Commons:Village pump/Copyright

Hello,

I'd like to have an opinion on the status of the photograph on the left of this French newspaper article, the one showing the Morlaix viaduct in the background, in Brittany (France).

This photo was taken from January 29 or 30, 1943 by an unknown German officer just after the Royal Air Force attempted to bomb the viaduct. The officer had the photo developed by a local photographer, Mr. Normandière, who took the opportunity to make a copy for himself. It's this copy that appears today in the press or in the book on this bombardment. I haven't found anything about this German officer. Having had this photo developed by a local photographer, he must have taken it privately. I've just written the article on this bombing on the French Wikipedia and I'd like to use this photo, which clearly shows the failure of this bombing. But what's the status of such a photo, whose author will probably always remain unknown ? TCY (talk) 07:21, 29 May 2025 (UTC)[reply]

The photos still remain unpublished because their author have never authorized their publication. Though he may well have been killed in action during the war. This the latter case his works are in public domain in Germany, France and USA. Ruslik (talk) 19:20, 29 May 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for this answer. I find it curious that been killed in action during war places the author's works in the public domain. This is not the case in France, where there are even wartime extensions of copyright.

I did some research of my own in the case of an unknown author. It seems that under French law, copyright subsists, but that publication is authorized with the mention DR (droits réservés = reserved rights). A sum must be set aside for 10 years by the publisher in case the author or his successors are found. In practice, this reserve is never set up; only the mention DR with possibly the addition of unknown author is made.

TCY (talk) 06:48, 30 May 2025 (UTC)[reply]

been killed in action during war places the author's works in the public domain — being killed in action is not what would place it in the public domain. The rule is usually that a work remains protected by copyright for 70 years after the photographer's death. If the photographer had died in 1945, then the copyright would have simply expired in 2015 (or 2016) and that's why it would be in the public domain. It doesn't matter under which circumstances the photographer would have died in 1945 — be it by being killed in action or just of natural causes like a heart attack. What matters is the 70-years-after-death rule regarding copyright protection. Nakonana (talk) 14:18, 31 May 2025 (UTC)[reply]

in the case of an unknown author — I think there are some EU-wide laws when it comes to such cases? Are those laws overruled by local French law? See {{PD-anon-70-EU}}. Nakonana (talk) 14:24, 31 May 2025 (UTC)[reply]

For anonymous works in the EU, the copyright is now 70 years after publication. If not published in the first 70 years after creation, then the copyright ends then. So if not legally published before 2014, it should be PD in the EU. Some countries could have older laws with longer terms, but not sure that's an issue here. The U.S. term could be longer, though. Carl Lindberg (talk) 01:05, 3 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Hi, we have hundreds of photos like File:Del. Joseph McNamara, SOTC 2024.jpg from Flickr accounts like Glenn Youngkin and Virginia Office of the Governor that were uploaded to Flickr with {{Cc-by-2.0}} but their description on Flickr (and copied over to Commons) includes non-compatible terms like the following:

Please note that these photos are for personal use only. If posting to social media or sharing the photos, the following byline must be used: Official Photo by Lori Massengill, Office of Governor Glenn Youngkin.

^ Special:Search/"Please note that these photos are for personal use only" finds 1,989 files with this language

Some contain additional disclaimer such as

If you share them with friends or family, make sure to include the disclaimer below:
These photographs are provided by The Office of Governor Glenn Youngkin as a courtesy and may be printed by the subjects in the photograph for personal use only. The photographs may not be manipulated in any way and may not otherwise be reproduced, disseminated, or broadcast, without the written permission of the Governor's Office. These photographs may not be used in any commercial or political materials, advertisements, emails, products, or promotions that in any way suggests approval or endorsement of the Governor, the First Family, or the Commonwealth of Virginia.

^ Special:Search/"The photographs may not be manipulated in any way and may not otherwise be reproduced, disseminated, or broadcast, without the written permission of the Governor's Office" finds 1,464 files with this language, overlapping with the above

My hunch is that the uploader to Flickr did not understand the terms of the CC license when they selected it, so I was thinking of creating a DR with the hundreds of photos in question, but I figured I'd ask here first. Thoughts - does the Flickr license override the description or vice versa? -Consigned (talk) 12:17, 1 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

@Consigned have you tried emailing them for clarification? Perhaps they thought CC was "copyright controlled" or "copyrighted (2x)" instead of Creative Commons. JWilz12345 (Talk|Contributions) 12:27, 1 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

On top of that, Virginia is not among the states that release their state works either in PD or in copyright-free CC licensing (COM:CRT/US#US States). JWilz12345 (Talk|Contributions) 12:29, 1 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

@Consigned: When the specific terms are in contradiction with the CC license tag, the writer did not have the intention to offer the CC license. There is no free license. See also Commons:Deletion requests/File:Compete to Win, Richmond - 1-23-23 - 067.jpg, Commons:Deletion requests/File:Compete to Win, Richmond - 1-23-23 - 075.jpg. -- Asclepias (talk) 14:09, 1 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

@Consigned As a counterpoint: Considering that they maintained both the exact same license and the same wording across uploads throughout Youngkin's governorship, with multiple photographers' works released this way, I wouldn't be so quick to dismiss the license usage; it does not seem like a one-time mistake that was made by someone careless with the drop-down menu. There is the option to fully copyright works, which they did not choose. If a public-domain release is irreversible, and if the licensing choice was so consistent, I do not see how release terms can override a clearly-and-consistently-chosen CC tag. (I'm not an expert, and @Asclepias seems to have provided evidence of precedent on this, but I wanted to add my two cents.) Packer1028 (talk) 15:00, 1 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Most of the language in those restrictions seems more geared to non-copyright issues -- even if public domain, you can't use images to misrepresent things, or use them to suggest endorsement (those are publicity/personality rights etc.). Some of that may be boilerplate they post elsewhere, without considering the copyright license they put on it. But, a little of the language does directly relate to copyright. Normally I'm pretty leery of a specific statement on the page, but if that statement is pasted in many other places for their material, it's a harder question if it trumps the explicit copyright license they put on it. Carl Lindberg (talk) 17:58, 1 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

If nothing else, the copyright status of a work licensed as "CC but it's for personal use only and you must contact us in writing before looking at the image" (or whatever) seems dubious. Even if the Creative Commons license technically renders any license riders ineffective, the fact that the author included this language at all renders their licensing intent unclear - per COM:PCP, we should probably treat this as non-free. Omphalographer (talk) 18:34, 1 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

The restrictions of that flickr account contradict practically all the principles of free licenses, including: use for any purpose, use by anyone, modifications allowed, no further permission required. -- Asclepias (talk) 18:58, 1 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Photographs of people have a lot of other restrictions on them -- that is mostly reminding you of that. Political figures are probably mostly attuned to those, and that is most of what the restrictions are talking about. "Free" here just means you can use it without violating copyright -- many uses of those photos would violate publicity rights even if public domain from a copyright perspective. You can also violate laws if you modify stuff but represent it as being the original, if it's damaging somehow -- that again is mostly what the restrictions are about. But, the broadcast stuff is more directly copyright. It seems like the same generic boilerplate copied from www.governor.virginia.gov, where there is no free copyright license (though has a pointer to Flickr). I've seen similar wording at times on PD-USGov stuff (though the broadcast and "not otherwise reproduced" goes a lot further here). The question is if it's a significant enough doubt, or more theoretical, given that a presumably competent legal staff has placed a CC license on it after all of that. Normally I would say yes that an explicit license clouds a CC license, but if this was just straight-up copied from the web page without thinking about the copyright license, I'm less sure in this particular case. Carl Lindberg (talk) 23:07, 1 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

It seems to me that the question here is: are we concerned with what is legally defensible, or do we wish to defer to a someone's more restrictive but unenforceable intent? The fact remains: they posted publicly with an irrevocable license. Legally, that would presumably be something any reuser can hold them to, as long as the reuser honors the terms of the license. - Jmabel ! talk 19:23, 1 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

According to this VPC discussion, the additional terms would constitute a separate license, so the CC license remains valid. However, I wonder what would happen if I were to release a work under a license where "This License constitutes the entire agreement" language is not present and included those terms. Would that also be considered multi-licensing, since by specifying the name of the license I am treating it as a separate thing? prospectprospekt (talk) 17:22, 3 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

je viens de decouvrir d'une personne avait utilisé ma photo personnel sans autorisation, et je n'arrive pas a la rejoindre ; je voulais savoir comment puis-je la trouver ou contacter? la personne porte le nom du compte Shehuhikmah94 Raccih (talk) 16:33, 1 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

@Raccih: Bonjour, Ça dépend des circonstances et si vous voulez vraiment contacter cette personne dans ce cas-ci. En théorie, si l'utilisateur a contribué relativement récemment, la manière habituelle de contacter un utilisateur d'un site Wikimedia est d'écrire un message sur sa page de discussion. Si l'utilisateur a fourni une adresse de courriel, il est possible aussi d'utiliser la fonction «Email this user» («Envoyer un courriel») qui se trouve dans la colonne des outils lorsque vous êtes sur sa page d'utilisateur. Toutefois, dans le cas particulier de la personne que vous mentionnez, Shehuhikmah94, il n'est pas certain que vous réussissiez à la contacter par ces méthodes, puisqu'elle n'a été présente sur ce site Commons que brièvement il y a plusieurs années, en 2020. Elle avait téléversé seulement deux fichiers, dont un a été supprimé, comme on peut le constater dans ses journaux d'opérations. L'autre fichier, encore présent, est celui-ci. Cet utilisateur a aussi été présent en 2020 et en 2021 sur le site de Wikipedia en langue anglaise, où il a tenté de créer quelques pages, qui ont été refusées par cette Wikipedia, comme on le constate sur sa page de discussion de cette Wikipedia. Si vous tenez absolument à tenter de contacter cette personne, vous pouvez essayer les méthodes ci-dessus, mais vous n'obtiendrez pas nécessairement de réponse de sa part puisque ses comptes n'ont pas été actifs depuis plusieurs années. Mais demandez-vous d'abord si vous avez vraiment besoin de la contacter. Ça dépend ce que vous voulez dire par «avait utilisé» et si votre problème est relatif à Wikimedia ou pas. Par exemple, si le problème est qu'il y aurait ici, sur le site de Wikimedia Commons, une photo sans autorisation, vous pouvez demander la suppression de cette photo, si vous dites de quel fichier il s'agit et d'où provient la photo et que vous expliquez en quoi exactement consiste le problème. Si votre problème est une utilisation à l'extérieur des sites Wikimedia, c'est différent. -- Asclepias (talk) 18:24, 1 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

@Raccih and Asclepias: apologies here for a foreigner's question: does ma photo personnel here mean that Raccih is the photographer or the subject? - Jmabel ! talk 19:27, 1 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

It's unclear as it would be in English with "my personal photo". It could be one or the other or both. That's why I suggested to the person to specify what exactly they mean. Given that not much is known about the other user nor about what photo it is, the photo in question could be a copyvio, or a violation of personality rights in a non-public context, or out of scope, or any combination of that. -- Asclepias (talk) 19:58, 1 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

We don't know if the question has something to do or not with the file uploaded by Shehuhikmah94, but anyway that file is a photo that was on the social media of the subject. So, possibly copied from there. -- Asclepias (talk) 03:25, 2 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Category:Internet memes by decade of introduction has very few files with none illustrating most of the even the most notable major Internet phenomena. Now the 2 only free-licensed illustrations of the This is Fine meme may get deleted but is an unworried mammal sitting in a room of flames, with reference to the meme in the title, a "major copyrightable element" (thus derivative work)? Maybe there's some copyright experts here who know more on that. From Derivative work:

In copyright law, a derivative work is an expressive creation that includes major copyrightable elements of a first, previously created original work (the underlying work). The derivative work becomes a second, separate work independent from the first. The transformation, modification or adaptation of the work must be substantial and bear its author's personality sufficiently to be original and thus protected by copyright.

