DieBuche (talk) 17:58, 14 July 2010 (UTC)
As it's Commons specific, it might be a bit early to file the request.  Docu  at 19:08, 14 July 2010 (UTC)

Apparently yes, so please voice your thoughts about this--DieBuche (talk) 09:20, 16 July 2010 (UTC)

 Support no problems! -- Lavallen (talk) 10:15, 16 July 2010 (UTC)
I can see no presentable issues with this request. Bastique ☎ appelez-moi! 20:49, 19 July 2010 (UTC)
 Support –Krinkletalk 21:00, 19 July 2010 (UTC)

Sweet, It was just activated a minute ago. Anyone got an idea hoow to mass assign the right?--DieBuche (talk) 15:48, 20 July 2010 (UTC)

Stewardbot? Bastique ☎ appelez-moi! 15:49, 20 July 2010 (UTC)
  • I think this has gone a little fast (I just saw on IRC that this went live).
  • 1) It's not staff that gives rights to OTRS, but OTRS-admin, are volunteers, several of them without global or commons rights.
  • 2) Stewards (as a group) don't have access to OTRS to confirm that a user actually is an OTRS-member.
  • 3) There are a lot of diffrent queues in OTRS. Do you want to mark users whos only access on OTRS is Wikimania or chapter-queues?
  • 4) Have you asked if anyone outside the commons-community (stewards or OTRS-admins) have the time to do these requests In addition to the job they already do? Laaknor (talk) 15:55, 20 July 2010 (UTC)
As the user group is specific to Commons, only those users who can confirm licenses for files on Commons documented through OTRS should be added (permissions-commons).
Currently OTRS users are self-identifying themselves. Meta:OTRS/personnel#Personnel lists only c. 30 users for permissions-commons, while Commons OTRS volunteers has 97 members. Normally we would need to ask an OTRS admin to confirm each time if the self-identification is correct. Thus the overall workload should be reduced. If help is needed for the initial set up, I would volunteer to do this.  Docu  at 06:42, 21 July 2010 (UTC)
Any user with access to OTRS can identify every other user by looking on the documentation on OTRS-wiki. Also, there are a lot of other queues on OTRS that document licenses (most of the requests right now on info-no, where I'm an agent, is permission-requests written in Norwegian). This is however besides the point; you should discuss this more, and create a policy on this. Also, my suggestion is that bureaucrats on Commons are in charge of assigning the rights, since neither stewards or OTRS-admins is a right on Commons, and stewards can't directly assign rights from meta (we'd have to assign ourself steward-rights on Commons to give out this rights, since it doesn't exist on meta/every wiki). Laaknor (talk) 10:20, 21 July 2010 (UTC)


I've just addigned the reviewer group for the users starting with 0-9 and A of this list: Commons:Flickr images/reviewers/list. For others, be sure to verify the archived discussion link. –Krinkletalk 16:34, 21 July 2010 (UTC)
Done B&C--DieBuche (talk) 16:46, 21 July 2010 (UTC)

Should we really assign the right to admin? I thought they get it automatically--DieBuche (talk) 14:12, 22 July 2010 (UTC)

Looking for a kind Wikipedian

I live in China where I cannot upload images greater than 500 kb. Is there a kind soul out there to whom I can email an image for upload to commons? I would be very grateful. You can reach me here at my Wikipedia talk. Thank you. Anna Frodesiak (talk) 01:03, 20 July 2010 (UTC)

Handling..--DieBuche (talk) 10:20, 20 July 2010 (UTC)
Resolved

Anna Frodesiak (talk) 00:01, 22 July 2010 (UTC)

Singular vs Plural cat name

I cannot understand why Category:Emerald is not the lead cat over Category:Emeralds (singular over plural). It isn't Aquamarines, it is Aquamarine, or Beryls against Beryl (ditto Goshenite, Golden beryl, Morganite and Red beryl). Why are emeralds so special that they must be pluarised in their category? 71.234.215.133 05:46, 22 July 2010 (UTC)

And Category:Diamonds and Category:Amethysts. Man vyi (talk) 06:06, 22 July 2010 (UTC)
Diamonds (as in discrete diamonds as "pieces" or as jewelry), should be plural. The MATERIAL diamond could have its own category. The plural diamond would then sit underneath, because a discrete individual diamond is more specific than the generic material (from the general to the specific rule. Ingolfson (talk) 11:58, 22 July 2010 (UTC)

Questions on Meta about Commons

See meta:2010 Wikimedia Study of Controversial Content#Questions for Discussion. It is mostly about Commons. /Pieter Kuiper (talk) 11:02, 22 July 2010 (UTC)

I'm Robert Harris, the consultant who is conducting the above-mentioned study. I was going to post a notice of the questions I've posted for discussion, but Pieter beat me to it. What this question list represents is a beginning phase of a process of consultation with the community that I'm hoping will continue throughout the summer and early fall. Pieter notes in his reply on the page itself that not everyone has the same understanding of Commons that you do, who work within it every day. That's why I'm especially interested in your comments. Thanks. Robertmharris (talk) 12:11, 22 July 2010 (UTC)

For those who don't read Meta, here is the list of questions by Robertmharris:

  • 1. Wikipedia has put certain policies and procedures in place to deal with special contentious categories of articles, (controversial articles, biographies of living people, e.g.) (see Wikipedia: Controversial articles http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia%3AGFCA) Do you think Commons could or should institute similar procedures with some classes of images?
  • 2. If yes, how would we define which classes and kinds of images were controversial?
  • 3. What policies and procedures might be put in place for those images? How would we treat them differently than other images?
  • 4. Could uploading practices differ for these images than other Commons images?
  • 5. If we assume that sexual images might be one of the categories included, or even if we don’t, do you think we have adequately defined sexual content historically in Wikimedia policies? (see Commons: Sexual content http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Commons:Sexual_content)
  • 6. If not, how might the definitions be extended, or otherwise changed?
  • 7. Commons identifies two goals for itself: supporting other Wikimedia projects, and creating an archive of visual images for use by all. Are these goals compatible with each other? Do they contradict each other?
  • 8. One of the participants in the recent discussion on a Commons sexual policy noted that as Commons more fully fulfills its mission to be an archive of all freely-usable visual images, the question of relevant educational scope becomes increasingly difficult to apply or at least begins to change? Do you agree? Is this a problem?
  • 9. Should the number of current images in any category be a factor in the decision whether to keep or delete any recently-uploaded image?
  • 10. Images on Commons are presented, by and large, without context, often with just a brief descriptor. Should a note on context and reason for inclusion be part of a regime around controversial images (as it is, for example, on the image of the Jyllands-Posten cartoons depicting images of Muhummad, to explain deviation from normal licensing regime) ?

Cheers.  Docu  at 03:14, 2010 July 24

Gallery problem

If I want to see my gallery, only the last image is shown and I get the message A database error has occurred Query: SELECT cl_to as cat FROM categorylinks LEFT JOIN u_daniel_cache.commonswiki_nontopics ON namespace = 14 AND title = cl_to where cl_from = 10973282 AND id IS NULL Function: getCategories Error: 1146 Table 'u_daniel_cache.commonswiki_nontopics' doesn't exist (sql-s4) . What is wrong, is it temporarely, must I do something? --Havang(nl) (talk) 12:21, 22 July 2010 (UTC)

See directly below--DieBuche (talk) 16:46, 22 July 2010 (UTC)

Toolserver down ?

What is wrong with the toolserver ? [30] gives "A database error has occurred", and [31] does not show any results. - Erik Baas (talk) 13:39, 22 July 2010 (UTC)

No, the toolserver is not down, just one of the database servers is acting up. I suggest you subscribe to toolserver-announce, Multichill (talk) 15:06, 22 July 2010 (UTC)

Incorrectly displayed PDF file

I uploaded File:Yamaguchi Soken - An Album of People of Yamato.pdf a landscape oriented PDF file which is incorrectly displayed as portrait shaped document. I do not have much experience with PDFs, so I am not sure is there is a way to somehow correct it or should I file a bug report. --Jarekt (talk) 13:19, 23 July 2010 (UTC)

Good wine imagery

Hi,

I noticed there's things like Featured, Quality and Valued images. But I'm not sure which is which and more over, which are permanent and which are varieing (ie. another image concurents and could be 'even better' than then other and thus the other would no longer have the status). The following images I think are very good, and I would like to nominate them for the status(es) that are permanent. Perhaps, if one ore more turn out to be also the best in general another nomination could be made aswell.

82.74.192.60 17:19, 23 July 2010 (UTC)

Quality images are of high technical quality with no regard to subject matter; since quality does not change over time, this is usually considered a permanent designation (barring changes to our standards). Valued images are considered to be the most useful individual examples of a particular subject area that we have in our database; as such, they could be replaced at any time should a more useful example appear. Featured images combine both elements -- they must have both high technical quality and strong educational value; this too is usually considered a permanent designation. Note, however, that our quality standards may change -- in the far future, for instance, we may require non-historical images to be three-dimensional to be considered "quality" or "featured" -- but that's not likely in the near term. Powers (talk) 18:01, 23 July 2010 (UTC)

Assistance in dealing with media not following the CC-BY-SA licence when reusing commons images

Hi,

since December last year I am conducting e-mail exchange with people administering official webpage of professional female Welsh golfer, which sports few photographs that I made and uploaded to commons in its 'gallery' section. They agreed that the images have to be acredited, but they have not done it until today (as I just checked). I know I can add the reused images to the "Images used by media organizations but violating license terms" category, but I am interested whether there is some kind of official support from Wikimedia to enforce following licence in cases when the entire process seems to be stalled. Thanks, Wmigda (talk) 18:09, 23 July 2010 (UTC)

To my knowledge there is not official support for fighting media organizations using our images without proper attribution. --Jarekt (talk) 19:01, 23 July 2010 (UTC)

Is there something that would officially prove me being a Wikimedia Commons contributor?

Hello.

My question may seem strange at first but is there something official like an id card, a sticker etc. that I could use to prove me being a Wikimedia Commons contributor?

This would very helpful since when a person makes a lot of pictures in an area that is not attractive to tourists (read: construction zones for example) people start to get uneasy and sometimes ask to stop (even though there's no real danger to either them or their "face"). In such situations it would be very helpful if I could prove that I am a Wikimedia Commons contributor.

This would also prove handy during large scale events with a lot of people as it would potentially allow me a better spot for making pictures as my work would be later made free for everyone to use.

