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Deprecate Template:PD-BNF and Template:PD-GallicaScan

The templates {{PD-BNF}} and {{PD-GallicaScan}} were created in 2008 when the general assumption was that everything the Bibliotheque Nationale de France scanned for Gallica is in the public domain. As we know now, that is not the case, and the BNF has changed the rights remark for many of its magazine, newspaper etc. scans to ""Droits  : Consultable en ligne" (rights: can be viewed online) - at least in the French language version; in the English version, you can confusingly still often read Rights: public domain for the very same magazine or paper, while the German version doesn't mention the copyright status at all.

Anyway, it should be clear that because some file is from the BNF or Gallica, that does not mean it's automatically in the public domain. So my proposal is to deprecate these two tags and mark them accordingly that they should not be used for new files. For new files from BNF/Gallica that are in the public domain for some other reason (because the author died over 70 years ago etc.), only the regular PD-old, PD-scan etc. tags should be used. If we don't do this, these tags will always come back to bite us in the a** because people will use them for new uploads. Thoughts? --Rosenzweig τ 10:23, 29 November 2023 (UTC)

Mostly  Support. Wording of these templates in indeed a problem. It should be mentioned that there are not sufficient for Commons, that a verification of the copyright status and a proper license are needed. Yann (talk) 11:23, 29 November 2023 (UTC)

Mostly  Support per Yann.   — 🇺🇦Jeff G. ツ _{please ping or talk to me}🇺🇦 11:47, 29 November 2023 (UTC)

•  Support Admittedly I don't have much experience in the area, but the proposal seems reasonable from doing a basic glance at the templates and how they are being used. --Adamant1 (talk) 23:05, 29 November 2023 (UTC)

OK, I've changed both templates so that they now say the file might NOT be in the public domain and might be deleted if not in the PD; also that other valid license tags should be used. To do this, I've created a new marker template {{PD Gallica warning}} (modeled on {{PD German stamps warning}}).

The specific wording could probably still be improved. Thoughts on that? --Rosenzweig τ 12:36, 3 December 2023 (UTC)

Hmm. We have now 1,403,257 files with a deprecated template. How do we fix that? Yann (talk) 12:52, 3 December 2023 (UTC)

For a large-scale tag swap we'd probably need a bot. Anything from ca. 1900 or before should most likely be ok, so perhaps the license tags for these files could be replaced with a suitable PD-old tag by a bot? For anything newer (and that might still be a lot), we'd probably need a file by file manual review. And that would most likely take a long time, see the German stamps situtation still in progress after a decade. --Rosenzweig τ 13:03, 3 December 2023 (UTC)

Precisely. We have 1.4 million files with a giant PLEASE DELETE ME sign on them, maybe some miniscule fraction of 1% actually might need removal upon request. Yes, the wording should be changed to the usual & much more neutral "... has been deprecated. This template should be changed to ..." like these things normally have.

Absolutely, though, the shift will require bots and we shouldn't be going out of our way to encourage removal of the files until such bots are available. This cart got waaaaaaay out in front of its horse. — LlywelynII 04:56, 4 December 2023 (UTC)

Fwiw,  Strong oppose until this can be handled better and less disruptively than what's currently going on. I've spent multiple weeks of my life on editing and research for several hundred of the files badly impacted by this. Others are doubtless in the same boat. The way we handle PD-Art would've been a much better way to handle this: "...please specify why the underlying work is public domain in both the source country and the United States..." Simply changing the PD license to PD-Old etc. will remove the previously provided links to the BNF files.

@Yann: @Jeff G.: @Adamant1: Those arguments might not cause you to change your vote ("might as well get started & the links don't matter") but, given how this has shaken out in practice, do you have suggestions for minimizing the damage and disorder this is going to cause? Are there any mass-PD-editing utilities similar to HotCat for categories to speed this up? I have to edit everything here through a series of proxies to get over the Great Firewall & going file by file would be a vastly prohibitive waste of time. — LlywelynII 05:05, 4 December 2023 (UTC)

My suggestion would be to look into how the review of German stamps was handled after they were found not to be PD. Which, as Rosenzweig has pointed out, still hasn't been fully dealt with 10 years later. So I don't think you have to worry about all the files being immediately deleted. Nor does anyone expect you to deal with it on your own. Let alone at all. Just as long there's a consensus about how to handle it and basic things being done to move in the direction of reviewing the files at some point. --Adamant1 (talk) 05:23, 4 December 2023 (UTC)

@Adamant1: Did those stamps come with 24+ point text "warning" that the files "could" be deleted at any point? I'm dubious. — LlywelynII 06:19, 4 December 2023 (UTC)

No, but neither does anything having to do with have such a warning either. If you look at the template for German stamps though it says "this file is most likely NOT in the public domain. It has been marked for review, and will be deleted in due course if the review does not find it to be in the public domain. Which I think is totally reasonable. If you look at Category:German stamps review there's still upwards of 8 thousand files that haven't been reviewed. That's just ones that are included in the category to, but there's others. With German stamps specifically, they are only being reviewed now because I've been slowly going through them over the past year. There's no one gunning to delete anything in mass though. So your assertion that the files will be immediately deleted the second we implement this is clearly hyperbole. Really, probably no one is going to delete the files. Let alone any time soon or in mass. --Adamant1 (talk) 06:52, 4 December 2023 (UTC)

@LlywelynII: So what is your proposal for the wording of the templates? And how do you think should we prevent them being used to upload copyrighted files, as some users are doing now? If we don't stop that, the amount of files will only get larger. And as Adamant1 pointed out, nobody in fact proposed to delete over 1 million files. Right now it says that the files might not be in the public domain and might be deleted. --Rosenzweig τ 05:42, 4 December 2023 (UTC)

If you're curious, in toto, this seems like a (bad) answer searching for a (miniscule) problem. The template was largely fine and helpfully included a link to the BNF that the current solution will just delete. The things that shouldn't be uploaded shouldn't've been uploaded with or without this template's existence. They can be uploaded with or without this template's existence. The template could be rephrased to only cover the appropriate material. The problem would be exactly the same and it wouldn't be putting 1.4 million valid files at risk.

At minimum (as already explained above) the language of the edit should be more neutral, more in keeping with similar templates like PD-Art, and simply request that separate/additional licensing be provided. — LlywelynII 06:19, 4 December 2023 (UTC)

@LlywelynII: "has been depreciated": I presume you mean "has been deprecated". (Normally I'd let is slide, but since this appears to be a proposed edit…) - Jmabel ! talk 06:04, 4 December 2023 (UTC)

@Jmabel: "Normally I'd let is slide": I presume you mean "I'd let it slide". (Normally I'd let it slide, but since this appears to be needless snark... Yes, if the normal phrasing is slightly different, sure, use some version of that instead. Neither here nor there. Still, do kindly leave some notes on the merits of what we're talking about. It's possible I'm just completely wrong in thinking that the current phrasing will cause a much bigger problem than the original issue. Some of the original posters hadn't even noticed that 1.4 million files were affected, though.) — LlywelynII 06:19, 4 December 2023 (UTC)

@LlywelynII: "included a link to the BNF that the current solution will just delete": Which "current solution" do you mean? All links to BNF in the file descriptions are still there, none were deleted. And yes, when replacing the PD-GallicScan tag with an appropriate PD-old tag, another template with just the link (like {{Gallica}}, which does that without any claim of public domain) will have to be added at the same time. --Rosenzweig τ 07:28, 4 December 2023 (UTC)

I've changed the templates a bit so that the collapsed section with the deprecated tag is now expanded by default. --Rosenzweig τ 08:00, 4 December 2023 (UTC)

We need a wording saying these are not eligible for a mass deletion, just to prevent fear and conflicts. There are a lot of cases where the BNF doesn't claim a copyright, although it could, e.g. File:Portrait Roi de france Clovis.jpg. Would replacing the current template by {{CC-0}} be OK? Yann (talk) 10:22, 4 December 2023 (UTC)

I've changed the wording of {{PD Gallica warning}} so that possible deletion is now mentioned in the last paragraph. @Yann: What do you mean with your CC-0 proposal? Insert CC-0 in those cases you mentioned "where the BNF doesn't claim a copyright, although it could"? You mean in addition to a PD-old template for the underlying work? --Rosenzweig τ 13:18, 4 December 2023 (UTC)

OK, thanks. Yes, in addition to a license for the content itself, we need a license for the picture when it is not 2D (i.e. when PD-Art/PD-scan doesn't apply). Yann (talk) 13:47, 4 December 2023 (UTC)

Does the BNF explicitly refer to CC-0 somewhere, or is this some other declaration that they don' claim such copyrights? Or is it just implicit / assumed etc.? Even if it is "only" implicit, we can most likely still find a way to express that, but we should try to get it as correct as we can. For the coin image you linked, the BNF now says "Droits : Consultable en ligne". Is that their new default? --Rosenzweig τ 17:07, 4 December 2023 (UTC)

May be. BNF doesn't use CC-0, but there is usually a "public domain" mention. I wonder if we should use PD-self or CC-0, or something else. There are a number of cases where they said that the pictures are in the public domain, and later changed their mind, e.g. File:En attendant Godot, Festival d'Avignon, 1978 f22.jpg. Fernand Michaud donated all his pictures to the BNF, and they were available with a public domain notice, but that was later changed. Yann (talk) 17:38, 4 December 2023 (UTC)

Maybe create something under Category:No known restrictions license tags? - Jmabel ! talk 20:22, 4 December 2023 (UTC)

OK, there were no new contributions here (or in the parallel COM:VP discussion) for a few days now, so the initial fears of imminent mass deletions seem to have died down. There was no bot mass-tagging files as missing license tags because of the tag deprecation, and nobody was launching mass deletion requests because of it.