Prototyperspective (talk) 19:16, 1 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Are these derivatives of what? I'm not familiar with the original meme image. Copyright does not protect an idea, and "figure sitting at a table in a fire" is pretty much an idea, not expression, which is more in the actual details drawn or photographed. But, if you put some other copyrighted figure sitting in the chair, it's derivative of that even if not the meme. You normally have to look at the original, and identify copyrightable expression (above the threshold of originality) that was copied from the original to the new work. I did ask similar questions on the DRs. Carl Lindberg (talk) 22:52, 1 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

The original work in question is this comic. Omphalographer (talk) 22:55, 1 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I would say no. There are no specific parts of the drawing copied -- that feels more like an idea to me. Duplicating the entire original text may not be a good idea, but one short phrase should be fine. Something like the plot of a story can be copyrighted -- those often have many many particular details -- but the overall genre can not be. For graphic copyrights, you are looking at the copying of particular curves and graphic elements -- that is where the copyright is. Carl Lindberg (talk) 23:12, 1 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I'm not so sure. Compare the first image with the first frame of the Gunshow comic. There's more than just an idea being copied here - the whole visual layout of the image is very similar, down to details like the doorway and painting in the background and the positioning of the fires. Surprisingly, the AI-generated image seems less derivative. Omphalographer (talk) 23:29, 1 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

That's not necessarily the copyright. It's still pretty broad strokes. I mean yes there is smoke on the ceiling and a door, but usually you need to have a lot more specific copying than that. Is there a court case which ruled infringement along those lines? I don't recall any. If just those elements alone are copyrightable, then nobody else can make a drawing of a room with fire and smoke, a table and a door and a window. To me, it's not particularly close -- that's still an idea. You can describe the scene in text, and someone can take that text and make a drawing based on that, and that is a separate representation of the same idea. Similarly, per Commons:Coats of arms, you have a written blazon of the design -- any drawing made of that design is not a derivative work of the written text (they are separate expressions of the same idea), and any two drawings are not derivatives of each other unless they incorporated actual linear parts from the other drawing. It takes a *lot* of small details in say a book plot before it gets obvious that it was effectively copied in another work. It's virtually impossible for a graphic work to be derivative of a literary work -- they are different forms of expression. If there were lots and lots of details copied, it's probably possible for something to be derivative of a particular comic drawing, but there's maybe 3-4 elements, maybe replicated in a very broad way here. Most rooms have doors and windows, etc. I don't think you can copy all of the text from the comic -- that probably is copyrightable as a whole -- but one short phrase should also be fine. You can make references to something else, without actually copying the expression. In the Compendium, part 911, when it comes to characters -- Applicants should not refer to or assert claims in “character,” “character concept, idea, or style,” or a character’s generalized personality, conduct, temperament, or costume. If the applicant uses these terms, the registration specialist may register the claim with an annotation, such as: “Regarding authorship information: Registration based on deposited [pictorial, graphic, or sculptural] authorship describing, depicting, or embodying character(s). Compendium 313.4(H).” In other words, you get a copyright on that particular drawing, but not ideas extrapolated from it. When actual character copyrights get involved, it can be far easier to make a derivative work in these areas, but that doesn't exist here. Carl Lindberg (talk) 01:48, 2 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I think this is a great point, and let me add this: when we're discussing whether a file is a derivative work or not, I think we should be making arguments rooted in formal substantial similarity tests to determine if expression was copied, not just eyeballing. With that said, I do have a feeling that the first image is substantially similar but not the second (though again, you may be right that the copying needs to be more concrete). Qzekrom (talk) 23:27, 3 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

The issue is that this needs to be made on a case by case basis. This is the purpose of the deletion request as it specifically should address whether the image is a derivative work.

Could I request the discussion be made at the specific deletion request, because that is the ultimate venue that will decide whether they are deleted or not. - Chris.sherlock2 (talk) 23:33, 3 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

FYI, there are already open DRs for the two images: Commons:Deletion requests/File:2023-06-29 This-is-not-fine by-David-Revoy.jpg and Commons:Deletion requests/File:This Is Fine (meme).png. Personally I don't see a problem with an empty Category:Internet memes by decade of introduction - internet memes are intellectual works, often copyrighted or fair use, so it's understandable and expected that not many are appropriate for Commons. Consigned (talk) 15:50, 2 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

The first image probably not. The second one I'd say is a derivative. Although if neither one is then I'd seriously wonder why they are being hosted on Commons to begin with since images like these only have educational value in so far as they suppose to depict the original work of art. Otherwise what exactly is educational here? The concept of a "this is fine" meme? Come on. Is anyone going to argue a depiction of the concept (whatever that means in this situation) of a non-notable meme is within scope? The fact that Prototyperspective or anyone else is claiming the images are educationally close enough to the original meme kind of proves they are derivatives. Otherwise File:This Is Fine (meme).png would just be an image of a dog in a burning building and this discussion wouldn't exist to begin with. Nor do I think the file would have been uploaded to Commons in the first place. But you can't have it both ways where it's close enough to the original to educate people on the meme but not close enough to be derived from it. There's no other instance where that would fly on here. --Adamant1 (talk) 23:56, 2 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

 Hard disagree, I think the meme is notable; it's been called "the meme that defined a decade." Qzekrom (talk) 00:35, 3 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Uumm OK. Good for The Atlantic I guess? The arguement here is supposedly that the images aren't based on or derived from the meme to begin with though. The whole thing is "Schrödinger's meme." The images are both close enough to the original to depict the meme but then somehow not enough to be derived from or based on it. Makes sense. --Adamant1 (talk) 00:49, 3 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

They absolutely illustrate the idea of the meme (one sense of "based on"). They are not strictly "based on" in a copyright sense, which means copying more than de minimis specific expression (conflating those two meanings is what usually gives rise discussions like this). You then added an argument about notability and scope, and the above was a response to that. There are multiple articles from reliable sources on the meme, so it's an educational subject and worthy of illustration. Not all projects can use the actual strip under fair use. I'm leery of using AI in a lot of contexts, but using it as a tool to illustrate a concept could well be fine. We have no automatic policy to delete such works (and if these were in use on a Wikimedia project, they are automatically in scope, so arguing here is moot). Carl Lindberg (talk) 00:59, 3 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

(Edit conflict) An image can be close in style or even overall layout, but still not be close in terms of copyrightable expression. Think of it like photography: if I photograph the same person as someone else did, the results might look similar (same subject, same setting) but unless I’ve copied their exact composition, lighting, and angle, it’s still my image. Not a perfect analogy, but the point stands.

The idea of "a dog calmly sitting at a table in a burning room", or more broadly the concept of detached optimism or denial in the face of chaos, is not protected by copyright. What’s protected is the specific expression of that idea in a particular drawing: the particular dog design, the brushstrokes, the exact layout, coloring, and proportions used in the original comic. Any and all depictions of "a dog sitting at a table surrounded by flames" is not automatically the property of the original artist, just as no one owns the exclusive right to draw "a man screaming on a bridge" after The Scream.

Intentional homage, parody, or thematic reference does not equal copyright violation. --Jonatan Svensson Glad (talk) 01:00, 3 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

1. I nominated File:This Is Fine (meme).png for deletion not because of it being AI generated, but despite it. There's already established policy and/or consensus on here that unused amateur artwork is out of scope. AI generated artwork doesn't get a special pass from that just because it's created with a novel technology. Sure, there's no automatic policy to delete such works, but there isn't one not to delete them either and I would have nominated the image for deletion regardless. I'm not the one making this about AI. Nor am I acting like the image should be deleted because it's AI generated.

2. Have either one of you heard of [1]? If not, it's a Palestinian children's television show that featured a character losely based on Micky Mouse. Or at least it did until they killed it off supposedly because of copyright concerns. Are either one of you going to argue it would be OK for there to be an American television show featuring a mouse character called "Nicky the Mouse" or something that looks and sounds similar to Micky Mouse? I don't think a random image of "a dog sitting at a table surrounded by flames" would be a durative. A meme of a dog wearing a hat while sitting at a table surrounded by flames that someone specifically says illustrates the "This Is Fine" meme would be. "This isn't Captain America. It's someone who looks 99% him and I'm saying they depict the character" is completely different then in an image of some dude holding a shield while wearing a flag. --Adamant1 (talk) 01:52, 3 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

1. Pretty sure you nominated it because it's AI-generated or that this played a major role. And there is no policy against hobbyist/nonprofessional/user-made artworks and lots of them in for example the Fan art categories or generally across the huge Category:Visual arts category where somewhat good-looking modern digital are is pretty scarce and of particular usefulness. The meme is very notable and there are just 2 illustrations of it, making these useful in principle and also because it's one of the only if not the only illustration of a meme made with AI (which is why it was used for quite some while in List of Internet phenomena which further underscores its usefulness) and in an entirely different style (photorealism). 2. Very much doubt that. And it's not a character like Micky Mouse. Prototyperspective (talk) 09:43, 3 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Pretty sure you nominated it because it's AI-generated or that this played a major role. Yet I'm sure if I asked you for evidence of that you wouldn't be able to provide any even though you repeatedly go off about how everyone else makes baseless arguments. And to think, your one of the people who went off about how I should be indefinitely blocked for making things personal. Go figure.

