Difference between revisions of "Commons:Village pump"
(→New policy proposal) |
(removing inappropriate section which can only result in unnecessary drama) |
||
| Line 1,255: | Line 1,255: | ||
There is a policy proposal and discussion on child protection currently in progress at [[Commons:Child protection]]. Editors are encouraged to provide their input at the relevant talk page. [[User:Russavia|russavia]] ([[User talk:Russavia|<span class="signature-talk">talk</span>]]) 11:54, 14 March 2012 (UTC) |
There is a policy proposal and discussion on child protection currently in progress at [[Commons:Child protection]]. Editors are encouraged to provide their input at the relevant talk page. [[User:Russavia|russavia]] ([[User talk:Russavia|<span class="signature-talk">talk</span>]]) 11:54, 14 March 2012 (UTC) |
||
| − | |||
| − | == New policy proposal == |
||
| − | |||
| − | Since given this latest witch-hunt (which has lost us a useful contributor) has made it clear that we are allowed to ban people for things which they |
||
| − | # Didn't do |
||
| − | # Did off-wiki |
||
| − | I propose the following policy: |
||
| − | :''In order to maintain an environment of civility, it is important that Commons users be [[COM:MELLOW|mellow]]. As such, anyone who has ever, is currently or ever might post a message on Wikipedia Review will be summarily banned for disrupting the project. No proof is required that the user is/was/will be a WR user, an accusation by any user or anonymous IP is enough, and no protestations of innocence will be accepted.'' |
||
| − | I think this should be fairly uncontroversial. -''[[User:Mattbuck|mattbuck]]'' <small>([[User talk:Mattbuck|Talk]])</small> 03:56, 15 March 2012 (UTC) |
||
| − | :{{oppose}} noisy, DOF too shallow [[User:Collard|Lewis Collard!]] <small>([[User_talk:Collard|lol]], [[Special:Contributions/Collard|internet]])</small> 04:04, 15 March 2012 (UTC) |
||
| − | :I don't think sarcastic proposals are going to reduce the dramaz. [[User:Dcoetzee|Dcoetzee]] ([[User talk:Dcoetzee|<span class="signature-talk">talk</span>]]) 05:38, 15 March 2012 (UTC) |
||
Revision as of 09:53, 15 March 2012
| Welcome to Commons | Community Portal | Help Desk Upload help |
Village Pump copyright • proposals |
Administrators' Noticeboard vandalism • user problems • blocks and protections |
Welcome to the Village pump
This Wikimedia Commons page is used for discussions of the operations, technical issues, and policies of Wikimedia Commons. For old discussions, see the Archive. Recent sections with no replies for 3 days may be archived. Please note
Purposes which do not meet the scope of this page
Search archives
|
|
Village pump in India. [add]
|
|||||||||||||||
|
|||||||||||||||
Contents
- 1 January 28
- 1.1 In your opinion, does this image violate law under the Dost test?
- 1.2 MediaWiki 1.19 deployment to Commons
- 1.2.1 MW1.19: Intro
- 1.2.2 MW1.19: Update attempts description
- 1.2.3 MW1.19: most notable changes
- 1.2.4 MW1.19: general discussion
- 1.2.5 MW1.19: problem - document.write does not work
- 1.2.6 MW1.19: problem - gadget Navigation popups does not work (at least in Firefox)
- 1.2.7 MW1.19: problem - gadget Mark as patrolled broken
- 1.2.8 MW1.19: problem - Upload Wizard: describe field only shows 11 languages
- 1.2.9 MW1.19: Special:Contributions/newbies
- 1.2.10 MW1.19: problem - display issue with file redirects
- 1.2.11 MW1.19 - editing old revision and "show changes" does not work
- 1.3 PD-Afghanistan
- 1.4 Freedom of panorama, Canada
- 2 February 26
- 3 March 3
- 4 March 4
- 5 March 5
- 6 March 6
- 7 March 7
- 8 March 8
- 9 March 9
- 10 March 10
- 11 March 11
- 11.1 The Commons on Flickr vs Wikimedia Commons
- 11.2 Sorting a category by date ?
- 11.3 Wikimedia Commons usage guidelines for public domain works
- 11.4 Change over of two pictures
- 11.5 Overwriting a file with itself
- 11.6 Pages with categories set via template may not appear in their super categories
- 11.7 Interesting DR
- 12 March 12
- 12.1 combine Arab Spring maps
- 12.2 Help with loop in categories
- 12.3 Symbols for non-literate people
- 12.4 Large image donation
- 12.5 Seal of the United States District Court for the Western District of Wisconsin
- 12.6 URLs in license templates
- 12.7 Speedy template is not visible
- 12.8 Filename conflicts between en.wikipedia and Commons
- 13 March 13
- 13.1 William Beechey and his son Henry William Beechey
- 13.2 File preview error
- 13.3 Categories and sub-categories of Christian saints
- 13.4 ISO graphical symbols - Copyright status?
- 13.5 Google Maps screenshot
- 13.6 How is email any better evidence of permission than description page content?
- 13.7 Child protection policy proposal and discussion
January 28
In your opinion, does this image violate law under the Dost test?
Discussion moved to Commons:Deletion requests/File:Tasting a condom.jpg
MediaWiki 1.19 deployment to Commons
Some interwiki links:
(updated templates:) Currently we are running: 1.25wmf10 (ba36e03), so MW 1.19 has been deployed (before we were running on 1.18).
- First try: was from 01:09 until 01:18. “reverting to 1.18 on commons due to DB overload”
- Second try: was from 03:25 until 04:17. “upload wizard thumbnailing, gadgets, other strangeness”
- Third try: was at 22:06. Successful.
MW1.19: Intro
According to the current deployment roadmap the server software of Commons was switched over from MediaWiki version 1.18 to 1.19 on Tuesday, , 23:00–03:00 UTC Wednesday, at 22:06 UTC. Most other big wikis will follow some days later.
Copied (re-formated) from #MediaWiki_1.19 above:
- “The Wikimedia Foundation is planning to upgrade MediaWiki (the software powering this wiki) to its latest version this month. You can help to test it before it is enabled, to avoid disruption and breakage. More information is available in the full announcement. Thank you for your understanding. Guillaume Paumier, 14:53, 12 February 2012 (UTC)”
Problems are expected to occur in old user scripts. There was already a big bunch of work done to make our gadgets as compatible as possible - thanks to the community script wizards who did that!
If problems arise, please make new level 3 headings (=== MW1.19: problem - example text ===) for those new topics below (to keep this section together also in the archive). by (but you may edit!): Saibo (Δ) 16:27, 20 February 2012 (UTC)
If you report JavaScript problems, please copy the whole error-message and error-messages only. They probably will look like "mw.user" is undefined or "mw.util" is undefined or "jquery.ui" is undefined. You find them in your browser's JavaScript error-console (to open the JavaScript error console look for it in your browser's menus or in Firefox/Chrome hit the keys Ctrl+Shift+J, in Opera the keys Ctrl+Shift+O). Filter to "errors" only, clear it and then open the page where the problem occurs.
Also include your browser's name, version, the page you are visiting and the action you are doing. Thanks in advance. -- RE rillke questions? 20:28, 20 February 2012 (UTC) (added how to open the console --Saibo (Δ) 03:56, 21 February 2012 (UTC))
MW1.19: Update attempts description
Hi folks, I thought since I have a bit of a breather, I'd give an update on how the 1.19 deployment is going. We got a late start because we wanted to make sure we fixed Bugzilla:34508 before starting, which we just barely got fixed. That meant that instead of starting 23:00 UTC (3pm PST), we started at 00:30 UTC (4:30pm PST). We briefly broke stylesheets and CSS, which you might have seen, in a prep step rather than the actual deployment. At 01:09 UTC, we made our first deployment attempt, and ran into some performance issues. We're putting the finishing touches on some more fixes, and we hope to make another attempt before 03:00 UTC. -- RobLa-WMF (talk) 02:38, 22 February 2012 (UTC)
- We encountered several problems with the 1.19 deploy (some upload wizard thumbnailing, gadgets, other strangeness). -- We're going to try again in several hours (tomorrow for us), starting at Wednesday, 2012-02-22 at 18:00 UTC. -- RobLa-WMF (talk) 04:35, 22 February 2012 (UTC)
MW1.19: most notable changes
- All changes
- pl:Pomoc:Nowości wprowadzone w MediaWiki 1.19 summary of the most notable changes in Polish, automated gTranslation
List:
- Scripts should load faster, but this (Ressource Loader 2.0) will also cause problems with old, legacy code (help: see e.g. migration guide to ResourceLoader).
- The difference in bytes of each edit is displayed in the history view. Example of a removal (in total): (44,982 bytes) (-69).
- Diffs are now yellow / blue.
- Log-in duration is extended to max. 180 days (before it was 30 days).
- Special:BlockList got a fresh look and filtering options.
- URL parameters for included special pages can be used, example:
{{Special:RecentChanges|namespace=8|hideReviewed=1}}
MW1.19: general discussion
Developers were looking at a last minute fix for bug 34508. Not sure if they found one.. That may produce problems. --Saibo (Δ) 01:27, 22 February 2012 (UTC)
Is fixed --Saibo (Δ) 14:04, 22 February 2012 (UTC)
...
...
MW1.19: problem - document.write does not work
The usage of document.write to import scripts is discouraged since long. Now it stops to work. See the report and solution by using mw.loader.load at hexmode's blog post or at this discussion. Solution for CSS imports (via mw.loader.load).
In "non-user space" we have document.write in
Fixed MediaWiki:Common.js/ku (don't know if this script is active at all) → is loaded for all users with language ku by the "parent script" RE rillke questions? 20:24, 20 February 2012 (UTC)
-
- I blocked this script via AdBlock while having using uselang=ku-arab with monobook and vector but did not notice a difference in the rendering. Probably that "workaround" part (inserted 2010-04-02) is redundant and should be deleted since the referenced bugs bugzilla:6756 (fixed since 2011-07-06), bugzilla:02020 (fixed since 2010-11-05) & bugzilla:04295 (fixed since 2010-07-15) are fixed in the meantime. Opinions? --Saibo (Δ) 14:52, 21 February 2012 (UTC)
- Have removed the "workaround" code for the ku-arab language. --Saibo (Δ) 23:45, 21 February 2012 (UTC)
not necessary MediaWiki:Gadget-Slideshow.js. → not used, replaced by MediaWiki:Gadget-GallerySlideshow.js RE rillke questions? 20:24, 20 February 2012 (UTC)
In user space: those user scripts probably will stop to work full or partly. --Saibo (Δ) 16:27, 20 February 2012 (UTC)
Gadget-popups does not work in Firefox 10.0.2 (Vector or Monobook, German). Works in Opera 11.61 (Vector and Monobook). No JS errors. --Saibo (Δ) 23:23, 22 February 2012 (UTC) Left a note at en:Wikipedia_talk:Tools/Navigation_popups#Stopped_working_at_Commons --Saibo (Δ) 23:32, 22 February 2012 (UTC)
- Appears to be a problem with the resource loader, not popups itself: when I import the script directly using
it still works.
importScriptURI( '//en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=MediaWiki:Gadget-popups.js&action=raw&ctype=text/javascript' );
You could try to remove the "[Resourceloader]" marker from MediaWiki:Gadgets-definition as a workaround. Amalthea (talk) 23:52, 22 February 2012 (UTC)- Thank you! You are right. Krinkle also helped in IRC. If I load the navpopups like descriped at mw:RL/MGU#Keep_gadgets_central on bottom in my monobooks.js/css then it works. --Saibo (Δ) 00:39, 23 February 2012 (UTC)
Gadget works with
workaround. Have removed loading via RL for Navpopups. --Saibo (Δ) 00:57, 23 February 2012 (UTC)
What about adding ResourceLoader again, but declaring some dependencies for things which are used at w:MediaWiki:Gadget-popups.js? Maybe mediawiki.legacy.wikibits (since it uses "importScriptURI", "addOnloadHook", etc...), mediawiki.util (for "mw.util.wikiScript") are enough:
* popups [ResourceLoader|dependencies=mediawiki.util,mediawiki.legacy.wikibits]|popups.js|navpop.css
Helder 01:37, 23 February 2012 (UTC)
- Thanks for the suggestion: I tried it, but did not work (reverted). This time it also did not work in Opera. Cheers --Saibo (Δ) 14:47, 23 February 2012 (UTC)
- That is odd.
- It is working on ptwikibooks. Its definition there is:
Navigation_popups[ResourceLoader|dependencies=mediawiki.legacy.wikibits]|popups.js
-
- Helder 12:29, 24 February 2012 (UTC)
- You are missing to add a css .. so the gadget seems to be different. Looking at b:pt:MediaWiki:Gadget-popups.js confirms that there the css is loaded inside the script but not via RL. And (that is really odd) the .js is loaded from pt:MediaWiki:Gadget-popups.js but the css from en. Uuhh.. the code at pt.Wikipedia then also loads CSS. However, many differences and probably different js code. However, we could try to load the css inside the gadget code instead of via the gadget definition... --Saibo (Δ) 16:10, 24 February 2012 (UTC)
- Oh.. I didn't notice that before. I've removed this duplicated call to enwiki CSS. Helder 23:02, 24 February 2012 (UTC)
- Reverted to version with RL. Can't reproduce with FF 10.0.2 -- RE rillke questions? 20:22, 2 March 2012 (UTC)
- Lost popups in the last 60 mins or so ff 10.0.2 --Herby talk thyme 20:58, 2 March 2012 (UTC)
- Back again - I really really wish this would get sorted - it is really annoying me. --Herby talk thyme 21:03, 2 March 2012 (UTC)
- Sorry. Reverted again, now without RL, are they back? -- RE rillke questions? 21:04, 2 March 2012 (UTC)
- Back again - I really really wish this would get sorted - it is really annoying me. --Herby talk thyme 21:03, 2 March 2012 (UTC)
- Lost popups in the last 60 mins or so ff 10.0.2 --Herby talk thyme 20:58, 2 March 2012 (UTC)
- Reverted to version with RL. Can't reproduce with FF 10.0.2 -- RE rillke questions? 20:22, 2 March 2012 (UTC)
- Oh.. I didn't notice that before. I've removed this duplicated call to enwiki CSS. Helder 23:02, 24 February 2012 (UTC)
- You are missing to add a css .. so the gadget seems to be different. Looking at b:pt:MediaWiki:Gadget-popups.js confirms that there the css is loaded inside the script but not via RL. And (that is really odd) the .js is loaded from pt:MediaWiki:Gadget-popups.js but the css from en. Uuhh.. the code at pt.Wikipedia then also loads CSS. However, many differences and probably different js code. However, we could try to load the css inside the gadget code instead of via the gadget definition... --Saibo (Δ) 16:10, 24 February 2012 (UTC)
- Helder 12:29, 24 February 2012 (UTC)
┌──────────────────────────┘
By the way, the @import statement recommended here no longer works reliably in MediaWiki 1.19. @import has to come at the beginning of a stylesheet, but ResourceLoader sticks it wherever it wants when combining gadgets' stylesheets. (RL seems to combine all gadgets' stylesheets, not just the ones that've opted into RL.) To work around this issue, the Vietnamese wikis now import the stylesheet using mw.loader.load("//path/to/stylesheet.css", "text/css"); in the JavaScript file. – Minh Nguyễn (talk, contribs) 07:47, 6 March 2012 (UTC)
MW1.19: problem - gadget Mark as patrolled broken
Now the [Mark as patrolled] link does not seem to be asynchronous. It is posting back to http://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?title=...&action=markpatrolled. Did this happen due to MediaWiki update? --Sreejith K (talk) 03:41, 23 February 2012 (UTC)
Fixed with workaround RL usage removed. Will check for other external gadgets with the same problem... --Saibo (Δ) 17:10, 23 February 2012 (UTC)
- There are some more similar ones.
- Tested and works: UTC live clock, MediaWiki:Gadget-Cat-a-lot.js/zh-sg, MediaWiki:VisualFileChange.js,
- Probably does not work: MediaWiki:Gadget-RTRC.js
- I did not check all. However, it seems not to be a general problem. Cheers --Saibo (Δ) 17:45, 23 February 2012 (UTC)
MW1.19: problem - Upload Wizard: describe field only shows 11 languages
Currently, if you want to upload a photo with upload wizard, you can only write the description in Deustch, English, Spanish, French... and other seven language.
Galician language is a language of a Wikipedia and a cooficial language with Spanish in Spain.
The attitude of "upload wizard" implies a políco, not neutral positioning.
-
For conviciones, I'll work with Commons whether this circumstance is not cured and will not return to the previous situation. All answers to the personal conviction that Commons should not marginalize and while respecting personal identities: I have the right to use, as was using, "upload wizard" on my tongue. I have that right in the same way that speakers of majority languages have so-automated translation by big G- On principle, I will stop working with Commons if this is not fixed and not returned to the earlier situation. My personal conviction, that Commons should not marginalize and stop respecting the identities of people [belonging to other nationalities], remains unfulfilled. I have that right, as do [other] speakers of minority languages. correctly translated by Magog the Ogre (talk) 21:18, 23 February 2012 (UTC), no offense
- ¡Hola Miguel! Hope you understand: Sorry! That problem appears not only in Galician - it is in every language. The list was much much longer until recently - that seems to be a bug. I have reported it (see the box on the right side). This problem should not happen - you are right - Commons is multi-lingual --Saibo (Δ) 20:13, 23 February 2012 (UTC)
- Thanks Saibo. --Miguel Bugallo 20:37, 23 February 2012 (UTC)
- But the problem is "Why are the languages that appear the languages with more speakers in the world?" --Miguel Bugallo 20:55, 23 February 2012 (UTC)
- Solamente los programadores saben porque estas lenguas son las únicas que aparecen en este preciso moment. Es posible que los programadores usaron estas once lenguas como un paso intermedio hasta que se arregle el problema (es decir, o el UploadWizard usaba solamente estas once lenguas, o no funcionaba en absoluto). Pero no se preocupe: este error (junto con los otros errores que han aparecido desde la introduccion de Mediawiki 1.19) es temporario y lo arreglarán los programadores dentro de poco. Magog the Ogre (talk) 21:30, 23 February 2012 (UTC)
- But the problem is "Why are the languages that appear the languages with more speakers in the world?" --Miguel Bugallo 20:55, 23 February 2012 (UTC)
- Thanks Saibo. --Miguel Bugallo 20:37, 23 February 2012 (UTC)
This is indeed a new bug. All languages in MediaWiki:LanguageHandler.js should be loaded.--Eloquence (talk) 21:45, 23 February 2012 (UTC)
- But temporarily, until this has been fixed, one can choose any language for description, say Dutch, write it for example in Galician, and then manually replace nl -> gl.--Ymblanter (talk) 22:00, 23 February 2012 (UTC)
-
- See this, thanks--Miguel Bugallo 22:01, 23 February 2012 (UTC):
- (es) Cualquier explicación por parte de "los que saben hacer" debería ser previa o tenerse dado al mismo tiempo de lo acontecido. Perdón por mi opinión, me doy cuenta de que mi opinión es como es y de que supone lo que supone, pero es que es como es: hay un acto de pobre sensibilidad con las lenguas minorizadas y minoritarias--Miguel Bugallo 22:08, 23 February 2012 (UTC)
- I know, I uploaded a file 15 minutes ago. Choose Nederlands (==Dutch), write the description in Galician, and save the file. The go, edit the template and replace nl -> gl.--Ymblanter (talk) 22:20, 23 February 2012 (UTC)
-
Español: Por cierto, los que usamos lenguas minorizadas, quizás también los que usan lenguas minoritarias, estamos habituados a ser desconsiderados publicamente, pero no por eso dejamos de protestar--Miguel Bugallo 22:23, 23 February 2012 (UTC)
-
-
Fixed Fix is live and confirmed. At worst you'll need a hard refresh on the UploadWizard special page. Reedy (talk) 22:36, 23 February 2012 (UTC)
MW1.19: Special:Contributions/newbies
This link no longer works - it needs to use &contribs=newbie. I've fixed it in MediaWiki:Recentchangestext like this, per comment at Bugzilla: 34659 and example at Meta's MediaWiki:Recentchangestext. Any references elsewhere will need updating as well. Rd232 (talk) 00:35, 24 February 2012 (UTC)
- A search for Special:Contributions/newbies suggests that this was the only place (confirmed by google). Although it could be that the searches do not find the occurrence. But E.g. in MediaWiki:Recentchangestext/de it is not at all. Cheers --Saibo (Δ) 01:15, 24 February 2012 (UTC)
MW1.19: problem - display issue with file redirects
- File:Andrea Temesvari RG 2012.JPG - clicking on this link redirects to the new filename but top bar shows two instances of the redirect message. --Denniss (talk) 21:38, 24 February 2012 (UTC)
- Confirm. Ah, yes, thanks for noting - I saw it also at a nother file today. Tested with "your" file in German and English interface. Cheers --Saibo (Δ) 01:16, 25 February 2012 (UTC)
- Filed as bugzilla:29097 TheDJ (talk) 19:48, 25 February 2012 (UTC)
MW1.19 - editing old revision and "show changes" does not work
Done
Try to edit any old revision of File:BPNM levees.jpg and use "show changes" to compare this revision to the current one. You'll probably see nothing as it obviously compares the recent version with the recent version. Tested in FF 10.0.2ESR and I-Exploder 9. If one looks at the adress bar it looks like the oldid-parameter is missing there. --Denniss (talk) 12:59, 1 March 2012 (UTC)
- Confirm the bug (FF10, Monobook, German). Editing works - but the comparision apparently compares not with the current version (like before 1.19) but with the version you had edited. That is not useful since what will be overwritten when the save is done is the current version. Test: edit, click compare button. Expected: for example the first two "wrong licensing" lines should appear as deleted in the diff. Added to BZ. Cheers --Saibo (Δ) 13:27, 1 March 2012 (UTC)
- This issue was fixed by Alexandre "iAlex" Emsenhube. Please report any issue on the bug report :-) Hashar (talk) 17:38, 1 March 2012 (UTC)
- That is
Fixed, confirmed that it is working as expected with my test case. Thank you! --Saibo (Δ) 20:12, 1 March 2012 (UTC)
- That is
PD-Afghanistan
Afghanistan has no domestic copyright laws and does not currently participate in international copyright treaties (Afghanistan and copyright issues, Circ. 38a). Accordingly, Commons created {{PD-Afghanistan}} to note that works from Afghanistan are in the public domain.
Unfortunately, until today, the template only said [1]:
- This work is in the public domain in the United States because it is a work of Afghanistan, which has no existing copyright law or intellectual property relations...
This is completely insufficient to establish public domain status.
Firstly, both the Berne Convention and the US Code (Title 17, Section 104) have provisions for protecting citizens of Berne countries that might happen to publish in non-treaty states. Specifically, any work published by a national of a Berne Convention country within a non-treaty state is still entitled to copyright protection in their home country and by extension all other Berne Convention states. For example, if a Swedish man publishes an image in Afghanistan, the US Code declares that the country of origin for that image will be regarded as Sweden and not Afghanistan. It is still the case that no copyright protections exist in Afghanistan, but foreign authors publishing in Afghanistan are able to assert copyright nearly everywhere else.
Secondly, both the US Code and Berne Convention consider the possibility that a work might be published in both a non-treaty state and a treaty state nearly simultaneously. If a work is published in a non-treaty state and is then subsequently published in a treaty compliant state within the first thirty days, the law considers that the Berne Convention still applies. Specifically, an Afghani who wishes to protect his copyright interests can arrange to have his work published in a Berne-compliant foreign country within thirty days of its initial publication in Afghanistan. If this occurs then he would have a defensible copyright in that foreign country and in all other Berne states. It is still the case that he would have no enforceable copyright in Afghanistan itself, since Afghanistan has no copyright laws, but this would not legally preclude him from asserting rights internationally.
I have now added short versions of these caveats to the PD-Afghanistan template. There are presently, 700+ images in Category:PD Afghan. A cursory inspection suggests that many of these are works of the Afghani government and are likely to be fine. However, many others appear to simply have been lifted from websites on the basis that they show scenes from within Afghanistan. With no identification of authorship, and no knowledge of whether they were published outside Afghanistan, it may be impossible to tell whether many of these images are truly in the public domain or not. Many of these will need to be reviewed and those without sufficient documentation as to origin may need to be deleted.
Issues related to copyright in non-treaty states are also being discussed on the foundation-l mailing list and on the English Wikipedia (Talk:Copyrights). Dragons flight (talk) 18:50, 23 February 2012 (UTC)
- Thank you for your clarification work, several users seem to think any photo taken in this country (and not published by an afghani in Afghanistan) falls in public domain.
