Commons:Village pump/Copyright/Archive/2015/11

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Need to change copyright status on image

Hello, my mistake. I uploaded this file under published pre-1923 when I should have chosen copyright not renewed. Can somebody more knowledgeable than me at editing metadata change this? Blythwood (talk) 02:17, 1 November 2015 (UTC)

@Blythwood: Works shouldn't be marked as 'not renewed' unless you have specifically, explicitly checked. Since you didn't specifically say if you had, I'm going ahead and double-checking it... the book was registered as A765665 on Dec 15, 1923, which means it's renewal was due in 1951. It doesn't 'pop up' in the Stanford search engine, but I'll glance at the actual indexes just to make certain. Revent (talk) 16:26, 1 November 2015 (UTC)
Search done, indeed no renewal found. Changed the license, and noted that a search was done. Revent (talk) 16:46, 1 November 2015 (UTC)

Care symbols and the Threshold of originality

Well, I'm here again to discuss what is the scope of the Threshold of originality of very simple shapes, like this file nominated for deletion, claiming that the file is a Copyvio (where these symbols may be actually Trademark). Also, these symbols are of the ISO 3758:2005 and are well know worldwide (even in my clothes).

  • Are the Care symbols actually ineligible for Copyright?
  • Is this just invalid in the rest of the world (specially in the US)?

--Amitie 10g (talk) 19:03, 1 November 2015 (UTC)

I would say those symbols are PD-ineligible. Perhaps the washing symbol is not OK in the UK, but not sure. There are international agreements on trademark though, so if they are trademarked, then yes there are restrictions -- but just trademark restrictions. As long as Wikimedia's own use does not violate trademark, we should be OK. For a trademark, simply displaying the symbol is not a "use" -- a "use" for trademark means using it in a symbolic way to connote an extra meaning, without permission from the trademark owner. The DR is just conflating trademark with copyright though (and the separate meaning of "commercial use" in a trademark context). Carl Lindberg (talk) 21:41, 1 November 2015 (UTC)

What license should I use when uploading an image with copyright holder's permission?

I would like to upload a recent photograph of a person who is the subject of a soon-to-be-created article on Wikipedia. Upon my request, the image was provided to me by the copyright holder, who also happens to be subject's spouse, as an attachment to an email message which included explicit permission to upload the photo to the commons under a free license that permits all sharing and requests attribution. Would someone be so kind as to confirm for me that this upload is permissible, and to advise me of the appropriate responses to the upload wizard? Thank you for any assistance you might offer. Malcom Gregory Scott (talk) 21:10, 2 November 2015 (UTC)

@Malcom Gregory Scott: You should select the specific license that the copyright holder indicated... they need to have been 'explicit' about which one they were granting permission under. Also, since you are not the copyright holder, you need to forward evidence of the grant of permission to OTRS... see Commons:OTRS#Licensing_images:_when_do_I_contact_OTRS.3F, under "I have received permission to upload the image to Commons." Revent (talk) 16:57, 3 November 2015 (UTC)
@Malcom Gregory Scott: Anyway, if you need to suggest a license to copyright holder, I would suggest CC-BY, since it is "a free license that permits all sharing and requests attribution". Anyway, as Revent said, the copyright holder must say explicitly which license he chooses.--Pere prlpz (talk) 17:25, 3 November 2015 (UTC)

Council of Europe report

Could this 1980 report from the Council of Europe (a PDF file) be uploaded here? What is the copyright status of such a document? I think this text would be nice to have in Wikisource. At Wikisource, there is already a s:Category:Council of Europe, but the documents there seem to be text-only, not backed up by scanned images (such as found in this PDF file). --LA2 (talk) 21:19, 2 November 2015 (UTC)

The Council of Europe can, and does, claim copyright on its works. That 1980 report from the Council of Europe is likely protected by copyright until January 1, 2051. It's possible that some works of the Council of Europe are public domain in the U.S. as edicts of government (e.g. if they are judicial opinions, administrative rulings, legislative enactments, etc.). I don't think the report to which you link would qualify. I am not familiar enough with Wikisource's policies to comment on what grounds they are hosting transcriptions of Council of Europe documents. —RP88 (talk) 11:57, 3 November 2015 (UTC)

Old postcard needs better date

Hello everyone! Can someone pinpoint the date a little closer? Asking on dewiki as well. --Hedwig in Washington (mail?) 06:25, 3 November 2015 (UTC)

Also:


The J.J. appears to be printed by the Jullien Freres... perhaps the J.J. is John Jullien, either the father (1818-1887) or son (1873-1928); seems like several sons of the earlier John ran the business, though it was sold in 1930 or so.[1] Or maybe it just stands for Jullien & Jullien, and is not indicative of an actual author. I think it's PD either way. Slightly wider view of same card here; no date.
The other is apparently printed by Briquet & Fils -- Briquet & Fils (fl. 1840 - 1940) were Geneva based publishers active in the late 19th and early 20th century.[2] I do see another postcard here postmarked 1901 which also has the "Cafe Interational" seen in this photo... not sure how long that brasserie existed. This page claims the date is April 14, 1912. No clue how it's dated that specifically. Carl Lindberg (talk) 10:41, 3 November 2015 (UTC)
Public domain:
In 1955, a revision of the 1922 law extended the copyright term from 30 to 50 years. This extension was not retroactive and applied only to works that were still copyrighted in 1955.

In 1992 a new copyright law was passed. It entered in force on July 1, 1993 and extended the copyright term again non-retroactively to 70 years. Swiss Copyright Law

--Aspro (talk) 22:20, 3 November 2015 (UTC)

Consent requirements in United Kingdom

We need expert opinions on "consent requirements in United Kingdom" at Commons:Deletion requests/File:Mothers and children eating ice cream at Kew Gardens.jpg. There is an argument that Commons:Country_specific_consent_requirements#United_Kingdom is outdated. If true, it need to be updated. At the same time, we can't mix "moral concerns" with applicable laws. Thanks, Jee 02:42, 4 November 2015 (UTC)

We shouldn't conflate them, but we certainly can and should wonder if we should be keeping photos like this. The photo is a closeup on a dining group that might reasonably expect to be caught in a photo of the area, but hardly a closeup of their group, especially one that then gets uploaded to a public forum. Given the little use we have for such pictures and relatively easy creation with consenting groups, I don't see that moral concerns are on our side.--Prosfilaes (talk) 02:47, 5 November 2015 (UTC)

File:Jacqueline Comerre-Paton - Mistletoe.jpg

Hi all, I am having trouble with a deletion discussion. I have as yet been unable to discover why the subject file was deleted when the copyright is PD in the US. So far I have only received the message that the country of origin states that the file is not PD. However, the file is from a US book published before 1923. Can someone spell this out for me please? I upload lots of artwork files so I really need to understand this. As a sidenote, I tried using the undelete option to spark a discussion and promptly lost track of where that request ended up. I posted also on the deleter's page here: User_talk:Natuur12#File:Jacqueline_Comerre-Paton_-_Mistletoe.jpg . Please try to help me get my head around this so 1) I don't continue to upload PD book illustrations or 2) I can have the file undeleted. Thanks in advance, --Jane023 (talk) 10:33, 4 November 2015 (UTC)

As it was discussed in Commons:Deletion requests/File:Jacqueline Comerre-Paton - Mistletoe.jpg the file was a print of a painting by Jacqueline Comerre-Paton printed in 1905 UK book. The license of the file was {{PD-old-70-1923}} which was incorrect since Jacqueline Comerre-Paton died in 1955. Since Jacqueline Comerre-Paton is french the country of origin is France. As far as I can tell Jacqueline Comerre-Paton artworks are still copyrighted in France and Europe, but they are PD in the US since they were published before 1923. --Jarekt (talk) 13:52, 4 November 2015 (UTC)
Country of origin is country of first publication. If the UK book was actually the first publication of the painting, then technically the UK would be the country of origin (no real difference, as the term there would still be 70pma which will not expire until Jan 1 2026). Likely though the painting was previously published in France given the nationality of the author. In either event, Commons cannot host the material. It can be uploaded to the English Wikipedia. The undeletion request is still active at Commons:Undeletion requests/Current requests#File:Jacqueline_Comerre-Paton_-_Mistletoe.jpg; I replied there a few days ago. Carl Lindberg (talk) 18:10, 4 November 2015 (UTC)

PD-1996

There is a proposal here to change wording of {{PD-1996}}, based on this discussion. Please review. --Jarekt (talk) 17:57, 4 November 2015 (UTC)

Theodor Pallady

Someone may want to comb through Category:Theodor Pallady Museum, Bucharest. The building itself is fine in copyright terms (it's a 19th-century merchant's house), but Pallady's own artwork is presumably not. He died in 1956.

Note that many artists are represented in the collection, and some of them died long enough ago for their works to be public domain. Also, in several of the photos here, either the artwork is de minimis or the problem could be solved with a Gaussian blur or some such, since the artwork is not the subject of those photos. - Jmabel ! talk 19:08, 4 November 2015 (UTC)

Free City of Danzig

As part of the German stamps review I noticed the Category:Stamps of the Free City of Danzig, with vital pictures auch as File:Danzig Wilhelm Konrad Röntgen 25 Pf 1939.jpg.

This made me wonder what the copyright situation actually is for works originating in the Free City of Danzig.

It seems, by reading a few articles, that there is no legal successor to the Free City of Danzig and the state ceased to exist at least by 1945. Germany is not the legal successor because the territory was invaded in violation of international law, as such, the Germany-specific copyright templates are all wrong. But what is right? It seems we would need to look at the historic copyright law of the Free City of Danzig - if it even had one. Does anyone know where one could research these sorts of documents? -- Liliana-60 (talk) 00:54, 5 November 2015 (UTC)

If it was published in Danzig, it was published in what is now Gdansk, Poland, and thus the country of first publication would almost certainly be Poland. Official works are more complex, and may require reading the actual Danzig law. Danzig had a copyright law, and the US and Danzig had bilateral copyright relations by Presidential Proclamation (on the US side) in 1934.--Prosfilaes (talk) 01:23, 5 November 2015 (UTC)
  • (Edit conflict) If the Free City of Danzig never joined the Berne Convention, then it is necessary to look at the country of citizenship and residence of the authors of works from the Free City of Danzig. If some of the authors were residents of either Danzig, Germany or Gdańsk, Poland on the date of death, then some countries might recognise the source country as being either Germany or Poland. In the United States, it seems that it is the country of residence or citizenship at creation which matters, though.
When borders change, I'd imagine that "country of publication" is determined by the borders at the time of publication, but the country of citizenship and residence is more complex. --Stefan2 (talk) 01:25, 5 November 2015 (UTC)
The Free City of Danzig did join the Berne Convention, in 1922 I believe.
International copyright and neighbouring rights: the Berne Convention and beyond, Volume 2 (ISBN 0198259468) might have something more specific about the subject, but shows only snippets on Google.--Prosfilaes (talk) 01:31, 5 November 2015 (UTC)

Are the following files below the Threshold of originality in US?

The company is based in the United States where the threshold is high. So these files could be below the threshold. --Rezonansowy (talk) 00:28, 6 November 2015 (UTC)

Yes, both below TOO. But are they within project scope? --Hedwig in Washington (mail?) 01:17, 6 November 2015 (UTC)
Yes, several potentially uses. --Amitie 10g (talk) 02:13, 6 November 2015 (UTC)
Great! No doubt about notability there. --Hedwig in Washington (mail?) 07:43, 6 November 2015 (UTC)
✓ Done File:Malwarebytes logo.png, File:Malwarebytes logo and wordmark.png. Thank you! --Rezonansowy (talk) 14:59, 6 November 2015 (UTC)

File:Arjun wiki.jpg

Photo is claimed as "own work", but it the way the subject is posing makes it seem like a PR photo or something similar. A Google image search shows that the photo is being used on lots of fan pages for the en:Arjun Kapoor as well as here on the actor's official Facebook page. -- Marchjuly (talk) 02:42, 6 November 2015 (UTC)

✓ Deleted Yann (talk) 14:29, 6 November 2015 (UTC)

Werkspoor diesel valve train

Hello - i am interested in using the werspoor diesel valve image commercially for a fashion fabric print. The image will be adapted and mixed with other train engine imagery. Sadly we are unble to attribue the copyright owner as it will not fit within the print. Can this request be granted? Also do you have more diesel train engines photographs we could use? we would be very interested. I look forward from hearing from you. Vicky — Preceding unsigned comment was added by 108.171.128.164 (talk) 14:40, 06 November 2015 (UTC)

Your question would be much easier to answer if you could help us pinpoint which of the 29 million files on Commons you're talking about, for example by mentioning the exact name of the file. I'm going to make a few assumptions and guess that by "werspoor", you mean Werkspoor and that the file in question is File:Werkspoor diesel valve train.jpg. Use of that photo without attributing the author, mentioning the license and releasing any works based on it under the same license is not permitted. The only one who could grant any requests for use under different terms is the copyright holder, User:Uberprutser, who may be contacted at User talk:Uberprutser.
For other photos of diesel locomotive engines, see Category:Diesel locomotive engines. For general information on reusing content from Commons, see Commons:Reusing content outside Wikimedia. —LX (talk, contribs) 13:41, 7 November 2015 (UTC)
To be fair, LX, searching for the entire section title above returns just the one file—not to dispute the general principle that links should be provided, though; it’s not usually so easy. I agree that only Uberprutser can change the licence or make a special arrangement regarding the textile. Vicky, perhaps you could offer to attribute the author wherever the product may appear in catalogues or brochures, or in some other alternative form, but you’ll have to get his or her consent for any use that doesn‘t satisfy the licence provided. Commons’ role is only to host and curate the media here, the rights to which (where extant) remain the property of their creators.—Odysseus1479 (talk) 22:18, 7 November 2015 (UTC)

File:Harry potter by daipayaan chakraborty.jpg

Uploaded as own work and seems like some kind of fanart. Would this be considered a derivative work of this movie poster found at gamesradar.com/even-more-harry-potter-deathly-hallows-posters/? Also, "the by diapayaan charkraboorty" in the file's name is not the same as the uploader, so I am wondering if this also means OTRS permission is needed to verify that they are the same person per COM:FAN#General rule. The same concerns also apply to File:Digital painting by daipayaan chakraborty.jpg and File:Manoj V. by Daipayaan Chakraborty.jpg -- Marchjuly (talk) 07:27, 9 November 2015 (UTC)

Thank you for pointing this out. It was obviously a derivative work so I deleted it per our speedy deletion criteria. De728631 (talk) 19:19, 9 November 2015 (UTC)

Photo contest

good afternoon! I would like to participate in the photo contest but I can not understand that such a copyright (or rather mean sfotanye pictures of me but not the originals, they are my own stones is important but sfotat me)? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Абду777 (talk • contribs) 12:31, 09 November 2015 (UTC)

I'm sorry but I don't understand your request. If you are uncertain how to write your question in English you may use your native language. Wikimedia Commons is a project with users from all over the world, so there should be someone who can read your language. De728631 (talk) 19:34, 9 November 2015 (UTC)

Correct licensing for old UK postcards etc. of probably anonymous status?