Anyway, I don't think we're going to agree on this and talking to you about it is clearly a time suck. So I'm not going to discuss it beyond what I have already. I will say though that I'd probably be willing to retract the DR if you make an actual argument for keeping the image. I'm already leaning that way due to Qzekrom mentioning The Atlantic article and I have absolutely no problem doing that if your willing to come up with more sources and/or an actual justification to outside of making this about me disliking AI. Otherwise I'm done with it since we're just talking in circles at this point. --Adamant1 (talk) 10:43, 3 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

What about the evidence that you nominated 5 other AI-generated images of mine at the same time and created 2 threads where you complained about specifically AI images / my AI images? I don't go off, I make rational ontopic points. Prototyperspective (talk) 10:49, 3 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I've been on here for 7 years and spent a lot of that time doing deletion requests. How many DRs for AI-generated have I opened in that time outside of those 5? I'll tell you, maybe like 5 or 10 and I nominated plenty of non-AI generated amateur artwork for speedy deletion in the meantime. Sorry, but acting like me opening 5 deletion requests for AI generated images out of the thousands I've done on here for everything else (including non-AI generated artwork) as evidence that I have an issue with AI isn't rational or on-topic. Again though, I'm more then willing to retract the deletion request if you want me to and provide a valid reason. Otherwise I'm done with the conversation. --Adamant1 (talk) 10:57, 3 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Doubt there are many users who have opened more AI-related DRs than you. I don't think you opened that many DRs in just 2 days nor a lot of new unrelated discussions. It doesn't matter. It's clear that this was a main issue you have with the image you also named that in the DR rationale regardless what you claim here but that doesn't matter either. I'm done with your walls of text so I won't continue this discussion. Prototyperspective (talk) 11:01, 3 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Didn’t you just ask me not to make presumptions, and now you are doing the same? - Chris.sherlock2 (talk) 23:35, 3 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

This seems like forum shopping. We now have discussions on VP and on CFD. This seems out of order. - Chris.sherlock2 (talk) 22:48, 3 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

No idea what you mean; including what you mean with CFD. Prototyperspective (talk) 22:53, 3 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Apologies, wrong acronym :-) I meant the dike deletion requests themselves. - Chris.sherlock2 (talk) 23:19, 3 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I don't know what you mean by "forum shopping", but I don't think the threads are redundant. VPC serves as a centralized discussion for this topic, while the two CFDs are specific to the files in question. Qzekrom (talk) 23:13, 3 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

That’s fine, but there is already an advanced discussion on the two deletion requests and Protoyperperpective is active on them already. I would prefer not to have to restate my detailed reasoning across three seperate forums.

Prototyperperspexyuce is clearly unhappy with the way the discussion is going, so has come here. It is rather unreasonable to make us discuss these specific images on so many forums. If this has a wider discussion about derivative works, there might be a point, but that’s not really the case. I’ve brought to admin attention for review, it might be that admins disagree with me but I think it’s more reasonable to close this thread and redirect people to the deletion discussions themselves. - Chris.sherlock2 (talk) 23:18, 3 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

This is a complex potentially/apparently difficult copyright question so it's more than legitimate to ask (more) copyright experts about it. Moreover, it doesn't just affect or is about these two files. Also please don't assume things about me and instead consider that this is a complex question with big ramification and asking here makes sense and is I think what this place is partly made for. Prototyperspective (talk) 23:22, 3 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I am just giving my perspective on your actions, apologies if they are wrong but that is how it looks to me. I have decided to take the appropriate action, which is to ask for review by the admin group and let them decide what action (if any) to take. - Chris.sherlock2 (talk) 23:29, 3 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

This is en:WP:Forum shopping - opening the same topic in multiple places. In the future please follow the recommendation of that page and notify participants of the other discussion(s) if you create a new discussion on the same topic. That's no longer necessary in this case as I've already done so. Consigned (talk) 08:57, 4 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

It's not a super big deal but personally I'll usually wait until DRs are closed to ask questions them in other forums. Otherwise it makes things to hard to follow. Especially if people in the DR aren't notified about it like happened here. But IMO the less forums something is being discussed on at the same time the better. This stuff is hard enough to follow and keep track of as it is already. I don't necessarily have a problem with it as the person who opened the DR though as long as people in the deletion request are properly notified about it. --Adamant1 (talk) 06:42, 5 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

You can't copyright ideas (memes), only expressions of ideas. So I think those images are probably fine. Nosferattus (talk) 02:01, 8 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Except what you are looking at here is a piece of artwork that has become a meme. The artist has copyright of the image they created, and the image we are debating is a direct derivation of their creative work. We aren’t asking for the idea to be deleted, we are aiming for the derivation of their artwork to be deleted due to copyright issues. - Chris.sherlock2 (talk) 09:43, 8 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Concerned page: COM:CRT/North Korea

There has been a heated deletion discussion over whether to keep the North Korean national anthem (Aegukka) on Commons for two months at Commons:Deletion requests/File:Aegukka - National Anthem of North Korea.wav. I have seen several deletion requests of this file mostly concerning Article 12 and the URAA, but I discovered that Article 32 of the North Korean copyright law also has a special provision for documents and says: "A copyrighted work may be used without the permission of the copyright owner...when a copyrighted work needed for state management is copied, broadcast or used in compilation". This would make the national anthem and other government works copyrighted free use. This is similar to Template:PD-IDGov because it allows reproduction and broadcasting of works without explicitly mentioning the public domain.

Other than the national anthem, my question is which government works are covered by this law. Article 12 clearly exempts documents for state management that are made without commercial intent, but unlike Article 12, Article 32 seems to cover at first glance all works needed for state management, regardless of purpose. Although there are copyright notices placed all over government websites, since the North Korean government heavily relies on state media propaganda to maintain control over the country's beliefs, Article 32's provision allowing works needed for state administration is possibly a loophole. I would like further discussion on this issue. VTSGsRock (talk) 21:19, 1 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

That gives the state itself the right to violate copyright for its own purposes, but doesn't make something free for everyone else. It clearly states that a work is copyrighted; it just makes a form of fair use that the government can use it if they deem it necessary. Carl Lindberg (talk) 22:55, 1 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

My interpretation is just the same as Carl's. It is a fair use/fair dealing clause or an exception that the North Korean government can use copyrighted works only for the purpose of "state management". It is not relevant for Wikimedia Commons because: a) we aren't part of Pyongyang regime, and b) media hosted here must be reusable for everyone for any purpose, not only for managing the states, be it North Korean government or governments of all countries. JWilz12345 (Talk|Contributions) 23:58, 1 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I disagree, since there is definitely a reduced relative clause in this sentence of the English translation of the North Korean law. When the relative clause is added, the text would read "when a copyrighted work that is needed for state management is copied, broadcast or used in compilation", which would imply that works that are needed for government activities can be used freely. This is probably the most accurate reference since a very similar translation appears in WIPO Lex: "when a copyrighted work needed for the state management is copied, broadcast or used for compilation" VTSGsRock (talk) 00:41, 2 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

That's still the same thing. It makes that one particular use (by the government) OK, not any use by anyone. Carl Lindberg (talk) 02:16, 2 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

@VTSGsRock assuming that it is indeed a possible valid copyright exception/limitation, I doubt that their national anthem qualifies as a "work required for state administration" (in this site, the translated term is "state administration"). JWilz12345 (Talk|Contributions) 02:39, 2 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

For reference, here is the complete translated version of Article 32 as per Law and North Korea, by Daye Gang.

Article 32 (Use of artistic works without permission)
Cases where artistic works are used without receiving the permission of the copyright holder are as follows.
1. In cases where artistic works have been reproduced or translated to be used by an individual or within the scope of family
2. In cases where places such as libraries, literary archives, museums, memorials reproduce artistic works to preserve, display, peruse, or lend
3. In cases where artistic works are reproduced, broadcast, or adapted for school education
4. In cases where artistic works required for State administration are reproduced, broadcast, or used in drafting compilations
5. In cases where an artistic work is to be introduced by broadcasting it or publishing it in a  newspaper or publication
6. In cases where an artistic work is quoted
7. In cases where artistic works are performed for free
8. In cases where artistic works installed in public places are reproduced
9. In cases where artistic works are sound recorded or reproduced in braille for blind persons

_ JWilz12345 (Talk|Contributions) 02:44, 2 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Trying a different route: North Korea's first copyright law dates to 2001. The text of the law does not appear to show retroactivity. This Yonhap source (cited on enwiki article concerning their copyright law) claims there were no copyright laws in the North Korean civil law system prior to the enactment of their first-ever copyright law. Does that mean, all North Korean works are unprotected in North Korea before 2001? (Trying the similar logic as the copyright histories of the US, the Philippines, and the UAE, where some old works are automatically PD due to being unprotected and not given protection by newer, non-retroactive laws.) Though there a complication due to a 1996 court ruling (apparently by a South Korean court) that was criticized due to overstepping of South Korean copyright law outside the territory of SoKor, to include works from North Korea. JWilz12345 (Talk|Contributions) 03:37, 2 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

That sounds like a great and clever idea, since there aren't any provisions that specify retroactivity (e.g. one that says that all works published before the law was made will be protected)! This is unlike Poland, the EU or Uruguay (funny enough, the name coincides with the URAA itself while Uruguay took away public domain works twice in 2003 and 2019), where massive amounts of public domain works have been taken away by provisions. VTSGsRock (talk) 03:54, 2 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

@VTSGsRock some caution is still adviced, though. Having no explicit retroactive provision doesn't mean that all prior works are magically in PD. If you haven't read it, I suggest reading the thread I started above, concerning the same issue for pre-1990 Chinese works. It appears that a single, simple clause magically slapped copyright to all Chinese works (as long as the author/s arent yet dead for more than 50 years), and this retroactivity was supported by Chinese court rulings. See COM:China: "The rights of copyright owners, publishers, performers, producers of sound recordings and video recordings, radio stations and television stations as provided in this Law, of which the term of protection specified in this Law has not yet expired on the date of this Law's entry into force, shall be protected in accordance with this Law." (Art. 55 of their first [1990] law) JWilz12345 (Talk|Contributions) 04:06, 2 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

The same clause still exists under Article 66 of the current/2021 law. JWilz12345 (Talk|Contributions) 04:08, 2 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Ping @Clindberg: regarding the possible default PD status within NoKor of North Korean works made before 2001. JWilz12345 (Talk|Contributions) 23:56, 2 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

North Korea's URAA date is 2003, so such work would would be restored in the U.S. as of then anyways. They were under no obligation to restore their own works, but the U.S. was. Also, for a sound recording, it also matters when the sound recording itself was made. Carl Lindberg (talk) 00:18, 3 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Their first copyright law was in 2001, and doesn't seem to show some sign of retroactivity. I assume that pre-2001 works are also unprotected in the US since they weren't protected in NoKor on the URAA date. Or is there something that US terms are restored to foreign works that are PD on the URAA date due to being PD in the involved foreign country? JWilz12345 (Talk|Contributions) 00:36, 3 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

The URAA did not restore works if they were public domain through expiration of a term of protection. They do restore works if they were never protected at all in their source country (such as below the source country's threshold of originality, but above the US'). North Korea is also under obligation to restore all foreign works to Berne minimums, just not their own. Unsure if they actually did, but it may not be worth it for other countries to press that matter with the WTO (when the U.S. tried to get away without doing that after joining Berne however, it was an entirely different situation). Carl Lindberg (talk) 00:46, 3 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

@VTSGsRock: seems Aegukka (the National Anthem of the Democratic People's Republic of Korea) has no chance of being hosted here. Even if it were not protected in NoKorea, it is protected in the United States due to URAA. Worse, the audio file under deletion discussion may be considered as a sound recording, eligible for more complicated US copyright terms. Final nail in the coffin for Aegukka. JWilz12345 (Talk|Contributions) 02:33, 3 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