- And I agree a check is needed, we've a lot of military pictures TAKEN in Afghanistan. --Dereckson (talk) 18:58, 23 February 2012 (UTC)
- How would this affect {{PD-Somalia}} and {{PD-MH}}? -- Liliana-60 (talk) 02:32, 24 February 2012 (UTC)
- I would say the same applies; we also applied Iranian copyright terms on here while the United States not does recognize it. User:Zscout370 (Return fire) 02:34, 24 February 2012 (UTC)
-
- All the same stuff applies. We have had several discussions on PD-Afghanistan; it can only be the country of origin if all the conditions User:Dragons_flight listed are true -- the conditions are basically a recap of the Berne Convention definition of "country of origin" which we follow; something can't be under PD-Afghanistan if the author is not an Afghan national due to those rules. However, we really should have added that information to the tag before now. Thanks for doing it. Carl Lindberg (talk) 04:11, 24 February 2012 (UTC)
- We had this discussion on en.wikipedia here. This is a very very bad idea. Let me elaborate:
- Are the images in the public domain in the absence of a treaty? Yes, for the moment.
- Will they become fully copyrighted once such a treaty is signed? Yes.
- Is Afganistan and other such countries likely to sign said treaties? Yes, Afghanistan and other such countries are trying to get into WTO which requires the ratification of Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS) and/or sign the Berne Convention for the Protection of Literary and Artistic Works.
- Would we be required to delete these images the moment these countries sign the said treaties even though material is in the Public domain? Yes. The case law as explained in Template:PD-Soviet should set the precedent on such content.
- Hence, we should avoid featuring any content that we know will be copyrighted eventually.
- -- とある白い猫 ちぃ? 21:10, 25 February 2012 (UTC)
- I actually went ahead and nominated the template for deletion at Commons:Deletion requests/Template:PD-Afghanistan. Feel free to comment there. -- とある白い猫 ちぃ? 21:23, 25 February 2012 (UTC)
-
- What is a very bad idea? If an image is PD in its home country and the US, why shouldn't we host it? Is it possible that that will change? Yes, but that could happen to any image, and we don't know how it will change. We don't know that the content will copyrighted eventually. Furthermore, we won't be required to delete these images the moment these countries sign the said treaties. In fact, in the US, we will be a reliance party and will have at least one year before our use could possibly be infringing copyright. We will want to delete it, because of our own policies, but outside forces won't force that.--Prosfilaes (talk) 09:07, 26 February 2012 (UTC)
Calling on the WMF to get the professional opinion of IP lawyer(s)...
I am going to thank Dragonflight for raising this issue.I have been calling -- for four or five years -- for the Wikimedia Foundation to call for the professional opinion of a lawyer or lawyers who specialize in intellectual property rights issues. I have called for the WMF to call for professional advice here, and in various other venues. I have called for the WMF to call for professional advice dozens of times. When I first raised this issue another contributor told me that while the WMF employed a lawyer, whose name I don't recall, he had no expertise in intellectual property law. Some years later another contributor referred to that lawyer saying he was a specialist in IP law. OK, over a couple of years a lawyer can become a specialist in a new field. But he didn't become a specialist answering our questions on the IP status of images from Afghanistan, and other nations without IP laws.
Last year I noticed a discussion triggered by a concern some contributors had over an aspect of human sexuality and some images. The contributors with that concern wrote that something like 48 hours passed between them calling for the WMF to get the professional opinion of its lawyers and that professional opinion being offered. Geo Swan (talk) 17:40, 26 February 2012 (UTC)
Summary of ideas from previous instances when this issue has been raised...
The issue of {{PD-Afghanistan}} has been raised many times in the past. Geo Swan (talk) 17:40, 26 February 2012 (UTC)
Afghanistan signing Berne is inevitable?
One suggestion has been made in a number of disccussions -- that we should treat all images that qualify as {{PD-Afghanistan}} as if all those images qualified for protection under the Berne convention. It has been suggested (for years) that Afghanistan was on the cusp of introducing its own IP laws, so we should treat the images are as if Berne applied.
My response to this assertion is that respect for Afghan sovereignty requires us to respect the laws they have in place == not the lawas we think they should have.
The underlying assumption under which we grant copyrights and patents is that, in the long run, doing so generally benefits society. The underlying assumption is that new inventions, new ideas, and new expressions of both new and old idaeas are good things. For individuals who don't believe in "Progress" granting IP rights that help inventors, authors, composers and photographers make money is not a good thing -- because they don't want to see new ideas introduced. It isn't only the Taliban who don't believe in progrss, many of the warlords that helped overthrow the Taliban, and who remain very influential in Afghanistan, also don't believe in progress.
- Afghanistan images are already treated under the assumption that the country may join the Berne Convention at any point, meaning that any works published after the joining date would have to be copyrighted for at least life+50 years whereas works published before that date may be subject to any other term (currently creation+0 years). --Stefan4 (talk) 18:34, 26 February 2012 (UTC)
- What those advocating this approach wanted was to require the explicit permission of the Afghan photographer, just as if they were the citizen of a Berne signatory -- and the deletion of any Afghan images that lacked that explicit permission.
I regard this as premature. Geo Swan (talk) 00:19, 27 February 2012 (UTC)
-
- I don't know who is suggesting such a thing but to me life + 50 is the bare minimum we should always observe. -- とある白い猫 ちぃ? 00:24, 4 March 2012 (UTC)
-
- No way. Life + 50 is absurdly long. I have an appreciation for a flat 40 years, and it's unlikely an argument about this will produce anything productive. Furthermore, it's a quid-pro-quo; the motivation every country has to protect the copyrights of foreign countries is that the other countries will in turn protect your copyrights. I'd be happy to ignore the copyright of Iran or any other nation that doesn't respect foreign copyrights even on paper.--Prosfilaes (talk) 09:58, 5 March 2012 (UTC)
- Life + 50, in anticipation of these nations joining Berne-world? So you are convinced that these nations signing international IP agreements is inevitable -- but you haven't said why. I explained, above, and elsewhere, why I don't think we should regard this as inevitable. I'd be very interested in reading an explicit counter-argument. Do you have one, or is this the traditional "gut feeling"? Geo Swan (talk) 01:50, 7 March 2012 (UTC)
- What those advocating this approach wanted was to require the explicit permission of the Afghan photographer, just as if they were the citizen of a Berne signatory -- and the deletion of any Afghan images that lacked that explicit permission.
Afghan images are like gold mines?
One interpretation that has been regularly offered in previous discussions is that some uninvolved third party who somehow lays their hands on an image captured by an Afghan, in Afghanistan, can then race to be the first to publish it in a Berne-signatory country -- and claim all the intellectual property rights to that image.
An example -- Dilawar was an innocent Afghan taxi driver, brutally beaten to death by GIs at the w:Bagram collection point. A freelance journalist visited Dilawar's family, and was allowed by them to snap a copy of their only photo of Dilawar, prior to his capture. This freelance journalist was the first to publish the image outside of Afghanistan -- and he claimed he owned all the IP rights to this image. Geo Swan (talk) 17:40, 26 February 2012 (UTC)
- In this case, I assume that the copyright holder would be the photographer, not the newspaper or the journalist. It is irrelevant if someone makes incorrect statements on who the copyright holder is. {{PD-US-defective notice}} no longer applies. --Stefan4 (talk) 18:30, 26 February 2012 (UTC)
-
- You call the photographer -- the family member -- the copyright holder. Well they wouldn't be the copyright holder under Afghan law, as it doesn't support copyrights.
Are you saying that your interpretation of Berne is that an Afghan owns the copyright to as yet unpublished images they took?
And if that freelance journalist claimed the family member assigned all rights to him? I believe it is possible for photographers to do this -- but it is rarely done -- mainly because most buyers don't know any better. However almost all Afghans are illiterate, and I have doubts as to whether it is possible for an illiterate person to knowingly give consent to release all their rights to a passing freelancer. Geo Swan (talk) 08:45, 29 February 2012 (UTC)
- No one can hold copyright to anything under Afghan law. However, outside Afghanistan, Afghan people would be the copyright holders of unpublished photos, unless a contract has been signed transferring the copyright to someone else. --Stefan4 (talk) 10:38, 29 February 2012 (UTC)
- Recent discussions elsewhere have asserted that, under Berne, unpublished images are protected, even if they are taken by citizens of countries with no IP protection, in nations with no IP protection. Geo Swan (talk) 01:54, 7 March 2012 (UTC)
- That is true for the U.S., yes. The Berne Convention tries to let authors from non-Berne countries publish their works in Berne countries, to get protection that way (since the Berne country would then be the country of origin) -- so it stands to reason that protection is there at least up to the point the author actually publishes it. Carl Lindberg (talk) 04:20, 7 March 2012 (UTC)
- Recent discussions elsewhere have asserted that, under Berne, unpublished images are protected, even if they are taken by citizens of countries with no IP protection, in nations with no IP protection. Geo Swan (talk) 01:54, 7 March 2012 (UTC)
- No one can hold copyright to anything under Afghan law. However, outside Afghanistan, Afghan people would be the copyright holders of unpublished photos, unless a contract has been signed transferring the copyright to someone else. --Stefan4 (talk) 10:38, 29 February 2012 (UTC)
- You call the photographer -- the family member -- the copyright holder. Well they wouldn't be the copyright holder under Afghan law, as it doesn't support copyrights.
What does an "AP file photo" on an Afghan image mean?
In deletion discusscions we routinely treat a credit like "AP file photo" as if this were an assertion by AP that they own the IP rights to an image. I regularly come across images credited to a wire service, or even (c) to a wire service that I know for a certain fact were public domain, or at least owned by someone else.
Up until a couple of years ago there were no published images of Guantanamo captives, taken at the base. But a couple of years ago the ICRC who regularly visited the captives were permitted to take photos of the captives, to give to their families, out of humanitarian concern. About a dozen of the captives' familiies allowed the press to republish these images. These friendly looking photos continue to be widely republished. Less than half the time the images are described as "courtesy of the family" -- or similar. Most often they are credited to a wire service.
Wire services add images to their catalogs from a variety of sources -- including the public domain. I think it is important to recognize how frequently wire services misleading imply they own the rights to {{PD-Afghanistan}} (and {{PD-USGov}} images in their catalog.
Dr Aafia Siddiqui and her 12 year old son were captured in Ghazni about three years ago. A considerable time after their capture a photo emerged showing 85 pound Aafia desperately hugging her child, trying to protect him. This image was nominated for deletion with the nominator asserting that since the site it was uploaded from had an "AP file photo" the image must have been taken by an employee of the Associated Press. Those favoring deletion of the image advanced an absurd narrative. They asserted that an AP photographer snapped the photo at the press conference when Afghan officials announced the capture of Dr Aafia and her son. The narrative is absurd because parading captives violates the Geneva Convention provision that protects captives from humiliation. And it is absurd as the Afghans didn't announce their capture. Aafia was only briefly in Afghan custody, being handed over to the US in short order. The Americans did announce her capture -- about a week later.
This photo was not an official mugshot. I figure it was an unofficial trophy photo taken by a corrupt Afghan police official, and clandestinely sold to the press.
Was the photo published first in Afghanistan? I don't know. Did Afghan police officials publicly release the photo? I don't know, but in either case I think the image should be considered {{PD-Afghanistan}}. What if a corrupt Afghan police official sold the image? Does selling an image to a single wire service constitute publication? I can't recall the name of this image, so I can't link to the discussion. But I remember looking and finding an image I thought was PD -- maybe this image -- that was credited to half a dozen different wire services. Geo Swan (talk) 17:40, 26 February 2012 (UTC)
- The copyright, if any, belongs to the copyright holder. If anyone makes an incorrect statement on who the copyright holder is, this is a problem when explaining the image source and not a problem with the {{PD-Afghanistan}} template. In fact, there may be sourcing problems with any template. --Stefan4 (talk) 18:28, 26 February 2012 (UTC)
- Well, the freelance photographer seemed to think, and some who have weighed in on this topic seem to think, that if they come across an Afghan image, previously unpublished in a Berne country, and they publish it first, they then own the worldwide IP rights -- just as the first prospector to stake a claim to a vein of gold owns that gold. Geo Swan (talk) 00:44, 27 February 2012 (UTC)
-
-
- "AP Photo" really just means that AP is the source, but obviously they aren't going to help you by mentioning it is PD, if it is -- it wouldn't be the first time a photo agency slapped their label on a PD image. But just like any other image, we need to determine the reason something is PD; the "AP Image" tag may not truly mean it's copyrighted (though it usually does), but that doesn't remove the requirement to identify the reasons something is actually PD in the first place. In your example, if the photo was previously published in Afghanistan, then there is no copyright. Is there any evidence of such publication? If not, then worldwide copyright can still subsist. The freelancer could possibly have paid the family for the picture, acquiring the copyrights. Or, they could have agreed to act as agent, funneling some of the profits back to the family, in which case they have every reason to act as rightsholder. It is of course possible they are just abusing the situation, but without some actual evidence indicating that, I don't see how we could possibly assume that to be the case. I don't think we should delete something which is tagged "AP Image" when there is fairly strong evidence to indicate PD status, but by the same token it is a good reason to delete if there is no other evidence at all to help its PD case. Carl Lindberg (talk) 04:35, 27 February 2012 (UTC)
- Celebrating Guantanamo's tenth anniversary two months ago a wire service -- Reuters I think -- published a photo essay of fifty images from Guantanamo. Everywhere this photo essay was published each of the images was explicitly credited "(c)" -- not "file photo". Geo Swan (talk) 08:52, 29 February 2012 (UTC)
- Guantanamo is in Cuba and is subject to Cuban copyright law with extraterritorial rights granted to the US so it may very well be US copyright law since practically everyone there with a camera is from a Berne signatory country or has a permanent residence from one. I do not see the relevance of Guantanamo to this discussion. -- とある白い猫 ちぃ? 00:26, 4 March 2012 (UTC)
- You don't understand the significance?
- Wire services regularly slap (c) copyright symbols on images that don't belong to them.
- On the tenth anniversary of the opening of the Guantanamo terror camp a wire service published a photo essay where they slapped (c) copyright notices on all fifty images.
- To my certain knowledge about 20 percent of those images did not belong to the wire service
- Guantanamo is in Cuba and is subject to Cuban copyright law with extraterritorial rights granted to the US so it may very well be US copyright law since practically everyone there with a camera is from a Berne signatory country or has a permanent residence from one. I do not see the relevance of Guantanamo to this discussion. -- とある白い猫 ちぃ? 00:26, 4 March 2012 (UTC)
- Celebrating Guantanamo's tenth anniversary two months ago a wire service -- Reuters I think -- published a photo essay of fifty images from Guantanamo. Everywhere this photo essay was published each of the images was explicitly credited "(c)" -- not "file photo". Geo Swan (talk) 08:52, 29 February 2012 (UTC)
- "AP Photo" really just means that AP is the source, but obviously they aren't going to help you by mentioning it is PD, if it is -- it wouldn't be the first time a photo agency slapped their label on a PD image. But just like any other image, we need to determine the reason something is PD; the "AP Image" tag may not truly mean it's copyrighted (though it usually does), but that doesn't remove the requirement to identify the reasons something is actually PD in the first place. In your example, if the photo was previously published in Afghanistan, then there is no copyright. Is there any evidence of such publication? If not, then worldwide copyright can still subsist. The freelancer could possibly have paid the family for the picture, acquiring the copyrights. Or, they could have agreed to act as agent, funneling some of the profits back to the family, in which case they have every reason to act as rightsholder. It is of course possible they are just abusing the situation, but without some actual evidence indicating that, I don't see how we could possibly assume that to be the case. I don't think we should delete something which is tagged "AP Image" when there is fairly strong evidence to indicate PD status, but by the same token it is a good reason to delete if there is no other evidence at all to help its PD case. Carl Lindberg (talk) 04:35, 27 February 2012 (UTC)
-
30 days == simultaneaty?
I suspect that the clause about publication within 30 days being "simultanous" publication dates back to the days of carrier pigeons and the pony epxress.
How supportable is the Berne clause that publication in a Berne-signatory country constitutes "simultaneous" publication? I described the claims of the freelance photographer who claimed all rights on the image of Dilawar. So, what would prevent some carpetbagger from monitoring the Afghan newspapers and television, and grabbing all kinds of images, republishing them in the USA, and then claiming they owned all the IP rights to tha image? Geo Swan (talk) 17:40, 26 February 2012 (UTC)
- The Berne Convention clause on 30 days applies to all Berne Convention countries. The copyright would belong to the copyright holder who may or may not have anything to do with whoever published the stuff first. --Stefan4 (talk) 18:26, 26 February 2012 (UTC)
- Sorry -- did you mean "the copyright belongs to the photographer"? "Copyright belongs to the copyright holder" is redundant.
My point is that if the photographer is an Afghan, the photograph was captured in Afghanistan, and is published in Afghanistan, what prevents AP, or that freelancer I mentioned above, from republishing every recently published Afghan image -- and claiming all the worldwide or Berne-worldwide intellectual property rights on them? Geo Swan (talk) 00:27, 27 February 2012 (UTC)
- Sorry -- did you mean "the copyright belongs to the photographer"? "Copyright belongs to the copyright holder" is redundant.
- People can claim lots of things, but that doesn't make their claims true. I'm unaware of any case law that exactly addresses the scenario that you suggest, i.e. a third party republishing and claiming copyright over works that are PD due to non-treaty status. However, the US case law is very clear that slavishly duplicating a PD work does not create a new copyright. I would expect that third party claims to copyright over copied works made without the consent or knowledge of the true author would be tossed out if ever challenged in US courts. The true author could republish the work within the 30-day window (or arrange to have others do so on his behalf) in order to protect his rights, but third parties that simply copy works from Afghanistan would seem unlikely to receive any copyright protection in US courts. Dragons flight (talk) 03:44, 27 February 2012 (UTC)
-
- It was the case back when there was still USSR, there were publishers who would try their hardest to get the new book from the Soviet Union, then make 100 photocopies and claim (successfully) that it constitutes publication and thus they have copyright within the US. This is why there are so many trashy translations of Solzhenitsin's work, they were translated while the cover and the number of pages was already set. VolodyA! V Anarhist Beta_M (converse) 03:52, 27 February 2012 (UTC)
-
-
- Cite? If this is true, why wouldn't they just make 100 photocopies of the Russian?--Prosfilaes (talk) 05:14, 27 February 2012 (UTC)
- Because the market for the english language version in the united states is slightly larger than for the russian one. Actually thinking about it, i think it was a different issue there. They considered everything published in USSR automatically public domain (thus you needed to add your originality to it, i.e. translation)...
- Yes, a translation is not the same as a copy. Dragons flight (talk) 18:44, 27 February 2012 (UTC)
- Because the market for the english language version in the united states is slightly larger than for the russian one. Actually thinking about it, i think it was a different issue there. They considered everything published in USSR automatically public domain (thus you needed to add your originality to it, i.e. translation)...
- Cite? If this is true, why wouldn't they just make 100 photocopies of the Russian?--Prosfilaes (talk) 05:14, 27 February 2012 (UTC)
-
Question
Hi there, can someone help with the following issue? There are some screenshots taken from Tolonews, an Afghan TV channel based in Kabul. (this one of anti-Taliban leaders i. e.) Tolonews.com writes: TOLOnews is Afghan owned and operated, a philosophy reflected in MOBY’s other local stations TOLO TV, LEMAR TV, ARMAN FM and Arakozia FM. Tolonews belongs to and is owned by the Moby Group. On their own website they state: "Moby Group is a 100% Afghan owned and operated organisation." The owner Mohseni is an Afghan citizen. A clear case of PD:Afghanistan. Now, one user says, as Mohnseni (son of an Afghan diplomat who traveled to several countries including Australia) may have also gotten the Australian citizenship, the image does not fall under PD:Afghanistan, although Moby Group itself says it is "100% Afghan owned and operated" and based in Kabul. Any input is very much appreciated. JCAla (talk) 14:11, 28 February 2012 (UTC)
- IANAL.
It seems to me that the individual who speculates that Mohseni became an Australian citizen would have an obligation to substantiate this speculation before we would have to take it into account.
If, for the sake of argument, Mohseni considered himself a dual citizen would the "100 % Afghan owned" assertion be considered to be a (temporary) waiving of his Australian rights? Geo Swan (talk) 09:27, 29 February 2012 (UTC)
Processing of images
- Category:PD Afghan images requiring verification
- Category:PD Afghan images requiring verification (lowres) subset, very low resolution images.
I have modified the template so that it now takes parameters for verification. Above category lists all the images still in need of verification. Since the template is here to stay we should minimize the number of problems it creates.
Some of these images can be verified to be works of non-Afghan nationals signatories to Berne convention countries. These works are also freely license-able for other reasons. These should not be licensed with {{PD-Afghanistan}} since a more stable license can be preferred.
-- とある白い猫 ちぃ? 23:57, 3 March 2012 (UTC)
- If an image is sourced to a web site, remember to do a whois check on the server to verify that it is located in Afghanistan (or Iran, Ethiopia or any of the other non-treaty countries). If the server is in some Berne Convention country, the image would be copyrighted in all Berne Convention countries. --Stefan4 (talk) 00:13, 4 March 2012 (UTC)
- Certainly true but it could be taken from the afghan webserver and then published elsewhere within the 30 day limit.If published outside of Afghanistan then it wouldn't be PD-Afghanistan. We do respect Iranian copyright law here on commons I believe. Also see below section. -- とある白い猫 ちぃ? 01:32, 4 March 2012 (UTC)
An Afghan copyright law
User:Nard the Bard pointed out on Template talk:PD-Afghanistan that Afghanistan does seem to have a copyright law enacted in 2008 (English version). From skimming it, the effective terms seem to be life of the author plus 50 years for most things. It is also applies to works published before the law was created. Hence most of the things presently tagged PD-Afghanistan, unless particularly old, should be deleted. Dragons flight (talk) 00:07, 4 March 2012 (UTC)
- This is something I catched prior but seems like I missed its significance. This simplifies things significantly. I modified the template to handle the past claim but it seems it will have a different purpose to see if images are old enough or not. -- とある白い猫 ちぃ? 01:27, 4 March 2012 (UTC)
- Photographs are subject to a 50-year-from-publication term, it seems. In any case, that now leaes only Somalia and the Marshall Islands as countries with no copyright legislation. -- Liliana-60 (talk) 01:39, 4 March 2012 (UTC)
- I found this url which google translates
- (1) 1-57 Law of copyright protection, author, artist and researcher (copy writing)
- (2) 58 - 100 Rights Protection Act, inventor and explorer
- Also see last page of the same linked document:
- The law of support the right of authors, composers, artists and researchers (Copy Right Law).
- The Law on support the rights of inventors and discoverers.
- So there you have it people, an official copyright law. Now comes reading Persian part...
- See Template:PD-Afghanistan for the updates.