Sorry if this is a bit longwinded...

Regarding this discussion, can someone please help confirm which license tags should be used for the images listed below so that we can (legitimately) retain as many as possible? These are old images, mainly from the mid-19th to the early-20th century and *probably* PD due to age. I don't want to see these deleted unless absolutely necessary, but at the same time, the licensing (or rather, PD rationale explanation) ought to be correct.

Many of this user's images were previously deleted because they didn't have proper UK rationale.

Would it be fair to say that for the majority of these images they can be considered PD-UK-unknown where "the author is unknown and cannot be ascertained by reasonable enquiry" (my emphasis)? (And what constitutes "reasonable" enquiry?- as noted in the talk page discussion above, this may be very far from straightforward if not impossible to find out). I understand that there are still a few cases where images from the late 19th century are still within copyright (presumably author's death + 70 years).

Afterbrunel says that he/she has used that license tag previously and had the images deleted anyway without sufficient explanation (see talk page discussion).

He/she also says "3) In the case of Friockheim I tried a different approach, viz: (a) the copyright had expired, (b) I made some (very) minor changes to the image, so (c) whatever very minor copyrightable artistic content it had was mine, (d) hence the copyright rationale I used." The problem is that this quasi-legal workaround misses the point and doesn't fix the problem- for it to work, the source image has to be PD, and the problem was that it *hadn't* been explained correctly why it was PD! (And if it was, the workaround isn't necessary).

Also, having two copyrights gratuitously complicates things. (Having asked previously, I still don't have a satisfactory answer as to what licensing labels or tags should be listed if an image has two or more copyrights, e.g. a copyrightable modification (or reproduction) of a PD image. (Even if the source image is PD, that still has to be explained, as otherwise the underlying image can't be assumed to be free.)

I assume that these have to be labelled with rationale for why they are PD both in the UK and in the US?

"Licenses" listed after each image are those claimed, not necessarily the correct ones.

Ubcule (talk) 23:37, 3 November 2015 (UTC)

If a work was published without any indication of a human author, that is a pretty solid basis for PD-UK-unknown or similar, especially if an author can't be found with a web search (they are sometimes documented by postcard collectors). However, it would be nice to see the other sides of the postcards -- it may have been rare, but there could be more publisher/author info on the back sides. Keep in mind that the author needed to become known within 70 years of publication -- if not disclosed by that point, the work became PD. Discovering the author's name today would have no effect. For works as early as the 1860s, it's pretty safe to assume PD-old for those anyways. I just changed one to PD-UK-unknown (it was a UK newspaper engraving from 1861) but really PD-old would have been fine as well.
If there are initials or other mark on the postcards though, it really should be looked up. A work published in say 1900 can easily still be under copyright today -- if the author was known, it just took that author to live until 1945. File:Cheeswring Quarry.jpg is kind of interesting... I see another version here with a mark of "J.V." in a circle, which is apparently en:Valentine & Sons (the original proprietor was James Valentine, who died in 1879). Since that is a corporate mark, that is likely enough anonymous I think. It is odd that the uploaded version does not have that mark though -- was the image altered or were there multiple printers? This eBay version also has the JV mark but says it was published by Botterell & Son, Liskeard, Cornwall -- that info must have been on the back. Another version here which says it is postmarked 1914 so it was then or before. I think that one is PD-UK-Unknown. File:W&C air lock.jpg on the other hand has a clear signature on the bottom right, though I can't quite make it out. It is credited on the page (and elsewhere) as being drawn by H Lanos, who would appear to be fr:Henri Lanos, whose death date is not known. He was French, but looks like contributed to the Graphic many times, so the country of origin for this work would still be the UK. Looks like he was active from the 1880s through the mid-1910s. That type of work cannot qualify for anonymous; there is an author, and we need to find out his lifespan. Failing that, it's a matter if we think the work period would point to the author being dead at least 70 years. Unfortunately, they all do need to be looked at -- "own work" is absolutely incorrect, and PD-1923 is not enough if they are non-US works.
If there are copyrightable modifications, those should be licensed -- but those would have to be additional creative content (not simple or minor changes) which would be inappropriate for this type of work, so I doubt there are secondary copyrights. Carl Lindberg (talk) 03:37, 4 November 2015 (UTC)
User:Clindberg: Note that the law says "reasonable enquiry", not "published anonymously". Would it be "reasonable enquiry" to demand that you ask the publisher about the identity of the photographer? If asking the publisher for information constitutes "reasonable enquiry" and it was possible to obtain the identity of the author that way in, say, the 1920s, then the author was "known" in the 1920s. British law furthermore states that an author can't become "unknown" if he has once been "known", meaning that he would in that case still be "known". I think that User:MichaelMaggs has made some interesting statements about what constitutes "reasonable enquiry" in some deletion discussions, so maybe he can clarify things for us. --Stefan2 (talk) 15:33, 4 November 2015 (UTC)
Not to my mind, because the author would have needed to have been made known within 70 years of making the work available to the public for it to count. If only the publisher knows, then it's not public information, and the author is/was anonymous for 70 years and the work became public domain at that point... becoming known today should not change anything. If the publisher privately knowing who the author is makes something "known", then hardly anything can really ever be "unknown" since they virtually always know who the author was. Knowing that the original publication was anonymous goes a long, long way. (And per the EU directive, for countries which allow works for hire like the UK, the author must be named on the copies that are actually distributed to get the 70pma term -- if not, it's 70 years from publication regardless if the author is later made known or not. But, not sure the UK actually implemented that clause even though they should have.) Of course, at the time photos were only copyrighted 50 years from creation so there was no reason to name authors, but those are the new, retroactive rules. And actually that is another point -- these photos were PD for a long time, and therefore (as published anonymous photos) would have expired in all other EEA countries by 1995, and therefore not been subject to the new EU rules which went into effect in 1996 (since it would not qualify as a revived work). The "unknown" portions of the 1956 and 1988 Acts also never applied in the first place because this was a photo taken before 1957 and the 50-year-from-creation term continued to apply to those, regardless who the author is, known or unknown. It would only be the EU restorations which could have affected the status; anonymous works from before 1915 (Spain protected works for 80 years from publication I think, so 1995 - 80) probably didn't qualify as a revived work in the first place. I'm not sure the 1996 revival law really gets into works of unknown authors, either. Carl Lindberg (talk) 16:50, 4 November 2015 (UTC)
The requirement is that it should have been possible to identify the author at some point by "reasonable enquiry" within 70 years from publication, which does not necessarily require that the identity has been publicly disclosed within that time if there are ways to identify the author by "reasonable enquiry" without having to reveal the identity of the author before someone actually tries to make a reasonable enquiry. If Britain uses a definition of 'anonymous' which is less likely to apply than the one in the EU directive, then Britain might only be able to use that definition for determining the old (1988) copyright term and use that term whenever it is longer than the EU term, though.
Note that the old Spanish law only mentions one copyright term, 80 years p.m.a., which seems to apply regardless of whether the author is anonymous or not. P.m.a. copyright terms are used for anonymous works in a couple of European countries. One example is Sweden, where the 1961 law states that the copyright term for anonymous works is 50 years pd or 50 years pma, whichever is shorter. This provides a copyright term for unpublished anonymous works which is usually longer than required by the EU rules. --Stefan2 (talk) 17:42, 4 November 2015 (UTC)
Spain's 1987 law specifically mentioned 60 years from publication for anonymous works. However, they gave existing works for hire a term of 80 years from publication in the transitional section. That's why I used 80. If the work was not covered in EEA countries in 1995, then the "unknown" provisions of UK law never applied to old UK photographs in the first place (as the transitional sections of the 1956 and 1988 laws make clear). And I still think that a publisher privately knowing the author would not make anything automatically "known" -- otherwise there is hardly any reason for the distinction since the initial publisher would virtually always know. The UK law says "unknown" but some of the article headings do say "anonymous" so there is some similarity in intent, I think. Carl Lindberg (talk) 17:53, 4 November 2015 (UTC)
Also, you are arguing for a situation where the term before the EU directives (50 years from creation) was definitely shorter, yet after the EU directives becomes longer than the term specified in the EU directives, which should not be possible. Carl Lindberg (talk) 18:04, 4 November 2015 (UTC)
Thank you for the feedback and discussion.
Unfortunately, beyond the fact that the "own work" claims will have to be changed- which I suspected would be the case- it's kind of hard to apply this the specific case I mentioned. :-/
I'd say that the onus for correct labelling always lies with the uploader (since they're supposed to know that an image is free before uploading it and should be able to explain why!) but it's also reasonable to help out if they basically know that but aren't au fait enough with Commons to dot the i's and cross the t's.
Bearing that in mind, what should we be asking the uploader to do? I'd assume asking what "modifications" have been made to the "own work" versions so that can be noted is reasonable.
Ultimately, we need to know where we stand with these images to keep them on Commons. If the requirements to demonstrate that they're (copyright-expired) PD are too convoluted, excessive or unclear to be practical for some or all, then it might not be possible to keep them, but I'd rather do so if possible.
Ubcule (talk) 20:31, 4 November 2015 (UTC)
Stuff from before 1870 or so shouldn't be an issue at all, and probably a bit later than that. It'd be highly, highly unlikely for someone whose works date from that period to still be alive in 1945. For photographs we know were first published anonymously, I'm OK with {{PD-UK-unknown}}, though that would only be useful for works published before 1926 (since otherwise their US copyright would have been restored). So, most of these are probably OK. But the "own work" stuff needs to be changed -- for that to be valid, they would have had to add actual new creative content, which we would not want on old works anyways. And we still have to demonstrate the original is PD. Basically though, please have the uploader leave as much information as they can, including the references to the works they were taken from -- that way other people can do more research and don't have to re-discover it. The main issue would be works which are more from 1890s and on with a known author but where that author's lifespan is not known, but as mentioned other Commons users can do further research -- the important part is to provide as much information as possible; calling something "own work" and not divulging the source is actually counterproductive as others may not want to make the effort to first find out what the uploader knew, and only then go further. I did find Henri Lanos' life dates and that work is fine. I would at least change them to PD-UK-unknown if there is no author listed on the work, and add the PD-1923 tag. For the really old stuff, just use {{PD-old-70-1923}} which is a combined tag. If the author's death year is known, {{PD-old-auto-1923}} is a better combined tag. Carl Lindberg (talk) 04:46, 8 November 2015 (UTC)
Thank you for taking the time and effort with this. I'll take a look at this when I have the time.
Unfortunately, it's quite clear from the end of our conversation (archive) that the uploader has no inclination to get further involved with discussing such details.
Since by that point I was starting to get *really* bogged down and mentally exhausted by this longwinded, unproductive and thankless conversation anyway, I'd already decided to bring it to a halt, even before it became clear he had too with that passive-aggressive "tell me what to do" ultimatum. So I'm afraid I'm not prepared to discuss it further with him either.
Basically, the problem is that the uploader obviously finds this obsession with copyright to be "intellectual masturbation" and has a very "them and us" attitude. He already made clear that "I don't for a moment suggest that my use of the marginal IPR I might add to an out-of-copyright work makes it "become" out-of-copyright. My reason for doing it was simply to discourage, evidently in vain, this kind of argument." In short, it was obfuscation.
In short no-one's going to sue over old images, so why's it a problem? I can sympathise with this point of view to some extent- a lot more than he does with ours- but that's not the Commons philosophy nor how things are done here.
Unfortunately, it's quite clear that this just won't gel with him, regardless.
The fundamental problem when he basically demands we tell him what to do is that he wants *us* to magically tell *him* the correct licenses and copyright status of *his* uploads. Actually, mate, it's meant to be *your* responsibility as the uploader to know all this in the first place. I was trying to help out, you were the one who openly admitted playing silly whatevers and intentionally misusing the "own work" tag to obfuscate things, making it harder for us to know what's what and determine the status or veracity of the images
He'll receive the usual auto/obligatory notifications and is still entitled to contribute via the usual Commons channels in response, but that's as far as I'm prepared to get involved. Ubcule (talk) 23:37, 9 November 2015 (UTC)
It's an understandable frustration -- copyright is mind-numbingly complex at times. It could be easier to have some safe rule as a cut off "nothing newer than 18XX" -- where it's safe to assume the author has been dead 70 years without having to do much research. But that would cut out a lot of public domain works we could legitimately use. And for others, the "free" part of the "free encyclopedia" just isn't that important and all the copyright documentation is just unwanted busywork. On the other hand, this is a collaborative project, so it's certainly possible for others to do research. After doing all the work to locate images and upload them, people often don't want to deal with the licensing research. There does need to be a basic understanding of the tags at least, but for works like that, anyone can do the research as much as the uploader. Often the uploader has special knowledge which makes it much easier for them, but for this type of work, usually not. It is still on the uploader if nobody else steps up though, because overworked admins also often don't want to take the time. But, sometimes people will do a lot of the work, especially if noted in this forum, though the default will still be delete if nobody does. It is certainly possible to mention links to potential material here, and if others chime in with the correct licenses, then go ahead and do the uploading work. Over time people would probably learn enough basics to figure out the tags on their own. I have gone through and updated the licenses on many of the above, and many of the rest are probably OK. Many come from the Illustrated London News -- if those are older than say 1880, I'd just put PD-old-70-1923 on them. If they are from before 1923 and there is no author mentioned, i.e. the image is not signed, or listed author is just a corporate name and not the actual human author, I'd probably just use PD-UK-unknown. I have found the human authors for some of them though, and updated with that info. But the "own work" ones can be frustrating because they don't actually list the source they were taken from, which puts roadblocks up to doing research. Sometimes, postcard authors were mentioned only on the back, so not having the backs might be an issue, though many of these can be found on the net or ebay to confirm. Just provide as much information as possible, basically ;-) Carl Lindberg (talk) 05:29, 10 November 2015 (UTC)
To be fair, I think it's clear that I also consider it desirable to help people out "if they basically know [..] but aren't au fait enough with Commons to dot the i's and cross the t's" or need help with the details.
If I didn't, I'd have simply nominated the obviously-mislabelled images for deletion in the first place instead of spending all that ******* time trying to get things sorted out! :-/
However, if- as seems to be the case here- someone has a fundamental difference of philosophy with Commons (the aforementioned "it's probably okay anyway") and views any attempt to reconcile this with the former as a sign of that person being the "them" in "them and us", and a waste of their time to the extent that they'd tried to obfuscate the issue by misusing the "own work" tag then... there's not a lot more that can- or should- be done to get them onboard.
At this point, in the absence of any better options, I'd probably be nominating some or all of these images for deletion. (Something I'd have been entitled to do in the first place, but didn't- this happened to some of his previous uploads). The images themselves are certainly good, but the lack of clarity in the licensing and info from the uploader is unacceptable.
If you're willing to spend your time getting and correcting the info for these, then please do so. Please also remember that the "own work" ones have *supposedly* been modified in some unspecified manner, so would have to be tagged as such.
All the best, Ubcule (talk) 19:46, 10 November 2015 (UTC)
Yep, all agreed. I have updated more than half of them though, and gradually doing more. I have removed several "own work" tags; some appear to be cropped and that sort of thing but the ones where I found an original source, there did not appear to be any actual copyrightable expression added so I have ignored that part and just used the older license. Like you say, the "own work" part was at best a misunderstanding, and at worst an obfuscation attempt anyways. Carl Lindberg (talk) 20:26, 10 November 2015 (UTC)

