Wikipedia talk:Copyright problems/Archive 6

Requesting second opinion on Karnobat

I'd like a second opinion on Karnobat. It's almost a year old and is reasonably well established (part of a template, about 20 edits, linked to from about 40 pages), but it's clearly from [1]. It's not a case of them copying us since the original author cited the url as a "source". The original edits are a clear case of cut & paste from different pages on the website, and all the subsequent edits appear to be just a wikification and formatting of the text dump. Be nice to rewrite or replace instead of just delete. 68.84.34.154 14:36, 12 March 2006 (UTC)

Request you take a look at Procrastination

Somebody cut and pasted 2 lists (that make up the core of the article) from other websites. I read the page on fair use, but couldn't find anything specific on including lists or chunks of text from copyrighted sources. Therefore, would somebody who is knowledgeabe about copyrights please tak a look at this article? Thank you. --Go for it! 14:52, 12 March 2006 (UTC)

This is not directly related but in the UK lists are protected by copyright. I strongly suspect that at least one Wikipedia contributer copies list entries wholesale from Who's Who. While facts are obviously fair game, compiled lists of facts are not. AtomBoy 14:34, 8 April 2006 (UTC)

Section copyvio

What do you do if only a section has been added to an article form another source? The entire article is not a copyvio but the one section is..is there a tempalte to use or can you just delete the content? (referring to Royal Canadian Air Cadets#Director of Cadets) Flying Canuck 21:44, 13 March 2006 (UTC)

You can remove the content and supply an appropriate message on the user's talk page. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Gflores (talk • contribs)

From Wikipedia:Copyright problems:
"Revert the page to a non-copyrighted version if you can.
Go to that user's talk page and add {{subst:nothanks | PageName}} ~~~~ , substituting the article's name (Royal Canadian Air Cadets) in place of PageName." - Slow Graffiti 01:27, 19 May 2006 (UTC)

Copyvio text origins

Pseudomonas fluorescens has some material merged from Pseudomonas flourescens. The latter article was a copyvio. I paraphrased it and put my work on the "/Temp" page. This was moved to the main title and the copyvio text and notice deleted.

Now:

• we have the first edit saying "Paraphrased original contribution." That made sense at the time but not now.
• we don't even know where the copyvio text came from, so it is difficult to track down references in my work that were copied from the copyvio text. Brian Jason Drake 03:19, 17 March 2006 (UTC)

Where are the copyvio archives?

I want to see the original copvio associated with [2] but "WP:CP#September_29" is now a broken link, and *super weird* going back in the article's history, it has content in it from the present -- its future?!? In fact, the only difference in the Copyright page from now and October 2005 is diffs to the boiler plate... is it some sort of weird non-Wiki page? -Reagle 18:24, 20 March 2006 (UTC)

There is no log as such, you just need to type the page in the search box: Wikipedia:Copyright problems/2005 September 29, except that an admin had deleted the page. I have restored it. However, the current scheme was only implemented on The article you mention currently has no deleted revisions and has never been deleted and is not currently a boilerplate, so I'm not sure what you mean exactly. -Splash^talk 18:34, 20 March 2006 (UTC)

I suppose the problem is I don't understand how the tasks here are undertaken. Are copyright violations found today placed on Wikipedia:Copyright_problems or on Wikipedia:Copyright problems/2006 March 20 as the "footer" recommends? After today, e.g. tomorrow, what happens? Are issues that are resolved actually deleted from the page or stricken (i.e., HTML strike-through)? In any case, Wikipedia:Copyright problems/2005 September 29 now exists, but there's nothing on the page? -Reagle 21:17, 20 March 2006 (UTC)

The main page, Wikipedia:Copyright problems transcludes each of the daily pages (press the edit button and take a look). So the individual entries are only stored on their daily subpages, but these are made to appear together on the main page for 'ease' of reference. Resolved issues are simply removed from the daily subpage and thus stop appearing in both places. If you go to the log page you mention, you find it blank because every entry there has been resolved. If you go through the history and choose the revision corresponding to the end of the day, you'll be able to see everyhting that was listed there. -Splash^talk 21:24, 20 March 2006 (UTC)

Oh, I had never seen whole pages transcluded (just template blurbs). Can one do that to any page, or you guys have it set up special here? -Reagle 22:42, 20 March 2006 (UTC)

You can transclude anything that is not in article space. That is to say that the page title must have a namespace in it, like Wikipedia: or User: and if it doesn't, MediaWiki assumes it to be a template and will redlink if there is nothing called Template:WhatYouTranscluded. If you transclude an Image: or Category: page, it will display only the description page rather than the image or category itself. So we don't have anything special set up here, no, is the short answer! -Splash^talk 01:04, 21 March 2006 (UTC)

A meta question here is, if I wanted to easily assess how copyright violations are disposed of, could I even look at a single page to do this? For example, I would like to know what portion of the copyright violation pages have been deleted, rewritten, or had permission granted. -Reagle 21:20, 20 March 2006 (UTC)

Following my response just above, having chosen that version of the history you'll be able to see (in show-preview) how many of the links are red. Perhaps we should have a practise of reverting to the end-of-day state on a daily page when it is untranscluded to make this slightly easier. -Splash^talk 21:24, 20 March 2006 (UTC)

Logs

Further to my comment in the immediately preceding section, I have created Wikipedia:Copyright problems/Log. A small amount of additional bureaucracy to keep this up-to-date when you finish a day, but worth it to avoid the situation of noone knowing where the logs are! This has revealed a few admins deleting completed days. This is pointless since the logs are useful and nothing is gained by deleting them. I've asked one admin to turn their redlinks blue, and I'd ask others to do the same. Thanks. -Splash^talk

Should we reorganize this page?

The major problem with this page in my opinion is that if someone is watching an article and the Copyvio template goes up the only direction to this discussion brings you to the top of the page. Then you have to try and find the right discussion without necessarily knowing the date. I realize you can figure out the date through the history tab or watchlist, but we are not making it easy for people to help out here. I know of some suspect prose I will be putting here, but I would like be able to find the discussion easily. Some of this might end needing some research outside of the internet. What does everyone else think of this page format?--Birgitte§β ʈ Talk 15:44, 24 March 2006 (UTC)

What do you suggest? – Quadell ^{(talk) (bounties)} 16:56, 24 March 2006 (UTC)

For one, seperating prose violations from Image violations might break things up. If we broke it up like that maybe we could use headings so you could pick the the one you are looking for out of the TOC. We could always copy the set-up of one of the *fD pages. Also if we could do something like speedy deleion or prod for only complete cut-and-paste prose internet violations with no significant history. That would stremaline a lot of this. We could make this page some sort of log only forcing all discussion on to the article talk pages. That is just some brainstorming. Currently this page is so overwhelming I am not surprised no one wants to clear the backlog even though many are super easy decisions. That so many blatent cut-and-paste jobs have sat here since March 6 is testament that the current process isn't working--Birgitte§β ʈ Talk 17:52, 24 March 2006 (UTC)

When you can't find the source

What should be done when you can't find the source of a copyvio? I can usually find it, but there are some that cannot be found through Google or are no longer online (I doubt many are truly offline, requiring the person to scan the source, type it him or herself or to have gotten an electronic version on a cd/disk or by email). On talk pages, I have noticed that some people support keeping articles that are very likely to be copyright violations when the source of the text cannot be found. I think that such articles should be deleted. Is there any policy on this? If not, what do you guys think?

By the way, the section on Copyright Problems for articles with offline sources has been removed, are they just being mixed in with the others now? -- Kjkolb 13:30, 4 April 2006 (UTC)

pictures

It does not look like Pictures get listed here. Can you point me to the right page. Or look at [3] Pictures that are "Getty Images" get classed as PD now. Agathoclea 20:10, 5 April 2006 (UTC)

Pictures can be listed here if you think they are copyright infringements. They can also be listed at WP:IFD; the two pages overlap somewhat. If you are unsure of the copyright status, you can list at Wikipedia:Possibly unfree images. It's not critical which you choose, but generally I'd avoid IfD in the case of copyright questions; it's not terribly good at dealing with them. -Splash^talk 22:57, 5 April 2006 (UTC)

Plagiarism

The discussion at WP:VP (policy)#Plagiarism makes plain that many editors think that "fair use" means you can cut and paste a few sentences from one source, provided you cut the next three sentences or paragraph from a different source. This is being done, all too often, in good faith.

Freedom House is a particular example of this. Each paragraph after the intro seems cut and pasted from a different page of their website. (Some of they were adapted a little, some have been edited since; but the basic structure is still there.)

I'm not sure what can be done about this. I suppose an extended essay on the fact that text can only be taken in order to comment on it, and that it must have some indication, by quotes or itals, that it is a direct quote. Septentrionalis 22:11, 7 April 2006 (UTC)

American Disc Jockey Association is another example. There's basically a whole paragraph copied from what looks like a local news item, with some other info interspersed in. The fact that they sprinkled other sentences in makes it seem as though the author was definitely acting in good faith, and even I wasn't entirely sure there was a real copyright problem there.

As a relative newcomer to Wikipedia, I've noticed the copyright pages are a little tricky to follow. There are many pages covering slightly different topics. I do remember seeing something about fair use somewhere; maybe that could be moved to a more prominent place and then more clearly explained, as you suggested. --Laura S 05:33, 9 April 2006 (UTC)

Another thing that needs to be made clear is that just because there is no copyright notice, it does not mean that the material is not copyrighted. -- Kjkolb 14:30, 9 April 2006 (UTC)

US state copyrights

Pardon a probably stupid question, but what's the copyright status of material produced by U.S. states? Wompatuck State Park is lifted directly from here, but:

• it's a ".gov" domain for the Commonwealth of Massachusetts.
• the page has no copyright notice, and I've been unable to locate a page laying out general copyright policy, either for the Commonwealth of Massachusetts or its Department of Conservation and Recreation.
• the Commonwealth of Massachusetts does append a copyright notice to some of its pages, so the notion that the Commonwealth of Massachusetts can hold copyright is clearly there.

So, implied copyright violation or not?

--Calton | Talk 00:48, 9 April 2006 (UTC)

1. Work created by U.S. state governments isn't necessarily PD, while work created by the U.S. Federal Government is. Also, some material on US Federal .gov sites isn't created by the Federal Government and therefore isn't PD. (don't assume stuff on .gov sites is PD)
2. It doesn't matter if there is a copyright notice on the material or not, copyright is automatically granted to creative work upon fixed form. See the first section of this project page or the U.S. Copyright Office basic intro.
3. For the given example we can't make assumptions about its license. (don't use it unless we know for sure that it is PD or available under a compatible license).