- -- とある白い猫 ちぃ? 02:38, 4 March 2012 (UTC)
- Also the sign agreement between US and Afghanistan may be binding with the line "Establish a forum for the exchange of information on commercial matters including but not limited to [...] Intellectual property rights protection and enforcement". -- とある白い猫 ちぃ? 12:07, 4 March 2012 (UTC)
- On your user page, you claim to be a native speaker of English, so I don't understand why you misunderstand this. It says "establish a forum for ..." and that's all we need to know to know that it has no direct impact on anything. They've agreed to set aside some place where they can talk, that's all.--Prosfilaes (talk) 09:44, 5 March 2012 (UTC)
- In legal/diplomacy speak that shows both sides are willing to cooperate more in the near future and this shows if you look at the dates. You can judge how diplomatic discussions can go based on the signing of such documents. I suppose this may not be obvious for people whom have no experience in diplomacy. That bill was signed in 10/07/2007 and Afghan Copyright Law came into effect in 26/07/2008, practically a full year after the fact. This can be seen as further proof that Afghanistan will sign international treaties soon which is why we should take care of these images as soon as possible. -- とある白い猫 ちぃ? 17:57, 5 March 2012 (UTC)
- When the US president creates an organization and promises the US will join it, that is a strong indication that the US will be a part of the organization. In the case of the League of Nations, it was a false one. In legal/diplomacy speak, "establish a forum for" means the exact same thing it means in normal English: "Okay, we'll talk about it, but we're not promising anything". The fact that it's to "exchange information" further distances the country from any obligation.--Prosfilaes (talk) 00:02, 6 March 2012 (UTC)
- It is a bad idea to discuss today's diplomatic practices using pre-WW2 era paradigms. But this is not the point. The point is Afghanistan is working for WTO membership which requires the establishment of copyright law as well as many other requirements unrelated to copyright such as tariffs and etc. Afghanistan has established a copyright to satisfy the minimum requirements of TRIPS/WTO which is why it is 50+life and not some other random number (for commons this is probably Life+70 as US copyright law uses the "longer term" rule). It matches it perfectly. Can Afghanistan back down? Sure. But it does not seem likely as not being a WTO member has significant penalties for a country like Afghanistan (such as access to medication and other goods). HENCE we should make an effort to satisfy Afghan copyright law as if they are a Berne signatory. All we need to do is uphold the copyright law of the source country + apply US law on top of it like we always do. We do this for countries like Iran which will not be a WTO member any time soon as US (and several other countries) actively blocks it. There is no reason for us to disregard Afghan copyright law even though it is not binding outside of Afghanistan currently. -- とある白い猫 ちぃ? 19:19, 6 March 2012 (UTC)
- The United States does not use the rule of longer term. For example, the en:Book of Common Prayer (1549) is still copyrighted in the country of origin but is not copyrighted in the United States, which would be an implication of the rule of the longer term. --Stefan4 (talk) 19:28, 6 March 2012 (UTC)
- US does apply the rule of the longer term. Table in the article as well as the section explicitly states "No" in a nut-sell. US does NOT follow rule of the shorter term unless public domain in the "source country" on the "date of restoration". Since Afghanistan already restored copyright before signing Berne/TRIPS the works will become protected in the US once works are signed as images will be copyrighted at the time of copyright restoration ie when the treaty is signed. Or to put it in simpler terms per cornell.edu source,
- "Published in a country that is a signatory to the Berne Convention" -> 70 years after the death of author, or if work of corporate authorship, 95 years from publication
- "Published in a country with which the United States does not have copyright relations under a treaty" -> Public domain
- Hence it is in the public domain now and it will be fully copyrighted. I am pretty confident it would be life+70 (US Copyright Law) and not life+50 (Afghan Copyright Law)
- -- とある白い猫 ちぃ? 18:01, 7 March 2012 (UTC)
- Quite incorrect: the rule of the longer term would mean that the work is copyrighted in the United States at least until the copyright expires in the source country (so that Mexican works are protected in the United States at least until 100 years after the death of the last surviving author and so that the en:Book of Common Prayer is protected in the United States at least until it enters the public domain in the United Kingdom). The United States uses neither the rule of the shorter term nor the rule of the longer term. The restoration upon treaty establishments does, as far as I have understood, apply to all Berne Convention countries, so that all countries would have to restore Afghan copyrights upon a treaty implementation. --Stefan4 (talk) 18:38, 7 March 2012 (UTC)
- (ec) No, the U.S. does not use the rule of the longer term. They use their own terms, whether they are longer or shorter than the source country. That is not the rule of the shorter term, correct, but it is also not the rule of the longer term. Also, when it comes to URAA restorations, it sort of is a one-day rule of the shorter term to define which works get restored and which don't. If works get restored, which is entirely dependent on the terms of Afghanistan's law on the URAA date, then yes they will get a term of 70pma or 95 years from publication in the U.S., depending on when they were published and by who. Carl Lindberg (talk) 19:01, 7 March 2012 (UTC)
- US does apply the rule of the longer term. Table in the article as well as the section explicitly states "No" in a nut-sell. US does NOT follow rule of the shorter term unless public domain in the "source country" on the "date of restoration". Since Afghanistan already restored copyright before signing Berne/TRIPS the works will become protected in the US once works are signed as images will be copyrighted at the time of copyright restoration ie when the treaty is signed. Or to put it in simpler terms per cornell.edu source,
- The United States does not use the rule of longer term. For example, the en:Book of Common Prayer (1549) is still copyrighted in the country of origin but is not copyrighted in the United States, which would be an implication of the rule of the longer term. --Stefan4 (talk) 19:28, 6 March 2012 (UTC)
- It is a bad idea to discuss today's diplomatic practices using pre-WW2 era paradigms. But this is not the point. The point is Afghanistan is working for WTO membership which requires the establishment of copyright law as well as many other requirements unrelated to copyright such as tariffs and etc. Afghanistan has established a copyright to satisfy the minimum requirements of TRIPS/WTO which is why it is 50+life and not some other random number (for commons this is probably Life+70 as US copyright law uses the "longer term" rule). It matches it perfectly. Can Afghanistan back down? Sure. But it does not seem likely as not being a WTO member has significant penalties for a country like Afghanistan (such as access to medication and other goods). HENCE we should make an effort to satisfy Afghan copyright law as if they are a Berne signatory. All we need to do is uphold the copyright law of the source country + apply US law on top of it like we always do. We do this for countries like Iran which will not be a WTO member any time soon as US (and several other countries) actively blocks it. There is no reason for us to disregard Afghan copyright law even though it is not binding outside of Afghanistan currently. -- とある白い猫 ちぃ? 19:19, 6 March 2012 (UTC)
- When the US president creates an organization and promises the US will join it, that is a strong indication that the US will be a part of the organization. In the case of the League of Nations, it was a false one. In legal/diplomacy speak, "establish a forum for" means the exact same thing it means in normal English: "Okay, we'll talk about it, but we're not promising anything". The fact that it's to "exchange information" further distances the country from any obligation.--Prosfilaes (talk) 00:02, 6 March 2012 (UTC)
- In legal/diplomacy speak that shows both sides are willing to cooperate more in the near future and this shows if you look at the dates. You can judge how diplomatic discussions can go based on the signing of such documents. I suppose this may not be obvious for people whom have no experience in diplomacy. That bill was signed in 10/07/2007 and Afghan Copyright Law came into effect in 26/07/2008, practically a full year after the fact. This can be seen as further proof that Afghanistan will sign international treaties soon which is why we should take care of these images as soon as possible. -- とある白い猫 ちぃ? 17:57, 5 March 2012 (UTC)
- On your user page, you claim to be a native speaker of English, so I don't understand why you misunderstand this. It says "establish a forum for ..." and that's all we need to know to know that it has no direct impact on anything. They've agreed to set aside some place where they can talk, that's all.--Prosfilaes (talk) 09:44, 5 March 2012 (UTC)
- Also the sign agreement between US and Afghanistan may be binding with the line "Establish a forum for the exchange of information on commercial matters including but not limited to [...] Intellectual property rights protection and enforcement". -- とある白い猫 ちぃ? 12:07, 4 March 2012 (UTC)
- I found this url which google translates
- Photographs are subject to a 50-year-from-publication term, it seems. In any case, that now leaes only Somalia and the Marshall Islands as countries with no copyright legislation. -- Liliana-60 (talk) 01:39, 4 March 2012 (UTC)
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
- Fine, then look at the Kyoto Protocol that the US signed but did not ratify. Until the i's are dotted and the t's are crossed, it doesn't matter.
- Yes, as per our policy, if Afghanistan has a copyright law, then we will follow it. That's all that matters.--Prosfilaes (talk) 00:05, 7 March 2012 (UTC)
-
- I don't see any reason to do anything based on an assumption they may join Berne someday. Their law does look to be specifically aligned to that, so it's always a good possibility, but they have not yet joined anything other than the WIPO Convention, which means relatively little. They have not joined any international agreements from the looks of it (nearly four years after their law went into effect), so it looks like they are now in the same situation as Iran, with a local copyright law which only applies within their borders. However, like Iran, I'm pretty sure we do honor those local laws, so we should start enforcing it. Carl Lindberg (talk) 00:12, 6 March 2012 (UTC)
- It isn't that simple for countries to sign TRIPS if they lack a body in the country that can regulate copyright nation-wide. There may simply be other priorities. The point is we will have exactly one year to remove problematic images the second it is signed. If we notice this late (we were 3-4 years too late to realize that Afghanistan in fact had a copyright) we will risk lawsuits. This is why we speedy-delete copyrighted images. -- とある白い猫 ちぃ? 19:57, 6 March 2012 (UTC)
- There won't be a delay for noticing them joining an international treaty -- it will be up on WIPO's site, the U.S. Copyright Office pages, etc., etc. well before it happens probably. And no, we probably won't risk lawsuits unless Afghan authors file NIE notices. Still, we do respect these sorts of copyright laws per Commons policy, so yes I agree we should start deleting them. But that is the main reason -- if policy were U.S. copyright only, I'd wait. Carl Lindberg (talk) 20:09, 6 March 2012 (UTC)
- What is your argument? A few lines above you are stating that "we should start enforcing it" where it is Afghan copyright law. -- とある白い猫 ちぃ? 17:32, 7 March 2012 (UTC)
- Just noting that there are no current copyright agreements, which you seemed to be arguing there were, and I would not support doing anything based on speculation that there *might* be relations one day. There is no legal reason to delete images. But yes, there is policy reason, so the question is moot. Carl Lindberg (talk) 19:01, 7 March 2012 (UTC)
- I made no such argument or claim. Images will remain in the public domain (provided they comply with the three conditions which has not been established for certain for a single image so far) until Afghanistan signs the needed treaty or treaties. That said the possibility exist that Afghanistan can sign the said treaty as early as tomorrow which is is a motivation factor for us to establish the copyright per policy and to avoid problems in the future. We wan't to avoid a PD-Soviet like situation. I do not make a claim beyond that. -- とある白い猫 ちぃ? 20:45, 7 March 2012 (UTC)
- Again it's moot, but there is no need to avoid theoretical problems in the future -- it's just as painful now as it would be then. If countries change copyright laws and make us delete stuff, fine, we deal with it as it actually happens. PD-Soviet was a misinterpretation of existing copyright law, anyways (works had been restored since the 1990s), and not the same situation. As it happens, policy is to respect the local law anyways, so the effect will be the same, which is fine too. So no, there is no motivational factor for me at all based on what Afghanistan might or might not do. They have changed their law, so now we deal with it per policy, as normal. Carl Lindberg (talk) 21:58, 7 March 2012 (UTC)
- It is 700 image painful now. I do not want to have a situation where there is the mess of PD-Soviet repeated. -- とある白い猫 ちぃ? 21:26, 8 March 2012 (UTC)
- That's entirely up to the countries and the laws they pass. PD-Russia-2008 was also painful, etc., etc. Pre-emptively deleting is just as painful, and may delete stuff where it turns out it would never have been necessary since you're operation on speculation alone. Let the laws be enacted, figure out the details, and proceed accordingly. Carl Lindberg (talk) 23:38, 8 March 2012 (UTC)
- Having images with licenses we know will expire is the problem here. No body is suggesting pre-emptively deleting. Since the start the goal is to establish copyright to make sure the images stay on commons in a stable manner. The problem of open-ended licenses like how PD-Afghanistan was is that people begin to assume anything and everything created in the country is copyright-free which isn't necessarily true. Such licenses are impractical and should be avoided. "PD until country drafts copyright" or "PD until country signs Berne/TRIPS" is speculation-based licensing which assumes
- The country will make no attempt to draft a copyright and sign Berne/TRIPS at a certain point
- The work was created in Afghanistan initially.
- The work was created in the non-signatory country by a national whom is also not a permanent resident of one of the Berne signatory countries.
- The work was not published outside of the country 30 days within its creation.
- How is any of these assumptions not based on speculation? I suppose you can establish the second bullet based on the content of the image but the last two bullets are very difficult to prove.
- And to respond to your point, the laws existed. Images created by non-afghan nationals in Afghanistan always were copyrighted even before Afghanistan got a copyright law. The copyright of the national origin of the people creating the IP works was still in effect.
- -- とある白い猫 ちぃ? 19:42, 10 March 2012 (UTC)
- It is entirely possible that a country never signs a treaty, or that it won't happen within the foreseeable future. Some countries signed the Berne Convention in the 19th century while other countries still haven't signed it. Should all countries have been treated as signatories already back in the 19th century? --Stefan4 (talk) 19:47, 10 March 2012 (UTC)
- That is not the point. There comes a point where there are non-legal practical aspects on how to manage content uploaded to commons. We should avoid loopholes in laws such as the case with PD-Afghanistan. That is my view that will not change. You are welcome to agree to disagree. -- とある白い猫 ちぃ? 10:55, 11 March 2012 (UTC)
- You were most definitely suggesting we delete PD-Afghanistan and all images under it. In its former form, it was a perfectly legitimate copyright tag until they passed their retroactive law. The fact a tag can be abused is not a reason to avoid it -- any tag can be abused. That is a matter for eduction, and not deletion (unless of course it was not applicable in the first place). Deleting because Afghanistan or any country *might* pass a law, or *might* sign a treaty, is indeed pre-emptive deletion. The goal is stability, sure, but there is always uncertainty due to changing laws. When it comes to that stuff, let the laws pass and just deal with the pain then. "The country will make no attempt to draft a copyright and sign Berne/TRIPS at a certain point" is not a valid reason -- we follow the law, and if there is no law, or no treaty signed, then it follows there is no copyright protection. It's entirely possible that will change, just like it's entirely possible the US Government will remove the PD-USGov licensing, or retroactively expand to 120 pma someday -- doesn't change the fact we should follow the current rules. There is no foreknowledge on new laws whether photographs may have a shorter term (which was in fact the case), etc., etc. You'd have to make up speculative copyright terms, originality rules, freedom of panorama, etc., etc., which will just cause unneeded friction because we can't point to *any* reliable source to base a deletion on. Once the laws pass, all that changes. Which it has in this case. Carl Lindberg (talk) 20:15, 10 March 2012 (UTC)
- It is entirely possible that a country never signs a treaty, or that it won't happen within the foreseeable future. Some countries signed the Berne Convention in the 19th century while other countries still haven't signed it. Should all countries have been treated as signatories already back in the 19th century? --Stefan4 (talk) 19:47, 10 March 2012 (UTC)
- Having images with licenses we know will expire is the problem here. No body is suggesting pre-emptively deleting. Since the start the goal is to establish copyright to make sure the images stay on commons in a stable manner. The problem of open-ended licenses like how PD-Afghanistan was is that people begin to assume anything and everything created in the country is copyright-free which isn't necessarily true. Such licenses are impractical and should be avoided. "PD until country drafts copyright" or "PD until country signs Berne/TRIPS" is speculation-based licensing which assumes
- That's entirely up to the countries and the laws they pass. PD-Russia-2008 was also painful, etc., etc. Pre-emptively deleting is just as painful, and may delete stuff where it turns out it would never have been necessary since you're operation on speculation alone. Let the laws be enacted, figure out the details, and proceed accordingly. Carl Lindberg (talk) 23:38, 8 March 2012 (UTC)
- It is 700 image painful now. I do not want to have a situation where there is the mess of PD-Soviet repeated. -- とある白い猫 ちぃ? 21:26, 8 March 2012 (UTC)
- Again it's moot, but there is no need to avoid theoretical problems in the future -- it's just as painful now as it would be then. If countries change copyright laws and make us delete stuff, fine, we deal with it as it actually happens. PD-Soviet was a misinterpretation of existing copyright law, anyways (works had been restored since the 1990s), and not the same situation. As it happens, policy is to respect the local law anyways, so the effect will be the same, which is fine too. So no, there is no motivational factor for me at all based on what Afghanistan might or might not do. They have changed their law, so now we deal with it per policy, as normal. Carl Lindberg (talk) 21:58, 7 March 2012 (UTC)
- I made no such argument or claim. Images will remain in the public domain (provided they comply with the three conditions which has not been established for certain for a single image so far) until Afghanistan signs the needed treaty or treaties. That said the possibility exist that Afghanistan can sign the said treaty as early as tomorrow which is is a motivation factor for us to establish the copyright per policy and to avoid problems in the future. We wan't to avoid a PD-Soviet like situation. I do not make a claim beyond that. -- とある白い猫 ちぃ? 20:45, 7 March 2012 (UTC)
- Just noting that there are no current copyright agreements, which you seemed to be arguing there were, and I would not support doing anything based on speculation that there *might* be relations one day. There is no legal reason to delete images. But yes, there is policy reason, so the question is moot. Carl Lindberg (talk) 19:01, 7 March 2012 (UTC)
- What is your argument? A few lines above you are stating that "we should start enforcing it" where it is Afghan copyright law. -- とある白い猫 ちぃ? 17:32, 7 March 2012 (UTC)
- There won't be a delay for noticing them joining an international treaty -- it will be up on WIPO's site, the U.S. Copyright Office pages, etc., etc. well before it happens probably. And no, we probably won't risk lawsuits unless Afghan authors file NIE notices. Still, we do respect these sorts of copyright laws per Commons policy, so yes I agree we should start deleting them. But that is the main reason -- if policy were U.S. copyright only, I'd wait. Carl Lindberg (talk) 20:09, 6 March 2012 (UTC)
- It isn't that simple for countries to sign TRIPS if they lack a body in the country that can regulate copyright nation-wide. There may simply be other priorities. The point is we will have exactly one year to remove problematic images the second it is signed. If we notice this late (we were 3-4 years too late to realize that Afghanistan in fact had a copyright) we will risk lawsuits. This is why we speedy-delete copyrighted images. -- とある白い猫 ちぃ? 19:57, 6 March 2012 (UTC)
-
-
-
-
-
-
- Blanket PD templates such as how PD-Afghanistan was in its older form was a problematic, unstable, ill-conceived copyright time bomb. My view of that has not changed and as far as how things have developed, I was proven right. Sooner or later such templates lead to pages AND PAGES of discussion being a complete waste of peoples time. The discussion leads to mass processing of all the images. For that reason such license templates are impractical and not useful because the PD status is expected to expire eventually.
- A good number of images were also mistakenly tagged with PD-Afghanistan when they should be tagged with something else as the creator of the works are actually non-Afghans bringing their nations long arm of copyright law with them. There were cases were images tagged with CC-BY got replaced with PD-Afghanistan as well.
- Afghanistan copyright law came into affect on 26/07/2008, the PD-Afghanistan template was created on 09/12/2008. So when the license template was created it already made false assumptions about Afghan copyright. I realized the existence of the law in 04/03/2012. You can see the multiple-year gap that images were hosted with a false license making false claims.
- What we were doing was gambling over when the nation will have a copyright or when they will sign Berne/TRIPS. We should always assume the minimum conditions of Berne/TRIPS which is life+50 which makes transition much easier. I ideally want to avoid having an identical discussion about the other non-signatories of Berne/TRIPS.
- I have changed my proposal based on the discussion as a compromise. Are you saying I am not allowed to compromise?
-
- Once again you have been tripped up by your assumption that Afghanistan's signing an International IP agreement is inevitable. I don't think you have offered a defense of this assumption and several of us have explained why this is not inevitable. Geo Swan (talk) 01:31, 12 March 2012 (UTC)
- The PD status is not "expected" to expire by anyone but you; PD could change one way or the other in any country and any time. Life+50 is not the minimum condition for Berne for preexisting works; you'll note that the United States does not give pre-1978 works life + 50.
- These aren't in any way time bombs. Even if they sign Berne, we will have at least a full year to delete any works.--Prosfilaes (talk) 02:36, 12 March 2012 (UTC)
- Yes, hence the PD status expires giving us just one year, provided we notice the signing immediately. Then we would have to process all images with a specific license. It is a lot of work that can be avoided. Otherwise I can upload every IP work from those handful countries without restrictions which would mean a lot of work for the reviewers at a later point. Why do you want commons to host content not released with free licenses and can only be considered PD under very strict conditions that are difficult to prove. For instance works would have to be NOT released in a Berne signatory and NOT be created by a Berne signatory national or permanent resident. Also should we not respect IP rights of these people?
- What pre-1978 works are we talking about?
- -- とある白い猫 ちぃ? 17:47, 13 March 2012 (UTC)
- The previous form of PD-Afghanistan was an accurate representation of the law (at least until they enacted their new law); it is never reckless to simply follow current law. Any country can change laws at any time, which will most likely always cause us some pain, but that is no reason to delete things prematurely. If the actual text of an upcoming law becomes available, then sure, we can start preparing based on that, but I still wouldn't act until it's actually passed -- wording and terms can change, and they can decide to not pass it, etc., etc.. And actually, in the event Afghanistan joins Berne, we will have a full year *from the time we are explicitly notified about specific works*, or authors file an NIE notice with the Copyright Office. It is not one year from when they join Berne; we would be a "reliance party" in that event. We just have to be sure to not allow anything new to be uploaded at that point. There is no guarantee that they will join Berne either; I wouldn't take any actions purely based on that speculation either. Also, life+50 is not the minimum term for all kinds of works -- Berne allows much shorter terms for cinematographic works and photographs (among a couple others), which are the most common media type we have. Unless we have concrete evidence over what terms a country is going to use, it's pointless to even speculate. Yes, it was always possible that Afghanistan would change their copyright terms, but that is possible for every country. You did fail to predict the 50 year from publication term for photographs, if I'm not mistaken. Anyways, policy is to respect local copyright laws whether Berne or not, so we can just proceed along those lines. Carl Lindberg (talk) 18:12, 13 March 2012 (UTC)
- Practical applications of the law is relevant. You are creating unnecessary work just to keep images on commons for 2-3 years (or 10 years) if you take the PD due to lack of treaty argument. Legally it is fine but it is impractical. We can assume life+50 because countries will either don't draft copyright at all or they will draft it for 50 years or more per WTO and/or Berne restrictions. We do reject images that are in the public domain only in the US if my memory serves me right. Afghan photos are copyrighted. The law does not state that they aren't copyrighted. -- とある白い猫 ちぃ? 19:50, 13 March 2012 (UTC)
- I'm arguing to follow our long-existing policy -- act only upon actual laws passed, but respect local copyright laws even if non-Berne. We should start removing Afghanistan stuff based on that, and that alone. We cannot assume anything about laws until they are passed, or treaties until they are signed. We absolutely cannot assume life+50; those are not necessarily the terms for all works, especially the ones we are most likely to have (i.e. photographs). We will not apply life+50 to Afghan photographs; there is no basis to do so, rather it is photos first published/broadcast since 1962. But if you are suggesting any additional deletions based on a treaty Afghanistan might sign, I would disagree with those. Carl Lindberg (talk) 20:35, 13 March 2012 (UTC)
- This is a tangent from the main PD-Afghanistan discussion for countries that still lack a local copyright, we should apply the life+50 pd rule for practical reasons. We should only declare content in the Public Domain if the local law or US law explicitly declares it PD. This has no legal basis but instead has practical benefits. -- とある白い猫 ちぃ? 19:19, 14 March 2012 (UTC)
- And I would absolutely oppose that. If there is no local copyright law, that is the law, end of story for me. I'm not going to go invent laws I think they should have. Particularly not life+50 for photographs -- minimum Berne protection is 25 years from publication. Carl Lindberg (talk) 19:23, 14 March 2012 (UTC)
- This is a tangent from the main PD-Afghanistan discussion for countries that still lack a local copyright, we should apply the life+50 pd rule for practical reasons. We should only declare content in the Public Domain if the local law or US law explicitly declares it PD. This has no legal basis but instead has practical benefits. -- とある白い猫 ちぃ? 19:19, 14 March 2012 (UTC)
- I'm arguing to follow our long-existing policy -- act only upon actual laws passed, but respect local copyright laws even if non-Berne. We should start removing Afghanistan stuff based on that, and that alone. We cannot assume anything about laws until they are passed, or treaties until they are signed. We absolutely cannot assume life+50; those are not necessarily the terms for all works, especially the ones we are most likely to have (i.e. photographs). We will not apply life+50 to Afghan photographs; there is no basis to do so, rather it is photos first published/broadcast since 1962. But if you are suggesting any additional deletions based on a treaty Afghanistan might sign, I would disagree with those. Carl Lindberg (talk) 20:35, 13 March 2012 (UTC)
- Practical applications of the law is relevant. You are creating unnecessary work just to keep images on commons for 2-3 years (or 10 years) if you take the PD due to lack of treaty argument. Legally it is fine but it is impractical. We can assume life+50 because countries will either don't draft copyright at all or they will draft it for 50 years or more per WTO and/or Berne restrictions. We do reject images that are in the public domain only in the US if my memory serves me right. Afghan photos are copyrighted. The law does not state that they aren't copyrighted. -- とある白い猫 ちぃ? 19:50, 13 March 2012 (UTC)
- The US is an example of Berne Convention country that does not have life+50 for works predating Berne; there are US works of all types that were published the year before the US enacted the Berne Convention that are out of copyright in the US. More generally, in no case do works published before 1978 get a copyright term based on the life of the author in the US; works published between 1923 and 1977 generally get 95 years of copyright from publication, with many US works in that period already having fallen out of copyright due to formalities.--Prosfilaes (talk) 01:17, 14 March 2012 (UTC)
- The previous form of PD-Afghanistan was an accurate representation of the law (at least until they enacted their new law); it is never reckless to simply follow current law. Any country can change laws at any time, which will most likely always cause us some pain, but that is no reason to delete things prematurely. If the actual text of an upcoming law becomes available, then sure, we can start preparing based on that, but I still wouldn't act until it's actually passed -- wording and terms can change, and they can decide to not pass it, etc., etc.. And actually, in the event Afghanistan joins Berne, we will have a full year *from the time we are explicitly notified about specific works*, or authors file an NIE notice with the Copyright Office. It is not one year from when they join Berne; we would be a "reliance party" in that event. We just have to be sure to not allow anything new to be uploaded at that point. There is no guarantee that they will join Berne either; I wouldn't take any actions purely based on that speculation either. Also, life+50 is not the minimum term for all kinds of works -- Berne allows much shorter terms for cinematographic works and photographs (among a couple others), which are the most common media type we have. Unless we have concrete evidence over what terms a country is going to use, it's pointless to even speculate. Yes, it was always possible that Afghanistan would change their copyright terms, but that is possible for every country. You did fail to predict the 50 year from publication term for photographs, if I'm not mistaken. Anyways, policy is to respect local copyright laws whether Berne or not, so we can just proceed along those lines. Carl Lindberg (talk) 18:12, 13 March 2012 (UTC)
The future of our PD-Afghanistan files
I was one of those uploading many files with the very convenient PD-Afghanistan-tag. What will follow? A mass deletion? What will happen with the numerous files in Category:Symbols of Afghanistan?--Antemister (talk) 11:44, 4 March 2012 (UTC)
- We need to re-license them. This was exactly what I feared would have happened. If we can establish an image is free for some other reason, that is fine otherwise they would need to be deleted. Let's avoid a panic mass deletion. -- とある白い猫 ちぃ? 12:28, 4 March 2012 (UTC)
- Our only choice is a mass deletion. It's safe to assume most if not all to the files cannot be freely licensed. -- Liliana-60 (talk) 02:35, 6 March 2012 (UTC)
- Reviewing them carefully to check whether any files are old enough wouldn't mean any legal risks for the WMF since the files are supposed to be in the public domain in the United States. --Stefan4 (talk) 02:40, 6 March 2012 (UTC)
- Should we apply life+50 or life+70? If rule of the longer term applies it would be problematic to give it a +50 range. -- とある白い猫 ちぃ? 19:21, 6 March 2012 (UTC)
- 50 years from publication (or broadcast) for photos. It's also possible that normal snapshots may be not be copyrightable at all, but unless we can get further clarifications on that, it may not be a good idea to assume it. However, I can't fathom any reason to use 50pma, let alone 70pma, for Afghan photos, given their law. Carl Lindberg (talk) 19:30, 6 March 2012 (UTC)
- (Edit conflict) You are misunderstanding things here. Currently, none of these works are copyrighted in the United States. Whenever Afghanistan establishes copyright relations with the United States, US copyright will only be given to works copyrighted in Afghanistan on the date when the copyright treaty is implemented. If the author died more than 50 years ago, the work wouldn't be copyrighted in Afghanistan and so the work would remain in the public domain in the United States even after the treaty is established. Those works becoming copyrighted in the United States would then be copyrighted for the usual US term, for example life+70 years or publication+95 years. --Stefan4 (talk) 19:35, 6 March 2012 (UTC)
- Likewise, U.S. copyright would not be restored to photos published more than 50 years before Afghanistan's implementation year. Carl Lindberg (talk) 20:00, 6 March 2012 (UTC)
- Why would this be different from Template:PD-Soviet. The case law is there. -- とある白い猫 ちぃ? 17:34, 7 March 2012 (UTC)
- It's not any different. Russia had 50pma terms on stuff on the URAA date in 1996, so that is the scope of what got restored. If something was public domain in Russia in 1996, then its U.S. copyright did not get restored, despite the fact that Russia later retroactively enacted 70pma terms. Thus, something by an author who died in say 1944 is not OK on Commons (since its copyright got restored in Russia) but would be OK in the U.S. (since it was PD in Russia in 1996). I don't think Russia had a separate shorter term for photographs the way Afghanistan does right now; that may be the difference you're looking for. It's normal procedure for the URAA; whatever is under copyright in the source country on the URAA date gets restored, anything in the public domain in the source country does not. Afghanistan's terms at the moment are 50 years from publication or broadcast for photographs, so presuming those terms are still intact when the URAA takes effect, then all Afghan photos published more than 50 years before that date will not get their U.S. copyright restored. If Afghanistan changes their terms before they join Berne and trigger the URAA, then it may be different. Any Afghan law changes after the URAA is triggered would have no further effect on the U.S. status. Carl Lindberg (talk) 18:10, 7 March 2012 (UTC)
- Fine. So life+50 it is. -- とある白い猫 ちぃ?