Conditions for the use of Gallica's contents

The conditions for the use of contents from the Gallica digitalisation project state that although "The contents accessible on Gallica website are mostly digital reproductions of works from the collections of the BnF that are no more protected by intellectual property rights [...] The commercial use of these contents is subject to payment and covered by a license." Is this of any relevance for Wikimedia Commons, or may reproductions of public domain 2D works be transferred unscrupulously from the Gallica site under reference to our PD-Art Guidelines? --Abderitestatos (talk) 00:21, 9 November 2015 (UTC)

See the notice under the blue box at {{PD-Art}} and the linked page COM:ART: Commons takes the position that any limits that galleries & collections may place on their reproductions of PD 2D works are in effect non-copyright restrictions; violation of a source website’s ToU on this account doesn’t taint the uploaded files as far as we‘re concerned. It’s up to individuals whether or not their scruples permit such activities as bypassing of viewing-resolution limits or misrepresenting their intended use on a download form. I note also that, according to COM:PDARTREUSE, French case-law is inconclusive on the question.—Odysseus1479 (talk) 01:49, 9 November 2015 (UTC)
Does {{PD-Art}} apply regardless of the source country? --ghouston (talk) 08:04, 9 November 2015 (UTC)
Yes, it's an exception to the "country of origin" policy. Carl Lindberg (talk) 14:50, 9 November 2015 (UTC)
OK, Thanks for your answers. --Abderitestatos (talk) 17:09, 10 November 2015 (UTC)

Virgin logo and Threshld of originality

I found some Virgin logos in Commons (namely this. According to the file hosted in the English Wikipedia as Fair Use,

  • Is the logo actually above the COM:TOO in the UK?

--Amitie 10g (talk) 06:57, 10 November 2015 (UTC)

Almost certainly, for the UK. The Commons logo isn't claiming PD-ineligible though... they are claiming a CC license. Which I do not see whatsoever on the source website. On the other hand, the uploader is pretty experienced. Carl Lindberg (talk) 15:05, 10 November 2015 (UTC)
Take it back that I don't see the license. Here is a link to a .jpg version, and they clearly license those media images CC-BY-3.0. If the link doesn't work, they have a "Media Centre" page, and you can click "Images & Videos", and the logo is in the list of images. I don't see the .pdf version any more, but I have to assume it was there. Carl Lindberg (talk) 15:19, 10 November 2015 (UTC)

UCSB Cylinder Archive

UCSB has a digitized collection of cylinders online. They're released under cc-by-nc-2.5. But if these are straight reproductions of audioforms out of copyright, wouldn't the digital files be in the public domain? czar 15:44, 10 November 2015 (UTC)

The copyright on the .mp3 files does seem a bit dubious. However, per their terms page: The University of California makes no claims or warranties as to the copyright status of the original recordings. The copyright status of sound recordings in the U.S. is a horrible mess, with the result being that most of those originals are probably still under U.S. common-law copyright and will be until 2067. The usual 1923 rule does not apply. Carl Lindberg (talk) 16:04, 10 November 2015 (UTC)

PD-Cambodia

I would like to transfer to Commons few old Cambodian magazines (Kambuja Suriya) issued by Buddhist Institute which is a government institution. According to the copyright law of the Cambodia, copyright of anonymous/collective works lasts 75 years after the publication. Could you, please, advice, which copyright template should be used in this case? {{PD-Cambodia}} applies only to works with known author and I see no {{PD-anon-75}} template. URAA date for Cambodia is 2004-10-13, so no US copyright for pre-1929 anonymous/collective Cambodian works.

Od maybe I should use {{PD-CambodiaGov}}? (But I doubt the magazines qualify as "instructed circulars"...) Ankry (talk) 21:05, 10 November 2015 (UTC)

I've updated the {{PD-Cambodia}} license template to include the term of protection for anonymous, pseudonymous, collective, audiovisual, and posthumous works published in Cambodia. —RP88 (talk) 00:29, 11 November 2015 (UTC)
Thanks. Ankry (talk)

File:San Francisco, 1955 Cinemascope film.ogv

Hi, The source says it is {{Cc-by-sa-3.0}}, but as there is no copyright mention in the film itself, it should be {{PD-US no notice}}, right? Regards, Yann (talk) 14:35, 11 November 2015 (UTC)

On the whole, I think it's more likely to be CC-BY-SA-3.0 than public domain due to failure to comply with copyright formalities. San Franscisco (1955) by Tullio Pellegrini (d. 1982?) is, despite its quality, an amateur 16mm film. It was posted to Archive.org by the Prelinger Archives, which specializes in "ephemeral" video. I can't find any evidence that it was ever published before 1 March 1989, even in the weaker pre-1978 sense, i.e. if "original or tangible copies of a work are sold, leased, loaned, given away, or otherwise made available to the general public". If it was published before 1 March 1989, it's likely public domain (either via lack of notice, or lack of renewal as I can't find evidence of renewal). If it was never published but Prelinger legitimately holds the rights, it's CC-BY-SA-3.0. if it was never published and Prelinger doesn't hold the rights, the CC-BY-SA-3.0 license is invalid and it's probably an orphan work, protected by copyright for decades to come. —RP88 (talk) 00:24, 12 November 2015 (UTC)

File:Sunday Mirror.jpg

Is Sunday Mirror logo acceptable here or not? File is about to be deleted because is considered to be above the threshold of originality required for copyright protection. --XXN, 16:11, 11 November 2015 (UTC)

I would say Keep. This is a standard font, not modified. Yann (talk) 22:49, 11 November 2015 (UTC)
Nitpick: two standard fonts.—Odysseus1479 (talk) 01:44, 12 November 2015 (UTC)

Pictures of Michael Lauke

images from Flickr

copied from Help Desk
Dear image experts: I came across this image File:Guitarist Michael Laucke 2011.jpg along with several others uploaded from the subject's Flickr account. They have not been taken by the subject, because he is in them. Apparently they have been checked by a bot to be sure that they were licensed at Flickr, but this one says it was taken by a renowned photographer. I don't know how to tell if this and the other images uploaded from the same place are okay from a copyright point of view; perhaps someone here will know how to check. Anne Delong (talk) 11:10, 5 November 2015 (UTC)
END copied from Help Desk

  • These look problematic to me. On Flickr it's fine that he's uploading other people's pictures of himself without any formalities, but of course we can't accept that on Commons. I don't know how someone would want to proceed on this: just delete them as copyvios? Write him and see if we can salvage some of these via the COM:OTRS process? Meanwhile, I'll alert the uploader to this discussion. - Jmabel ! talk 18:01, 6 November 2015 (UTC)
FYI: There's a note on the Flickr page, left hand side.

Note for copyright purposes, this photo was taken by either an employee of, or by a photographer hired by Michael Laucke. It is a work for hire, owned and paid for by Michael Laucke. It is hereby licensed under Public Domain Dedication (CC0); ALL RIGHTS WAIVED!

. --Hedwig in Washington (mail?) 02:27, 13 November 2015 (UTC)

Photo of actress Terry Moore - clothing and copyright

Could a high-resolution version of this photo of actress Terry Moore be uploaded to Commons if the photo itself was freely licensed, or would there be a copyright issue with Moore's clothing, particularly her pink hat, being more artistic than utilitarian? --Gazebo (talk) 23:09, 10 November 2015 (UTC)

I shouldn't think there would be a problem. Clothing as a rule is considered to be a functional object and it is extremely difficult to determine the point at which a garment would go beyond utilitarian and become instead a copyrightable work of art. OK - having now looked at the photograph - ABSOLUTELY zero issues. I see absolutely nothing about this picture that anyone could conceivably claim copyright on if the photographer is prepared to release it for public use. Mabalu (talk) 10:30, 11 November 2015 (UTC)
Thanks for the feedback. Since I took the photo myself, I have uploaded it as File:Terry-Moore-actress-in-2015.jpg. --Gazebo (talk) 23:57, 11 November 2015 (UTC)
Swedish courts have ruled that clothes are copyrighted on numerous occasions, but this picture seems to have been taken in the United States, where utilitarian objects are exempted from copyright. When uploading pictures of clothes, it is necessary to consider the source country of the clothes. --Stefan2 (talk) 01:21, 12 November 2015 (UTC)
The patterns on clothes can be copyrightable in the US, but unless the photograph is focusing particularly on the patterns, it shouldn't be an issue. Carl Lindberg (talk) 07:08, 12 November 2015 (UTC)
And yet Swedish museums have made dozens of photographs of 20th-century clothing that would presumably still be in copyright per their rules publicly available through Wikimedia Commons... Mabalu (talk) 11:41, 12 November 2015 (UTC)

Hedy Lamarr photo

Help wanted to review an image. Low pay. Apply within. --Light show (talk) 04:53, 11 November 2015 (UTC)

Certainly an old photo, but is there any evidence that copy was actually distributed in the day? Carl Lindberg (talk) 06:09, 11 November 2015 (UTC)
I don't know when or where it was reprinted. But note that per U.S. copyright law, "Generally, publication occurs on the date on which copies of the work are first made available to the public." Her photos have been on countless old magazine covers. And note that the current lead image doesn't mention any re-publication either. Unlike a personal and private photo, a movie studio publicity still with the film details and stamp on the back, implies it was published.--Light show (talk) 06:33, 11 November 2015 (UTC)
The image at hand is also at this image, for what it's worth. The larger image is stated there as © Underwood & Underwood, however that company quite likely only distributed it... C. S. Bull was presumably the actual photographer, given the attribution on the back of the ebay photo, and he was an employee of MGM. Given that the image is described by Corbis as a "publicly distributed film, television or publicity photograph", we can probably assume it was indeed published at the time. Revent (talk) 09:03, 11 November 2015 (UTC)
I have no doubt it was published (overall) at the time... but PD-US-no_notice is stating that there was a distributed copy without a notice. If distributed copies had notices, but a version which was never distributed at the time but instead only after 1989 was the one without notice, it doesn't speak anything to the copyright. That said, the probably bogus Underwood copyright claim does kind of indicate it was a public domain publicity photograph... I am sure they have no problem claiming copyright over a PD image, but might have a harder time with a work validly copyrighted by someone else. It does help the case a lot to see the markings of an entity other than the studio on the back, which indicates the copy did indeed change hands, or knowing the history of that copy in particular. But... there may be enough reason to think it's OK here. Carl Lindberg (talk) 21:29, 12 November 2015 (UTC)

File:Mein Kampf dust jacket.jpeg

The license is wrong. It is not "common property". What is the right license to determine its copyright status? --George Ho (talk) 05:53, 11 November 2015 (UTC)