Regards. - SuperTank17 (talk) 23:40, 21 July 2010 (UTC)

May be you can create one yourself. Use the Wikimedia Commons logo and the data you can obtain from "edit count" of your contributions. That gives Username, User ID, Registration date and Total editcount. Wouter (talk) 06:18, 22 July 2010 (UTC)
Quite some time ago, there has been talks about accredited Commons photographers (Commons:Accreditation). No idea if something really happened. --Foroa (talk) 06:47, 22 July 2010 (UTC)
While I could create one myself it wouldn't really carry any weight becausei8t would not be official. You see anyone can create an id card which "proves" that his with the XYZ organization even if such an organization doesn't exist or if his not really a part of it.
About the Commons:Accreditation: I've read about and there's a discussion there from more than two years ago where one of the users says and I quote: "The Commons as a WMF project is not a legal entity of any kind; the Commons is not an organization in itself, and it could not issue accreditations."
Regards. - SuperTank17 (talk) 11:31, 22 July 2010 (UTC)
You could get in touch with your local Wikimedia chapter (for example Wikimedia Polska). They might be able to help. Pruneautalk 07:17, 22 July 2010 (UTC)
Thanks, I will look into it. For now I guess I'll just have to rely on words alone.
Regards. - SuperTank17 (talk) 11:31, 22 July 2010 (UTC)
n:en:Wikinews:Accreditation policy. Not Commons, but at least 'official' and should work for your intended use. --Slomox (talk) 18:58, 24 July 2010 (UTC)

July 22

Category:River locks

Today a new category Category:River locks was introduced. I wonder if this is a useful category, as we already have Canal locks and it is not so simple to categorise locks in rivers with a parallel lock canal. Please transfer this item to another discussion forum when appropriate. --Stunteltje (talk) 18:19, 23 July 2010 (UTC)

There is somewhere a place to discuss categories. But this is a simple case which can be dealt with by a move proposal. Could they be fused to a Category:Canal and river locks ? If yes, make a simultaneous move proposal on the two categories to start the discussion there. --Havang(nl) (talk) 18:28, 23 July 2010 (UTC)
I have my doubts. Have a look at category:Canal locks and you'll find that it is not so simple to move all these files. One has to rename a hell of a lot of categories that way. --Stunteltje (talk) 19:46, 23 July 2010 (UTC)
I think the distinction is useful, but if you want to take this to the right forum it would be Commons:Categories for discussion. - 05:56, 24 July 2010 (UTC)
Transferred. --Stunteltje (talk) 06:49, 24 July 2010 (UTC)
.... Here. Multichill (talk) 15:53, 24 July 2010 (UTC)

July 24

Ending POTD

Due to many people complaining about POTD being either censored or not censored, I hereby propose we do away with it and replace it with images from COM:FK, which I urge you all to contribute to. -mattbuck (Talk) 02:21, 24 July 2010 (UTC)

What about people who are offended by cute animals? Are there any societies that view cats as evil or unclean? lol — Huntster (t @ c) 04:29, 24 July 2010 (UTC)
Too much nudity. Rocket000 (talk) 07:23, 24 July 2010 (UTC)
I want featured bunnies! Multichill (talk) 11:57, 24 July 2010 (UTC)
French speakers may see Commons:Chatons remarquables. Jean-Fred (talk) 16:28, 24 July 2010 (UTC)

Uploading to Commons

User:guillom of the Wikimedia Multimedia Usability team has published some results on his blog of the first testing done of the usability of Wikimedia Commons upload process, and the results of the first prototype for the new upload wizard that is currently under development. See also the following movies:

Please contribute your ideas, and you can test the prototype if you want. TheDJ (talk) 20:05, 22 July 2010 (UTC)

Thank you. As a follow-up, I'd like to add that I'm currently working on a Questions & Answers page to address the most frequently asked questions. Feedback on the prototype is of course welcome, but you will understand that we may not have the resources to answer every comment individually, especially if many are similar. The Q&A page isn't ready yet, so it'll take some time before I can publish it. So, please consider this a "soft launch": we don't want to make a lot of publicity about our prototype yet. If you happen to know about it and you want to share your opinion, that's fine. But we'll officially invite the community later to try it out, when the Q&A page lets us focus on the most useful comments. Thanks, Guillaume Paumier 20:30, 22 July 2010 (UTC)
Generally I like it. Some stuff i found:
  • Currently most users can't move any files, and I'm not sure we would want to activate that.
  • I don't really like that temp file thing, as it would also leave us with a lot of unfinished uploads to cleanup.
--DieBuche (talk) 20:54, 22 July 2010 (UTC)
This is typically the kind of thing we're going to fix before releasing the new upload wizard :) About the "temp file thing", these would be automatically deleted after a short period of time (a few hours?) if left incomplete. guillom 21:20, 22 July 2010 (UTC)
Ok, great--DieBuche (talk) 22:10, 22 July 2010 (UTC)

There should be a possibility to upload files by giving a url. The roundabout by first downloading to one's own computer is unnecessary extra work when an image is available on line. It would also improve the documentation of such uploads. /Pieter Kuiper (talk) 22:38, 22 July 2010 (UTC)

There is, but it's disabled for some reason. The right's called upload_by_url. It's listed on Special:ListGroupRights for admins. Rocket000 (talk) 00:25, 24 July 2010 (UTC)
See bugzilla:20512. —LX (talk, contribs) 11:46, 25 July 2010 (UTC)
Interesting, I wouldn't use it though (too use to the current upload page or I just use the basic upload page), I do think it would be a better way for those who don't know the process to well but I find the prototype's page is slower on my ADSL (1500/256) connection. Bidgee (talk) 14:22, 25 July 2010 (UTC)

July 23

Funny category of the day: Category:Primates of Poland

Today I discovered rather funny category: Category:Primates of Poland which is not a sub of Category:Primates by country. Rather puzzled I found out that some IP who created it. meant this kind of en:Primate (religion) :) --Jarekt (talk) 04:13, 25 July 2010 (UTC)

This brings to mind a piece I read in the Readers' Digest many years ago. I don't remember the exact details, but it was something along these lines. An environmental group was organizing a conference, and decided to send invitation letters to various bodies in the UK studying primatology. However, the invitation was politely declined by the Primate of England (the Archbishop of York – or perhaps it was the Primate of All England, the Archbishop of Canterbury), his personal assistant writing: "Although His Grace is partial to the occasional banana, the conference is not really within his area of expertise." — Cheers, JackLee –talk– 06:33, 25 July 2010 (UTC)
And similarly, the Primus of the Scottish Episcopal Church is not a stove. (Compare and contrast: Primus v. Primus). Man vyi (talk) 08:06, 25 July 2010 (UTC)

Korean War Veterans Memorial

I've been discussing the status of the Korean War Veterans Memorial with another user on their talk page, and wanted to get wider opinions here on how to handle images of this memorial or parts of this memorial. The best source I have found so far discussing who was responsible for which bits of the memorial is this article (a Washington Post article hosted by the designers of the wall part of the memorial). As a multi-artist work, the "NoUploads" tag was removed (I agree with that removal). From what I can tell from the Washington Post article, and from the court case documented at the article, and from the deletion discussion, pictures of the statues and the wall are off-limits. But I'm not so clear what other photos of the memorial or parts of the memorial are OK or not. What do people here think? Carcharoth (Commons) (talk) 11:23, 25 July 2010 (UTC)

Commonwealth of Massachusetts works

How do we treat images taken from Commonwealth of Massachusetts websites? They state that: All of the material posted on the Commonwealth's Websites and accessible to the public without use of an authenticating and authorizing mechanism (such as a "PIN" or password) is public record. Most of the public record posted on Commonwealth Websites can be copied and used for any purpose. <...> please be advised that Mass.Gov makes use of materials (including, but not limited to, photographs) in which third parties hold the copyright, which also cannot be copied or used for use other than "fair use" without permission of the copyright owner. If you want to make use other than "fair use" of any copyrighted information on this Web site, you must seek permission directly from the copyright owner.

There is File:BarbaraLItalien.jpg in Category:Media without a license as of 19 May 2010. It is from Mass.gov, but author of the photo is not given. Should we presume it to be a Commonwealth of Massachusetts work and therefore PD or it may be a work of a third party and thus it's better to delete it until more info about the file is provided? Btw, I failed to find any specific PD-template concerning Commonwealth of Massachusetts works. --Blacklake (talk) 09:52, 21 July 2010 (UTC)

I'd say that the text from the website that you reproduced above is adequate as a release of material not protected by a password into the public domain, except for material the copyright of which is held by a third party and not the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. As regards "File:BarbaraLItalien.jpg", I note that it is a photograph of a Massachusetts State Representative, so the copyright in it was likely to be held by the Commonwealth, which has released the photograph into the public domain. It seems unlikely that this is a photograph the copyright of which is held by a third party. I'd say leaving it in the Commons is all right. A new template for material from Mass.gov may have to be created. — Cheers, JackLee –talk– 10:03, 21 July 2010 (UTC)
I feel that better to file a normal DR in this case. The permission is quite ambiguous. Trycatch (talk) 13:09, 21 July 2010 (UTC)
Dunno, that does feel pretty explicit to me. "use for any purpose" seems fairly straightforward. Seems to be exactly what {{Copyrighted free use}} says. In general "public record" is not even close to the same thing as "public domain" in a copyright sense (public records can be from multiple authors, and may not allow commercial use or derivative works) but that does seem to be giving copyright statement on Massachusetts-owned works appearing on that website. Clarifications always help, but the license statement above seems to be absolutely aware of what copyright entails. Carl Lindberg (talk) 16:23, 26 July 2010 (UTC)

File:German stamp- Marlene Dietrich crop.PNG

File:German stamp- Marlene Dietrich crop.PNG has been listed at Commons:Deletion requests so that the community can discuss whether it should be kept or not. We would appreciate it if you could go to voice your opinion about this at its entry.

If you created this file, please note that the fact that it has been proposed for deletion does not necessarily mean that we do not value your kind contribution. It simply means that one person believes that there is some specific problem with it, such as a copyright issue. Please see Commons:But it's my own work! for a guide on how to address these issues.

Please remember to respond to and – if appropriate – contradict the arguments supporting deletion. Arguments which focus on the nominator will not affect the result of the nomination. Thank you!
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  — Jeff G. ツ 04:14, 25 July 2010 (UTC)

Um, this is the village pump... Rocket000 (talk) 11:24, 25 July 2010 (UTC)
I think the user wants others to Comment on the DR. --MGA73 (talk) 15:32, 26 July 2010 (UTC)

Image not loading properly

Can someone work out why File:Global tree canopy map NASA.jpg is not showing properly? Only the full size can be seen, not the large thumb on the image page, nor the small thumb in categories or galleries. I tried cropping excess white background but that didn't work. It isn't because it is too large, there are plenty of larger pics which do show properly. - MPF (talk) 10:31, 25 July 2010 (UTC)

"Error creating thumbnail: convert: Insufficient memory (case 4) `/mnt/upload6/wikipedia/commons/6/65/Global_tree_canopy_map_NASA.jpg'." TheDJ (talk) 13:46, 25 July 2010 (UTC)
So can it be solved so the thumbs do show? - MPF (talk) 14:09, 25 July 2010 (UTC)
It could, see Bugzilla:24228  Docu  at 19:05, 25 July 2010 (UTC)
Fixed. cropped white, saved as jpg 97 quality using en:GIMP. I guess more quality should work too. --Saibo (Δ) 00:19, 26 July 2010 (UTC)
Excellent, thanks! - MPF (talk) 12:31, 26 July 2010 (UTC)

Requesting freedom of panorama permissions

I was looking into writing to various people and organisations to get permissions related to images with freedom of panorama concerns. Specifically, I am thinking of writing to artists who had been commissioned to do public installation artworks (or the estate of said artists) as well as private or public organisations that had employed artists to do such work (works-for-hire). I was advised to ask them to use the form letter at Commons:OTRS, but this doesn't seem suited for the purpose. What I want to get across in such letters is the following:

  • (a) This relates to public installations of artworks in countries which don't have freedom of panorama
  • (b) we are not asking for permission to use their photographs, but we want permission from them to use the photographs of others who are willing to upload photographs to Commons
  • (c) the permission to modify and distribute and reuse the uploaded photographs applies to specific uploaded photographs, not the original artwork installation or any other photographs taken of that artwork
  • (d) this includes potential downstream commercial use of such photographs but would not permit such use with photographs they hadn't given permission for.