So the task at hand is now how to replace the bulk (hopefully) of the PD-GallicaScan and PD-BNF license tags with better and more fitting tags so only a small percentage (hopefully very small) of them remain to be examined if they have to be put through the deletion process.

I've looked at various categories and files both here and at the BNF web site, and I've noticed that we really cannot rely (anymore, if ever) on what the BNF writes on the file description pages as far as copyright is concerned. In the French description, for all files at which I've looked I found "Droits : Consultable en ligne", regardless if it was a map from the 1600s or a magazine from 1970. In the English description, they say "Rights: public domain" for the very same files, 1600s map as well as 1970 magazine. In other languages (German, Spanish, Italian, Russian) I didn't see anything about copyright in the descriptions. Given that situation, what the BNF writes on its file description pages about copyright has become meaningless, and it really was about time that we retired and deprecated those tags.

Now what the proper replacement tags for PD-GallicaScan and PD-BNF are depends on the individual file. For those with named authors it would be some variety of PD-old or PD-old-auto, plus a tag like PD-expired or PD-1996 if they're also in the public domain in the US. I don't know how well a bot could do this, maybe better if the file description page uses a specific {{Creator}} tag for the author. For files with no named author, but a date older than 120 years, PD-old-assumed(-expired) could be a solution.

I've looked at some press agency photos from the Rol and Meurisse agencies we have which usually came from Gallica. The usual rationale here is that these agency photos are collective works accd. to French copyright, and {{PD-France}} applies if they're older than 70 years. I've tried to change some tags with VisualFileChange, and changed the tags of 200 files or so in Category:1927 photographs by Agence Rol and Category:1926 photographs by Agence Rol. Namely those that simply used {{PD-GallicaScan}} without any parameters, and I've changed that to {{PD-Scan-two|PD-France||PD-US-expired|}}. Stuff like that – very similar files which all take the same relatively simple license tags and are already grouped in categories fitting for the task – could be done without bots with the assistance of VFC, somewhat reducing the overall usage of the deprecated tags. Besides the press agency photos, are there any other suggestions for similar cases?

While VFC can help somewhat, a large number of file description pages will probably have to be changed by bots, especially those where the tags have parameters, which may not be what one excepts (like {{PD-BNF|{{ARK-BNF|ark:/12148/btv1b53184933b}}}}, combining two tags that probably weren't meant to go together). Those are probably too complex to be cleanly replaced with VFC. What do you think would be the best way to proceed with this? Simply turn up at Commons:Bots/Work requests? Ask somewhere else? Gather more details first on what exactly should be changed, preferably not here but somewhere else where it won't be archived after a week of no new contributions? --Rosenzweig τ 16:36, 10 December 2023 (UTC)

@Rosenzweig: Without very specific parameters, I would not want to touch this as a bot task. I don't read French.   — 🇺🇦Jeff G. ツ _{please ping or talk to me}🇺🇦 16:52, 10 December 2023 (UTC)

@Rosenzweig: I'm not grasping why you think VFC wouldn't be the main tool for this. Admittedly, I've never taken on something this large that way, but the key to using VFC effectively for this sort of thing is usually to start by a well-chosen search to find a set of images whose tags you want to change in a particular way, and I suspect that a lot of progress could be made reasonably quickly in that manner. - Jmabel ! talk 22:21, 10 December 2023 (UTC)

@Jmabel: We'll see. I've now discovered that a huge lump of the 1.4 million files (about half) are in Category:Manuscripts from Gallica (Bibliothèque nationale de France) uploaded by Gzen92Bot, so uploaded by a bot. There are subcategories there for the works, containing the files for the single pages, and while some only have 2 files, others have over 500. Most are probably somewhere between those two. Per Category:Manuscripts from Gallica, many have less than 10 though. I've changed the tags in a 500+ category already with VFC, that went well I think, and by concentrating on the larger categories one could get down the number of template usages fairly quickly. Until only the smaller categories are left to change, and those would be more tiresome. Maybe the bot operator who uploaded these files could help out. --Rosenzweig τ 22:36, 10 December 2023 (UTC)

Oh, and PS, not every search can be used as a basis for VFC unfortunately, as I found out. You can search for "has template XYZ" and everything, but VFC then won't accept that search, or more precisely, you're not even offered to use VFC then. --Rosenzweig τ 22:39, 10 December 2023 (UTC)

I didn't get around to try replacing more tags with VFC, but will try to do so tomorrow. --Rosenzweig τ 20:06, 16 December 2023 (UTC)

@Rosenzweig: You can instead search for "insource:{{XYZ}}", with quotes if necessary.   — 🇺🇦Jeff G. ツ _{please ping or talk to me}🇺🇦 20:09, 16 December 2023 (UTC)

OK, I've done some more both in the press agency and the manuscript categories, several hundred files. I'll probably have a bit more time to dedicate to this task over the holidays, so we'll see how many files can have their tags replaced in the near future. With just under 1.4 million files still left it will still take a lot of time until it is done. --Rosenzweig τ 23:15, 23 December 2023 (UTC)

Down to slightly below 1.29 million files now, so a bit over 100,000 files in 6 days (my edit count here at Commons has certainly gone up dramatically). I didn't work full-time on this, but it certainly took quite a few hours. It works quite well for files uploaded by a bot (like the Gallica manuscript files) where you can expect a certain uniformity of the file description pages. You need to find some specific phrase that reliably (!) identifies a large subset of Gallica files (more than just one category), then go through all the VFC hoops like having to load "more" files several times to really get all of them. Even then, you won't get all (at least for some of the larger chunks) and will have to repeat the task two or three times, I guess because the servers/API take some time to really find all of the files. Also, some files will fail with API errors when processing several thousand files, so to catch all of them you need the repetition. I was able to process some larger chunks of 8,000 to 9,000 files that way (like archival records of the Comic Opera in Paris), but that is probably the upper limit of what can be accomplished with VFC. Other chunks were several thousand files. Once all the bigger subsets are processed, it will get more tedious, so this will take a lot of time as predicted. Looking at the template transclusion count, I noticed it going down slightly every now and then even when I hadn't processed any files with VFC, so maybe some users are actually replacing the deprecated tags. --Rosenzweig τ 13:45, 29 December 2023 (UTC)

I was mostly busy with undeleting files freshly in the PD over the last few days, so I didn't get much done here. Still down about 20.000 files to below 1.27 million now. --Rosenzweig τ 21:11, 4 January 2024 (UTC)

Copyleft Trolls

Hi, See [1] for background. Cory Doctorow and Joshua Brustein accuse Larry Philpot of using Commons to sue people. Nenad Stojkovic is also mentioned by Doctorow. Nightshooter didn't upload anything since October 2013, but we should probably do something here. Images by Marco Verch were previously deleted for the very same reason. Yann (talk) 21:33, 25 December 2023 (UTC)

@Yann: He just has 21 mediocre quality concert photos on Commons. I would strongly support nuking from orbit and banning his account for eternity. Plus maybe sending a note to his mother. He is exploiting Commons and hurting our mission and reputation. We should have no tolerance for such bad faith foolishness. Nosferattus (talk) 00:27, 27 December 2023 (UTC)

@Nosferattus: concur, though I don't have a space laser to spare. Care to start the DR, or would you rather that someone else does? - Jmabel ! talk 01:31, 27 December 2023 (UTC)

@Yann and Jmabel: Done: Commons:Deletion requests/Files by Larry Philpot. Hope I did that correctly. Nosferattus (talk) 02:09, 27 December 2023 (UTC)

Cory Doctorow makes an interesting suggestion about including a warning alongside old CC licences to make reusers aware of the potential danger. However, our templates like {{Cc-by-sa-2.0}} don't mention it. Should we add a warning to these templates along with a message encouraging copyright holders to re-licence their work under 4.0? The files will still remain here if the old licence is used but it gives reusers the opportunity to choose a safer file or make very sure they follow the terms precisely. From Hill To Shore (talk) 03:31, 27 December 2023 (UTC)

Yes, I think about suggesting that. Yann (talk) 09:01, 27 December 2023 (UTC)

We've had this discussion before. I think it would be a good idea to first approach those users who are still active and ask them to change their uploads with pre-4.0 cc licences to 4.0 or cc-zero. The best way to do this could be with an offer: just agree on "this-to-be-created-page" and a bot will adapt all your uploads. It would also be good if Flickr would adapt its licences, as many of the pre-4.0 licences come from there. C.Suthorn (@Life_is@no-pony.farm - p7.ee/p) (talk) 12:15, 27 December 2023 (UTC)

And not to forget @Doctorow has an account at Commons. C.Suthorn (@Life_is@no-pony.farm - p7.ee/p) (talk) 12:17, 27 December 2023 (UTC)

If we do that, it's probably best to add the 4.0 license and not remove the earlier version -- if someone is using it under an earlier license for a derivative work, they may still need the original version to comply with those older terms. Carl Lindberg (talk) 16:32, 27 December 2023 (UTC)

To my understanding, re-licensing under 4.0 could never undo the fact that they had previously irrevocably licensed it under the older version (say, 2.0). So, it would be dual-licensed, and could be used under the terms of either version 2.0 or 4.0, which may be more restrictive or more permissive in various ways. I agree it would be good to keep some explicit record of the old license in the file metadata, ideally in a less prominent way to show that 4.0 is preferred. 70.181.1.68 00:48, 2 January 2024 (UTC)