The one that it has, for the US anyways, which is PD-ineligible. Carl Lindberg (talk) 06:06, 11 November 2015 (UTC)
Carl, there is some hint of authorship, even with common "Swastika" logo. Also, I don't think "PD-text" applies because it was part of "literary work". What about "PD-because", a custom template? --George Ho (talk) 08:14, 11 November 2015 (UTC)
Not really, for the US. It is text, plus a common symbol (a swastika). For the US, the layout of text on a printed page does not get a copyright. There is nothing copyrightable there. The text of the book is copyrightable of course, but that is not present in the cover. Something doesn't get copyrightable by association; either there is copyrightable expression present in the image or there's not. You can always extract an uncopyrightable portion of a copyrighted work -- there is no copyrightable expression being copied therefore no infringement. PD-ineligible is the generic template of which PD-textlogo, PD-shape, etc. are all special cases. Carl Lindberg (talk) 08:28, 11 November 2015 (UTC)
Look at COM:TOO#Germany and COM:TOO#Austria. The "Germany" section is tagged as outdated, while Austria sets level of threshold of originality to very low. --George Ho (talk) 09:41, 11 November 2015 (UTC)
IMO (IANAL), the only possibly protectionable expression is the typeface used for the book's title (MEIN KAMPF). Formally, the publishing company de:Franz Eher Nachfolger had been in the possession of the Nazi party NSDAP and has been dismantled in 1945. Its intellecual property has been transferred to the state of Bavaria. --Túrelio (talk) 10:18, 11 November 2015 (UTC)
Bavaria is part of Germany (was West Germany). What are differences between state law and federal law? Also, I found this source discussion US copyright ownership. --George Ho (talk) 10:34, 11 November 2015 (UTC)
Wait, royalty rights are sold to Houghton Mifflin. If copyright were to exist in the US, Houghton Mifflin would have still owned copyright since 1979. However, I read that he has been stateless from 1925 to 1931 or 1932. But, under EU laws, his work went to public domain this year, implying that even a "stateless" person might have been also European 'stateless' citizen. I'll research more about US copyrights from secondary sources. --George Ho (talk) 11:04, 11 November 2015 (UTC)
Found court decision and another source saying that a "stateless" person's works could be protected by federal law. --George Ho (talk) 11:29, 11 November 2015 (UTC)
More at Archive.gov. --George Ho (talk) 11:42, 11 November 2015 (UTC)
Never mind. The US copyright wouldn't be restored anyway; the Office seized it in 1942. --George Ho (talk) 11:55, 11 November 2015 (UTC)
Correct, but the copyright status of the book text has no relevance to the cover copyright. For the U.S., there is no copyright in that cover so the rest of the above becomes meaningless. Whether it is above the threshold in Germany, I have less idea. And even there, Anonymous-EU is a possibility if the cover designer has never been named. Carl Lindberg (talk) 00:00, 12 November 2015 (UTC)
Hi, Not considering anything else about the author of the book, and even if it were above the threshold of originality, the jacket copyright would be owned by the publisher, and is usually in the public domain 70 years after publication in Europe. So it entered the public domain in 1998 at the latest anyway. Regards, Yann (talk) 14:40, 11 November 2015 (UTC)
Usually, book covers have a designer, and in Europe go into the public domain 70 years after the death of the designer, if threshold of originality for protection is met - not 70 years after publication. That doesn't change if a designer worked on behalf of the publisher and the publisher owns the copyright, the term of protection is still 70 years p.m.a. At least according to German copyright law which is an Urheberrecht and binds protection always to the Urheber, the creator. In German copyright law, there is no concept of corporate authorship - the creator is always an individual (or a group of individuals); usage rights can be transferred to the company they are working for, which however doesn't change the 70 years p.m.a. term of protection. A "70 years after publication" term may be applicable if a designer is really anonymous - see {{PD-anon-70-EU}}. - By the way, though not directly connected to the question: In the EU, Hitler's work didn't go into the public domain this year, that will happen on 1 January, 2016 - the 70 years p.m.a. term isn't calculated exactly by date of death; works always go into the public domain on 1 January of the year that follows 70 years after the author's death. Gestumblindi (talk) 23:17, 11 November 2015 (UTC)
Hi, That's the exception rather than the rule. What you said may be the case in Germany, but in most places, the designer is anonymous, and the copyright goes to the publisher. At least in France and the UK, and countries where law is influenced by them. Regards, Yann (talk) 23:22, 11 November 2015 (UTC)
See Wikipedia, article "Work for hire", section "Copyright duration": "In the European Union, even if a Member State provides for the possibility of a legal person to be the original rightholder (such as is possible in the UK), then the duration of protection is in general the same as the copyright term for a personal copyright: i.e., for a literary or artistic work, 70 years from the death of the human author, or in the case of works of joint authorship, 70 years from the death of the last surviving author." So, even if in France and in the UK there is corporate authorship, this changes nothing - the term is still measured after the death of the human author(s). Also, I doubt that "in most places, the designer is anonymous" - I have seen many cover designer's names mentioned in books. Gestumblindi (talk) 23:44, 11 November 2015 (UTC)
Yep, that much is true. If there was a copyright, and the human designer was named in the first 70 years of publication, it would be 70pma. Carl Lindberg (talk) 00:02, 12 November 2015 (UTC)
Per de:Anonymes Werk (Urheberrecht)#Frühere Rechtslage in Deutschland / Übergangsrecht, anonymous artworks get a copyright term of 70 years pma, not 70 years pd. Germany only seems to use the copyright terms in the {{Anonymous-EU}} template for literary works published during the lifetime of the anonymous author. However, this cover is presumably below the threshold of originality. --Stefan2 (talk) 01:36, 12 November 2015 (UTC)
Yeah, the previous law is a bit of a muddle there. It's basically impossible to know how long the copyright would last with a truly anonymous fine arts work in their older law. I do wonder what the effect of the EU directives were if the existing term wasn't even known... they didn't shorten any, but if it wasn't known to be longer than the new ones? Weren't the directives supposed to bring some clarity and not leave things muddled like that? Anyways, I think that issue is just for fine arts -- photographic, literary, cinematographic, musical etc. works are listed as being separate from fine arts, I think (at least they were in the older law). Carl Lindberg (talk) 06:52, 12 November 2015 (UTC)
If a copyright holder claims that his copyright has been violated and wants to sue someone for this, then the copyright holder will have to prove that he is the copyright holder. In most cases, I assume that it is impossible to prove that you are the heir of the author without proving who the author is, so this probably isn't a big problem.
Under the former Swedish copyright law, the copyright term for anonymous works expires 50 years after publication, but if you can somehow show that the author died before the work was first published, then the copyright expires 50 years after the death of the author instead. The Swedish law seems to require absolute evidence that the author died before publication of the work, otherwise the 50 years from publication term applies. I guess this may make the copyright term different depending on who is using the work as different users of the work may have different access to evidence about the copyright status of the work. I don't know how this interacts with URAA restoration in the United States or the rule of the shorter term in many countries, where the assumption seems to be that there is a fixed date when the work enters a so-called 'public domain'.
The old Swedish law treats a 'cinematographic work' as a literary work which essentially consists of the film scenario in text form. Everything else, such as film frames, music and artworks shown in the film, are separately copyrighted works with different authors with copyright terms depending on the respective authors of these works. The old German law seems to use more or less the same definition of a cinematographic work. This makes it very complex to tell when a film enters the public domain in Sweden and Germany. In many cases, the old laws tell that the copyright to some parts of the film expires later than the EU copyright term. The same problem also seems to exist in other European countries. --Stefan2 (talk) 14:01, 13 November 2015 (UTC)
I own several thousands books of various styles, provenances, and ages, and as a best guess, for at least 90% of them, the designer of the cover is not mentioned. Regards, Yann (talk) 09:57, 12 November 2015 (UTC)
Well, I own several thousand books as well. But it really may have to do with different publishing traditions. I assume that most of your collection is in French? Most of my books are in German, some in English. Most are from the 20th century. As an experiment, I have now pulled five books from my shelves at random (really!), and each of those mentions the cover designer and/or illustrator of the cover: Arno Schmidt: Griechisches Feuer. Haffmans, Zürich 1989: "Produktion und Gestaltung: Urs Jakob". Ivan Turgenev: Rauch. Aufbau, Berlin 1997: "Umschlaggestaltung: Andreas Heilmann". P.G. Wodehouse: Sam the Sudden. Overlook Press, Woodstock / New York 2007: "Jacket: illustration Andrzej Klimowski / design Peter B. Willberg". Stanislaw Lem: Die Astronauten. Suhrkamp, Frankfurt 1982: Mentions the designers (Willy Fleckhaus, Rolf Staudt) as well as the cover illustrators (Hans Ulrich and Ute Osterwalder). Philip José Farmer: Pater der Sterne. Knaur, München 1983: "Umschlagillustration: Tom Kidd". Gestumblindi (talk) 21:44, 12 November 2015 (UTC)

Works released by Wikipedia/Commons users as PD, DW ones licensed under CC licenses

While I'm checking Category:PD-user_without_author_information, I found this file licensed under the CC-BY-SA license, but is derivated from this file released as PD (that is the same map but with translated text).

In these haces, what license tag should be used, the less restrictive or both? Anyway, is important to tell the uploader of the DW to check the actual licensing, so I need to ask this before. --Amitie 10g (talk) 00:27, 13 November 2015 (UTC)

In this case I think the legend in the derivative map has copyrightable authorship, minimal though it may be, so there’s justification for the translator to license it that way, and any later-generation DW that retains that material should abide by the CC-BY-SA and credit the author. (Here one would probably get better results working from the original anyway, making the licence question academic.) However, where there’s been no “value added“ worth mentioning in terms of creative content, the image should be licensed PD like the source, and if it’s not I would feel free to ignore the additional conditions.—Odysseus1479 (talk) 04:01, 13 November 2015 (UTC)

Strange sound recordings

Check these two sound recordings:

Same uploader but two different voices. Do we question whether the sounds were recorded by the same person or not when something like this occurs? --Stefan2 (talk) 14:03, 13 November 2015 (UTC)

Photos from Flickr released as PD, reviewed, but license changed to CC-BY-SA laterly

The November 10, I checked this and this files twice, uploaded to Flickr by Clive Barker and released as PD Mark (where the most correct license tag is {{PD-author}}}.

But, the November 12, User:Ellin Beltz left a message to INeverCry asking for a second opinion; checking the source again, I found that these pictures are now licensed under the CC-BY-SA license, assuming that I can commited a mistake when checking these pictures (that I considered a distrust of my review 2 days before the message to INC), but I rember very well that the license was PD Mark (assuminf good faith), so, I can confirm that Clive Barker changed the license.

So, the actual question is if the license was changed from PD to CC, what license we should keep? According to that INC said, CC is more correct, but what do you think? --Amitie 10g (talk) 04:54, 14 November 2015 (UTC)

  • If you're sure the photo were licensed in the PD, it was indeed your reviewer job to confirm "...that it was available on Flickr under the stated license on that date." . And if you sure you made no mistake, {{PD-author}}} seems correct IMO. However as cc-by-sa-2.0 is compatible for us, I see no problem to keep it under this license. --Christian Ferrer (talk) 07:16, 14 November 2015 (UTC)
  • If it was under a PD mark for a long time, that is probably more appropriate -- but if the user changed their mind quickly (sounds like within a couple of days) it may have just been a mistake, and we usually will just accept that -- so I'd just use the CC license. Carl Lindberg (talk) 08:06, 14 November 2015 (UTC)
Consider that these files was uploaded to Flickr in August 17, and the Flickr user changed the license between November 10 and 12. This is a very long time, and {{PD-author}} should be kept, I guess. But, I'll keep in mind what you mentioned about license change in short period of time (that this case is not). --Amitie 10g (talk) 11:45, 14 November 2015 (UTC)
It's also important to note here that the Diff provided above isn't the end of the convo on INC's page at the time of this posting. See [3]. INC replied to Amitie 10g on 12 November 2015 and the matter seemed to be closed prior to the start of this thread. See the history which shows that the license couldn't be verified by a bot as of 10th November ( 14:30, 10 November 2015‎ FlickreviewR 2 (talk | contribs | block)‎ . . (797 bytes) (+122)‎ . . (FlickreviewR 2: size_not_found Public Domain Mark) , then suddenly it was fine, but a couple days later, the license was different at Flickr. This is only over two days, not any lengthy period of time. I believe it was a good idea to ask for a second review especially after Amitie added {{PD-author|[https://www.flickr.com/photos/austin7nut/ Clive Barker]}} which was apparently not correct as of 10th November, nor was it correct when I asked INC to review it. There is nothing in my request to review other than asking a license reviewer to check when the image on Flickr on the same date was not PD. As for Amitie's statement, assuming that I can commited a mistake when checking these pictures (that I considered a distrust of my review 2 days before the message to INC, that never entered the discussion, the only question was about the license. Ellin Beltz (talk) 16:49, 14 November 2015 (UTC)
What evidence do we have what the license was on August 17? How do we know it wasn't all rights reserved until November 9 or 10? Also... I think the photo was taken August 17, but not sure when it was uploaded to Flickr -- that info now seems harder to come by. The license was changed two days after being uploaded here... I would just use the CC license. The PD mark is usually used for someone else's photograph, and if it was just a mistake, I don't think a judge would hold them to it. It's really not the same thing as an explicit license you are giving to your own work. Carl Lindberg (talk) 17:36, 14 November 2015 (UTC)

File:Stone of Washington Monumental from Ningpo China.jpg

This is a photograph of an inscription about George Washington, written by Xu Jiyu (died 1873), and this inscription donated to the US when Washington Mounment was built. The inscription is dated 7th day of the sixth month of the third year of Xianfeng (in Chinese calender), which is in 1853. Inscriber is not known.

The copyright tag says it being public domain work of federal employee of National Park Service of which is strictly speaking wrong as this is a photograph of an engraving which has a copyright by itself, although it is an expired one.

But what is the correct copyright tag to use? SYSS Mouse (talk) 01:42, 15 November 2015 (UTC)

The photograph itself is likely copyrightable and that is what the tag is there for (and is necessary). Technically, you could additionally put PD-old-100 for the underlying work, but when things are very very old and copyright has obviously long expired, there isn't much need. Carl Lindberg (talk) 02:09, 15 November 2015 (UTC)
I've updated the license to {{Licensed-PD|PD-old-100-1923|PD-USGov-NPS}}. —RP88 (talk) 02:34, 15 November 2015 (UTC)

Approval of press photos in possession

I have some old press photos in my possession which would be PD. How are they to be approved, or is approval necessary? I've added this question to my photo talk page.--Light show (talk) 18:21, 14 November 2015 (UTC)

