Commons:Village pump/Copyright

I suspect this is a digital archive for someone, like they're using it as storage rather than other storage providers; /wiki/User:Atlasowa/New_video2commons/2025_June_1-10 This is the page i initially found, i was attempting to find all instances of a song and came across this, with multiple full episodes of The Amazing World Of Gumball just here.

User:Atlasowa/New video2commons heres the entire list, it feels like a rabbit hole.

Is this sort of thing allowed? It seems like its violating alll sorts of copyright law, but then again i see lots of videos with varying use/significance HyperNover (talk) 02:48, 30 November 2025 (UTC)Reply

@HyperNover apparently, for example File:The Amazing World of Gumball- Gumball & Darwin vs. The Evil Baby.webm, the underlying video is commercially licensed (by Cartoon Network India). I'm not sure if CN India has authorization from their parent firm to release the cartoon works into free culture (commercial-type) Creative Commons licensing. JWilz12345 (Talk|Contributions) 04:05, 30 November 2025 (UTC)Reply

One related video was deleted but later undeleted (Commons:Deletion requests/File:Tom & Jerry - Enjoy the Eternal Cat & Mouse Game of Tom & Jerry on Cartoon Network India.webm). I doubt on Cartoon Network India's legal right to commercially license their parent firm's productions, though, considering India remained among the "priority watchlist countries" in 2018. An email correspondence from Cartoon Network's parent firm may be needed to clarify if they indeed gave CN India the authorization, as well as the extent of CN India's rights to relicense the Cartoon Network productions. JWilz12345 (Talk|Contributions) 04:10, 30 November 2025 (UTC)Reply

It looks like the user is displaying the videos of Category:Uploaded with video2commons but in chronological order of upload. -- Asclepias (talk) 11:47, 30 November 2025 (UTC)Reply

Please see the discussion I started below: Commons:Village pump/Copyright#Cartoon Network India. Nosferattus (talk) 16:13, 30 November 2025 (UTC)Reply

With the latest information obtained by 19h00s, it is quite clear that we can't keep these videos and derivative works. So I deleted all files and closed the DR. Thanks to all for the investigation. Yann (talk) 19:05, 12 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

I also added Cartoon Network India channel to Commons:Questionable YouTube videos/Users. Yann (talk) 19:22, 12 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

All 4000+ videos posted on Cartoon Network India's YouTube channel are marked Creative Commons Attribution. These include videos of numerous cartoon franchises owned by numerous different companies (Looney Tunes, Tom & Jerry, Ben 10, The Amazing World of Gumball, Teen Titans Go, Lamput, Kiteretsu, Grizzy & the Lemmings, Batwheels, etc.). There is no way in hell that Cartoon Network India somehow overthrew capitalism and convinced some of the most litigious media companies on the planet (Warner Brothers, DC Comics) to relinquish control of their intellectual property and give away their cartoons for free in perpetuity. Please put on your thinking caps and ask if this actually makes sense. Clearly someone somewhere has made a mistake. If you think that's unlikely, notice that they also consistently misspelled the title of Grizzy & the Lemmings. Clearly this YouTube channel has low quality control and no one has noticed the incorrect license setting. We need to do two things, neither of which I know how to do:

1. Nominate all the videos in Category:Videos by Cartoon Network India for deletion (in a single discussion if possible).
2. Blacklist the Cartoon Network India YouTube channel from video2commons.

Can anyone help with this? Nosferattus (talk) 16:11, 30 November 2025 (UTC)Reply

Totally agree with you. To me, this is ridiculous on its face. This does not appear to be a purposeful choice by the actual rightsholder, but rather a designation made by an overzealous or misinformed staffer at a foreign subsidiary, which may or may not have the legal authority to license these videos as such - and that's not a legal authority I believe we should be comfortable "assuming" they had. We need some kind of proof that this was purposeful and authorized by the rightsholder, unlike with individuals, where it's generally safe to assume that any person has the legal authority to release their own work. However, it does appear that all the shows Cartoon Network India has uploaded are in fact owned by Cartoon Network or their parent company, Warner Bros Discovery, some via other subsidiaries (for example: Grizzy & the Lemmings was produced in part by the French TV channel Boomerang, which is owned by WBD; Batwheels is property of DC Comics, which is owned by WBD; and the rights to Tom & Jerry were purchased from Hanna-Barbera by Turner Broadcasting in 1986, which merged with TimeWarner in 1996 and eventually became WBD). 19h00s (talk) 18:30, 30 November 2025 (UTC)Reply

Warner Brothers Discovery's Clip and Still Licensing guidelines and contact info may be of relevance here. JWilz12345 (Talk|Contributions) 22:21, 30 November 2025 (UTC)Reply

I took my own initiative and just sent correspondence to clipandstilldept@wbd.com, in hopes of getting a response from at least one department from WBD. Fingers crossed, though. JWilz12345 (Talk|Contributions) 22:35, 30 November 2025 (UTC)Reply

@JWilz12345: Did you hear anything back? A faster approach might be to repost one of the videos on YouTube and see how long it takes to get it taken down with a copyright strike. My guess is less than a day. Nosferattus (talk) 06:42, 3 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

@Nosferattus no response from the Clips and Stills Department of Warner Bros Discovery, so far. I don't have an account on YT (and I don't have any plan to create one in the forseeable future). JWilz12345 (Talk|Contributions) 06:50, 3 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

@19h00s and JWilz12345: Since we didn't hear back from Warner Bros (I also emailed them a few days ago), I went ahead and created a deletion discussion: Commons:Deletion requests/Category:Videos by Cartoon Network India. Unfortunately, I don't know how to properly nominate all 68 files without doing it manually. Does someone know how to do that? Nosferattus (talk) 20:57, 3 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

I'm not sure we're gonna hear back from WBD anytime soon given the news (the company is splitting its Discovery properties into a new entity and selling its Warner Bros/HBO properties to Netflix, pending regulatory approval). I imagine there's about to be a lot of work for the licensing team as they split up their content and possibly assign new IP ownership. 19h00s (talk) 16:34, 5 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

Can you think of any plausible scenario in which a staffer would mark all their videos as CC BY SA without intending to do exactly that? Trade (talk) 01:43, 8 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

 Comment It is indeed surprising that these videos are under a free license. They should be contacted to make sure the license is valid, on YT or on https://www.facebook.com/CartoonNetwork.India/. Another possibility is to write to copyright@youtube.com (I did that). But if we don't get any answer, I don't see any reason to delete these files from Commons. There is no doubt that this is an official channel, so we do not have to make a double standard with free licenses. Yann (talk) 15:31, 4 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

Hi, I got an answer from YouTube which basically says: If you are the copyright holder, then send a takedown notice (with the form). It is clear that YouTube doesn't care. Yann (talk) 17:19, 5 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

Perhaps we should take the same attitude here, though unlike them I think we would do well to add a warning template about questioning the authority of Cartoon Network India to release these. Or we could just delete. But nothing else between seems to make much sense to me. - Jmabel ! talk 20:32, 5 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

If it's under CC law and Warner India released it under then it should be creative commons, so i think we should keep the files.

Also similar situation with NickRewind releasing character depictions and videos under CC, people might take advantage of this for fanworks or some weird stuff.