It can't undo it, but if it's not explicitly shown, there could be issues. Say someone used the work in a derivative which is CC-BY-SA-3.0 -- not sure you can do that with a 4.0 work; the derivative must be 4.0 or higher. If someone is validating the license and doesn't see the old versions, you could get into technical problems (which is what these copyright trolls can live on). Best to be explicit abut the dual-licensing and show all versions the author agreed to license under. Carl Lindberg (talk) 06:41, 3 January 2024 (UTC)

The Philpot images had already been discussed and processed years ago -- see Commons:Administrators' noticeboard/Archive_74#Vote:_overwriting_the_images_with_forced_attribution. The images had the correct attribution and a warning added to them. It sounds like another user who uploads here (Harald Krichel) is now using Pixsy, which I guess uses copyleft troll tactics. That user is apparently a member of VRT, and Wikimedia Deutschland. The question seems to be what to do with those uploads. They use the CC-BY-SA-3.0 license explicitly, even now, and only the 4.0 versions have the provision which helps fight these tactics. Not sure we have heard back from that user -- whether this is intentional on their part, or not being aware of how Pixsy does business. Carl Lindberg (talk) 16:28, 27 December 2023 (UTC)

@Clindberg: Obviously, we should do the same thing with Harald Krichel's <4.0 uploads.   — 🇺🇦Jeff G. ツ _{please ping or talk to me}🇺🇦 16:36, 27 December 2023 (UTC)

There are unfortunately thousands of them, so unless done by a bot (and then the images protected from being overwritten like Philpot's were), not sure how easy that approach will be. But it is one option, for sure. Unsure if this user has actually filed lawsuits like Philpot did, or just uses Pixsy, which I would presume (given the notice on the help desk) demands payment rather than the option of just fixing the attribution. Carl Lindberg (talk) 17:11, 27 December 2023 (UTC)

Is there some reason that no one wants Harald Krichel to participate in this discussion? Nosferattus (talk) 16:58, 30 December 2023 (UTC)

The two linked accounts (@Seewolf and Harald Krichel: ) were pinged from the previous discussion on Help Desk and there is a link from that discussion to this one.[2] Seewolf was pinged on 14 December and the last global contribution was today. Harald Krichel was pinged on 20 December but the last global contribution was on 15 December. Seewolf should have received a notification for the previous discussion but has not replied. I am including Pings in my comment here to repeat the notification. Hopefully we will get a response. From Hill To Shore (talk) 18:37, 30 December 2023 (UTC)

I have never sued anyone nor send them a bill for minor or even major violations of a cc-license. A major violation would be a "Photo: Wikipedia" and nothing else as attribution. But there are cases where the picture is used and a very different copyright holder is named on the page. In some of these cases on very commercial pages, I have sent them an invoice. If that is so heavily frowned upon, I will in the future abstain from that practice and license my pictures as cc by-sa 4. --Harald Krichel (talk) 16:06, 4 January 2024 (UTC)

Usually, if someone has this wrong online, the first step should be to simply ask them to fix the attribution, and if they will do that, then the matter should be settled. Conversely, I for one don't think there is any problem with threatening to sue a someone (especially a commercial) entity that used your work in print without attributing you (or one that won't fix an online attribution when requested), especially if they are a repeat offender. I'd be interested to hear from anyone who thinks that is excessive on my part.

Harald, is your practice much different than that? - Jmabel ! talk 20:52, 4 January 2024 (UTC)

I agree with this. The issue is not copyright holders holding accountable copyright violations, it's when the copyright holders jump straight into "sue!" mode without giving the violator a chance to correct the mistake. Those violations are often just a case of ignorance rather than maliciousness. — Huntster (t @ c) 21:10, 4 January 2024 (UTC)

Basically yes, but I didn't first ask to fix the attribution, before I have sent them the invoice, hence the anonymous complaint. By switching the license to CC BY-SA 4.0 I obligate myself to do that. Harald Krichel (talk) 10:36, 5 January 2024 (UTC)

Trying to adhere to license but it's impossible to "link" to a license on a print piece

Hi all-

I'm looking to use an image for a print piece that is tied to this licensing standard. However, one of the requirements is that a link to the license be included with the image when it's used. The issue is that I want to use the image for the print piece, so I can't provide a link in the common digital sense. I really don't want to clog up my layout with a long url. Can I just give appropriate credit like this, and the person who views the physical piece can look up the license if needed? "[Creator name/handle], License: CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons"

If anyone wants to dig into the license further, here's the Image. Clarejello (talk) 18:48, 29 December 2023 (UTC)

You do need at least to provide a URL. You can set up a bitly link, which will be short. - Jmabel ! talk 19:00, 29 December 2023 (UTC)

10-4. Thanks for the response! Clarejello (talk) 20:39, 29 December 2023 (UTC)

@Jmabel MW has its own Link-Shortener w.wiki. The image and the author (if the author of the image has a MW account) can be linked to with w.wiki. The license would need an external link shortener unless a single link to the file description page is deemed sufficient. C.Suthorn (@Life_is@no-pony.farm - p7.ee/p) (talk) 21:43, 30 December 2023 (UTC)

True. That would be another way to do it. Still, Creative Commons is independent of WMF, and the user is entitled to link to the license without involving anything from WMF. - Jmabel ! talk 21:49, 30 December 2023 (UTC)

For images where the file name on Commons is too long, you can also use a shortened URL using the article number, such as https://commons.wikimedia.org/?curid=109924879 . It doesn't help much for this image because the filename is already short. You can find the article number in the first SCRIPT element of the HTML source code, marked with "wgArticleId". – b_jonas 18:54, 31 December 2023 (UTC)

Additionally, on an image page under the Tools sidebar, there should be an option for "Get shortened URL", which generates a link like https://w.wiki/8jVC. So, there's various options! — Huntster (t @ c) 21:19, 4 January 2024 (UTC)

Source country and the U.S. laws differences

Hello! I'd like to start a discussion on an issue that is bothering me for a long time: a file (photograph or book) that is public domain on its home country, but under copyright at the US, should never be uploaded at the Commons, and what have been uploaded should be deleted or moved to another project (like Wikisource)? This discussion has been made in the past (2008a and 2008b), but it seems that nothing has come out of it. What do you all think? The differences, for example, between "Publish + 95 years" and "Life + 70 years" is reaching to a point where the Wikisource may not receive newly PD works for some time and it seems that the attempt of a Wikisource clone has been dead for some time now. Erick Soares3 (talk) 10:24, 1 January 2024 (UTC)

The most recently discussion at the Portuguese Wikisource. Erick Soares3 (talk) 10:25, 1 January 2024 (UTC)

I may be mistaken but I believe all of the Wikimedia servers are based in the US, so US copyright law would apply. That normally means that if US copyright has expired, the file can be uploaded to any project. However, because Commons policy requires dual licensing in both the source country and the US, we won't upload here until the "life +x years" rule is also met. That is the reverse of the position you describe (copyright free in source country but under copyright in the US).

Commons has no control over the policies of other Wikimedia projects. If consensus of your local project is to adopt a different copyright policy and you can convince the Wikimedia Foundation that your new policy is not blatantly illegal (to stop them pulling the plug on the server they are hosting your project on) then that is entirely up to you. Hypothetically, you could convince the Wikimedia Foundation to move the server for the Portuguese Wikisource to Portugal, so Portuguese copyright law would be the most prominent concern. From Hill To Shore (talk) 13:36, 1 January 2024 (UTC)

The link to a Wikisource clone doesn't seem to go anywhere but does mention Wikilivres.[3] This appears to be a project independent of Wikimedia that is based in New Zealand and subject to New Zealand copyright law. The most recent change was in 2019. From Hill To Shore (talk) 13:45, 1 January 2024 (UTC)

Yes, that's a project I started in 2006. I don't maintain it anymore, and the last maintainer is unreachable, but if anyone wants to start it again, there are dumbs on Internet Archive. Yann (talk) 13:50, 1 January 2024 (UTC)

@Yann@From Hill To Shore (just some segué) the long-dead project may be stabbed by a trend to extend NZ term to 70 years. But right now, current proposals are confined to sound recordings (but that may open the gates of NZ to 70 years p.m.a.). Seems not yet incorporated in the law as the current version still bears the 50-year rule from making for sound recordings. JWilz12345 (Talk|Contrib's.) 14:20, 1 January 2024 (UTC)

I only saw the replies now:

• But @From Hill To Shore, the standard at Commons would be to delete everything that doesn't complain with US law? Even the files from Template:PD-AR-Photo? The Portuguese Wikisource there's, at much, a draft of a decision: since there's about 3 or 4 active editors, the place is almost a ghost town.
• @Yann: and @JWilz12345: : would it be possible to move Wikilivres to East Timor (Life + 50 years)? It seems the best place for this project. Brazil and Portugal are Life + 70 (which is already kind of strict)... Thanks, Erick Soares3 (talk) 01:32, 2 January 2024 (UTC)

@Erick Soares3 consider the threshold of originality issue too. Also, the site itself is de facto dead and no one has tried to fix the codes, so unless there are persevering contributors to Wikilivres, there is no use even if it is migrated to Timor-Leste or anywhere where 50-year term for all works is still applied. JWilz12345 (Talk|Contrib's.) 01:56, 2 January 2024 (UTC)

@JWilz12345 My point is: there are stuff in the Commons that shouldn't be here in the literal interpretation of this site policies (like the 1950s Argentina images). I started to use the Template:Not-PD-US-URAA for some images/books because it was the only that made any sense, but ShakespeareFan00 rose some issues in some of my uploads, and then backed out when he saw that "Commons hasn't made a 'consistent' decision on these yet" (example). In my opinion, if this template shouldn't be used, it should have a clear warning on it (or just redirect it to SD). If books like Escândalo do Petróleo really should not be here, I'm ok with transwiking them to Wikisource. Erick Soares3 (talk) 11:05, 2 January 2024 (UTC)