--Duk 15:39, 9 April 2006 (UTC)

California state works are public domain, but I don't know about other states. It would be nice if we compiled a list of states and countries that make their works public domain. -- Kjkolb 16:01, 9 April 2006 (UTC)

There has been some recent debate about this one (here and here). I wonder if anyone has ever contacted the State for a better explanation? --Duk 16:55, 9 April 2006 (UTC)

I'd rather contact a knowledgeable lawyer. I have talked to government employees many times (energy stuff mostly) and they are generally uncomfortable with other people using their material freely (and with the public having access to "too much" information or information that might make them look bad) and they often do not know the rules about usage. Sometimes they make up conditions that don't exist (because the work is in the public domain and there are no restrictions), like not modifying the work or only using it for non-profit purposes. Some of the people in the discussions are going by the copyright notices on websites, but as someone else pointed out, they could have been put their automatically by a program or by a website designer or employee who is unaware of the situation. I did look it up online once and I think that I found the law and I know I found a reputable source that said the material is public domain, but it took a lot of work and I don't remember how to find it. -- Kjkolb 17:16, 9 April 2006 (UTC)

I just got the following email after talking to several State of California lawyers:

...The ownership issue disclosed on each State website puts the "information" contained on the website in the public domain. However, this does not include copyrightable materials such as photographs. Photographs taken by State of California workers while on State of California business are owned by the State of California, and should not be used commercially without State of California approval. Other photographs taken by and owned by individuals that may be on a State website should not be used commercially without the owner's approval.

If anyone needs the emails and contact information ask me and I forward via email. --Duk 01:26, 2 May 2006 (UTC)

Easy for Newbies to be Over Zealous

I speak as a newbie. I was certain that a whole wikipedia article had been lifted verbatim from elsewhere, and went through the process of finding the "unlifted" prior version (took me a while, there were loads of edits after the apparent copyvio was made), reverted the page, put the entry on the "page of the day" as required here, and put nothanks actually on two different apparent copyvio users' talk pages. I felt virtuous and content, though the article was now a shadow of its former self.

This morning I discovered I had made a fool of myself. I had viewed answers.com as a source, not a licenced mirror. I don't mind making a fool of myself, and the wikipedia system protected the article I had reverted, and a more experienced person had undone my revert, so that is absolutely fine. My point is about guidance, since everyone is a newbie once.

Suggestion:

That the project page contains a dynamically updated list of mirrors whose articles are thus not copyright, and that this list is either clickable form or is in the "Instruction Blocks" on the project page, so that we growing band of newbies can see at a glance what is going on.

I know I should not feel discouraged, because I have simply learnt more about the system, and that should make me happy, but, at present, I am discouraged from making a decision about a copyright issue again since I have now felt foolish once. If people like me can be helped with a little more information then we are less likely to make errors or to feel foolish.

I'd appreciate thoughts on this from experienced and inexperienced people alike to determine if this suggestion has value to the community

Fiddle Faddle 10:06, 15 April 2006 (UTC)

I agree that it's easy for newbies to mess up. I made a similar mistake on the Seneca Rocks article, although my mistake was putting the copyvio template on the article at the same time as I mentioned it on the talk page, instead of waiting for a response. Wikipedia:Spotting possible copyright violations is useful, but it's relatively hard to find, compared to Wikipedia:Copyright problems. There's already a link to Wikipedia:Mirrors and forks on the copyright problems page, but it's hidden in the "See also" section; maybe we could make it more prominent and suggest checking it before posting a copyvio. We could also add something on the "Instructions" section of this page instructing editors to mention a possible copyvio on the article's talk page first; this would take care of errors where the original material was in the public domain, or the original author gave permission. --Cadaeib 15:53, 16 April 2006 (UTC)

Combination of images

I noticed an image on the 2008 Summer Olympics page with a copyright status I think might be questionable, but I wanted to ask here before listing it. The image is Image:Friendlies All.jpg, and is a combination of five separate images each of which are tagged {{promotional}}. The uploader has marked the combined image as {{GFDL-self}}. Is that legit? -- Jonel | Speak 17:08, 15 April 2006 (UTC)

No, that image cannot be re-licensed under the GFDL simply because someone pasted individual images together in a row. Jkelly 17:29, 15 April 2006 (UTC)

What's the appropriate course of action, then? -- Jonel | Speak 18:48, 15 April 2006 (UTC)

If some editor feels strongly that we need to be hosting that image, they need to change the license to Template:Fairusein, and write a detailed Fair use rationale, mention that a specific user put the images in a row, and leave a note on the Talk page of the uploader that they were committing plagiarism by claiming the image as their creation and infringing upon copyright, neither of which they should do again. Otherwise, tag the image with Template:Nld. Jkelly 19:10, 15 April 2006 (UTC)

I appologize for the confusion. I being the one who created the image (combination of images), must have accidentally used the wrong licence. I have done this atleast once before, when I was in the middle of doing something else. I will try to be more careful when I upload images in the future. I will now go to retag it. Sorry for any inconveniance. → J@red  20:57, 15 April 2006 (UTC)

Partial copyvio from 2+ sources

See Talk:Polish Empire. I am not sure if this should be blanked with copyvio tag or something else should be done, I'll leave it up to experts. On the bright side the article can be viewed as a poor-man's fork of History of Poland.--Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus ^Talk 19:49, 15 April 2006 (UTC)

Danielle Rousseau

Part of the page Danielle Rousseau (Lost) was taken from http://www.lostpedia.com/wiki/Danielle . Since this is from a Wiki site independent from wikipedia, surely the same copyright rules apply? I feel that a link to the direct article or maybe slight rewording would solve this. - Shaft121 14:16, 17 April 2006 (UTC)

it woujld be a copyvio since lostpedia is not released under GFDL (admitedly I can't find anything showing what the copyright status is.)Geni 14:24, 17 April 2006 (UTC)

But it does give links to the Wikipedia legislation on this matter. So does this mean that it does come under that jurisdriction? Also, I have placed a request on that page to see if anyone minds it being copied over.

If that isn't okay, would it be okay to reword the information to a certain degree or would I have to remove the piece? I have looked at the relevant page on the site but it is blank...hmm http://www.lostpedia.com/wiki/LostPedia:Copyrights - Shaft121 14:37, 17 April 2006 (UTC)

Having read the information on the Lostpedia site, I found this text... "The license Wikipedia uses grants free access to our content in the same sense as free software is licensed freely. This principle is known as copyleft. That is to say, Wikipedia content can be copied, modified, and redistributed so long as the new version grants the same freedoms to others and acknowledges the authors of the Wikipedia article used (a direct link back to the article satisfies our author credit requirement). Wikipedia articles therefore will remain free forever and can be used by anybody subject to certain restrictions, most of which serve to ensure that freedom.

To fulfill the above goals, the text contained in Wikipedia is licensed to the public under the GNU Free Documentation License (GFDL). The full text of this license is at Wikipedia:Text of the GNU Free Documentation License."

Since the text used on that site is licensed to the public & Wikipedia content can be copied, modified, and redistributed so long as the new version grants the same freedoms to others, I feel that just placing a link to the original article at the bottom of the page would remedy this. Agreed? - Shaft121 19:00, 17 April 2006 (UTC)

1 Corinthians 11

Material has been nominated as copyright infringement on 1 Corinthians 11 by User:Clinkophonist that was written by me. The text in question is here. I cited my source as this book by Bushnell on the Talk page which confused as me saying that I plagarized it from the book. The information is specifically on this page and on this page. A quick comparison shows the source and my summarization are not the same at all, in addition the fact that I constantly write "Bushnell writes this and that." Please restore the text I wrote.

The block quote translation at the beginning is a quote. Is this too long? I believe the book is in the public domain anyway, but I'm double checking now. --JBJ 20:09, 20 April 2006 (UTC)

Yes, the entire book is in the public domain. --JBJ 06:59, 22 April 2006 (UTC)

Because 7 days have passed and no one has voiced a contrary opinion, I'm restoring the disputed information. --JBJ 20:43, 25 April 2006 (UTC)

GFDL

If I create an image and release it under the GFDL, can someone modify it and put it in the public domain, or is that a copyright violation and I can delete the image? Also, don't I have to be credited in any modified version released under the GFDL, and again, if I'm not, isn't that a copyright violation and I can delete it? Hiding The wikipedian meme 19:01, 25 April 2006 (UTC)

That would be an egregious copyright infringement. Blatantly copyright-infringing images are not a WP:CSD, but I doubt that anyone would raise a fuss about that in this case. Jkelly 19:24, 25 April 2006 (UTC)

Very old copyvio

I just stumbled over what appears to be a very old -- as in Dec 2004 old -- copyright violation for Lee Raymond (the use of "Mr" raised my suspicions). See here for the press release/corporate bio the text was lifted from. But there have been about 40 edits over the last 16 months since the violating text was added: should article be reverted all the way back to the last non-infringing version, or is there some middle ground? --Calton | Talk 05:07, 28 April 2006 (UTC)

That's bad, but there is no middle ground. The pre-copyvio text is simply the first paragraph, but the last paragraph is also clean, as is the Education section. The image needs a source, too. ×Meegs 11:32, 3 May 2006 (UTC)

Where should this go?

User:Futureobservatory is copying plenty of text from his website (presumably) ointo pages. His whole edit history looks like spamming! What's the standard procedure? The village pump? A request for comments?

(The problem isn't just that he's copying material, it's also that it's not encyclopedic, and that he adds loads of links back to his site) Flammifer 13:54, 28 April 2006 (UTC)

and its a million times worse since his site is the worst I've ever seen.  :) Stuph 17:37, 28 April 2006 (UTC)

copyvio concerning Phaerimm page

It was said that my edit of the Phaerimm page held copied texts from http://www.realms.force9.co.uk/UD/races/rfour.htm.

I have to say this: Phaerimm is a kind of creature from the fantasy world of the Wizards of the Coast. Many books producted from that company has written introductions concerning Phaerimm.

I doubt the information from the given link themselves holds any copyright, its not a offical site.

This whole misjudgement of violating copyright thing really kills my passion. I wrote most of the text in the page myself, and some from the published source book, but never from http://www.realms.force9.co.uk/UD/races/rfour.htm, which does not even worth a glance!