Also sorry for pinging @Yann Is anything okay btw? Idk why i'm asking this sorry lol ZigZagTheTigerSkunk (talk) 19:08, 7 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

I dont see what fan works could possibly be done with a bunch of TV clip compilations Trade (talk) 01:48, 8 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

Idk, maybe memes and crap like that. ZigZagTheTigerSkunk (talk) 02:27, 8 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

Sounds like the thing you propose is the exact thing task already being fulfilled by {{Free depiction (Cartoon Network)}} and {{Official Cartoon Network India YouTube channel}}

Or am i wrong? Trade (talk) 01:47, 8 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

DR the category. Unlikely that CNI has the authority to freely license the works. The guy uploading files to YouTube would not have relicensing in his scope of employment. Glrx (talk) 04:04, 8 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

Cartoon Network India is offically owned by Warner. ZigZagTheTigerSkunk (talk) 13:11, 8 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

So is WBTV which asserts that the clips are fully copyrighted.[1] Nosferattus (talk) 17:38, 8 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

Hmm.. Seems a bit more complicated than i thought. ZigZagTheTigerSkunk (talk) 17:58, 8 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

I agree with this due to the sheer volume of materials 'licensed' here. Though, this does make me wonder about Hasbro Australia. Sure, it's much, much less than CNI, but should we also put into question whether or not the Australia subsidiary got proper permission from the main company to freely license these materials too? Cawfeecrow (talk) 03:03, 19 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

@Cawfeecrow: I would recommend someone initiate a deletion discussion for the matter. – Howardcorn33 (💬) 19:42, 23 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

Hi, I recently uploaded this file: File:L'union des origines (1972).jpg

AntiCompositeBot gave me a warning about a missing or unclear copyright tag, but the copyright tag exists: it's {{self|cc-by-sa-4.0}}, and I don't see what's unclear about it. Not sure how to proceed to avoid the file getting deleted. Robinmetral (talk) 21:54, 18 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

@Robinmetral The bot sent you the message because User:MHM55 briefly removed the license template from the file (see this diff). So, you don't have to worry about the file getting deleted. Thanks. Tvpuppy (talk) 22:03, 18 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

Thanks a lot @Tvpuppy, hadn't noticed! Cheers Robinmetral (talk) 09:43, 20 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

Can this be uploaded to Commons? I'm feeling like that it's too simple to be copyrighted. Nvdtn19 (talk) 03:46, 19 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

 Comment China has a very low threshold of originality. - Jmabel ! talk 04:45, 19 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

Plus: en:File:360 Safeguard Logo.png, en:File:360 Total Security Logo.png, also seems too simple. Nvdtn19 (talk) 04:58, 19 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

Taking a quick glance at what China deems as copyrightable, per COM:TOO China, it seems like something as simple as combining two letters in a somewhat unique way (such as the K2 Sports logo or LY Company logo) or modifying a smiley face clears the threshold. I don't speak Mandarin, so the logic behind what is deemed original or not is lost on me, but I'd say the bar is a bit too low to risk it in this scenario. Cawfeecrow (talk) 16:07, 19 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

Got it. So, it's not safe to upload these to Commons, right? Also, is there any cases when simple Chinese logo uploaded here and being deleted after? Nvdtn19 (talk) 16:28, 19 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

I wouldn't know about consensus as I haven't had to deal with this sort of scenario (yet), but I'll give finding relevant Deletion Requests a good shake when I have the chance. Though I will say you might want to hold out a bit, as there's a good chance someone that has had to deal with this kind of thing will swing by, and they'd be able to explain it to you better. Again, I don't speak Mandarin, and Chinese law is nowhere near my specialty. Cawfeecrow (talk) 16:34, 19 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

@Nvdtn: if you want to see the history of decisions on this topic, the DRs should at least largely be in Category:Threshold of originality-related deletion requests in China. - Jmabel ! talk 20:32, 19 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

We have 49 files in Category:PD-American Samoa and conflicting deletion request results regarding its namesake template: Commons:Deletion requests/Files in Category:PD-American Samoa was closed as delete while Commons:Deletion requests/Template:PD-American Samoa, which I started, was closed as keep. I'm not going to nominate the template for deletion again because it has independent value in explaining why any file that uses or may use it is in the public domain in American Samoa. Rather, I propose changing it to say that another template explaining why such a file is freely licensed or in the public domain in the United States must be included.

Having read COM:American Samoa, this VPC thread and the latter deletion discussion, my take on the rationale for files created in American Samoa being PD in the US is this: since the definition of "United States" in 17 USC § 101 excludes American Samoa, American Samoans are only US nationals (for the purposes of the title) if they happen to physically be in where that definition considers a part of the US. Therefore, any work created by an American Samoan in American Samoa is not made by "a national . . . of the United States", and so cannot receive US copyright protection under 17 USC § 104. This rationale is faulty because the title's definition of the US only applies when the term is "used in a geographical sense". As this footnote explains, when 17 USC § 104 uses the term "national . . . of the United States", it is doing so "in a political instead of a geographic sense. In the context of nationality status, the term 'United States' in a geographical sense would be without meaning." Thus, works created by American Samoans in American Samoa should still receive US copyright protection.

Pinging DR participants @D. Benjamin Miller, @Marcus Cyron, @VTSGsRock and @Zoozaz1, as well as @TE(æ)A,ea., who scanned the document containing the footnote, for their thoughts on this matter. prospectprospekt (talk) 21:09, 19 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

As I cover at Commons:Village_pump/Copyright/Archive/2024/02#US_copyright_law_DOES_protect_the_work_of_American_Samoans, the notion that American Samoans are somehow not entitled to US copyright in the US is completely and utterly wrong.

1. American Samoans are US nationals. The copyright laws of the United States protect any works by US nationals (citizens or non-citizens), no matter where those US may reside and no matter where the work may have been created or first published. 17 USC §104: The works specified by sections 102 and 103, when published, are subject to protection under this title if— (1) on the date of first publication, one or more of the authors is a national or domiciliary of the United States. As I discuss in Commons:Deletion requests/Template:PD-American Samoa, the definition of "national" for the purposes of the Copyright Act definitely includes US nationals from American Samoa (see my citations there).
2. It is true that the federal copyright statute doesn't apply to American Samoa directly, but this has no impact on the protected status of works by American Samoans in the United States (per the area defined by the statute). Wikimedia's servers are in the United States, and so works by American Samoans (US nationals) are protected. Whether or not they are protected within American Samoa is irrelevant.
3. The files in Category:PD-American Samoa, in any event, currently fall into two categories.
   1. Files created by the government of American Samoa. These are in the public domain because they are creations of a US territory (which has no existence separate from the federal government).
   2. Photos and videos from the 2020 Olympics posted on Facebook by the American Samoa Track and Field Association. These files are not only copyrighted in the US due to national eligibility, they were also neither created nor published in American Samoa, since they were created in Japan and posted on Facebook, a website whose servers are not based in American Samoa!

The position that any US national resident in American Samoa is ineligible for copyright has no basis in law, and I find it extremely hard to take seriously. This flagrant copyright violation shouldn't be allowed to stand. D. Benjamin Miller (talk) 21:48, 19 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

We should just treat American Samoa as part of the US. This does mean all pre 1989 works not registered for copyright are PD, and the template should be updated to reflect this. It would be silly to split hairs and create a legal black hole that post 1989 works aren't protected because American Samoa hasn't signed Berne but also not eligible for protection as American domestic works. -Nard (Hablemonos) (Let's talk) 21:57, 19 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

It's not actually based on American Samoa not having signed Berne; it's based on the lack of a local copyright statute. Works by nationals of non-signatory states aren't protected in the US, but works by US nationals are protected. And works by American Samoans should also be protected in other Berne states because they are works by US nationals. The copyrights might not be enforceable in American Samoa, but they're enforceable everywhere else. D. Benjamin Miller (talk) 22:10, 19 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

This has been a long-running unresolved controversy and I hope we are able to come to a resolution here. The above posting rests upon a misapplication of the relevant copyright law. The authoritative interpretative source in this matter, The Application of Federal Laws in … American Samoa, Guam, the Northern Mariana Islands, and the U.S. Virgin Islands argues that the United States is indeed used in a geographic sense in this context, stating that "When the term "United States" is used in these provisions, as in other sections of Title 17, it is usually used in a geographical sense." The report references Wikisource:17 U.S.C. 101, which states that "The United States, when used in a geographical sense, comprises the several States, the District of Columbia and the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico, and the organized territories under the jurisdiction of the United States Government," (which excludes American Samoa), meaning that the geographical sense clearly applicable and spelled out in statute. Importantly, the footnote pointed out by User:Prospectprospekt applies only to 17 U.S.C. 104(b)(1), not 17 U.S.C. 104(b)(2). As the footnote states, "When the term "United States" is used in connection with nationality status, as in 17 U.S.C. 104(b)(1)--in referring to a "national … of the United States"--the term is thus used in a political instead of a geographic sense." This is not the case for (17 U.S.C. 104(b)(2)), where the United States is not used in direct connection with nationality status, and is clearly used geographically. US copyright protection does not extend to American Samoans at home, in American Samoa, because Federal law does not apply there and there is no copyright protection in American Samoan law. The key unresolved question is whether this lack of protection extends to the United States, and if American Samoan domiciles ("at home" in American Samoa) can obtain redress in the United States for works published in American Samoa, despite the inapplicibility of federal law to American Samoa.