- Not for photos or audiovisual works, which are 50 years from publication, rather than 50 pma, per Afghanistan's terms. Granted we may not have any that old, but those are the terms in Afghanistan's law, and those are the terms which determine if their U.S. copyright gets restored. Life+50 would apply to very little that we have. Carl Lindberg (talk) 21:50, 7 March 2012 (UTC)
- Fine. So life+50 it is. -- とある白い猫 ちぃ?
- It's not any different. Russia had 50pma terms on stuff on the URAA date in 1996, so that is the scope of what got restored. If something was public domain in Russia in 1996, then its U.S. copyright did not get restored, despite the fact that Russia later retroactively enacted 70pma terms. Thus, something by an author who died in say 1944 is not OK on Commons (since its copyright got restored in Russia) but would be OK in the U.S. (since it was PD in Russia in 1996). I don't think Russia had a separate shorter term for photographs the way Afghanistan does right now; that may be the difference you're looking for. It's normal procedure for the URAA; whatever is under copyright in the source country on the URAA date gets restored, anything in the public domain in the source country does not. Afghanistan's terms at the moment are 50 years from publication or broadcast for photographs, so presuming those terms are still intact when the URAA takes effect, then all Afghan photos published more than 50 years before that date will not get their U.S. copyright restored. If Afghanistan changes their terms before they join Berne and trigger the URAA, then it may be different. Any Afghan law changes after the URAA is triggered would have no further effect on the U.S. status. Carl Lindberg (talk) 18:10, 7 March 2012 (UTC)
- Why would this be different from Template:PD-Soviet. The case law is there. -- とある白い猫 ちぃ? 17:34, 7 March 2012 (UTC)
- Likewise, U.S. copyright would not be restored to photos published more than 50 years before Afghanistan's implementation year. Carl Lindberg (talk) 20:00, 6 March 2012 (UTC)
- Should we apply life+50 or life+70? If rule of the longer term applies it would be problematic to give it a +50 range. -- とある白い猫 ちぃ? 19:21, 6 March 2012 (UTC)
- Reviewing them carefully to check whether any files are old enough wouldn't mean any legal risks for the WMF since the files are supposed to be in the public domain in the United States. --Stefan4 (talk) 02:40, 6 March 2012 (UTC)
- The files fall into two groups: those that are new enough to be copyrighted in both the US and Afghanistan, and those that are only copyrighted in Afghanistan. Files in the first group need to be deleted, while files in the second group can be moved to enwiki and other wikis that only require US public domain status. I don't know what date is the dividing line between the two groups, though. --Carnildo (talk) 23:37, 6 March 2012 (UTC)
- Clarification: the United States still applies a copyright term of publication+0 years for works first published in Afghanistan (or de facto publication+30 days since publication in a Berne Convention country within that time frame means maintaining copyright for the work). As such, the "new enough" works would mainly consist of unpublished works. --Stefan4 (talk) 23:45, 6 March 2012 (UTC)
- Not quite, as Stefan4 mentioned -- none of these files are copyrighted in the U.S. (yet). So there are only files which are copyrighted in Afghanistan, and possibly some old ones which are still PD even with the new rules. Once Afghanistan joins Berne, then the URAA will kick in, at which point virtually all the works still under copyright in Afghanistan suddenly become copyrighted in the U.S., and will generally not expire in the U.S. even if they subsequently expire in Afghanistan. At that point, the set of images OK on Commons should be the same as the ones OK on en-wiki. But yes, if en-wiki wishes to use U.S. law only, they can currently just transfer these images to be local. If any of them expire in Afghanistan between now and when Afghanistan joins Berne, then those can be transferred back to Commons. But en-wiki would have to delete any others once Afghanistan joins Berne -- but who knows, that could be years away still, and could conceivably never happen (though the law does seem carefully positioned to allow them to join easily). Carl Lindberg (talk) 01:15, 7 March 2012 (UTC)
- Under current policy, en-wiki treats works from non-Berne countries as if they are protected as long as they are protected in the country of origin. Recently, there has been a variety of discussion about possibly changing this though. Dragons flight (talk) 04:17, 7 March 2012 (UTC)
-
-
-
- One other thing that might bear mentioning -- if any files which get restored by the URAA are hosted on Commons or en-wiki at the time, then the WMF may qualify as a "reliance party" under those laws, who are then able to continue to use those works without liability unless directly notified by the copyright owner or an NIE notice is filed, which could bring up policy considerations which have pretty much not been applicable before. I sort of doubt it would make a difference on a project policy level, but it would on a legal level. Carl Lindberg (talk) 18:10, 7 March 2012 (UTC)
-
-
Simple rule
Disregarding the existence of Afghan copyright law (for the sake of argument),
Can you prove to me that these images are in the public domain? Let's follow the original three conditions.
- The work was first published in Afghanistan.
- The authors of the work are citizens of Afghanistan and are not also citizens or permanent residents of any country that participates in the Berne Convention.
- Within thirty days of its first publication in Afghanistan, the work was never published in any country that participates in the Berne Convention.
Can you prove that all images tagged with Template:PD-Afghanistan comply with all three conditions? Condition #1 can be established fairly easily. Condition #2 and #3 will be very difficult for vast majority if not all of the images. Images can be speedy deleted if they lack proper sourcing ie who created them.
-- とある白い猫 ちぃ? 18:16, 7 March 2012 (UTC)
- Proving all of those for any specific image may be hard. If it can't be proven for a specific image, I suppose that the image should be tagged as "no source" or be proposed for deletion. Anyway, proving this doesn't seem harder than proving that a photo, which possibly appeared at lots of places, didn't get its copyright renewed but qualifies as {{PD-US-not renewed}}. We already have similarly difficult cases elsewhere. --Stefan4 (talk) 18:45, 7 March 2012 (UTC)
- These images almost entirely had been taken in the past 10 years. That vast majority is the concern here, not historic images. -- とある白い猫 ちぃ? 20:51, 7 March 2012 (UTC)
- You will have to consider that laws don't reach back. You can't be fined for anything that happend before the law was put in place. That is a general rule in all jurisdictions i know. The present images where perfectly legal before 2008 and still are, following this basic concept. -- /人◕ ‿‿ ◕人\ 苦情処理係 20:09, 13 March 2012 (UTC)
- Continuing to distribute them may not be. Distributions before the law went into effect would still be OK, but future and continuing distribution may not be, depending on how the law was written. There are often transition sections of laws near the end to determine the details. Carl Lindberg (talk) 20:27, 13 March 2012 (UTC)
- Lets say i grabbed a PD image in 2007, used it to create a new work from it and released that work in the same year under CC-BY-SA. Would it be now a copyright violation? I doubt that. -- /人◕ ‿‿ ◕人\ 苦情処理係 20:34, 13 March 2012 (UTC)
- US law. Title 17, Chapter 1, § 104A, (d)(3) says that you can continue to exploit that copyrighted work provided you pay them reasonable compensation; if you two can't agree on what that is, it's decided by a US district court. I don't know what a district court would charge you releasing a work under the CC-BY-SA, but I doubt it will be cheap.--Prosfilaes (talk) 01:26, 14 March 2012 (UTC)
- I guess it would simply mean that the CC-BY-SA licence only applies to your changes and that people using the work would have to pay royalties to the copyright holder of the original work. It was a true CC-BY-SA work at one point but has now stopped being one. --Stefan4 (talk) 01:37, 14 March 2012 (UTC)
- See the thing is how are we going to track all this? I mean say we have an offline version of wikipedia with only one of these images. We would have to hunt all of them. Or how about projects like OLPC. It would be illegal to distribute the laptops with that one file. It is expensive and impractical to hunt them down. -- とある白い猫 ちぃ? 19:15, 14 March 2012 (UTC)
- No, that's not the same thing at all. That is a past exploitation, nothing wrong there -- they are not exploiting the work. Owners of books that became re-copyrighted don't have to destroy them, that kind of thing. You only have to worry about future exploitations -- if you own a PD book, you can make copies, but once it becomes not PD, you can't make or sell any more copies (but existing sold copies are fine). Furthermore, any infringement would not be enforceable unless they were specifically notified by the (restored) copyright owner, or a special notice was filed with the Copyright Office. If neither of those are done, continued usage of works (i.e. selling more copies of the book in the previous example) I think is perfectly OK. Carl Lindberg (talk) 19:33, 14 March 2012 (UTC)
- See the thing is how are we going to track all this? I mean say we have an offline version of wikipedia with only one of these images. We would have to hunt all of them. Or how about projects like OLPC. It would be illegal to distribute the laptops with that one file. It is expensive and impractical to hunt them down. -- とある白い猫 ちぃ? 19:15, 14 March 2012 (UTC)
- I guess it would simply mean that the CC-BY-SA licence only applies to your changes and that people using the work would have to pay royalties to the copyright holder of the original work. It was a true CC-BY-SA work at one point but has now stopped being one. --Stefan4 (talk) 01:37, 14 March 2012 (UTC)
- US law. Title 17, Chapter 1, § 104A, (d)(3) says that you can continue to exploit that copyrighted work provided you pay them reasonable compensation; if you two can't agree on what that is, it's decided by a US district court. I don't know what a district court would charge you releasing a work under the CC-BY-SA, but I doubt it will be cheap.--Prosfilaes (talk) 01:26, 14 March 2012 (UTC)
- Lets say i grabbed a PD image in 2007, used it to create a new work from it and released that work in the same year under CC-BY-SA. Would it be now a copyright violation? I doubt that. -- /人◕ ‿‿ ◕人\ 苦情処理係 20:34, 13 March 2012 (UTC)
- Continuing to distribute them may not be. Distributions before the law went into effect would still be OK, but future and continuing distribution may not be, depending on how the law was written. There are often transition sections of laws near the end to determine the details. Carl Lindberg (talk) 20:27, 13 March 2012 (UTC)
- You will have to consider that laws don't reach back. You can't be fined for anything that happend before the law was put in place. That is a general rule in all jurisdictions i know. The present images where perfectly legal before 2008 and still are, following this basic concept. -- /人◕ ‿‿ ◕人\ 苦情処理係 20:09, 13 March 2012 (UTC)
- These images almost entirely had been taken in the past 10 years. That vast majority is the concern here, not historic images. -- とある白い猫 ちぃ? 20:51, 7 March 2012 (UTC)
Freedom of panorama, Canada
-
-
- (ii) "a sculpture or work of artistic craftsmanship or a cast or model of a sculpture or work of artistic craftsmanship, that is permanently situated in a public place or building".
-
Okay, so Canadian freedom of panorama laws say the above. How permanent is permanent? Specifically, the statue Kwakiutl... it was in front of a public building, then inside the lobby of the building, inside a library inside that same public building, at the entrance to a public park, inside a public greenhouse at that public park. My photo is from the current location. Does that count? The statue is also owned by the municipality, and the reason it's jumped around so many times since 1972 is because he's nude, and the greenhouse partially obscures his genitals. -- Nick Moreau (talk) 14:52, 25 February 2012 (UTC)
- I think this would count as permanent. Who owns the statue? The local government or does the artist still own it? Is this photo already on commons? -- とある白い猫 ちぃ? 21:00, 25 February 2012 (UTC)
- I think we've considered "permanently situated in a public place" to mean that its in a public place all the time and not being put away for periods of time, like not a seasonal exhibition. I think that's what they meant by that. ViperSnake151 (talk) 21:19, 25 February 2012 (UTC)
- Are there definite plans to remove it at a known date? If not, that usually means "permanent". Carl Lindberg (talk) 22:23, 26 February 2012 (UTC)
-
- It's owned by the City, now. Photo's not on Commons, yet. If it were off display for a month or two during one of the moves, would that be a ding against it? (I haven't the foggiest in that level of detail, yet, haven't checked the council minutes, etc.) There are no definite plans to remove it, though at any point, it could come under more controversy, and being banish forever. -- Nick Moreau (talk) 19:46, 28 February 2012 (UTC)
-
-
- If it was put up without an intended end date, that is "permanent" to the best of my knowledge, so it sounds like the photos should be fine. Something like a sculpture festival scheduled for three months... that would not be permanent. Carl Lindberg (talk) 20:40, 28 February 2012 (UTC)
-
-
-
-
- Thanks for all your help! -- Nick Moreau (talk) 00:01, 7 March 2012 (UTC)
-
-
February 26
{{Assessments}} tweek
Is anyone familiar enough with the {{Assessments}} template to fix it so that it only adds categories to image pages, and not others (eg talk pages where it is being discussed) ? --Tony Wills (talk) 04:49, 26 February 2012 (UTC)
- All categories should be within if statement like "{{#ifeq:{{NAMESPACE}}|File|[[Category:......]]}}". You should also announce the intent to change the template at Template talk:Assessments. I do not think there should be any objections but that way people that usually maintain it would not be surprised. --Jarekt (talk) 04:29, 27 February 2012 (UTC)
- Thanks, I see how to fix it, but it is a right pain to bloat the template even more by surrounding every instance of [[Category:......]] with more code. It would have been easier (less messy) before a change at the end of last year that merged the seperate category setting section. Adding extraneous pages to categories is really a general problem when people are discussing templates by transcluding them into talk pages etc, perhaps we need a {{filecat|cat}} template that basically does {{#ifeq:{{NAMESPACE}}|File|[[Category:cat]]}} --Tony Wills (talk) 11:06, 28 February 2012 (UTC)
Enhancing Image Usability
When using wikipedia or other sites and clicking on an image it opens up on a new page. Wouldn't it be nice if it just scaled-up on the same page like a pop-up as in sites like facebook and google-image search when hovered. And then when we click on them the image page opens up.--Nischayn22 (talk) 20:03, 27 February 2012 (UTC)
- Could be useful, probably a lot more a WP issue than Commons. If somebody ever implements this I hope they make it optional and the size selectable under preferences as it could get annoying in the category display. Dankarl (talk) 20:26, 27 February 2012 (UTC)
- Actually this could simply be done in a site-wide JS (possibly a default gadget). Even with standard image popup code modules. IF we want that. And of course every user can run it as userscript. Thumbnails in all sizes are delivered on request by the servers - so it is just the display popup / overlay thing. Cheers --Saibo (Δ) 20:47, 27 February 2012 (UTC)
- No, it wouldn't be nice. When I click on a link, I want it to behave as a link.--Prosfilaes (talk) 05:16, 28 February 2012 (UTC)
- If you compare Google Images behaviour, it's a popup when hovering over the image thumbnail, and a click takes you to the page as usual. Rd232 (talk) 17:16, 29 February 2012 (UTC)
- Also attribution (a legal duty) would be tricky in that context. Jarry1250 (talk) 16:27, 28 February 2012 (UTC)
- This is good I think. Some examples of implementation of this behavior on MediaWiki -- http://lurkmore.to/Ubuntu, http://traditio-ru.org/wiki/OpenStreetMap, http://absurdopedia.net/wiki/Травмай. Britannica do it as well (but in my opinion in super annoying and bloated way) -- example. Getty and Corbis behave in slightly different way -- they show larger thumbnail on hover, but thumbnails always behave like links -- [2], [3]. --Trycatch (talk) 19:06, 29 February 2012 (UTC)
- So what do you actually want?
- A popup with full information
- The image only
- When should it open?
- On hover
- On click
There is also mw:User:Magnus Manske/wikipic#File information; A google images-like popup should be also easy to implement but it would be a bit slow because you never know which size of an image is in the cache or even on your squid. -- RE rillke questions? (ریلکه) (里尔克) (リルケ) 11:16, 5 March 2012 (UTC)
- Prototype for testing:
- User:Rillke/galleryZoomHover.js
mw.loader.using(['mediawiki.util', 'mediawiki.api'], function() { importScript('User:Rillke/galleryZoomHover.js'); });
- (currently works on galleries and search results only; adding additional information possible; linking image to file-description page, too)
- Regards -- RE rillke questions? 23:32, 14 March 2012 (UTC)
QI/VI/FP categories
I still would like to know if there is a consensus to put or not to put categories like "Quality images of xxx" in the respective topic categories. For example, if the Category:Quality images of Germany should be put into Category:Germany. There was an issue on COM:ANU due to editwarring by some user, but as it's a policy question I have to make a proposal here. - A.Savin 11:14, 29 February 2012 (UTC)
- The question to answer is, if a Commons project is a topic. Or if some users opinion is valid to separate some files in the topic category, whith the users opinion becoming part of the topic. The alternative is to keep topic categories topic categories and highlighty featured conent in portals, projects and other wiki related sites. Thats how all other wikis do it with their featured content. --Martin H. (talk) 12:08, 3 March 2012 (UTC)
-
-
- Those images are just a classification as many other: videos, B&W pictures, SVG files, drawings, audio, stereo images, aerial photo's, panoramics, ... and even historic, cultural heritage, ... They should be hidden categories and limited in depth as to avoid indeed parallel categorisation systems. --Foroa (talk) 16:43, 3 March 2012 (UTC)
-
DLR the German Space Agency switches all Media to CC-BY 3.0
See here: http://www.dlr.de/dlr/desktopdefault.aspx/tabid-10067/149_read-17/ .
On the site it reads:
- Nutzungsbedingungen für DLR-Bild- und Videomaterial
- Die Rechte aller auf dieser Website verwendeten Bilder und Videos liegen, sofern nicht anders angegeben, beim Deutschen Zentrum für Luft- und Raumfahrt e.V. (DLR).
- Sofern nicht ausdrücklich anders angegeben, stehen Bilder und Videos des DLR unter einer Creative Commons Namensnennung 3.0 Deutschland Lizenz. Das heißt, Sie dürfen das Werk bzw. den Inhalt vervielfältigen, verbreiten und öffentlich zugänglich machen, Abwandlungen und Bearbeitungen des Werkes bzw. Inhaltes anfertigen und das jeweilige Werk kommerziell nutzen, wenn Sie den Namen des DLR wie folgt ausdrücklich und gut lesbar nennen. Beispiele: "Bild: DLR, CC-BY 3.0", "Bilder: DLR, CC-BY 3.0", "Video: DLR, CC-BY 3.0".
Which means, that the import-bots can start working :). The dlr decided to do that because someone from wikipedia asked them about reusing the images (see here). cheers, Amada44 talk to me 16:03, 1 March 2012 (UTC)
- Great news! :-) Thank you for posting here! To other users (who understand German): the "here" blog post is interesting. --Saibo (Δ) 01:28, 2 March 2012 (UTC)
-
-
- Already created Template:DLR-License by User:AndreasPraefcke. Raymond 06:59, 2 March 2012 (UTC)
-
However, beware: The license only applies to media where DLR has the sole rights and is able to release the material under this license. Note the "sofern nicht anders angegeben", i.e. "if not otherwise stated": The DLR website contains also images where the copyright lies with other entities and which are not relaesed under CC-BY. Two examples of which one is IMHO ok and the other one not:
A photo of German Federal Minister Philipp Rösler. If you click on "Informationen" in the upper right corner of the image, you get "Quelle: DLR (CC-BY 3.0)" - so, this photo would be ok (and you can download it conveniently in full resolution using the link "0,53 MB" above). Counter-example:
- http://www.dlr.de/dlr/desktopdefault.aspx/tabid-10081/151_read-2869/ (currently on the DLR main page)
If you click on "Informationen" for this photo (which is also downloadable), you get "Quelle: T-Systems". So, I suppose that this photo's copyright is owned by T-Systems, not by DLR, and it's not available under CC-BY. I would always check what "Informationen" has to say. Gestumblindi (talk) 20:21, 11 March 2012 (UTC)
- Yep, this is exactly the same situation as NASA, save that DLR is CC and NASA is PD. — Huntster (t @ c) 20:45, 11 March 2012 (UTC)
Author is citizen of Australia
Regarding these images ---> (File:National Front of Afghanistan.jpg File:Ahmad Zia Massoud.jpg File:Amrullah Saleh 1.jpg File:Amrullah Saleh.png File:Anti-Taliban protest.png) --- the authors are given as "Tolo news.com" which is owned by Saad Mohesni (citizen of Australia and was born in the United Kingdom) but the license applied on them is {{PD-Afghanistan}}. According to the U.S. copyright office in Washington, DC, "Works that are... created by a citizen or domiciliary of a country with which we have a copyright treaty are also protected [4] See Circular 38a, International Copyright Relations of the United States, for the status of specific countries. This prevents us from uploading Mohseni's work because it is very well established that he is a citizen of Australia, a country which the U.S. has a copyright treaty with. Arguing about how many countries Mohseni is a citizen of is irrelevant and doesn't matter. I nominated them for deletion but Blackcat decided to keep them. I don't understand his reason so can someone please help resolve this matter. Thanks.--Officer (talk) 20:30, 1 March 2012 (UTC)
- Blackcat's reasoning, as I understand it, is that the photos are authored by an Afghan company, and the citizenship of the company's owners isn't relevant. That seems reasonable to me. --Avenue (talk) 21:25, 1 March 2012 (UTC)
-
- Sounds reasonable. Unless Mohesni was actually behind the camera, he's not the author, and has no personal interest in the copyright. The company could be the owner I suppose, but it may depend on where that corporation is registered. The owner's personal citizenship would not enter the equation at all, I don't think. If they were first published online, that could get into the "published simultaneously in every country in the world" ambiguity... Carl Lindberg (talk) 21:38, 1 March 2012 (UTC)
-
- According to this and this, Tolonews.com's server is actually in the United States (at TheStreet.com).