  • What exactly are they, when do they date from, what country are they from, and above all why are they PD? I'm not even sure whether by "press photos" you mean publicity photos from press packets made available to the press, or photos from "press" sources such as newspapers. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Jmabel (talk • contribs)
I have some old U.S. press photos which have the source, dates, details, some publication or photographer names, etc. Similar to the info shown in these press photo examples: Monroe; Wood.--Light show (talk) 21:21, 14 November 2015 (UTC)
I'm obviously not going to argue with whomever wrote these guidelines, except to note that the rule is an oxymoron and for practical purposes is impossible to comply with. The guideline says, Unless the copyright holder specifies a free license, press photos are generally intended only for journalists, and cannot be modified. So they are not suitable for Commons.
  • For one thing, U.S. press photos have already been shown to have been rarely copyrighted. The Library of Congress did an investigation of this, which User We Hope found, and they concluded that of millions of press photos, essentially none were copyrighted;
  • It is nonsense to think that any press organization that took the time and expense to copyright a photo, would specify that it's also free. Before 1976, any photo published or offered to the public without a notice is considered PD by default;
  • In the U.S., copyright protection before 1989 was given after specified actions by the owner, and was not automatic, and can not be made a default rule. It required notice, with date and publisher clearly visible. Therefore the phrase "unless the copyright holder specifies a free license," is an invalid rule in the U.S. If a U.S. photo is PD in the U.S., it's free globally by default. Isn't it bad enough that Bill Gates's Corbis is trying to lock up PD photos for profit via copyfraud without WP blocking them totally? Am I to understand that in the EU or UK, no images are ever free unless they are specifically given away by the owner or by decree? --Light show (talk) 21:02, 14 November 2015 (UTC)
  • Yes, you are right. In the EU (which the UK is a part of), all photographs are automatically copyrighted to the photographer without any official registration or publication being required. This rule lasts for the life of the author plus 70 years, so you'd need an explicit permission for press photos from this part of the world. De728631 (talk) 21:56, 14 November 2015 (UTC)
What about press photos from this (U.S.) part of the world? --Light show (talk) 22:00, 14 November 2015 (UTC)
It all depends on the date of publication. If published from 1923 through 1977 the images would have had to have a copyright notice attached, and after 28 years the copyright would have been due for renewal. But then either was hardly ever done with press photos, so photos from that era are most likely PD. That said, all works first published in 2003 or later in the US are also copyrighted without conditions. Please see the Commons:Hirtle chart for details. You can also check the records at http://www.copyright.gov to see if anything was ever registered or is still copyrighted. De728631 (talk) 01:12, 15 November 2015 (UTC)
Basically, is there evidence on those works that they were actually distributed before 1989? The Wood example you gave was a wire photo, and I'm not sure we can take lack of notice on those to mean anything -- weren't those printed locally at the newspapers off the wire? If so, the physical copy itself is not evidence of distribution without notice. The Monroe one doesn't have presented evidence of no-notice either. Carl Lindberg (talk) 01:31, 15 November 2015 (UTC)
Regarding the actual publishing, see U.S. copyright definition of "Publish." The very fact that it was made available for future distribution, to anyone anywhere, is proof of publication. Regarding being printed in a newspaper or other publication, unless that publication had their staff photographer take the picture (work for hire,) they would not be entitled to a copyright of the photo. Photos have their own separate copyright which would be owned by the photographer. See explanation: In general, when the shutter is released, the photographer who pressed the button owns the copyright. An exception is when the image falls into the “work-made-for-hire”(also known as “work for hire”) category.
One of the main purposes of AP and UPI, for example, is to have their giant staff of photographers located around the world feed photos to newspapers. Currently, AP alone publishes over 1 million photos yearly. Practically all their photos are only good for a day or two since they're for news events, and are nearly worthless after that. Which is why they would not bother filing and paying for a copyright registration. For fun, I just did a search of all "press photos" registered since 1978, and probably at least 100-200 million were published. I found only 7 items actually registered, a ratio probably relevant to the precautionary principle. --Light show (talk) 02:04, 15 November 2015 (UTC)
First, that definition of publish has only been in effect since 1978. There was no definition in law before that, but yes, it was similar to the current one in many respects (though not all). Your basic understanding of publication is correct. I am not questioning if they were published, but rather if they were published without notice. That is an entirely different standard, and for that it does mean that physical copies in question were actually distributed and also did not have a notice. If that is the license tag being claimed, then that is the evidence needed. Publication is only one aspect (and yes, offering to newspapers was publication). Publication without notice -- the part which lost copyright -- is an entirely separate issue. Registration was not required for 28 years; they didn't have to pay for it at all until they sent in a renewal. Both your example images claim it was published without notice, but the evidence of such isn't really there. If it was only a relative few copies which were published without notice, copyright may not have been lost as well, so there is some judgement about it (particularly if the lack of notice was the fault of a licensing party). But simply showing something is published does not mean it was published without notice. Your second paragraph above is all about renewals, which is a separate topic and a different tag. Renewal searches on photographs can be difficult, as they may not have been renewed individually. For example, the AP put out news annuals (typically as books) which may have compiled a lot of material; if those were renewed then the renewal may well have covered the photographs. Yes, I'm sure a large number were never renewed, but we simply cannot assume such as a general rule. If we do a reasonable search and can't find anything relevant, then put that tag on there, but don't claim published without notice. This is only possible for works published before 1964, so the publication date is also important (as it is needed to know which years to search for renewal records). Carl Lindberg (talk) 02:31, 15 November 2015 (UTC)
Both examples given were from "original" photos, marked as press photos, with printed descriptions, dates, and source. And we're only talking about pre 1963 photos at this point. And we're not talking about "limited publication," to a specific media as in a book manuscript going to a publisher for review. These are photos intended for general readership in newspapers.
The search I did was for all press photos, not just renewals. In the past, when I uploaded a film still, I wouldn't even bother specifying the 28th year to check for renewal. I would just do a general, any year search. I've never seen a publicity photo with a registered copyright. Copyrighting those makes even less sense than press releases, which are at least sold to the newspaper, while stills were always intended to be free and widely distributed as a marketing tool.
I'm unclear why you'd write, "I'm sure a large number were never renewed, but we simply cannot assume such as a general rule." The Library of Congress found the opposite result: "In an attempt to determine if UPI registered any copyrights and if those copyrights were renewed, specialists in the Prints and Photographs Division of the Library of Congress searched the Copyright Office files. It was found that only a few images were registered for copyright and those copyrights were not renewed." --Light show (talk) 04:28, 15 November 2015 (UTC)
The Wood photo is marked "wire photo". The realities of those differ than an actual hardcopy distributed by the AP. The photo was transmitted over a telephone line and printed at individual newspapers. I don't think the lack of notice on that hardcopy actually means anything in respect to the copyright -- the physical copy owned by the newspaper was not distributed, and in any event it was out of the control of the copyright holder at that point so forgetting a notice shouldn't result in a lost copyright. It proves publication without a doubt, but not publication without notice. To claim "distributed with no notice" is not a good idea there. The Monroe example does not show the back nor anything else to show how it was distributed. Maybe it's PD, but again, there is only evidence of publication, yet it is tagged with "published without notice". If you want to claim PD-US-no_notice, then we need to find a copy actually distributed by the copyright owner with no notice on it -- that was the law in regards to lost copyright. That will be much easier with movie publicity shots, which often were distributed that way, then news photos.
If you want to claim PD-US-not_renewed, then you need to find that it was published before 1964, and it was not renewed -- so as long as you do a decent search like you say you are, then OK. But in that same UPI link, as it notes, researchers should be advised that determining the copyright status of photographs can be problematic because of the lack of pertinent information, and researchers often have to make calculated risk decisions concerning the appropriate use of an image when its copyright status is unknown or ambiguous. For works published before 1951, that search needs to be in the tedious online scanned copies of the catalog of copyright entries volumes since the records would not be online at www.copyright.gov. As you say, it would be rare to be renewed, but it was not impossible, and photographs can be renewed in a number of ways -- part of a book or magazine, for example. We can't just assume nothing was renewed; someone has to do the search. Carl Lindberg (talk) 05:42, 15 November 2015 (UTC)
OK, all of that makes sense, so I'll only upload any original photos which I have that were published by the author, as opposed to reprints. The search of online catalogs isn't really that tedious fortunately. For instance, here's a typical contents page, showing 1960, which leads to the "Artwork and photographs" listings. Note that of the 12,761 original registrations, there were only 227 renewals, or 1.8%. They usually take up a page or two and are easy to search. Now, if I plan to upload a photo from 1932, for instance, and it had a notice, I would check the 27th, 28th, and 29th year for any renewals. And if an editor still finds reasons why the PD status is doubtful, I'm more than happy to tag as self-delete.
The only open question I have concerns online photos that also show the front and back, have dates, source, etc. I've made a number of requests for approval for images which I pointed to my photo talk page, and so far the only editor who's commented there said they'd like someone else with more expertise to approve. But for the few I own meanwhile, thanks for the feedback. --Light show (talk) 17:40, 15 November 2015 (UTC)
You should also check books, and perhaps periodicals. If the photo was present in a book etc. by the same copyright owner which did get renewed in the time window for the photo, the renewal probably covers it as well.
As for the ones one your home page... it's not great we can't see the Sahl photo back, but it does show the photo was from his management agency (though no evidence of distribution). The second eBay auction shows evidence of being distributed (a note added by a TV network I think) with a date and also no notice, the combo is probably enough evidence. Either one alone might not... you'd have to know the first one was distributed, and not an old copy left at the management company and only found/distributed later, and for the second one it would be hard to tell the TV network was not the original owner. But the second shows distribution from the original author (given the known owner from the first) and no notice. If the second was a wire photo, maybe still not completely sure, but ... given everything, I'd say that one is OK. The Sharif and Streisand photo appears to have a valid notice in other copies on the web.[4] The eBay auctioner conveniently cropped that out, so that is likely not an old copy anyways. The Ruth Roman one says it's a wire photo; same issue that lack of notice likely doesn't mean anything. Most publicity photos had borders, so if that one was cropped, it is also not enough evidence (the notice could have been cut out). But a wire photo makes more sense. I can't see the Lamarr auction page. Carl Lindberg (talk) 22:10, 15 November 2015 (UTC)
Thanks for reviewing those.--Light show (talk) 23:46, 15 November 2015 (UTC)
@Clindberg: Archive of the Hedy Lamarr auction, if it helps. The object listed definitely appears to be an 'original', in that it has a very faded "Please credit MGM Photo by Clarence Bull" stamp. Revent (talk) 02:36, 16 November 2015 (UTC)
The exact same copy was apparently sold here as well. Certainly looks old; this photo which was obviously part of the same session was dated October 18, 1940. There's no direct evidence of distribution on the photo, other than maybe the pencilled mark at the top left of the back. I do see other photos from the session in various places, including gettyimages credited to "Time/Life Pictures" which is pretty strong evidence those were distributed (since the actual owner, MGM, and photographer, Clarence Bull, are known). I don't see all that many copies of this one in particular out there though.... oh wait. tineye.com finds scads of them. Including one at Corbis where they have a bogus copyright notice and a note it was a distributed publicity shot. Would prefer to see evidence that photo was distributed -- I guess it was folded in half -- but there is some circumstantial evidence it is a PD publicity shot. Carl Lindberg (talk) 06:32, 16 November 2015 (UTC)
"Publish" and "distribute" mean the same, for photos, per copyright defintions. Unlike a written document, which is only published after it's been distributed, a photo is considered published when it's simply produced and offered for distribution, even if it's not yet or ever displayed (printed) in any media. Stills were mass produced and included in press kits along with being sent to fans who wrote in. And in any case publicity photos were not traditionally copyrighted and were intended to be free. --Light show (talk) 07:17, 16 November 2015 (UTC)

Internet Archive Book Images and "No known copyright restrictions"

1. Can this image be uploaded to Commons? It was published in 1930, but the Internet Archive Book Images Flickr account has tagged the image as "No known copyright restrictions". Compare with this file from the same journal but a different year, tagged with {{Flickr-no known copyright restrictions}}.

2. If yes, then: Can any image with "No known copyright restrictions" posted to Flickr by Internet Archive Book Images be uploaded to Commons?

3. If yes, then: If the Internet Archive Book Images believes that a work has "No known copyright restrictions", does this mean that any images from that work can be uploaded to Commons? Including images that have not been uploaded to Flickr by Internet Archive Book Images (but are obviously from the same source). I understand that copyright law doesn't care if a file is on Flickr or not, and that Internet Archive Book Images doesn't decide what is in the public domain and not.

It's not the best image ever, but I've not managed to find any better image, free or non-free, to illustrate the en:w:Eulithomyrmex article. Thanks! jonkerz ♠talk 18:05, 16 November 2015 (UTC)

1. Yes, see the IA catalogue page.
2. Mostly, for some publications you may find reasons to doubt the assessment. See examples at User:Fæ/Project_list/Internet_Archive#Useful reference_deletion_discussions.
3. As 2.
Fæ (talk) 19:01, 16 November 2015 (UTC)
The Internet Archive is notoriously unreliable when it comes to public domain assertions, at least on archive.org itself... I don't think there is much editorial control, and people can upload what they want. I have less idea about their Flickr Commons stuff... hopefully that was vetted. If possible, it's best to figure out the real reason something is PD though and add them in addition to the Flickr tag. I have no idea why the 1972 image is OK... that volume had a clear copyright notice, so it's either PD for another reason (author donating to public domain) or it's a bad license. The 1930 volume on the other hand appears to be {{PD-US-no notice}}, so I would use that tag in addition to the Flickr one. Carl Lindberg (talk) 19:53, 16 November 2015 (UTC)
Thanks for the replies Fæ and Carl Lindberg. This is indeed very good news! I'll make sure to be careful when adding content from Internet Archive Book Images's account. Carl, I share your concerns regarding archive.org, but I was hoping and think that at least their Flickr account is better vetted. jonkerz ♠talk 21:02, 16 November 2015 (UTC)

(Tangent) I'll just pick up on the 1972 image question. The IA catalog page is based on the BHL data for the bulletin. This makes it clear that Harvard was the digitizing sponsor, with their library releasing the documents, as well as the publisher and therefore copyright holder. Rather than NKCR, the status at BHL includes "Copyright Status: NOT_IN_COPYRIGHT" which the BHL only use when their donating institution has made a statement (based on the large number of other works I've examined at that source). It seems convincing to me, though I'm always open to a DR with different reasoning based on the facts. --Fæ (talk) 21:58, 16 November 2015 (UTC)

OK, sounds good enough to me. That means that particular use of the Flickr tag is really as a license tag (reasons 1 or 2), instead of a proxy for another one (reasons 3 and 4). The 1930 one appears to have been PD already, but if there was a similar licensing statement from the original copyright owner (Harvard), then it's good to keep that as well (which is why it's best to add other tags in addition to the Flickr-no known copyright restrictions if it came from there). Carl Lindberg (talk) 22:16, 16 November 2015 (UTC)

Nobel medal

Hello, is the Nobel Medal freely usable. Basically I would like to know if Femmes lauréates du Nobel.png and Female nobel laureates.png are not copyvio because of the Medal in the upper right corner? Anyway, I "translated" these pictures into SVG format here without the Nobel medal. Pamputt (talk) 21:34, 10 November 2015 (UTC)

The Nobel Prize medal is an artistic work by the Swedish sculptor and engraver Erik Lindberg (1873–1966) and as such will be copyrighted until January 1, 2037. Commons has some attractive substitutes at Category:Nobel Prize icons that are freely licensed. —RP88 (talk) 23:53, 10 November 2015 (UTC)
So are tboth files I mentionned are copyvio or not? Probably the same question on these two files for the small icons. What are we supposed to do with theses files? Pamputt (talk) 11:02, 11 November 2015 (UTC)
The files are clear copyvios in Sweden, the source country of the medal. --Stefan2 (talk) 01:18, 12 November 2015 (UTC)
I've uploaded a new version of both files. In both cases I replaced the copyrighted Nobel Prize medal with a freely licensed alternative. —RP88 (talk) 01:41, 12 November 2015 (UTC)
Ok thanks for the explanation and for the modification. Pamputt (talk) 18:25, 17 November 2015 (UTC)