*sigh* VTSGsRock (talk) 02:41, 3 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Update: JWilz12345, turns out that we were wrong about retroactivity for the whole time. In a lawsuit on the copyright of North Korean works in Japan, the Korea Film Export & Import Corporation tried to sue a Japanese film distributor over the use of North Korean films, including one film made in 1978. Furthermore, the second plantiff (referred to as X2) made an agreement with the Ministry of Culture that confirmed the copyright to the films. Although the case result was that North Korean works are not copyrighted in Japan (which is irrelevant anyways because Commons is hosted in the US), the case shows evidence that the North Korean government doesn't treat pre-2001 works as PD. The final nail in the coffin has been sealed. VTSGsRock (talk) 03:17, 4 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

@Clindberg I'll also correct the part that I added on COM:CRT/UAE concerning pre-1993 works. JWilz12345 (Talk|Contributions) 02:37, 3 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Carl, this fact may affect several non-architectural Philippine works made before 1972, since several are unprotected due to lack of registration (formalities existed until November 1972, per COM:PHILIPPINES#General rules). It seems, Wikimedia Commons-wise, being public domain by default in the source country is worse than being public domain due to term expiry, due to URAA. JWilz12345 (Talk|Contributions) 02:46, 3 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

This stuff is rarely if ever tested in court, but when a copyright owner had no chance of protection, I think it's likely that the U.S. would consider a work restored. If it was PD due to the copyright owner's own inaction, that may be an entirely different situation. They were given the opportunity of a copyright term and basically declined it. That may count as expired. Carl Lindberg (talk) 02:56, 3 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

@Clindberg you mean, if (assuming) a pre-1972 Philippine work is unregistered, it is counted as "expired" under US URAA rule? JWilz12345 (Talk|Contributions) 03:01, 3 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

It's impossible to say with any certainty, but I'd lean that way yes. The term of protection was available and the copyright owner chose not to use it, so it made the term zero or very short or whatever the formalities were. (Which were of course inherited from U.S. law.) The URAA seems fairly clear that they will protect works above the U.S. threshold even if they were under the source country threshold. It does not say explicitly what would happen in a situation like North Korea. In the end, a judge would have to interpret the wording is not in the public domain in its source country through expiration of term of protection with regards to the particular situation. Carl Lindberg (talk) 03:37, 3 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Hi! I'm currently working on an article on the Wikipedia side and would love to use this image of Marsha P. Johnson for it. However, I'm a bit unsure about the PD justification and am wondering if anyone has any insights on what its copyright status might be. Thank you! Spookyaki (talk) 02:54, 2 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I don't see any confirmation at the original source that the photo is PD. The photo needed to have been published without a copyright notice before 1989 in order to be PD, not simply printed once without notice. I'm not sure if Hank O'Neal (the photographer) made that image as part of a published series, but we would need confirmation that it was indeed published without a notice before it can be hosted on Commons. Given the annotations by Allen Ginsberg on the back of the photograph as described at the source, it may have been published; but those also could've been the annotations of a friend on an unpublished image. The auction house that was selling the image described it as part of an "archive", which could also imply that the works were unpublished. We need more info for any sort of decision imo. 19h00s (talk) 11:05, 2 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Buenas, se puede agregar el témplate {{LicenseReview}} a las fotografías,logos,etc. que han pasado al Dominio Público por ejemplo como este (File:Logo White House (USA) 2025.png) ,para mi opinión agregar este témplate (LicenseReview) fue buena idea?? AbchyZa22 (talk) 11:48, 2 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

LicenseReview is for when a license specified on an external website needs to be checked by a license reviewer. It's usually not for PD works, as such evidence needs to be supplied with the upload. Or in the case of something like that, it's pretty obvious just by looking at it. Carl Lindberg (talk) 00:25, 3 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Hi, What is the copyright status of these? Commons:Deletion requests/Files in Category:Passports of the United Kingdom was closed as kept, but DeFacto has pointed out that the UK Gov document [2] says The Controller of His Majesty’s Stationery Office (HMSO), who manages Crown copyright, must give permission before a British passport and the Royal crest image on the front of a passport can be reproduced. What do you think? Yann (talk) 20:27, 2 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

UK crown copyright would expire after 50 years. When was the first passport with that particular rendition of the crest? Carl Lindberg (talk) 00:23, 3 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I found a slightly more detailed document by the HM Passport Office regarding this issue: [3]. Tvpuppy (talk) 01:12, 3 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Does this photo (https://mieszkaniec.pl/henryk-machalica-mieszkaniec-nr-7-1991/) of a Polish actor published on this Polish newspaper in 1991 fall under PD-Poland? Lemonix1004 (talk) 13:26, 3 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Would the work of a en:taxidermist be something considered eligible for copyright protection? Could there be creativity involved in the way the work (e.g. an animal) is posed or otherwise costumed? For example, would File:Cocaine Bear, Kentucky for Kentucky Fun Mall (cropped).jpg be a derviative work in which the photgraphed stuffed bear is eligible for copyright protection? I tried Googling it and found what appears to be a US court case saying such works can be eligible for copyright protection here, but I can't read the full page without registering for the site. There's also File:Primate Taxidermy, Rahmat International Wildlife Museum and Gallery.jpg showing various monkeys. -- Marchjuly (talk) 14:21, 3 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

@Marchjuly: See also Commons:Copyright rules by subject matter#Taxidermy and Category:Taxidermy-related deletion requests. -- Asclepias (talk) 15:37, 3 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I don't see why not. Taxidermy is, in essence, a rather morbid sort of sculpture. While the animal's skin isn't a copyrightable work, there's plenty of creative work involved in posing it. Omphalographer (talk) 00:00, 4 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Many of the works - though not all - in the Bundestag Image Database ([4]) have the licensing text "This image may be used for private and commercial, non-advertising purposes. Use of the image on social media is permitted." (example). Some do not have this text, instead saying "This image may only be used for private purposes, as well as for the purposes of political reporting or political education. Use of this image on social media is prohibited." (example), which is clearly unacceptable for Commons. So my question is, is the first one Commons-acceptable? It explicitly states commercial use is allowed but also non-advertising which I am confused by. And if so, what would be the license? Curbon7 (talk) 21:51, 3 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

 Comment nothing in that explicitly authorizes derivative works. - Jmabel ! talk 00:57, 4 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for the response. I took a look through the database's terms of use. Sections 3.2 and 3.3 seem to indicate broad derivative use is not allowed beyond technical edits; 3.3 specifically says "More significant edits to an image are generally not permitted, particularly via drawings of the image, rephotography, colour changes, cropping or the use of montage techniques.". Curbon7 (talk) 22:00, 4 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

So, recently I've decided to upload photo from one of the scientific journals and it states that it is under a CC-BY license, but when I go to the RightsLink site it still requires permission (?), it also states that: "Note: This article is available under a Creative Commons License. Please return to the article and check the Copyright Information at the end of the article to clarify which Creative Commons License this article is published under and whether permission is required. Please see the following link for full details of license types: https://creativecommons.org/share-your-work/licensing-types-examples/". Should I still upload it?

P.S. Here is the link for the article and its corresponding RightsLink site:

1.https://molecularcytogenetics.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s13039-015-0142-7#rightslink

2.https://s100.copyright.com/AppDispatchServlet?title=Cytogenomic%20delineation%20and%20clinical%20follow-up%20of%2010%20Brazilian%20patients%20with%20Pallister-Killian%20syndrome&author=Larissa%20Sampaio%20de%20Athayde%20Costa%20et%20al&contentID=10.1186%2Fs13039-015-0142-7&copyright=Costa%20et%20al.&publication=1755-8166&publicationDate=2015-06-26&publisherName=SpringerNature&orderBeanReset=true&openaccess=true

NotCarlJohnson1992 (talk) 19:00, 4 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

You can use this article under terms a CC-BY license but if you want a different license you should use the RightsLink site. Ruslik (talk) 19:34, 4 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

So it means that I can upload photo from this article without getting in trouble? NotCarlJohnson1992 (talk) 20:00, 4 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

There is certainly no copyright-related issue. Figure 2 (the photograph) certainly would need (at least) to be tagged with {{Personality rights}} and might violate Commons:Photographs of identifiable people. You won't "get in trouble" over this, but I cannot guarantee that the photograph would not be deleted. - Jmabel ! talk 21:05, 4 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I usually tag photos with an identifiable person with a personality rights warning.

Thank you for the clarification! NotCarlJohnson1992 (talk) 21:07, 4 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I am in the process of adding more images to Category:Toicon fandom series icons as many of the icons listed at https://web.archive.org/web/20201031052506/http://www.toicon.com/series/fandom (the site is currently defunct, so I am using an archive) are not listed there. All toicon icons were released by the copyright holder (Carol Liao) under the CC BY 4.0 license; however, most icons in this series derive from some element of pop culture (film, television, music, video game, etc.). Some icons depict enough creative elements from the underlying work that they would constitute derivative works; whereas, others may be permitted based on the rule that alternative depictions of an idea (without copying from a specific depiction of the idea) are permitted on Commons or because they derive from {{PD-textlogo}} elements (see further information at COM:FANART).

The main question for this discussion is this: which icons from this set should be disallowed as derivative works and which should be allowed as simply alternative expressions of ideas or as depictions of simple logos? (For example, the icon for "to uncover" should be allowed as it is similar to File:Bullwhip and IJ hat.jpg; and, the icon for "to defend" should be permitted as it depicts the PD File:Captain America Shield.svg.) Before anyone asks, this discussion may also be used as a starter for DRs for some files already in the category. JohnCWiesenthal (talk) 22:50, 4 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I was somewhat surprised by today's picture of the day, File:Oratorio de Santa María Reina y Madre, Málaga, España, 2023-05-20, DD 08-10 HDR.jpg, showing a church ceiling painting in Spain by a living artist (Raúl Berzosa Fernández (Q20013463)). The painting is not in the public domain, and I don't see any VRT tags on the file page.

Instead, there is the tag {{FoP-Spain}}, claiming that “The photographical reproduction of this work is covered under the article 35.2 of the Royal Legislative Decree 1/1996 of April 12, 1996, and amended by Law 5/1998 of March 6, 1998, which states that: Works permanently located in parks or on streets, squares or other public thoroughfares may be freely reproduced, distributed and communicated by painting, drawing, photography and audiovisual processes.”

The way I interpret that law is that it covers works located in public outdoors (parks, streets, squares, other public thoroughfares), but not inside buildings (public or not). The map in Commons:Freedom of panorama also shows Spain in light green color for a simple OK, not in the dark green color for OK, including public interiors.