Is it possible to come up with a wording that would satisfy all this, or would this be too much like a new license? Carcharoth (Commons) (talk) 11:40, 25 July 2010 (UTC)

Seems a great idea to me. --Havang(nl) (talk) 14:27, 25 July 2010 (UTC)
Thanks. I'd like some more opinions and some help with actual wording before going ahead. Maybe I should raise it at Commons talk:OTRS, or Commons:WikiProject Permission requests, or Wikipedia:Example requests for permission? Carcharoth (Commons) (talk) 18:25, 25 July 2010 (UTC)
Why not, and if the first try doesn't get results, stick patiently to it and repeat your trials till you have a few users to join in to bring your idea in practice. But I do not find myself apt to this, sorry. User:Pieter Kuiper could be one of them, if he survives (see below): it could give him a possibility to take positive action regarding this subject. -- Havang(nl) (talk) 20:47, 25 July 2010 (UTC)

Discussion on a ban of User:Pieter Kuiper

Currently there is a discussiuon to ban Pieter Kuiper at Commons:Administrators' noticeboard/User problems#Lets end it here. In short the problem is that Pieter in a dispute starts deletion requests regarding (possible) copyvios uploaded by admins. Help us decide if that behavior should be stopped or if it is ok to nominate (possible) copyvios for deletion. --MGA73 (talk) 13:50, 25 July 2010 (UTC)

Please excuse the biased tone of that last sentence. Wknight94 talk 13:53, 25 July 2010 (UTC)
..."in a dispute" then :-) --MGA73 (talk) 15:33, 26 July 2010 (UTC)

File:Camouflage DSC05383 - Original image.JPG

Originally posted on en:Talk:File:Camouflage DSC05383 - Original image.JPG by Mister Morris: "Either somebody provide a new version of this image with the alleged frog outlined in red, or I will be forced to call bullshit on this image and request that it be removed. Seriously, this drove me nuts for like 15 minutes. I think that was the intended purpose of this image."

I can't really see it either. Can someone help him out? NW (Talk) 20:23, 25 July 2010 (UTC)

[32] is linked from a blog, that claims to show the frog. I'm still a bit skeptical; is a frog that happens to look a lot like leaves, or is it a bunch of leaves that happens to look a little like a frog?--Prosfilaes (talk) 20:43, 25 July 2010 (UTC)
I looked at this picture and at first I too didn't see it but when I saw the version of the picture with the frog highlighted I looked closely at that spot on the original picture and I think that this is indeed a frog that looks a lot like the leaves surrounding it. You can clearly see its body parts and the shadow it casts on the ground (granted that you look very closely). Regards. - SuperTank17 (talk) 20:52, 25 July 2010 (UTC)
Of course it's a frog, see adjacent images from uploader's Picasa photostream. Trycatch (talk) 20:58, 25 July 2010 (UTC)
I also saw it easily after knowing that she was left to the stick. Just look for her eyes, the legs are also visible.--Darwin (talk) 21:29, 25 July 2010 (UTC)

July 26

File:Strahman.jpg

Hi, could someone delete this image please. It is a classic and evident grab from the internet. In the source it says it was taken from Olé (Argentine newspaper) but it is then licensed as an own work... Thanks in advance. Regards. User:Fache (feeling lazy to log) 07:14, 26 July 2010 (UTC)

Please nominate the image for deletion by clicking on the "Nominate for deletion" link on the left panel of the screen. — Cheers, JackLee –talk– 09:37, 26 July 2010 (UTC)

User gallery aint working

Since some days the user gallery shows only one picture:

Message is:

"A database error has occurred Query: SELECT cl_to as cat FROM categorylinks LEFT JOIN u_daniel_cache.commonswiki_nontopics ON namespace = 14 AND title = cl_to where cl_from = 11004585 AND id IS NULL Function: getCategories Error: 1146 Table 'u_daniel_cache.commonswiki_nontopics' doesn't exist (sql-s4)"

--Mbdortmund (talk) 10:28, 26 July 2010 (UTC)

See above, july 22, toolserver down.--Havang(nl) (talk) 17:16, 26 July 2010 (UTC)

Amendment to closure policy on Deletion Requests

In accordance with views expressed recently there is a proposal to ensure that DRs are not closed by those whose media is the subject of the DR. The community may wish to express their opinion here. Thanks --Herby talk thyme 12:23, 26 July 2010 (UTC)

Incorrect flickr file descriptions

Recently I encountered several files uploaded from flick which had incorrect file descriptions (incorrect location etc). Is there a policy about checking the truthworthy of the file descrition before uploading from Flickr? --Havang(nl) (talk) 17:10, 26 July 2010 (UTC) Comment added: It means, flickr files do not a priory fulfill encyclopedic standards and by uploading so many may-be it has been forgotten to be critical on these files as sources for encyclopedie images. --Havang(nl) (talk) 17:21, 26 July 2010 (UTC)

  • With Flickr files, as with any others, if you see inaccuracies, then correct them. Yes, there will be more of these on Flickr, since it is common for the "description" on Flickr to just be something like "I really like this image" and, of course, the date is the date of Flickr upload, which may be way off target. - Jmabel ! talk 17:30, 26 July 2010 (UTC)
Yes, I correct. The problem starts when a correct description or identification is failing. Is there need for some policy guideline for flickr-to-commons uploaders concerning the description in view of its encyclopedic usefullness? The flickr people are not normally present on commons for answering questions regarding their images. --Havang(nl) (talk) 18:40, 26 July 2010 (UTC)
I don't think we need a new guideline or policy for this. If a meaningful description can't be derived from the Flickr description or the image itself, its use on Wikimedia projects may be of guidance. If it is not used and a meaningful description can't be derived from the Flickr description or the image itself, a deletion nomination with reference to Commons:Project scope is a completely reasonable recourse under current rules and practices. —LX (talk, contribs) 09:23, 27 July 2010 (UTC)
Even if a description on flickr is accurate, it can generally use some editing: e.g. transform "I" in the photographer's comments, remove pasted wikipedia articles, etc.  Docu  at 09:46, 27 July 2010 (UTC)

July 27

Disappearing toolbox link in Chromium

I recently started using Chromium to browse Commons, and noticed a very strange behavior. When I go to an image page for the first time, the links to add problem tags or nominate the image for deletion show up just fine; but if I leave the page and come back, they are gone. Does anyone else have the same issue? –Tryphon☂ 10:16, 27 July 2010 (UTC)

Quoting LX: The Quick Delete gadget was recently switched to a new version of the script, which can be found at MediaWiki:AjaxQuickDelete.js. As discussed at MediaWiki talk:AjaxQuickDelete.js#Missing links on some images?, the deletion toolbox entries are not available for files that already have problem tags. I guess we haven't decided if this is a bug or a feature yet. :) If you click on edit, the links appear.
I have disabled that for now, the seemingly unexplainable disapperance seems to cause to much confusion; also see above --DieBuche (talk) 10:44, 27 July 2010 (UTC)
Thanks, and sorry for the duplicate thread. I must still be asleep, because I looked up and down this page to see if the issue had already been reported, but somehow missed it was right there at the bottom of the page. I need more coffee... –Tryphon☂ 10:49, 27 July 2010 (UTC)

Category guidance - Something OF else / Something BY else

Hi everyone. Recently, I placed a list of renames on the Delinker which I considered perfectly uncontroversial (these category move requests - which were then removed from the list).

I pointed out to the person who had removed them that that was standard categorisation policy. We don't use categories like Category:Examplestan people, we use Category:People of Examplestan. The same logic applies pretty much everywhere, and I have myself created and or moved hundreds of categories in this way. So why would we use Category:Example University alumni, when the "correct" way was Category:Alumni of Example University, I asked the editor who had removed my request.

Said editor then pointed out / queried whether we indeed had such a policy. Sadly, we may in fact not. However, this is such a generic rule used in practice, that it seems to me we should, for consistency if nothing else (unless it does exist somewhere after all - often, I find Commons so overwhelmingly hard to use in terms of finding policies or help I KNOW exists).

So do we have such a policy / should we have such a policy / what do others feel about the proposed change and similar changes? Ingolfson (talk) 11:56, 22 July 2010 (UTC)

Additionally I mentioned harmonisation of Commons categories with Wikipedia categories, and mass changing of categories away from a existing pattern - changing all of "University alumni" to "Alumni of University" in Category:Alumni by university or college in the United States for example. That change also effects links on Wikipeida to Commons, en:Category:University of Auckland alumni for example. Benchill (talk) 13:03, 22 July 2010 (UTC)
That harmonisation is for en:wikipedia, but can't be done simultaneously for other wikipedias. Don't say it's an english shortlooking idea about commons. To avoid that on other wikipedias one gets lost, one should keep the old name as redirect to the harmonised name, shouldn't one? --Havang(nl) (talk) 13:33, 22 July 2010 (UTC)
I would say "Alumni of..." is the Commons way. I would be all for harmonisation with en.wp, but not when it comes to people/group categories. That would involve changing thousands (or tens of thousands) of categories around, not to mention all the links on all the wikis. Not going to happen. Rocket000 (talk) 07:16, 23 July 2010 (UTC)
If en_wiki uses some other form, one should at least keep a corresponding category redirect.  Docu  at 10:08, 23 July 2010 (UTC)
Keep? You mean create. These weren't moved from the en.wp names. Anyway, their commonscat links are usually right. Rocket000 (talk) 10:28, 23 July 2010 (UTC)
A couple of days ago a few were moved and the old categories deleted (I'm not sure though in which direction they were moved). If redirects are there, it makes it easier to copy and paste categories from en_wiki when a category for an alumnus/alumna.  Docu  at 10:51, 23 July 2010 (UTC)
I think it is pretty useful to keep the redirects, and my understanding is that that happens automatically unless one tells the bot otherwise / unless one deltes the redirect cats later. I seem to get at least somewhat of a feel here that the proposed rename is acceptable (i.e. moving to "Alumni of...") Ingolfson (talk) 21:45, 23 July 2010 (UTC)

There is the proposal Commons:By location category scheme which says "[object] of [Location name]", to avoid the adjectival form for placenames. It has a proposal "In order to maintain a consistent usage of Category names, the English Wiki's designation shall prevail". Also CommonsDelinker says the category redirects need to be created manually, and there is a discussion to change one of the alumni categories back already[33].

I think ideally alumni and faculty categories would use one system both on en:wikipedia and here, I feel it's somewhat counterproductive and problematic when the projects needlessly use different schemes. I understand the category discussions are more extensive on en, and the system used there is primarily [Organisation] [association], except for some British universities. Benchill (talk) 00:17, 26 July 2010 (UTC)

On Commons, almost all categories are <Topic> <Qualifiers> <by criteria>, left to right, small to big (in general). If we have around 500000 new categories per year (one per minute) with decreasing category discussions and renames, it means that we have a relatively sound and coherent system that is understood by most contributors.
We have around 700 sister projects in 272 languages, each with their own standards. What's important on Commons is that we use a consistent (worldwide) naming and that categories are in line with the naming of their parent categories. Considering the parent category name (and the world wide Commons standard on this topic), this naming discussion is closed for me as I have seen no single argument that could possible prevail over the Commons naming habits.
It is true that for now, the en:wikipedia provides the most articles (22 % of total), but Commons has nearly twice as much categories as the en:wikipedia, and should have within 18 to 24 months more categories than they have articles. If it is stated that "English Wiki's designation shall prevail", this is for English vocabulary issues, not for category naming syntax and structure.
Anyway, I would not be surprised to see the en:wikipedia category naming changed one day with its horrible (occasional) right-to-left syntax and not extensible/modular; try for example to extend this one: Category:University of Georgia alumni to Category:University of Georgia (US state), campus Sapelo Island, Marine alumni --Foroa (talk) 14:44, 27 July 2010 (UTC)
I should point out that the "University of Georgia alumni" pattern has some advantage, at least with the Category-adding/editing interface in use on our upload form. It allows the user to start typing "University of Georgia" and see what the possible completions are; it doesn't work in the other direction. Powers (talk) 15:44, 27 July 2010 (UTC)
That's correct but is the case for all naming systems: the left to right one or the right to left one, but you have to stick to one system. You can now start typing "Alumni of ..." and see what possible completions are ... --Foroa (talk) 18:40, 27 July 2010 (UTC)
Well, yes, but that's not nearly as useful. In general, when uploading an image, one would expect there to be at least a category for the university, along with a selection of subcategories, among which might be "alumni". With the university name first, that fact would be readily apparent after starting to type, and one could easily select an alternate category. On the other hand, worded with "Alumni" first, one would be tempted to start typing the university name and will not find the alumni category at all (or, if one is familiar with the pattern, one will start typing "Alumni of" and see if the category exists, but if it does not, one must delete the text and try some other prefix that might or might not have a University of Georgia category). Powers (talk) 19:42, 27 July 2010 (UTC)
More concisely, a less-to-more-specific ordering better reflects the way humans think. Powers (talk) 19:44, 27 July 2010 (UTC)
The fix to this would surely be fixing the tool to do substring matches instead of changing our category system.--Prosfilaes (talk) 20:08, 27 July 2010 (UTC)
I didn't suggest changing the category system. I just pointed out that there is, currently, some advantage to the alternate system. Powers (talk) 12:43, 28 July 2010 (UTC)