- There is no information if the person behind the camera was an Afghan citizen or the photos was obtained from a 3rd party.--Officer (talk) 02:33, 2 March 2012 (UTC)
- What matters are two things:
- Citizenship of the author. If the author is an Australian citizen, the work is protected. On the other hand, if someone who is only an Afghan citizen creates the work, possibly on behalf of an Australian citizen, this doesn't seem to be sufficient for copyright protection.
- Country of first publication and any other countries where it was published within 30 days. If the physical servers are in the United States, I would guess that it counts as a work first published in the United States, meaning that it is copyrighted.
- Based on the server location, I assume that we would have to treat this as something first published in the United States. --Stefan4 (talk) 12:30, 2 March 2012 (UTC)
- I've felt like we pretty much have to assume that anything published online nowadays was first published in a Berne convention country. There may be some exceptions for Iranian servers, but Afghanistan doesn't have much Internet architecture, and if it was first placed here or on Flikr or anything remotely similar, it was first published here. (IIRC, the US Copyright Office is willfully vague about whether the Internet counts as being published at all.)--Prosfilaes (talk) 02:14, 3 March 2012 (UTC)
- That may well be the case, particularly if the servers are in the U.S. Carl Lindberg (talk) 14:04, 4 March 2012 (UTC)
- I've felt like we pretty much have to assume that anything published online nowadays was first published in a Berne convention country. There may be some exceptions for Iranian servers, but Afghanistan doesn't have much Internet architecture, and if it was first placed here or on Flikr or anything remotely similar, it was first published here. (IIRC, the US Copyright Office is willfully vague about whether the Internet counts as being published at all.)--Prosfilaes (talk) 02:14, 3 March 2012 (UTC)
- What matters are two things:
-
- Sounds reasonable. Unless Mohesni was actually behind the camera, he's not the author, and has no personal interest in the copyright. The company could be the owner I suppose, but it may depend on where that corporation is registered. The owner's personal citizenship would not enter the equation at all, I don't think. If they were first published online, that could get into the "published simultaneously in every country in the world" ambiguity... Carl Lindberg (talk) 21:38, 1 March 2012 (UTC)
Is this C-Span video in the public domain?
Many of their videos are, but how about this one? http://www.c-spanvideo.org/program/111009-1 FunkMonk (talk) 09:05, 2 March 2012 (UTC)
- I don't believe so, their CSPAN Video Terms of use page says You agree not to use the Video for any commercial use without the prior written authorization of C-SPAN. --Captain-tucker (talk) 11:14, 2 March 2012 (UTC)
- Ok. Because at least their video from congressional hearings are PD. FunkMonk (talk) 13:27, 5 March 2012 (UTC)
- http://www.c-span.org/About/C-SPAN-Copyright-Policy/ is pretty clear. Following works are generally PD:
- Congressional committee hearings
- Executive agency hearings
- Events at the White House
- Congressional and Presidential Commissions
- Exceptions include for example if they for example show a copyrighted movie.
- -- とある白い猫 ちぃ? 17:54, 13 March 2012 (UTC)
- http://www.c-span.org/About/C-SPAN-Copyright-Policy/ is pretty clear. Following works are generally PD:
- Ok. Because at least their video from congressional hearings are PD. FunkMonk (talk) 13:27, 5 March 2012 (UTC)
- They have had some copyright spats before, including claiming copyright over government video because they slapped their logo on there. They have backed off some, now only claiming copyright in videos where they have their own cameras present (though William Patry had some issues with that even). However... telecasts of stuff like the above would certainly be copyrightable just like any other network. They have multiple cameras, decide when to switch between them, etc., etc. Carl Lindberg (talk) 18:30, 13 March 2012 (UTC)
Non-free images due to FOP#Japan
There are some images that may be declared as non-free here and deleted due to restriction on architecture in FOP#Japan.
These images used in some articles on English Wikipedia. What is the best way to upload reduced versions of said images as non-free to the English Wikipedia? I can do it by hand, but if there is a better way. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Laitr Keiows (talk • contribs) 10.47 2 March 2012 (UTC)
- There's a bot (the Commons fair use upload bot) that can upload images to other projects. English Wikipedia is in scope. If you want to reduce / change the image though I'm not sure there's a bot for that. Instructions on how to tag the images for the bot are on its user page. QU TalkQu 10:53, 2 March 2012 (UTC)
- Actually Commons fair use upload bot automatically marks the images for reduction, and they are then reduced by another bot :-) Dcoetzee (talk) 23:37, 2 March 2012 (UTC)
- Is that means that I don't have to do anything at all about these images?Laitr Keiows (talk) 05:17, 3 March 2012 (UTC)
- I think that you still have to instruct the fair use upload bot that it needs to upload the images. The bot also fails to write a fair use rationale, so you would have to do that yourself, and possibly change a non-free content licence template into some other non-free content licence template. --Stefan4 (talk) 11:31, 3 March 2012 (UTC)
- Is that means that I don't have to do anything at all about these images?Laitr Keiows (talk) 05:17, 3 March 2012 (UTC)
- Actually Commons fair use upload bot automatically marks the images for reduction, and they are then reduced by another bot :-) Dcoetzee (talk) 23:37, 2 March 2012 (UTC)
POTD again
For March 4 (the day over tomorrow) we got File:Madinat Jumeirah-Dubai3303.JPG, which contains Burj el Arab on the background. Any ideas whether it can be qualified as de minimis? If not we probably would need to replace the image as soon as possible. (Frankly speaking, I am not even sure the building at the foreground is free).--Ymblanter (talk) 23:48, 2 March 2012 (UTC)
- I think the Burj el Arab qualifies as de minimis in that photo as it is clearly in the background and not the focus of the image. Kaldari (talk) 22:12, 4 March 2012 (UTC)
March 3
File:Steve McQueen.png
Can anyone assist with File:Steve McQueen.png? Is a drivers license photo, or an international drivers license photo, in the public domain? If so, can you cite for me the basis of that? Is a club racing license issued by a private organization, Fédération Internationale de Motocyclisme, in the public domain? Can an auction house, Bonham's, assert copyright over the document? --Dennis Bratland (talk) 04:03, 3 March 2012 (UTC)
- Probably {{PD-US-no notice}} is the best bet. The blank form itself was issued by that organization, and printed in the UK, but that is probably not copyrightable in the U.S. in the first place, and the UK typographical arrangement copyright would have expired by now. If you notice, it was issued by "MICUS" (Motorcycle International Clubs of the United States), and there is a New Jersey stamp on the other side, meaning the photo itself was applied in the U.S. thus that would presumably be the country of origin for the photo itself. There are no copyright notices anywhere I can see, photo or otherwise. And no, the auction house can't assert copyright -- Commons:When to use the PD-scan tag is our position on that. Carl Lindberg (talk) 00:26, 15 March 2012 (UTC)
Original Research tag?
Is there a template tag to tag images that feature original thought? At English Wikipedia, policy specifically prohibits using images that feature presentation of unpublished ideas (w:en:WP:OI) ... so it would be useful to be able to tag such images on Commons, and perhaps have a bot orphan such images off of en.wiki to conform to its w:en:WP:OR policy. I suspect that other language Wikipedias also have such a rule on publication of novel ideas.
70.24.251.71 05:11, 3 March 2012 (UTC)
- But you are on Commons. We also host content for Wikibooks and Wikiversity. There is {{Fact disputed}} and some more in the "See also" section. A full listing is at Category:Problem tags. It's upon the local projects to decide what they consider OR. -- RE rillke questions? 11:21, 3 March 2012 (UTC)
-
- Yes, this is Commons, and the images are hosted on Commons, so unless you are suggesting that various Wikipedias should blacklist specific Commons images, it does appear that it needs to be addressed on Commons. 70.24.251.71 04:34, 4 March 2012 (UTC)
-
-
- If a Commons image can't be used on the English-language Wikipedia without breaking against English Wikipedia policies, the image shouldn't be used on the English-language Wikipedia. It would then appear to be up to the English-langauge Wikipedia to make sure that it follows its policies. I think that there is also a policy which states that material on the English-language Wikipedia should be in English, which probably rules out a couple of images with non-English text on the images. --Stefan4 (talk) 11:02, 4 March 2012 (UTC)
-
- Our policies are at Commons:Project scope. We can host images to support Wikibooks, Wikiversity, etc., not just the encyclopedias, so such policies are not necessarily in effect here. It's possible some such images would be considered out of our scope as well, but the criteria is different. Carl Lindberg (talk) 16:51, 3 March 2012 (UTC)
-
- I'm not saying anything about not hosting the images, I'm saying that it would be nice if there were a template that can be applied to file pages for images that are wholly what on en.wiki would be considered w:en:WP:ORIGINALRESEARCH, so that en.wiki can manage use of Commons images better (en.wiki bans uses of such images on their articles) I suspect other language Wikipedias also have problems with original research, so such a tag would be useful for various Wikipedias, so they can also be able to prune such images from articles. 70.24.251.71 04:34, 4 March 2012 (UTC)
- I'm not sure we should be hosting tags purely for the use of one subproject -- there are hundreds of subprojects, and each could want their own specific tags. I believe that the image page descriptions can be edited locally on en-wiki, with the content being combined with the Commons page description, so custom local tags could be added that way. See for example en:File:Floury Baker cicada side.JPG (and the general note at en:Help:File page#Wikimedia_Commons). I suppose some tags may be useful across subprojects, but something like original research can be a pretty contentious and subjective issue, with possible differences in policies between subprojects, and those disputes should not be on Commons. Carl Lindberg (talk) 13:48, 4 March 2012 (UTC)
- I'm not saying anything about not hosting the images, I'm saying that it would be nice if there were a template that can be applied to file pages for images that are wholly what on en.wiki would be considered w:en:WP:ORIGINALRESEARCH, so that en.wiki can manage use of Commons images better (en.wiki bans uses of such images on their articles) I suspect other language Wikipedias also have problems with original research, so such a tag would be useful for various Wikipedias, so they can also be able to prune such images from articles. 70.24.251.71 04:34, 4 March 2012 (UTC)
- The original question was not if we'd delete these images (we won't) but if we'd create a tag to make a bot remove all uses of the image on a particular project (presumably because it's easier than doing so manually). I personally think this should be done by individual contributors using downloaded tools - in case the action is disputed, they would be blamed instead of the bot. Dcoetzee (talk) 19:37, 3 March 2012 (UTC)
Unreferenced tag?
Also, in extending this idea, original images that do not feature original thought, but are built from published data, need references, since using unreferenced novel images fails en.wiki's w:en:WP:V, so while they can be used on en.wiki, they need references on the image description page for verifiability.
70.24.251.71 05:13, 3 March 2012 (UTC)
- You are of course free to add references to any image description page. Dcoetzee (talk) 19:38, 3 March 2012 (UTC)
-
- It's quite clearly impossible to determine what datasets some images are built from, only the original image creator would know such things. So... it seems, to be able to serve some of the client projects better, that a tag for "original user image" (created by a user) would be good, and if it's used on one of the Encyclopedia projects, then an unreferenced tag to go along with it (equivalent to an image without a source, except that user created images have a source, the user, but we don't know what data was used to create the images) ... 70.24.251.71 04:29, 4 March 2012 (UTC)
-
-
- There is {{References missing}}. It is up to subprojects if they want to use the images or not. Carl Lindberg (talk) 13:52, 4 March 2012 (UTC)
-
-
-
-
- Thanks, that's what I was looking for. 70.24.251.71 09:17, 5 March 2012 (UTC)
-
-
Images from MyNewsdesk
Hello! I uploaded a lot of images from the site mynewsdesk.com (Wikipedia entry about the site here) which, as I understand, is primarily a platform for press releases. Every channel on MyNewsdesk is operated by the spokesperson, press contact or similar from their respective companies. All of the images I uploaded were released under a Creative commons attribution 3.0 license, and all the Wikimedia commons pages contain a link back to the source page, an author as well as a request for review to confirm the license. Some of the images have recently been nominated for deletion and since the issues with the images are all the same it would perhaps be wise to have a centralized discussion about all these images in one place. --Bensin (talk) 17:49, 3 March 2012 (UTC)
- Though IMHO it's unfortunate that this discussion now has spread to the 4th location ([5], [6], [7]), I need to add some rationale for my doubts about this source:
- mynewsdesk.com offers for download promotional-quality, high-resolution photos(some examples) from commercial rights holders such as Sony Music Corp., allegedly released under CC-BY 3.0.
- despite the CC-BY-licensing, which requires attribution of the author for any legal use, for some of the images such as for example File:Tove Styrke 2010.jpg no author name is provided on mynewsdesk.com.
- despite the alleged CC-BY-licensing, some of the images such as File:Markoolio 2011.jpg and File:Markoolio - Borta bra men hemma bäst cover.jpg have an EXIF/meta data entry saying "Copyright© David Bicho, All Rights Reserved" and "Detta fält får inte ändras eller raderas enligt 6 kap. enligt lag" (Google translat.: This field must not be altered or erased under Chapter 6. by law 1960:729). [bolded by me]
- So, this problem/discussion is not about any misbehaviour of the uploader (made clear to him from the beginning), but about the credibility of the source website's licensing. As some pages provide a link to a PR person from the (likely) rights holding company (such as Sony etc.), I recommended to the uploader to ask these persons for confirmation of the CC-licensing or for a standard permission (OTRS). This would provide us with a legally solid record of the license and thereby protect our re-users in case mynewsdesk.com goes offline in the future. --Túrelio (talk) 08:45, 4 March 2012 (UTC)
-
- I'll try and answer these doubts in order.
- I have no objections to the description of the site. My best guess as to why they are releasing these images is that it generates good promotional value that the images are spread and used on, for instance, Wikipedia.
- The license states "You must attribute the work in the manner specified by the author or licensor". So as I understand the license, attribution is only required when the work is reproduced if it was specified when it was published, not that it is a requirement by the publisher for the license to be valid. The license also says "'Licensor' means the individual, individuals, entity or entities that offer(s) the Work under the terms of this License." So it is the copyright holder (which is not necessarily the same as the author) that has the right to release the work under a new license. In the case of work for hire "the employer—not the employee—is considered the legal author".
- CC licenses were designed to be compatible with copyright. It is therefore possible for a work to exist under two or more licenses at the same time, much in the same way a work can exist under a GPL-license and a CC-license at the same time. It is then up to the user to determine which one of these licenses (or both) to use when the work is reproduced.
- As for the credibility of the website, mynewsdesk.com has operated since 2003 and serves as a platform for organizations that want to release information to the public. Every account is operated by a representative for the organisation, much in the same way that every flickr account is operated by the photographer himself/herself. I feel confident that any attempt to impersonate a representative for Disney, Sony Music, Swedish Royal Opera, Liseberg would not go unnoticed. --Bensin (talk) 10:29, 4 March 2012 (UTC)
- I did look into the example image File:Avatar half face.jpg and support a keep for that example as the license is clear and used on a well established website. I am not 100% sure if Túrelio is suggesting that every image needs an OTRS confirmation or if it would be a good idea to send a generic query. The latter sounds reasonable even if only to spell out to the website management that Commons volunteers are taking many of their images have have them permanently and irrevocably available to the public for free commercial reuse as their license allows us to do precisely that. Unless we have a complainant, I feel such an action is icing on the cake and there is no imperative to go on a deletion spree on the basis of maybes rather than significant doubt as to copyright status. Thanks --Fæ (talk) 22:50, 4 March 2012 (UTC)
Propose that COM:GRANDFATHER becomes a guideline
I wrote the essay Commons:Grandfathered old files (abbreviated as COM:GRANDFATHER or COM:GOF) a few months ago for using it in future discussions about files which predate the OTRS system (ca. 2006). This sometimes turns up at (un)deletion discussions. See e.g. Commons:Undeletion_requests/Current_requests#File:Talbot_Tagora_2.2_green_profile.jpg. It would be useful to have this as a general guideline. I hope to hear your input about this. SpeakFree (talk) 23:06, 3 March 2012 (UTC)
- Suggest you start a discussion, at the talk page of that page linked above. -- Cirt (talk) 23:33, 3 March 2012 (UTC)
- I was advised on the #wikimedia-commons IRC chat to suggest it here. Besides Talk pages often do not get frequented much unless they are from popular pages. SpeakFree (talk) 23:45, 3 March 2012 (UTC)
- Strange. Not only do i
Support that, but i was under the impression that this was a de facto policy here. I've seen this argument being made successfully on the Deletion Requests before, and i think that it makes a lot of sense. That's not to say that if the contributor is still active we can't politely ask for OTRS, but that lack of it doesn't mean that we must delete. VolodyA! V Anarhist Beta_M (converse) 04:41, 4 March 2012 (UTC)
- Strange. Not only do i
- I was advised on the #wikimedia-commons IRC chat to suggest it here. Besides Talk pages often do not get frequented much unless they are from popular pages. SpeakFree (talk) 23:45, 3 March 2012 (UTC)
I happen to
Support it as well. I just think: suggest it here, but discuss it at its talk page, please? -- Cirt (talk) 05:10, 4 March 2012 (UTC)
- I agree it would be better to continue the discussion there, I've copyed my proposal on the talk page. SpeakFree (talk) 15:22, 4 March 2012 (UTC)
I think we can have some initial discussion here, before having a formal vote on the talk page, properly advertised (COM:RFC). I say "initial discussion" because I want to ask, before we get into voting
Support or
Oppose: the essay is in effect explaining an exception to a "general practice". But that "general practice" is not itself a policy or guideline (or is it?). Making it a guideline without doing anything else would be a bit odd. Maybe we should think about making COM:GRANDFATHER a section of a new guideline on how to document permissions? Rd232 (talk) 12:29, 4 March 2012 (UTC)
- If such a guideline would be written it would be useful to include this. SpeakFree (talk) 15:22, 4 March 2012 (UTC)
- Regardless of guidelines, it seems that some people like to nominate files for deletion that lack "proof of permission". Since many of my uploaded files date back to 2005, it would be nice if there was some sort of written guideline that protected them from deletion. Kaldari (talk) 05:02, 7 March 2012 (UTC)
- I do support this for files with an upload date that go back this far. For new files, obviously we have OTRS in place. Edoderoo (talk) 22:17, 7 March 2012 (UTC)
I've created Commons:Verifying permissions as a first draft of a proposed guideline on verifying permissions. Mentioning the grandfathering principle there may be enough for the purposes of proving "look, the principle is accepted", and the detail left in this essay; or we could merge the entire (fairly short) essay into that guideline. I'd prefer the former, I think, certainly at the early drafting stage. Anyway, comments welcome on the new proposal - and I stress that it's a first draft so don't expect anything too much :) Rd232 (talk) 14:43, 10 March 2012 (UTC)
March 4
Template:LangSwitch vs. Templates like Template:en and Template:de in image descriptions
See title. I am not really sure, which of the templates I should prefer for use in image descriptions.
(It seems, that Template:LangSwitch is only for use in the template-namespace and not in the file-namespace. Is that right?) --Hurlbrink (talk) 11:21, 4 March 2012 (UTC)
- {{LangSwitch}} shows only one version at a time, and the other versions are not available without switching the UI language. So it is only worth using when you can’t afford using {{en}}, {{mld}} or {{Translation table}}. --AVRS (talk) 16:15, 4 March 2012 (UTC)
-
- {{LangSwitch}} will kick in automatically if there are too many (more than three?) language-templates. See File:Täktom war cemetery1.jpg for example. /Esquilo (talk) 09:53, 5 March 2012 (UTC)
- That's MediaWiki:Multilingual description.js. {{LangSwitch}} does server-side processing. -- RE rillke questions? (ریلکه) (里尔克) (リルケ) 11:28, 5 March 2012 (UTC)
- Unlike {{LangSwitch}}, {{mld}} adds a drop-down list of language code to the top of the page (under the picture in this case). --AVRS (talk) 11:38, 5 March 2012 (UTC)
- {{LangSwitch}} will kick in automatically if there are too many (more than three?) language-templates. See File:Täktom war cemetery1.jpg for example. /Esquilo (talk) 09:53, 5 March 2012 (UTC)
The technical side:
- LangSwitch uses server-side processing. Using too often can prevent page rendering. But the content of the page does not jump around when languages are hidden like when using
- {{Mld}} or the single sublanguages. This is achieved by JavaScript. If you turn it off you will see that nothing happens.
So what is better? On file pages it is definitely better to use {{langcode}} like {{en}}. This adds special attributes so search engines can recognize the language of the text. If you use LangSwitch the crawler will get only one language: English because the crawler is an anonymous-user and is unable to change the language. In the end, it's your decision. -- RE rillke questions? (ریلکه) (里尔克) (リルケ) 11:28, 5 March 2012 (UTC)
- There is also a gadget in Special:Preferences which forces all language versions to display if you use {{en}}, {{sv}} etc. but if you use {{LangSwitch}} you still only see one language version. Thanks to that gadget, I see the description at File:Täktom war cemetery1.jpg in four languages, but the licence template is only in Swedish. --Stefan4 (talk) 12:26, 5 March 2012 (UTC)
I think that "langswitch" is inappropriate for file description pages (since it prevents people from seeing more than one description, to check if translations are correct, etc., without editing the page), and I remove it and resolve it to individual language templates when I see it on a file page. See previous discussions at: Commons:Village_pump/Archive/2011/02#Multilingual_descriptions_not_displaying, Template_talk:LangSwitch#Multiple_languages, User_talk:Ophelia2#File:Mosaic_amb_la_representaci.C3.B3_d.27una_vella.JPG, etc. AnonMoos (talk) 03:36, 6 March 2012 (UTC)
- I agree that {{LangSwitch}} should not be used in the file descriptions. Many people can read more than one language and we would like to minimize possibility of conflicting descriptions in different languages. I personally much more prefer {{en}} and similar templates over {{Mld}}. Which last time I looked at it did not seem to work properly, incorrectly hiding parts of the description which was not translated. Luckily there is some way to disable {{Mld}} so it shows all versions. --Jarekt (talk) 17:16, 6 March 2012 (UTC)
- Mld should work very close to using {{en}} because the same JavaScript is responsible for hiding the unrelated languages. BTW, in the near future, I intend to make a default gadget from MediaWiki:Multilingual description.js and remove the opt-out so all who opted out must deselect the gadget. The move is done for technical reasons (code minification, easier localization in the near future (the client only gets those languages that are needed) and dependencies, that allow other scripts to reuse the gadget). But this will be announced in your watchlist and requires 3 clicks so it shouldn't be a problem. -- RE rillke questions? 17:59, 6 March 2012 (UTC)
Category loops
Does Wikimedia Commons have a guideline that covers category loops? They're strongly discouraged in the English Wikipedia, but I couldn't find the subject in the Commons guidelines. I've always thought of them as something to avoid, but I encountered a fellow contributor who clearly disagrees. I'd appreciate any guidance you can provide. Thanks! - Eureka Lott 22:23, 4 March 2012 (UTC)
- See COM:C#Category structure in Wikimedia Commons: "There should be no cycles (i.e. a category should not contain itself, directly or indirectly)." And the following, "The category structure should reflect a hierarchy of concepts, from the most generic one down to the very specific," implies that loops aren't allowed since it would require going from something more specific to something less specific somewhere. --Stefan4 (talk) 01:05, 5 March 2012 (UTC)
- Often, when you'd be tempted to have a loop, putting a see also in the text for the category is a good idea. - 04:09, 5 March 2012 (UTC)
- Please notify the other party to your edit war next time you start a discussion about their edits on a public board (or more importantly discuss it with them first!) I have now notified User:Beyond My Ken. Regarding the category, you are correct that the category tree should not contain cycles. I have reverted and temporarily protected the page. --99of9 (talk) 05:25, 5 March 2012 (UTC)
March 5
Broken thumbnails
Hi,
I uploaded a bunch of photos to Category:St Peter's Church, Linchmere yesterday, including 8 in one go with the new(ish) upload form - for some reason the thumbnails on 5 of them are broken - forcing the page to reload makes no difference, nor does looking at them on a different PC. Clicking through to the image is fine - it's just the thumbnails:
- File:Font in Linchmere church.JPG
- File:Linchmere church stained glass window 1.JPG
- File:Linchmere church stained glass window 3.JPG
- File:Linchmere church stained glass window 4.JPG
- File:Linchmere church stained glass window 5.JPG
Any idea why?