Am I missing or misinterpreting something? Does Spanish fop cover indoor works after all? Or is the {{FoP-Spain}} tag just wrong for that file (which would ultimately mean it needs to be deleted)? Pinging @Poco a poco: as the uploader. --Rosenzweig τ 06:20, 5 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

There is some minor reservation at Commons:Featured picture candidates/File:Oratorio de Santa María Reina y Madre, Málaga, España, 2023-05-20, DD 08-10 HDR.jpg though; ping @BigDom: who uttered the reservation. See also Commons talk:Freedom of panorama/Archive 5#does FOP in Spain also apply to interiours of public buildings. JWilz12345 (Talk|Contributions) 06:48, 5 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Just seen the ping, thanks for letting me know. I don't really have anything more to add; I raised the query at FPC, everyone ignored it and I forgot the whole thing ever happened. Reading the FoP-Spain text again today I still think it's very possible that indoor works are excluded, but we would need someone more versed in Spanish law to confirm one way or the other. BigDom (talk) 18:01, 5 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Hello, yes, right, I took that shot. How couldn't I photographed that awesome fresco, when I saw it? In fact, I upload pictures from everywhere and cannot give a clear statement whether we have an issue here (although I'm Spaniard). Poco a poco (talk) 09:55, 6 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I'll ping @MarcoAurelio: who has an essay on Spanish FoP (User:MarcoAurelio/FoP-ES). JWilz12345 (Talk|Contributions) 10:49, 6 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Dear Admins and Trusted users,

I was about to review this CC BY 3.0 image here: File:Kate bush 1978 1.png when I noticed that the Youtube source account has 855 videos all licensed freely with a cc by 3.0 Youtube license. Is this possible or is this account commiting a major copyright violation. There are about 7 videos from this account on Commons. When I was about to review the video, I did not receive a warning. I don't know the account user. If this is a Youtube washing account, then it should be blacklisted. Any views anyone? User:Krd, User:Rosenzweig or someone else. I am not an Admin. Something does not smell right but as I said I don't know this Youtube account. Best, --Leoboudv (talk) 00:16, 6 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

•  Comment: Does the Youtube account hold the copyright to this freely licensed 1975 video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3KL0oCchy5A OR this freely licensed 1985 video with Donna Summer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3il35ewe0zo ? It does not feel right, --Leoboudv (talk) 00:20, 6 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

It would appear to me that this channel is just a collection/archive of television clips. I don't think the uploader is the original copyright holder for any of this content. The about section of the channel sort of implies this and doesn't admit to actually creating or owning any of the content. Whichever TV stations these clips originated from would likely hold the copyright. For an example: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wFv3aB6JtJI - This clip is from The Wil Shriner Show, 1988. Perhaps the uploader recorded the clip back in the day and thinks they can license their own recording? PascalHD (talk) 00:41, 6 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

 Comment – Just added this user to Commons:Questionable YouTube videos, just in case. JohnCWiesenthal (talk) 01:46, 6 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

From the channel description: "All content legitimately exhibited under Fair Use terms and Creative Commons license. Copyrights in all content, both video and sound recordings, acknowledged and attributed accordingly." So, in short: they don't understand copyright law, and none of the licenses on their channel should be treated as valid. Omphalographer (talk) 03:24, 6 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Can Admin User:Krd or User:Rosenzweig or User:MGA73 add this account to the Commons:Questionable YouTube videos list? If the source account could be added to a blacklist, that is sufficient...but the 7 videos from this account should also just be deleted ASAP if possible. I am not an Admin. Best, --Leoboudv (talk) 07:59, 6 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

@Leoboudv: Please create a deletion request for all these videos. Yann (talk) 09:27, 6 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

As mentioned above, I have already updated that list to include this account. JohnCWiesenthal (talk) 14:33, 6 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Dear Yann or User:Rosenzweig,

• I have nominated all 7 images for deletion. Please add the source Youtube account to Commons:Questionable YouTube videos Goodnight, --Leoboudv (talk) 10:52, 6 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

  Already done. JohnCWiesenthal (talk) 14:33, 6 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

• Thank You JohnCWiesenthal and Yann for all your help here. I am not an Admin, just a trusted user and don't want to edit this list on my own in case I make a mistake. Kind Regards from Canada, --Leoboudv (talk) 22:14, 7 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

File:The Silence (11030194386).jpg is a photograph of a Doctor Who character created in 2010. It was taken at a temporary, paid exhibit. Is it a derivative work? Is it appropriately tagged? Thankyou, Rollinginhisgrave (talk) 00:31, 6 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

The file File:John O'Keefe.jpg is currently listed as {{PD-USGov}}. I don't believe that's correct, as everything I can find indicates that this was created by the Boston Police Department, which would be a state agency, not federal. It does look like Massachusetts government works can be PD, but only if held by the Massachusetts Archive, if I understand correctly, and I cannot find that photo in their collection. Would tagging this as {{PD-MAGov}} be appropriate, or is it nonfree? Seraphimblade (talk) 02:24, 6 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Is not the Boston Police Department a municipal agency? Ruslik (talk) 19:53, 6 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Indeed, hence why it's state. Municipalities are state subdivisions. Seraphimblade (talk) 20:15, 6 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I asked because as written in {{PD-MAGov}} municipalities are excluded. Ruslik (talk) 13:41, 7 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Municipal governments are not legal subdivisions of state governments in that sense, in the same way states are not legal subdivisions of the federal government and thus federal PD status does not apply to states. And as Ruslik points out, the MA statute explicitly addresses municipal governments, of which the Boston PD is a part. 19h00s (talk) 14:00, 7 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I missed that (though actually, municipalities are entirely subordinate to states, contrary to the way that states are not entirely subordinate to the federal government, since they're actually given various authorities by the Constitution, but some states do similarly give various levels of autonomy to municipalities. But they don't have to). That said, since this looks to be clearly municipal, looks like MAGov is not an option here. Thanks for catching the part I missed! Seraphimblade (talk) 23:12, 7 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I know, weird title, though I'm mostly referring to a Demoscene production for an ancient telephone: AONDEMO.

The YouTube video linked has been uploaded by the author and is tagged CC BY, and features chiptune music driven by hardware similar to a PC speaker.

While I'm aware that YouTube videos tagged as CC BY are OK on Commons, my question is if the 10 notes originally coming from the phone's firmware might make it a derivative work, therefore violating COM:DW?

It's probably worth mentioning that most of the music is original content while the jingle only plays for like three times, though IDK if there's anything like COM:DM for audio. At the worst, I could try muting those portions myself, though I don't really know how to do that losslessly. SergioFLS (talk) 04:41, 6 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

There might be more DW issues in that demo video: At 01:37 the demo features part of the theme song from the Knight Rider series. (Even visually at 01:37, the demo appears to replicate the light sequence from the Knight Rider car "K.I.T.T.", see here for comparison). The video might include further melody bits from other songs/soundtracks, too. Nakonana (talk) 17:40, 6 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I recently created a template specifically for dustjackets published in the US before 1978 without a valid copyright notice. It is currently located at User:Howardcorn33/sandbox/PD-US-dustjacket. The text is based on the text on the permission section at File:The Autobiography of Malcolm X (1st ed dust jacket cover).jpg. Howardcorn33 (talk) 14:46, 6 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I think a more useful template would be one for book covers more generally. Since from what I understand, they are usually are copyrighted separately from the book just like dust jackets. It's kind of pointless to have a template specifically for dust jackets when book covers in general have their own copyrights though (that's assuming I'm correct of course). --Adamant1 (talk) 15:20, 6 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

@Adamant1: do you have any citation for attached book covers having separate copyright status? I wouldn't expect that: what's magic about being on the outside of the copyrighted book? Whereas dustjackets are physically separable. - Jmabel ! talk 17:28, 6 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Maybe just in the sense of the writer of the book usually not being the one who drew/created the book cover, which is usually the job of an artist. So, the copyright for the book cover art would be with the artist, while the copyright for the text in the book would be with the writer. Nakonana (talk) 17:55, 6 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

@Jmabel: From what I understand the copyright for a book is usually retained by the author. Whereas the cover art is either owned by the publisher or artist. This site (which is supposedly ran by lawyers) says "A book cover has its own copyright protection, which is separate and in addition to the copyright protection for the book itself." Also, this website says "In both traditional publishing and indie/self-publishing, the cover art is a piece of intellectual property separate from the book itself." Createifwriting.com says "Most cover designers will retain the copyright of the cover and license it to you for use for your book cover design only and anything related to the promotion of the book. Very few designers offer what is called work for hire." Etc. Etc. I think you get the point. --Adamant1 (talk) 17:57, 6 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Still, that copyright would normally appear on the copyright page of the book (just like anything else in the book might have separate copyright) whereas I believe that before 1978 you needed a separate (usually minimal) notice on the dustjacket. - Jmabel ! talk 18:10, 6 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

We have {{US book dust jacket 1909–1977}}, which is what I've been using for post-1929 dust jackets that I've uploaded. prospectprospekt (talk) 04:01, 7 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Oh, I was simply not aware of that template before. It doesn't clearly say "this dustjacket is in the public domain," like the template I made. Shouldn't it be more explicit? Howardcorn33 (talk) 10:45, 7 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I've made this variant which blends together both templates: User:Howardcorn33/sandbox/PD-US-dustjacket-2 Howardcorn33 (talk) 10:52, 7 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I've now boldly updated the license template so that its more clearly a license template. Howardcorn33 (talk) 11:07, 8 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Hi, I found out that FlickreviewR 2 reviewed bogus licenses, i.e. {{PD-US}} for a recent image from Europe. This should not happen. So is the license at the source valid? Yann (talk) 17:39, 6 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

The photo on Flickr is attributed to "The Chancellery of the Prime Minister / PAP S.A" and marked as Public Domain, however, on the official website of the Polish Presidency of the Council of the European Union, photos by the The Chancellery of the Prime Minister / PAP S.A are marked with a copyright icon, see: [5]. The Flickr license seems questionable. Nakonana (talk) 18:05, 6 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Although, they also have a Creative Commons note on the website here that says: "All content published on this website is covered by a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 PL license, unless stated otherwise." Not sure if copyright is transferable according to Polish law. If it was Germany, then the copyright would remain with the photographer and the council couldn't just license the photos easily as creative commons on behalf of the photographer.

Either way, the Flickr license is still bogus because "Commons Attribution 3.0 PL" is not equivalent to "Public Domain". Nakonana (talk) 18:11, 6 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/legalcode

"Our public licenses are intended for use by those authorized to give the public permission to use material.." Copyright not being transferable doesn't mean you couldn't authorize someone else to license it.

"If You Distribute, or Publicly Perform the Work or any Adaptations or Collections, You must, unless a request has been made pursuant to Section 4(a) , keep intact all copyright notices for the Work and provide, reasonable to the medium or means You are utilizing: (i) the name of the Original Author (or pseudonym, if applicable) if supplied, and/or if the Original Author and/or Licensor designate another party or parties (e.g., a sponsor institute, publishing entity, journal) for attribution ("Attribution Parties") in Licensor's copyright notice, terms of service or by other reasonable means, the name of such party or parties"  ${\displaystyle 999}$REAL 💬 ⬆   21:53, 6 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Wouldn't the images in this categorie be fair use, not Creative Commons? It seems like they should be hosted on their respective projects (Wikipedia, etc.) instead of on Commons. The screenshot of Paint.NET on the English Wikipedia article is fair use, as well as the images for many other software articles. CoolDino1 (talk) 21:21, 6 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Convenience link: Category:Screenshots of Paint.net - Jmabel ! talk 21:47, 6 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

It used to be under MIT license a long time ago see Template:Paint.NET  ${\displaystyle 999}$REAL 💬 ⬆   21:59, 6 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Okay, so that means that screenshots of version 3.36 and earlier are all right, correct? CoolDino1 (talk) 22:20, 6 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Hello,

I saw a recent upload by SuperSkaterDude45 (talk · contributions · Move log · block log · uploads · Abuse filter log) block user which I deemed problematic. I went on and began to review his most recent uploads. When I got back to File:Miguel Ángel Cottón Pumas UNAM.jpg from 2025-06-01, I was already at 7 DR out of 9 reviewed files, Special:Diff/1041006922/1041010709 (diff to the daily DR listing page). In my opinion, he's interpreting public domain regulations in the Americas in a (too) lax way, using social networks (Facebook, Twitter) as sources and evidence for publications and PD status. I'd like to invite some scrutiny over these proceedings and a discussion whether this is a sound behaviour and acceptable on copyright grounds. I'm not convinced that it's with the purview of COM:L and COM:PRP. Regards, Grand-Duc (talk) 04:38, 7 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

@Grand-Duc: Most of the uploads that you have tagged for deletion have largely been that of smaller clubs of decades past in countries that don't tend to focus on clubs that tend to have an exclusively local following in countries that don't have the most readily available access. Naturally, this results in social media posts tending to be the only available sources of a direct scan of images otherwise found in dedicated blogs (to which I'm also assuming you deem unreliable) to said clubs. This is only reinforced as even through the use of several image searches with different indexes with nearly all of the files you've filed for deletion yielding the same results of said social media post or displaying results of entirely different players of the same era. Naturally, if there were better sources, I'd use them but going off of the precedent you want to establish, this leaves a lot of files of more niche subject matter to essentially never be uploaded on Commons for an unreasonably long amount of time.

