Commons talk:Guidance for paid editors/Initial discussion

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Initial discussion from Commons:Village pump[edit]

This section was moved here from Special:Permalink/127673604#Guidance for corporate editors. —LX (talk, contribs) 15:48, 28 June 2014 (UTC)[reply]
The following discussion is archived. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section.

Alrighty, so we passed Commons:Paid contribution disclosure policy. (Could someone remove the Watchlist notice?) That may be okay as a policy, I think we need a more detailed guideline to help those editing on behalf of organisations understand what is expected of them. I frequently see corporate editors make a particular set of mistakes that are characteristic of their specific situation. While most of the information exists in other policies and guidelines, I believe they would benefit from having it all in one place. I believe advice for this group should include:

  • Don't use the company name as your user name. Accounts should not be shared between more than one individual, so a company name is not a suitable user name. Your user name may include the company name, but it should identify you as an individual using your name or nickname.
  • Know our policies – and your company's policies. Commons only hosts content that can be used, modified and shared by anyone for any purpose, including commercial purposes. If you want to share content on behalf of your company through Commons, all of those things must be allowed. Before uploading content here, make sure that it has already been released elsewhere under a free license or that you are allowed by your company's rules to publish it under a free license that meets our licensing requirements.
  • You may be required to disclose your affiliation with the company on other Wikimedia projects. Unlike many other Wikimedia projects, Commons does not require disclosure of paid contributions. However, if you want to include content that you have uploaded on Commons in an article on English Wikipedia, for example, you need to follow the rules on that project.
  • You may need to provide evidence of your affiliation with the company. While we don't require disclosure of paid contributions as a matter of policy, you may still need to identify your connection to the company for copyright reasons. If you upload content for which the copyright is held by your company, you will need to send an e-mail from a company address to our permission archive and certify that you are allowed to speak on behalf of the company on copyright matters.
  • "Own work" means a work that you personally created. If you are uploading a work on behalf of your company that someone else created, choose the option "This file is not my own work."
  • Sharing logotypes correctly: If your company's logotype meets threshold of originality required for copyright protection, it needs to be published under a free license in order to be hosted on Commons. This means that your company will no longer be able to stop others from using logotype for commercial purposes on copyright grounds, but restrictions on use imposed by trademark rights still apply. If it does not meet the threshold of originality, select the option "Another reason not mentioned above" during the upload process and enter {{PD-textlogo}} in the wikitext input field that appears. In both cases, it is a good idea to add {{Trademarked}} to the file description. When uploading logotypes, use SVG format or high-resolution PNG. JPEG is not a suitable format for most logotypes.

Your thoughts? —LX (talk, contribs) 11:47, 26 June 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Very well phrased.  Support the text as-it-is. I am just wondering where to put it as we have neither a central landing page for new users nor asking questions like about the profession of new users. I guess the {{Welcome}}-template and Commons:Welcome could provide a link to Commons:Guidance for corporate editors but it's sometimes noticed/read too late. -- Rillke(q?) 15:20, 26 June 2014 (UTC)[reply]
 Support; but I doubt whether the word "company" cover all cases. We have a lot of small establishments and websites that are not formally "companies". See Japanexperterna.se as an example. The user provided OTRS permission on request. Further we have a few professional contributors who published their works on their own sites prior to commons without a free license. We usually don't demand OTRS from them; they edit here on real name or nickname too. So I think it is OK. Jee 16:11, 26 June 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Further, in this example, the user is using a separate account for editing Wikipedia. Pinging Jameslwoodward for opinion as he who handled the case earlier. Jee 02:41, 27 June 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  •  Comment Whilst I support the above as "best practice guidelines" we need to be totally clear that there will not be repercussions for non-disclosure. On another note, I understand de.wp has verified company accounts. Could this be something that we should look at introducing here on Commons too? russavia (talk) 19:09, 26 June 2014 (UTC)[reply]
    • The concern is about copyright. Either they verify, allow verification (e.g. marking files on their website "as free") or their uploads are deleted, if there are reasonable doubts. I  Support verified "company accounts" through OTRS but it must be clear what kind of files the account holder (a single human) is entitled to upload. -- Rillke(q?) 20:32, 26 June 2014 (UTC)[reply]