Thanks, Simon Burchell (talk) 12:38, 5 March 2012 (UTC)
-
- Strange - I've tried with my laptop and with an independent PC, with both Firefox and IE, and I just can't get those thumbnails to display. Simon Burchell (talk) 13:59, 5 March 2012 (UTC)
- Effectively, the thumbnails at the bottom do not appear. This is also the case in the category. Yann (talk) 14:55, 5 March 2012 (UTC)
- Yep, there is something wrong here: [8] Danmichaelo (talk) 16:01, 5 March 2012 (UTC)
I just uploaded 2 more (File:St. Paul's Church, Camelsdale 1.JPG and File:St. Paul's Church, Camelsdale 2.JPG - same problem. Very frustrating. Simon Burchell (talk) 16:42, 5 March 2012 (UTC)These 2 seem to have corrected themselves at least - or maybe I was just too impatient. Simon Burchell (talk) 16:49, 5 March 2012 (UTC)- OK, thanks - I'll wait and see... Simon Burchell (talk) 17:28, 5 March 2012 (UTC)
- It appears you're right - now only 3 have broken thumbnails and I expect they'll sort themselves out in due course. Many thanks, Simon Burchell (talk) 18:40, 5 March 2012 (UTC)
- All OK now. <quote from IRC>jeremyb: anyway, maybe it was related to swift but it's hard to tell if nothing's currently broken.</quote>. Yann (talk) 04:46, 6 March 2012 (UTC)
Norwegian localization question
Hi, I'm trying to do some localization work for Norwegian, more specific Bokmål. The problem with this language is that there are two language codes around: no and nb. I have selected no as my language, and I just added Template:Potd/2012-03-05_(no), but this is not visible on the frontpage, since the box there seems to be configured for nb. Danmichaelo (talk) 13:49, 5 March 2012 (UTC)
"upload a new version" replaces old version
I just used the link "Upload a new version of this file" to upload a cropped version of File:Bundesarchiv Bild 146-1978-043-13, Erwin v. Witzleben.jpg.
I choosed the file from my computer, entered a comment ("losslessly cropped caption bar") and clicked "Upload file".
Special:Upload appeared again with the the following error message (big red letters):
- "Could not store file /tmp/phpYIAfCo at mwstore://local-backend/local-public/4/42/Bundesarchiv_Bild_146-1978-043-13,_Erwin_v._Witzleben.jpg."
The second try gave me this message (simple text only, no upload form):
Empty oi_archive_name. Database and storage out of sync?
Backtrace:
#0 /usr/local/apache/common-local/php-1.19/includes/filerepo/file/LocalFile.php(911): LocalFile->recordUpload2('', 'losslessly crop...', false, Array, false, Object(User))
#1 /usr/local/apache/common-local/php-1.19/includes/upload/UploadBase.php(573): LocalFile->upload('/tmp/phpItyZHg', 'losslessly crop...', false, 1, Array, false, Object(User))
#2 /usr/local/apache/common-local/php-1.19/includes/specials/SpecialUpload.php(446): UploadBase->performUpload('losslessly crop...', false, true, Object(User))
#3 /usr/local/apache/common-local/php-1.19/includes/specials/SpecialUpload.php(181): SpecialUpload->processUpload()
#4 /usr/local/apache/common-local/php-1.19/includes/SpecialPageFactory.php(476): SpecialUpload->execute(NULL)
#5 /usr/local/apache/common-local/php-1.19/includes/Wiki.php(263): SpecialPageFactory::executePath(Object(Title), Object(RequestContext))
#6 /usr/local/apache/common-local/php-1.19/includes/Wiki.php(593): MediaWiki->performRequest()
#7 /usr/local/apache/common-local/php-1.19/includes/Wiki.php(503): MediaWiki->main()
#8 /usr/local/apache/common-local/php-1.19/index.php(58): MediaWiki->run()
#9 /usr/local/apache/common-local/live-1.5/index.php(3): require('/usr/local/apac...')
#10 {main}
Now the cropped file is visible but the second upload does not appear in the upload log and the initial uploaded file is gone.
The same happened here:
- File:Bundesarchiv Bild 183-1987-0206-003, Flöha, Forstarbeit, Bergen von Holz.jpg and :File:Bundesarchiv Bild 102-12719, Chicago, Waffen eines erschossenen Verbrechers.jpg (some days ago)
No problems here: File:Bundesarchiv Bild 183-B10919, Frankreich, Internierungslager Drancy.jpg (35 minutes ago) -- Common Good (talk) 19:26, 5 March 2012 (UTC)
- bug 34993 got
. New bug for restoring the missing versions. --Saibo (Δ) 00:36, 8 March 2012 (UTC)
Resolved
Move link for users who are no filemovers on file pages
- How can I move a file?
- Can you move that file, please?
Are common questions on COM:AN and COM:HD. That's why I wrote RenameLink (small installer script) and RenameRequest (contains the interface and main logic that creates a technically well-formed rename request).
RenameLink installs a "Move"-tab like you can find them on each normal page. I think this is the most intuitive approach. Clicking this tab will load RenameRequest. Translation will follow.
Some thought behind this gadget: File moving is always seen very critical by some users and has indeed ugly side-effects, so it should ensure one has read the page before one can request renaming and the policy is a central object.
You can test it with an account that doesn't have the file-mover or sysop-group attached.
Feedback is welcome.
Should this be enabled by default, improving the experience for new users? Should this be an own gadget or should we create a gadget "newcomers helpers" so we can include more functionality later or merge RotateLink?
Thank you for your thoughts. -- RE rillke questions? (ریلکه) (里尔克) (リルケ) 20:03, 5 March 2012 (UTC)
- Very nice, well done. (I still have notes from November on this idea: User:Rd232/Filemove). Problem: on my laptop (resolution 1366x768) the script window doesn't fit on my screen (the bottom of the box isn't visible), and there's no way to scroll it. Maybe the examples can be separated out from the rename reason, and provided as a popup on click or hover? Or else make the script window scrollable. Rd232 (talk) 23:06, 7 March 2012 (UTC)
Done Thanks for pointing this out. -- RE rillke questions? 23:51, 7 March 2012 (UTC)
- As to the gadget question: does it need to be a gadget? Why would anyone want to turn the move tab off? Maybe it could just be universal (with maybe a non-gadget option - i.e. a line to add to your own script file - to turn it off just in case). Rd232 (talk) 23:11, 7 March 2012 (UTC)
-
- Well, this is live now. If you encounter problems (vandalism, too many unjustified requests), please tell me and I will add traps. Thank you. -- RE rillke questions? 16:09, 13 March 2012 (UTC)
Survey invitation
The Wikimedia Foundation would like to invite you to take part in a brief survey.
With this survey, the Foundation hopes to figure out which resources Wikimedians want and need (some may require funding), and how to prioritize them. Not all Foundation programs will be on here (core operations are specifically excluded) – just resources that individual contributors or Wikimedia-affiliated organizations such as chapters might ask for.
The goal here is to identify what YOU (or groups, such as chapters or clubs) might be interested in, ranking the options by preference. We have not included on this list things like “keep the servers running”, because they’re not a responsibility of individual contributors or volunteer organizations. This survey is intended to tell us what funding priorities contributors agree and disagree on.
To read more about the survey, and to take part, please visit the survey page. You may select the language in which to take the survey with the pull-down menu at the top.
This invitation is being sent only to those projects where the survey has been translated in full or in majority into your language. It is, however, open to any contributor from any project. Please feel free to share the link with other Wikimedians and to invite their participation.
If you have any questions for me, please address them to my talk page, since I won’t be able to keep an eye at every point where I place the notice.
Thank you! Slaporte (WMF) (talk) 22:41, 5 March 2012 (UTC)
March 6
Help:Machine-readable data
Hi folks,
I drafted Help:Machine-readable data, to fill what I think was a gaping hole in our technical documentation. Improvements and thoughts welcome.
Jean-Fred (talk) 00:43, 6 March 2012 (UTC)
Question about image that isn't properly accredited
I have a question about the image File:3prinsesjes.jpg. The image information states that it is public domain in the Netherlands and gives the author as unknown. This image, however, is one of a series of photos taken not in the Netherlands but in Canada, by Yousuf Karsh in 1944. Other images in the series (with the girls wearing the same clothing) can be seen here. I don't know enough about copyright law to know whether the current public domain disclaimer is adequate; Yousuf Karsh died only ten years ago, so under Canadian law his works may still be under copyright. But is this one, if it wasn't originally published in Canada? And if it does have Canadian copyright, does the Netherlands have the legal right to release it under the public domain? --NellieBly (talk) 01:46, 6 March 2012 (UTC)
- Netherlands has the full right to make whatever copyright law it wants to inside its borders ;-) (so long as they conform to Berne and EU treaties). It was apparently in a Netherlands publication (cover at File:De Wervelwind24.jpg) in December 1944, so the question is if that is the first publication. While I'm sure it's correct, I have not found an explicit credit to Karsh on that photo yet -- I do see a Karsh photo here, which is similar, although the girls are wearing different outfits. It would be {{PD-Canada}} as well (the term was 50 years from creation), but the main question with Karsh's works was whether they were published with a copyright notice and thus retained the U.S. -- some of his works did, and got renewed as well, though that may have been ones from later in his life. We do have a lot of his works in Category:Yousuf Karsh. There is some further discussion at en:Wikipedia:Public domain#Canadian_images:_Yousuf_Karsh. So... the question would seem to be where the first publication was. If it was Canada, without a copyright notice, then it's fine. If it was this Netherlands publication, it may well also be OK. If it was simultaneously published in both nations, the U.S. URAA restorations would use the "country with the greatest contacts with the work", which would probably be Canada -- and this image therefore would not have been restored by the URAA, most likely. Carl Lindberg (talk) 02:59, 6 March 2012 (UTC)
Rename to WikiCommons
I'm sure that the idea of changing the name of Wikimedia Commons to "WikiCommons", to be consistent with the naming of the sister projects, has been discussed before. Can someone please point me to that archived debate? Wittylama (talk) 02:30, 6 March 2012 (UTC)
- We're not really a "project" in the sense of being one of the LANGUAGECODE.PROJECTNAME.org domains (e.g. en.wikipedia.org, fr.wiktionary.org, it.wikiversity.org etc. etc.)... AnonMoos (talk) 03:42, 6 March 2012 (UTC)
- Anonmoos, I don't think Wittylama was saying that. He/she was saying we are analogous to Wikipedia, WikiTravel, Wiktionary, etc. - Jmabel ! talk 16:11, 6 March 2012 (UTC)
- Wouldn't that mean changing commons.wikimedia.org to something like wikicommons.org? Wouldn't that, um, break thousands or millions of links? -- Cirt (talk) 16:49, 6 March 2012 (UTC)
- I think he is asking for links to possible previous discussion about Wikimedia Commons name, he is not proposing to change it. Wittylama, We discuss a LOT of things around here, but I do not recall ever running into discussion about official change of Wikimedia Commons name. However term "WikiCommons seems to be frequently used to describe our project. --Jarekt (talk) 20:35, 6 March 2012 (UTC)
- Wouldn't that mean changing commons.wikimedia.org to something like wikicommons.org? Wouldn't that, um, break thousands or millions of links? -- Cirt (talk) 16:49, 6 March 2012 (UTC)
- Anonmoos, I don't think Wittylama was saying that. He/she was saying we are analogous to Wikipedia, WikiTravel, Wiktionary, etc. - Jmabel ! talk 16:11, 6 March 2012 (UTC)
Jarekt - exactly. A lot of people already do call it "WikiCommons" because that is consistent with the other projects. AnonMoos, the original reason for calling it the way we do is indeed because of that, because Commons was a "service" wiki to support the Wikipedias, but now it has well-and-truly become a sister-project in its own right. Cirt, yes, I'm sure it would, but I'm also sure that that is a relatively easy technical fix to just redirect things.
So, to my original question, can anyone point me to any previous discussions about the naming of this project - specifically about the name "WikiCommons"? As far as I can see, the reason that Wikimedia Commons is called that way originally is because of a historical accident - because it was originally designed to be a "behind the scenes" wiki (commons.wikimedia.org similar to meta.Wikimedia.org and outreach.wikimedia.org) and not the "public facing" wiki it certainly has grown to become. Subsequently, all of the reasons I've seen for it to remain that way are "status quo" reasons rather than any genuine support of the existing name. So, I'd love to read through any previous debate on this issue to investigate the arguments/reasons that have been raised. Wittylama (talk) 23:10, 7 March 2012 (UTC)
- Same as Jarekt. I am pretty sure no discussion on this topic has occurred in the last 3 years (I cannot tell for farther back in time). And I believe this is because no one thought of any real reason for renaming the project. Are you suggesting we should? If yes, why?
- (If I dare say: the "historical accidents", IMO, were more the naming of the software and the foundation than of this project. Ah well.)
- Jean-Fred (talk) 16:33, 8 March 2012 (UTC)
- Hi Jean-Fred. Yes - far more confusing than anything else is the whole MediaWiki-WikiMedia thing! :-) I've just always thought that "Wikimedia Commons" was a cumbersome name that, if we were starting the project today, would obviously be called "WikiCommons" for consistency with all of the other sisterprojects. So, my argument "for" would be consistency. But I'm not actually making a serious effort to have the name changed, I'm just trying to find out if there was ever a consensus on this issue out of curiosity. Wittylama (talk) 03:34, 9 March 2012 (UTC)
- Some history for the name is found on Commons:Project plan#Naming and a small amount on the mailing list. Original proposal is here. Also, I've never heard it referred to as "WikiCommons" by established user or new users -- and I've helped many a new user upload things via the #wikipedia-en-help IRC channel over the last several years. Killiondude (talk) 08:59, 10 March 2012 (UTC)
- Hi Jean-Fred. Yes - far more confusing than anything else is the whole MediaWiki-WikiMedia thing! :-) I've just always thought that "Wikimedia Commons" was a cumbersome name that, if we were starting the project today, would obviously be called "WikiCommons" for consistency with all of the other sisterprojects. So, my argument "for" would be consistency. But I'm not actually making a serious effort to have the name changed, I'm just trying to find out if there was ever a consensus on this issue out of curiosity. Wittylama (talk) 03:34, 9 March 2012 (UTC)
Wrong category names
I have been informed that category names have to be only in English. This is why I inform you about the wrong names. If someone can rename them, please do, because categories with non-English names strictly violate some Commons rule. Category:Cimetière Français d'Auvelais, Category:Presbytère polonais de l'église Saint-Louis de Rouvroy, Category:Presbytères français et polonais de l'église Notre-Dame des Mineurs de Waziers, Category:Collection de costumes polonais, Dessinés d'après nature par Norblin et gravés par Debucourt, Category:Société des anciens textes français, Category:École du ski français, Category:Muzeul Național al Hărților și Cărții Vechi. --PereslavlFoto (talk) 11:41, 6 March 2012 (UTC)
-
- Place names and titles of books can sometimes be a partial exception... AnonMoos (talk) 14:10, 6 March 2012 (UTC)
- From place names in Russian, none survived. To me, this means place names cannot be exceptions.--PereslavlFoto (talk) 15:11, 6 March 2012 (UTC)
- There are many thousands of categories to be renamed. We start with the ones that are most far away from Germanic and Romance languages; first the ones with non latin characters as they are not readable by 98 % of our users, then we will see. --Foroa (talk) 17:34, 6 March 2012 (UTC)
- Please rename those I found for now, and I will search for other non-British categories. Thank you. How did you know about 98%, was there any research? Or is this just a guess?--PereslavlFoto (talk) 18:07, 6 March 2012 (UTC)
- From the 280 wikis, there are about one third that use a non latin characterset. If they (and or Commons users) would be evenly distributed and all languages are really different, then only 0,36 % of the people would be able to read a specific non latin character set. So I have a margin of 6 times. But the precise figure is not the important thing; what matters is that any specific non latin characterset locks out the large majority (almost all) of the users here, so we have to correct those as quick as possible. First, we have to be able to read it, understanding is for a second round ... --Foroa (talk) 18:33, 6 March 2012 (UTC)
- You might fancy starting here --Foroa (talk) 18:45, 6 March 2012 (UTC)
- Starting what? I cannot rename categories. Even more, I don't think this is necessary. As soon as others think this to be done, I inform others about non-British categories.--PereslavlFoto (talk) 20:06, 6 March 2012 (UTC)
- Anybody can rename categories. Just create new category with correct name and move all images to it, or use CommonsDelinker, or drop {{category redirect}} template. But as with any other rename, your action will be evaluated by others and possibly reversed. For larger or more controversial categories the move should be discussed first. Also PereslavlFoto you should keep in mind that this is a wiki run by volunteers, and most people volunteer to do the tasks they like doing or are important to them. So you should not be requesting people to do things that are important to you when you can do them yourself. --Jarekt (talk) 20:21, 6 March 2012 (UTC)
- Wow, thanks a lot for the way. I thought only People In Charge may rename categories; your link is more than helpful.--PereslavlFoto (talk) 21:09, 6 March 2012 (UTC)
- Anybody can rename categories. Just create new category with correct name and move all images to it, or use CommonsDelinker, or drop {{category redirect}} template. But as with any other rename, your action will be evaluated by others and possibly reversed. For larger or more controversial categories the move should be discussed first. Also PereslavlFoto you should keep in mind that this is a wiki run by volunteers, and most people volunteer to do the tasks they like doing or are important to them. So you should not be requesting people to do things that are important to you when you can do them yourself. --Jarekt (talk) 20:21, 6 March 2012 (UTC)
- Starting what? I cannot rename categories. Even more, I don't think this is necessary. As soon as others think this to be done, I inform others about non-British categories.--PereslavlFoto (talk) 20:06, 6 March 2012 (UTC)
- All wikipedias use UTF-8 character encoding, so latin or non-latin charsets is not an issue. But transcription to tha latin alphabet will off course make life easier for 98% of the users. Otherwise, place names should be in their original lagnuage (i.e. Category:Göteborg, not Category:Gothenburg). /Esquilo (talk) 12:16, 7 March 2012 (UTC)
- You might fancy starting here --Foroa (talk) 18:45, 6 March 2012 (UTC)
- From the 280 wikis, there are about one third that use a non latin characterset. If they (and or Commons users) would be evenly distributed and all languages are really different, then only 0,36 % of the people would be able to read a specific non latin character set. So I have a margin of 6 times. But the precise figure is not the important thing; what matters is that any specific non latin characterset locks out the large majority (almost all) of the users here, so we have to correct those as quick as possible. First, we have to be able to read it, understanding is for a second round ... --Foroa (talk) 18:33, 6 March 2012 (UTC)
- Please rename those I found for now, and I will search for other non-British categories. Thank you. How did you know about 98%, was there any research? Or is this just a guess?--PereslavlFoto (talk) 18:07, 6 March 2012 (UTC)
- There are many thousands of categories to be renamed. We start with the ones that are most far away from Germanic and Romance languages; first the ones with non latin characters as they are not readable by 98 % of our users, then we will see. --Foroa (talk) 17:34, 6 March 2012 (UTC)
- From place names in Russian, none survived. To me, this means place names cannot be exceptions.--PereslavlFoto (talk) 15:11, 6 March 2012 (UTC)
- Place names and titles of books can sometimes be a partial exception... AnonMoos (talk) 14:10, 6 March 2012 (UTC)
Rename does not work. Messages at User talk:CommonsDelinker/commands do nothing.--PereslavlFoto (talk) 20:57, 7 March 2012 (UTC)
- Messages on that page need to be reviewed and moved to User:CommonsDelinker/commands by an admin. Only then will CommonsDelinker act. It can take a few days for messages on that page to be reviewed. Rd232 (talk) 14:12, 8 March 2012 (UTC)
Copyright on material published anonymously
I recently uploaded some photos of front covers of Brighton Voice newspaper, from between 1973 and 1985. Information on this newspaper is at en:Brighton Voice and I wanted to illustrate it. The seven photos uploaded were speedily deleted. The newspaper was always published anonymously by a sort of anarchist collective. No copyright was ever claimed in the newspaper. I am thus unclear of the grounds for deletion of the photos. One of the covers was a photomontage, two were original drawings, with no attribution to the artist. The other four consisted of headlines, text and a couple of photos each. I was one of those working on three of the latter, and so I suppose I can claim part of the copyright. So my questions are: (1) why does something published anonymously have any copyright? and (2) if I was part responsible for some of the covers does that entitle me to claim copyright enough to upload the photos? Thanks Roundtheworld (talk) 19:37, 6 March 2012 (UTC)
- If the material really was anonymous, you need to wait until 95 years after publication to comply with both British and American copyright laws. A work being anonymous is not a reason for it not to be copyrighted. If it was something made for a newspaper, the newspaper would typically be the copyright holder, not the individual journalists, photographers and illustrators. --Stefan4 (talk) 19:43, 6 March 2012 (UTC)
- But the entire newspaper was anonymous, not just one contribution. There is no way of identifying the copyright holder from the publication. Roundtheworld (talk) 20:32, 6 March 2012 (UTC)
- I'm not a lawyer, but: The UK doesn't require a copyright notice; it was one of the original 8 signatories to the Berne Convention in the 1880s, which gives authors their rights without any notice or registration requirement. (This is different than the USA, which only signed in 1989; pre-1989 U.S. works without copyright notices tend to fall into the public domain.) In the UK, anonymous works published between 1969 and 30 August 1989 are copyright for 70 years from the year of first publication: see Commons:Licensing#Ordinary copyright. My (uneducated) guess is that, since this was in the form of a losely-organized collective, each contributor retains the rights to exactly what his contribution was, and no more. (For a typical newspaper this wouldn't be the case, as your contribution would be "work for hire" for the newspaper company, and that company would have the copyright.) Assuming that it is not work for hire: If you took photographs or wrote text, you own the copyright. If you modified photographs or text, then the result is probably that you and whoever created the original would both have to consent to copying; the original photographer or writer has full rights to the originals, but not the versions you made any meaningful changes to. To answer the specific questions:
- Copyright applies to anonymous and pseudonymous works because being publicly anonymous does not necessarily mean having no legal recourse or no further attachment. For example, an author could still have a publishing agreement and get money without having to reveal his name. Or the author, though anonymous, may wish to prevent other people from using or modifying his work to say the opposite of what he meant or otherwise exploit or misuse his work; the publisher, or the author through a lawyer, could still do that without revealing his identity in public.
- You probably don't have enough rights to upload photos you didn't take yourself, only to stop others from uploading the photos. You probably need permission from everyone who contributed something meaningful to the work you're uploading; but you only need it from contributors to what you're uploading, not the whole newspaper. --Closeapple (talk) 23:03, 6 March 2012 (UTC)
Noted and thanks for all the legal opinions. I am naturally disappointed. In a way, the paper and similar alternative papers in the UK in the '70s and '80s were forerunners of Wikipedia. Authorship was shared and no one could claim rights to any article. I suppose the only difference is that Wikipedia makes this explicit but with such newspapers and magazines it was only implicit. Roundtheworld (talk) 16:48, 8 March 2012 (UTC)
March 7
Malfunctioning tool pannels
I use MonoBook skin and in past weeks (or months?), I noticed a non-standard functioning of edit forms. The tool pannel below the edit window sometimes is displayed, sometimes isn't. I detected no regularity in such behaviour. Usually, multiple repetitive "refresh" helps to appear the tool. However, in case that the tool pannel below the edit window is OK, simultaneously some icons (mostly "New line" and "table") from the tool pannel above the edit window overflow into the edit window.
Have you any notion what is the problem? --ŠJů (talk) 08:21, 7 March 2012 (UTC)
- I think it would be a good idea if you would make a screenshot. -- RE rillke questions? 12:01, 7 March 2012 (UTC)
--ŠJů (talk) 08:40, 9 March 2012 (UTC)
- You are using Internet Explorer? -- RE rillke questions? 13:48, 9 March 2012 (UTC)
- Since it might be related - maybe not: since some days the "Edittools" are sometimes (e.g. 15h ago, now they are ok) displayed below the edit box although they are (with my setting) ususally moved to a dropdown menu of the "enhanced editing toolbar". FF10, Monobook, Linux, German. --Saibo (Δ) 14:19, 9 March 2012 (UTC)
moving files, User talk:CommonsDelinker/commands and watchlist
To javascript coders - please, add option to stop adding User talk:CommonsDelinker/commands to watchlist during moving file, even with enabled option "Add pages I edit to my watchlist". It is doable as nominating file for deletion is not adding daily nomination page to watchlist Bulwersator (talk) 19:48, 7 March 2012 (UTC)
- Bestechende Logik ;-) Convinced me. I'll do it. -- RE rillke questions? 19:54, 7 March 2012 (UTC)
Done. -- RE rillke questions? 19:58, 7 March 2012 (UTC)
Copyright on publications by NMHM ?
Howdy, I'm sure this will have been discussed before, but I can't seem to find it. Anyway, is there a straigthforward answer to this:
Works by employees of the US government created during the course of their work are supposedly in the public domain, right?