You can label my interpretations as being "too lax" but I am following the example that has been set to me by various other contributors throughout the past few years of uploading files on Commons, especially when some of your own deletion reasons lack certainty of the copyright laws of other countries such as your citation for the deletion of File:Bonavena Ramírez 1985.png where you state that The use cases of the claimed PD statuses aren't applicable as far as I can tell. despite the PD-Mexico template directly stating that anonymous works are considered to be PD until the author comes forward with this especially being the case after I had directly cited a news publication that used the same image you're currently attempting to delete. I could point out other flaws in your arguments such as say for example how other sources I've found for File:Plaza San Martín 1970 (2).jpg tend to be either other social media posts or forum posts as well as other equivalent images such as this and this that are dated as being either of the same era or decades prior that would still put it within PD-Peru-photo, giving an estimate that would still put the image at PD-Peru-anonymous but I want to see what others have to say before I add on to my previous comments. SuperSkaterDude45 (talk) 05:23, 7 June 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Well, about "lot of files of more niche subject matter to essentially never be uploaded on Commons" - that's a consequence of a strict application of the precautionary principle, our mandatory prerequisite of commercial usability and the result of works being orphaned, yes. You cannot assume that stuff like author attributions not visible on the Internet don't exist. Especially for sports subjects, there could be very well be newspapers in microfilm archives holding information relevant to the copyright status that were never digitised and made available online. For the concise example of Commons:Deletion requests/File:Bonavena Ramírez 1985.png, you provided a link to a news outlet (MSN, aggregated from en:El Universal (Mexico City)), claiming it didn't "cite no author nor publisher". The credit line of the image says "Muere leyenda del Atlante / Foto: Especiales", which is IMHO a huge hint that the journalist Édgar Luna Cruz indeed actually had clues about the image author or provenience. By that alone, the assumption of an anonymous work is not valable any more, I think, at least not in the light of the precautionary principle.

For "I want to see what others have to say before I add on to my previous comments" - me too; I hope for a good participation in this redactional quality assurance work. Regards, Grand-Duc (talk) 05:42, 7 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

@Grand-Duc: In the article you've seemingly attempted to cite (Orphaned works), the majority of its contents are largely through a more Western point of view that doesn't exactly give specifics on third world countries with other language Wikipedia's usually being a translated version of the few general paragraphs of the main English version. I'll state this again, comparisons to other photos of the era from more reliable sources can at the very least give a rough estimate of a definitive time frame and thus, meet eligibility for both PD in their home nation as well as in the US. Furthermore, if you're aware that a majority of these images are direct scans from, in your own words, newspapers in microfilm archives, why is this conversation even being held in the first place? This is especially odd since a majority of Argentinian and Peruvian sports images are sourced from the magazines El Gráfico and Ovación respectively with more niche images and teams typically being direct scans from local newspapers that don't have an internet archive for the public to use on their own free will and volition unlike major publications such as the South China Morning Post and The New York Times. Hence, this is why a majority of these images tend to be from social media posts that are direct scans from said publications. Again, you could say that these are precautionary principles (which doesn't make much sense for reasons I have already cited) but to state that none of the images you have filed for deletion aren't at least within the general time frame of the aforementioned templates for PD status is quite absurd, especially since I highly doubt that there were many people in Peru that had readily available access to color film in the early 1970s.

As per your second argument, this is purely reliant on speculation with no actual basis as typically, if a known author is found of a work, the publisher is at the very least credited with this especially being the case for obituaries. For example, this Der Spiegel article announcing the death of German footballer Volker Graul cites both the photographer (Horst Müller) as well as the publishing company of the image used of Graul (IMAGO). If either of these were known prior to the publication of Ramírez's obituary, I can assure you one of the longest running newspaper companies in Mexico would've already given the proper attribution needed in order to use the image in the first place. SuperSkaterDude45 (talk) 06:25, 7 June 2024 (UTC)[reply]

I fixed the typo in the orphan works link. I may answer later to the remainder. Regards, Grand-Duc (talk) 06:43, 7 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I still maintain that "rough estimate of a definitive time frame and thus, meet eligibility for both PD in their home nation as well as in the US" is a thinking fully incompatible with COM:PRP. Using estimates for determining a PD status is actually a valid thing in our project, but only if there's a safety margin. This is exemplified with out templates {{PD-old-assumed}} and {{PD-old-assumed-expired}}, which show for an assumption of expired copyrights, but only with a 50 YEARS margin. You claimed a PD status for File:Hugo Madera.jpg and that this one was produced between 1970 and 1979. The needed limiting date for PD there is 1972-02-20, so forget about safety margins, it's even possible that the PD limit wasn't even reached!

Incidentally, my wife is an actual journalist trained and employed at a local publisher, so I got first-hand experience in seeing how screwed-up attributions often were (wrong names, to archives without stating individuals despite them being known...). Hence, your argument about "one of the longest running newspaper companies in Mexico would've already given the proper attribution" is moot; the line "Foto: Especiales" is more of a hint meaning in fact "Photo: Courtesy of XY" in similar cases.

I concede that your way of thinking is totally fine for private publishing venues like blogs et al., where you're free to ignore a small residual litigation risk. But it's unfit for Commons, where the policy is to COM:CARES even about these small residual risks of rights infringements, and to avoid them. This often entails an inability to host images, but we can't do much about this. Regards, Grand-Duc (talk) 16:08, 7 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

@Grand-Duc: Right, but your statements are usually just exclusive to say, Cuban players and even then, no one is truly certain of specific dates due to information regarding 1970s Cuban footballers generally being scarce for reasons that I think are obvious to many here. Once again, sourcing for images, especially those of sports, are largely from at least some news local publication as once more, I highly doubt that football officials just allow any random Joe to invade the pitch to take a photo shot of players from angles that only official photojournalists are normally only allowed to take. Further arguments for the verification of the dates can also be seen with other reliable sources corroborating the same general dates that give eligibility for the files falling within the required dates. For example, this article details on the career of Juan del Águila's career with CNI de Iquitos largely being derived in at least in the 1970s with {{PD-Peru-anonymous}} still being applicable due to again, the lack of information pertaining to both the photographer and the publishing studio of File:Juan del Águila Salazar 1974.jpg as well as all of the 1970s being covered before Peru joined the URAA in 1996. This is still applicable if hypothetically, the date wasn't exactly 1974 (which doesn't correlate with team images of later years used in reliable sources but I'm making this argument for the sake of the criteria you've established).

I am saying this with no intentions of ill will, but this is largely purely anecdotal evidence that wouldn't be appropriate for use in say, a discussion in the English Wikipedia. If a secondary source was used to describe the aforementioned that would be something else entirely but the lack of any definitive source nor rationale for a given author nor publishing company like in the Der Spiegel article I've cited earlier makes me less inclined to believe that the author has the sufficient information for proper attribution for the following:

Considering that most reliable sources derived in Latin America typically use images sourced from blogs or social media posts such as for example, this El Comercio article detailing the biography of Peruvian footballer Pedro Aicart using an image directly from a blog about retro Peruvian football, this just further inclines me to believe that the El Universal article I've cited is another one of those instances due to again, the lack of a readily available internet archive for local newspapers based in third world countries with inconsistent internet access. This also being assuming said publications are still operating as of 2025. SuperSkaterDude45 (talk) 17:53, 7 June 2024 (UTC)[reply]

You've introduced {{PD-Peru-anonymous}} in this thread, good. Then, you talk about the improbability of "any random Joe to invade the pitch to take a photo shot of players from angles that only official photojournalists are normally only allowed to take". I totally follow you there. But the template states several prerequisites for that a work can be considered anonymous. I strongly doubt that imagery produced by professional photographers can fulfil them at all! For us at Commons, it's sensible to assume that newspapers have some kind of records on who provided what and it's not sensible to assume that there were no registration at all, maybe in some almanach for a jubilee or whatever - I reiterate again: COM:CARES, COM:PRP, COM:L are the framework on which we have to operate. I doubt that one can demonstrate the applicability of "XY-anonymous" templates only by online searches, possibly from abroad. You've got to get your feet on the ground and search through local physical archives to get a level of certainty where it becomes reasonable to assume anonymity of the photographer of any work to be hosted on Commons! What somebody does on social networks, especially from countries where, I surmise, the awareness towards copyrights is low, is not to be replicated here, on Commons. Policies and guidelines forbid it.

Newspaper editorial departments and publishers can often get away from copyright infringements, simply by healing the error after the fact and paying fees due. The compagnies are likely already allocating budgets for this. Copyright laws show for this possibility and there are such disclaimers on a lot of publications, something along the lines of "Great care was taken to determinate and contact all rights holders. That was not successful in all cases. In case you have legitimate claims, contact the editor to settle the matter." But that is not a course of action for us, we've got to clear the rights situations before any rights holders put forth a DMCA takedown, for instance.

For the record: I was surprised by Yann's quick action lately, yes. I would have preferred a thorough discussion involving more people than both of us beforehand. But apparently, he was convinced by my arguments and not by yours. So, while I totally agree that you're not intending to do harm to the project, I think that your interpretations of these PD rules from the Americas are flawed or biased towards a (likely non-existent) admissibility for Commons. Regards, Grand-Duc (talk) 18:30, 7 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

@Grand-Duc: Since I've previously begun using the template, I've always used it whenever it met the two set criteria of how the work failed to mention the given name of author and if the copyright had been registered in the National Copyright Registry by 1996 (when again, Peru joined the URAA which extended copyright protections from 15 years to 70 years). Reading the official PDF provided on Commons also largely reaffirms these two as being the major criterias Unfortunately, the framework you're proposing is rather unreasonable as not only are again, is this significantly more doable for 1st world countries as opposed to their 3rd world counterparts given that a majority of Commons contributors are based in the US but also how I'm certain even physical archives of 3rd world publications aren't as readily available as you make them out to be. Sure, you can make the argument of say, me directly contacting the accounts for what original source scanned the image from so that I can give more direct attribution and sourcing which is fair although this also varies as some of the accounts I have posted from have remained dormant for several years with this especially being the case for countries where internet access is not only inconsistent but also heavily restrictive such as in again, Cuba.