I humbly request that this copyvio tag be removed. I will continue to support wikipedia with faith and passion.

Automatic update of new listings

The new listings are not updated automatically anymore, since User:Uncle_G seems to be MIA, and his update bot User:Uncle G's 'bot has disappeared as well. A few people update manually the new listings, but it is not always up to date. Does anyone mind if I get a new bot to do this job ? Of course, I'll go through the usual bot approval etc, but I just wanted to make sure I am not duplicating any work before spending too much time on this. Schutz 23:44, 6 May 2006 (UTC)

Sounds good- do it. --Duk 00:04, 7 May 2006 (UTC)

Let me know if you want any help with it :-) --lightdarkness ^(talk) 02:01, 7 May 2006 (UTC)

Thanks for the offer ! I have some code that should do the job without too much work, but I'll start with something easy (just add the new listing), and if everything goes well, will improve it afterwards. I won't hesitate to ask you if I need anything ! Schutz 09:43, 7 May 2006 (UTC)

Ok, I've listed the request at Wikipedia:Bots/Requests for approvals#Zorglbot: rotate copyright problems pages. Schutz 12:37, 9 May 2006 (UTC)

Splitting images and articles

Would anyone object to splitting the images and articles into different subpages? They would still be shown next to each other under their respective dates, but personally, I think if they were seperated, it would be easier for admins who are more familiar with one over the other. Any objections? --lightdarkness ^(talk) 03:18, 7 May 2006 (UTC)

Sounds like a good idea.Geni 18:23, 7 May 2006 (UTC)

I also agree with this. The page is obviously not functioning well in it's current design. --Birgitte§β ʈ Talk 19:06, 7 May 2006 (UTC)

No objections from me either. --Siva1979^{Talk to me} 05:50, 9 May 2006 (UTC)

Alright, gonna give it a shot here... --lightdarkness ^(talk) 22:27, 9 May 2006 (UTC)

A proposal

I responded to an inquiry from another editor who questioned the use of certain fair use images. After I briefly pointed out the basic rationales for the photos, I was instructed at length about how my rationale was incorrect and provided with an explanation as to how fair use "works." The discussion essentially stopped after I explained how I was licensed to practice law and knew how to determine "fair use" under 17 USC § 107.

After the conversation, it got me thinking. Everyone seems to have an opinion about what fair use is and is unafraid to share this interpretation with others. In fact, there's so much hand wringing in various forums about fair use, it's a wonder any articles get written at all. As someone who represents media clients I can honestly state that copyright violations on websites are typically handled by deleting the offending media which almost always resolves the problem. A more pressing issue, from my vantage point, is: who told these editors (no attorneys that I have yet met) that they can provide explanations and render opinions as to the application of the legal doctrine of fair use or other aspects of copyright law?

Wikipedia is based in Florida. As such, I will assume that the authorities of that state would be involved in enforcing state laws. However, other states have similar laws and may assert jurisdiction. As to the concept of fair use, it falls within the federal laws governing intellectual property and the preferred means of obtaining any opinions is via counsel licensed before the USPTO or those who have background in such issues.

From the Florida Bar Association's website:

What is the unlicensed practice of law?

The unlicensed practice of law, in its simplest terms, is when someone who is not licensed or otherwise authorized to practice law in Florida practices law. In determining whether the giving advice and counsel and the performance of services in legal matters constitute the practice of law, it is safe to follow the rule that if giving such advice and performance of services affect important rights of a person under the law, and if the reasonable protection of the rights and property of those advised and served requires that the persons giving such advice possess legal skill and knowledge of the law greater than that possessed by the average citizen, then the giving of such advice and performance of services by one for another constitutes the practice of law.[4]

Practicing law in Florida without a license is a third degree felony punishable by up to five years in prison.[5] In certain cases, the Courts have incarcerated people who have done so, a Pensacola man recently spent five (5) months in jail for unlicensed legal practice.[6]

The Florida penal statute states:

§ 454.23 Penalties.--Any person not licensed or otherwise authorized to practice law in this state who practices law in this state or holds himself or herself out to the public as qualified to practice law in this state, or who willfully pretends to be, or willfully takes or uses any name, title, addition, or description implying that he or she is qualified, or recognized by law as qualified, to practice law in this state, commits a felony of the third degree, punishable as provided in s. 775.082, s. 775.083, or s. 775.084.

Is an editor who publically announces that a phrase or image is being improperly used within the context of federal intellectual property law holding him or herself out to practice law? In many instance I have seen, the person is quite emphatic though brief in declaring an opinion. "Fair use doesn't apply here" and "this material isn't in the public domain" (or variations thereof) are common expressions seen on many pages. Others go into more specific details, offering their version on what the law is and how it works. Presumably the person who takes heed of this information is receiving legal advice from a (presumably) non-lawyer. Will that person take that information and act on it in other forums? Who knows.

I posit for discussion consideration of the following rule:

For the protection of Wikipedia, its officers and agents, no one except persons authorized to practice law within the United States and who is either licensed with the USPTO or otherwise familiar with copyright law may provide advice and determine the suitability relative to the use or removal of alleged copyrighted materials.

I would be interested in seeing some feedback. Jtmichcock 21:55, 8 May 2006 (UTC)

This proposal, if implemented, should apply to all Wikimedia projects. It appears to be addressing just one of many problems resulting from a general lack of understanding of the law. Brian Jason Drake 04:39, 9 May 2006 (UTC)

There are a number of problems with your arguments. The first is the claim that you know how to determine fair use. You can't do that. Only a court can do that. At best to can produce a fairly good estimate of the result the court would produce. The second is your claim that people are giving legal advice. They are not. They are merely debating how to enforce Wikipedia policy. We are not affecting anyone's rights under law. People do not have the legal right to upload pictures to Wikipedia and they do not have the legal right for them not to be deleted. What we do does not have any effect on the rights of the various owners of IP to protect their IP (in the form of sending DMCA notices and the like). Thirdly I rather doubt you would be able to successfully extradite me. Fourthly with the number of problem fair use images around we don’t have the rescores to use lawyers only.Geni 05:14, 9 May 2006 (UTC)

1. As I read Jtmichcock's comment, when he talked about making a decision, he meant a decision that would guide Wikimedia's actions, not necessarily a legally accepted one.
2. If you treat Wikimedia as a person (and this is not as far-fetched as it may sound according to what I've heard), then (since Wikimedia has rights too) the issue is whether we are using skill and knowledge greater than that possessed by the average citizen. I would guess that we are. Therefore we are technically giving legal advice.
3. You don't think a legal challenge would be succesful? Do you want to take that risk?
4. We don't have to keep the disputed images. As you say, "People do not have the legal right to upload pictures to Wikipedia and they do not have the legal right for them not to be deleted." Brian Jason Drake 08:10, 9 May 2006 (UTC)

1)"and knew how to determine "fair use"" looks like he is claiming he know how to determain fair use.

2)No. Th foundations legal stratergy appears to be to fall back on the protection they think they have under the DMCA. We are mearly trying to reduce the number of times that happens.

3)If all else fails.

4)Very good. Now what do you mean by dissputed? Judging by when the foundation gets involved they don't worry too much until the DMCA notice turns up. At that point they might want legal advice (or they might just delete the image). Remeber Jtmichcock was argueing in favor of keeping an image.Geni 17:22, 9 May 2006 (UTC)

1. Anyone can tell you how to determine fair use by looking up the rules for it and reciting them. That doesn't mean much in itself.
2. Huh?
3. Huh?
4. "Disputed" simply means that someone has disputed it, be it an anonymous editor or someone sending a DMCA notice. I am (obviously?) referring to those disputes that mean that "we don’t have the rescores to use lawyers only."

(I'm not familiar with the DMCA) Brian Jason Drake 07:13, 11 May 2006 (UTC)

Fifthly. I would add that anyone whogoes to the trouble of listing legal penalties for actions he doesn't approve of and notes the consequences for some unnamed person is, implicitly, violating WP:NLT. I might add that, as I recall, the Texas Bar Association tried this logic out when they tried to bar Nolo Press from distributing its legal self-help books in Texas. --Calton | Talk 05:43, 9 May 2006 (UTC)

Listing legal penalties for actions one does not approve of does not constitute a legal threat. It informs us about the possible consequences of those actions should someone sue us, and remember that anyone could sue us. Brian Jason Drake 08:10, 9 May 2006 (UTC)

I have to agree with Brianjd here. --Siva1979^{Talk to me} 08:24, 9 May 2006 (UTC)

Listing legal penalties for actions one does not approve of does not constitute a legal threat. Bilge. Listing legal penalties for actions one does not approve of AND telling some anecdote about some poor (unnamed) sap who got in trouble DOES constitute a legal threat, a long-winded variant on the old standby "Say, nice little store you got here, be ashamed if omething happened to it." The intent is to inhibit action through reference to outside legal action, a clear violation of the WP:NLT policy: couching it in passive-aggressive syntax using gaseous terms doesn't change that. --Calton | Talk 10:43, 10 May 2006 (UTC)

I'm sorry, but I fail to see any legal threat. In the first instance, I am in no position to do anything legally, I am neither a prosecutor or bar officer. I am placing up for discussion a proposal that I believe can be used to avoid problems. It would be no different than, say, proposing that people who uploaded kiddie porn be banned permanantly. Would you object to that proposal being offered for discussion? It should be a source of concern to all when members cite statutes and case law in support of a position unless they happen to have the credentials to do so. It would be no different if members offered medical advice or opined about the deductibility of expenses on tax returns without similar training. These are the sorts of situations that Wikipedians should be seeking to avoid and to not discuss these matters in a civil fashion would be irresponsible. Jtmichcock 11:15, 10 May 2006 (UTC)

If you think there is a legal problem with our current system take it to the foundation. In any case the positions they are citing case law for have no legal effect (unless we have run into a DMCA notice which would be handled at foundation level.). There is no legal effect of me saying no I don't think that image is fair use on wikipedia I'm going to delete it. What "rights of a person under the law" have I taken away from anyone? I'm pretty certian no one has the right to upload stuff to wikipedia.Geni 03:24, 11 May 2006 (UTC)

That advice has important implications for the Wikimedia Foundation's rights. Based on what I, as a non-lawyer, have seen, it is possible that legally, the Wikimedia Foundation could be treated as a person. Brian Jason Drake 07:13, 11 May 2006 (UTC)