So, how do works published by the United States National Museum (nowadays NMHM) qualify. Can images from these be used freely even if publication date and author's life time would not let them qualify for PD-old?
Cheers, Pudding4brains (talk) 20:52, 7 March 2012 (UTC)
- Did the museum staff create the works in question? Do the works include only content created by the staff? --Carnildo (talk) 21:57, 7 March 2012 (UTC)
-
- Today, the question is about this paper, but it would probably be good to have a general guideline to situations like this.
- In this case the authors are listed as:
- Sophy I. Parfin: Entomologist, U. S. National Museum.
- Ashley B. Gurney: Entomologist, Entomology Research Branch, U. S. Department of Agriculture.
- There is no seperate mention of any other name for the artwork, except that one image is "adapted from Killington, 1936". The other images hence seem te be produces by the authors, both of whom are listed as employees of an US gov.dept. - that is, if the museum qualifies as such. Pudding4brains (talk) 01:47, 8 March 2012 (UTC)
- I seem to remember there may have been some weird status for the Smithsonian in this respect. You might do better to ask at Commons:Village Pump/Copyright, where more of the copyright experts tend to check. - Jmabel ! talk 03:36, 8 March 2012 (UTC)
- This general issue was discussed at Commons:Village_pump/Archive/2010/11#Images_from_the_Smithsonian_Institution. --Avenue (talk) 04:40, 8 March 2012 (UTC)
- I seem to remember there may have been some weird status for the Smithsonian in this respect. You might do better to ask at Commons:Village Pump/Copyright, where more of the copyright experts tend to check. - Jmabel ! talk 03:36, 8 March 2012 (UTC)
-
-
- Most Smithsonian employees are federal employees I think, but not all, making it somewhat ambiguous. In this case though, you could probably just use {{PD-US-no notice}} to be conservative. It probably qualifies as PD-USGov too -- anything done by the Agriculture Department employee would definitely fall under that -- but a copyright notice was required either way if they wanted to keep copyright, which they apparently did not as I don't see any. Carl Lindberg (talk) 06:41, 8 March 2012 (UTC)
-
<= Hi all, thanks a lot for the info and links. A murky mess and a bloody embarrasing shame that a public organisation such as the NMNH/SI seems to make a deliberate effort to making unrightful claims and keeping things as murky as they can possibly get away with as opposed to making an effort to clearly indicate what is what. IMHO the people responsible for such behaviour should not be paid by the people for their "work". It would seem to me that Commons would benefit from a clear page/template about the issue, as opposed to the info being scattered in archived discussions on Commons and en.wp. I may try to have a go at summarizing later (first finish the lacewing project that I need the images for). One thing that may need to be addressed: When did the murky mess of public and private funding that the SI is hiding behind start? Was this already the case when it was still called the NMNH or USNM. If we can draw a clear line there, that would be a good start. For now, I'm satisfied that Carl made the most pragmatic point here: "but a copyright notice was required either way if they wanted to keep copyright" - I keep forgetting that quirk of US-law :o) Thanks all! Pudding4brains (talk) 13:13, 8 March 2012 (UTC)
- The template {{PD-USGov-NASA}} contains a statement that images hosted on the NASA web site not necessarily are made by NASA. I think that a similar statement should be placed on the {{PD-USGov-SI}} template. The important difference is that the NASA web site typically indicates who the author is whereas the SI web site normally doesn't do this. --Stefan4 (talk) 13:17, 8 March 2012 (UTC)
March 8
Batch uploadings and API
Hi, I regularly uploaded some files via Flickrripper till yesterday morning. Now it writes:
Uploading file to commons:commons via API....{urlopen error timed out)WARNING: Could not open 'http://commons.wikimedia.org/w/api.php'. Maybe the server or your connection is down. Retrying in 1 minutes...
Is it only my trouble or another users have the same? Kobac (talk) 06:18, 8 March 2012 (UTC)
Proposal for controversial renaming
As it was pointed out [9], the search in French Wikipedia on Devoirs or Vacances gives as one of the top results the pornographic film File:Devoirs de vacances.ogv. This is being used as an argument in discussions on the controversial content which I am not going to bring here. However, this particular problem has an easy solution: The file can be renamed into File:Pornographic_movie_Devoirsvacances.ogv, after which, I believe, it will not show up in the search. I could technically make the move, but it is clearly against the policy, which does not list such reason. From what I know, we do not have a dedication page for renaming discussion (the policy says just do it or do not do it, it does not say discuss it), therefore I open the topic here. If there is a more appropriate place, please move.--Ymblanter (talk) 07:35, 8 March 2012 (UTC)
- I don't know how relevant Commons considers this but; the movie is certainly illegal in a number of countries (including the UK; 2 year jail term) and, although untested, almost certainly fails US obscenity laws. I am not sure which state law apply to Commons though, because laws around transmission of obscene material over the internet vary. --ErrantX (talk) 07:43, 8 March 2012 (UTC)
- If this is considered hosted in the United States, it's illegal. All countries relevant of viewing aside (but are still serious to anyone who clicks on the link), if we're hosting this video in the U.S. it needs to get gone. Keegan (talk) 08:02, 8 March 2012 (UTC)
- Why is it illegal? You link to a page of definitions that define bestiality as "sexually explicit conduct", but there is nothing on that page that says that it or anything else is illegal; it's merely a definition.--Prosfilaes (talk) 09:01, 8 March 2012 (UTC)
- Depictions of bestiality are not illegal in themselves in the US. Obscenity law would only encompass a work that "taken as a whole, lacks serious literary, artistic, political or scientific value", per en:Miller test. If the work indeed lacks any such value, it is out of scope and should be deleted, but I don't believe that is the case. As I have argued before, "hiding" things from the search by renaming them is an awful practice that makes it harder for people who are seriously trying to find these things for legitimate educational purposes to find them. Instead, we should be adding more tags and description to the other works which are supposed to be matching the search in question. Dcoetzee (talk) 09:35, 8 March 2012 (UTC)
- Depictions of bestiality are not illegal in themselves in the US; depends on state law. Most states outlaw zoophilia - some have specific laws related to distribution of zoophilia pornography (the one I can recall of the top of my head is Iowa). The standard definition here is that transmission from or into states which specifically outlaw the material is probably illegal - including over the internet. So it really depends on which states laws Commons falls under. There is an argument this video holds historical value; but we have other portions of the video (w/o zoophilia) so... --ErrantX (talk) 11:34, 8 March 2012 (UTC)
- I think this is Florida re server location.--Ymblanter (talk) 12:33, 8 March 2012 (UTC)
- Then it's probably illegal (to host). Untested though. --ErrantX (talk) 12:39, 8 March 2012 (UTC)
- Should we ask the WMF then? Rd232 (talk) 13:59, 8 March 2012 (UTC)
- Office action is always an option.--Ymblanter (talk) 14:46, 8 March 2012 (UTC)
- It's worth considering having them review it. To me, based on my experience, this falls somewhere in the category of "things that probably won't cause an issue, unless someone happens to notice it and decide to pursue it". If the issue gets in front of the wrong person then it might cause ruction. You tend to see that a lot in grey areas of legality like this. (I think from our perspective it's also worth considering that this video is also illegal in several other prominent countries). Given that we (apparently) have other snippets from the same movie I think there is a potential case to just scrap this portion - but I'm not overly bothered. --ErrantX (talk) 15:55, 8 March 2012 (UTC)
- Office action is always an option.--Ymblanter (talk) 14:46, 8 March 2012 (UTC)
- Should we ask the WMF then? Rd232 (talk) 13:59, 8 March 2012 (UTC)
- Then it's probably illegal (to host). Untested though. --ErrantX (talk) 12:39, 8 March 2012 (UTC)
- I think this is Florida re server location.--Ymblanter (talk) 12:33, 8 March 2012 (UTC)
- Depictions of bestiality are not illegal in themselves in the US; depends on state law. Most states outlaw zoophilia - some have specific laws related to distribution of zoophilia pornography (the one I can recall of the top of my head is Iowa). The standard definition here is that transmission from or into states which specifically outlaw the material is probably illegal - including over the internet. So it really depends on which states laws Commons falls under. There is an argument this video holds historical value; but we have other portions of the video (w/o zoophilia) so... --ErrantX (talk) 11:34, 8 March 2012 (UTC)
- Depictions of bestiality are not illegal in themselves in the US. Obscenity law would only encompass a work that "taken as a whole, lacks serious literary, artistic, political or scientific value", per en:Miller test. If the work indeed lacks any such value, it is out of scope and should be deleted, but I don't believe that is the case. As I have argued before, "hiding" things from the search by renaming them is an awful practice that makes it harder for people who are seriously trying to find these things for legitimate educational purposes to find them. Instead, we should be adding more tags and description to the other works which are supposed to be matching the search in question. Dcoetzee (talk) 09:35, 8 March 2012 (UTC)
- Why is it illegal? You link to a page of definitions that define bestiality as "sexually explicit conduct", but there is nothing on that page that says that it or anything else is illegal; it's merely a definition.--Prosfilaes (talk) 09:01, 8 March 2012 (UTC)
- If this is considered hosted in the United States, it's illegal. All countries relevant of viewing aside (but are still serious to anyone who clicks on the link), if we're hosting this video in the U.S. it needs to get gone. Keegan (talk) 08:02, 8 March 2012 (UTC)
I'm not opposed to renaming (although not convinced that it would fix the search result). FYI, read w:The Good Old Naughty Days (At the time of its release (2003) it was the first R18 film to be rated for display in cinemas in the United Kingdom for over ten years, despite its contents, partly due to its 'classic' style and age and as "historical footage".) --Atlasowa (talk) 09:44, 8 March 2012 (UTC)
This is the title of the movie. What would be more suitable as to it's tile for the title of the file? What you intent is to manipulate the search engine to bias results. Yes, I'm against the renaming of this file, which isn't illegal. -- /人◕ ‿‿ ◕人\ 苦情処理係 11:02, 8 March 2012 (UTC)
- The problem is that the title of the movie contains words that are common search terms for something completely different. If we are going to host this file then ideally we want it to appear when people are searching for "Devoirs de vacances" and they want that specific film, but not when they are searching for "vacances". There are no easy solutions to that. WereSpielChequers (talk) 13:06, 8 March 2012 (UTC)
- There is: [10] -- /人◕ ‿‿ ◕人\ 苦情処理係 13:12, 8 March 2012 (UTC)
- (Edit conflict) Other film-related images contain common words. The standard practice is to use file names containing the film title. This is analogous to a search for "toothbrush" and it is not our problem if a file is related to a common word. Compare with a search for "monarch" in the file namespace: there are very few pictures of monarchs in the results. --Stefan4 (talk) 13:15, 8 March 2012 (UTC)
This is part of the broader problem of improving search. See
- Commons:Requests_for_comment/improving_search
- Commons:Requests_for_comment/improving_search#A_little_bit_of_intelligence
- m:Controversial_content/Brainstorming#Clustering_for_search_results_on_Commons
I don't think renaming individual files is a good fix, but it might work in the short term until search is improved. However there is too much opposition to such renaming, so there's not much point in pursuing the idea. Rd232 (talk) 13:59, 8 March 2012 (UTC)
- I would have nothing against a temporary solution. But if we rename the files now, edit their description (ranking includes them) and implement a better search later on, someone will need to revert all this changes. While I'm seeing an currently very active lobby that would do the first step, i don't see the same persons revert their changes in the second step. If we really want to improve matters, then we should start to improve the search as soon as possible. Otherwise it will only cause more disruption and delay. -- /人◕ ‿‿ ◕人\ 苦情処理係 14:04, 8 March 2012 (UTC)
- I am not sure whom you mean, but if I am the person to rename the file, I will also be the person to revert the change when/if your idea on Meta gets implemented. I also have no personal problems with the file (I am the only one in my office and hopefully this is not going to change).--Ymblanter (talk) 14:49, 8 March 2012 (UTC)
- If a temporary rename solution is at all plausible, it's not hard to make sure it's really temporary: just tag all renamed files with an appropriate template and the original name. Then, once the search is improved so that the temporary fix is no longer needed, a filemove bot can rename the file back to the original name. This may involve breaking some links from external sites though, unless we use redirects (which might defeat the purpose, I don't know). PS We probably don't need to edit the description; I think the title features heavily in search rankings. Anyway, it would be difficult to edit the description in a sensible way that lowered the search ranking. Rd232 (talk) 16:12, 8 March 2012 (UTC)
- I just want to mention again: That is a slippery slope! Is there good and bad content? Should be "Mohammed" be banned from file titles so that is never shows up in searches? Should people searching for this film be not able to find it? We have a technical problem of a bad search engine (which was found out now by some sensitive (to whatever) people), yes, but the solution is not to introduce content classification in good or bad and to rename half Commons (we have restrictive renaming rules for good reason). We can place a note inside the search: "caution - the search may contain images you do not like". --Saibo (Δ) 14:29, 9 March 2012 (UTC)
- Honestly upon reviewing this in more detail, I think these search results make sense. There are only four works on Commons including "devoirs" in the title, and a multimedia search for "devoirs" naturally lists these four first. "Devoirs de vacances" is in the filename because of course it is the title of the work. The extracted blurb below the filename clearly labels it as "a pornographic short film involving nuns". It's not even the first result. A Google site search returns nearly exactly the same results - I wouldn't imagine even with extensive development that we could do better than Google. Relevance is subjective, and depends very much on the person searching - a person who is looking for the film will search for words in the title of the film and expect to find it, so a rename is unreasonable. Our intuition is that these people are comparatively rare compared to people searching for general media about homework, but do the logs bear this out? This deserves more careful consideration. Dcoetzee (talk) 22:16, 9 March 2012 (UTC)
Python library for generating attribution text
I've written a simple library that aids with generating attribution text when reusing Wikimedia Commons content from third-party code. It is based on User:Magnus Manske's and User:Krinkle's MediaWiki:Gadget-Stockphoto.js code. You can find it here. It's a Python library, but simple enough to be used from other languages, via standard I/O or a web service. It's experimental code, but I would love to get some feedback, suggestions and error reports. Regards, /Skagedal (talk) 15:11, 8 March 2012 (UTC)
Please help this user
On wikt:Wiktionary:BP#Uploading_files User:Istafe stated that he/she wants to contribute to Wiktionary adding audio files for Czech as a native speaker, but says that he/she can't add them to Commons. I don't really use Commons so I can't help. PS feel free to move this message if it's on the wrong forum. Mglovesfun (talk) 18:04, 8 March 2012 (UTC)
March 9
Documentation for gadget authors
We're trying to start a library for gadget authors to use. If you help create gadgets, please join us! Please check it out and post any questions or comments there. -- ☠MarkAHershberger☢(talk)☣ 01:59, 9 March 2012 (UTC)
Batch upload / bulk upload
Hi, I am trying to upload a large number of files again. Actually, it will be somewhat more than 100. But that will be more than cumbersome enough for me to use a tool. The last time I did that was at least 2 years ago and it does'nt work anymore. I reprogrammed Nichalps uploadscript. I tried to use the Commonist. But they all fail nowadays.
It probably has to do with the fact that the upload page is being used by all these tools. This upload page nowadays requires the license to be set before a file is allowed to be uploaded. And that seems to fail.
Anyway, I want to find out whether someone else is trying to do a bulk upload and is facing the same problems or maybe not. I am already looking into it deeply by looking at the code, but I am not really a specialist in this area. Please report to me. Ger Hanssen (talk) 09:07, 9 March 2012 (UTC)
- See Commons:Batch uploading, where other scripters coordinate and share their tools & Commons:Guide to batch uploading for some documentation. Jean-Fred (talk) 14:29, 9 March 2012 (UTC)
Commons:YouTube files
Hi all,
I quickly drafted Commons:YouTube files to have our "state of the art" concerning files from YouTube, both licensing & technical aspects. Improvements are welcome.
Jean-Fred (talk) 14:29, 9 March 2012 (UTC)
- Thank you Jean-Fred for your work.
- I added two examples of Creative Commons videos (one eligible, one not eligible as NC) not using the YouTube licensing tool. --Dereckson (talk) 09:45, 10 March 2012 (UTC)
March 10
Need help with Malayalam
Could someone who reads Malayalam take a look at File:അലാസ്കൻ-പർവ്വതങ്ങൾ2.jpg and translate the description? Thanks Dankarl (talk) 03:48, 10 March 2012 (UTC)
- Sreejithk2000 should be able to. Might want to ask him. Regards. Rehman 06:59, 10 March 2012 (UTC)
Commons:Alternative outlets
I've recently created Commons:Alternative outlets (COM:ALTOUT), modelled after en:Wikipedia:Alternative outlets. This aims to provide a listing of alternative outlets for material which Commons can't host. I think it may usefully supplement COM:PS in some contexts - we can then refer people not just to "COM:SCOPE" ("not here"), but also "COM:ALTOUT" ("try there"). That may make them more likely to not contribute again things we don't want, and perhaps even to contribute things we do. So I invite people to propose additions (or other changes) on the talk page, and also to suggest where COM:ALTOUT might usefully be linked from on other Commons pages. Thanks, Rd232 (talk) 12:55, 10 March 2012 (UTC)
- Best would be to add a link in {{Project scope}}--Gauravjuvekar (talk) 13:18, 10 March 2012 (UTC)
- Good idea - done for the English version ({{Project scope/en}}) - but there are lots of translations, so anyone who can, please update other language versions. Rd232 (talk) 14:47, 10 March 2012 (UTC)
Commons:WikiProject Public Domain
I've created Commons:WikiProject Public Domain, following on from Commons:Requests for comment/PD review. It aims to support the Commons community's efforts to organise Commons' public domain materials, and to ensure that these materials meet Commons licensing policy. This includes URAA issues, probably at Commons:WikiProject Public Domain/URAA review, and a wider review of PD tagging, probably at Commons:WikiProject Public Domain/PD review (to be developed). Please consider participating. Rd232 (talk) 14:04, 10 March 2012 (UTC)
French or French-speaking user needed
Hi, i've been doing some datadumps of radio shows which do interviews and stuff, one of them is Puissance Maximale. I have recognised from the title of many of the shows that they are interviews, and because they were under a free licence, and i was doing similar work, i've uploaded them as well. Unfortunately somebody has informed me now that there may be issues with some of these shows not being educational, and that some actually feature copyrighted content. Can somebody who speaks french please go through them. I think that interviews should be kept, but if it's just a front for copyvio, i want no part to it. Thanks for your time. VolodyA! V Anarhist Beta_M (converse) 16:01, 10 March 2012 (UTC)
Delete the bunch; why do you upload hours of radio that you do not even understand? /Pieter Kuiper (talk) 16:56, 10 March 2012 (UTC)
- Do you truly expect me to answer the question that you begin with the template made for Deletion Request pages? VolodyA! V Anarhist Beta_M (converse) 17:54, 10 March 2012 (UTC)
- It's just an expression of an opinion. The question is valid: is it really a good idea to upload materials you don't understand? (I think not.) Rd232 (talk) 18:53, 10 March 2012 (UTC)
- Is that actually the question at hand? Not only did Beta_M explain why he uploaded them, but — more importantly — they're already here. I don't think it is proper Commons procedure or etiquette to respond with a blind delete tag when someone asks for help, particularly when the uploader asked specifically for someone who was qualified to decide, and the responders haven't even bothered to mention whether they understand French. I'm sure Beta_M could nominate them for deletion himself once he gets the answer he asked for. --Closeapple (talk) 23:18, 10 March 2012 (UTC)
- One doesn't need to know the language to at least listen to a few minutes of a file and realize that it's the kind of amateur programme where buddies speak for a few minutes, then listen to some commercial tune, speak for a few more minutes, listen to another tune, etc. I listened to the first five minutes of one file. It began with an excerpt from a TV programme (obviously not free), then an excerpt from a music album, then two minutes of the guys speaking, then a Michael Jackson song, etc. By that point, it should be obvious that the programmes include unfree material. I'm guessing that must be the usual format of all their one-hour programmes. If Beta_M wants to sort through all the material, he would have to remove at least the material other than the parts where the guys are speaking. Even then, are the spoken parts free? On the official website of the guys who make the programme [11], they link to recordings of their programmes on the www.archive.org website [12]. I don't know if the hosting of the recordings on www.archive.org automatically means that the spoken parts are under some free license. I couldn't find a clear indication about it there. I have no idea if the person who uploaded copies of recordings on the radio4all website with a CC-by license tag owns any copyright on any of that material or if he has anything to do with the guys who make the programme or with the community radio station that broadcasts it. I didn't see a mention of radio4all on the website of the programme or on the official website of the radio station [13]. Even if the spoken parts of the recordings are free, it's those guys talking about games (video games, board games, etc.) and is that in scope for Commons? -- Asclepias (talk) 01:12, 11 March 2012 (UTC)
- Is that actually the question at hand? Not only did Beta_M explain why he uploaded them, but — more importantly — they're already here. I don't think it is proper Commons procedure or etiquette to respond with a blind delete tag when someone asks for help, particularly when the uploader asked specifically for someone who was qualified to decide, and the responders haven't even bothered to mention whether they understand French. I'm sure Beta_M could nominate them for deletion himself once he gets the answer he asked for. --Closeapple (talk) 23:18, 10 March 2012 (UTC)
- It's just an expression of an opinion. The question is valid: is it really a good idea to upload materials you don't understand? (I think not.) Rd232 (talk) 18:53, 10 March 2012 (UTC)
- Do you truly expect me to answer the question that you begin with the template made for Deletion Request pages? VolodyA! V Anarhist Beta_M (converse) 17:54, 10 March 2012 (UTC)
- Some people have helped with categorisation, thanks for that. However, i see that much will be nominated anyhow, so here it is. VolodyA! V Anarhist Beta_M (converse) 03:55, 11 March 2012 (UTC)
March 11
The Commons on Flickr vs Wikimedia Commons
What are the difference between The Commons on Flickr and Wikimedia Commons? I am looking for the advantages and disadvantages of those two participatory web tools. --Bmulatiningsih (talk) 00:58, 11 March 2012 (UTC)
- The Commons on Flickr is a repository of public domain works contributed by various selected partners. It is not possible for individuals to contribute. Wikimedia Commons is a (somewhat larger) database of freely licensed and public domain works from a variety of sources, including individual uploaders. Wikimedia Commons works can be used directly on Wikipedia and related projects, while Commons on Flickr works would have to be uploaded here first. Dcoetzee (talk) 06:05, 11 March 2012 (UTC)
Sorting a category by date ?
My apologies if this is a "hardy perennial" feature request, but would it ever be technically feasible to add a button to each category page to allow the category to be sorted by date?
It seems to me that both for categories that contain works by particular artists, and for categories include historical works on particular themes (eg artistic works showing particular places), that this would be a really nice addition -- eg to group series and similar works together, or to show how a place or an artist's style developed.
Date-sorting of search results is a feature I have personally found very useful on image sites that provide it (eg the europeana project, compared to finding the same images on the British Library site), so I wondered if it was something that we could offer too? Jheald (talk) 08:29, 11 March 2012 (UTC)
- Depends on which date. There's some old bugs (bugzilla:1289) in bugzilla about sorting articles by the date that the article/file was added to the category - mostly because it'd be useful to wikinews (And provided we don't separate the category into the subcat/article/file distinction, this is mostly feasible - and can be accessed via the api [14], as well as some extensions (DPL) that take advantage of it, but there is no real interface for it). Sorting a category by the date an image is uploaded is somewhat inefficient on large categories. Bawolff (talk) 03:23, 13 March 2012 (UTC)
Wikimedia Commons usage guidelines for public domain works
Dear community,
In June 2011, some GLAM users wanted Wikimedia Commons publishes some guidelines about how to use correctly the public domain, like the Internet portal Europeana does.
In a nutshell, the goal is to have a page remembering attributions to museum should be given, maybe also a financial compensation on commercial usage (at least for the Europeana version) and to trust museums for moral rights application. This page should help to convince museums and institutions to give their digital collections to Commons.
The page started as a copy from Europeana usage guidelines for public domain works on the page Commons:Usage guidelines for public domain works (then renamed to Commons:Cultural context and finally Help:Usage guidelines for public domain works).
Those guidelines are offered as a proposal, asking kindly user to follow them by goodwill. The page will even told users this is not a binding contract.
The problem is Europeana and Wikimedia Commons weight together 25 millions pictures, and so when we both define the same best practices on how to use public domain works, we're defining the best practices to use the public domain works; in other words, we are restricting the public domain use.
More technically :
- this page never were consensual (they were objections about reciprocity - cf. the rama mail on the mailing list about how museums consider respect, I quote him, "do not photograph if it is not allowed, do not use you flash, do not attempt in any way to 'steal' photographs, as the quality will be poor", about the jurisprudence risk, about the fact our mission is to preserve public domain, etc.)