In principle US copyright law does protect works of American Samoans regardless of where they are or where their work was published because of 17 U.S.C. 104(b)(1). In practice, however, American Samoans cannot enforce their copyright claims in the United States, if domiciled in American Samoa, because of the lack of Federal and local copyright law within American Samoa. The key source that proves this is this news article, which discusses an American Samoan domicile who sought to obtain legal relief for unauthorized copying of his work in the United States. As the article relates, "when he got to the Honolulu swap meet, someone was selling his CDs. He reported the unauthorized reproduction of his music to the FBI Hawaii Office but was told they could not pursue the complaint because he is based in American Samoa 'an unincorporated territory.' He was advised to talk to the Fono to pass a copyright law." As this demonstrates, the United States does not enforce/apply copyright for works published in American Samoa by authors based (domiciled) in American Samoa, due to the lack of a copyright law within American Samoa. If any users are aware of a situation in the United Stateswhere an American Samoan domicile successfully protected his/her work first published in American Samoa, I would be very interested to hear it. Short of that, the evidence seems to indicate that works by American Samoan domiciles first published in American Samoa do not obtain US copyright protections. Zoozaz1 (talk) 16:49, 20 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

It is true that American Samoa is not within the United States as defined for the purposes of 17 USC §104(b)(2). This, however, does not deprive American Samoans of copyright protection in the United States. 17 USC §104(b)(1–6) specifies six classes of published works that receive protection in the United States. These classes are connected with "or." A work that falls into any of the six categories is protected. A work by an American Samoan falls into category (1), and so the fact that such a work, if first published in American Samoa, does not also fall in category (2) wouldn't affect its protection in the United States, just as it doesn't matter that such a work is not, say, "first published by the United Nations or any of its specialized agencies, or by the Organization of American States" (class (5)).

The very memorandum to which you link says, "The Federal copyright laws apply fully in the Virgin Islands, Guam, and the Northern Marianas. They do not apply within American Samoa or the Trust Territory, but American Samoans can obtain copyright protection elsewhere in the United States, and Micronesians who are U.S. domiciliaries can also do so" (emphasis added). The text of the law is clear, and the interpretation given in the memorandum in line with the obvious and plain meaning of the law. There can be no serious doubt as to the meaning of this text.

Furthermore, the 2021 Compendium of U.S. Copyright Office Practices says (2002.1):

For purposes of copyright registration, the term "foreign works" generally refers to works created by author(s) who are not U.S. citizens or U.S. nationals and/or works that were first published abroad. […] U.S. citizens are people who are citizens in accordance with the U.S. Constitution or federal statutes, including (i) people born in Guam, the U.S. Virgin Islands, and Puerto Rico; and (ii) certain people who are by federal statute nationals, but not citizens of the United States, including people born in the outlying possessions of the United States. All U.S. citizens are also U.S. nationals. Works by U.S. citizens and nationals are not considered foreign works, and generally they are eligible for U.S. copyright protection.

The only evidence that you have — and it's quite thin — that American Samoan domiciliaries don't have full copyright protection in the United States is the article to which you link, where an American Samoa-based musician alleges that an FBI Hawaii Office did not pursue his complaint regarding alleged copyright infringement in Hawaii. Not only do we not know that this was exactly what the FBI told him (small local news outlets are not necessarily known for their accurate reporting on legal intricacies, and there may well have been a misunderstanding somewhere along the way), the lack of an FBI criminal investigation in one specific is not the same as a lack of protection — especially copyright protection is fundamentally almost always a civil matter. This is not a lawsuit; it is a report of something an FBI agent might have said. (The proper remedy, by the way, would be for the US Congress to extend copyright law to American Samoa, not for the territorial government to pass a local law.) I can't find any record that Tupuivao Bernard Scanlan ever tried to sue anyone. There is no doubt he could filed a lawsuit against an alleged infringer; if he really had no protection, the lawsuit would be dismissed after being filed.

It is ludicrous to take a second-hand description of something some FBI desk officer might have said, and which contradicts every single other available source (the Department of the Interior, the Copyright Office and the plain text of the statute), and use that as a justification for the claim that works by American Samoa domiciliaries are not protected in the United States. It certainly isn't compatible with COM:PCP! (Besides this, except for two government-created images (which remain), literally none of the now-deleted files previously in Category:PD-American Samoa were created or first published in American Samoa.)

One can't search for lawsuits based on whether the plaintiffs were domiciled in American Samoa, and I can't find any specific copyright case with a plaintiff from American Samoa, but that surely has to do with the territory's very small population. I'm sure you could find some cities and towns in the US with a population of under 50,000, but that doesn't mean their domiciliaries wouldn't enjoy copyright protection. D. Benjamin Miller (talk) 19:57, 20 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

I accept much of this. As I wrote in my previous response, I fully accept that "in principle US copyright law does protect works of American Samoans regardless of where they are or where their work was published because of 17 U.S.C. 104(b)(1)." The law, however, does not clearly state that this also applies to American Samoan nationals who are domicilaries in American Samoa, whereas the article clearly states the opposite. The Compendium states that "generally they are eligible," not specifying the cases in which they are not eligible, and the memorandum states that "American Samoans can obtain copyright protection," yet not specifying under what specific conditions this applies. I fully accept that American Samoan nationals who are domicilaries in the United States are eligible for copyright protection, since no source contradicts this and this must be the case for American Samoans to be generally eligible for copyright protection in the US. The article above, however, by specifically saying that American Samoan nationals "based in" American Samoa are ineligible for copyright enforcement, leads me to believe that these protections are only enforceable for American Samoan nationals who are domiciliaries in the United States, which is not contradictory to any of the laws or memos we have been discussing. This could arise out of a flaw in the article, as you argue, but it could also arise from de facto practice in the USA or a law relating to standing/enforcement we have not previously considered. I understand that this news article is not the highest quality source, but it is not contradicted by any of the higher quality sources offered. Perhaps we should contact the US Copyright Office for clarity on this matter. Of course if they claim that the article contains incorrect information, there would be no question as to the copyright enforcement status in the United States of works first published in American Samoa by American Samoan nationals who are domiciliaries of American Samoa. Zoozaz1 (talk) 21:41, 20 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

The 1985 memorandum says "can" because, at the time, copyright protection was dependent on compliance with formalities (since this was after the Copyright Act of 1976, but before the Berne Convention Implementation Act of 1988). In 1985, American Samoans would receive copyright protection in the US if they included a proper notice, but would lose protection if they did not.

The Compendium says "generally" eligible because there are reasons why a work may not be eligible for protection. See §608, §707, etc. For example, an unauthorized derivative works are ineligible for copyright insofar as much as they are incorporate the infringing materials, or a work may be considered insufficiently original or lack the proper subject matter or fixation to be copyrightable. There are no specified exceptions to the principle of national eligibility for US nationals anywhere in the statutes, and no such thing is mentioned in the Compendium (which in fact specifies in its glossary that national includes non-citizen nationals from outlying possessions, such as American Samoa).

The source that contradicts the article is the law. There are no secret laws. An implication in an article on some website is not a law and has zero legal weight. When it contradicts the plain language of the statute and the interpretations publicly given by government agencies (which agree with that plain language), it should be ignored as clearly out of line with the law.

You go on to surmise there could be some "de facto practice" in the US to deny American Samoans protections (on no basis but this article), or that there could be some law we have somehow overlooked (but for which you have no evidence or citation whatsoever). (I'm not sure what you'd even mean by a "de facto practice," and, even if there were such a practice, our rule is to follow what the law actually is, even if it is not enforced. Are orphaned worked de facto in the public domain because the owners don't enforce the copyrights?)