Permission from sculptor to publish a photograph of a sculpture

I have made a photograph of a sculpture whose creator still is alive, and the scuplture is inside an Austrian church, so it's not FOP. However, the sculptor has agreed to give his ok to publishing the photographs under a free license. Is there anything special that should be considered when getting the permission from the sculptor? I would have asked him to send the text given on Commons:Email_templates by email, but I am unsure about the sentence "I agree to publish the above-mentioned content under the following free license:" - it seems not clear to me whether this sentence relates to the work itself (the scuplture) or the photograph. Would it be ok to change the text to "I agree to publish these photographs under the following free license:" so it is clear that he just puts the photographs under a CC license and not the sculpture itself? Thanks --Reinhard Müller (talk) 20:18, 15 November 2015 (UTC)

Sounds fine to me, there is nothing really 'official' about the exact text of that email template, it's just what evolved over time. As long as a statement of license permission is clear and unambiguous, it should be fine. Revent (talk) 02:39, 16 November 2015 (UTC)
Thanks! --Reinhard Müller (talk) 08:02, 17 November 2015 (UTC)

Copyright status of a letter from 1920 that may never have been published

  • Does anyone know what the copyright of status of what this letter would be? It was authored in 1920 in the United States. As far as I can tell the letter was never "published" but it was released to the University of Washington archives. Here is the link. I would like to be able to upload images like this to Commons if the copyright status can be clarified in a way that would allow the image to be uploaded. --Pine✉ 01:40, 17 November 2015 (UTC)
If its author can be identified, an unpublished work is out of copyright 70 years pma. But where the author is unknown, as appears to be the case here, it takes 120 years after creation, so not until 2041.—Odysseus1479 (talk) 06:34, 17 November 2015 (UTC)

File:Aboriginal Flag 02.jpg

I nominated this image for deletion; I invite you to deletion discussion. --George Ho (talk) 07:32, 17 November 2015 (UTC)

File:Volcano footage of two eruptions in Hawaii.ogv

Hi, The source says it is in the public domain, but there is a mention of a copyright at the beginning. So I suppose it wasn't renewed, or the mention isn't complete? Yann (talk) 22:48, 11 November 2015 (UTC)

I checked the records and found that copyright was in fact not renewed [5]. De728631 (talk) 23:25, 11 November 2015 (UTC)
@De728631: Thanks a lot. Could you tell where to look, or help filling up this: Commons:Batch uploading/Public domain films? Regards, Yann (talk) 17:40, 13 November 2015 (UTC)
For something published in 1959, it would have needed to be renewed during 1987 or maybe late 1986. Any records after 1978 are online at www.copyright.gov so you can just search there. Carl Lindberg (talk) 17:50, 13 November 2015 (UTC)
What Carl said. And for pre-1978 records, there is a direct link from www.copyright.gov to all those records at archive.org. De728631 (talk) 18:02, 13 November 2015 (UTC)
Thanks Carl. For en:Plan 9 from Outer Space, which seems to have a complex copyright history (see [6]), there are records ([7]), but not in 1986 or 1987. Is that sufficient to establish absence of renewal? Regards, Yann (talk) 18:25, 13 November 2015 (UTC)
The film was registered in 1981 and renewed (RE0000279707) in 1986. The "date" column of renewal records is typically the original date of publication, which was given as 1958, instead of the renewal date, but it's there -- the numbers start with "RE". The archive.org page claims that the incorrect titles and possibly incorrect date on the registration would make them invalid -- I don't believe that is correct. An incorrect date earlier than the actual publication date might mean that the federal copyright would be considered to start from that earlier date, but it would not invalidate anything. Their second claim is that the person who filed the renewal did not have standing to renew -- sounds like he got quitclaims for some of the involved people but if none of those had any standing, then the renewal would still be invalid. The archive.org page also notes the screenplay was registered as an unpublished work, possibly to claim the movie was a derivative of the copyrighted screenplay, but that gambit has been overruled by the courts -- as much of the screenplay as is present in the released film is considered published and its copyright would expire with the film's. So archive.org is correct on their third point. Basically, the question on that film is squarely on that 1986 renewal -- it was definitely timely, but if the claimant had no standing to renew, then it would not be a valid renewal and the film became public domain. That sounds like it's a rather tangled question though. archive.org might be correct, but it might be messier than that. If the film was a work for hire, the rights would have stayed with the company. If the rights were owned by Wood and transferred, then the renewal rights did not vest (since Wood died before the time for renewal) and the rights would have reverted to his heirs. If the renewal party got a transfer from those heirs, it might make a difference. The registration does say work for hire, which may eliminate the vesting thing. I don't really feel like wading through that mess of quitclaims, so I really don't know. Carl Lindberg (talk) 03:12, 14 November 2015 (UTC)
With regard to File:Volcano footage of two eruptions in Hawaii.ogv, the following question may be of interest. If a motion picture or video recording incorporates a soundtrack, and the movie or video recording was fixed prior to February 15, 1972, is the audio portion subject to the complicated special case copyright situation for pre-1972 sound recordings? A 2005 Groklaw article speculated that "common law copyright may continue to subsist in the sound recording" for "a soundtrack from a copyright-expired movie". In addition, state laws regarding copyright of pre-1972 sound recordings have sometimes included language such as "phonograph record, disc, wire, tape, film or other article on which sounds are recorded" (emphasis mine) with regard to subject matter.
At the same time, from what one understands, the state law/common law copyright situation for pre-1972 sound recordings does not necessarily affect the audio portion of movies or video recordings because for the purposes of US copyright, the audio portion of a movie is not a "sound recording" but is instead treated as an integral part of the work and is subject to the same copyright status as the movie itself. In a US government report on the legislation that was later enacted as the Copyright Act of 1976, it was mentioned on page 56 that the audio portion of a motion picture has been "long a nebulous area in American copyright law" and that the proposed definition of "motion picture" includes the movie's audio portion. In addition, the report mentions that the audio portion of a motion picture is excluded from the definition of a "sound recording."
A practical example: Commons includes visual material from the 1968 movie Night of the Living Dead. Could a portion of audio extracted from the movie's sound track be treated as free content for the purpose of Commons, and would the licensing situation for such audio would be a case of {{PD-Pre1978}} (the same as the movie) as opposed to {{PD-US-record}} (a pre-1972 sound recording)? --Gazebo (talk) 01:55, 16 November 2015 (UTC)
@Clindberg: Thoughts on this? --Gazebo (talk) 16:38, 18 November 2015 (UTC)

File:Colosseum in Rome, Italy - April 2007.jpg

The author suggests attribution: "Photo by DAVID ILIFF. License: CC-BY-SA 3.0" by info template, so could I change the permission at "license-header" section to {{Cc-by-sa-3.0|1= David Iliff}}?

Thanks by the attention. --Almondega (talk) 14:47, 18 November 2015 (UTC)

P.S.: I'm new here and have so many questions, so, is here someone who could help me in Portuguese (Brazilian) language like a a tutor? My English is terrible... Thanks again. --Almondega (talk) 14:54, 18 November 2015 (UTC)

Google Chrome Screenhsots

Anyone know the Google Chrome is covered by its EULA, but the interface is part of the Chromium source code licensed under the BSD, so, the Google Chrome screenshots sowing the UI and free elements are allowed in Commons.

Laterly, this file and other has been originally tagged as Speedy (and one of them converted to a DR), so, please pay attention of that DR, and (regardless if there is already community concensus) please discuss why the Google Chrome IU is actually licensed under the BSD license. --Amitie 10g (talk) 18:42, 18 November 2015 (UTC)

For more information, see this thread at the Google Chrome forums (Google account is required) and waiting for answer from a Google employee. --Amitie 10g (talk) 18:58, 18 November 2015 (UTC)
Amitie 10g: The reason we have DNs is for people to discuss the file/s at the Deletion Nominations. There's no reason to post up extra requests for comments when the discussion is not going your way at the DN. This file went to DN because you removed the speedy tags on several of these files without converting to DNs and I converted the remaining one for consensus - where it belongs. Ellin Beltz (talk) 03:05, 19 November 2015 (UTC)
Well, you're right. Anyway, I asked in the Google Product Forums and I'll ask in the Chromium forum, too. --Amitie 10g (talk) 03:18, 19 November 2015 (UTC)

File:Greenwich arms.png

File is tagged with {{PD-because}} claiming that it's copyright has expired, but it's not clear how this is determined since there is no source given for the image other than "English Wikipedia". Moreover, the image does not seem to be a freely recreated version of the original per COM:COA#Coat of Arms "found on the internet". -- Marchjuly (talk) 07:53, 19 November 2015 (UTC)

I added necessary information from the enwiki. Ruslik (talk) 20:26, 19 November 2015 (UTC)
Thanks for taking a look Ruslik0. -- Marchjuly (talk) 02:01, 20 November 2015 (UTC)

Coat of arms of Iran

Hey guys. Could you please help us on this thread Commons:Deletion requests/File:NOHED.svg? Perhaps User:Micheletb which is the creator of Template:Coat of arms can help us to find out criteria of coat of arms on the regions don't have explicit rule about this. Thank you. −ebrahimtalk 20:40, 18 November 2015 (UTC)

Flag of Brunei's work of art : clearly legal restrictions of use apply in the local legislation, but that work of art may be reproduced without authorization nor payment, which makes it essentially "free" and acceptable on Commons.
Hello.
A/ As said on the template, there is two different things in a coat of arms :
  • its definition (e.g., "a red circle on a green background"), which is public domain (in the sense that anybody can draw a picture accordingly), but with restricted use, though (in the sense that such a picture represents the holder of the title and cannot be said to represent anything else, it cannot be appropriated by others) ;
  • and its realization (this peculiar picture representing a rend circle on a background - the file, the piece of graphic art), which has a specific author and is NOT public domain.
Thus, to be accepted on Commons, a coat of arms must generally be redrawn after a description obtained by looking at a (protected) model : since the description is not protected a drawing made accordingly is legal ; and since the Commons author is the author of the graphic work per se, he can put his work under a PD license and it is OK for Commons.
In that case, if the original file is indeed نشان تيپ 65 نوهد نيرو زميني ارتش (whatever it means) and the author of the .svg is indeed MrInfo2012, for which there is no reasonable doubt, it is OK to flag the .svg as "own source" and place the link to the model used.
B/ The problem, though, is that it is not a "coat of arms" in the medieval meaning, but (obviously) a logo of a military unit, industrially produced. Being essentially military in its function, logo in its conception, and industrial production in its realization, this is a mixed case : military units use their logos just the way medieval knights used their coats of arms. (If it is protected as an industrial model, which is not automatic, this would lead to further protections, which are irrelevant in that case anyhow).
The legal problem for a judge, when different point of view may lead to different legal treatment, is to determine which point of view has priority.
In that specific case, the legal treatment of coats of arms will very probably have priority on that of logos. The judge must make his own opinion, but the choice seems really straightforward, alternatives being dubious.
And, btw, the legal regime of logo reproductions (and of industrial models) do not specifically forbid any reproduction, contrarily to the general legal regime of "work of arts" where author's rights fully apply - there are cases where reproductions can be allowed without authorization or payment. It is generally OK to take a photograph of a logo and of an industrial model, like the one of the "silver lady".
C/ There has been a similar discussion on the fr: wikipedia on military logos, with the conclusion that the question could be put to the French MoD. The "official" answer was ... evasive - enumeration of the legal regimes that could be applied, unclear as to who is the right owner of such a logo, and inconclusive. Clearly, the problem lies in uncharted waters.
D/ As for an admissibility on Commons, the two main questions are whether the picture can be published and reproduced (1) without payment to the right holder, and (2) without authorization from the right holder. If the answer is OK, the media is essentially "free", even though addition legal restrictions may apply (such as for flags, for instance).
In that case, a Reductio ad absurdum can show the correct approach:
  • If we suppose it must be considered as a work of art, authorization must be asked to the right owner, who may ask for a payment.
  • The right owner (or at least its legal representative) is obviously the military unit represented by such logo, since the unit obviously can make reproductions and representations without asking anybody.
  • Has such a military unit ever asked for payments, or imposed restriction, to the diffusion of their logo ? This is unheard of, and the very idea is ludicrous.
  • Hence the "work of art" hypothesis is not the correct approach, and the "coat of arms" approach can be preferred in that case.
E/ I would suggest the following rule of thumb to be followed by the Commons community : "Military logos can be assimilated to coats of arms". But of course, this opinion is open to discussion. And the Commons:Deletion requests/File:NOHED.svg can be a good example to discuss that rule.
Beware, though, that the formulation of what is a "military logo" can lead to various interpretations : arm/breast cloth woven emblems? Metallic 2D-3D ones (beret-like)? Breast enameled ensigns? Military medals or distinctions (cloth / metal versions)? Rank indications? unit indication (probably PD-ineligible anyway)?... there has been discussions on where would the limit be set.
Michelet-密是力 (talk) 08:08, 20 November 2015 (UTC)

File:IABY-Profile-Picture-Crop.png

Uploaded as own work, but there's no OTRS verification and it's the only file uploaded by the uploader. Title of image seems to suggest it's a crop from something found online and it looks like it's from this My Space page -- Marchjuly (talk) 08:27, 19 November 2015 (UTC)

The uploader is probably associated with the subject. They should provide OTRS permission. Ruslik (talk) 20:36, 20 November 2015 (UTC)

File:Mahatma Gandhi First Television Interview (30 April 1931).webm

Hi, Is this video {{PD-US-no notice}} or {{PD-US-not renewed}}? Regards, Yann (talk) 19:22, 19 November 2015 (UTC)

Under older US law and practice, TV programs were generally unpublished until if and when they went into syndication. This couldn't have been just aired on TV, though. [8] and Wikipedia are pretty clear that 1931 had minimal and experimental TV at best, so anything of the sort would have been distributed as a filmstrip to movie theaters. (I bet the TV interview is simply wrong.) PD-US-not renewed is pretty likely; I have a problem taking a YouTube copy of unknown provenance and saying that there was no copyright notice in the original.--Prosfilaes (talk) 00:34, 20 November 2015 (UTC)
OK, thanks for your answer. There is no copyright notice in the film itself, that's why I presumed "no notice". I changed it to "not renewed", and renamed the file. Regards, Yann (talk) 09:21, 20 November 2015 (UTC)

File:Tony Sealy.JPG

I think this image uploaded as own work may not be so. It appears elsewhere on the web e.g. here in a list of people from Hackney (although it could be copied to there from the Wiki page). It is uploaded as own work in April 2014 but the subject's football career finished 20 years ago. Thanks. (Apologies if I am mistaken). Eagleash (talk) 15:18, 20 November 2015 (UTC)

I think it is fine. Tony Sealy is now a manager in Hong Kong. The link you found is a FamousFix site, which scrapes wikipedia, so I think they got the image from us, not the other way around. In addition the version on Commons is much larger and the Exif camera data is consistent with other photographs from that uploader. —RP88 (talk) 15:45, 20 November 2015 (UTC)
OK thanks. I thought that the other site might have copied it from Wiki (as noted above). I knew Sealy was working in HK but the image looks like one of him at younger than 56. Anyway if it's been looked at & found to be OK, all's well. Thanks & again apologies for 'time-wasting'. Eagleash (talk) 17:48, 20 November 2015 (UTC)

Unfree Image?