The foundation makes it's own arangements in order to optain legal advice. Nothing to do with us. The foundation is pretty much free to decide what to host and what not to host on it's servers. It is free to use "what geni thinks is a copyvio" as an exculsion criteria.Geni 13:20, 11 May 2006 (UTC)

Someone wrote above The first is the claim that you know how to determine fair use. You can't do that. Only a court can do that. At best to can produce a fairly good estimate of the result the court would produce. I'm constantly telling clients how a court may interpret a particular act or construe specific language. That's what legal advice ultimately means: how would this look in court. Jtmichcock 11:05, 9 May 2006 (UTC)

Geni has just about said all there is to say. A few observations: we don't pretend to be lawyers, hence a large part of the penalties paragraph you quoted above doen't apply. Remains the question whether expressing an opinion on law is "practicing the law". I hold that this isn't so, and that one shouldn't misconstrue the prohibition on unlicensed practice of law as a muzzle to prevent people from voicing their opinions. What we do here on Wikipedia is, as Geni quite correctly said, debating Wikipedia policies. These policies need of course be in compliance with the law, and one area where this is most eminent is image copyrights. Of course we do voice our opinions about what the law requires in order to implement our policies. Once implemented, we also may explain to others why a certain policy is the way it is, which again may entail explaining our understanding of the law. None of these are "practicing law". We do not give legal advice, and there is no client-attorney relationship. In fact, since all on-wiki communication is public, the confidentiality required for such a relationship and its communications is completely missing. We do, however, tell someone that he shouldn't upload this or that image to Wikipedia (or that an image uploaded will be deleted) because our policies are against it because we think that the law doesn't allow it. See the difference? Lupo 13:50, 9 May 2006 (UTC)

P.S.: of course a great many people would just love it if all those of us who labor hard to get rid of the most egregious copyright violations here had to shut up and go home because they were "practicing law". But that won't wash. Lupo 13:50, 9 May 2006 (UTC)

I don't see anything in the definition about "pretending" to be lawyers, a "client-attorney relationship" or confidentiality.

...one shouldn't misconstrue the prohibition on unlicensed practice of law as a muzzle to prevent people from voicing their opinions. Of course not. But we need to have certain restrictions on our content for our protection. Brian Jason Drake 07:13, 11 May 2006 (UTC)

May we introduce you to WP:OFFICE? Again once a problem reaches foundation level the foundation has it's own sources of legal advice.Geni 13:20, 11 May 2006 (UTC)

By that same standard, aren't you practicing law without a license when you purport to advise Wikipedia's editors and administrators that their efforts to bring the site in compliance with (their opinion about) copyright law may in fact be a violation of the law against unauthorized practice of law? And then I'm breaking the law too by suggesting this. An infinite regress occurs... *Dan T.* 18:16, 2 June 2006 (UTC)

7 days?

The project page says, "Instructions for administrators": Listings should be checked and processed by administrators after 7 days. See Wikipedia:Copyright problems/Advice for admins for some help. But the "Advice for admins" doesn't say anything about waiting 7 days (unless they're a claim of permission or ownership). Do we really have to wait 7 days to delete obvious copyvios? Could someone clear this up for me? Thanks. --Fang Aili ^說嗎? 17:13, 9 May 2006 (UTC)

see [WP:CSD#Articles]] number 8 for when we can vapourise obvious copyvios.Geni 17:25, 9 May 2006 (UTC)

So we can immediately delete 48 hr-old articles, but must wait 7 days for anything older? --Fang Aili ^說嗎? 17:48, 9 May 2006 (UTC)

It must meet the following:

• Material is unquestionably copied from the website of a commercial content provider (e.g. encyclopedia, news service) and;
• The article and its entire history contains only copyright violation material, excluding tags, templates, and minor edits and;
• Uploader makes no assertion of permission or fair use, and none seems likely and;
• The material is identified within 48 hours of upload and is almost or totally un-wikified (to diminish mirror problem).

--lightdarkness ^(talk) 22:19, 9 May 2006 (UTC)

In obvious cases as outlined by the rule.Geni 18:31, 9 May 2006 (UTC)

Image:Albert Einstein 1947.jpg

It is claimed that this image is Public Domain because "anything published before January 1, 1964 and not renewed is in the public domain in the United States.". Can anyone verify this? (also, how would one know whether the copyright was renewed?). Arniep 21:55, 17 May 2006 (UTC)

In the United States, the Library of Congress has staff that research the issue. Jkelly 21:59, 17 May 2006 (UTC)

I assume all of the images at [7] would therefore also be OK for Commons? A related issue, do we have a fair use claim for Image:Einstongue.jpg considering we have so many free images of Einstein? Arniep 22:16, 17 May 2006 (UTC)

Each of the images at the LOC page you just linked to have a description page, which gives the restrictions on use. A lot of them are PD, but not all. I have no opinion on the Einstein tongue image; it would depend upon usage. We certainly shouldn't be decorating pages with it. Jkelly 01:54, 18 May 2006 (UTC)

The pre-1964 language is a reference to the modifications that year to the 1909 Act. The Berne Convention Implementation Act superceded the '64 legislation to the extent that copyright can be revived if something is circulated with a tag. That's how It's a Wonderful Life left the public domain. Whether or not there's a tagged image out there (and dollars to donuts there is) seems to illustrate the point I made above. Here's someone who has taken incomplete legal trivia and turned it into doctrine. Not a good idea. Jtmichcock 22:21, 17 May 2006 (UTC)

Talk:Chef's uniform

Talk:Chef's uniform has a statement that use is permitted provided the copyright and relase on the talk page is preserved. Is this compatible with GFDL? Since we edit (frequently) can we accept such use and restrictions? RJFJR 22:02, 18 May 2006 (UTC)

Content must be released under the GFDL, or another free license. Since it has not, we cannot use the content. --lightdarkness ^(talk) 22:26, 18 May 2006 (UTC)

Image:Curry Beanz.jpg

I'm wondering if this is really a legitimate photo to go in Wikimedia Commons, seeing as it depicts various logos and package designs that are presumably copyright to Heinz? I have a similar photo of a coffee packet that I want to upload but am not sure if it should go in Commons or in one of the Fair Use categories to illustrate the product in question. Cheers. — SteveRwanda 15:35, 20 May 2006 (UTC)

Image:Pateros High School.jpg

One thing I've noticed looking around Wikipedia is that people have been tagging images created by Washington State or entities within the state as being in the public domain due to being created by the "US Federal Government" (Having a wa.gov address doesn't make WA State a branch of the US Government). Washington State (including school districts) claims copyright on its creations, and does not release them unless you find a notice on the page of the agency itself (there is plenty of statues in the Revised Code of Washington and the Washington Administrative Code explicitly mentioning retaining copyrights). Alemily 18:31, 20 May 2006 (UTC)

Holy frack!

The backlog is DESTROYED!!!! Woooooooooo!!! We should throw a party. =) --Fang Aili ^說嗎? 15:57, 21 May 2006 (UTC)

Lots of hard work went into it :-) Thanks to all that helped! --lightdarkness ^(talk) 13:48, 22 May 2006 (UTC)

G Quadruplex

Can someone look at this - looks like a copied academic paper or something? Not sure what to make of it...Stevage 13:12, 22 May 2006 (UTC)

Template:cv-unsure glitch

I've just spent the last five minutes trying to work out why I couldn't get {{cv-unsure}} to work the way it was supposed to. It'd be worth telling people that it only works if you have an "unembellished" sig such as:

Grutness 10:10, 23 May 2006 (UTC)

...but doesn't work if you have worked in links to your talk page etc. Any way it can be fixed for fancier sigs, or should the information given for how to use it get rid of the three tildes and simply say "your user name here"? Grutness...wha? 10:10, 23 May 2006 (UTC)

Image:CarolineFeraday-01.jpg

The image in question is in the public domain, it is fair use. Why is it up for deletion as copyvio? --RichardHarrold 12:19, 23 May 2006 (UTC)

Being in the public domain and being fair use are mutually exclusive. This is certainly not a public domain image. Whether you can claim fair use or not depends on how it is being used. You might want to read the copyrights page for a better understanding of copyright issues.--Birgitte§β ʈ Talk 16:01, 23 May 2006 (UTC)

Requesting input on a template idea

I've been playing with a little template for a specific kind of copyright violation I've seen several instances of: the addition of song lyrics to an article about a band/musician/song/etc. They most often seem to be a good-faith attempt to improve the article, made without a proper understanding of copyright and Wikipedia's policies. Therefore, I first wrote a little blurb (intended to be friendly) for my own use, notifying the editor in question that the lyrics have been removed and pointing them to pages that would help explain why. What I'm wondering now is if this would be something useful for other editors.

As a Wiki-newbie, I defer to those with more wisdom and experience.  :) Is this something "worth" a template? And if it is, any input on wording, links, etc., is more than welcome.

The (very beta) version of the template can be found at User:PaperTruths/copyvio-lyrics, and the implementation can be found at User:PaperTruths/White_space#Templates. Thanks for your time! (I also posted this at Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_user_warnings.) —PaperTruths (Talk) 08:13, 30 May 2006 (UTC)

GFDL status of cropped image

I have a specific example I'm concerned about here, but I'm sure there are other examples like this. The image Muraliposter.JPG, which was tagged as GFDL by the uploader, is a photograph of a poster, which in turns features a photo of Murali. I'm dubious whether this GFDL claim is reasonable, since in taking a photograph of the poster, they haven't really "created" anything that they can claim copyright for — IMHO this probably ought to be fair use, although possibly somebody who deals more often with image copyrights can correct me.