I understand that this news article is not the highest quality source, but it is not contradicted by any of the higher quality sources offered.

It is, in fact, contradicted by every other source I have cited, and some of those sources actually have legal weight, unlike that news article! The law does not have any cutout for US nationals domiciled in American Samoa (or in a non-treaty country or anywhere). You are using this news article to create an exception to the clear language of the law. D. Benjamin Miller (talk) 01:29, 21 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

@D. Benjamin Miller not the news article per se, but FBI itself. I believe in FBI's authority to reject copyright claims, since American Samoa is just an unincorporated territory. Quoting from this article: "Tupuivao said he personally experienced this predicament and thinking that the U.S already has a copyright law — he reported it to the Hawaii field office of the U.S Federal Bureau of Investigation. However, he was informed by the FBI that they could not pursue the claim because Tupuivao is based in American Samoa which is an unincorporated territory and he should petition the territorial Legislature to pass a copyright law." JWilz12345 (Talk|Contributions) 03:39, 21 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

You don't have any source from the FBI; you have a news article where someone claims that someone at the FBI told him something, which is not the same thing. Even if someone at the FBI told him this, the claim made in this piece of hearsay directly contradicts the plain language of the statute and the interpretations offered by the Department of the Interior and Copyright Office, so I am strongly inclined to believe this is completely wrong. Even if an FBI employee did say this, who's to say this was not some low-level fool taking cues from the rank nonsense like can be found on... Wikimedia Commons?

You are making an extraordinary claim, that domiciliaries of American Samoa are categorically unable to enforce a copyright (going against the plain meaning of the statute, common sense and all the on-the-record interpretations). For this claim, nobody has at any point been able to offer any actual legal basis. It should be stamped out from this website as quickly as possible in order to avoid further damage. D. Benjamin Miller (talk) 04:45, 21 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

@D. Benjamin Miller the law is unenforceable in American Samoa. The musician's grievances mirror those of other native musicians in the island. They were reluctant in distributing original musics (likely to the mainland of US or other US territories), due to the fear of their works being copied or pirated without permissions. The legalese of Department of the Interior and Copyright Office and other rules do not apply, considering the ongoing problem of piracy of local works made by native American Samoans (since there is no default protection for their works in the first place). JWilz12345 (Talk|Contributions) 04:56, 21 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

US federal copyright law may be unenforceable for alleged infringement in America Samoa, but our entire conversation was about the copyright status in the United States proper (that is, not in American Samoa) for works by US nationals domiciled in American Samoa. D. Benjamin Miller (talk) 05:03, 21 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

• Proposal: Just treat American Samoa as part of the USA. This means most pre-1989 works will be PD, but post 1989 works would be pma+70. -Nard (Hablemonos) (Let's talk) 21:44, 20 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

Hi, I originally started this conversation on the English Wikipedia (here), and was recommended to ask my question on the Commons Village Pump. Does anyone have information on the copyright status and rules of coins from the Cook Islands? I have an image that I want to upload to the English Wikipedia or Commons, but I cannot find information online regarding reproduction of the currency in a photograph. Does anyone know how I can find this information?

Link to the Cook Islands Dollar Wikipedia Page Mitchsavl (talk) 23:17, 19 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

[2] It already has another issue they licenced my own photo. URSOR LIMITED. All rights reserved My photo and licence is available here; File:Beautiful Image of Pikes Peak (IMG 0136).jpg. Tokeamour (talk) 21:14, 20 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

It is mentioned but it is not in the first image, it's either succummy or a violation. Tokeamour (talk) 21:16, 20 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

I believe it is the wrong link please view pikes peak, on this website owned by siad company Tokeamour (talk) 21:17, 20 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

Hi Tokeamour. A Commons or Wikipedia user can most likely help you regarding uses of your image on any Commons or Wikipedia pages, but there's nothing really anyone here can do to help you when it comes to people using your images out in the real world. As explained in COM:ENFORCE, only the copyright holder of an image can enforce its terms; the Wikimedia Foundation isn't the copyright holder so there's not much it can do. So, you're going to need to contact whoever is using your photo (URSOR Limited in this case perhaps) and ask them to comply with the terms of the license you released the file under either yourself or find a lawyer to do so on your behalf. You might even want to considered a en:DMCA takedown notice if they continue to fail to comply with the terms of the license even after you notify them of the issue. -- Marchjuly (talk) 21:44, 20 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

They did credit him and linked to the license, I'm struggling to understand why he's complaining. -Nard (Hablemonos) (Let's talk) 21:48, 20 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

I saw that too. @Tokeamour: The website you linked to above does seem to be complying with the terms of the license you choose for your photo. However, if you feel the website isn't complying with that license for some reason, you will need to discuss whyt with whoever runs the site. Once again, there's nothing anyone here can really do to sort that out for you. -- Marchjuly (talk) 21:55, 20 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

@Marchjuly, @Nard the Bard Thanks for the help, if I presented it as a opinion "I'm struggling or complaining")-Nard the Bard, it is understood. Both of you and millions of individuals are continuing to make wikimedia commons, a safe environment. (it already is!) Tokeamour (talk) 01:15, 22 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

I know court decisions are part of the public domain. But my question is if images contained in court decisions can be uploaded? ANd if so, what kind of images are permissible? For example, a logo of a private company used in a document of a court decision (in a trade mark case). Maat777 (talk) 10:21, 21 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

No, courts do not acquire copyright in exhibits. A private company logo included in a judgment is usually still copyrighted and cannot be uploaded to Commons unless it is clearly below the threshold of originality or released under a free license. --Jonatan Svensson Glad (talk) 13:17, 21 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

Are you sure that court decisions are public domain? I'm not finding any license tag for that in Category:PD European Union license tags. And which court exactly do you mean? The EU court? Or a court of one of the EU member states? Nakonana (talk) 13:52, 21 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

If we're talking about the EU court then it doesn't sound like the documents are PD according to this website[3] as there are too many restrictions:

• Any citizen of the Union, and any natural or legal person residing or having its registered office in a Member State, has a right of access to documents of the institutions, bodies, offices and agencies of the Union, whatever their medium. — Access granted only to people from the European Union, not to people outside the EU. And it only grants "access", not that one can share and change the documents as one pleases or use them for commercial purposes.
• The Court of Justice adopted a decision setting out how it deals with access to documents requests relating to its administrative work only. There is no right of public access to documents it holds relating to its ‘judicial work’, which includes pleadings, evidence and its internal deliberations on cases. The legal basis for this exception to the general rule of public access to documents is found in paragraph 4 of Article 15(3) of the Treaty on the Functioning of the EU (TFEU), which states that the right of public access to documents does not apply to the Court of Justice, except when it is exercising its ‘administrative tasks’. — Access granted only to administrative tasks, not to judicial work. And again, it only grants "access", nothing else. I'd say that court decisions are judicial work, not administrative tasks.

Nakonana (talk) 14:09, 21 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

These notices have nothing to do with copyright, but only with the right to receive copies upon request.