- this page received some days after his publication, and is inactive for 9 months
I'm so proposing it to deletion. --Dereckson (talk) 08:33, 11 March 2012 (UTC)
Change over of two pictures
Is it possible to switch between two pictures of same size, triggered by "mouse over"?. Example: Photo, and Photo + information if touched by mouse: [15] Akroti (talk) 10:56, 11 March 2012 (UTC)
- Not in the wiki, to my knowledge. - Jmabel ! talk 00:45, 12 March 2012 (UTC)
- Depending on what you want to do, you might be able to use Commons:Image annotations. Be cautious though: annotations applicable to the whole image are banned. Dankarl (talk) 01:12, 12 March 2012 (UTC)
Overwriting a file with itself
Isn't the software supposed to prevent overwriting a file with a duplicate of itself. I am asking that because, apparently it is what happened here (the uploader thought it did not work, so reuploaded the files several times and the same version of the file appears to have been saved four times in a row) --Zolo (talk) 13:54, 11 March 2012 (UTC)
- I'm not sure how possible it is to detect such in PDFs/Videos/Audios. But I agree that this would be greatly helpful when it comes to image files. I've seen a ton of similar cases. Will cleanup the file you mentioned to avoid confusion to other readers. Rehman 14:03, 11 March 2012 (UTC)
- It probably could detect for all file types (hash comparision) - but sometimes that is done intentionally - eg. to fix a strange display problem. --Saibo (Δ) 15:43, 11 March 2012 (UTC)
- For those who don't understand Zolo's question: in the meantime, Rehman deleted several versions of the file at File:Nietzsche - Le Gai Savoir.djvu. -- Docu at 15:51, 11 March 2012 (UTC)
- Actually, it's very easy to upload duplicates file versions; sometimes this can happen pretty much just by clicking more times than you intended on the "upload" button -- that's more or less what happened at File:Fine Gael historical flag.svg etc... AnonMoos (talk) 01:50, 12 March 2012 (UTC)
Pages with categories set via template may not appear in their super categories
- Previous discussion: User_talk:Saibo#Anzeigeproblem bei (Unter-)Kats
This section is just for information or to collect other cases of this bug.
For example (now fixed) form 9th March: Category:7th-century conflicts has the sub cats Category:620s conflicts, Category:630s conflicts and Category:650s conflicts but they were not shown on Category:7th-century conflicts. Category:680s conflicts was shown. The template which sets the cat template:ConflictsDecade was not edited for a long time. A fix was done by null-editing the subcat pages. Now they show up correctly.
This problem may may lead to apparently empty categories but in fact only the sub cats are not shown currently. This problem appeared in December 2011 in dewp: MP, AAF.
We should try to find more cases and or isolate the cause and report it to bugzilla. --Saibo (Δ) 15:41, 11 March 2012 (UTC)
Interesting DR
File:Wikipedia Anonymous.png has been discussed on Commons:Bistro.
On a nutshell:
- Wikimedia Commons allows to publish some WMF copyrighted content, including the Wikimedia projects logos ;
- we've a lot of variations, generally good-faith one (e.g. color + articles count) ;
- this variation could create a confusion between Wikipedia and Anonymous, and so some users think it should be deleted (and they're right to think so, if they believe this confusion is reasonable enough and susceptible to provoke damages for the project - I'd personally trust each member of the community to do a good faith use (and so I voted kept) but I'm probably a little bit too optimist here) ;
- the uploader claims he wanted to illustrate a This user does not want any Special User Rights. userbox with this logo (which is maybe a strange choice, as Anonymous or V for Vendatta or Guy Hawkes have or want to have some influence and power on the society!) ;
- the artwork is clearly associated to Anonymous in the news, but it's also the V for Vendetta / Guy Hawkes mask, and so has a scope broader than Anonymous.
I think the community at large should have an opportunity to give an opinion, as the WMF trademarks are our intellectual property, and so our input is important. --Dereckson (talk) 21:57, 11 March 2012 (UTC)
- Hawkes ==> Fawkes. - Jmabel ! talk 00:46, 12 March 2012 (UTC)
- This might be a copyvio just because the design for the mask came from the film V for Vendetta. Assuming it was not a pre-existing mask design, this could be a derivative work. I'm not sure how much of its appearance however is separable from its utilitarian purpose as a mask. Dcoetzee (talk) 03:22, 12 March 2012 (UTC)
Delete as copyvio, along with all other unfree WMF materials -mattbuck (Talk) 23:01, 12 March 2012 (UTC)
March 12
combine Arab Spring maps
File:Arab Spring map reframed.svg and File:Arab Spring map reframed updated.svg should be a single file; since the latter had apparent (and unjustified) errors (Arab Spring uprisings in Italy?), I replaced w the former. Kwamikagami (talk) 05:48, 12 March 2012 (UTC)
- File:Arab Spring map reframed.svg has no key to the colors used. cmadler (talk) 19:00, 12 March 2012 (UTC)
Help with loop in categories
Hi at all! I have a problem with this category Category:I promessi sposi (1840) In this category i have another subcategory named Category:Illustrations of I promessi sposi (1840) .I want join all image of these categories in Category:Illustrations of I promessi sposi (1840), but now there is a loop among the category and the subcategory. Thanks --Saettadizeus (talk) 12:42, 12 March 2012 (UTC)
- Loop fixed: Category:I promessi sposi (1840) does not belong to Category:Illustrations of I promessi sposi (1840). --Stefan4 (talk) 12:47, 12 March 2012 (UTC)
- Thanks, but i want join these two categories in Category:Illustrations of I promessi sposi (1840). I can't do it. Creation of second category was my mistake. Can you help me? Thanks --Saettadizeus (talk) 13:20, 12 March 2012 (UTC)
- The .djvu file is the complete book, not illustration. --Foroa (talk) 13:49, 12 March 2012 (UTC)
- No, I must join the categories because these images are linked in the book on wikisource. Therefore i want a single category for all images updated. I have created this second category for mistake. Is this any way for join them automatically? --Saettadizeus (talk) 16:08, 12 March 2012 (UTC)
- The .djvu file is the complete book, not illustration. --Foroa (talk) 13:49, 12 March 2012 (UTC)
- Thanks, but i want join these two categories in Category:Illustrations of I promessi sposi (1840). I can't do it. Creation of second category was my mistake. Can you help me? Thanks --Saettadizeus (talk) 13:20, 12 March 2012 (UTC)
Symbols for non-literate people
Is there an international system of the use of symbols to illustrate concepts for people who are not literate in any language? When considering the Wikimedia Commons I realized that some images could use a system of symbols to help illustrate the concepts to illiterate viewers. I wonder if there is a system that could be used to help non-literate viewers understand more information about images they see. WhisperToMe (talk) 19:35, 12 March 2012 (UTC)
- It seems unlikely that somebody illiterate will use commons Bulwersator (talk) 20:02, 12 March 2012 (UTC)
- There have been cases where immigrants and refugees from non-literate backgrounds have found themselves in first world countries, i.e. the Hmong coming to the United States. While there is now a written form of Hmong Dawb (that's in the Wikimedia incubator), many of the Hmong immigrants who originally came to the U.S.A. are or were illiterate. The way they communicated with distant relatives in refugee camps was sending audiotapes to each other. People from illiterate backgrounds can and do have access to modern technology that would let them view Wikimedia Commons. Even in undeveloped countries the proliferation of cell phones could hasten access to technology. WhisperToMe (talk) 21:07, 12 March 2012 (UTC)
Somebody on the English village pump mentioned some resources:
- Otto Neurath > Visual Education
- Yazdani & Barker, Iconic Communication
- en:ISO 7001
- en:DOT pictograms
Perhaps we could insert some of these symbols into select image descriptions, to help illustrate certain concepts to the illiterate WhisperToMe (talk) 22:06, 12 March 2012 (UTC)
- I suggest In the Land of Invented Languages by Arika Okrent to you. Her section on Blissymbolics says "He had created a 'universal' language that nobody else could figure out how to use" and compares it to aUI, both designed to have natural, obvious symbolism and yet nothing alike. I've spent plenty of time playing boardgames with natural, obvious symbols and spent a lot of time looking them up in the manual.
- Given my experiences, I have a hard time imagining any multicultural symbols that could be useful without explanation in language. Given the small number of illiterates who would use Wikimedia Commons, the difficulty of actually installing these symbols, and the fact I have a hard time imagining a large gain in usability to them, I would oppose it.--Prosfilaes (talk) 23:10, 12 March 2012 (UTC)
- Thanks for the reading! It was an interesting chapter. I guess people found more difficult with the practicality of the languages then the creators had hoped.
- It turns out aUI has an ISO language code, "art," and Bissymbolics also has an ISO language code, "zbl" - I wonder if interested parties could simply ask for the ISO codes to be activated, and then, if no font exists, they could use the symbols as images, i.e. [[File:aUI001.gif|20px]]
- English village pump contributors mentioned Bissymbolics, Pocket Comms from the UK police, and general traffic symbols.
- In addition symbols can also be useful for people who are literate, but not in the presented languages. I.E. international airlines use symbols and illustrations on safety cards so all people can understand them.
- WhisperToMe (talk) 00:05, 13 March 2012 (UTC)
- Apparently there are fonts that have aUI and Blissymbolics, but I'm not sure if Unicode supports them. WhisperToMe (talk) 01:38, 13 March 2012 (UTC)
In the meantime I decided to see what it would look like to use AIGA symbols. I added some (using inverse versions) at Category:First aid and Category:Barber shops as examples WhisperToMe (talk) 06:05, 13 March 2012 (UTC)
- If I receive no objections in a week or so, I would like to try adding more AIGA/USdot symbols to category pages, to supplement the written text descriptions. In cases of, say "barber shops in the United States" I could pair the AIGA symbol with the flag of the given country. WhisperToMe (talk) 16:29, 13 March 2012 (UTC)
-
- I think this is a useful think to do, especially for users who don't speak much or any English, and to support quick browsing of those who do. I'm not terribly convinced there's enough demand from illiterate users to justify the effort from that point of view, but it's useful for a much wider audience, so I have no problem with that being your motivation :) . I would say though that in the interests of standardisation, the symbols you use should be documented. This could be part of COM:ICON - perhaps a separate subpage, if it's going to grow very rapidly. Also, we might consider using templates to help standardise the presentation and selection of symbols. Rd232 (talk) 12:12, 14 March 2012 (UTC)
- About having the icons documented on COM:ICON - That's a great idea. COM:ICON can link to AIGA Images (for AIGA images), Category:ISO_7001_icons (for ISO 7002 images), and to a list of country flags. If we find more internationally recognized icon images, they could be listed too. WhisperToMe (talk) 16:31, 14 March 2012 (UTC)
- I think this is a useful think to do, especially for users who don't speak much or any English, and to support quick browsing of those who do. I'm not terribly convinced there's enough demand from illiterate users to justify the effort from that point of view, but it's useful for a much wider audience, so I have no problem with that being your motivation :) . I would say though that in the interests of standardisation, the symbols you use should be documented. This could be part of COM:ICON - perhaps a separate subpage, if it's going to grow very rapidly. Also, we might consider using templates to help standardise the presentation and selection of symbols. Rd232 (talk) 12:12, 14 March 2012 (UTC)
Large image donation
Not sure if this is the right page for this - please move it if you know of a better place! Photographer Cesare Brizio has agreed to donate 1300+ images here. Can any one suggest how we might achive this? any bot writers help? Images may be taken from the web page OR originals can be sent to anyone on a DVD if required
Data from OTRS ticket 2012021810002796 follows (permission obatined to copy this here)
++++++++++++++
Dear Ron Jones: yes, I confirm that I am actually glad to release all the images located at via the "View Media" link at http://tolweb.org/onlinecontributors/app?service=external/ImageContributorDetailPage&sp=1810 as "Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported (CC BY-SA 3.0)". Furthermore, I can provide upon request higher resolution versions (1024x768 or more) of almost all the same images.
By the way, I would gladly release as "Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported (CC BY-SA 3.0)" all the audio samples (recordings of animal sounds) available at the web pages listed here:
- http://cebrizio.xoom.it/cebrizio/MapAudio.htm
- http://cebrizio.xoom.it/cebrizio/BIOAC_ORTH/OrthAudioSamples.htm
- http://cebrizio.xoom.it/cebrizio/BIOAC_HEMI/HomoAudioSamples.htm
- http://cebrizio.xoom.it/cebrizio/BIOAC_HEMI/HeteAudioSamples.htm
- http://cebrizio.xoom.it/cebrizio/BIOAC_AMPH/AmphAudioSamples.htm
best regards,
Cesare Brizio
+++++++++++++
Ronhjones (Talk) 20:04, 12 March 2012 (UTC)
Seal of the United States District Court for the Western District of Wisconsin
Can we please get a picture of the United States District Court for the Western District of Wisconsin, like we have for Category:Seals of the United States district courts ?? I wasn't able to find one, can someone help me with this?? Thank you, -- Cirt (talk) 21:48, 12 March 2012 (UTC)
URLs in license templates
In the license tag templates such as {{cc-by-sa-3.0}} and {{gfdl}}, there is html like this: <span class="licensetpl_link" style="display:none;">www.gnu.org/copyleft/fdl.html</span> — useful for code that generates attribution text, such as MediaWiki:Gadget-Stockphoto.js (the "Use this file" thing). However, as you see, complete URLs aren't used — the w:URI scheme (usually http://) is left out. Is there a good reason for this? Otherwise, I would propose that the templates are changed to include full URLs.
There is currently a bug in MediaWiki:Gadget-Stockphoto.js in that it fails to complete these URL:s. Steps to reproduce: go to File:Ramaria-flaccida-fichtenkoralle.jpg, press "Use this file [on the web]" (the link with the globe icon), check the "HTML" button. The generated html will include [<a href="www.creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0">CC-BY-3.0</a>] which, if pasted into some page mypage.org will give a link to mypage.org/www.creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0... I could of course just report this as a bug to MediaWiki:Gadget-Stockphoto.js, but I would prefer if the root of the problem was fixed to improve machine-readability one tiny step at a time. /skagedaltalk 21:49, 12 March 2012 (UTC)
Speedy template is not visible
I moved File:PSM V40 D213 Soth seas dance mask.jpg to File:PSM V40 D213 South seas dance mask.jpg to correct the spelling error in the name, and requested the speedy deletion of the old file name. But, the template doesn't show up after saving. I was the original uploader and the end user on Wikisource and corrected the links accordingly. — User talk:Ineuw 22:02, 12 March 2012 (UTC)
- You did everything right. The software did not remove the redirect. That's strange. -- RE rillke questions? 13:43, 13 March 2012 (UTC)
- For some reason, {{speedy}} didn't like the internal link "[[:File:...]]". I removed it, and the template now appears. — Cheers, JackLee –talk– 13:52, 13 March 2012 (UTC)
- Oh, that's weird. The preview looked OK, but when I saved my changes {{speedy}} disappeared. Now I'm stumped. — Cheers, JackLee –talk– 13:55, 13 March 2012 (UTC)
Filename conflicts between en.wikipedia and Commons
Beta was kind enough to run this script. There is a sizable number of files with identical names on en.wikipedia and on commons. This means en.wikipedia cannot see commons images of the same name. I propose either images in commons or en.wikipedia be moved. Suggestions? -- とある白い猫 ちぃ? 22:12, 12 March 2012 (UTC)
- Would it be possible to check if some of these are duplicates of the same image? Does the script do that already? /skagedaltalk 22:18, 12 March 2012 (UTC)
-
- There are currently 1600 files which have been moved to Commons under the same name but not yet been deleted on Wikipedia. Those are not an issue since they don't block any different Commons file (both files would be identical). They are deleted as fast as the admins have the time to do so, and there's not really any hurry.
- There are lots of images with the "keep local" template which may exist on both Wikipedia and Commons; these are only a problem if the images are different.
- I sometimes notice that people move thumbnails from Wikipedia to Commons without proper sourcing. If these overlap with the same name, it would be better to correct the Commons move and delete them from Wikipedia than to move any files.
- If files really are different, something needs to be done. They should at least be tagged with en:Template:ShadowsCommons and preferably be moved.
- Maybe all images could be tagged with en:Template:ShadowsCommons if their hash values differ, for manual check? --Stefan4 (talk) 22:29, 12 March 2012 (UTC)
- Our guideline clearly says that we do not move files because project x has shadows. This is not discussable and not our problem. -- RE rillke questions? 13:40, 13 March 2012 (UTC)
March 13
William Beechey and his son Henry William Beechey
It may be of course that William Beechey [RA] (1753-1839) did indeed have a anterior Christian name of Henry, but I have found no evidence of it, whereas his son, Henry William Beechey (1788 - 1870?) was also a painter. Therefore some thought and effort may be profitably expended on considering the naming of the page and category respectively, Creator:Henry William Beechey and Category:Henry William Beechey, and ensuring the works are correctly attributed. Rich Farmbrough, 00:30 13 March 2012 (GMT).
File preview error
There is some problem with this File:Kuldiga bridge.jpg. For some reason the main preview (800 × 600 pixels) cannot be seen.--MrPanyGoff 08:17, 13 March 2012 (UTC)
- Works perfectly for me. Try Ctrl+Shift+R if you're using Firefox on Windows, to hard reset. Rehman 11:32, 13 March 2012 (UTC)
- Ctrl+Shift+R solved the problem, thanks.--MrPanyGoff 12:55, 13 March 2012 (UTC)
Categories and sub-categories of Christian saints
Hi to all, I apologize now for my approximate English: I have a problem, I cannot understand how to structure a sub category of saints as well as a statue of a Christian saint, see for example Category:Sculptures of Agatha of Sicily v Category:Sculptures of Saint Agatha of Sicily when in the "mother" category the adjective "saint" is missing. I think I understand that in an international historical figure tied to a religion can only be considered holy by a POV, and I think this is to avoid problems related to the religion of those who use an image (a time ago, in it.wiki a discussion led to a consensus to remove from articles the suffix "saint") but but I think should find a guideline to avoid the creation of double categories and in this case not even know which one is better: help me, please. Thank you for your attention. :-)--Threecharlie (talk) 13:17, 13 March 2012 (UTC)
- One can view "Saint" as a formal title rather than a description. This is perhaps easier in English. It seems unlikely that there would ever be a blanket removal of the term since so many early Christian Saints are known by only one name, and because we favor the common form of names. I guess I'd work on getting the category structure right and not worry much about the form of the category name. If you want an objective approach you could examine the frequency with which each form is used in written sources.Dankarl (talk) 14:05, 13 March 2012 (UTC)
- We had similar problems where we had churches without a saint in the parent cat such as Category:Benno, Category:Cadoc, Category:Agnes of Bohemia, Category:Thomas Becket, Category:Thomas More, several popes ... to name a few of the many. So we followed the natural logic to use the name of the parent cats and named all categories without saint. This has been strongly contested because for many if not most people, a church without a saint in the name is not correct. So, if you like it or not, if it is some sort of saint, you will find the saint back in the category names on the end of the tree. So, I think that if the saint is unavoidable, we better take it on as high as possible in the category tree. --Foroa (talk) 17:02, 13 March 2012 (UTC)
ISO graphical symbols - Copyright status?
About http://www.iso.org/iso/graphical-symbols_booklet.pdf - What is the copyright status of the graphical symbols themselves? Would they be considered too simple to copyright? Or does the ISO have an effective copyright over them?
I know the ISO exit symbol is at File:PublicInformationSymbol EmergencyExit.svg
WhisperToMe (talk) 17:42, 13 March 2012 (UTC)
Google Maps screenshot
I have a single screenshot of a satellite image from Google Maps that I would like to upload. I have retained the original copyright information in the bottom right-hand corner, and have not made any modifications to it (aside from cropping). I read through the copyright/permissions page for Google Maps/Earth to find the proper, legal route to using this image here, but I am unclear as to whether this screenshot is acceptable. The permissions page does have this: "For screenshots, the Google or or Google Maps logo is not required but attribution must always be present. However, the reverse is not allowed - only including Google logo is not proper attribution, particularly when 3rd-party suppliers were used for the Content." Since I have kept the full original copyright attribution, is my screenshot safe to upload here? ~~ Lothar von Richthofen (talk) 17:42, 13 March 2012 (UTC)
- No. While it may be legal according to their terms, Wikimedia Commons has a self-imposed policy which requires significantly more permissive copyright licenses than Google allows -- see Commons:Licensing. So, Google Maps screenshots are not allowed. The USGS does provide a bunch of government-authored overhead photography, but they keep changing how it can be accessed, so I'm not sure where it is at the moment. Carl Lindberg (talk) 18:37, 13 March 2012 (UTC)
-
- Hm, that's a shame. Do you know if such an image would be acceptable on en-wiki (or do I have to go ask around there)? ~~ Lothar von Richthofen (talk) 18:51, 13 March 2012 (UTC)
-
-
- One requirement for fair use on English Wikipedia is that free images can't be created. However, in this case it would be possible to create a free image by using your own satellite or by drawing a map or by using {{PD-USGov}} data, so I would guess that it would be very hard to find Google images acceptable. --Stefan4 (talk) 18:57, 13 March 2012 (UTC)
-
-
-
-
- @Lothar von Richthofen. Could you provide a link to this screenshot? For small scales use Landsat imagery (actually Google use Landsat for small scales as well), there are places in the web where you could freely download it (currently I don't remember the url, but it's googleable). For large scales -- sorry, no luck. Maybe it's possible to use OpenStreetMap instead of satellite imagery? Trycatch (talk) 07:08, 14 March 2012 (UTC)
- The screenshot itself is on my desktop; here is the permalink to the approximate image. ~~ Lothar von Richthofen (talk) 07:37, 14 March 2012 (UTC)
- "by using your own satellite" - rather - purchasing satellite pictures Bulwersator (talk) 07:19, 14 March 2012 (UTC)
- I don't really have too much spare money lying around to spend on satellite images of uninhabited islets (certainly not for a satellite ;) ). ~~ Lothar von Richthofen (talk) 07:37, 14 March 2012 (UTC)
- @Lothar von Richthofen. Could you provide a link to this screenshot? For small scales use Landsat imagery (actually Google use Landsat for small scales as well), there are places in the web where you could freely download it (currently I don't remember the url, but it's googleable). For large scales -- sorry, no luck. Maybe it's possible to use OpenStreetMap instead of satellite imagery? Trycatch (talk) 07:08, 14 March 2012 (UTC)
-
-
How is email any better evidence of permission than description page content?
I was just very surprised to be asked for an email to prove that I have granted a license to a file which I have uploaded three different versions of, refining them each time. I think this is absurd. Why would an email be any better proof of the evidence of permission than the file description page? Both consist entirely of my computer keystrokes, with no formal real world documentation or authentication. If I have been lying about the fact that I created the file in question on the file description page, why would anyone think that I would tell the truth about it in email? I note with some consternation that the person who asked me for this email proof has a pornagraphic barnstar on his talk page.
In the future, I think it would be best if I avoided Commons, and uploaded content to Wikipedia instead, even if it is free. The atmosphere here is too adolescent. Npmay (talk) 21:33, 13 March 2012 (UTC)
- Sorry, my fault for not checking enough. Wikipedia files may also be tagged for no permission, so that would not make any difference except that it would create a bigger backlog of files to move from Wikipedia to Commons. --Stefan4 (talk) 21:51, 13 March 2012 (UTC)
- Sorry for your negative experience. A large part of the reason we get e-mail for pre-existing works is that we can authenticate the address by mailing it and receiving a response. In many cases when the address belongs to an official domain this helps to verify it. E-mail also allows us to request additional authentication information, if necessary, which you might not want to show in public. Dcoetzee (talk) 07:20, 14 March 2012 (UTC)
-
- Also the reason someone asked for ITRS (presumably OTRS - Jmabel) email is because your file description source does not mention that it is {{Own}} work, creating impression that the image was downloaded from stats.grok.se. And in such a case we would need permission of the author. I realize that your username is listed in the author field, but I think that was the source of the confusion. --Jarekt (talk) 18:07, 14 March 2012 (UTC)
- Yes, that's exactly what I thought: it looked as if the file had been downloaded from that page. Later, I realised that the page only contained Wikipedia statistics and that there is no issue, but at that point you had already started the discussion here and on my talk page. Again, sorry for my mistake, but it did look a bit confusing at the file information page. --Stefan4 (talk) 18:11, 14 March 2012 (UTC)
- Also the reason someone asked for ITRS (presumably OTRS - Jmabel) email is because your file description source does not mention that it is {{Own}} work, creating impression that the image was downloaded from stats.grok.se. And in such a case we would need permission of the author. I realize that your username is listed in the author field, but I think that was the source of the confusion. --Jarekt (talk) 18:07, 14 March 2012 (UTC)
Child protection policy proposal and discussion
There is a policy proposal and discussion on child protection currently in progress at Commons:Child protection. Editors are encouraged to provide their input at the relevant talk page. russavia (talk) 11:54, 14 March 2012 (UTC)