More worrying though is Muralitharan Poster.png, which is a crop of Muraliposter.JPG, and thus has also been tagged as GFDL. However, this crop reduces the image just to Murali's face, which means that it is now basically identical to the original photograph of Murali himself (albeit much lower resolution). This clearly can't be right — somebody presumably holds the copyright to the original Murali photo, and thus any exact copy of that photo can't be GFDL'd without their consent. So how should either of these images be retagged? — sjorford++ 15:43, 6 June 2006 (UTC)

I must agree with your assessment. In fact, I'd argue even the original work can't be placed under GFDL, as it's just a picture of a poster with relatively little creative value added - the poster's creator should have to give permission. Deco 20:54, 6 June 2006 (UTC)

I agree that cropping just the individual photo murali is problematic. As per posters, i can't judge the exact legal framework here, but if political organizations (which is the case in this issue) put up posters in public, then they have in one way or another agreed that they can be photographed. I do believe there is a difference between scanning a work of art in your own place or photographic in public. --Soman 09:33, 7 June 2006 (UTC)

Important note for admins re template

Admins, please take a look at WP:CP#Template transitional period for an important change to the copyvio template. Kcordina ^Talk 10:48, 7 June 2006 (UTC)

Low resolution

The fair use policy on images stipulates that we use low resolution versions. What do we mean by "low resolution"? I can't find any guidance. -Will Beback 03:59, 8 June 2006 (UTC)

Something low enough that it makes the use of the image outside of Wikipedia impractical. Example, if your uploading an album cover, you want the resolution low enough so that users won't be able to print out a copy and use it for their pirated cds. Basically, we want it just barely big enough for an accurate representation of the subject. --Hetar 05:33, 13 June 2006 (UTC)

A place to report general user-specific problems?

This user[8] is routinely posting large chunks of text, etc. cut&pasted from either http://www.soapcentral.com and/or subpages for characters from http://abc.go.com/daytime/allmychildren/ . I need to go home and go to sleep--hopefully someone can take over trying to keep the copyvios off Wikipedia. 24.18.215.132 04:28, 8 June 2006 (UTC)

Helpful edit summaries when posting templates

Folks. Keeping on top of the copyvio backlog is a tough task as there are so many pages each day to check and delete/restore. I have been thinking of a couple of things that could speed things up:-

There seem to be a lot of self-admitted copyvios, that beyond any doubt should be deleted. If this were noted in the edit summary when adding the template, or when listing on WP:CP it would save the admin having to review the article and the source to ensure that is true.

Similarly a note indicating that the history has been reviewed and there is no older version would be equally helpful - it can easily double or triple the time taken to clear a copyvio if you have to review the history.

I guess there is potential for some abuse of such a system by users incorrectly labelling things, but keeping on top of the backlog is a huge chore for some of us. Kcordina ^Talk 14:31, 19 June 2006 (UTC)

A deleting admin should always be reviewing these things for themselves anyway. It is not defence to say "but he told me to". This is not to say that the above suggestions are not useful advice, but they shouldn't be offered as means of absolving the deleter from due diligence. -Splash - tk 14:42, 19 June 2006 (UTC)

Logos and fair use reduction

I was thinking about whether using gfdl/pd photos of corporate logos on signs and ibllboards would be good to reduce the amoun tof fair use needed in articles. --larsinio (poke)^(prod) 16:20, 19 June 2006 (UTC)

You can't make a free derivative work of an unfree image. Photographing a creative work doesn't negate the creativity that went into the original, and so doesn't negate its copyright. —Simetrical (talk • contribs) 20:36, 19 June 2006 (UTC)

In other words, even if you freely license your logo photo, any rights that the company has to the logo itself may still prevent the photo from being used under free license terms. Deco 21:18, 19 June 2006 (UTC)

Does this apply to things I own? Like if I buy a bottle of coke and make a picture of it, can I not make it a PD image because of the creativity that went into the packagin is protected by copyright? --larsinio (poke)^(prod) 21:23, 20 June 2006 (UTC)

I am not a lawyer, but I believe you would possess limited rights to the photo and its organization, due to the creative input of lighting, angle, and composition, but not to the art on the label. In many such circumstances the label art may be considered fair use. The shape of the packaging may or may not be subject to copyright - there's been at least one recent ruling in which the shape of a vodka bottle was ruled to be ineligible for copyright protection (ref). A good page to ask more about this is Wikipedia talk:Copyright problems. Whether or not you own the object copyrighted material is printed on doesn't matter - I can buy a book or magazine full of copyrighted material. Deco 21:31, 20 June 2006 (UTC)

So basically I'm asking what can I and what can I not make pd/gfdl in terms of content/property I own. --larsinio (poke)^(prod) 22:15, 20 June 2006 (UTC)

There's no really easy answer to what I think you're asking, but, in general, your ownership of the subject of the photograph has no effect on that photograph's final copyright status. Jkelly 22:23, 20 June 2006 (UTC)

Maybe if you have a specific question? What do you want to photograph? Regards, Ben Aveling 10:01, 21 June 2006 (UTC)

Like anything, common objects that need better photographs or use unsourced pictures from the web. Items with logos on them or commericla packaging --larsinio (poke)^(prod) 15:48, 22 June 2006 (UTC)

Another worthy backlog

Now that the backlog here is dead (for the time being), if anyone fancies tackling a truely monstrous backlog, there's one here. If everyone takes a few each, it'll be gone in no time - they're nice and quick to deal with, so dive in. Kcordina ^Talk 15:25, 22 June 2006 (UTC)

Too many copyvio's

Hi, today I was curious and I checked about fifty articles with the {{wikify}} tag on them. Of them seventeen were copyvio's. (ones I could find on google anyway) I really was surprised on that amount. I guess it already has been discussed multiple times, but is there nothing more that can be done against it? Not that I have any brilliant idea's though. Garion96 ^(talk) 23:42, 30 June 2006 (UTC)

Link to external webpage showing video clip - copyright issue?

A question for you - I am trying to understand an issue around copyright violation marked on a page I updated. The page is Landshark and I added a link to a web page that shows a clip of the skit into the external links section. It was reveresed as a possible violation. I have added a note into the talk page of the editor who reversed it as well as the article talk page but have not gotten any feedback. I read WP:CV but don't really see how I would have contravened the policy. Any thoughts or pointing to a person/article would be appreicate. Thanks--Gay Cdn 18:51, 1 July 2006 (UTC)

The legal case for linking copyvio material is much less clear, but we frown on it. This has come up at VP a number of times. Deco 19:03, 1 July 2006 (UTC)

As someone still unclear about copyright issues here (but learning) I don't think I am the best person to update the main page with this grey area around linking copyvio material, but I think it needs to be there.--Gay Cdn 19:27, 1 July 2006 (UTC)

Copyrighted text used with permission

What to do if someone uses copyrighted text (no third party use) with permission from the website owner? I'm looking over the contributions of User:Ela112, who has made many articles copied verbatim from http://www.lankalibrary.com, such as Abhayagiri Dagaba. He has made a note saying he has used content from that website and with permission. SCHZMO ✍ 15:32, 3 July 2006 (UTC)

He should forward that permission to permissions AT wikimedia.org. Better still, he could get the website owner to send an e-mail himself, stating that he licenses his texts under the GFDL. Still simpler, he could just get the website owner to include a statement on his web site saying that the texts are licensed under the terms of the GFDL. Lupo 15:48, 3 July 2006 (UTC)

Which, to be clear, is to say that "no third party use" is not acceptable material for Wikipedia and, absent such a declaration, needs to be deleted. In the meantime, the standard treatment of blank with {copyvio} is the right thing to do. The editor also needs to stop uploading such material until such time as it becomes available under either the GFDL or the public domain. -Splash - tk 16:17, 3 July 2006 (UTC)

The permission from the owner of that website to distribute information seems to be confirmed on Talk:Mihintale. SCHZMO ✍ 02:06, 4 July 2006 (UTC)

This specific exchange is not sufficient. In particular, the request and subsequent permission make no mention of the restrictions inherent in GFDL. Please feel free to use any information on this site is not nearly the same as I agree to license this material under GFDL. And, a copy of an alleged email posted by a contributor wanting to use the information is not exactly adequate. Please see Wikipedia:Requesting copyright permission. -- Rick Block (talk) 04:25, 4 July 2006 (UTC)

I have restored the text, but I made a note on the talk page that the confirmation was questionable. SCHZMO ✍ 20:00, 4 July 2006 (UTC)

University of Guelph copyvio

A question about proper procedure:

On June 19, I realised a section of the article University of Guelph-Humber was a copyvio. A section of this article was included on the main University of Guelph article, under the section University of Guelph#Guelph-Humber Campus. I blanked the entire University of Guelph-Humber article, and the problem section in the University of Guelph article. The copyvio issue on the University of Guelph-Humber article has been resolved, but there is still, almost a month later, a big ugly copyvio notice in the Guelph-Humber section of the University of Guelph page. This confuses me, since it's a fairly minor copyvio, and an alternate section has been written under Talk:University of Guelph/Temp. Can I simply remove the notice and insert the newly written version on my own, or do I need to wait for someone more powerful than I to do it? Thanks in advance for the help. --Gpollock 05:12, 12 July 2006 (UTC)

Also, this might be further complicated by the fact that it is just a single section of the article that is a copyvio, but I think I used a tag that says the entire article is a copyvio. (I'm not actually sure if a "section copyvio" tag even exists). --Gpollock 05:14, 12 July 2006 (UTC)

Be bold. Yank the copyvio text, insert non-copyvio text, and just make sure you got it all - then the tag should be able to come off with no problem. Deco 10:16, 12 July 2006 (UTC)

Thanks for the help, Deco! --Gpollock 16:21, 12 July 2006 (UTC)

Possible Infringement

---

This is a section that I have created so that any user that suspects possible copyright infringement on a certain wiki article can paste it here to leave it up to a more knowledgeable user to deal with. Questionable articles are to be listed in this section with a simple dash followed by the link, like so:

-[Link to Article]

When a user edits the article to his satisfaction, he is to paste his changes like so:

-[Link to Article] / "All puppies are orange" is a direct quote from www.orangepuppies.com/whatpuppies so I changed it to "Some puppies can be orange" Ring-Ding July 30, 2006

Other users that notice that an edited article still infringes copyright laws may paste on additional edits by adding a "/" and their changes.

Ring-Ding July 30, 2006

---

-

Yahoo Answers

How do we deal with websites like Yahoo Answers where answers [9] (see the underagelying answer) have stolen the answer straight from Wikipedia without following the GFDL? I have tried contacting Yahoo but they're totally unhelpful, telling me that the owner of the content needs to tell them about the copy violation. This is a bit of a tough one on a collaborative website like this! Tompagenet 18:53, 4 August 2006 (UTC)

U.S. Government text

Hi,

I'm currently wikifying a World Oil Market timeline for another user, here. It's still a work in progress, but I think it'll make a great Wikipedia article. There's just one thing I wanted to be sure about. The text in the timeline articles is a direct copy job (not by me) from documents in the U.S. Department of Energy located here. If I am correct, works by the U.S. federal government are in the public domain. Can someone enlighten me so I make sure that I haven't wasted hours of time on this? Thanks. Green451 01:25, 15 July 2006 (UTC)

Polish Reformed Church Article

Hi,

I am the copyright owner (I am the author) of the article "Polish Reformed Church". I added the text on Wikipedia, but it got suspended for copyright breach (it is also on www.reformowani.pl). What do I do now? I REALLY don't want to write the same stuff again. How can I get you to OK it?