For instance, you will find in German copyright law that official acts of government are excused from copyright (Article 5 of the German copyright statute). The same exceptions are found in virtually every country. In the US, this is the "edicts of government" exception to copyright. In pretty much every country, this excludes all court decisions, domestic and foreign, from copyright. D. Benjamin Miller (talk) 18:57, 21 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

Because most EU member states include an exception in their national legislation that acts of government (like court decisions) are not copyrightable, I thought that those texts were in the public domain. Just like Bejamin Miller said for the German statute or article XI.172 in the belgian economic code. But I do not know if those exceptions include materials included in those decisions or not. Maat777 (talk) 08:20, 22 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

The actual decisions are always public domain, but external copyrighted works that might be incorporated into them remain copyrighted. D. Benjamin Miller (talk) 10:00, 22 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

 Comment I don't know if these are free of copyright, but if they are, they should be uploaded as PDF files, not images. Yann (talk) 15:43, 21 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

They are only allowed on Commons if there is no restrictions on re-use, which becomes sort of a quasi public domain license. That does not appear to be the case here. -Nard (Hablemonos) (Let's talk) 16:13, 21 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

The laws in the EU member state countries can differ from the rules that apply to the EU Court of Justice. But tbh, even then I'd rather question whether court decisions are public domain in EU countries per se (because they can contain very private information if not redacted). {{PD-GermanGov}}, for example, says they are, but a court ruling determined[4] that this is only true if the court decision is actually published by the court itself (Amtlich verfaßt seien Leitsätze nur dann, wenn das veröffentlichende Gericht in Erfüllung seines hoheitlichen Amtes den Leitsatz verfasse und veröffentliche.) (in the given case, a judge was providing such guidelines to a publisher on a private contractual agreement, which means that they were not published by the court itself and thus not "official"). But judging by some other website[5] it seems that not all court decisions are published but only if they are deemed useful for the legal discourse and public (and also per the Federal Court of Germany[6]: daß allen Gerichten […] kraft Bundesverfassungsrechts die Aufgabe obliegt, die Entscheidungen ihrer Spruchkörper der Öffentlichkeit zugänglich zu machen. Insoweit handelt es sich bei der Veröffentlichung von Gerichtsentscheidungen um eine öffentliche Aufgabe. Sie erfaßt alle Entscheidungen, an deren Veröffentlichung die Öffentlichkeit ein Interesse hat oder haben kann.). Unless I'm reading that wrong. The German wiki article w:de:Publikation von Gerichtsentscheidungen also states that most court decisions remain unpublished. So, even if a citizen would request and be granted access to the court decision of a particular court case, I'm not sure whether they could just upload it to Commons if it's an unpublished court decision. Nakonana (talk) 18:58, 21 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

Personal data privacy laws have nothing to do with copyright. German law, as with the laws in other EU countries and almost every country in general, excludes court decisions from copyright. D. Benjamin Miller (talk) 18:59, 21 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

Many files from studies use symbols from BioRender. I have asked BioRender whether files using their icons really can be CCBY. I got this reply:

kat@biorender[…].com> wrote:

Hello,

Thank you for reaching out to BioRender support!

Due to the open-source nature of Wikipedia, the protections for BioRender assets are not sufficiently protected when publishing under this platform. As such, you will unfortunately not be able to utilize BioRender illustrations for this purpose, though I do appreciate you taking the time to look into this.

Please let me know if you have any other questions or concerns!

This would imply they can't be CCBY and that the files using BioRender icons, symbols, illustrations, etc on Commons need to be deleted. Haven't nominated them for deletion so far.

By the way, now there is a free-licensed alternative set of symbols & illustrations one could use Category:NIH BioArt. I was thinking the longer scientists and other people think BioRender symbols can be used for files that are released under a free-license the bigger the problem will become as more people will continue to use BioRender, thinking they can publish study figures under CCBY.

However, now there's this page on BioRender: https://help.biorender.com/hc/en-gb/articles/21283116932765-CC-BY-publishing-and-reader-permissions which states the BioRender images can be used in CCBY-licensed images. This seems to overturn what one would have to conclude based on the email quoted above. This is now complicated further by that a user got this in a mail-response asking about the license:

While the CC-BY 4.0 license allows readers to share and adapt the published Completed Graphic (provided they follow attribution requirements), any reader who wishes to reuse or publish the figure with modifications (e.g., editing the BioRender icons or components) is required to obtain a BioRender subscription (either a paid Academic or Industry Plan) themselves and comply with BioRender's respective License Terms. This requirement exists specifically because BioRender retains ownership of the icons.

See further details in QuackGuru's posts at User:QuackGuru/Category discussion workshop. Also pinging @Marbletan and Tvpuppy: who participated there.

Most of the affected files are by now in Category:Files created with BioRender.com.

Are they fine to be on Commons or the files need to be deleted or modified? Prototyperspective (talk) 16:48, 21 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

Per my understanding, CC BY 4.0 allows anyone to share and reuse with attribution [7] and they can't place restrictions on that for one specific platform. CC licenses are also irrevocable, so they can't go back on what they stated on that page. To me it seems like this is all a bit disorganized - whoever is replying to the emails doesn't seem to understand what I said above.

I would say that if the CC license page predates the emails, we should be able to keep them, but if it gets murkier delete and replace with the free alternatives per COM:PRP. HurricaneZeta (talk) 23:15, 21 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

To add onto this, the email doesn't mean that it's no longer CC BY, since again CC licenses are irrevocable. I believe that images are failed on license review when they're from e.g. Flickr under a free license but with additional restrictions such as "must notify me for usage" or "must not use for x", but this is different since this would be like Flickr itself saying that they must be notified for usage or that something hosted there must not be used for x. HurricaneZeta (talk) 23:31, 21 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

Shouldn't this file be deemed as a derivative of w:en:File:NobelPrize1.jpg which is non-free in its country of origin, Sweden? Jonteemil (talk) 01:36, 22 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

Yes, most likely so as it appears to be a derivative of the Lindberg design. – Howardcorn33 (💬) 12:07, 22 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

Is this template valid? Apparently used to tag images of works of art from Taiwan in which their designers or artists "waived" their rights to claim copyright if the photos of their works are commercially used (?). No image uses this template as of this writing. See recent changes at COM:FOP Taiwan. JWilz12345 (Talk|Contributions) 02:10, 22 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

At the very least, this should be renamed as {{Copyrighted free use-Taiwan-art}}, on the same pattern as {{Copyrighted free use}}. Technically this is not a Freedom of Panorama exemption, since FoP is only a legal privilege given by law. The waiver from the artists constitutes the precepts of the CopyrightedFreeUse template, not the FoP law of Taiwan (no disclaimer provided under Article 58). Ping @Teetrition: (who was one of the involved users in Taiwanese FoP discussions). JWilz12345 (Talk|Contributions) 02:17, 22 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

I agree with you. I've noted the changes at COM:FOP Taiwan, and it seems doubtful that any artists would actually use this disclaimer. Teetrition (talk) 02:53, 23 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

Per Commons:Deletion requests/File:Milad Tower from Goftogu Park 2.jpg, the architectural copyright expires next year (50+1 years after creation). Yet w:en:Milad Tower mentions the name of the architect. Which is true in accordance with COM:Iran: CREATE+50+1 or AUTHOR DEATH YEAR+50+1? JWilz12345 (Talk|Contributions) 04:02, 22 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

Milad Tower was not finished in 1975, so that date is not really relevant to anything. If a legal entity owns the rights on the building it will expire 30 years from publication. Also copyright does not run to the end of the year in Iran  ${\displaystyle 999}$ REAL 💬 ⬆   16:22, 22 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

Pinging @Jeff G. on how come the year 1975 was comcluded in the discussions. JWilz12345 (Talk|Contributions) 23:24, 22 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

SELECT ?work ?workLabel ?pubDate ?author ?authorLabel ?deathDate WHERE {
  {
    SELECT ?author (MIN(?pubDate) AS ?minPub) WHERE {
      ?author wdt:P31 wd:Q5;
              wdt:P570 ?deathDate;
              wdt:P569 ?birthDate.

      # Still in copyright today (life+70 as of 2025-12-21)
      FILTER(?deathDate >= "1956-01-01T00:00:00Z"^^xsd:dateTime)

      # Make 19th-c publications plausible
      FILTER(?birthDate <= "1875-01-01T00:00:00Z"^^xsd:dateTime)

      ?work wdt:P50 ?author;
            wdt:P577 ?pubDate.

      # ---- ADD THESE LINES ----
      BIND(YEAR(?pubDate) AS ?py)
      BIND(YEAR(?birthDate) AS ?by)
      BIND(YEAR(?deathDate) AS ?dy)
      FILTER(?dy <= ?by + 115)
      FILTER(?py >= ?by + 12)
      # -------------------------
    }
    GROUP BY ?author
    ORDER BY ASC(?minPub)
    LIMIT 200
  }

  # Now retrieve a representative work at that author's earliest pub date
  ?work wdt:P50 ?author;
        wdt:P577 ?pubDate.
  FILTER(?pubDate = ?minPub)

  ?author wdt:P570 ?deathDate.