@Erick Soares3: Argentina pictures are OK until 1972. Italian pictures are OK until 1976. Yann (talk) 12:03, 2 January 2024 (UTC)

@Yann There's no fundamental difference between the copyright situation of Argentina and Italy. The requirement of a minimum protection of 25 years since creation comes from the Berne Convention, a treaty signed both by Italy (1887) and Argentina (1967). Lugamo94 (talk) 13:13, 2 January 2024 (UTC)

There was a grandfather clause in the Berne Convention which allowed existing members to keep shorter terms than that 25 years, which is why Italy is still fine to keep 20 years for simple photos. Carl Lindberg (talk) 13:58, 6 January 2024 (UTC)

There is also the possibility to read the wording of paragraph (4) of article 7 as requiring a minimal 25 year term for only the photographs that are deemed to be artistic works, and not requiring any minimal copyright at all for those that are not. Depending if the condition "in so far as they are protected as artistic works" and the word "they" are understood to apply to both types of works mentioned before it (photographic works and works of applied art), or if they are understood to apply only to the second type of works mentioned (works of applied art). I suppose that it has been interpreted somewhere. Applying the condition to both types of works specified in the article makes sense, and that interpretation is reinforced by the presence of the comma in some linguistic versions (e.g. Spanish, Catalan). Do we know an official interpretation? -- Asclepias (talk) 15:28, 6 January 2024 (UTC)

This is true. Photographs below the threshold of originality may be outside the scope of the Berne Convention but may still be protected by a country anyways, but the length of protection would not be mandated. Carl Lindberg (talk) 18:23, 6 January 2024 (UTC)

@Clindberg Out of curiosity, do you know when the requirement of a minimum protection of 25 years for photographs was introduced? I have checked the links sources listed here, and the first time I could find that specific requirement was in the Article 7, Subsection 4 for the 1971 revision, created 3 or 4 years after Argentina signed the Berne Convention. Lugamo94 (talk) 17:32, 6 January 2024 (UTC)

I think it was the Stockholm revision in 1967.[4] The Rome revision in 1928 mandated protection of photographs, but no minimum term. The Brussels revision in 1948 has no minimum term either. I think Argentina joined the Brussels act right before the Stockholm act came into force, although the grandfather clause is limited to countries which had acceded to the 1928 Rome act, which Argentina had not. Argentina did not ratify the Paris 1971 provisions until 1980.[5] This page has links (if you expand "Contracting parties") to show which countries acceded to each revision of Berne. Carl Lindberg (talk) 18:23, 6 January 2024 (UTC)

@Clindberg Thanks for the comprehensive reply. Lugamo94 (talk) 18:32, 6 January 2024 (UTC)

@Erick Soares3 {{Not-PD-US-URAA}} has a cutoff date, March 1, 2012. URAA-affected files uploaded after that date are not supposed to be hosted here and must be deleted. Only URAA-affected files that were uploaded until March 1, 2012 can be retained here. We already reject public monuments of no-FoP countries that are now in public domain in those countries but are still copyrighted in the U.S., like Commons:Deletion requests/File:Sveti Janez Marija Vianej.jpg (from Slovenia, a pre-1978 sculpture). JWilz12345 (Talk|Contrib's.) 13:10, 2 January 2024 (UTC)

@Erick Soares3 "complain" => "comply", I presume. And good luck finding hosting that would let you legally claim a base in East Timor. - Jmabel ! talk 01:59, 2 January 2024 (UTC)

There are more countries with 50 pma laws: Hong Kong, South Africa, Taiwan, etc. Yann (talk) 10:01, 2 January 2024 (UTC)

Accd. to meta:Non-free content#Wikisource, the French Wikisource does accept "some media files are free according to lex loci but not US law". You might try that approach at Portuguese Wikisource. --Rosenzweig τ 02:31, 2 January 2024 (UTC)

Commons is not supposed to host anything which is still under copyright in the U.S. There are undoubtedly some out there -- nobody has wanted to go delete the {{Not-PD-US-URAA}} files which were uploaded when the URAA was under a legal challenge. Other projects can if they want -- they could always claim fair use if a legal situation came up. That may be harder for Wikisource than Wikipedia, but probably possible. However, note that works published without a copyright notice lost their U.S. copyright, and only gained it back if it was under copyright in the source country (country of publication) on January 1, 1996. Portugal is in a bit of a gray area for that -- they did not enact the law extending works to 70pma until after January 1, 1996, though it's possible the text of the EU directive became legally applicable in July 1995 even without their law changing, if they deem treaties to be self-executing there. I'm not sure how U.S. courts would treat that. The policy on the URAA here is a little different -- it seems to require showing that a file was in fact restored, at least enough to show there is a significant doubt. So that gray area probably would mean we'd allow uploads which were PD in Portugal under their older terms in 1996, provided they were published without a copyright notice (which most non-U.S. works were). Also note that the text of laws, judicial decisions, and the like do not get a U.S. copyright in any case ({{PD-EdictGov}}). Carl Lindberg (talk) 14:18, 6 January 2024 (UTC)

DOVA-SYNDROME

I was planning to discuss the licence and the FAQ on the DOVA-SYNDROME music library website, so can anyone evaluate whether they're eligible or not? - THV | ♂ | U | T - 12:56, 2 January 2024 (UTC)

It seems incompatible to me. Specific areas of concern are: 1. It is not redistributable - if the file is no longer distributed from that website, the licence becomes invalid for anyone who obtained the file from elsewhere (Commons, for example). 2. The licence states specifically that creators may impose additional conditions outside of the terms of the licence (we would have to check every single use of the licence to ensure no extra terms were added that invalidate usage here). 3. Usage is limited to background music only - that goes against our principle of being reusable for any purpose. From Hill To Shore (talk) 13:25, 2 January 2024 (UTC)

Thanks for the quick response. I guess I'll add it to my blacklist as above. - THV | ♂ | U | T - 14:08, 2 January 2024 (UTC)

Also, I've nominated 53 videos for deletion, excluding the last one, where I removed the audio entirely. Feel free to have thoughts if there are additional issues. - THV | ♂ | U | T - 23:01, 5 January 2024 (UTC); edited: 23:05, 5 January 2024 (UTC)

French film posters

Hi, I wonder who is the copyright owner of French film posters. If I would be a film producer, I would get the copyright from the artist, but is it the case? I found 2 posters for Category:Les Aventures de Robert Macaire (1925): This one was made by Jean-Adrien Mercier, and this one by Alain Cuny. Both artists aren't dead long enough for public domain, but if the copyright is owned by the film producer, then there are in the public domain by {{PD-France}}. Any idea? Yann (talk) 18:09, 3 January 2024 (UTC)

I don't know if France has any specific rules, but normally in countries where there is no such thing as work-for-hire or corporate copyrights (e.g., UK, Germany), the copyright belongs to the creator, which would be the artist in these cases. —holly {chat} 19:57, 3 January 2024 (UTC)

I think work for hire does exist in French law, but I don't know the practice in film industry. Yann (talk) 20:10, 3 January 2024 (UTC)

The UK has work for hire explicitly in their law (they treat "author" and "first copyright owner" differently). I would think in other places, usually the employment contract would specify that the economic rights would be transferred, even if technically first owned by the author. French law presumes that "collective works" published under a corporate name is owned by the company. However, I would disagree the posters qualify as PD in France by my reading -- the definition of collective works are only those in which the personal contributions of the various authors who participated in its production are merged in the overall work for which they were conceived, without it being possible to attribute to each author a separate right in the work as created. If you are able to attribute the artwork to a particular person, then it's not a collective work I don't think. Carl Lindberg (talk) 14:12, 4 January 2024 (UTC)

I don't think these are collective works, and I don't understand why you mention it. Only one author is mentioned for each. Yann (talk) 17:05, 4 January 2024 (UTC)

I thought that would be the only way they are PD in France. How would the copyright expire if it was owned by the film producer? Carl Lindberg (talk) 18:47, 4 January 2024 (UTC)

If the film producer was Jean Epstein who died in 1953, it became public domain a few days ago. Or if the copyright owner was Films Albatros, it expired on January 1st, 1984, 58 years after publication (until 1996, when it was prolonged to 70 years if it didn't expired). Yann (talk) 21:30, 4 January 2024 (UTC)

The film has a copyright term based on the director, author of the screenplay, author of the dialog, and score composer (if made specifically for the movie). The producer's lifetime does not enter into it. (EU directive 2006/116/EC, article 2; and French IP code article L123-2.) The poster would have a copyright term based on the artist's life, since they are known. The producer may own the copyright and is where you need to get permission, but the term of the copyright is pretty much always based on the human author (if known) in the EU, if you are waiting for it to expire. Carl Lindberg (talk) 22:47, 4 January 2024 (UTC)

In looking, Epstein was the director, and it was a silent movie so no music. If Epstein was the sole writer, then the movie would be PD. But unless the poster was a still from the movie, it would be an independent work, with a term based on its own author. Carl Lindberg (talk) 15:16, 5 January 2024 (UTC)

Carl Lindberg: Well yes, they may have work for hire in the UK, but the copyright term durations, which are what is most important for us, are still tied to when the the author (a natural person) dies. --Rosenzweig τ 21:28, 4 January 2024 (UTC)

I don't see how this is possible in practice. An organization or the State would have to keep track of all its employees' death date... Yann (talk) 21:55, 4 January 2024 (UTC)

If they want to sue and prove ownership of a valid copyright outside the 70 years, yes. If the company doesn't name the author, they may only get 70 years from publication. But if the author was named (or names themselves later, or in some countries simply becomes known), then the term reverts to 70pma even if still owned by the company. The EU directive does have a part which says that countries which have work for hire are supposed to require the author name on initial publication, else it will always be 70 years from "making available" with no option to expand to 70pma. The UK however did not actually implement that in their law, even though they have work for hire, so they still allow a work to become 70pma later on. France does not have work for hire technically, though I think they require an author to "make themselves known" to get the 70pma later on. Carl Lindberg (talk) 22:47, 4 January 2024 (UTC)

Correct upload?