@LX: , thanks for starting this off -- definitely a worthwhile guideline to create. I like the draft you propose, but would suggest we also capture and address some of the points that came up in the discussion that led to the adoption of the new policy. Here are the ones that stand out to me:

  • @Fæ: suggested that we should describe some examples of effective/ethical engagement by paid contributors.
  • @Sven Manguard: pointed out that, while uploading files for pay may not be problematic, some kinds of activities -- like proposing or voting on policy changes -- should not be undertaken when one has an undisclosed conflict of interest. @Psychonaut and Saffron Blaze: shared this concern.
  • @Billinghurst: had some good points about the title of the policy and the process for amending it.
  • @Mike Peel: objected to the new policy on the grounds that it creates unneeded bureaucracy; perhaps this guideline will address that concern to some degree, by offering helpful context for otherwise opaque rules..?
  • @Alanscottwalker: had concerns about the specific use of the word "disclosure," and felt that we do require certain kinds of disclosure as part of our normal processes. Again, perhaps the existence of this document in general will address that concern to some degree..?
  • @Nick-D: expressed concerns about encouraging uploads of promotional material that might not be useful to Wikimedia projects.
  • @Davidwr: expressed concerns about covert uploads of promotional material, and felt the new policy would give cover to sneaky PR firms.
  • @Closeapple: expressed a number of concerns, which I won't attempt to summarize here, but recommend that others read carefully.
  • @Thivierr: felt that better wording would have been a better approach than a blanket exemption; perhaps this document offers an opportunity to address that to some degree..?