As per your second series of arguments, you'd think that a major club such as Barcelona would've already made a series of legal complaints with this especially being the case since not only do European countries take copyright a lot more seriously but also how a majority of these official photographs are usually by a major photographing company with this especially being the case for stickers of the era. I doubt a potential significant copyright violation like that can be let go by simply by healing the error after the fact and paying fees due considering how protective said companies tend to be over their intellectual property to the point where some of these images can't even be used for files exclusive for the English Wikipedia such as almost every image from IMAGO. Taking these restrictions in mind, these potential issues are significantly more consequential than what you're attempting to depict it as. Finally, haphazardly filing eleven additional files for deletion for quite literally no reason with some of them somehow having even weaker rationale than your first bunch with this conversation even coming close to reaching to a consensus doesn't exactly bode well with me when all I'm really asking for is a centralized conversation here. SuperSkaterDude45 (talk) 22:35, 7 June 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Did you compare your Special:ListFiles/SuperSkaterDude45 against the DR opened? I went down from youngest towards older uploads. I hope that you have noticed that I'm not against your work, there are several uploads for which I do indeed not harbour sufficient doubts about their admissibility here, e.g. File:Rua Líbero Badaró 1977.jpg. But with Jmabel's and Yann's postings here, I felt confident enough to put more of your uploads for definite scrutiny, hence some more DR.

BTW, as it stands, Commons is indeed rather operating on first-world standards in copyright matters. Only because getting certainty about (copy-)rights is factually nigh impossible in some countries does not mean that uploads to Commons are possible under our standing policies. Regards, Grand-Duc (talk) 22:47, 7 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

@Grand-Duc: Question, what makes that file different from the other ones? Is it because of the Brazil template? I mean, it fulfills all you relatively lax qualification for deletions when it comes to the sourcing. Just because other contributors express mild support, doesn't mean you can now file more DR because you have a hunch feeling, especially when again, my aforementioned arguments directly conflate with deletion requests such as with File:Raúl Giustozzi River Plate.jpg where despite clear sourcing from various sources on his tenure with River Plate as well as the latest year still falling safe within {{PD-Argentina}} with the latest year being 1976, you still file it for deletion for... reasons. SuperSkaterDude45 (talk) 23:04, 7 June 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Yes. {{PD-Brazil-Photo}} refers to the creation of a photograph; the example being documentary in my opinion. {{PD-Argentina}} on the other hand refers to a publication of a photograph! A creation date can be gauged by the depicted scene (you've got to look for technical devices and vehicles, clothing and so on) and is easier taken out of sources than a publication date. For File:Raúl Giustozzi River Plate.jpg, the general appearance is that of a lithograph printed on paper used in books, for instance, it's not a glossy postcard nor newsprint (I saw images of a similar printing quality in illustrations in books printed between ~1960 and ~1985). Images taken for books can be published much later than the date they were shot as the editing processes of books may be slow. So, it's up to the uploader to demonstrate a valid publication date, until it's done, a brash PD-Argentina claim is misplaced.

And yes, I'm taking the media appearance into account when reviewing files; several files you uploaded were clearly scans from photo prints with creases and scratches, where I assumed that they may have been postcards. Others were clear scans from newspapers, the crude image raster was evident. The framing and possible posing of the motifs is also relevant. Any of these small indices combined may lead or not to the decision of opening a DR, everything can be a hint for determining a creation and publication history. Regards, Grand-Duc (talk) 23:35, 7 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

@Grand-Duc: So in summary, your arguments largely boil down to personal preference and interpretation with little reasoning nor basis to objective facts and dates which is something that I had previously thought we could come to a consensus to. Not even prior editors that I've engaged with have even told me your statements should be applicable when it comes to which files are allowed on Common. Also, if we were to go by technical devices and vehicles, clothing and so on then your rationale for deletion has even less basis if we were to go by the kits used in just about every image as I highly doubt that say, the jersey used in File:Raúl Giustozzi River Plate.jpg was the same kit used in 1977, especially when again, you compare and contrast with similar images used by reliable sources (with all the other aforementioned arguments I've made still applicable here. SuperSkaterDude45 (talk) 00:15, 7 June 2024 (UTC)[reply]

What did I say to give you this impression of "arguments largely boil down to personal preference and interpretation with little reasoning nor basis to objective facts and dates"? It's the complete opposite. I clearly said that "it's up to the uploader to demonstrate a valid publication date" (as for PD-Argentina cases); it should be clear that I'm arguing for a stringency in providing data and facts in order to determine PD statuses. But these datasets should be clear-cut (ISBN + page numbers, DOI, concise links, you get it?) and not some wishy-washy excerpt of random social media cruft. To gain knowledge about a creation history of a photo in the absence of concise data, you could use several proxies (appearance of the image, motifs, background features...) for that. Your Raúl Giustozzi image does not really need such roundabout ways. The creation is plausibly dated, but {{PD-Argentina}} mandates "Date and source of any publication prior to 20 year old must be indicated so anyone can check it." This is currently not the case, information about a publication is absent, so the usage of the PD claim is not valid.

Provide publication dates for PD-Argentina claims and any other where it's relevant, give the largest amount possible of information for any other PD case, plan with safety margins around PD dates and you would be safe from copyright-founded deletion requests. Not doing that is quite a sloppy work, I think and makes your uploads liable for deletions. Regards, Grand-Duc (talk) 00:48, 8 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

@Grand-Duc: I'll reiterate: This is the very first time I've seen any other contributor on Commons present the very arguments you are currently making for eligibility for uploading in commons. Furthermore, the datasets you have listed are largely once more, significantly more suitable for first world countries that are more likely to have internet archives at their disposal. The criteria you're also attempting to establish would also significantly reduce files that were already uploaded years ago. I'm not sure about you but trying to scour the internet for a specific source (that may not even be digitally uploaded at all mind you) just for this standard to not be applied to other contributors as a majority of my uploads are largely similarly structured to older posts that have been up for years with absolutely no prior qualms. I'd give more specifics such as say for example, the source of File:László Harsányi 1978 Media Archive.jpg being a direct PDF scan of the original source, but I'm interested in reading your inevitable response to this. SuperSkaterDude45 (talk) 01:27, 8 June 2024 (UTC)[reply]

My response is, after doing the work that YOU should have done: the attribution to the San Diego Sockers" is likely wrong, on the source PDF at page 2, there's a photographer named: "Ron McClendon". It's sensible to assume that he made the pictures displayed in the PDF. Then, the probability of a copyvio grew, as there's a copyright registration from 1983 for a NASL player manual, see https://publicrecords.copyright.gov/detailed-record/voyager_16703089 (I admit, that's after when the soccer player went back to Europe). This means that you absolutely cannot be sure at the moment that the photo never went into a copyrighted publication. If people with experience in judging US copyrights come forth and say, "it's OK", I can likely trust them, but you're currently not worth this trust, not with how lax an attitude you displayed towards copyrights. You should maybe admit that there are difficult areas to get illustrations for (these third world countries with fragmented and analog archives, if there are archives at all) and that there will be areas where illustrations found aren't fit for Commons. For EN-WP, you can easily fall back on fair use, which is not possible here, as you surely know (Commons:Fair use). Regards, Grand-Duc (talk) 02:14, 8 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

@Grand-Duc: Not sure what's up with the sudden increase in personal attacks towards me, but please, relax. Anyways, for this particular instance, this is largely based on files within Category:Los Angeles Aztecs 1979 media guide. There are separate media archives per season as the site in where I had even found the PDF had. At the end of the day however, these are largely your own personal preferences with prior uploads that had underwent similar deletions stating otherwise. I'm ultimately going to wait and abide on a consensus by a series of different contributors rather than appeasing a singular editor whose criteria for inclusion isn't used by even other users that have filed DRs on prior uploads. SuperSkaterDude45 (talk) 02:44, 8 June 2024 (UTC)[reply]

@Jmabel: You came into my mind as fellow Wikimedian here with relevant language, good communication skills and experience. Could I ask you for your opinion about our arguments? Regards, Grand-Duc (talk) 18:35, 7 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

 Comment Grand-Duc is mostly right. SuperSkaterDude45 has uploaded quite a large number of copyright violations with bogus license, so a formal warning is quite needed. Yann (talk) 18:37, 7 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Sorry, but my main opinion here his that you've both gone on at great length and provided no summary of what you are saying, and I'm not slogging through it. At a skim: the precautionary principle does, indeed, mean that there are a lot of subjects where we end up not being able to get photos that meet Commons' criteria. Given our intent to host only material that is clearly "free content", we end up being way more limited than most other websites. I routinely upload images to my own Flickr account or (when I was doing one) my own blog that I would not upload to Commons. - Jmabel ! talk 19:22, 7 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Aye, then I will try to sum up my ideas, Jmabel.

• I looked through 10 recent uploads of SuperSkaterDude45, 10 of them claimed to be PD due to various laws in the Americas.
• I challenged these PD opinions, making 7 DR while reviewing these 10 files, as I think that SSD45 is too lax, too lenient in his interpretation of PD rules:
  • Three examples:
    • File:Hugo Madera.jpg is said to be PD, but its creation and publication date is IMHO by far not long enough ago to fulfil {{PD-Cuba}} without further evidence
    • File:Juan del Águila Salazar 1974.jpg is said to be PD, but there's not information provided that the prerequisites of {{PD-Peru-anonymous}} are fulfilled, beyond a Facebook posting.
    • In Commons:Deletion requests/File:Bonavena Ramírez 1985.png Yann got already convinced by my argumentation and deleted the file for failing the {{PD-Mexico}} prerequisites.
• Our discussion here has two opposite poles, mine can be summed up to that a positive demonstration of PD status by virtue of having anonymous creators is not doable by online searches and that the remaining uncertainty makes such files unfit for Commons per COM:PRP and COM:CARES. SSD45 says the opposite. Regards, Grand-Duc (talk) 19:47, 7 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]
  • Demonstration of anonymity is usually very difficult, barring that you can find a clearly initial publication that didn't credit the work to an individual but rather to a collective entity, e.g. a press agency or a postcard company. Even then, it's possible that the author becomes known. Jmabel ! talk 01:35, 8 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Hi. A month ago I imported some images from a Flickr stream. A good percentage of them, including this file have extremely long descriptions. As well as the text "Copyright 2017. Some rights reserved. The associated text may not be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without prior written permission of Steven R. Shook." I know on Flickr's end that the images are released under a free license, but I can't find anything saying that the accompanying file descriptions would be and it seems that at least Steve Shook thinks his writing is copyrighted separately from the images. So does anyone know how exactly it works? Adamant1 (talk) 04:48, 7 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

@Adamant1, that seems to be the implicit perspective of Alexwlchan, the tech lead at the Flickr Foundation, based on some of his responses at Commons talk:Flickypedia. For instance, the reason that CC0 licensing for captions cannot be applied to the import of descriptions is that "The title and caption not being auto-loaded is an intentional choice – metadata on Wikimedia Commons has to be CC0 licensed, but there is no license for metadata on Flickr. We tried to be very cautious to avoid license washing of metadata." (source; caption here refers to the descriptions themselves). This was raised before; see Commons:Village pump/Copyright/Archive/2024/09#Are we allowed to copy descriptions from Flickr? and Commons:Village pump/Copyright/Archive/2024/07#On descriptions of Flickr imports (the latter of which, I personally raised). The prevailing view right now is that the file descriptions on Flickr have the same licensing as those of their associated image files. Of course, having an official response from Flickr or an explicit copyright page on Flickr concerning the licensing of Flickr uploaders' descriptions is more desirable.