Hello, I upload the Cosina CX-2 image from Flickr, but are bigger and I cropping to have better size for articles in Wiki. It's correct the upload? https://commons.m.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Cosina_CX-2.jpg Bernatargentona (talk) 08:16, 4 January 2024 (UTC)

Convenience link: File:Cosina CX-2.jpg

@Bernatargentona: That's a bit hard to follow; if there is another language you write better than English, please feel free to use it here.

Cropping is fine.

Was there something additional you were asking? - Jmabel ! talk 21:10, 4 January 2024 (UTC)

Moltes grácies, només tenia aquest dubte de si el retall era correcte.

Thanks you @Jmabel Bernatargentona (talk) 21:54, 4 January 2024 (UTC)

Street art and FOP in the US

Would the image of en:Guy Fieri in File:Portland, Oregon (July 26, 2022) - 008.jpg be considered copyrightable as a COM:DW per COM:FOP US or would it be treated as possibly COM:CB#Graffiti? -- Marchjuly (talk) 09:10, 4 January 2024 (UTC)

• {{Non-free graffiti}} imho apply here Юрий Д.К 18:10, 4 January 2024 (UTC)

  I thought that might a possibility, but this seems to have been painted on the wall of a restaurant owned and operated by Fieri; so, perhaps it's more of a en:work for hire, than random graffiti. Anyway, the uploader has stated on their user talk page that they only took the photo and didn't not create the image/graffiti; thus, the "own work" claim only applies to the photo. -- Marchjuly (talk) 22:17, 4 January 2024 (UTC)

If it was legally painted, then it's not graffiti, and it would have a copyright. (The graffiti question is gray at best if illegally painted, but that has been our policy.) Carl Lindberg (talk) 22:54, 4 January 2024 (UTC)

@Clindberg: It looks like this might've have been intentionally painted on the wall of the restaurant/food truck en:Viking Soul Food which was featured in a 2013 episode of Fieri's en:Diners, Drive-Ins and Dives. The photo seems to also show Fieri's signature next to his likeness. It doesn't seem to be a case of random graffiti, at least not to me. -- Marchjuly (talk) 01:26, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

This might help: "Fieri spray paints a memento inside every restaurant in Diners, Drive-Ins and Dives" -Another Believer (talk) 01:29, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

Are You Experienced - US album cover art

File:Are You Experienced - US cover-edit.jpg is licensed as {{PD-US-no notice}} and is listed as an example of a public domain album cover in COM:CB#Album covers. However, I'm wondering whether it's really PD based upon what's written about the cover art and other images created by the photographer who took the photo for the cover in this article. -- Marchjuly (talk) 09:24, 4 January 2024 (UTC)

What exactly in the (long) article? At first glance, the article doesn't seem to affect the conclusions reached in:

• Commons:Deletion requests/File:Are You Experienced - US cover.jpg
• Commons:Deletion requests/File:Are You Experienced - US cover-edit.jpg
• Wikipedia talk:Files for discussion/Archive 7

-- Asclepias (talk) 14:16, 4 January 2024 (UTC)

Without reading the long article: under the old U.S. copyright law, any authorized publication without notice put the work in the public domain. It didn't matter if there had also been publication with notice elsewhere. - Jmabel ! talk 21:13, 4 January 2024 (UTC)

@Asclepias and Jmabel: First, my apologies for not being more specific about the part of the article that I thought might be relevant. At the very end of the article, it states the following: "All images featured in this Cover Story are Copyright 1967 and 2008, Karl Ferris and Karl Ferris Photography - All rights reserved." It was the "Copyright 1967" part that made me wonder since the first image in the article is the album cover. -- Marchjuly (talk) 22:13, 4 January 2024 (UTC)

There would be a valid copyright on it in the UK (and before Brexit all across the EU) -- since it's a British author, they would not use the rule of the shorter term, but 70pma. And there were more photos in the article than just what is on the cover in question. Carl Lindberg (talk) 22:53, 4 January 2024 (UTC)

@Clindberg: As posted above, this file was discussed several times before and was deemed to be OK for Commons. Would this assessment need to be revisited if the cover art (based upon the article I found) is still protected by copyright under UK copyright law. The photographer who took the photo en:Karl Ferris apparently is still living so 70 pma would end at the earliest on January 1, 2095, if he died this year, right? What's also interesting is that File:Don gift cover new.jpg and File:Don heaven album w.jpg both are also attributed to Ferris, but are actually VRT verified. It might be possible that if the Hendrix cover is still copyrighted that Ferris might be willing to give his COM:CONSENT for that too. -- Marchjuly (talk) 01:14, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

Country of origin is country of first publication, not nationality of the author. Since this was apparently for the U.S. cover only, it would appear it was first published in the U.S., so that would satisfy both the "country of origin and the U.S." rule. It's an odd situation where it's fine (provided our analysis is correct) in the U.S., but not a good many other countries. Carl Lindberg (talk) 01:51, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

Photographs of the European Parliament

Hello, I'd like to know if this picture and others of the archive of the European Parliament are suitable for Commons. It is atributted to © Communautés européennes 2001 and states that it can be used under "Identification of origin mandatory". Morevover, the legal notice of the website states the following:

"As a general rule, the reuse (reproduction or use) of textual data and multimedia items which are the property of the European Union (identified by the words “© European Union, [year(s)] – Source: European Parliament” or “© European Union, [year(s)] – EP”) or of third parties (© External source, [year(s)]), and for which the European Union holds the rights of use, is authorised, for personal use or for further non-commercial or commercial dissemination, provided that the entire item is reproduced and the source is acknowledged. However, the reuse of certain data may be subject to different conditions in some instances; in this case, the item concerned is accompanied by a mention of the specific conditions relating to it."

I guess this would fall under an attribution acknowledging the source licence. Nevertheless, I've seen that File:Official portrait of David Sassoli, president of the European Parliament.jpg has been licensed as cc-by-4.0, so I don't know which licence should be used, maybe a new template should be created. Any thoughts? Basque mapping (talk) 13:41, 4 January 2024 (UTC)

No. You can only use the CC-BY-* licenses if that license was explicitly stated by the copyright owner. In this case, the statement only authorizes "non-commercial or commercial dissemination" (which does not conform to our policies requiring commercial use) and also requires "the entire item is reproduced", which prevents derivative works, which also does not conform to our policies. So even though uploading with acknowledgment of the source would be OK by their rules, it does not conform to COM:Licensing so would not be OK here. The statement on the image you mention that "which is understood to be equivalent to a CC BY license" is not correct. They may have had different usage terms at the time which may qualify for us, but you can't "assume" a CC license, ever -- the license is the explicit wording they used, and we'd have to judge if it conforms to COM:Licensing. A license statement solely of "Usage terms: Identification of origin mandatory" with no other restrictions does sound like {{Attribution}}, but if there are more explicit terms associated like the ones you mention, then it would not be OK. Carl Lindberg (talk) 14:20, 4 January 2024 (UTC)

@Clindberg Well, in the legal notice also specifies that "the reuse of certain data may be subject to different conditions in some instances; in this case, the item concerned is accompanied by a mention of the specific conditions relating to it." so we could consider the sidenote "Identification of origin mandatory" overrides the general conditions of the website? Thanks for the help :) Basque mapping (talk) 14:53, 4 January 2024 (UTC)

@Clindberg I agree with you that this doesn't allow derivative works, so the rest of this is moot but: what is the problem with authorizing "non-commercial or commercial dissemination"? What is that leaving out in terms of our policies requiring allowing commercial use? - Jmabel ! talk 21:18, 4 January 2024 (UTC)

I must have missed the "or commercial". So OK, that hurdle is fine. Carl Lindberg (talk) 22:50, 4 January 2024 (UTC)

Clarification on UK mural copyright

Hi all, I've been reading COM:FOP UK and the description of Category:Murals in England pretty much back and forth over the past half an hour or so, and having taken a few pictures around Hull Paragon Interchange's entrance hall yesterday of Andy Pea's 2023 mural (commissioned by Trans-Pennine Express) 'Creation of Hull', I'm not quite sure of my rights here. Would photographs of various parts of the mural constitute a "graphic work" and therefore be inadmissible for Commons uploading under Sections 4 and 62 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988? Hullian111 (talk) 11:19, 5 January 2024 (UTC)

It is hard to say without knowing the construction method of the mural. From the linked page it looks like a painted scene, so would be a 2D graphic work. We could only upload here if the artist releases their mural under a compatible licence. As the train company commissioned the piece, it may be that they also acquired copyright or the right to relicense the work; in that scenario, a suitable licence from the train company would be acceptable. From Hill To Shore (talk) 11:42, 5 January 2024 (UTC)

So, hypothetically, I'd have to contact Andy Pea (who handily has a contact page) and Trans-Pennine Express to get 13 photos licensed. Ah, no bother then, that sounds like too many hoops to jump through; thanks for the advice, I'll just keep them on my hard drive for personal viewing. I assume the same licensing problem might be encountered if the GeographBot uploads this to the Commons in about a year's time?