Births/deaths by month

For a short time (June 16 - July 18) the {{Creator}} template categorized categories of artists with births and deaths by month. Example: Category:Ernst Moritz Arndt was sorted into Category:December 1769 births and Category:January 1860 deaths automatically. This was discussed at Commons:Village_pump/Archive/2010Jul#Why are we splitting up births and deaths by month? and the discussion page of the Creator template. There are arguments in favor and against this kind of categorization.
The Creator template was switched back so that most of the categories are empty now. Some people started to use this categorization, created the by month categories and also added some subcategories to them manually, see Special:WhatLinksHere/Template:Monthbyyeardeaths. Most categories were not created, see my (intentionally selected) example above. The question here is what to do with this now. Can we dissolve this new categorization scheme of births/deaths by month? --Martin H. (talk) 05:29, 24 July 2010 (UTC)

Yes, please delete them. There's no good reason to sort by month. I've never seen a year category even close to having enough members to warrant further categorization, which would be quite a high number given the use of these categories; they're more of informational labels rather than there to aid in finding images. Rocket000 (talk) 07:33, 24 July 2010 (UTC)
Such date categorisations are marginal for the Commons role, so let's not make it more complicated (and unreliable and unsearchable) than it is. --Foroa (talk) 08:14, 24 July 2010 (UTC)
Nuke them! Multichill (talk) 11:56, 24 July 2010 (UTC)
Yes, delete them, but dont'forget to replace the month cat by the year cat.-- Havang(nl) (talk) 12:04, 24 July 2010 (UTC)
Same here. Jean-Fred (talk) 15:19, 24 July 2010 (UTC)
Fired up a bot to clean it out. Multichill (talk) 16:36, 24 July 2010 (UTC)
Thank God for that! The next step would probably have been a '1 December year births' etc. categorisation (completely isolated from other cats, of course...). ;-) Anatiomaros (talk) 18:34, 24 July 2010 (UTC)
Thanks a lot - I wondered how best to request reverting this :) Hekerui (talk) 18:39, 24 July 2010 (UTC)

Nuked

I moved all contents to the year births/deaths categories again. The month categories are all deleted and also the two templates. Multichill (talk) 09:34, 25 July 2010 (UTC)

More date categories

Apparently some users have been busy creating all sorts of intersections by date. Most of the subcategories of Category:Countries by month don't seem to be very useful to me. Opinions? Multichill (talk) 20:31, 25 July 2010 (UTC)

They look pretty useless now as Martin H. just nuked most of them. There is a thread about him at Commons:Administrators'_noticeboard/User_problems#Martin H. (talk · contribs).
For some reasons, he doesn't want to discuss them at COM:CFD as everybody else would.  Docu  at 20:49, 25 July 2010 (UTC)
I'm sort of a fan of them; what does a place look like in spring, summer, fall and winter, basically?--Prosfilaes (talk) 21:10, 25 July 2010 (UTC)

(ec) Thanks for the link to Category:Countries by month, I came from Category:Months by country which was a twin, some countries took the one way, some the other. The category tree is removed. Collecting Category:January 2009 in England and Category:January 2005 in England together in Category:January in England with the only purpose of collecting images created in January in England is unnecessary, the topic related categories of Category:January 2009 in England are untouched.
The next category tree requireing a careful view is Category:Images of plants taken on June 21 et al. While for File:Starr 070621-7432 Cortaderia selloana.jpg it is maybe interesting to see how Cortaderia selloana looks in different growing seasons (and then build a topic based categorization tree from species growing seasons to seasons of the year and locations) the day of photo creation is unecessary categorization. There is no topic based relation between June 21 and this plant. --Martin H. (talk) 21:22, 25 July 2010 (UTC)

I still can't believe someone thought organizing plant photos by the date they were taken was a good idea. WTF purpose does that serve? Category:Countries by month is a little more sane but still useless (IMO, of course, but I seriously tried to understand the purpose of these... they just seem like some people got carried away with categorizing not stopping to think how it would benefit users. Why would you ever need to look for files this way? There's no relationship. The date is simply metadata.). Organizing by season obviously has its uses, but that's completely different. Rocket000 (talk) 23:21, 25 July 2010 (UTC)
I think that for several trees, it is important to know the position of the moon when the picture is taken. Professional high quality wood harvesters cut only trees if the moon is in a certain position (flow direction of their juices). I think that for most date related categories (and their proliferation), we would better of with some catscan "date range" options instead of multiplying category matrixes. --Foroa (talk) 18:57, 27 July 2010 (UTC)
Some are by moon phase, some are by season, some are by some other category - I don't hear any that do something in particular on June 21. Hell, June 21 means vastly different things in Alaska than they do in New Zealand. By specific dates is overkill. Wknight94 talk 19:11, 27 July 2010 (UTC)
Right. If these were organized by moon phase that would be different. We are talking about days of any year, which have different moon phases. They also have different seasons depending on the location. "June 21" can contain any moon phase or season (well, at least summer and winter). Rocket000 (talk) 20:56, 27 July 2010 (UTC)

→CFD discussion Rocket000 (talk) 16:56, 28 July 2010 (UTC)

Community hall, village hall, town hall categories

Hello, I find some trouble in categorising these. Town hall is from the municipality, even if this is a village. Two things

  • A few category:village halls ... have been created, which contain either town halls or community halls, or a mix. ~Can some one sort these out.
  • And is there a category tree or parent type category for Fr: Salle polyvalente, salle des fêtes, foyer (culturel), Nl:Dorpshuis, Gemeenschapshuis; wijkgebouw; en: community hall, etc. --Havang(nl) (talk) 10:18, 24 July 2010 (UTC)
Category:Community centres? The difficulty with the "town hall" categories is that, depending on the form of municipal government, a "hall" may be a seat of local administration, or an enclosed amenity space, or both - and it's very difficult to tell from even a correctly described image what the precise function(s) is/are. Man vyi (talk) 10:40, 24 July 2010 (UTC)
Whether a building is the town hall, in most cases in fr and nl it is evident by its naming (hotel de ville, mairie, raadhuis, gemeentehuis, stadhuis). For those which can not be defined as town halls, Category:Community centres seems a good overall category, with a large range (houses of culture, community halls, memorial halls etc. , I find there the specific cats I needed. Thanks. --Havang(nl) (talk) 11:36, 24 July 2010 (UTC)
A "community center", at least in U.S. parlance, is usually unrelated to local government operations (except perhaps in terms of funding and administration). Perhaps just "town, village, and city halls"? Powers (talk) 14:45, 24 July 2010 (UTC)
The problem we've been grappling with is that many village halls are unrelated to local government operations. Further, there are municipal halls which are not town halls as such, and then there are things like the chitalishte... Man vyi (talk) 17:10, 24 July 2010 (UTC)
Indeed, usage varies widely. I think this is an example where "local" categories should be followed. In the countries of Britain, for example, a village hall may or may not be in use for the meetings of the local council and it may (or may not) also be in use as a "community centre" (recreation etc). On the other hand, a community centre is most often not a village hall as such. Town halls are usually used by the town council but will often be used for events and recreation as well and in some cases may no longer be used for day-to-day local government at all, having been superceded by some other, more modern centre. Neither a town hall or a village hall can be classed as "community centres" in the usual meaning of that term in Britain. We have Category:Town halls in Wales which has as one of its parent cats *Municipal buildings in Wales. Category:Village halls in Wales is a sub-cat of *Town halls in Wales but is only in the *Municipal buildings cat because of that: in most cases these village halls are not centres of local government as such. Confusing, perhaps, but without a case by case categorisation requiring research and/or local knowledge I see no alternative. A super-cat as proposed above - 'town, village, and city halls' - could be misleading. Anatiomaros (talk) 18:22, 24 July 2010 (UTC)
Indeed, naming the three groups in the title was asking for distinction, nor for merging. Some locally (english) called village halls have there evident place in the town halls category tree. Thanks to above comments, I found that for other locally (english) called village halls the community centers tree is quite apt. But a category tree village halls should at inmternational commons level soon lead to confusion and is not suitable. The term Village hall(s) therefore should be restricted to the local (english) naming of items and categories and those should be as soon as possibly enter either parent cat town halls... or parent cat community halls ... or community centers... --Havang(nl) (talk) 13:31, 25 July 2010 (UTC)
There are such differences in nomenclature, often even within the same country, that en-wiki renamed its article to Seat of local government. --Skeezix1000 (talk) 18:05, 27 July 2010 (UTC)
I'd strongly support a similar renaming here. Man vyi (talk) 20:15, 27 July 2010 (UTC)
So would I. --Skeezix1000 (talk) 20:40, 27 July 2010 (UTC)
  • Anyhow, the principle of two distinct cat-trees (town halls, community centers) seems accepted. Whether that one cattree should be town halls or seats of local government could best be discussed at the existing town hall category tree. But I feel ambiguity of another kind in the word seats: seat may indicate the place or the building (cf seat of national governments). --Havang(nl) (talk) 21:03, 27 July 2010 (UTC)
I see that Category:Community centres has been created and populated and I'm happy with English/Scottish/Welsh village halls been included in that. They are rather unique institutions but this seems an acceptable compromise as it keeps them out of local government. An exception might be made locally for United States village halls. I see that the 'en' article en:Village hall has the categories *Government buildings and *City and town halls, but whilst that is true for the US it is clearly contradicting their definition of village halls in Britain as given in the article itself ("usually a building within a village which contains at least one large room, usually owned by and run for the benefit of the local community. Such a hall is typically used for a variety of public and private events, such as parish council meetings, sports club functions, local drama productions, dances, jumble sales and private parties") and we should not follow suit. As for *Seats of local government, I agree with you that there is a certain ambiguity but can't think of an alternative that is much of an improvement (*Centres of... could arguably include local government offices etc, not just town or city halls, as would *Local government buildings). Perhaps we have to accept that perfection is not always possible? Anatiomaros (talk) 22:18, 27 July 2010 (UTC)
We already have Category:Municipal buildings which would cover the same very ambiguous ground as *Local government buildings. Man vyi (talk) 05:41, 28 July 2010 (UTC)

July 25

Image flipping

I came across File:Ayaan-Hirsi-Ali-VVD.NL-1200x1600.JPG which has gone through four revisions. While I agree that the cropping is probably better now (although not compellingly necessary), the horizontal flipping is in my opinion unacceptable. The reason given at the image's talk page is to conform better to Wikipedia's style guidelines regarding the placement of images.

Is there a formal policy on the appropriateness of flipping images, particularly of portraits? If so, is there a template to flag images which violate such policy?