If Flickr's perspective is the same as Alex's, then we have a problem for Commons description pages of millions of Flickr-imported image files (including hundreds that I imported). Massive suppression of revisions must be made, if ever. This is, considering that the Flickr image licensing does not apply to descriptions, and those descriptions are "unlicensed" by default. JWilz12345 (Talk|Contributions) 05:23, 7 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

@JWilz12345: Yikes. It sounds like something that should have been dealt with in the beginning but just wouldn't be practical to fix now due to the scale of the issue. Although really, it sounds like something should be done about it if descriptions are in fact copyrighted. --Adamant1 (talk) 05:28, 7 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

@Adamant1: we need at least some official response from Flickr itself regarding image descriptions (or what Flickr calls "captions" of their images) before proposing any drastic action. JWilz12345 (Talk|Contributions) 05:31, 7 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

But be aware, though, that shorter descriptions may be OK if those are below the threshold, as {{PD-text}}-type descriptions. Some Flickr uploaders also copy-pasted Wikipedia excerpts in verbatim to be used as descriptions for their images.

You may want to inspect the original source of the verbose description of the image you're referring to, and see if it originated from an unlicensed source. JWilz12345 (Talk|Contributions) 05:34, 7 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

@JWilz12345: I wasn't planning on removing the descriptions if there's no consensus to. But removing the longer ones just to be on the safe side seems like a good idea anyway regardless of if Flickr ever says anything about it or not. Although I'm still not planning on doing that at this point either. At least it's been talked about and there's a reasonable argument for keeping the text until someone from Flickr clarifies things. That's the important thing. --Adamant1 (talk) 05:51, 7 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

There are a lot of situations where copying metadata from Flickr is clearly not problematic: e.g. people copying their own content from Flickr, copying U.S. government content from Flickr. - Jmabel ! talk 19:26, 7 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Hi, does the copyright info/notice/license on the IETF's RFC documents is OK for Commons? DinhHuy2010 (talk) 10:50, 7 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Please link to an example. Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 15:21, 7 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

@Pigsonthewing, Any RFC that have this copyright notice:

Copyright Notice

Copyright (c) <INSERT YEAR NAME> IETF Trust and the persons identified as the

document authors. All rights reserved.

This document is subject to BCP 78 and the IETF Trust's Legal

Provisions Relating to IETF Documents

(http://trustee.ietf.org/license-info) in effect on the date of

publication of this document. Please review these documents

carefully, as they describe your rights and restrictions with respect

to this document. Code Components extracted from this document must

include Simplified BSD License text as described in Section 4.e of

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Does this consider OK for Commons?

(Sorry for broken formatting, I copied from the RFCs directly.) DinhHuy2010 (talk) 15:34, 7 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

That is not OK for Commons. What led you to think it might be? Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 15:38, 7 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

??? DinhHuy2010 (talk) 15:40, 7 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Distribution of this memo is unlimited.

Does it mean it {{Template:Copyrighted free use}} DinhHuy2010 (talk) 15:43, 7 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I don't think that Category:Banknotes of Serbia fall under {{PD-SerbiaGov}} no where in the official gazette does the government give a picture of how it would (i.e. description of 200 RSD bill, description of 100 RSD bill or description of 2000 RSD bill) instead it created by Institute for Manufacturing Banknotes and Coins – Topčider. No.cilepogača (talk) 12:16, 7 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I wouldn't think so either, at least going by the wording in the template. Although Commons:Copyright rules by territory/Serbia says it applies to "state symbols." But the template doesn't say that and including money in it seems like a stretch anyway. There's also the same issues with stamps of Serbia BTW. People on here tend to take any general license for government works and apply it to stamps and/or currency regardless of if the law specifically says they are PD or not because "state symbols" or some similar clause. I've never been a big fan of it myself but then mass deleting thousands of images for no reason wouldn't be a great alternative. So I don't know. It's one of those things like my conversation with JWilz12345 above this for file descriptions where the issue really should have been dealt with years ago but realistically is to widespread now to do anything about. --Adamant1 (talk) 15:10, 7 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I found an actual legal act restricting reproduction of bank so here is a translation of the part I think is relevant.

Decision on the conditions under which banknotes and coins may be reproduced

1. This decision regulates the conditions under which banknotes and coins issued by the National Bank of Serbia in accordance with the Law on the National Bank of Serbia may be reproduced.
Banknotes and coins referred to in paragraph 1 of this point include both those currently in circulation and those withdrawn from circulation but still within the legal exchange period.
2. The reproduction of a banknote or coin, or part of a banknote or coin, refers to its electronic image or image created on a surface, where the general impression is that the item resembles the banknote or coin as defined in point 1 of this decision.
3. Banknotes and coins may be reproduced if it is clearly evident that the reproduction is not an actual banknote or coin referred to in point 1 of this decision, especially in the following cases:
[...]
– when the reproduction is electronic and the resolution does not exceed 72 dots per inch (dpi).

It also says that you can't reproduce a banknote or a coin if it damages the reputation of Serbia or the National Bank.

No.cilepogača (talk) 15:47, 7 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Should File:Portrait of President-elect Donald Trump.jpg be deleted on the basis of Commons:Deletion requests/Files in Category:Official portraits of Donald Trump? --Geohakkeri (talk) 16:51, 7 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

The Library of Congress states it has "no known restrictions on publication". I think it is fine. Bedivere (talk) 17:20, 7 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Apparently in April 2017, it said the same thing. So on that regard, the situation hasn’t changed since the DR. --Geohakkeri (talk) 17:32, 7 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I think we are on the same terrains as the 2025 inaugural portrait. The photographer most likely, if not obviously, made the portrait under some contract, then the White House liberated the picture (as it can be extracted from the archived 2017 website) under a Creative Commons Attribution license. CC or PD (based on the Library of Congress note), I think it is undoubtedly free. Bedivere (talk) 19:33, 7 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I'm writing an article on Kathinka Kraft and the only free image I can find of her is in Kraft's memoirs Et og andet fra min tid : erindringer, the book is public domain in Norway according to the Nasjionalbut I've noticed on the PD Norway tags it says it has to be in public domain in the US also. According to COM:NORWAY, a Norwegian work is public domain in the US if it was in the public domain before the URAA restoration date in 1996. As the book was published posthumously in 1938, I am unsure if it can be uploaded according to the rules. Kraft died in 1895 and Arthur Skjelderup, who died in 1943, provided some extra biographical details to the book, so I'm unsure if he counts as a co-author. Spiderpig662 (talk) 20:11, 7 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

It's a photograph; it's going to have a separate copyright from the book. ChatGPT puts Norway going to life+70 on July 1, 1995, which means if that was the first publication and the photographer is anonymous, it would have left copyright in 2008. Unless you can find a previous publication of the photograph or the identity of the photographer, I think it would be copyright in the US until 2034.--Prosfilaes (talk) 20:53, 7 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Kathinka Kraft was born in 1826 and died in 1895. The photograph was probably taken in the 1870s or 1880s; it looks like a studio photograph by a professional photographer. Per COM:Norway, “Under the former photo law, protection ended 25 years after creation, provided that more than 15 years had passed since the photographer's death or the photographer is unknown. The image is in the public domain if this older term already had expired as of 29 June 1995.” It's rather likely that a photographer who took a 1895 (or earlier) photograph died in 1979 or earlier, so the photograph was likely in the PD in Norway in 1996. From a US standpoint, the photograph was probably published when sold to the commissioner by the photographer (see Carl Lindberg's contribution in Commons:Deletion requests/File:Minerva Kohlhepp Teichert 1908.jpg). I'd say you can upload the photo with {{PD-old-assumed-expired}}. --Rosenzweig τ 21:24, 7 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you both for your help. Spiderpig662 (talk) 18:11, 8 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Hello. I was directed here from the [Teahouse]! I've uploaded an [image] to Wikipedia for a draft I am currently working on. It is a screenshot of a page of a book written by Charles de La Roncière called 'Le Flibustier Mystérieux: Histoire d’un trésor caché'. La Roncière himself died in 1941. The book is written in French and was published in France in 1934. The screenshot I took is of a digital copy of the book hosted on [Flipbuilder] I assume that as 70 years have passed since the author's death in 1941, the book would be in the public domain, at least in France. I am unsure about the USA or if it would be acceptable on Wikipedia currently. Basically I am just double checking this can be used on Wikipedia without violating copyright! Thanks! 11wallisb (talk) 21:23, 7 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

(I did originally post on the Teahouse, but was directed here! I hope this is okay! For some reason I am unable to reply there currently?) 11wallisb (talk) 21:23, 7 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I don't think these symbols and letters are even copyrightable. --Rosenzweig τ 21:25, 7 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for the reply! I would normally be more certain, however this specific one is a huge question mark for me. From my research, in the US, the Uruguay Round Agreements Act of 1994 made many works from before 1964 and after 1929 copyrighted again. This novel was published in 1934 by Le Masque, Paris, a publishing house of cheap fiction. The particular copyright they imparted on their published works is not something I have been able to find unfortunately. However, as La Roncière passed in 1941, copyright would have lifted from 'Le Flibustier Mystérieux' in France in 2012. My question mark is in regards to its copyright status in the US. 11wallisb (talk) 21:32, 7 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Let me rephrase that: I think that these symbols and letter are too simple to have a copyright, in both France and the US. --Rosenzweig τ 21:41, 7 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Ah, I see what you mean now. Thank you for clarifying. I think that is definitely the logical assumption to the symbols and letters on the image itself. My concern would then shift onto the book they are apart of as a whole. 11wallisb (talk) 21:43, 7 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Hi! On this page https://americanhistory.si.edu/collections/object/nmah_706503 there is a notice about CC0 but I'm not sure if it is only the metadata or if it is also the photo. Perhaps a native English can have a look? MGA73 (talk) 18:17, 8 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Logically it applies to the photos. Metadata themselves lack originality. Ruslik (talk) 19:13, 8 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

per https://www.si.edu/Termsofuse the photo doesn't appear to be marked with CC0, only the metadata. Abzeronow (talk) 19:25, 8 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

[6] makes it pretty clear: CC0 is for the metadata, for the media themselves the terms of use apply, which restrict usage to "uses consistent with the principles of fair use under Section 108 of the U.S. Copyright Act." --Rosenzweig τ 19:35, 8 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]