  SERVICE wikibase:label { bd:serviceParam wikibase:language "en". }
}
ORDER BY ASC(?pubDate)
LIMIT 50

I wasted some time today using Wikidata Query Service to produce a list of the oldest works still in copyright in life+70 nations. The answer is

s:en:The Royal Family of France (Henry) (1882) by s:en:Author:Lucien Edward Henry (died 1957), or

All Among the Barley: A Novel (1882) by Flora Hayter (died 1959) (Wikidata only).--Prosfilaes (talk) 06:00, 22 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

I am not knowledgable at all about copyright law, so forgive me if this is a frivolous question, but would uploading a visual depiction that I have created, of purely numerical data that I have found in a work protected by copyright be permitted? (Naturally the original source would be cited in the descripton.) Idkpineapples (talk) 07:59, 22 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

@Idkpineapples: Purely numerical data is factual information and contains no original authorship, and so should be filed under {{PD-ineligible}}. – Howardcorn33 (💬) 10:36, 22 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

If you created the visual depiction of the data yourself, then it would be permitted. – Howardcorn33 (💬) 10:39, 22 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

To my knowledge, in Indonesia, photographic works issued by legal entities (in my case a record label) are subjected to copyright until after 50 years of its publication. Please correct me on this. 2026 is a few weeks away, and I have some 1976 album covers from a singer that I would really like to upload. As soon as the new year hits, will the album cover become public domain? Or will I have to wait until the precise date during which the album was released? What if I do not know the exact date? Thank you in advance. Sorry if this has been asked before. WannzKaswan (talk) 14:08, 22 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

Sources from Indonesian Commons claims that a work's copyright will expire 50 years after its original publication, but only becomes public domain the year after? Is this true? That means I might have to wait until 2027... WannzKaswan (talk) 14:19, 22 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

I don't specifically know about Indonesia, but most countries go by year, not day within the year, so if your analysis is correct, you have to wait one more year.

"Issued" is not a term that usually arises in copyright law. If the term translates to "created" rather than "published", a relevant copyright-holder may be an artist, photographer, or even graphic designer (or some combination of these) rather than the record label, and they may have rights based on their lifetime, not year of publication. Again, I say this with no specific knowledge of the laws of that particular country. - Jmabel ! talk 19:21, 22 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

This image is causing troubles. First I was unable to transfer it using inat2wiki.toolforge; it detects the license as cc-by-nc. This is frustrating because the copyright holder changed it to cc-by-sa on my request and the page clearly says cc-by-sa. iNaturalist Import tool also failed to detect it among suitable images. I uploaded it hoping to bypass iNaturalist tools and get a human review, but it still got flagged for speedy deletion by INaturalistReviewBot. The file is at File:Cyprinodon dearborni shoal.jpg. Surtsicna (talk) 22:41, 22 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

@Surtsicna: are you still in contact with Mr Boccia? The "front" page of https://inaturalist.lu/observations/254901139 doesn't state CC-by-SA 4.0, but CC-By 4.0. - Furthermore, the detail page https://inaturalist.lu/photos/456683744 still has the NC license, that's why the bot is likely assuming the unsuitability for Commons. Regards, Grand-Duc (talk) 23:24, 22 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

Yes, only the photo license matters, not the license for the observation data. AntiCompositeNumber (they/them) (talk) 02:22, 23 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

This is such a facepalm moment. I sent the observation data page link when I asked for the license change and it never occurred to me that the observation and photo licenses might not be connected. Thank you both for explaining and thanks for helping out, Grand-Duc. Surtsicna (talk) 10:25, 23 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

On the page for Category:United States passport photos there is a section about the copyright of passport photos. It raises the possibility that passport photos may not be eligible for copyright because they do not meet the threshold of originality. That seems to rely only on a statement found on this page. It is not at all clear that the statement was made in relation to US passports.

I believe that passport photos meet the deliberately low bar for originality despite the guidelines that photographers must follow. Regardless of my opinion, we should clearly be following the precautionary principle here. If we are not certain that US passport photos are ineligible for copyright, we should not have them here.

I don't believe that the discussion of copyright on the category page is normal or helpful. Any such statements belong in guidelines or help pages. I have read the recent discussions on this noticeboard and I learned nothing. Is there any settled case law about this? Is the entire "below the threshold of originality" just some editor's wishful thinking or is there a documented basis for it? Counterfeit Purses (talk) 05:20, 23 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

My only problem with accepting passport photos is we reject other photos that are below TOO, There was a New York case that ruled thay clip art such as photos of food on a menu were below TOO but good luck gettinh Commons to accept them. -Nard (Hablemonos) (Let's talk) 12:42, 23 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

@Nard the Bard I would be surprised by that ruling. What is the name of the case? Counterfeit Purses (talk) 16:41, 23 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

Oriental Art Printing, Inc. v. Goldstar Printing Corp.; one of the photographs denied protection by that case is found on page 1522 of this Brooklyn Law Review article. prospectprospekt (talk) 17:55, 23 December 2025 (UTC) edited 18:02, 23 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

Per the US State Dept.'s website, it is clear that individuals outside the US govt may create and submit their own passport photos according to particular guidelines, so we cannot rely on arguments utilizing {{PD-USGov-DOS}}.

(Disclosure: I am not a lawyer, I am an amateur only attempting to make sense of what I have read.)

The only relevant case I can find with such routine portrait photography is the California case Dlugolecki v. Poppel, which dealt with unauthorized usage of yearbook photos of Meghan Markle in news broadcasts.

In its summary of the same preliminary finding, the US Copyright Office said "On [...] the nature of the copyrighted work, the court declined to “make any fine distinctions between creative and factual works,” accepting that there was a minimal measure of creativity in the photographs that slightly benefited Dlugolecki."

According to a 2025 article by law professor Paul Szynol, "A mug shot and passport photos are paradigm examples of an image produced in strict compliance with preexisting dictates that, by definition, not only don’t require creativity, but actively prohibit it. [...] Generic portraits—like high-school yearbook photos—are no more creative than mug shots." I am not sure if Dlugolecki v. Poppel went beyond a preliminary finding, or if its ongoing, but if it did ultimately conclude that such photographs were not protected by copyright, that would most likely mean that passport photos wouldn't be either.

Since I am not a lawyer, I therefore have to ask these questions:

1. Is Dlugolecki v. Poppel ongoing? Did the case conclude beyond anything other than a preliminary finding?
2. If so, would its verdict about the yearbook photos say anything about the copyrightability of passport photos?
3. If not, is its preliminary finding enough for "significant doubt" about such photos' copyrightability that COM:PCP will require us to delete passport photos?

– Howardcorn33 (💬) 13:09, 23 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

@Howardcorn33 I think you may have misinterpreted the statement in Dlugolecki v. Poppel. They were merely stating that despite the nature of the images, they met the standard for creativity. It wasn't in doubt. That statement is just checking off an item on the checklist.

Szynol isn't saying that passport photos and mugshots are ineligible for copyright. He is saying that they shouldn't be, which is very different. Right after the sentence that you quote, he says The formulae listed above would nevertheless provide courts with a doctrinal basis for finding creativity and lists the reasons. He is saying that mugshots and passports photos are, in the current interpretation of the law, copyrighted. Counterfeit Purses (talk) 16:39, 23 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

@Counterfeit Purses: thanks for clarifying. So should we take Szynol's statement about the current interpretation of the law (rather than his own advice) to mean that such photos are indeed copyrighted and therefore we should not permit them on Commons? – Howardcorn33 (💬) 19:35, 23 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

(Or at the very least that such photos have such significant doubt regarding their copyright status that COM:PCP applies?) – Howardcorn33 (💬) 19:36, 23 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

@Howardcorn33 That's how I take it but I'm just another editor like you and not an expert in these matters. Counterfeit Purses (talk) 22:27, 23 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

Has there ever actually been a case in the United States of anyone successfully registering copyright of a mugshot photo? Do we have any legal precedent here? PARAKANYAA (talk) 06:06, 26 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

For me, almost any photo of a 3D object has enough creativity to merit a copyright. Even if I'm wrong, the issue is close enough to raise COM:PCP.