Disclosure: I've once flipped an image back without asking for advice (File:Tomáš G Masaryk1918.jpg), but that image was less high-profile than Hirsi Ali's and it was uncontroversial because it made it fit better with Wikipedia style guidelines. -- Michael Bednarek (talk) 13:18, 26 July 2010 (UTC)

Flipping a portrait is not a good idea, as no face is perfectly symmetrical. I don't see how the flipping of Ali's image makes it conform better to Wikipedia's guidelines. Actually, en:MOS:IMAGES is quite clear: "images should not be reversed simply to resolve a conflict between these guidelines; doing so misinforms the reader for the sake of our layout preferences". I'll go unflip the image straight away. Pruneautalk 14:05, 26 July 2010 (UTC)
That "rule" may apply to enwiki but image is used in other wikies as well. And the wikies has added this photo knowing that the image is "facing left". I think it is a bad idea to change a used image - it is better to upload a new version and let the wikis decide which image they will use. However I suggest the discussion is thaken in one place so we do not have to add comments both here and on the image talk page. --MGA73 (talk) 15:46, 26 July 2010 (UTC)
We should not have pictures of people knowingly mirrored; it's deceptive. Would we keep a picture of Andrew Jackson in place under that name if we knew that it was actually Andrew Johnson?--Prosfilaes (talk) 16:06, 26 July 2010 (UTC)
Issues of accuracy aside, flipped images should never be uploaded over the original image. They may be uploaded under a new filename, if some local wikis prefers to use the mirrored image. Commons does not usually make editorial decisions of this nature. Dcoetzee (talk) 17:41, 26 July 2010 (UTC)
Flipped images shouldn't be uploaded over the original images.
If an image is flipped (or "flopped" as en_wiki calls it), this should be clearly indicated in the file description. Please categorize them into Category:Flopped images. The seal mentioned there is a good sample of an image that should be flipped.
For portraits, one could argue that there isn't really any value in a flipped version and I wonder if we should be hosting them. File:Billykid.jpg would be an exception. In any case, which version Wikipedia uses shouldn't be discussed here, but there.  Docu  at 06:04, 27 July 2010 (UTC)
In my view, flipping flopping lateral inversion is either (1) for aesthetic purposes; or (2) to correct an earlier mistake. Action 2 is fine, but for action 1 the only images that should be laterally inverted are those of objects where the action has no potential to mislead. We really should not be flopping portraits of people, photographs of places, historical images, photographs of artworks, and the like as this will give an incorrect impression of the subjects featured. — Cheers, JackLee –talk– 06:52, 27 July 2010 (UTC)
I don't see how a mirrored portrait can have any educational value above the corerctly oriented version, in the absense of very specific image-related reasons (eg. to make mirrored text readable). Creating them purely to standardize the layout of biographical articles is blatantly unencyclopedic and should not be supported by Commons. --Latebird (talk) 12:47, 28 July 2010 (UTC)

File:Ice-cream.jpg duplicate title on en.wiki

Hi.. I want to use the File:Ice-cream.jpg from the COMMONS, but everytime I try to use it on the en.wiki, I get a different picture this. Help please. :( Tommy2010 (talk) 18:38, 27 July 2010 (UTC)

I moved the en.wiki image. It's now also here: File:Mablethorpe, Spanish city - Ice-cream.jpg. When some en.wiki admin has deleted the File:Ice-cream.jpg on enwiki you are able to link the commons image. Cheers --Saibo (Δ) 19:02, 27 July 2010 (UTC)
I've deleted the en image. —David Levy 19:11, 27 July 2010 (UTC)
Thank you!!! Tommy2010 (talk) 19:28, 27 July 2010 (UTC)

July 28

Redundant categories

Hello fellows!

These categories seem to be redundant: Category:Males with firearms and Category:People with guns. These cats must merged or linked somehow. Does anyone have an idea. --High Contrast (talk) 18:41, 28 July 2010 (UTC)

Are women not people? -mattbuck (Talk) 19:09, 28 July 2010 (UTC)
Are males not people? --High Contrast (talk) 19:33, 28 July 2010 (UTC)
Actually, the problem is Category:People with guns is redundant with Category:People with firearms. Rocket000 (talk) 19:38, 28 July 2010 (UTC)
Exactly. Mattbuck didn't want to recognize this. --High Contrast (talk) 19:45, 28 July 2010 (UTC)
ResolvedCategory:People with guns was redirected.

Oh Maria

I uploaded the following File:Maria in station Flaminio.jpg. I am surprised that I could not find a category of Maria statues. Smiley.toerist (talk) 19:44, 28 July 2010 (UTC)

Category:Statues of Virgin Mary Rocket000 (talk) 19:51, 28 July 2010 (UTC)

July 29

Which license

I uploaded File:Annals of the World.pdf, but I am not sure what license to use. It is a PDF version of Annals of the World on Wikisource. Can someone give me some assistance? Arlen22 (talk) 02:04, 29 July 2010 (UTC)

There's no reason for a mechanically generated copy of Wikisource pages to be on Commons. It can be regenerated as needed from the Wikisource files, and the regenerated version will contain any recent fixes found in the Wikisource files, unlike this PDF.--Prosfilaes (talk) 03:09, 29 July 2010 (UTC)

Plenary chambers

What are Plenary chambers? Would this include council chambers and parliamentary chambers? What else might it cover? Man vyi (talk) 05:31, 29 July 2010 (UTC)

Odd term to me, but a "plenary" is when a body meets as a whole, as against in committee, so I presume it would be the place where a legislature (or a house of a bicameral legislature) or a similar body meets as a whole. - Jmabel ! talk 16:14, 29 July 2010 (UTC)

Dictation category

I found a picture here that was of dication (File:Dictation of the Guru Granth Saheb.jpg) and was surprised there was no mention of dictation in the categories. Therefore I added it to Category:Dictation in Art (new), and added that to Category:Dictation (new), which I then added to the writing category. I also added Category:Dictation machines (not new) to the Dictation category. Just a heads up on these new categories. I have often had trouble finding what I want because of incomplete categorizing, so I hope this helps. Arlen22 (talk) 13:07, 29 July 2010 (UTC)

Easy way to list images in category that are in use?

Is there an easy way to list which images in a category are currently used in wikis? I tried catscan and gallery details, but neither seems to list file usage. MKFI (talk) 13:34, 28 July 2010 (UTC)

There is the Tool Bad Old Ones to handle deletion in Category:Unknown. That tool has this ability. Example for Category:Sandy_Bay,_Gibraltar: http://toolserver.org/~magnus/bad_old_ones.php?category=Sandy_Bay,_Gibraltar. Not the best sollution but maybe it helps you for small categories. --Martin H. (talk) 14:43, 28 July 2010 (UTC)
http://toolserver.org/~magnus/glamorous.php? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Tryphon (talk • contribs) 14:54, 28 July 2010 (UTC)
This tool has a bulk mode (usage of list of images (potentially coming from Catscan)). --Foroa (talk) 14:56, 28 July 2010 (UTC)
Thanks Tryphon for that tool, didnt know it so please forget about my lousy attempt ;) Great tool. --Martin H. (talk) 15:14, 28 July 2010 (UTC)

Thanks for the help. MKFI (talk) 10:19, 30 July 2010 (UTC)

Great but seems only to work with categories --Foroa (talk) 11:32, 30 July 2010 (UTC)

Correction of a template needed

Hi,

please let me know if I am not posting in the right place. The template {{PD-GallicaScan}} needs some updates specifically in order to correct the link to the Gallica website. Could an administrator handle this? More information was provided by Tachymètre on the template discussion page. Thanks by advance. Badzil (talk) 08:49, 30 July 2010 (UTC)

SVG translation guide

Based on this question... I tried to search for SVG translation/internationalization but nothing appeared in Commons namespace. I think will be good idea if folks with related experience will create guidelines for this topic. --EugeneZelenko (talk) 14:52, 30 July 2010 (UTC)

Maybe {{Translation possible}} is a help. It's linked from COM:SVG. --Saibo (Δ) 15:55, 30 July 2010 (UTC)

Microscopic organism images needing articles

Hi folks. I'm looking for images of microscopic organisms that need articles to be created for them. Is there an easy way to search for those? Please give me any advice you can here. Thanks very much. Anna Frodesiak (talk) 17:12, 30 July 2010 (UTC)

Rework of category display by wikimedia

As you can read here, it looks that there is a major rework of the category displays in the pipeline. Category displays that are crippled whenever there are more than 200 items and that have all sorts of sort problems. Maybe it is the moment to ask for additional filtering of the media (to start with): on file extension and potentially some tag based filtering (sound, movie, B&W) and possibly some dates or date ranges. --Foroa (talk) 21:37, 27 July 2010 (UTC)

Looks like a lot of sortkey stuff. I'm not convinced that it's that important for Commons.  Docu  at 05:29, 28 July 2010 (UTC)
To me, the basic problem is that category content pagination is global which makes it, in crowded categories, difficult to access a part of the image, gallery or category list; for example, one has no idea if there is a gallery in the category unless paginating through the whole bunch. So they need to reengineer it substantially to solve the problem of separate item type pages. --Foroa (talk) 07:30, 28 July 2010 (UTC)
Generally there is just one gallery in a category. Most of the time, a simple fix that would set the sortkey for galleries with "categoryname" = "galleryname" or "categoryname" = "galleryname"+"s" could take care of that.
cattree can take care of categories that combine subcategories and files. Apparently cattree is inefficient for the server side, but if we'd start fixing everything that's inefficient for the user side, we'd never get to this one.
If work is done on sortkey, maybe sorting by date an image was taken could be a category sort key option that is useful for Commons.  Docu  at 09:31, 29 July 2010 (UTC)
Check the theory on Category:Rock music groups, which is only beginning seriously, there are certainly more difficult cases. --Foroa (talk) 13:40, 29 July 2010 (UTC)
It just need about 30 new subcategories and it will be fine.  Docu  at 05:08, 30 July 2010 (UTC)
BTW, I filed Bugzilla:24613. It could be useful for other wikis too.  Docu  at 16:15, 31 July 2010 (UTC)

Free for all on Afghanistan images?!?

Is this really a good idea: {{PD-Afghanistan}}?

It is correct, as far as I know, that Afghanistan currently has no copyright laws and is not a party to any copyright treaties. But I could have sworn there was a past discussion (probably several years ago) that concluded that it was morally wrong to simply declare open season on works from Afghanistan. Not to mention that if they ever do adopt a copyright law and normalize international relations then most of this stuff is likely to be retroactively protected anyway. Isn't the country beaten up enough without our needing to appropriate all of their intellectual property? While maybe that tag is legally okay, it doesn't really seem consistent with the spirit of how we approach the treatment of international rights. Dragons flight (talk) 03:31, 28 July 2010 (UTC)