As a test case so I know how to get this copyright thing right with murals in the UK, would anything by the 'Spray Collective', such as this street mural, fall under a similar licensing issue, too? The burger shop that commissioned it has since gone out of business some years ago, so the current owners of the building probably have no part in maintaining the mural, but I assume copyright still lies with the 'Spray Collective' and thus puts it under a similar licensing issue to Andy Pea's railway station mural? Hullian111 (talk) 12:16, 5 January 2024 (UTC)

In general, taking a picture primarily of someone else's copyrighted work is a derivative, and we would need a license from the owner of the underlying work (for at least your photo) to be OK here (or the copyright needs to have expired, which can take 120 years or more). Some countries have a "freedom of panorama" provision for anything permanently in public, such that photos of it are OK, but in the UK that does not extend to murals or paintings (primarily just 3-D works like sculpture or buildings). Obviously such things are fine in many non-commercial contexts under fair use or fair dealing, but not on Commons. If the photo is primarily of something else and is a minor part of the photo, some of the situations in Commons:de minimis may apply. Carl Lindberg (talk) 15:12, 5 January 2024 (UTC)

What counts as an "author" for the purposes of copyright (with regard to a still image of a film)?

(copied from my question over at the English Wikipedia, because my question wasn't answered properly and i figure you all would know more)

The director? The cinematographer? The director in this case died in 1929 (it is a German film from 1920), and the cinematographer died in 1969. Or does it belong to the company? Since it's before 1928 it's good for America (so it can stay on enwiki) but it comes from a country that has life of the author + 70. PARAKANYAA (talk) 05:25, 6 January 2024 (UTC)

The copyright term in the EU for a film, these days, is defined in the 2006 directive, article 2: The term of protection of cinematographic or audiovisual works shall expire 70 years after the death of the last of the following persons to survive, whether or not these persons are designated as co-authors: the principal director, the author of the screenplay, the author of the dialogue and the composer of music specifically created for use in the cinematographic or audiovisual work. The copyright owner is likely the company, if you are looking to obtain permission. But if you are waiting for the copyright to expire, then you need to look at the lives of those people. If that was a silent movie, then obviously there was no music. The cinematographer does not enter into it. Carl Lindberg (talk) 06:35, 6 January 2024 (UTC)

@Clindberg: for a silent, insofar as the author of the dialogue [in this case intertitles] is distinct from the author of the screenplay, there is probably not a clue to be had as to who the former would be. Does that mean we have to wait a full 120 years from initial release for all such EU films? - Jmabel ! talk 08:09, 6 January 2024 (UTC)

I think what is not credited will be attributed to the director and/or the producer, copyright wise. Nowadays, the producers manage the copyright, but it may have been different in the 1920s. Yann (talk) 09:14, 6 January 2024 (UTC)

For unknown authors {{PD-anon-70-EU}} should apply for works form Europe. As in most cases the credited author was still alive on the date of publication this means that if it is public domain because all known authors are dead for 70 years the hole work is public domain. GPSLeo (talk) 10:23, 6 January 2024 (UTC)

Thank you for your response!

So in summary:

• director died in 1929
• no music (silent film)

So on that front I'm good.

Alas the other screenplay writer died in 1966 so not out of the woods there. And I have no idea who the intertitle / dialogue writers would be (unless it's the same as the screenplay). Thanks for answering my question! PARAKANYAA (talk) 10:42, 6 January 2024 (UTC)

Another related question: so when referring to copyright of film stills (not including dialogue/screenplay/intertitles), the same copyright still applies as to the whole work of the film (which would include the screenplay)? PARAKANYAA (talk) 11:01, 6 January 2024 (UTC)

I'm prefacing this comment with a caution that I am not an expert, but I think a lot depends on exactly what you mean by "film still". If you mean actual frames extracted from the film, either by photographic reproduction of an original negative or print, or by capturing an image from a digital scan, then yes, the film copyright would apply. But many "film stills", especially in the silent era, are actually publicity stills: still photographs taken during production with a separate camera by a separate photographer, for use in lobby cards, advertisements, company promotional newsletters, etc. References to "film stills" often conflate both types of material, but it seems to me that any independently created photographs that were not extracted from the finished film have an entirely separate copyright, the term of which is determined by the publication date (in the US) or the death date of the photographer (in most other countries). If, as is usually the case with promotional stills, the photographer is unknown, then the applicable laws for anonymous published photographs (not films) would apply. In the EU, for example, that would be the standard 70 years after publication for works with no claimed author. This, at any rate, is what I have always assumed. If I'm wrong, I'd be grateful if User:Clindberg or someone else would correct me, because I can easily imagine using the wrong license myself when labeling future uploads. Thanks, Crawdad Blues (talk) 14:57, 6 January 2024 (UTC)

Now that you mention it it seems to be a publicity still of the set. PARAKANYAA (talk) 17:00, 6 January 2024 (UTC)

Something I learned from User:Pajz in Commons:Deletion requests/File:Greta-Garbo-and-Jaro-Furth-in-the-film-Joyless-Street-1925-142462321702.jpg: In Germany, a single frame of the film does not share the term duration of the film as such, but is protected as a work of the cameraman (-person) who shot it. So 70 years pma. --Rosenzweig τ 21:01, 6 January 2024 (UTC)

Wow, that's unexpected and very interesting. Thanks very much for the link, Rosenzweig. So the camera operator is irrelevant to the copyright of the film as a whole, but he has the complete copyright for any individual frame of the film. Copyright law is so crazy ... Crawdad Blues (talk) 22:55, 6 January 2024 (UTC)

Yes, it's quite the paradox. I guess that is what can happen when you're trying to "harmonize" existing copyright law regimes all over the EU. --Rosenzweig τ 23:34, 6 January 2024 (UTC)

And Italy protects them for just 20 years :-) Carl Lindberg (talk) 01:56, 7 January 2024 (UTC)

So in this case, would that apply to the cinematographer, or would it apply to the unknown cameraman (so PD-anon-70-EU would apply?) PARAKANYAA (talk) 20:07, 7 January 2024 (UTC)

Since you say it's a German film, the German law cited in the link given by Rosenzweig above applies. Under that law, it really doesn't matter whether the image is a frame extracted from the finished film or a separately made publicity photo; either way, the copyright is determined by the rules for a single photographic image (70 years pma), with the author being the person who operated the camera. So

• If the image is a frame extracted from the film, and the "cinematographer" was the actual cameraman (as was often the case in the silent era), then the image remains under copyright until 2040 (71 years after the death of the cinematographer in 1969).
• If the image is a frame extracted from the film, but a separate camera operator (other than the cinematographer) is listed in the credits or is otherwise identifiable, then the image is under copyright until 71 years after the death of that cameraman.
• If the image is a frame extracted from the film, and you know for a fact that the cinematographer was not the actual cameraman, and the cameraman himself is not identifiable, then then PD-anon-70-EU would apply.
• If the image is not a frame extracted from the film, but a photograph taken at the time of production by some other photographer for publicity or documentary purposes, and the photographer is not identifiable, then PD-anon-70-EU would apply.

I think that sums it up. Out of curiosity, can you provide a link to the specific image in question? Crawdad Blues (talk) 15:24, 9 January 2024 (UTC)

@Crawdad Blues wikipedia:File:Algol 1920.jpg PARAKANYAA (talk) 18:32, 9 January 2024 (UTC)

@Yann moved it over to commons. Not sure about that... PARAKANYAA (talk) 23:34, 9 January 2024 (UTC)

@PARAKANYAA: @Yann: I'm not going to get into a fight with anyone over this, but I agree that moving the image to Commons was premature, and the grounds on which it was moved and the license now attached to it do not seem valid to me. According to the EU regulation cited by Carl Lindberg above, the film itself remains under copyright until 2037 at the earliest, because one of the two authors of the screenplay, Fridel Köhne, died in 1966. And according to the German law cited by Rosenzweig above, the copyright term on a single frame of the film is tied to the death date of the cameraman, not the director. So, at least as far as German copyright is concerned, I can see no legal justification for Yann's attribution of this image to the director Hans Werckmeister as creator, or the application of a PD-old-70-expired license to it on the basis of Werckmeister's death in 1929. Yann, can you clarify your reasoning here? Now that I've seen the image, I would argue that the creator of the original three-dimensional artwork was Walter Riemann (died 1936), the art director and set designer of the film, and that this photo is a derivative work made by the cameraman, who may have been cinematographer Axel Graatkjaer (died 1969) or someone else. Since Riemann's work is now PD, this image may still be eligible for the Commons, but only if the cameraman died before 1953, or if PD-anon-70-EU is invoked. That, at any rate, is my understanding of the discussion so far. Crawdad Blues (talk) 16:21, 10 January 2024 (UTC)

Fine, feel free to nominate it for deletion. Yann (talk) 16:27, 10 January 2024 (UTC)

Masks

Batgirl

One of this month's photo challenges is "masks" so it seems like a good idea to ensure our guidance on mask copyright is sound.