Kazimierz Bem

According to the introduction to this page, WP:Copyright problems, it is sufficient to either "make a note permitting reuse under GFDL at the site of the original publication" or "Send an email from an address associated with the original publication to permissions at wikimedia dot org or a postal message to the Wikimedia Foundation", the contact information of which you can find at http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Contact_us —Centrx→talk • 03:51, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Copyright problems/Log

What is to be done about archives? No one archives the copyright problems, and I think it would be unnecessary to do so, and a burden on those dealing with copyright problems, especially when many copyright problems may not get listed on this page, being dealt with either by speedy deletion or dealt with in Category:Possible copyright violations. In addition to not archiving, and especially with the increasing size of Wikipedia, wouldn't it be better to have this be a dated category, etc.? Having identifiers of copyright infringement not only find the copyright infringement on the Web, but also to list it here when nearly all of the listings have no discussion whatsoever is an unnecessary burden. —Centrx→talk • 03:57, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

Every indicator screams copyvio; can't find source

Kjkolb posted above on this same topic (without response). I too would like some feedback on what to do when you have an addition that has so many hallmarks of a copyvio that you know with a high degree of certainty that it is but you can't find the source. Certainly WP:AGF comes into play, but should it put us in a straitjacket? The article in question had approximately 20 kilobytes of polished text added in a single edit, by a new user whose talk page edits show about a second grade mastery of English. Given these facts, I can think of no scenario where such text would later be revealed as not a copyvio. I could simply remove the material as unsourced under the technical letter of policy, but that's a poor fit, when my reason for removing are otherwise—feels dishonest. What would be your reaction if you came across a removal of such material with an edit summary: "removal of presumptive copyvio text"? Any thoughts?--Fuhghettaboutit 23:16, 19 July 2006 (UTC)

I think most users will respond to a (polite) direct question, e.g. "Hi, I noticed you recently added content to article xxxx. Did you write it yourself and, if not, can you please let me know where it came from?" If you get no response, then a followup along the lines of "This content looks to me like it might be copied from somewhere (although I don't know where). Until you let me know where it came from, I'm removing it from the article (blah, blah, blah)". I think anything else is likely to violate WP:BITE or WP:AGF (or both). -- Rick Block (talk) 00:18, 20 July 2006 (UTC)

That sounds like a very reasonable course of action. I suppose, in the case that if I get no response after an appropriate wait period, the same action would be justified. Thanks!--Fuhghettaboutit 00:41, 20 July 2006 (UTC)

Fair use issues?

Image:Sacred Heart Cathedral Richmond Va.jpg is claimed "fair use", but the photo does not seem to be explicitly for promotional purposes. This page specifically says "©2006 Cathedral of the Sacred Heart. All Rights Reserved." I wasn't sure if this was a violation or not, so I didn't want to tag it as such, so instead I am asking here. As a side note, I live in Richmond, and I am a amature photographer, so I can get a high resolution image sometime in the next week or so to replace this one.--Andrew c 01:55, 20 July 2006 (UTC)

Dated categories

What are people's thoughts on having dated categories, as with CAT:PROD? This would need some template changing and adding to the bot. It could also be done without a bot, that is by not using subcategories but by sorting copyright violations by date, like [[Category:Possible copyright violations|2006-07-20]], but this may be a novel idea. —Centrx→talk • 04:38, 20 July 2006 (UTC)

Splash Mountain

A great deal of the article Splash Mountain seems to be from http://members.tripod.com/four_kingdoms/splash_mountain.htm, with a few word changes. It looks more as if Wikipedia copied it from that personel website. I'm not sure if this is right or not, so I thought I would ask it here. Thank you.Jimjones00000005 19:50, 21 July 2006 (UTC)

Thank you. I have changed the section in question back to an older version that is not copied from that website. —Centrx→talk • 22:46, 21 July 2006 (UTC)

Can we use this source??

Hello,

Suppose that there is a web site offering useful information, and claiming (on its home page) that the material is freely available to public domain. However, when you look more precisely, you find out that a large proportion of the content offered there is word by word translation, or copy and paste, of a book which is under copyright (or otherwise, the web site that is offering the content doesn't have the right to offer the content.) Now, is this allowed to copy information from that web site to Wikipedia? If the answer is no, is this 100% no, or we still can copy those pieces of information that we are not sure they are grabbed illegaly from a copyright protected sourece?

Please advise huji—TALK 21:18, 21 July 2006 (UTC)

The answer is no, since the text is not actually public domain (and certainly not GFDL). It is better by far to never copy and paste anything, but if you must, you should only do so when you are cast iron certain that it is public domain or GFDL. You can of course write the material in your own original words, and that is the route to take. -Splash - tk 22:18, 21 July 2006 (UTC)

Thanks for your precious comment. One last question: If I want to offer information in public domain (under GFDL) should I add a notice under all of the pages, or is it enough to state in one page that all the text is public domain? huji—TALK 11:35, 22 July 2006 (UTC)

Do you mean on your own website? It's largely up to you, I suppose, but the easier is to find your copyright statement the better. I guess what I see on most websites is a standardised footer note that links to the actual copyrights page. If you mean for on-Wikipedia purposes, then all your edits here are GFDL'd anyway (and there's a statement saying so at the bottom of every page already). There is no need for a further statement unless you wish to multi-licence your work.

One thing I'd like to unpick slightly: the GFDL is not public domain; your use of parentheses in your second sentence confuses me somewhat. A release into the public domain (where such is possible; the US is, the UK is unclear, for example) allows anybody to do anything they like with it for ever without having any obligations to you of any kind. The GFDL on the other hand, insists they credit you for your part in the work and that any derivative work also be released under exactly the GFDL. -Splash - tk 22:29, 23 July 2006 (UTC)

Reform on how to deal with copyvios?

There is a discussion about reforming how copyvios are dealt with on Wikipedia here. Input would be appreciated. -- Where 21:04, 23 July 2006 (UTC)

Searching for Copyvios

I'm still pretty new to wikipedia, but I'm doing my best to try and find copvios (please forgive me if I mislabeled any). While doing this, I've began to wonder about searching on wikipedia. Is there a way, for instance to search for articles whose were, say, over 5kb at creation? Or images less than 20kb with a "irrevocably released all rights" tag? It seems like those are very likely to be copyvio and it would be very helpful to just have a list produced matching those criteria. Also, are there any other suggestions for finding copyvios? I've been going through the "To Wikify" categories and searching through google, but I'm sure there exist other ways which are more effective.
Also, on a more personal level, I found it troubling that a full eighth of the articles I looked through last night yielded copyvios. Is there any way to bring more people into the search or deter people from posting copyvios or something? Well, thank you. --Douglas Whitaker 22:17, 23 July 2006 (UTC)

Some people have bots that watch out for these things at creation time, and when it is/was working, the Toolserver is/was probably able to provide that kind of information. But doing this on-Wiki with the tools you have available now, no, it can't be done. You can only find out the size of an article by typing its name in the search box and pressing "Search" rather than "Go". (Or editing an over-length page, when Mediawiki puts a message at the top warning you of its size.) To your final question: perhaps if you offered them cookies, or something, but regrettably not otherwise. -Splash - tk 22:32, 23 July 2006 (UTC)

What also helps to search for copyvio's is to use this site Copyscape.com instead of google. Garion96 (talk) 22:42, 23 July 2006 (UTC)

Sounds good. What is the proper procedure if I find out that, say, I've mislabeled a copyvio? (i.e. it was from a PD source that I didn't know was PD) Do I just remove it from the list of copyvios and revert or is there something else? --Douglas Whitaker 10:41, 24 July 2006 (UTC)

In my overzealousness, I marked one article and one image as copyvios and have since found proof that they aren't; basically, it was me thinking I had done enough background research when I hadn't. I've removed the copyvio tags from the pages and am going to remove them from the copyvio list next. Sorry for being too hasty and sacrificing quality for quantity. --Douglas Whitaker 19:33, 24 July 2006 (UTC)

And if I've committed any giant blunder by any of my actions, I'm sorry and implore your patience - I really would like to help in this area, but guess I'm just still newer than I realized at it. --Douglas Whitaker 19:39, 24 July 2006 (UTC)

A New Proposal

I have created a proposal at Wikipedia:Copyright review, based off Wikipedia:Copyright problems, to merge the copyright verification processes together. Please discuss the proposal on its talk page, not here. -- tariqabjotu (joturner) 19:49, 24 July 2006 (UTC)

Just a note regarding the project page

I think there is something wrong with the project page as everytime I visit it in mozilla it crashes the browser. It might be the size or something on it. I reinstalled to be sure, but I can't really use the page. Any thoughts?--Crossmr 03:22, 25 July 2006 (UTC)

Copyright on image content ?