They can use anything from anywhere free of copyright. The amount of material that would be covered under Afghanistan copyright is minimal; Afghanistan does not produce many books or films. The appropriation for most purposes will be being done by them.--Prosfilaes (talk) 04:29, 28 July 2010 (UTC)
If you believe that control over one's own intellectual property is a natural right, and not just a legal one, then I'd say that justifying our exploitation of their deficient legal system on the basis that they might do likewise is still fundamentally immoral. If they had collectively chosen to intentionally ignore copyright, then I might feel differently, but I think it is safe to assume that their lack of copyright law is merely a reflection of the terrible conditions Afghanis face and not a deliberate choice. Dragons flight (talk) 15:50, 28 July 2010 (UTC)
I believe that (quoting RMS) "There is no such unified thing as “intellectual property”—it is a mirage... The term “intellectual property” is at best a catch-all to lump together disparate laws... These laws originated separately, evolved differently, cover different activities, have different rules, and raise different public policy issues." I believe the only aspect of copyright that is a natural right is basically CC-BY; an author has a right to attribution for his work and not to be attributed for what's not his, in perpetuity. Of course, current copyright law sucks at that. (Not that I'm knocking the economic value of copyright, but I don't elevate it to moral right.) Afghanistan has been an independent nation since 1919, and the Berne Convention has been available for them to sign for every one of those 91 years. The fact they didn't sign was a choice, and a very, very valuable choice to them, since they never have been an exporter of a significant amount of copyrighted work.--Prosfilaes (talk) 16:41, 28 July 2010 (UTC)
No offense, but I think there is a deep flaw in the reasoning in User:Dragons flight's initial query, and their comment of 15:50 above. I started a sub-heading, Is using Afghan images a kind of moral theft? User:Dragons flight asserts that Afghanistan's lack of copyright protection to a "deficient legal system". Afghanistan is a sovereign country, and it not up to the United Nations, the International Courts of Justice at the Hague, or any other International body to ram copyright protection done the throats of the Afghan people. I suggest it is absolutely not the role of the wikimedia foundation to decide Afghanistan has a "deficient legal system".
The comment of 15:50 goes on to say: "If they had collectively chosen to intentionally ignore copyright, then I might feel differently, but I think it is safe to assume that their lack of copyright law is merely a reflection of the terrible conditions Afghanis face and not a deliberate choice." This is not a safe assumption. I have done a lot of reading about Afghanistan in the last five years. I believe that Afghanistan's lack of copyright protection does reflect the views of the Afghan people as expressed through their elected representatives. Geo Swan (talk) 17:51, 29 July 2010 (UTC)
As noted below, representatives of the Afghani government have repeatedly stated (on multiple occasions over several years) that they intend to create a system that honors intellectual property. Dragons flight (talk) 21:45, 29 July 2010 (UTC)
In politics different factions hold different positions. I believe there is a US Congressional representative who, for decades, had tried to introduce legislation for the USA to have universal health care, like every other nation in the industrialized world. But he did not have support for that legislation, and it did not get introduced. I never doubted that the Afghan legislature included individuals with a westernized education, who believed in "progress", and were in favor of westernized copyright protection. And, if those factions can convince enough of the more conservative factions to sign on board, and pass the legislation, we will have to deprecate {{PD-Afghanistan}} Geo Swan (talk) 18:51, 30 July 2010 (UTC)
It is important to understand that this only affects material first published in Afghanistan. Just because eg. a photograph was made there does not make it Public Domain. The template should probably be modified to explicitly explain this ("Work of Afghanistan" is not a legally meaningful term). --Latebird (talk) 10:21, 28 July 2010 (UTC)
Even more restrictive than that -- only material first published in Afghanistan by Afghan authors. If first published, even in Afghanistan, by an author from a Berne Convention country, the technical "country of origin" is then the country the author is from. "country of origin" is only the country of first publication if that nation is a Berne signatory. Carl Lindberg (talk) 14:27, 28 July 2010 (UTC)
Is it "first published", or "only published"? I was under the impression that works published in non-treaty countries by citizens of those countries, functionally didn't count as published under the law. And, that consequently, any future act of publication in a treaty country still counted as an act of first publication, even if it were far removed in time from the original publication in the non-treaty country. If that understanding is correct, then if an Afghani ever publishes a work in a treaty country then that work qualifies for copyright protection, regardless of when it may have been published in Afghanistan. Dragons flight (talk) 15:50, 28 July 2010 (UTC)
The Berne Convention, article 3 says "(1) The protection of this Convention shall apply to: (a) authors who are nationals of one of the countries of the Union, for their works, whether published or not; (b) authors who are not nationals of one of the countries of the Union, for their works first published in one of those countries, or simultaneously in a country outside the Union and in a country of the Union." Since simultaneously is within 30 days, and IMO uploading to Flikr or Commons or Internet Archive would satisfy the requirements for publication in a country of the Union, we're actually talking about a small set of locally published materials.--Prosfilaes (talk) 16:41, 28 July 2010 (UTC)
Thanks for the clarification. Anyone want to take a stab at improving {{PD-Afghanistan}} to at least be more precise about what works it applies to? Dragons flight (talk) 17:28, 28 July 2010 (UTC)
{{lang|en|''This work is in the '''[[w:Public domain|public domain]]''' in the United States because it is a work first published in Afghanistan, not published within 30 days in [[:File:Berne Convention signatories.svg|a country that has signed the Berne Convention]], and by an Afgani national or the national of another country that has not signed the Berne Convention.}}
I'd add some comments about the potential to be deleted when Afghanistan adopts copyright law, and note about Flikr or Commons or IA probably being proper publication in a Berne Convention country to the discussion page or a /Doc page. Opinions?--Prosfilaes (talk) 18:12, 28 July 2010 (UTC)
I would suggest that rearranging the phrases makes it easier to read, i.e. "This work is in the '''[[w:Public domain|public domain]]''' in the United States because it is a work first published in Afghanistan by an Afgani national or the national of another country that has not signed the Berne Convention, and the work was not also published within 30 days in [[:File:Berne Convention signatories.svg|a country that has signed the Berne Convention]]. I also agree that having a discussion below the template would be a good thing. Either in the discussion, or in the template itself, it is probably good to retain the link to Afghanistan and copyright issues. Dragons flight (talk) 20:31, 28 July 2010 (UTC)
eh, not a good one. While I don't think the Berne Convention defines publication, it is surely not as complicated as the U.S. definition (which has no bearing on the Berne Convention). But selling artwork (or even just offering for sale) is generally publishing it, even in the U.S., regardless if there are multiple copies. Those would certainly seem to be first published in Afghanistan by an Afghan artist. Not simultaneously published elsewhere either, since that act was not done by the copyright owner (if such even exists in this case). Carl Lindberg (talk) 03:25, 29 July 2010 (UTC)
The Berne Convention, so you can see what it has to say about the subject. The US definition certainly has to do with whether it's out of copyright in the US. Selling the original can't be publication, because it can be legally done by someone not the author. If Salinger had sent you a letter, you could sell it, but you couldn't publish it.--Prosfilaes (talk) 03:46, 29 July 2010 (UTC)
The simple act of the original author offering the work for sale to the public is publishing it, by the U.S. definition. It appears those were sold in Afghanistan, by the author -- did I miss something? Not copyrighted in the U.S. from what I can tell. Private letters is different -- that is limited publication, not general (by the wonderful U.S. definitions). Carl Lindberg (talk) 03:51, 29 July 2010 (UTC)
The simple act of the original author offering copies of the work for sale "provided that the availability of such copies has been such as to satisfy the reasonable requirements of the public".--Prosfilaes (talk) 04:21, 29 July 2010 (UTC)
Yes. The U.S. considers the original a "copy". The nature of the work also needs to be taken into account -- paintings like that are generally expected to have just one real copy -- that is "reasonable requirements of the public" to me. The author received expected economic compensation for it; this is the normal way such works are exploited. I really don't see how "country of origin" can change based on the nationality of a purchaser -- Berne Convention to me would clearly still have this as an Afghani work. U.S. definitions as well. Carl Lindberg (talk) 04:43, 29 July 2010 (UTC)
  • I have raised the issue of images from Afghanistan, on the village pump, at least half a dozen times, and participated in dozens of discussions of this issue, elsewhere. User:Dragons flight, the initiator of this thread thinks they remember a consensus to hold off from using Afghan images, not because they were actually protected, but out of respect for the photographers moral rights. Well, I don't reemmber this consensus, from the dozen of times I have seen Afghan images discussed.

    IMO it would really be a good idea if the wikimedia foundation sought the professional opinion of a lawyer, or lawyers, who specialize in intellectual property law, to sort out, once and for all, the status of images taken in Afghanistan. The law can be wildly counter-intuitive. I strongly suspect Afghan images will turn out to be an area with counter-intuitive elements. Geo Swan (talk) 17:27, 29 July 2010 (UTC)

For record, I am pretty sure the discussion I believe I remember is much older than the {{PD-Afghanistan}} tag (which was created in 2008). If I had to guess I would say it was probably 2005 or 2006. Of a similar vintage, but probably slightly more recent than discussions that decided to respect the local copyright laws of countries that have no copyright treaties with the US (like Iran). Dragons flight (talk) 22:01, 29 July 2010 (UTC)
The earliest discussions I was a party to also preceded the creation of the {{PD-Afghanistan}} tag. Geo Swan (talk) 13:22, 31 July 2010 (UTC)
With Afghanistan having no copyright law whatsoever, the law seems pretty clear there (i.e. there is no protection whatsoever), unless there is some sort of judicial history we are unaware of. But the Berne Convention is equally clear on works merely *taken* there; that fact is almost irrelevant, as it is the country of first publication which matters most, followed by nationality of the author. And the Berne Convention definition is the one that Commons uses to determine "public domain in the country of origin". Carl Lindberg (talk) 11:56, 30 July 2010 (UTC)

Is using Afghan images a kind of moral theft?

User:Dragons flight wrote, in the initial comment above:

"Isn't the country beaten up enough without our needing to appropriate all of their intellectual property? While maybe that tag is legally okay, it doesn't really seem consistent with the spirit of how we approach the treatment of international rights."

No offense, but it seems to me that this comment, which I have read in several similar discussions, is based on a kind of unrecognized cultural ethnocentrocism. In the developed world, and in the developing world, we have a very strong belief in "progress". We believe that Science and Technology are good things, that they lead to positive developments, that benefit the public, in general. This idea is so embedded in our culture that it is almost inconceivable that other cultures may not believe in progress, at all.

But some other cultures genuinely to not believe in progress.

The whole premise of our protections of intellectual property rights, copyright, patents, is based on the assumption that progress is good, and that it benefits the public in general. Copyright holders, and patent holders, get to control how their creations, their intellectual property, is used, so that they can make money from it, and finance their initial creations and future creations -- which in turn will benefit the public in general.

The Taliban were very culturall conservative. Let musical composers benefit from new works of music, so they could continue creating new musical works? Well they outlawed music. Painters worked under extreme restrictions too. The Taliban came from a philosophy that did not believe in progress. And it wasn't just the Taliban that felt that way. Many of the warlords in the Northern Alliance, now members of the National Assembly, share this view.

Russell Peters shares one of the funniest things about being a comedian whose humor focusses on different ethnic groups. Not funny ha-ha, but funny peculiar, is that the only people who complain that the humor he offers about people from India and Pakistan, from Africa, from the far east, are white people. Indians, Asians and Africans are his biggest fans. He says it is as if the white people who complain, are telling his fans, "It is okay, you are too stupid to understand, but we will protect you."

I see something similar going on here. Afghanistan is not a colonly. It is a sovereign country. And the Afghan people are entitled, through their elected representatives, to sign on to International agreements to protect intellectual property, and to pass a domestic copyright law. The Afghan people should do so if a majority of them make clear to their elected representatives that they do, in fact, believe in progress, and believe that individuals who compose music, paint paintings, or take pictures, should benefit from doing so, so they can keep on creating. If a majority of the Afghan people do not believe in progress, do not want to hear new music, see new paintings, new photos, do not think new work benefits the Afghan people in general, they should not pass these laws.

It is not up to the wikimedia foundation to protect rights the Afghan people seem to have rejected. I suggest it is culturally insensitive to protect those rights. It is a kind of cultural imperialism. It is as if we were saying to them: "You are too stupid to pass the right laws to protect yourselves. That is OK, we will protect you against yourselves."