Currently, the language at COM:COSTUME is ambiguous. It includes a long explanation that, to my reading, can be summarized as "yes, they're copyrightable". But then the very end of that section undermines the rest with a photo of someone dressed as Spider Man and the line Present consensus is that "files that merely show people cosplaying" are acceptable. - What does that even mean? "Merely"? To say, they're copyrighted ... but hey, those people are merely cosplaying doesn't seem to make any legal sense. So a photo of an official Donald Duck costume at Disney World might be copyrighted, but not the same costume on a cosplayer? A copyrighted work hung on a wall is copyrighted, but not on a body? The English Wikipedia article on w:Guy Fawkes mask says Warner Bros. Discovery, which owns Warner Bros. and DC Comics, owns the rights to the image, but we host about 1,200 photos of that mask. Can someone do a better job than COM:COSTUME at articulating some clear rules here? — Rhododendrites ^talk |  20:03, 6 January 2024 (UTC)

User:Rhododendrites, That is a good point and I guess we should add some warning about potential for copyrighted material. Many types of masks like: historical masks, cloth masks, covid masks, welder masks, gas masks, fencing masks, balaclavas, hokey masks, etc. are not copyrighted but Darth Vader mask, iron man mask, Donald duck mask, etc. would be. How should we make people aware of the distinctions. I removed the photo of the batgirl (which we had on Commons for 12 years), because I am not certain of its copyright status. --Jarekt (talk) 02:12, 7 January 2024 (UTC)

Do you know of any court cases which would clear up some of the gray area? I think "masks", unlike most clothing, are not considered "utilitarian" in U.S. copyright law, so they lose one of their possible ways to avoid infringement. Whether they can still count as "incidental" may be subjective, but if the photo is of the whole person and not the mask specifically, that may hold. Carl Lindberg (talk) 02:16, 7 January 2024 (UTC)

I do not know much about copyrights related to cosplay, etc. So my opinions are mostly based on some discussion from a past. For example I think we had photographs of hot air balloons deleted because one depicted Darth Vadar. In the past we had some Commons:Photo challenges where several winners got deleted for copyright issues. That is a bad publicity and I would like to minimize the chances of the repeat. Commons:Photo challenge/2024 - January - Masks is the link to the current challenge. I added a warning to the page, can I get a second opinion on the wording? I also removed some of the example images I considered more in the "gray zone". Any others I should remove from the example gallery? --Jarekt (talk) 02:43, 7 January 2024 (UTC)

Hi all, sorry for causing such issues with my suggestion. I think the wording is clear, Jarekt, thank you for adding this box. I will remove one more image from the example gallery that might be questionable in terms of copyright and might also attract more questionable entries. Kritzolina (talk) 09:52, 7 January 2024 (UTC)

Yeah, it's one of those gray areas copyright-wise, where they may be OK but they will be arguable, and could end up with some uncomfortable decisions. I imagine those would likely go both ways, as with anything arguable, as there are no bright lines. Which also means we won't have any good answers here either. Some will get nominated, some of those deleted, etc. Carl Lindberg (talk) 21:03, 7 January 2024 (UTC)

Gallica

I have just uploaded a 1603 book on Commons. Of course it is in the public domain everywhere on Earth, but Gallica claims commercial use is subject to payment and requires a license (see the second page of the PDF). What should be done here? Thanks, RodRabelo7 (talk) 06:16, 7 January 2024 (UTC)

@RodRabelo7 Claims from Gallica on scans are discounted here - see #Deprecate Template:PD-BNF and Template:PD-GallicaScan above.   — 🇺🇦Jeff G. ツ _{please ping or talk to me}🇺🇦 08:47, 7 January 2024 (UTC)

Posso caricare questa foto in commons?

Buongiorno, vorrei sapere per favore se posso caricare questa foto. E' molto vecchia ma vedo un simbolo di copyright che mi incute timore. https://libreo.ch/livres/l-heritage-de-gustave-revilliod/epilogue/walther-fol-i-un-alter-ego-i-de-gustave-revilliod . Grazie a chi avrà tempo e modi di rispondermi. Manuela Musco (talk) 16:17, 7 January 2024 (UTC)

@Manuelarosi: Which image? There are several on that page. Some of them are certainly public domain, others less obvious.

Quale immagine? Ce ne sono diversi in quella pagina. Alcuni di essi sono certamente di pubblico dominio, altri meno evidenti. - Jmabel ! talk 17:44, 7 January 2024 (UTC)

Scusami tanto, la foto in questione è la prima in elenco e riporta questa didascalia: [b](fig. 62)[/b]

Sébastien Straub, Portrait de Walther Fol, vers 1855-1860. Centre d’iconographie de la Bibliothèque de Genève (© BGE). Manuela Musco (talk) 20:19, 7 January 2024 (UTC)

Questo è ciò che in inglese chiamiamo "copyfraud". No, non è più possibile che qualcuno ora possa avere il copyright su un'immagine della metà del XIX secolo. - Jmabel ! talk 22:43, 7 January 2024 (UTC)

Licensing tag

File:An Ideal Cycling Costume.jpg is in public domain. Should the current licensing tag be replaced with appropriate PD tag? Syrus257 (talk) 16:05, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

And also I'm trying to upload some images from this Flickr album. But I have been unable to upload. What's wrong with the link? Syrus257 (talk) 18:08, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

@Syrus257: Your uploads have triggered Special:AbuseFilter/142 frequently. Please avoid potentially problematic words and phrases when uploading with a mobile device. Perhaps an Admin can comment further.   — 🇺🇦Jeff G. ツ _{please ping or talk to me}🇺🇦 19:45, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

@Jeff G.: I uploaded them one by one. And this time it worked. Could you please take a look at the PD image. Syrus257 (talk) 09:01, 9 January 2024 (UTC)

@Syrus257: Where did Seahawk4lyf get the cc-by-4.0 licensing tag?   — 🇺🇦Jeff G. ツ _{please ping or talk to me}🇺🇦 10:59, 9 January 2024 (UTC)

@Jeff G.: not sure where they got it from. Should we change it? Syrus257 (talk) 14:49, 9 January 2024 (UTC)

Commons:Deletion requests/File:Partido futuro.png

Buenas Administradores, está foto debería ser removido (deleted) o quedarse (keep)?? AbchyZa22 (talk) 17:27, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

Page x missing from Dictionary of the Vilamovan language

As the title describes, page x (i.e. after ix, before xi) is missing from the file series Dictionary of the Vilamovan language. The category, created almost a decade ago, has a label indicating that the rights holder has given written permission to license it here and the missing page is also available online from the Polish national library, which labels the file as being in the public domain (in Poland, evidently). However, as a presumably posthumous (author died 1919) work published in 1930-1936 (page x would appear to be part of Vol. 1, so from 1930), I'm not confident on what the status would be for our purposes (i.e. according to the US situation, where it doesn't seem to have ever been published) and I'm not confident that the written permission applies to the whole work or only the files so far uploaded (thus inadvertently excluding the missing page). What are the chances of adding the missing page? Helrasincke (talk) 20:29, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

@Helrasincke: While I think it would be reasonable to presume that the intent of the permission would have included that page, this question would be better asked at Commons:Volunteer Response Team/Noticeboard, where someone can actually see the relevant ticket. - Jmabel ! talk 21:11, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

On a quick and dirty search, Polish law in 1996 gave 70 years of copyright from publication to posthumous works (s:Polish_Copyright_Law#Chapter_4._Term_of_Author's_Economic_Rights), and thus the work would have been in copyright in Poland and thus in the US until 95 years from publication, so 2026. I don't know about the rights holder; I'd assume any release covers the page, but someone with VRTS access might have to take a look.--Prosfilaes (talk) 21:13, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

File:Aelita Queen of Mars.webm

Hi, What's the copyright status of this film? This is a Soviet film from 1924, but published in USA only in 1929. The director, Yakov Protazanov, died in 1945. Yann (talk) 14:27, 9 January 2024 (UTC)

Commons:Copyright rules by territory/Russia and Template:PD-Russia/en seem to have the most up to date information (the other languages versions of the template are apparently outdated). As a film shown in cinemas before 1943, it's apparently out of copyright in Russia. As for the US: If that stipulation that pre-1943 films are in the PD in Russia is a consequence of Russia's 1993 copyright law, the film probably wasn't protected in Russia on the URAA date in 1996, and the URAA then didn't restore a US copyright. A subsisting copyrights check for Aelita at [6] also didn't bring up anything, and a search for Revolt of the Robots only turned up a 1966 screenplay, presumably for something else. So the film is probably in the PD both in Russia and the US. --Rosenzweig τ 19:12, 9 January 2024 (UTC)

Thanks, I added a {{PD-1996}} tag. There is a high resolution version on YT, which I will upload. Yann (talk) 19:30, 9 January 2024 (UTC)

Unless in the 9th circuit, I think the 1928 line is taken to mean published anywhere. We would use the same thing for any URAA restorations. I think that was restored by the URAA, given the 4-year extension for people who worked during WWII, but should have expired again in 2020 -- the same wartime extension meant it possibly expired in Russia on the same day. For Russia, their 1993 law says the authors were the director, the author of the script, and the author of the music if created especially for the film. If it's silent, that may remove the music part (though some of those movies had music designed to be played by a live orchestra... wonder in the EU if that could be part of the term calculations, though it would not be a co-author as I read it for Russia if not actually in the file). If Protazanov wrote the script, I think the file is fine, though should not have been uploaded before 2020. Carl Lindberg (talk) 19:34, 9 January 2024 (UTC)

@Clindberg: Then it will only be in the public domain next year? Yann (talk) 20:44, 9 January 2024 (UTC)

@Clindberg: Commons:Copyright rules by territory/Russia specifically says that films shown before 1943 are in the public domain in Russia, without making any references to authors, directors or other people attached to the films. The 4-year extensions are only for the pma copyrights attached to people I think. So the terms for any films after 1942 (50 years before the 1993 law) are probably based on the lifespan of the people involved, while those for films before 1943 are probably based on the year of release. At least that is what would make sense to me. I don't have much experience with Russian copyright law though, so I could be wrong. Alex Spade wrote that portion of COM:Russia, so probably he could tell what is correct. --Rosenzweig τ 22:00, 9 January 2024 (UTC)