Statue

The licence on Image:Sant antoni.egg.large.jpg says PD, issued by the wikipedian photographer. However, I'm unsure if this is applicable as this is a derivative work. __meco 08:47, 24 July 2006 (UTC)

This ruling only applies to two-dimension works. For pictures of statues (which is, effectively, a translation of a three dimensional work into a two-dimensional copy) the picture taker has creative input into which angle to take the photographs from. Therefore, a new copyright is created when the picture is taken. Therefore, pictures of public domain 3D works are not necessarily in the public domain. Jude (talk) 09:11, 24 July 2006 (UTC)

Maybe it's just me being dense. Does the above mean that the photographer is free to determine the licence and that the photograph is considered an independent work af art? (Because on the Norwegian Wikipedia, where I'm from, which abides by Norwegian laws in this field, such a photograph would be considered a copyright violation.) __meco 09:30, 24 July 2006 (UTC)

The implication in this case is that, if you take a photograph of a public domain piece of art, the person who took the photograph can claim copyright on it (it isn't in the public domain itself). Just like if you took a photo of a statue, in this case, that image, you would own the copyright. I am not a lawyer, though, this is just my understanding of that paragraph. Jude (talk) 09:22, 25 July 2006 (UTC)

See Commons:Derivative_works#Casebook under Photographs of buildings and artworks in public spaces. It's OK because it's in Spain. If it were in the US the answer would likely be different. William Avery 21:40, 31 July 2006 (UTC)

But the answer to this question based on US law is indeed relevent, as this is where Wiki is published. If the photo were published in Spain, it would be Spanish laws that would hold sway in that case. Regards. THEPROMENADER 21:45, 31 July 2006 (UTC)

Current consensus on the Commons seems to be as I explained, but ISTR at least one proviso about a case being won in Germany concerning an original work in Austria. William Avery 21:59, 31 July 2006 (UTC)

(grinning) Personally I'm just trying to sort out what counts here - and I think all that really counts on Wiki is US law. I really wish it were but a question of consensus, but unfortunately it's the hard-to-find, difficult-for-the-layman-to-interpret law that has the final say here. I do wish there was some sort of Wikiservice for this - it is important, non? THEPROMENADER 22:10, 31 July 2006 (UTC)

The déja lu is getting stronger so I've gone back and found the discussion on Commons. It was at Commons:Template_talk:Deletion_requests#Architecture_and_public_art. Anyway, I was looking for discussion of things like Image:Sam_Houston_Huntsville_Statue.jpg, which seems to me to be more straightforward. And Image:Civil_Rights_Memorial.jpg and Image:Lincoln_and_Davis_Statue.jpg? William Avery 07:06, 1 August 2006 (UTC)

Thank you for the clarifications and insightful discussion. I notice that in these exchanges as well, the participants are assuming that (example) German Wikipedia is in Germany - which would make German Wiki 'sueable' if German law protected a copyright type - but this is not the case, as all of Wiki's servers, all languages confounded without exception, are in the state of Florida, USA. This should make the question much simpler. THEPROMENADER 09:16, 1 August 2006 (UTC)

Eiffel Tower

Hello - this is a problem that I've been trying since some time to find a solution for. I have already recieved what seems to be a sensible reply on another page concerning copyright templates, but as I am not at all an expert in judicial affairs, would like to ask for some sort of confirmation. Another problem is that I am not at all sure where to ask for this "case-closing" confirmation.

In summary, the problem is this: I have taken a picture of the Eiffel tower at night. I have uploaded the photo here under a GNU license since it is my own work. It is now a Featured picture candidate; somebody there informed me that the SNTE (the company running the Eiffel tower) has placed a copyright on the tower's lighting, and this is true. My question is: Does this apply to publications outside of France? Since Wiki is published in the US, does this apply to Wiki?

I have managed to do some research on the matter. The international copyright agreement of which France is a signatory member is the Berne convention:

The Berne Convention requires its signatories to protect the copyright on works of authors from other signatory countries (known as members of the Berne Union) in the same way it protects the copyright of its own nationals, which means that, for instance, French copyright law applies to anything published or performed in France, regardless of where it was originally created.

...therefore only US copyright law applies to a work published in the US. The Eiffel tower lighting is registered only in France (with the INPI - Institut national de la propriété industrielle). The only US 'cases of copyrighted architecture in images' were two - both copyrighted under US law. Even these were contested, and it really looks as though only the copyright of the authour of an image, not its contents, is protected under the Berne convention.

In addition to the above, the copyright on the Eiffel tower's lighting only seems to apply should the "derivitave work" be damaging or defamatory to the original work, according to a "cour de cassation" judgement on the 7th of May 2004 [10]:

The owner of a thing does not dispose to an exclusive right over an image of it; he can all the same oppose the use of this image by a third party should it cause him abnormal trouble.

...This "Eiffel image" question seems to be one much raised in France, and most all cases link to the above as a case in point [11].

Even though the above seems to indicate that the pubication of this image on Wiki is entirely acceptable, I would like to be 100% certain, so if anyone has anything to add I would be much obliged. THEPROMENADER 14:08, 25 July 2006 (UTC)

PS: The closest tag I could find for a case like this was {{Template:Statue}} - but this only concerns US-copyrighted objects - and coincidentally I've just noticed the above statue issue. Sorry for the copyright paranoia. THEPROMENADER 14:12, 25 July 2006 (UTC)

I would be surprised if the SNTE could claim a copyright in the U.S. on an otherwise free image of the illuminations (which are widely visible from public spaces!), but to clarify the position in France I have asked for an opinion at French Wikipédia. Physchim62 (talk) 15:06, 25 July 2006 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Copyright problems/Advice for admins

I have rewritten these instructions to be much simpler and less daunting, and to reflect common practice. —Centrx→talk • 20:48, 25 July 2006 (UTC)

Unlikely violations

I propose that we allow for situations where the text is from a blog or other personal website where it is likely that it is the original author adding the text, not tagging them as copyvios. One unintended effect of this is that some bad, weak copy-paste articles could not then be deleted under the copyvio process, but on the other side we have some articles that are written encyclopedia, and oftentimes are from a blog that is written by a person with the same username as the Wikipedia editor.

The example that prompted me is Godh bharai. It is an eminently encyclopedic subject, and it is written in the appropriate tone and format. It was added by User:TheIndianPhotographer, which is the name of the blog where it was added from [12], from someone who clearly knows what they are talking about. In such cases, I think the default should be changed to letting it remain, and only if someone complains to remove it. —Centrx→talk • 20:59, 25 July 2006 (UTC)

No, that's really not good enough. If we suspect that the text may be infringing, we should not display it until we are sure that it is not. It doesn't matter that it is well written; they could as well have copied it from somewhere else themselves. -Splash - tk 21:01, 25 July 2006 (UTC)

Can someone explain why this is ok?

Not sure if this is the right place to ask, I thought there used to be a copyright help desk. I am mostly just curious. I have heard before that one is not allowed to draw their own pictures of copywritten images/characters (and then claim to hold the copyright), as they are considered "derivitive works". If that is the case, then how come this is ok: Image:StargateGlyph01.png? This is just a user-drawn version of a (presumably) copywritten logo, but is licenced as released to PD, and has been used in non-fair-use manners (on project pages, etc) for quite some time. I'm not looking to cause them any trouble at that project, but it just seems this would also be considered derivitive work, and still copywritten by whoever owns the original logo. -Goldom ‽‽‽ ⁂ 22:35, 25 July 2006 (UTC)

I'm inclined to agree with your interpretation since this is a "slavish copy" of a "two-dimensional work", which is the basis on which the relevant Supreme Court of the US ruling rests. IANAL, however. -Splash - tk 23:18, 25 July 2006 (UTC)

That shouldn't be tagged PD-self. It is either PD-ineligible or it is a copyvio. Jkelly 23:21, 25 July 2006 (UTC)

Copyright status of seals of US counties

(cross-posting this from Wikipedia:Help Desk per the author's request) --Daduzi ^talk 07:16, 26 July 2006 (UTC)

Does anyone have information or links that can clarify the copyright status of seals of US counties? A lot of seals would be PD-old (maybe with some non-copyright usage restrictions) I guess, nevertheless {{seal}} is used on most of them, which is a fair-use template. If you can answer my question please do so on my talk page. Thanks in advance. NielsFTalk to me.. 21:07, 11 July 2006 (UTC)

Copyright questions – Yikes

The whole series of articles about copyvios has terminology confusing to the unitiated, such that I can't figure out where to ask my question.

I need information about External links that appear to be copyright violations of paid commercial content. WP:EL says External sites can possibly violate copyright. Linking to copyrighted works is usually not a problem, as long as you have made a reasonable effort to determine that the page in question is not violating someone else's copyright. If it is, please do not link to the page. Knowingly and intentionally directing others to a site that violates copyright has been considered a form of contributory infringement in the United States (Intellectual Reserve v. Utah Lighthouse Ministry). Also, linking to a page that illegally distributes someone else's work sheds a bad light on us (see Wikipedia:Copyrights and in particular Contributors' rights and obligations).

Where can I get some help with a source that appears to violate the commercial holder's copyright? This site has a Fair Use claim, but following the link at the bottom of the page reveals it has reproduced the full content from a paid, commercial site. If they are taking revenue from the copyright holder, how can it be Fair Use? The same site does it here as well. If you follow the links to the original copyright holder, you find this is paid, commercial content, reproduced in its entirety. Where can I find out if it is appropriate to link to this site from Wikipedia? Thanks in advance, Sandy 18:58, 26 July 2006 (UTC)

Copyvio help

I'm closing over at WP:CFD, and there is a category Category:Hurricane Devon's uploads that needs to be deleted, but it's filled with images that were uploaded by someone recently banned for copyvios [13]. I could just remove the images from the category, but they need to be checked first for copyvios, and I don't know how to do that. Can someone who knows what they are doing help out? Thanks! --Kbdank71 15:14, 28 July 2006 (UTC)

It seems to me that all those images have the proper licensing information: the vast majority are from NASA and others are screenshots/posters and contain the fair use tag. The only thing I'm not entirely sure about are the artist renditions tagged with "NASA" - the sources don't have any copyright information and there is a credit to NASA in addition to the artist. I'm not a copyvio expert, but it appears that most of the images are legit. --Douglas Whitaker 02:57, 29 July 2006 (UTC)

No problem on this page "Sapphire (astral projection writer)

Hi, everyone,

This is Sapphire. I gave my friend permission to use this articale, I am the owner of that website of:

http://www.sapphire-universe.faithweb.com/

I would like this artical to appear in this Wikipedia and I will follow your rules make these lines appear. And to prove that I am the owner of that website, I added these words in that site:

"(Wikipedia the free encyclopedia got my permission to use the article of Sapphire mini Bio material. Note by Sapphire. And Thanks Wikipedia.)

Sapphire"

You can click on that link, you will see these lines at the bottom.

And if you want me to write more articles regarding Astral Projection, I will be very happy to.