So, no, I absolutely do not agree that using Afghan images is either actual theft, or some kind of moral theft. Geo Swan (talk) 17:29, 29 July 2010 (UTC)

I don't think it is cultural imperialism to assume the Afghanis want intellectual property laws given that the Afghani government has repeatedly said they intend to create laws honoring intellectual property. If the Afghan government had said they intend to ignore copyright, then I would be happy to honor that, but that does not appear to be their intent. If the country were domestically stable then the absence of action on the issue might be a good indicator, but given their past and ongoing violence and the novelty of their current system of government (formed in 2004), I am inclined to accept their stated position on the issue and simply assume they just haven't gotten around to it legislatively. Dragons flight (talk) 21:38, 29 July 2010 (UTC)
Telling us what you intend to do doesn't carry nearly as much weight as doing it. Politicians tell each group what they want to hear, and what WIPO and much of the US government want to hear is that Afghanistan is going to recognize the copyrights of Hollywood and the RIAA the world. Given the amount of money that the US and WTO will give struggling countries on the condition of having strong copyright protections, I'm sure Afghanistan will pass those laws sooner or later, but I have serious doubts that it will have anything to do with Afghanis actually wanting those laws.--Prosfilaes (talk) 22:16, 29 July 2010 (UTC)
I believe policy is to respect whatever copyright law a country has, even if not a member of the Berne Convention or Universal Copyright Convention (within reason -- not sure we would respect a perpetual copyright or something like that). So, as soon as Afghanistan creates some sort of copyright law, we would start respecting it. As mentioned though, they haven't done that in their entire existence, let alone join in one of the two main copyright treaties, which was pretty obviously a deliberate choice, so at the moment it is pretty clear -- there is no copyright there (which, conversely, means they can copy foreign works there at will, which is probably to their overall benefit right now). If an Afghan author takes care to first publish a work in a foreign country, that is one way their authors can gain protection. We need to host works which are "free", which in a way is the national policy in Afghanistan, so we can use works first published there (by Afghan authors). Carl Lindberg (talk) 11:45, 30 July 2010 (UTC)
PS. Regardless of how you feel about the general issues involved here, I do hope we can work together to at least clarify when the tag applies, as discussed in the sections above. Dragons flight (talk) 22:19, 29 July 2010 (UTC)

The Tansey Collection of Miniatures

Hi. The Tansey Collection of Miniatures have a large collection of 17th, 18th and 19th century miniature portrait paintings in high resolution. The paintings are definitely within our scope, and would be a great addition to the commons. I have therefore uploaded some of them here, but since there are so many and the frames needs to be cropped to make them eligible for PD-Art, some help would be appreciated. Cheers —P. S. Burton (talk) 10:36, 29 July 2010 (UTC)

You can try a request for Commons:Batch uploading. I assume mostly paintings of known people or by known artists would be in scope. --Jarekt (talk) 14:14, 29 July 2010 (UTC)
I would presume the frames are mostly contemporary with the images & wouldn't need to be cropped. - Jmabel ! talk 16:16, 29 July 2010 (UTC)
Generally we've done because frames are 3d-objects and thus photographs of them are potentially copyrightable. There may be a bit of copyright paranoia there, but those making copies of old paintings and photographs are potentially hostile rights-claimers and historically strong ones, and cutting out those frames cuts out a potential legal argument against us.--Prosfilaes (talk) 16:31, 29 July 2010 (UTC)
Thanks for the answers, I will try asking at Commons:Batch uploading. —P. S. Burton (talk) 17:23, 29 July 2010 (UTC)
I have commented there (I think it would be courteous to contact the curators of the collection and ask them about this), but wanted to note here as well that I think cropping in such cases puts copyright concerns above encyclopedic and educational concerns. In many cases, the frame of an artwork is part of its provenance and history, and cropping should be avoided or done with care. The original should always be uploaded to allow comparison, and should be linked to where uploading is not possible. More generally, though, I have concerns in that there are cases where a printed reference work would publish an image of an artwork with its frame, and where we would crop we are falling short of the standards that should be applied in such areas. Compare File:Mona Lisa.jpg with this. Does the Mona Lisa get printed in paper encyclopedias without its frame? I genuinely don't know and would be interested to find out (the en-wiki article Mona Lisa has a bit on the history of the frame: The Mona Lisa has had many different decorative frames in its history, owing to changes in taste over the centuries. In 1906, the countess of Béarn gave the portrait its current frame, a Renaissance-era work consistent with the historical period of the Mona Lisa. The edges of the painting have been trimmed at least once in its history to fit the picture into various frames, but no part of the original paint layer has been trimmed.). For these miniatures, the frames form part of the piece in my opinion, and ideally photographs of them would include the frames, which is why I would suggest asking for access to photograph the miniatures or asking for the photographs of the miniatures to be freely licensed. More generally, this falls under the heading again of when it is suitable to crop and when it isn't, and I'll expand on that in the section I started on that elsewhere. Carcharoth (Commons) (talk) 06:47, 31 July 2010 (UTC)

Replacing a file I'm the author of

This is actually a multi-part question, but it's all related...

I would like to replace a file that I am the author of with a higher quality version. How do I do that? There's probably a procedure for that and I'm not sure where to find it.

Second part: somebody else uploaded the file from wikipedia, not me. Does that pose unique problems?

Thanks in advance, Micahmedia (talk) 08:03, 30 July 2010 (UTC)

Somewhere on the description page there is a link to overright the old with a new version. --Mbdortmund (talk) 08:56, 30 July 2010 (UTC)
Well, if you are properly credited as the author and copyright holder, and it's just an higher resolution version of that image, I can't see why you shouldn't. On the file page, just below the thumbnails displaying version history, there's a link to upload a new version of the same file. If by "higher quality" you mean an higher resolution version of the same image, I'd say there shouldn't be any problem, except that image annotations won't display (because of the size change). On the other hand, if by "higher quality" you mean something else, please consider uploading under a different file name, and perhaps declare the former image superseded (via {{Superseded}}). --Ianezz (talk) 09:14, 30 July 2010 (UTC)
I am properly credited on both here and WP, but I uploaded it to WP and somebody else copied it over to here. Yeah, a little larger and higher quality setting for the jpeg compression. I don't see the link to upload a new version. All I see is "edit with external..." Thanks for responding! If I can't get it going tomorrow, I'll just upload and mark the old one for deletion/superseded. Micahmedia (talk) 10:18, 30 July 2010 (UTC)
Usually, new users need to wait four days after signing up to be able to upload a new version of an image. I've just transferred you to the "confirmed" group of users, which will give you the rights you need. You should now see a link "Upload a new version of this file" in the File history section of the image page. Pruneautalk 12:21, 30 July 2010 (UTC)
Thanks everybody! Mission accomplished. Micahmedia (talk) 20:11, 30 July 2010 (UTC)

Misunderstanding (?)

I've recently uploaded some pictures of DJ Sava and Heaven and now i don't understand why they're going to be deleted... I officially manage these artists (virtually) and i have received the rights to use the photos legally. What am i supposed to do now? - Divercitycafe (talk) 14:58, 30 July 2010 (UTC)

The notice that was added to File:Dj_Sava.jpg indicates what you need to do to clarify permission. See COM:OTRS for more details. The problem is, of course, anyone could have uploaded this image that is already on the web. We need an email with clear and explicit permission. - Jmabel ! talk 15:59, 30 July 2010 (UTC)
(ec) First of all: thank you for uploading! I think best is if you could send an email as described here: Commons:Email_templates. This is needed to be sure that you are the copyright holder. Do you own really all rights of these pictures? Cheers --Saibo (Δ) 16:04, 30 July 2010 (UTC)

Further question

Divercitycafe's confusion above raises a question for me: shouldn't {{No permission since}} include a link to COM:OTRS? And, if not, why not? - Jmabel ! talk 16:01, 30 July 2010 (UTC)

Hmm, it includes a link to Commons:Email templates. Sufficient in my eyes (and includes a link to COM:OTRS). COM:OTRS is not very helpful to a newbie, is it? Cheers --Saibo (Δ) 16:07, 30 July 2010 (UTC)
There is a link to OTRS in {{Image permission}}, which was added to Divercitycafe's user talk page. Personally, I'm quite puzzled as to why someone, after reading the texts of both those templates, would ask "what am I supposed to do now?" —LX (talk, contribs) 08:57, 31 July 2010 (UTC)

More Tropenmuseum images

Hi everyone, I just finished uploading another batch of images as part of the Tropenmuseum partnership. The latest batch contained mostly images of objects in their collection like shields, swords, wayang and a lot more. Most of the images are still in one or more temporary categories. If you feel like helping: Please find real categories for these images :-). Thank you, Multichill (talk) 19:35, 30 July 2010 (UTC)

They take such careful photographs but then release them at a width of only 800px? Such a shame. But thanks for the uploads, they look great. --99of9 (talk) 04:57, 31 July 2010 (UTC)

July 31

Are people from places or are they of places?

I would like to invite anyone interested to comment on Commons:Categories for discussion/2010/07/Category:People by country. It's about whether people categories should be called "People from <location>" or "People of <location>". You'll see we are very inconsistent if you look through Category:People categories by country. By "people" I don't mean just the literal word "people" in the title but anything that refers to people (with some exceptions). This will possibly affect a large number of categories so please voice your opinion. Thanks. Rocket000 (talk) 02:51, 31 July 2010 (UTC)

Personally, I think either "People from location" or "People of location" is fine; we should just pick one and stick to it. If I had to choose, I'd say from. A related problem is how to categorize people who originate from one location but are photographed in another location (perhaps because they have emigrated there and have lived there for some time). Do we call them people from or of the location in which they are photographed? Or maybe we should use categories like "Category:Immigrants" and "Category:People by descent". — Cheers, JackLee –talk– 06:56, 31 July 2010 (UTC)

Some odd categories

Do any images like photographs of buildings belong directly in Category:Classification systems or Category:GIS? If so, what does inclusion in these categories mean? Because there are a lot in each of them, and I don't understand on what basis. - Jmabel ! talk 06:06, 31 July 2010 (UTC)

That's a definite "no" from me. The photographs of buildings are wrongly categorized. — Cheers, JackLee –talk– 06:31, 31 July 2010 (UTC)
It seems to be something that CategorizationBot and File Upload Bot (Magnus Manske) have mistakenly added to files which are used in articles that have geocoding templates. Several of those bot moves have ostensibly been checked by users who clearly fail to follow the steps described in Commons:Moving to Commons#Check the image. —LX (talk, contribs) 08:49, 31 July 2010 (UTC)
Looks like enwp mixes tracker categories and source categories, so it goes like this: File:Joplin Carnegie Library.jpg -> en:National Register of Historic Places listings in Missouri, Counties J–K -> en:Category:Geographic coordinate lists -> en:Category:Geocodes
-> en:Category:Classification systems -> Category:Classification systems
-> en:Category:Geographic information systems -> Category:GIS
I blacklisted the categories so that will prevent CategorizationBot from adding it. File Upload Bot (Magnus Manske) on the other hand will still add it as long as this situation is not changed at enwp.
I'll do some cleanup as described on User:CategorizationBot#How to fix the flooding of a category? Multichill (talk) 09:34, 31 July 2010 (UTC)
✓ Done. Multichill (talk) 10:18, 31 July 2010 (UTC)
Would you make sure that this will work in the future? This was reported on User talk:CategorizationBot on before and shouldn't really have happened again.
Oddly I can't find the bug report there. Somehow archiving of your bot's talk page is broken or inconsistent with the information given there.  Docu  at 10:37, 31 July 2010 (UTC)
Most of the images in these categories were uploaded and categorized by User:File Upload Bot (Magnus Manske). I don't control that bot. Multichill (talk) 11:20, 31 July 2010 (UTC)
@Docu: It is a Wiki so anyone can fix such problem as described in User:CategorizationBot#How to fix the flooding of a category?. I do not think we shoul make the botoperators responsible for checking all images uploaded by a bot or categorized by a bot. The bots are an offer of assistance and the alternative is that bots are disabled and all images are categorized by hand. If someone volounteer to do that I'm sure botoperaters would not mind to disable the bots. There is a lot of categories to check in Category:Media needing category review. The ones to blame is the users that transfer images because they SHOULD do as described in Commons:Moving to Commons#Check the image. --MGA73 (talk) 11:40, 31 July 2010 (UTC)
IMHO the usual per bot policy should do ("The bot operator is responsible for the prompt repair of any damage caused by a bot which operates incorrectly. Bot operators must ensure that they make themselves available for dealing with user queries relating to the bot, and that they promptly fix any identified bugs.").
BTW would someone fix the archiving of the bot's talk page? The current situation makes it really difficult to track which bugs have already been identified.  Docu  at 17:05, 31 July 2010 (UTC)

When to crop and when not to crop

I recently came across some examples of cropping that seemed unnecessary. I will list three examples here. If there is a better place to discuss this, please move this post there.