I uploaded this image to Wikimedia commons and it was deleted as an unfree image on Flickr. The Creative Commons tag on Flickr says it can be used as long as attribution is given and it is not used for commercial purposes. That seems like it is allowed. Can anyone help me? Ayzmo (talk) 15:24, 20 November 2015 (UTC)

Sorry, but that Flickr image can not be uploaded to Commons. It is Commons policy to only accept free content, in particular, Commons only accepts media files that are not subject to copyright restrictions which would prevent them being used by anyone, anytime, for any purpose. That Flickr flie is licensed under the CC BY NC ND 2.0 license, which prohits commercial use as well as the creation of derivative works. Neither of those restrictions is acceptable on Commons. Additional information is available at Commons:Flickr files. —RP88 (talk) 15:36, 20 November 2015 (UTC)

Images from Facebook albums

Agency for Inspection and Restoration of Monuments of Moldova has a bunch of albums on their Facebook page containing original work of monument photography: https://www.facebook.com/Agentia-de-Inspectare-si-Restaurare-a-Monumentelor-din-Republica-Moldova-212165758808185/photos_stream . Question: if the page administrator, which is also the head of given agency, adds a description for every album stating this text (CC-BY-SA-4.0), will it make the photos eligible for uploading @ Commons? Thank you. //  Gikü  said  done  Tuesday, 17 November 2015 20:43 (UTC)

I think so. Ruslik (talk) 19:13, 18 November 2015 (UTC)
Sure. If a copyright owner puts an explicit license on their work on a web page, then it would seem to be licensed, and it's fine to upload. The main issue is when people other than the copyright owners add a license -- those are meaningless. Carl Lindberg (talk) 16:45, 21 November 2015 (UTC)

Template for UK sound recordings

Hi, Do we already have a template for UK sound recordings, which are in the public domain if prior 1957, cf. en:Copyright law of the United Kingdom#Broadcast copyright? Should we create one? Regards, Yann (talk) 12:23, 19 November 2015 (UTC)

What should be the wording for such a template? Any opinion please? Yann (talk) 18:27, 23 November 2015 (UTC)
That sounds like a copyright for broadcasts, not sound recordings. The rules for sound recordings are given in the following section on the page. A sound recording which was broadcast on radio would appear to be subject to both copyrights, so you need to wait until both of them have expired. You can compare this with a film which is copyrighted as a 'cinematographic work', as a 'sound recording', as a 'performance', as a 'video recording' and in some countries also as 'photographs', these being different rights which to some extent are subject to different copyright terms and have different copyright holders.
Also note that the w:Copyright Duration Directive restored sound recording copyright. This was discussed when Sweden implemented the directive because sound recordings created before the 1970s or so previously were in the public domain in Sweden. --Stefan2 (talk) 18:39, 23 November 2015 (UTC)
OK. I am asking because of [9]. This a radio broadcast recorded in 1931 in UK. So I presume that it became public domain 50 years after recording, i.e. on January 1st, 1982. Regards, Yann (talk) 19:00, 23 November 2015 (UTC)
In the European Union, sound files like this may be subject to several rights with different copyright terms:
  • The spoken words may constitute a literary work with a copyright term of 70 years pma. The requirement here is that the words, as written down on a paper, should meet certain quality requirements. I suspect that there are countries where these words do not meet those quality requirements, but the UK is a bit special. I have no idea when the journalist died, but Gandhi died less than 70 years ago.
  • The sound recording of the spoken words may be subject to copyright protection as a 'sound recording'. This is not based on originality because there is only one way to record sound. The European Union first set the term to 50 years from publication, but this was recently increased to 70 years from publication. The European Union restored copyrights if the 50-year term hadn't expired when implemented, but I have no idea if anything additional was restored when the term was increased to 70 years. In either case, the sound recording copyright term has expired, since the recording is more than 70 years old.
  • The people who appear in the sound recordings might make a performance. I'm not sure how you define a 'performance' except that the definition doesn't seem to involve any originality (at least not under Swedish law). However, the copyright term is only 50 years from publication, so it has already expired if it once applied.
  • In the UK, there is apparently also a 'broadcast copyright', which apparently doesn't apply to broadcasts of this age.
From what I can tell, you need to ensure that all applicable rights have expired, and then there is also the question about the copyright status in the United States. --Stefan2 (talk) 19:55, 23 November 2015 (UTC)

Need advice on two images

I am currently doing a GAC review on Joan Lindsay. Two images are included that I need advice on whether or not these are free to use:

File:Joan Lindsay enhance crop 1925.png
File:Joan Lindsay 1914.png

Please advise. Maile66 (talk) 13:17, 21 November 2015 (UTC)

Just as a quick note before we dive too deep on the intricacies of copyright terms here: the (physical) photographs in question are currently owned by the en:State Library of Victoria who in their online database record for both these images have a specific statement that the image is out of copyright. Were I assessing their status purely on my own count I would most likely simply accept this statement as valid since they are the current owners and a presumption that they possess superior knowledge. How that stacks up against the standard on Commons my familiarity with the area is not sufficient to judge. So "FWIW", I guess. --Xover (talk) 14:12, 21 November 2015 (UTC)
I notice that 'File:Joan Lindsay enhance crop 1925.png' is flipped left to right compared to the original. I appreciate that with this change Lindsay faces the page, but flipping portraits isn't good practice. Aa77zz (talk) 15:00, 21 November 2015 (UTC)
Australian photographs at the time expired 50 years after creation, and nothing has restored copyright. So, add {{PD-Australia}} to the two images (and File:Joan and Daryl Lindsay.jpg, the source of the crop). Carl Lindberg (talk) 16:36, 21 November 2015 (UTC)
✓ Done Yann (talk) 14:59, 23 November 2015 (UTC)

Copyright of handprints

Can a handprint be eligible for copyright protection in certain regions? What about Category:Handprints in front of Grauman's Chinese Theatre? --George Ho (talk) 09:21, 23 November 2015 (UTC)

I don't think so. Copyright is only generated when there is creative input, and there is minimal, if any, of such input when one places a hand into wet concrete. (The answer might be different if an artist used multiple handprints to create an artwork.) — SMUconlaw (talk) 12:32, 23 November 2015 (UTC)

File:Padisah-selanik-te-85424.jpg

I this ok? it seems enough old to be in the PD, but source : "web site"? it seems to come from [10] not free. --Christian Ferrer (talk) 13:08, 23 November 2015 (UTC)

 Comment I added this infor, but we need a license for the country of origin (Turkey?). Yann (talk) 14:57, 23 November 2015 (UTC)
thanks I found, I think it's it's PD-Ottoman Empire..--Christian Ferrer (talk) 16:22, 23 November 2015 (UTC)

Possible copyright violations?

I came across this via the English Wikipedia's draft article for Walking War Robots. The article has several long sections that contain pictures of robots from the game. A look at one of the images, File:Destrier v2.png, shows that the uploader claims that this is his own work. My question though, is whether or not you can make this claim when it comes to screen shots of a game. Even if you could create and customize your own build (which does not seem to be the case), wouldn't any in-game images be considered copyrighted to the game publisher/creator? A look at the uploader's history shows that they've done several of these.

I figured that I'd bring this here and ask about this, since I've always thought that game screenshots and images of in-game characters/robots/etc fell were considered to be copyrighted and thus ineligible for upload except in very, very specific scenarios - and even then you had to properly credit the game creators. Tokyogirl79 (talk) 12:14, 25 November 2015 (UTC)

You are correct; unless the game's artwork has been freely licensed then those uploads are not allowed. Looks like an admin has deleted them. Carl Lindberg (talk) 20:55, 25 November 2015 (UTC)

I do not understand

I have been contributing images to Wikipedia Commons for several years. By and large I am happy enough, but one issue keeps cropping up.

I take photos of art in museums and galleries in the US and abroad, and post them on Commons. I get the message that a "United States public domain tag" is needed.

I have spent the better part of an hour finding out what this might be. I quit.

1. Everything I post is an image of art over 100 years old. Some found in the US, some abroad. 2. By and large I took the image with my own camera. 3. I could care less about attribution to me.

What tag should I use?

{{PD-1996}} ? {{PD-US-unpublished}} ??

By the way, recently I attended the Wiki conference in Washington, DC. I found the presentations to be useful and comprehensible. Unlike what I find online, which by and large seems to be written for the priesthood, those initiates to the arcane knowledge.— Preceding unsigned comment added by Henrytow (talk • contribs) 21:22, 26 November 2015 (UTC)

If every work of art you photograph is over 100 years old as you say, {{PD-1923}} ist the accompanying US PD tag you are looking for. Others are possible, like {{PD-old-auto-1923}} – which only makes sense if you fill in the artist's year of death, like {{PD-old-auto-1923 |deathyear= 1666}}. You will still need another tag, like {{PD-old}} or {{PD-old-100}}, for the copyright situation outside the US.
There is also the combination tag {{PD-old-100-1923}} which combines the two tags needed. --Rosenzweig τ 21:40, 26 November 2015 (UTC)
Dealing with copyright law *does* involve a lot of incomprehensible arcane nonsense that wouldn't be out of place in a priesthood. Don't blame people online though, blame the politicians and judges who write and interpret these laws. --ghouston (talk) 23:52, 26 November 2015 (UTC)

At the Wiki conference it was noted that the number of editors goes down year after year. Like the number of priests? The learning curve is too steep for the perceived benefits ? ??? henrytow~~

Permission with regards to using images from flickr

Been meaning to use the following from flickr for the Pindad Anoa article:

- https://www.flickr.com/photos/i_grim_reaper/6822653766/in/dateposted/
- https://www.flickr.com/photos/i_grim_reaper/6822653510/in/dateposted/

I got in touch with the guy who took the images and said its okay. I'm not sure if it'll pass OTRS. My concern is that the response I got (and from the other two flickr uploaders I spoke to) didn't use this.

Please help. Thanks.

Ominae (talk) 10:09, 26 November 2015 (UTC)

I'm not sure how we can help. If the copyright holder is willing to remove the non-commercial restriction, the easy way is that they change the license on Flickr. Giving a license only for use on Wikipedia isn't accepted here. --ghouston (talk) 23:59, 26 November 2015 (UTC)
Well, the response I got at least is that I have permission (which is directly said) to upload the images here. They didn't say anything about removing the non-commercial restrictions. Ominae (talk) 12:56, 27 November 2015 (UTC)
We need to be sure the copyright holder is OK with making them available to everyone (not just Wikipedia) for use in almost all circumstances (including commercial). That is why we prefer the declaration in the COM:OTRS process (which is the declaration of consent you mentioned). Often, authors assume we are only asking for permission for use on Wikipedia itself, and don't understand the wider implications. If the author is OK with it, as mentioned, they could just change the license on Flickr to CC-BY-SA or CC-BY (which would be the indication we'd be looking for). That is the easiest path for all involved. Or, they could submit an OTRS email. If the author made clear they are also OK with the image being used anywhere else as well as Wikipedia, including commercial contexts, then it would be OK, though it would be best to send the correspondence to the OTRS address to see if they agree. Short of that, it's best to be conservative in order to not create hard feelings later, or force us to delete the image when the situation was not what the author intended. Many authors, understandably, do not want their work used in commercial contexts, so we really want to be sure. Carl Lindberg (talk) 17:49, 27 November 2015 (UTC)

(dwt).

Hallo an das Wikipedia Team,

Ich habe eine Frage zum Thema Kategorien, bezüglich der Hochgeladenen Bilder meiner Seit's, die nicht übertragen warden.

Beispiel, Liste der Kulturdenkmäler Chemnitz.

Wenn ich weitere Bilder bei Commoscat einfüge, was bisher immer gut geklappt hatte, ist dies jetzt nicht mehr erkennbar.

Hat sich diesbezüglich da etwas im Ablauf geändert?

Wenn nicht, dann ware ich dankbar für die Rückstellung der Abläufe, so dass das ganze auch wieder nach dem Einfügen unverbindlich und ohne Zeitverzug funktioniert.

Danke. — Preceding unsigned comment added by (dwt). (talk • contribs)

Hallo User:(dwt)., nein hat sich nichts geändert, deshalb fällt "Rückstellung" weg. Auf deiner Benutzerseite links unter "Werkzeuge" steht Benutzeruploads, da draufklicken, dann siehst du deine hochgeladenen Dateien. Gruß --Jean11 (talk) 19:09, 28 November 2015 (UTC)

File:Harry_Daisy_Freaks_1932.jpg

Hello

Sometime posted this photo: File:Harry_Daisy_Freaks_1932.jpg, it belongs to the 1932 movie Freaks, which is in the public domain since 2011, I put the notice in PD-mark because it was a user here me indicated and said it would be the most recommended in case, you even can look at your talk page: here, and recently this file has been proposed for deletion could take a look and see if this all right? Following page: Commons:Deletion requests/File:Harry_Daisy_Freaks_1932.jpg

Thanks.