The arguments for mugshot and passport photos usually play in another sandbox.

The mugshot question is usually about whether photographs taken by government employees have a copyright. That question varies by jurisdiction. Criminals do not supply their own mugshots.

Passport photos are not taken by government employees. Is my passport photo a work for hire where I own the copyright or does the photographer still hold the copyright? There usually is not a written contract where the copyright is transferred to me. A similar situation is when a passerby snaps a photo of me using my camera. Ramanujan's passport photo is a complicated mess: an unknown Indian photographer took the photo, but Chandrasekhar's heir claims she got the rights from Ramanujan's heir.

Back to creativity. I like my current driver's license photo. I was told to stand on the mark; that does not require much creativity. The DMV employee then gave me two posing instructions — instructions not needed for the ID photo. For me, those instructions take the picture out of the carnival photo booth realm. Even without those instructions, a yearbook or passport photographer gets to set up the lighting, and that involves more than mechanically clicking a shutter release. Maybe the same spacing and lighting is used for hundreds of passport photos, but that does not mean no creativity was involved. A Kodak pamphlet goes into a lot of detail about setting up lighting for a portrait.

The Copyright Office has also registered CCTV footage, so there is a presumption that even some utilitarian imaging can have a copyright. There are utilitarian images that are outside of copyright. For example, my recent series of x-rays are medical images that fall outside of copyright.

Glrx (talk) 19:41, 23 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

Passport photos aren't typically works for hire in the legal sense, that requires an employee employer relationship. They fall under the legal category of commissioned works, where the photographer almost always retains copyright (LifeTouch sends me emails every year reminding me they have photos of my kid from every year of his life, should I choose to purchase). Unlike yearbook photos, however passport photo companies rarely retain originals once the transaction is done, which is a pretty clear sign of implied transfer of copyright (destroying all copies of a work is considered a sign of copyright abandonment per Pacific and Southern Co., Inc. v. Duncan) but again, good luck convincing Commons. -Nard (Hablemonos) (Let's talk) 20:30, 23 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

The ground on which we deny copyright protection to X-Ray images is ridiculously flimsy, there has not once been a legal case on the matter. It is at least as originated by an human author as any passport photo or mugshot. The human author frames it, puts the subject into position, sets everything about how the image is going to look. If you think any photo of a 3D object passes the threshold of originality (which I don't agree with), I don't know why you would defend our practice of declaring those free based off of 0 legal precedent. PARAKANYAA (talk) 06:00, 26 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

@Bremps @D. Benjamin Miller @Clindberg @Jeff G. You all participated in a similar discussion here in March 2024. Any thoughts? Counterfeit Purses (talk) 22:47, 23 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

Can we add a subsection "Passport photos" in Commons:Copyright_rules_by_territory/United_States#Miscellaneous addressing this? Perhaps something along the lines of:

ID photos in US passports may not be assumed public domain works of the federal government as private citizens may submit their own photos. The copyrightability of such photos which adhere to strict compositional standards is unclear, but are presumed to have such significant doubt as to be deleted under the precautionary principle. Passport photos known to be shot by employees of US embassies and consulates as part of their official duties may be tagged with {{PD-USGov-DoS}}.

? – Howardcorn33 (💬) 23:25, 24 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

Are signatures of non-artistic nature (i.e. not a painter's work) like en:File:John Gnaegy signature.png or en:File:Beat Jans signature.png above or below TOO in Switzerland? And is there a difference between signatures of living people and those of people who are no longer alive?

(This is a followup to en:WP:Media copyright questions#Swiss signatures.) YuniToumei (talk) 15:54, 23 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

@YuniToumei: Per COM:TOO Switzerland, Swiss copyright law defines works as "literary and artistic intellectual creations with individual character, irrespective of their value or purpose". If we take this at face value, a signature, being a written mark intended to be unique to an individual, would appear to be literary, a creation, and have individual character and would therefore suffice for copyright. – Howardcorn33 (💬) 20:00, 23 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

Thanks, @Howardcorn33! That makes sense to me and means that the cases of all the signatures of people who are alive or died recently are clear to me.

Follow-up question regarding Gnaegy's signature: en:John Gnaegy died in 1772 which should place his works firmly within PD. However, the file is currently under free use and attributes the copyright to en:Ralph Beaver Strassburger who died in 1959. Under Swiss law, his works are copyrighted until 1959+70=2029. The signature appears in his book as a "facsimile", which the book describes as tracings and photographies of the original signatures. Am I understanding correctly that this would not generate new copyright attributed to Strassburger, and that this depiction of Gnaegy's signature would thus be PD? YuniToumei (talk) 22:39, 23 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

@YuniToumei: Facsimilies would most likely be covered under {{PD-scan}}. – Howardcorn33 (💬) 23:07, 23 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

Nonsense. A signature is not a "literary" work, because the Swiss copyright law's definition of category (a) says that these are "linguistic works," and a name is not such a work. You would have to argue that the letter is somehow a "graphic work." Furthermore, the Swiss courts have consistently held that there is a very high standard for "individual character." Many photographs were considered by Swiss law not to have "individual character," despite being copyrightable in the United States (which has a fairly high TOO). Only recently was Swiss law amended to specifically protect photographs of 3D objects even if they lack individual character; the requirement remains in place for all other types of works. It is virtually inconceivable that any ordinary signature could be copyrightable under Swiss law. @Howardcorn33 @YuniToumei D. Benjamin Miller (talk) 04:33, 24 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

Thank you! In that case, I will retag the relevant files and move them to commons soon :) YuniToumei (talk) 00:04, 26 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

@D. Benjamin Miller Could we get this info on COM:TOO Switzerland at some point? No rush or obligation, of course, but it'd be nice to have an easy-to-access reference point for this kind of thing. Cawfeecrow (talk) 11:24, 26 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

I seek clarification about interpreting the statement on page 2 of the published work: New Zealand geology - an illustrated guide. The statement on page 2 says: "This eBook is free to everyone. It is free of copyright restrictions, with the exception of the NIWA chart in Chapter 1 and various photographs supplied by GNS Science, as stated in the captions." Does this mean that I can take snips of illustrations (other than the exceptions listed) and upload these into Wikimedia Commons as "Public domain" or similar ? This is a great resource, and I would be keen to upload some of the illustrations if permissible._Marshelec (talk) 07:22, 24 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

• @Marshelec: The intention is pretty clear, even if their vocabulary to talk about copyright is poor (you can't wish copyright away, you can just give people permission to ignore it). I would say that anything in the book (with the stated exceptions) could be uploaded as {{Copyrighted free use}}. - Jmabel ! talk 20:19, 24 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

  Thanks, that's great. :)_Marshelec (talk) 20:46, 24 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

In a recent YT video from Baumgartner Restoration, a portrait of Frances Hodgson Burnett painted by Dora Wheeler Keith (d. 1940) was discovered. Can we legally grab a screenshot of the painting from the video? ~2025-42754-69 (talk) 12:06, 24 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

Yes, if you crop to just the painting, and note the frame or background. Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 14:28, 24 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

@~2025-42754-69: I assume you refer to this video? Since Keith was American, US law applies, which means publication is relevant. Thankfully the video provides us with all the relevant information, beginning at 47:49:

• Painting was created in 1884 by Keith
• Painting was privately held after its creation
• It was entirely unpublished until the airing of the video (Dec. 2025)

Therefore {{PD-US-unpublished}} should apply. – Howardcorn33 (💬) 14:48, 24 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

{{ping|Howardcorn33]] {{PD-US-unpublished}} - Jmabel ! talk 20:22, 24 December 2025 (UTC) I must have somehow missed that his ended his post with the license. - Jmabel ! talk 21:22, 24 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

? – Howardcorn33 (💬) 21:00, 24 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

Thanks guys ~2025-42754-69 (talk) 21:13, 24 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

Would this image of a pink cube be considered ineligible for copyright as a simple, non-artistic depiction of a geometric form? If so, what is the correct copyright information template to use when uploading the image? -- Cl3phact0 (talk) 16:43, 24 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