  • (1) File:German stamp- Marlene Dietrich.jpg cropped to form File:German stamp- Marlene Dietrich crop.PNG. There are two issues here that I see (already discussed at a deletion discussion, but worth bringing out here in more detail, I think):
    • (a) The claim that the German copyright statements require the stamps to be displayed complete.
    • (b) My contention that cropping the stamps transforms the image too much and serves no useful purpose. Any use of the cropped stamps can just as well be served by the stamp image or by a photograph of the person in the image. In this deletion debate, the example was given of de:Heinz Rühmann, which back in 2007 did not have a free lead image so the stamp was used. But now, in 2010, the lead image is this one and the stamp is only used further down the article, hence cropping the stamp is not needed here. Similarly, for Marlene Dietrich, it is possible to use this image or this image or this image, so a crop of the stamp is not needed and will likely be an orphan.
  • (2) Sometimes people crop images to remove copyrighted elements. If incidental parts of an image are cropped to remove such elements, that is normally fine, but I recently came across an example where a central part of a photo was removed, leaving a big white square. I don't think such a cropping technique should be used, and I can't think of any case where a photo cropped in such a way would be useful. The example here is this image which was centrally blanked/cropped to form this image. Apart from anything else, I think it is disrespectful to crop out elements of a memorial like that, but more generally, I think such cropping is just not very useful, no matter how free the resulting image is.
  • (3) My third and final example is Template:NoFoP-France. This template says "Framing this image to focus on the copyrighted work is also a copyright violation." I agree with this, but others have told me that for images to be free enough to use on Commons, you need to be able to crop the images. Who is correct?

Given the examples above, would a guideline on cropping be useful? It would cover things such as when cropping is strictly not allowed and when cropping might not be needed (even if technically allowed) and when cropping is allowed and useful and produces images that will be widely used by the WMF projects (as opposed to used for other purposes - my contention being that if the crop is used by the WMF projects it should be hosted here, but if not then the crop should be hosted externally). It would also cover aspects such as cropping to produce a tighter focus, cropping to frame a picture, cropping to extract elements from an image (usually transforming the image in the process), and cropping to remove elements around the edge of an image (whether damage to the image or correcting poor composition). A guideline could also try and mention that cropping should be respectful to what is being shown in the image (per the memorial example above). Maybe such a guideline already exists? If not, would it be useful to write one? Carcharoth (Commons) (talk) 02:21, 27 July 2010 (UTC)

Only two comments: (2) is simply an stupid upload, that photo is not usefull and out of scope. For (3) you must involve the de minimis argumentation, you can modify the image as long as the de minimis argument is not broken. --Martin H. (talk) 02:40, 27 July 2010 (UTC)
I agree that a policy (or at least a guideline) regarding cropping would be helpful. As I wrote in this edit, 'If we had image tags that would let us crop in wikitext, perhaps "There is little point in doing crops such as this in any case" might make some sense, but we would have to teach everyone who is using crops how to crop in wikitext. Many original photographers leave a large margin for error when composing their photographs, with the thought "I can always crop it later" - this was what I was taught in photography class. To prefer full images with EXIF metadata, and not allow cropping, flies in the face of classic photography.'   — Jeff G. ツ 02:41, 27 July 2010 (UTC)
The capability to crop in wikitext (named "allow cropping images when rendered") is the subject of Bugzilla: 7757.   — Jeff G. ツ 19:57, 31 July 2010 (UTC)
Technicalities like that might be better discussed in the section below, where I made this comment. Carcharoth (Commons) (talk) 22:09, 31 July 2010 (UTC)
Courtesy link: Commons:Deletion requests/File:German stamp- Marlene Dietrich crop.PNG. Your crop (1) is manifestly useful, since it illustrates the person and not the stamp, but its legality appears to be uncertain. There are three positions we can take here: 1. both are free; 2. the cropped version should be deleted since it's not free but the original version should be retained; 3. both should be deleted, since we require any work on Commons to allow derivative works, and the cropped version is non-free. This is a largely unexplored area of inclusion policy - the de minimis cropping exception is well-established, but the one you describe in (1) is not and should be the subject of wider policy discussion. Another similar issue arises with currency (see Commons:Currency), where some countries require electronic copies of currency to be "clearly marked" as not actual notes (I think we currently reject this kind of currency image, but I may be overlooking something). My own position is that, besides the established de minimis exception, any image prohibiting some type of derivative work should be excluded from Commons (but not necessarily from local wikis).
For (2), we are legally obligated to remove copyrighted elements from images if they are not de minimis, regardless of the impact on image quality - for example we routinely crop frames from PD-Art images. Whether it should be removed in a very obvious manner or "painted over" with a plausible background is a matter for the uploader to decide. I don't agree with Martin H that File:Korean War Veterans Memorial Without Soldiers.jpg is necessarily out of scope - it usefully depicts the text in front of the monument and its surroundings. Dcoetzee (talk) 02:43, 27 July 2010 (UTC)
To explain my judgement: One can think of way better modifications, e.g. blurred out soldiers, but not a white rectangle in the center of the image. --Martin H. (talk) 02:52, 27 July 2010 (UTC)
My view is that modifications of this nature (even blurring) are akin to desecrating the memorial (strong view, but put yourself in the position of a veteran of that conflict viewing the photo and seeing the memorial to their sacrifice airbrushed out). Though I'm also aware that some may say that the US government not ensuring the memorial is in the public domain is also disrespectful to the memory of those it commemorates (and I'd agree with that as well). I may eventually nominate the image for deletion, as I think this is a situation of all or nothing. Either have the whole image, or nothing. And the elements that are useful (such as the text and surroundings) can be cropped out separately or someone can go and take a new photo. Incidentally, the main inscription on the memorial says "Freedom is not Free", which I thought people here might appreciate even in an ironic sense. Carcharoth (Commons) (talk) 02:59, 27 July 2010 (UTC)
(2) I strongly support retouches like this (of course it was better to pixelate or to blur out the memorial, but it's not the point). While the main object of the photograph was removed, the photograph is still useful, it provides useful context for a reader -- general look & feel of the location where the object is placed. Surroundings of the objects like this have value for themselves, and often it's just impossible to photograph surroundings without a very prominent depiction (not de minimis) of a copyrighted object (some small square, and a large sculpture in the center). Trycatch (talk) 14:41, 27 July 2010 (UTC)
Rather than upset people who would object to pictures of memorials being altered in that fashion, why not just link to the picture as an external link? I do this all the time in articles where non-free images are needed to give the reader a balanced range of imagery (often, limiting yourself to free pictures compromises the ideal of comprehensive visual coverage, and in some cases even compromises NPOV). I've done this for the article on en-wikipedia, so that makes any arguments about blurring or blanking the central part of this picture unnecessary now. Carcharoth (Commons) (talk) 23:37, 27 July 2010 (UTC)
Everything could be replaced with something (using Google Images is generally more handy than clicking numerous external links), photographs like this gives Wikipedia editors and editors of Commons galleries a choice. Commons is not censored, and hosts much more disturbing and upsetting photographs than a cropped photograph of the copyrighted memorial. Trycatch (talk) 08:38, 28 July 2010 (UTC)
To take two separate points you raise:
(a) Google Images is more handy than clicking numerous external links? I think you misunderstood. External links should be reserved only for the non-free images that are essential for a more complete understanding of a topic, and usually only where the copyright status is clear (you would normally link to a website hosted by the copyright holder, or to an official archive or library hosting page, in cases where the copyright status is not clear enough for Commons, but OK in terms of being published on an external website). Google Images is for indiscriminate searching. Wikipedia articles should assemble the most appropriate collection of free images and links to non-free images that is needed for the best encyclopedia article possible.
(b) You say Commons is not censored and there are shocking image that we host. This is true, but the shocking element of those pictures is created by others, not added by our actions. There is a difference between uploading a shocking picture and altering a picture (in a way that might upset others) and then uploading it. The irony, also, is that some people would see placing a big white rectangle over those statues as a form of censorship in itself! I realise that it is not really censorship (as this is a matter of copyright), but can you see how people might mistake it for censorship?
(c) There is a situation where this would be censorship, and that is where you provide only the cropped picture and fail to provide a link to the uncropped photo. In this case, the cropped photo gives a link to the original, but there are some situations where providing a link to the uncropped photo would be a linkvio. In those cases, how do you verify that the crop is accurate and genuine?
Anyway, I suspect this is moot for the cropped photo, as it is likely to remain an orphan. Carcharoth (Commons) (talk) 22:47, 28 July 2010 (UTC)

Cropping non-free image to extract free elements

After coming across another example of cropping, I wanted to check whether it is OK to crop a non-free image to extract the free elements of the image? The canonical example of this is cropping third-party pictures of PD artworks in frames (because photographs of 3D frames are considered copyrightable by the photographer due to considerations of lighting and angle and composition). My question is whether, since it is not considered acceptable to crop a free image to create a non-free image, whether it is acceptable to crop a non-free image to create a free image? i.e. Should the source of a free image be free or not, and can an image obtained from a non-free source be considered free? The examples here are the stamp above (image 1 was cropped to form image 2) and PD artworks such as the Mona Lisa (image 1 was cropped to produce image 2). I suppose an even simpler way of putting my question is whether you need permission (a license) to crop a non-free image to produce a free one? Are there cases where it would not be permissible to do this? e.g. a press agency photograph that included a PD sculpture or artwork couldn't be cropped to extract an image of that artwork? Carcharoth (Commons) (talk) 07:07, 31 July 2010 (UTC)

Of course it's permissible to copy non-copyrighted elements of copyrighted material. You can't crop a photo to just a PD sculpture, because the photo of a PD sculpture is copyrighted.--Prosfilaes (talk) 17:29, 31 July 2010 (UTC)
Sorry, I got confused for a moment there. The example I should have used was a copyrighted photograph taken in an art gallery that includes PD 2D artworks. If the image is of high-enough resolution that images of the artworks can be cropped and usefully used separately, is that permissible? It feels a bit like cannibalising other people's work instead of trying to get someone to take a new photo and release it under a free license. If the cropping does no more than remove frames or make the composition tighter, that feels different from taking a small but free portion of the copyrighted photograph and saying that it is OK to use that. I guess what I am saying is that cropping and extracting elements from an image depends on: (a) how much cropping is done; (b) the reason for cropping; (c) the usefulness and resolution of the resulting image. If you end up with a very low resolution crop, it is unlikely to be of much use. If the crop removes important elements of the object being photographed and gives a misleading impression of what is left, it is unlikely to be of much use. If the crop changes the focus of the image, care needs to be taken. What I want is to try and get a general agreement that care needs to be taken when cropping or altering images, and that a clear reason should be given, not just "it is free, so I can crop/alter this image however I like". In other words, to improve the standards of cropping and other alterations. Some sorts of alterations will result in images with educational uses that are in COM:SCOPE, and some alterations will result in images that are no longer in COM:SCOPE. I think the former sort of alterations can be hosted on Commons, but if people make alterations that take images outside of COM:SCOPE then they should host the images elsewhere. Is that reasonable or not? Is there a list somewhere of the main sort of alterations people make to images? If there is, I could come up with more examples of where alterations are (obviously) allowed under the license, but how the alterations result in images outside of COM:SCOPE (the scope of Wikimedia Commons). Carcharoth (Commons) (talk) 17:57, 31 July 2010 (UTC)
You're conflating issues. Whether it's useful or not is not connected to whether we can legally do it. We don't host images that are out of our scope. I see the discussion of what alterations we should be doing as a productive one: see for example Commons:Village_pump#Image_flipping. But I'd rather not start it in a thread about crops of non-free images; the subject is just too confused.--Prosfilaes (talk) 18:53, 31 July 2010 (UTC)
OK. Thanks for agreeing that is is productive to discuss what alterations we should be doing. I'll try and assemble my thoughts and examples in a more coherent manner in some sort of essay and then ask for feedback on that. Carcharoth (Commons) (talk) 19:07, 31 July 2010 (UTC)

Need search link and category search link in sidebar to open in new tabs

Where do I go to request that there be a search link (not a blank search form) in the sidebar? This way people can right-click it and open the search form in a new tab.

This way one does not cover the page one is reading as when a search is made from the top-right search form.

Also need a sidebar search link (not a blank search form) for category search. --Timeshifter (talk) 22:15, 31 July 2010 (UTC)

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