OK. I did not see anything in their 1993 law which gave a shorter term for films, and they did explicitly name the co-authors of a film. So, I assumed those would be 54pma on the URAA date in 1996. But, I'm sure I missed a detail somewhere, and Alex Spade would know that far better than me -- I missed that point on the PD-Russia tag. So... would seem to be fine. Carl Lindberg (talk) 23:38, 9 January 2024 (UTC)

Ah, the 1993 law had a transitional clause: The copyright of legal persons which originated prior to the entry into force of the aforesaid Act shall cease upon the expiration of 50 years from the time of the rightful disclosure of a work or the creation of a work, where it has not been disclosed. That was extended to 70 years later on, but the 50 would have applied on the URAA date, with no wartime extensions. So this film would have expired long before the URAA date. Carl Lindberg (talk) 23:50, 9 January 2024 (UTC)

You are citing the sentence about the the copyright of legal persons (aka corporate copyright in legislation of some other countries), which is actual for old, but post-1929 films - see p.3(b) of PD-Russia (which is similar to p.4 - both of them are about the copyright of legal persons). Aelita is pre-1929 film - for it see p.3(b) of PD-Russia (which is similar to p.2(a) - both of them are about cases, where copyright term counts from publication date, not from author death). Alex Spade (talk) 10:15, 10 January 2024 (UTC)

• Lang-versions Template:PD-Russia/en (Template:PD-Russia-1996/en) and Template:PD-Russia/ru (Template:PD-Russia-1996/ru) are actual. Other lang-versions can be outdated, I do not know respective langs to edit them. For more information about films in p.3(a) and p.3(b) of these templates see this and that notes (sorry, in Russian). On this year (2024) Aeltita-1924 is {{PD-Russia-1996}} (both in Russia and the US), on next year and later {{PD-Russia-expired}} tag (both in Russia and the US) will be more suitable. Alex Spade (talk) 22:30, 9 January 2024 (UTC)

I've updated Template:PD-Russia/de. --Rosenzweig τ 23:20, 9 January 2024 (UTC)

I retranslated Template:PD-Russia/fr from the English version, and translated Template:PD-Russia-1996/fr, which was never translated in French. Yann (talk) 20:19, 10 January 2024 (UTC)

New archive

Hi, I made a pic for one article, Can I simply upload and the license Commons starts to work or I have to register it in any way? Thank you. AntonioCyla (talk) 15:17, 9 January 2024 (UTC)

@AntonioCyla: I'm sorry, but mostly what that question shows me is that you are very confused. "the license Commons starts to work" doesn't make any sense, and I can't even imagine what you are thinking about when you refer to "registering" it.

If the image is a photograph you took yourself, and it does not include anyone else's copyrighted work, just upload it as your own work, give it a license like {{CC-BY-SA-4.0}} and it will be fine. If it is something else, please explain what the image is, and then someone can give you a more useful answer. - Jmabel ! talk 19:22, 9 January 2024 (UTC)

Once it is uploaded you can include it in the article. Guido den Broeder (talk) 21:28, 9 January 2024 (UTC)

Logo Alcaldía de Lecheria

Buenas, una pregunta el Logo de la Alcaldía de Lecheria como lo indica esta foto (https://twitter.com/Urbanejalcaldia/photo) esta en el Dominio Público ({{PD-textlogo}} porque representa una "geometric shape")?? AbchyZa22 (talk) 21:59, 9 January 2024 (UTC)

@AbchyZa22: No conozco el umbral de originalidad para Venezuela, pero eso es mucho más complejo de lo que normalmente se entiende por una "geometric shape". - Jmabel ! talk 02:41, 10 January 2024 (UTC)

PD in Italy 70 PMA or not

Hello. I have marked this file File:Emblem of the Fasci d'Azione Rivoluzionaria (Milan).jpg as unlicensed. This is a picture from a 1915-1919 fascist party card. The user started this discussion linking this template. I ask:

1. ) What does published mean? Formally published in a register or simply made known to someone
2. ) What does anonymous mean? That we don't know him because we didn't make enough researches or that the author's name is lost forever
3. ) Is that template valid? Because I have seen many photos, taken in Italy before 1976, deleted. So I do not understand

Can anyone knowledgeable take part in the discussion, please? Thanks a lot. Kind regards. Pierpao.lo (listening) 11:47, 10 January 2024 (UTC)

Please read COM:DR and COM:SD. This should be a regular deletion anyway. Yann (talk) 11:52, 10 January 2024 (UTC)

Distributing copies to people is always publication. The definitions can get blurry for types of works which you don't make copies of, and can differ somewhat between countries. However, the anonymous term in the EU starts from the "making available to the public", which is different than pure "publication" in their definitions, and includes public display and broadcast. So the definition of publication rarely matters for the term, in the EU.

Anonymous is simply published (or made available) without naming a human author. It's true that it's not simply lost and now unknown, but if you can find the original publications and no author is named there, it's anonymous. If the author becomes known (or in some countries, they have to make themselves known) within the 70 years, it can move to 70pma. So if the real artist of that was known by the 1980s, it could be 70pma now. Otherwise, its copyright expired long ago.

"Simple" photos are 20 years in Italy. Artistic photos are 70pma. I think such things as studio portraits, where everything is under control of the photographer, are not "simple". I think carefully-composed landscape photos have also been ruled not simple. Also, works also need to be free in the U.S. to host here -- and simple photos from 1976 and later got restored by the URAA (since the 20 year term was still valid on the URAA date of 1996), so 1976 is really a more realistic limit for Italian photos here (not just current year - 20). There was also a time when we did not accept the PD-Italy tag, and photos got deleted then. So there could be lots of valid reasons why photos get deleted (and I'm sure some were deleted incorrectly, too). Carl Lindberg (talk) 06:48, 11 January 2024 (UTC)

Photos generated from DALL-E

I have recently checked the DALL-E model and found it interesting to generate AI photos. However, I wonder that FOP (Freedom of Panorama) has effects across various countries, if someone utilizes DALL-E to produce AI-generated photos of buildings and scupltures, could they potentially encounter copyright issues?  A l p h a m a  ^Talk 13:44, 10 January 2024 (UTC)

My take: I doubt you could get in trouble for using DALL-E to generate the image, but you could presumably get in trouble for publishing it. (Just like you couldn't get in trouble for photographing a recent building in France, only for publishing that photo.) Someone who published could certainly encounter copyright issues in any country where the resulting image might be considered derivative work. E.g. an identifiable image of the Memorial of Rebirth in Bucharest or the pyramid entrance to the Louvre in Paris would presumably not be shielded from copyright because it was generated by AI. - Jmabel ! talk 18:40, 10 January 2024 (UTC)

"AI-generated photos of buildings and sculptures" are almost always going to be either out of scope or copyright violations. If the building or sculpture is in the public domain or ineligible for copyright, freely licensed photos of it probably exist, so an AI-generated image is unlikely to have any educational use and is out of scope. If, on the other hand, it's protected by copyright, an AI-generated image is necessarily a derivative work which we cannot host. Omphalographer (talk) 07:23, 11 January 2024 (UTC)

Universal Permissive License and Commons

I looked at the Open Source repository of Oracle, and found the UPL (Universal Permissive License). I didn't find a corresponding template on Commons. 1. Did I missed it and if not: 2. Does this license qualify to be used on Commons? OSI provides a page for the license here: https://opensource.org/license/upl/.

Greetings! --PantheraLeo1359531 😺 (talk) 19:12, 10 January 2024 (UTC)

@PantheraLeo1359531: Is it every used for anything other than software? - Jmabel ! talk 19:36, 10 January 2024 (UTC)

I assume it is only reserved for software, like GPL and others, and of course screenshots that show result of code, etc. --PantheraLeo1359531 😺 (talk) 20:58, 10 January 2024 (UTC)

@PantheraLeo1359531: I guess if it is free enough and likely to be used, you could create a license tag. I can't imagine it will be used much. - Jmabel ! talk 23:33, 10 January 2024 (UTC)

Can I post images received via FOIA?

I know copyright is by jurisdiction, but in cases where it's from a department of the Government of California (whose works are in the public domain), but are there any different circumstances for FOIAs? PARAKANYAA (talk) 03:15, 11 January 2024 (UTC)

@PARAKANYAA: The details are covered by {{PD-CAGov}}.   — 🇺🇦Jeff G. ツ _{please ping or talk to me}🇺🇦 04:16, 11 January 2024 (UTC)

So a FOIA wouldn't be any different? I guessed it wouldn't but wasn't sure because it wasn't "published" prior to them giving it to me in most cases PARAKANYAA (talk) 04:19, 11 January 2024 (UTC)

@PARAKANYAA: I don't think that's any different, but let's see what our experts say.   — 🇺🇦Jeff G. ツ _{please ping or talk to me}🇺🇦 04:36, 11 January 2024 (UTC)

Mannequins cosplaying copyrighted characters with simple clothing designs

I was wondering the legal status of mannequins dressed as copyright-protected characters wearing "the kind of clothing that an ordinary person might wear on the street or on the job" per COM:COSPLAY (for example: Emmet Brickowski, Lois Griffin, Lincoln Loud, Dipper Pines and Steven Universe). May one illustrate copyrighted characters with simple outfits by using photos of mannequins cosplaying them? JohnCWiesenthal (talk) 04:27, 11 January 2024 (UTC)