I'd suggest you just move your draft text to its own page, and we work on improving it over there instead of here on the Village Pump. Among other things, that would provide a nice separation between the draft guideline, and discussion about improving it (on the talk page). -Pete F (talk) 19:41, 26 June 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for the summary of the discussion. Is it intentional that you link to the MMV RfC? Aren't we going to overcomplicate it? The points listed by LX aren't made to make bureaucracy happy but to actually help corporate editors (and us). If it says, for example Guidance, it is clearly not a policy so I do not entirely understand all the points you added. -- Rillke(q?) 20:21, 26 June 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Whoops!! No, I must have pasted the wrong link before -- corrected now. Thanks for catching that.
On reflection, I suppose my one critique of what LX proposes is, I think the title "Guidance for corporate editors" is a bit too narrow. What I think is needed, is a guideline that covers the various issues, and speaks to the various audiences, associated with the new paid contribution disclosure policy. I think all the points I summarized above are worth including, or at least considering, for such a document; but you're right, they don't necessarily fit under that title. These guidelines should be helpful to universities, museums, Wikipedians in Residence, librarians, archivists...so having the word "corporate" in the title probably isn't ideal. I don't (yet) have an alternative to propose, but I'm happy to put a bit of thought into it, and would also love to see others propose alternate titles... -Pete F (talk) 20:35, 26 June 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Okay, it sounds like there's support for the general idea, even though I'm sure the specific wording could use some tweaking. As you say, that's better done on a page of its own. The question now is what to call that page. I agree that "corporate" and "company" are a bit too narrow. The advice also applies to non-profit organisations, political campaigns, government entities and so on. "users editing on behalf of organi[sz]ations" is a bit clunky, and one has to choose between Commonwealth or American spelling. One alternative is to accept a somewhat narrow name and state in the introduction that it applies to others as well. —LX (talk, contribs) 08:14, 27 June 2014 (UTC)[reply]
How about Commons:Guidance for paid editors. I'd also at this time create it as an essay and see if there is consensus at a later stage to make it a guideline. @LX: what do you think about verified company accounts? russavia (talk) 08:56, 27 June 2014 (UTC)[reply]
 Support, very much to the point(s). -- Tuválkin ✉ 03:19, 27 June 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  •  Support Well done, thank you.
I think, though, that the word "company" is too restrictive. Perhaps "Guidance for Organizational Editors", as this should cover not only ordinary business companies and corporations, but also not-for-profits, including museums. I might add an introductory line to further explain that.
The username / company account question is raised above. I firmly believe in our one person, one username consensus and wish it were formal policy. I like to know who I am dealing with -- I can't build trust with a name that has more than one person behind it. I also think that it is perfectly OK if a person uses one username for his company edits and another for his personal work, provided that he keeps the two persona separate and doesn't edit the same page with both.
.     Jim . . . . (Jameslwoodward) (talk to me) 10:25, 27 June 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  •  Oppose the first point. That's something hardly anybody will do and potentially lead to conflicts as users signup. If my company had a Wikimedia account, everyone of at least some kind of communication department should be able to access it – otherwise Commons would be multiplying the workload on the company's side (multiple accounts for multiple people, who might just leave the company, what happens to the media files then?!) as well as on Commons' side (multiple account verifications, several accounts instead of one to contact, …). ( Support the rest.)    FDMS  4    10:43, 27 June 2014 (UTC)[reply]
    • Yes, I would make the first point only a suggestion, but I can see several cases where one account for an organisation makes sense. It depends very much of the size of the organisation, and its hierarchical structure. Regards, Yann (talk) 11:07, 27 June 2014 (UTC)[reply]
    According to our Terms of Use, "You are responsible for safeguarding your own password and should never disclose it to any third party." I think that pretty clearly shows that accounts and passwords are personal and should not be shared. The English Wikipedia's policy on sock puppetry prohibits role accounts and its user name policy prohibits account names implying shared use. Similar rules apply on other projects. Even if our rules are not as clear cut, all new accounts are automatically unified across all Wikimedia projects, so users with shared accounts are likely to run into problems if they ever stray outside the confines of ours. Creating an account involves typing a user name once, a password twice and clicking a button. This is a fraction of the work involved to upload even a single file, so it's not multiplying the workload for anyone. Even sending in an e-mail to tag an additional user onto an established OTRS ticket is not that much work; most of the work lies in getting an initial ticket that conforms to our needs. As for people leaving a company, that is actually a bigger problem with shared accounts with shared passwords. This text is meant as guidance to avoid trouble, not as a policy, and in light of that, I stand by the assertion that using shared company or role accounts is unwise and likely to cause problems. I'll add a pointer to Commons:Changing username to make it more helpful for those who have already made this mistake. —LX (talk, contribs) 18:03, 27 June 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  •  Support I would also clarify: "Own work" means a work that you personally created [and no one else holds the copyright for]. If you are uploading a work on behalf of your company that someone else created [or holds the copyright for], choose the option "This file is not my own work." I would also support expansion to "organizations/paid editors". But, I also support as is. Alanscottwalker (talk) 15:19, 27 June 2014 (UTC)[reply]

 Comment There are a few Commons accounts for GLAM institutions, such as User:Swiss Federal Archives, mainly used for uploading pictures from their collections. See also: Commons_talk:Username policy#Libraries, archives, partnerships. I think that such accounts are useful and GLAMs shouldn't be forced to continuously change or rename their account from something like "Swiss Federal Archives - John Smith" to "Swiss Federal Archives - Fritz Müller" etc. etc. every time a different person is tasked with an upload or maintenance (e.g. applying description fixes). These are accounts for uploading material officially released under a free license by the institution (such as in the case of the Swiss Federal Archives), not by some specific employee (if not in the public domain anyway), and often in partnerships with Wikimedia chapters such as Wikimedia Switzerland. Gestumblindi (talk) 19:52, 27 June 2014 (UTC)[reply]

The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section.
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