Regards,

Sapphire

Thank you very much for contributing to Wikipedia. You do understand that all of your contributions to Wikipedia are going to be re-used all over the web and edited by Wikipedia users, right? Jkelly 00:00, 30 July 2006 (UTC)

Youtube

Just a quick question, would linking to this url from the article Solar Assault constitute a copyright violation? Combination 00:34, 30 July 2006 (UTC)

on external site. Not our problem.Geni 00:35, 30 July 2006 (UTC)

I'll rephrase my question, is the link in question a copyvio and can it be linked to? Combination 01:07, 30 July 2006 (UTC)

Probably a copyvio. The video bing is of such low quality I'm not sure it is worth linking to.Geni 08:33, 30 July 2006 (UTC)

PRODing copyvios

See Wikipedia talk:Proposed deletion#PRODing copyvios for a proposal that would explicitly allow copyvios that are deletion candidates for other reasons to also be tagged as PROD and deleted under that process. This would limit needing to follow up on or examine the websites of copyright problems that don't warrant keeping anyway. Should something about this be added to the Instructions section here? —Centrx→talk • 22:41, 30 July 2006 (UTC)

No, not until and unless such a process actually comes into being. -Splash - tk 00:09, 31 July 2006 (UTC)

Obviously. —Centrx→talk • 05:15, 31 July 2006 (UTC)

NoteEdit

Does NoteEdit have copyright problems? The first section comes from [14] and second is from [15]. The software has a GNU General Public License but does the web page also? -Bogsat 00:39, 31 July 2006 (UTC)

Note that being GPL is incompatible with being GFDL since each license insists exactly and only iteself can be used. The documentation file for the software is, in fact, GFDL at [16], which includes the authors list, so that's ok, with attribution. (Aside: facts are not copyrightable, only their presentation is, and so the list of authors is probably ok.) The 'lead' section in the article here does not appear in the documentation, and the website itself does not indicate that it is GFDLd, and so it needs to be removed and rewritten. -Splash - tk 01:19, 31 July 2006 (UTC)

Memory Alpha

Some recent contributions taken from Memory Alpha have been defined as copyright violations by various people, and some fairly robust messages left on the contributors talk pages. I'm pretty sure these aren't copyright violations per se, but a license compatibility issue. Wikipedia uses GFDL licensing, while MA uses Creative Commons licensing. Are MA lifts copyright violations or not? exolon 22:01, 31 July 2006 (UTC)

They are copyvios since CC and GFDL tend to be incompatible. More signifcantly memory alpha is non comercial so we really really can't use it.Geni 14:37, 1 August 2006 (UTC)

Redundant copyright templates

Wikipedia's copyright resources are too complicated. To start with, Template:Copyrightassistanceheader and Template:Wikipedia copyright should be merged, they are mostly redundant (see the top of WP:CP). And both are missing some important links (Wikipedia:Contact us/Article problem/Copyright and Wikipedia:Media copyright questions for example). I'd like to merge these if there isn't too much objection. --Duk 05:19, 1 August 2006 (UTC)

• No ojbections from me to anything that makes the process easier to understand.--Peta 06:15, 1 August 2006 (UTC)

DumbBOT

I have requested an approval for my bot to perform a function that is relevant to this page at Wikipedia:Bots/Requests for approvals#User:DumbBOT.2C_fifth_function. If approved, this bot would list articles and images that are tagged with {{copyvio}} but are then not listed here (Liberatore, 2006). 12:55, 1 August 2006 (UTC)

Space Needle -- Violation of Wikipedia's GFDL and a photographer's CC license

The following URL appears to be using a edited/modified screen shot of the wikipedia's Space needle article and appears to be in violation of both Wikipedia's GFDL and the photographer's Creative Commons license under which the article's image is licensed. There is no attribution, inclusion of the licensing terms, etc., etc. http://labs.live.com/photosynth/whatis/smartphotos.html

I'm not sure what can/should be done about this. I will also post this to the Talk:Space Needle page so anyone specifically interested in the article is aware (hopefully someone can get in touch with the photographer).—Preceding unsigned comment added by 205.201.53.207 (talk • contribs)

I'd say get in touch with Microsoft, but I can't for the life of me figure out how to do so after about half an hour getting lost in the depths of their website (I've found this to be a very common problem with large corporate websites). Failing that, then, if you want to contact the photographer you could try contacting them through their Flickr page (click on "Send FlickrMail" just next to their profile picture, you'll need to set up a Flickr account if you don't already have one but it's free). As regards the potential Wikipedia copyright violation, I'm no expert and can't find any contacts within the Wikimedia Foundation who could deal with it, so the best I can suggest is to leave a message at Wikipedia talk:Mirrors and forks, those guys are very experienced at dealing with copyright violations of Wikipedia content and could probably offer some useful advice. --Daduzi ^talk 08:29, 2 August 2006 (UTC)

I contacted the photographer via Flikr (having never used the service, I didn't know there was a contact method for signed-in users), and per the recommendation, I've posted to Wikipedia talk:Mirrors and forks (see Wikipedia talk:Mirrors and forks#Improperly used screenshot of wikipedia article) --205.201.53.207 20:48, 2 August 2006 (UTC)

Microsoft's use is a pretty obvious fair use, and doesn't require adhering to the license any more than, for example, Stephen Colbert showing a page on his show during the Wikiality segment. It would be too sweet irony (I think) if a leading site in the Free Culture movement became as litigious as the Fox lawyer described in Free Culture who threatened to sue a documentary maker for fair use of several seconds of a Simpsons episode. (See pp. 107-110 of the PDF.) KWH 04:50, 17 August 2006 (UTC)

Link error

I think there is an error in the embedded link for "Go to today's section and add" instruction. It took me here, where I mistakenly added my entry [17]. I've since correctly added this entry on the actual August 3 page, but this should be fixed (and my original page edit deleted?). Thanks. --MichaelZimmer (talk) 15:06, 3 August 2006 (UTC)

Possible copyright issues from Lithusanian source document

If there is someone who can read Lithusanian, could you please review Local Self-Defence in Lithuania during the Nazi German Occupation (1941–1944) and the source provided in the article to determine if there is a violation here. Based on the word choices and the location in the text of numbers leads me to believe is is a violation.--Gay Cdn (talk) (email) (Contr.) 15:48, 4 August 2006 (UTC)

Part of doctoral dissertation used for article

Here's a question. A user has uploaded part of his doctoral dissertation for an article. It has appropriate citations and all (it is a fairly good article), but there is no reference to the fact that this is an excerpt of a doctoral dissertation (a verbatim quote). He has then placed a copy of the article on his faculty's website. How best to approach this? The user is a good contributor. I don't want to insult or anger him. I was thinking of contacting him to discuss options. However, I want to be sure of the legal groundrules before I do that. Any advice? Sunray 00:03, 8 August 2006 (UTC)

• He owns the copyright to his own work. The thesis should be cited as a reference, but there is no copyright issue here.--Peta 00:06, 8 August 2006 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Suspected copyright violations

It doesn't seem that it was mentioned here, but Wherebot is putting suspected copyright violations here. If you're interested in helping out, please add that page to your watchlist. Garion96 (talk) 18:29, 8 August 2006 (UTC)

Copyright of US city flags

Hi, I have drawn a bunch of SVG US city flags and uploaded them here. I've licensed most of them under the GFDL. Most of them are more or less based on an actual representation, which was in a JPEG or GIF form, of unknown copyright status. What I'm asking is, is this legal? Can US city flags be copyrighted in the first place? Someone just claimed on my talk page that I'm infringing the copyright of the original creator of Image:Saint Louis, Missouri flag.svg, which I drew myself, by licensing it under the GFDL. Then he pointed me to [18], a regulation that clearly defines the flag of Saint Louis, Missouri. I read in Wikipedia:Copyright on emblems that flags thus defined cannot be copyrighted. Should I retag them as PD, or remove them as copyright infringements? –Mysid^(t) 16:10, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

Our position on flags is that they are ineligible for copyright, so long as they are accurate representations, as they have to be a certain way and so there is no scope for artistic interpretation. Physchim62 (talk) 16:44, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

• Do we have direction on this written somewhere? I think we need to clarify the tags that are used for flags. We have a wide disparity. Currently at Wikipedia:Image copyright tags there is no tag listed that echos what we're saying here. Of course, there are a number of tags that are not listed on that page. For example, there is {{PD-US-flag}}, which is not listed on the copyright tags page. This does not seem to apply to city flags however. User:Mysid noted on his talk page in discussion with me, "This applies to such works whether they are Federal, State, or local as well as to those of foreign governments." (U.S. Copyright Office: Compendium of Office Practices II, section 206.01.) It says local as well, which I presume includes cities. ". I've read that section. It states that it applies to edicts. I don't know that we can state that flags are edicts. A counter example is that various cities have retained copyright on their seals. I'd like to see some supporting evidence for Physchim62's position that they are free of copyright because they can not be artistically interpreted. I don't think it follows that if we can't artistically interpret something, it's free of copyright. In fact, I rather see that as an argument for fair use here. --Durin 17:50, 9 August 2006 (UTC)
• I've started a wider discussion at Wikipedia:Village_pump_(policy)#Copyright_status_of_flags.2C_in_particular_U.S._flags. --Durin 18:06, 9 August 2006 (UTC)
• I also found some related discussion at Template_talk:Flagimage#Copyright_redux--Durin 18:15, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

Melissa Bank

Hello, I've stumbled upon the Melissa Bank wikipedia entry and it looks as though the entire text has been copied word-for-word from the official Melissa Bank website's start page. Pretty sure this is a copyright violation, and it's not particularly useful to boot. Hope this helps.

GFDL and the spam blacklist?

A user Shihhsin (talk · contribs) uploaded two images used in Solenoid and released under GFDL from a website (solenoids dot com dot tw, so I don't set off the blacklist) that has been being spammed by rotating ips onto Solenoid. I have submitted that site to the meta spam blacklist. From what I can tell, the contact info for the website is shihhsin@that address so I suspect he has authority to release the images under GFDL...but does placing his site on the spam blacklist in any way effect the GFDL release of the images? Syrthiss 15:26, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

Don Durant

I wonder if any copyright experts can be of assistance here. The writer of an online bio of Don Durant has made two complaints (on the talk page and at the reference desk) that our article infringes her copyright. It looks to me like her bio is the major (if not exclusive) source for our page, but as far as i can tell the content has been carefully re-written. Moreover, she has given permission for other newsources to use her content, so the editor could have used those as a source also.

I don't have a clue if this is a copy vio or not, my gut says it might not be, but what do i know? I recommended she contact Jimbo as the designated agent if she wants it taken down immediately, and told her i would seek a second opinion. Anyone? Rockpocket 06:30, 12 August 2006 (UTC)

Locust bean gum

Locust bean gum is copied verbatim from http://www.lsbu.ac.uk/water/hyloc.html (see the copyright notice at the end of the wikipedia article). --Abdull 16:13, 12 August 2006 (UTC)