Yasméssica (talk) 11:00, 28 November 2015 (UTC)

I've replied over at Commons:Deletion requests/File:Harry Daisy Freaks 1932.jpg. —RP88 (talk) 19:56, 28 November 2015 (UTC)

Passport covers

Is it acceptable to simply scan/take aphotograph of a passport cover like File:RMI passport cover.jpg or File:Cover of Papua New Guinean Passport.png and claim it as "own work"? Passports are official government documents, so I guess there may be cases when they are considered to be in the public domain, but I'm not sure if that's the case for every country. Isn't a "PD" license also needed for the passport in addition to "own work" license for the photo/scan if the passport is truly PD? -- Marchjuly (talk) 04:44, 29 November 2015 (UTC)

Hi, Please create a deletion request. Regards, Yann (talk) 13:05, 29 November 2015 (UTC)
Understand. Will bring this up at COM:DR -- Marchjuly (talk) 00:09, 30 November 2015 (UTC)

User:Artinmarseille99

Hi,

I've already signaled one photo that is a copyright violation, but I'm afraid all of the uplaods from this user are also taken from diverse websites… --Superbenjamin (talk) 10:24, 29 November 2015 (UTC)

Hi, It seems that the first picture is not a copyvio. Other pictures have consistent EXIF data. I deleted 2 pictures which were copied from here, and wrongly attributed. Regards, Yann (talk) 13:08, 29 November 2015 (UTC)

User:Bissorte

Can some administrator studie the list of uploads of User:Bissorte, actif since august 2015. I asked for deletion of some of his files, but there a a lot more dubious files. It seems to me that he doesn't understand the rules of copyright. He also does not categorize its images. He seems to use its user page as discussion page. --Havang(nl) (talk) 13:27, 29 November 2015 (UTC)

Hi, I added a message in French. It seems most files are old documents. I will review his/her uploads, and help correct the source. Regards, Yann (talk) 14:00, 29 November 2015 (UTC)
@Yann Merci. J'ai mis un lien sur sa fr:Discussion utilisateur:Bissorte. Il y a entre autre un problème avec plusieurs images sur cette page : fr:Éditions Maugard, la plupart des auteurs ayant vecu jusqu'après 1945. --Havang(nl) (talk) 16:15, 29 November 2015 (UTC)
C'est un peu plus compliqué. La couverture du livre n'est en général pas réalisé par l'auteur, mais par l'éditeur. C'est donc lui qui détient les droits, avec le designer, le photographe ou l'artiste, si cette couverture contient une photo, un dessin, etc. De plus, une couverture avec uniquement du texte doit être {{PD-ineligible}} (ex: File:La douceur des loukoums, Peggy Lebourgeois, 1979.jpg). Cordialement, Yann (talk) 17:06, 29 November 2015 (UTC)
Comme il/elle continue d'importer des documents avec des infos fausses ou incomplètes, j'ai fait une demande de suppression massive, et ajouté un avertissement plus ferme : Commons:Deletion requests/Files uploaded by Bissorte. Cordialement, Yann (talk) 17:16, 29 November 2015 (UTC)

Category:City Lights, by Chaplin

Hi, Is this film in the public domain? There is a copyright registration, so at least {{PD-US-no notice}} is wrong for film stills. Images from the trailer should be OK. However I can't find any renewal [11] [12], which should have been done in 1959. Any idea? Yann (talk) 18:32, 29 November 2015 (UTC)

I don't know if City Lights (1931) had a copyright notice (I don't have access to copy to look). However, City Lights (1931) was renewed in 1958 #R217556: CITY LIGHTS, a photoplay in nine reels by Charles Chaplin. © 1Feb31; L2034. Charles Chapline (A); 1Jul58; R217556. —RP88 (talk) 18:46, 29 November 2015 (UTC)
By the way, you generally can't rely on using a HathiTrust/Google Books OCR search on the CCE volumes to confirm the absence of a registration/renewal record, in my experience the OCR misses too much, i.e. you can use it to maybe find a record, but can't rely on it to confidently show the absence of a record. Also, since a copyright renewal has to be sometime in the 28th year, you'd typically look for renewals at the publication date + 27 years and + 28 years. So if the original publication was in 1931, you'd look for renewals in the 1958 and 1959 records. However, during some periods in the past the Copyright Office was slow in publishing renewals (i.e. some renewals made in December in some years don't actually get published until the following January), so actually also have to check + 29 years. —RP88 (talk) 19:00, 29 November 2015 (UTC)
Thanks. I was quite sure I missed something... Yann (talk) 21:35, 29 November 2015 (UTC)
Commons:Deletion requests/Files in Category:City Lights. Yann (talk) 21:42, 29 November 2015 (UTC)

Copyright violation?

Hello, copyright violation?: File:Preis der leipziger buchmesse (6).JPG. Thanks. Regards --Jean11 (talk) 19:11, 28 November 2015 (UTC)

Please, explain why do you think that this a copyright violation? Ruslik (talk) 09:47, 30 November 2015 (UTC)
Probably as a derivative work of the photo on the screen, as the file is being used on that person's article. Carl Lindberg (talk) 16:52, 30 November 2015 (UTC)

References for public domain movies

Hi, I'd like to upload movies in the public domain from Internet Archive and YouTube, at least those which have an article on the English Wikipedia. I'd also like to document that in the article en:List of films in the public domain in the United States. But I was reverted (see article history and en:Talk:List of films in the public domain in the United States#US Copyright Database as a source) under the pretext that my references to absence of renewals are "original research". So we have quite a silly situation, with movies on Commons with a public domain template, but they can't be listed in an article on the English WP. Opinions? Solution(s)? Regards, Yann (talk) 18:36, 23 November 2015 (UTC)

It's my understanding that Public Domain status is not determined by Wikipedia editors who are looking through primary source database and making a determination on their own if the film qualifies. Lack of a registration in the US Copyright Office database is a good sign of PD status, but that database has errors and there may be competing claims on some or all of the properties associated with the film (script, score, etc). Thus, we rely on reliable secondary sources that have made a claim of PD status. -- Green Cardamom (talk) 19:01, 23 November 2015 (UTC)
Also note that many of the movies that are labelled as public domain on the Internet Archive, are not, in fact, public domain. The Internet Archive does very little vetting of public domain claims for media uploaded to their site. Kaldari (talk) 23:09, 27 November 2015 (UTC)
@Kaldari: I agree with you, but that's not the issue. A proper assessment is needed before uploading anything from IA. Actually I take this argument by Green Cardamom as a straw man. Regards, Yann (talk) 20:28, 1 December 2015 (UTC)
@Yann: True, that isn't especially relevant to your dilemma. Unfortunately, I don't imagine there's anything you can do to convince them due to WP:OR. It's a common situation for many list articles on there. Some are stricter than others, but when it comes to any sort of legal issues, they usually enforce WP:OR to the nines. Kaldari (talk) 20:59, 1 December 2015 (UTC)

Madame Tussauds Sydney, Australian FOP, and temporary vs permanent displays

In the category Category:Madame Tussauds Sydney, there are a number of photos that show a figure of Captain Cook situated in an outdoor location. From what one understands, Australian freedom of panorama applies only to works that are permanently situated. It seems unusual that this figure would be permanently situated outdoors. In the description for this image, there is talk about an event where "Captain Cook sails into Darling Harbour to track the Transit of Venus..."

See:

In addition, there are a number of images that show a figure of Captain Cook on board a modern boat. Once again, it seems unclear that the figure was permanently situated as shown in these images. (Assuming that the figure is copyrighted and is not covered by Australian FOP, de minimis may apply to some of the images.)

See:

--Gazebo (talk) 06:58, 30 November 2015 (UTC)

Permanent does not mean forever, because even a permanently exhibited model may be eventually removed. What actually matters is the intent. Was this a temporary exhibition with some fixed dates? Are these models are moved indoor during the night? Ruslik (talk) 11:32, 1 December 2015 (UTC)
From what one understands, the wax figures at Madame Tussauds Sydney are generally on display indoors. In 2012, there was an event where a figure of Captain Cook was (presumably) moved outdoors and then transported on a modern boat from the Captain Cook Cruises company to commemorate a transit of the planet Venus across the Sun. (According to the event details, the real Captain James Cook tracked a transit of Venus back in 1769.) As such, it may be that many of the photos in the category Category:Madame Tussauds Sydney are of figures displayed indoors (I have not seen any indication that these figures are routinely moved elsewhere) and that the moving of the Captain Cook figure outside was likely of a temporary nature because of the event with which Cook is supposedly associated. From that, {{FoP-Australia}} + {{Not-free-US-FOP}} would cover most of the photos from Madame Tussauds Sydney but not the photos of the Captain Cook figure outdoors since that appears to have of a more temporary nature. --Gazebo (talk) 12:07, 3 December 2015 (UTC)

Screenshots of Google Chrome and licensing issues (continuing the discussion)

Previous discussion
Regarding this and this DRs, this issue was already discussed several times with broad concensus, but each time many users found little issues with the Google Chrome screenshots, that afefcts not just few files, but dozens and even hundred of screenshots that are supossed to be licensed under a free license (BSD).

We already know the issues with the BSD licenses and its loose nature, and how a company can take the source code and fully relicensing under restrictive terms. Therefore, we should consider some aspects about the screenshots:

  • The Threshold of originality: Many users could consider the elements of the Google Chrome/Chromium UI bellow the TOO, but other users doesn't, and even confusing the de minimis with the TOO; the US Copyright law is very clear about the Simple shapes (this is the reason why the DRs related to OS X and Microsoft Edge screenshots were resolved as Kept. Why Google Chrome not? Is not this DR relevant?).
Also, there is a big problem: different admins have different opinions and taken different decisions about the same issues. Namely, Natuur12 decided to crop the screenshot to remove the elements considered non-free (and claiming that the Google Chrome screenshots DR is not relevant). But Yann decided to resolve this Microsoft Edge screenshot DR as Kept and leaving the file as is... whm...
  • The relationship between the Google Chrome Terms of Service (also called as EULA, but is still just a TOS) and the BSD (and other) license: By reading carefuly the Google Chrome TOS, the preface and the section 1 of it mentions the term Open source and the relationship between it and the Open source licenses (read and understand carefuly the bold text):
1. Your relationship with Google
1.1 Your use of Google’s products, software, services and web sites (referred to collectively as the “Services” in this document and excluding any services provided to you by Google under a separate written agreement) is subject to the terms of a legal agreement between you and Google. “Google” means Google Inc., whose principal place of business is at 1600 Amphitheatre Parkway, Mountain View, CA 94043, United States. This document explains how the agreement is made up, and sets out some of the terms of that agreement.
1.2 Unless otherwise agreed in writing with Google, your agreement with Google will always include, at a minimum, the terms and conditions set out in this document. These are referred to below as the “Universal Terms”. Open source software licenses for Google Chrome source code constitute separate written agreements. To the limited extent that the open source software licenses expressly supersede these Universal Terms, the open source licenses govern your agreement with Google for the use of Google Chrome or specific included components of Google Chrome.
As I can see, IMHO, the BSD license, as a separate agreement, supersedes the EULA applied to the elements derived from Chromium (regardless its loose nature), not the otherwise. If you have the otherwise opinion, please express it here, in detail, why the TOS supersedes the BSD applied to the elements derived from Chromium.
The section 2 of the BSDu says:
2. Redistributions in binary form must reproduce the above copyright notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer in the documentation and/or other materials provided with the distribution.
Then, the non-viral nature of the BSD license only allows to use the code with/between non-free software (and even relicensing the whole code under non-free elements), but The Chromium Projects is still the copyright holder of the Google Chrome UI. Also, Chromium (and then Google Chrome) contains code from several sources (third-party libraries), covered under several licenses, most of them free, including the BSD, MIT, Apache, and the viral licenses GPL, LGPL, and the MPL/GPL/LGPL tri-license (see chrome://credits). Therefore, this reafirms my assumption that the TOS covers only the propietary elements included in the Google Chrome binaries, not anything else, specially, due the GPL, LGPL and the MPL/GPL/LGPL tri-license explicitely supersede the TOS.
The thinks in this order:
  • Google released the Google Chrome source code under the BSD several years ago
  • The Chromium Projects develops and maintain the Chromium source code, including the UI.
  • Google takes Chromium, compile it and add some propietary elements, and then, release the binaries under the EULA
  • The EULA mention (in a loose way) that the Open source licenses supersedes the EULA applied to elements originaly licensed under these Open source licenses (the BSD)
Anyway, I already contacted to Google asking about the licensing of the Google Chrome, and the scope of the EULA (and how affects the BSD applied to the elements derived form Chromium. Therefore, I strongly discurrage to nominate or made any further edition to the Google Chrome screenshots until Google answer the question; COM:PCP could be applied, but we shouldn't especulate about the licensing, that was already discussed with broad concensus (and accepted for years that the Google Chrome screenshots are covered under the same terms as Chromium), the answer from Google will be mandatory. --Amitie 10g (talk) 23:50, 28 November 2015 (UTC)
Amitie 10g A lot would be cleared if Google responded. Thanks for writing the office. Blue Rasberry (talk) 15:07, 30 November 2015 (UTC)
Unfortunately, Google did not given a satisfactory answer. Therefore, if the thread at the Google Chrome and Chromium forums is not answered from a Google employee, furter direct contact to Google is needed; I can contact to Google Chile, they may answer properly to my question if I'm lucky. --Amitie 10g (talk) 08:31, 1 December 2015 (UTC)

I reopen this discussion to remember that I just contacted to Google again, and I'm contacting directly to The Chromium Projects developers.

To stay clear and informed, see also this post at the Google Chrome Blog with interesting explanation about licensing.

Consider that we accepted the Google Chrome screenshots for years, so, we shouldn't change our mind (specially by admins) because a user presented weak reasons to claim that the Google Chrome screenshots are non-free (considering just a TOS but not the US Copyright Law). As I mentioned in the related DR, Copyright violation accusations should be based in the Copyright Law. --Amitie 10g (talk) 03:59, 10 December 2015 (UTC)

Some updates: I stay connected to the Google Chrome and the Chromium forums. I leaved more messages in this thread at the Chromium forums, but one of these answers mentions that a Lawyer can answer this issue. This could be a good idea (but I don't live in the US), so I think that we could contact to Wikimedia Legal... but, the only who can answer this is Google.
Therefore, I asked to Google via Brand permissions twice, but the answer was not satisfactory (forwarded to OTRS with ticket #2015121110017545) they are unable to give these kind of permissions. --Amitie 10g (talk) 18:24, 11 December 2015 (UTC)
I don't see anything about copyright in the linked blog post. It seems to be about Google's TOS as it relates to filtering content from end-users. BMacZero (talk) 00:12, 17 December 2015 (UTC)

Update: I asked to online Attorney services and I get some answers. This copyright issue is too complicated to be taken too lightly. Google Chrome is covered under several license agreements, and the TOS is just one of them. --Amitie 10g (talk) 18:34, 26 December 2015 (UTC)

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