I don't think the cube itself is copyrighted, but the photograph of the cube can be. Please see Commons:When to use the PD-Art tag#This does not apply to photographs of 3D works of art. Thanks. Tvpuppy (talk) 16:56, 24 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

Thank you. Given that the framing, lighting, and point of view of image don't seem to demonstrate originality (it's a neutral, isometric, evenly lit image of a pink cube), I'm not sure how to interpret the rule in this case. -- Cl3phact0 (talk) 17:09, 24 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

With a three-dimensional object, even "neutrality" is a decision. Yes, the photo is probably copyrighted. - Jmabel ! talk 20:23, 24 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

That sounds like "no, we can't use this". As we have loads of cubes (and even rather a lot of c:Category:Cubes in art), it seemed like there might be a shot with this one. Worth a roll of the dice? -- Cl3phact0 (talk) 22:16, 24 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

This file is heavily in use so I thought I'd bring it here instead of going directly to a DR. Is the eagle cut-out to the left really below COM:TOO Germany? Jonteemil (talk) 23:30, 24 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

Probably yes, Germany still has a rather high TOO even after the court cases several years ago. I'm not so sure about COM:TOO US here though. --Rosenzweig τ 16:43, 26 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

Is the hCaptcha CAPTCHA interface copyrightable? I'm asking as I'm planning to replace the wonderfully outdated image on enwiki's CAPTCHA article with this 2023 image of hCaptcha taken from this Vice article. I chose this image in particular as it is very obvious that the images are AI-generated (see the linked Vice article) and therefore in the public domain; I'm just not sure if the UI itself is copyrighted or not (obviously the logo is copyrighted and would need to be masked out). Thank you. OutsideNormality (talk) 05:17, 25 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

If we can be confident that all the images there are AI-generated, then I see nothing else there that would be copyrightable in the U.S. - Jmabel ! talk 19:23, 25 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

I am aware that raster renderings of any font made in the US are generally under the public domain. What is not clear to me is the copyright status of vector (SVG) renderings of proprietary font made in the US. {{PD-font}} lays out one of the following caveats:

Vector format images of fonts (such as SVG) may be copyrighted in the United States.

If "vector format images of fonts" means vector representations of any font, and "may be copyrighted" refers to the copyright status of an individual font (free or proprietary) that is determined on a case-by-case basis, almost all SVG entries in Category:Typeface samples and its subcategories (e.g., Category:Typeface samples (Font Specimen Creator)) would be at risk of deletion for copyright violations. Most of the fonts/typefaces present in the said categories are proprietary, with notable examples being Arial, Comic Sans, Futura, and Helvetica.

One might argue that the term "font" refers to the software that allows a computer to render a typeface, such as TrueType (TTF) and OpenType (OTF) files. Font file formats are not supported file formats.

I managed to find several deletion requests on the subject matter. Only one deletion request, as far as I found, resulted in the successful deletion of what I presumed to be a few vector typeface samples.

Note that I am basing this discussion on US copyright laws and how they apply to fonts/typefaces.

Here are the relevant questions:

1. Would vector representations of proprietary fonts on Wikimedia Commons, including vector-based typeface samples, be subject to deletion due to copyright (e.g., Microsoft YaHei.svg)?
2. Does Wikimedia Commons make a distinction between the terms "font" and "typeface", especially in copyright policies? Are users, especially nominators of deletion discussions I mentioned, aware of the said distinction?

AlphaBeta135talk 05:52, 25 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

Re. #1: in most cases, no. Under US law, typefaces are not protected by copyright; this extends to any representation of the typeface, whether it's in print, a bitmap image, or vector graphics. Font files may in some cases be copyrightable, but, as you noted, this is a moot point because they cannot be uploaded to Commons. The language in Commons:Licensing#Fonts which specifies "raster renderings" should be removed, as it has no legal basis. Omphalographer (talk) 21:02, 25 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

The actual computer code is what might be copyrighted. The uploader would have had to independently create the svg, which probably explains why raster versions never have a concern. It's not a legal distinction, its a practical one. -Nard (Hablemonos) (Let's talk) 04:28, 26 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

Is it the computer code that is present in TTF or OTF files? AlphaBeta135talk 16:42, 26 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

Since 30 December 2024, the website of the President of Georgia was under construction, and re-opened later but without the CC license statement. The CC license was last noted on 29 December 2024, therefore uploads before that date is still OK as CC license are non-revokable. A1Cafel (talk) 14:06, 25 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

This photograph was published in The Tatler, a London magazine, on 10 February 1937. It was attributed to "Bassano", and the original is held by the National Portrait Gallery. Could someone please advise on its copyright status, and whether it would be appropriate for Commons? To the extent publication in the US need be shown, the magazine gives publication information at the bottom of the 70th page, where it states that it is printed and published in England, and "Entered as Second-class Matter at the New York (N.Y.) Post Office, 1903." The cover also indicates different postage rates for "Inland", Canada and Newfoundland", and "Foreign", the latter of which would apply to the US. Thanks in advance for any help. --Usernameunique (talk) 02:35, 26 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

Alexander Bassano retired in 1903 and sold his business, which retained his name. He died in 1913. Assuming the Bassano credit is for the firm, and not a person, you could use {{PD-UK-Unknown}} to tag this. If the magazine had subscribers in the US, you could use {{PD-URAA-simul}} unless the US copyright was properly registered and renewed, which sounds doubtful. -Nard (Hablemonos) (Let's talk) 02:47, 26 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

Thanks, Nard the Bard. Per Penn's database of periodical renewals, The Tatler does not appear to have renewed any of their issues in the US (if they even copyrighted them in the first place). --Usernameunique (talk) 03:27, 26 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

These pics are from the same ext. source

Currently on our project, these are marked "PDM" (unreviewed) If one clicks on "License: PublicDomain" these statements come up:

CC0 1.0 Public Domain Universal

CERTIFICATION 1.0 US Public Domain United States

PDM 1.0 Public Domain Universal

while nothing is checkmarked or highlighted. There is no note "pick one". Only one of the three licenses is given in the pics in our project. Is "PDM" only correct? Seasonal greetings, --Mateus2019 (talk) 11:33, 26 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

It's not a PDM. The link to CC doesn't really help. The file might perhaps have been tagged simply PD-author, if it weren't for the statement of copyright. The line "© [name] [...] PublicDomain" doesn't make much sense. It's also unclear if one part of that line might have been placed by the author and another part by the website. The whole thing is confused. The general statement of the photographer [8] doesn't help either where he says "Please do not redistribute my images in part or whole, for money or for free. You need my specific permission for that. Please read the terms of use and image licence." You'll have to decide if think that you can tell with certainty what the real status is. -- Asclepias (talk) 13:03, 26 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

Please see Commons:Deletion requests/File:Initiative ‘Children without tobacco’, 2022.jpg.

Thanks in advance. Graisely-1818 (talk) 11:42, 26 December 2025 (UTC).Reply

@Graisely-1818: Hello, The page of the DR closed in October 2025 was not really the place to start that discussion today. Undeletion requests can be made on the page Commons:Undeletion requests. You can also discuss here. I'm taking the liberty to move your comment here, below. -- Asclepias (talk) 13:19, 26 December 2025 (UTC)Reply

Hello. I see that one of my picture has been deleted (although the subject has Wikipedia articles). The second one, also a political poster, has not.

In my understanding, Wikimedia Commons and Wikipedia publish many political posters from street pictures as encyclopaedic information.

Many are found in Switzerland (Category:Political signage in Switzerland) and around the globe (Category:Political signage by country).

Can we restore this picture? Graisely-1818 (talk) 11:39, 26 December 2025 (UTC).Reply

The file was deleted for reasons of copyright, not for reasons of project scope. Please see Commons:Derivative works. It can't be restored on Commons unless the poster is freely licensed or in the public domain. The categories should include only free licensed or public domain works, but copyright violations might be found there if they have not been spotted and deleted. -- Asclepias (talk) 15:47, 26 December 2025 (UTC)Reply