Commons:Village pump/Copyright

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Welcome to the Village pump copyright section

This Wikimedia Commons page is used for general discussions relating to copyright and license issues, and for discussions relating to specific files' copyright issues. Discussions relating to specific copyright policies should take place on the talk page of the policy, but may be advertised here. Recent sections with no replies for 7 days and sections tagged with {{section resolved|1=~~~~}} may be archived; for old discussions, see the archives.

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Ice cream single cover copyright concern and free alternative[edit]

I went to Wikipedia and found a song called Ice Cream by Battles, and there is a cover image of a strawberry ice cream. However, there is no text on the cover image, I don't know if that image is copyrighted or free. I don't know if the song or the artist labelled the single All Rights Reserved. There were numerous images in Commons that have ice cream flavors, should the single cover image count as one? In that image, the replaceable section said "N/A" on a non-free image.

There is an album image that is part of the Ice Cream song made by the same artist in 2011. It does have the word in the album image called "Gloss Drop." Evan0512 (talk) 05:56, 20 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

@Evan0512: Hello. Both of these cover images are copyrighted and non-free. That is why they are being kept at the English Wikipedia with a fair use rationale instead of being hosted here at Commons. The ice cream images that we have on Commons are either out of copyright due to old age or were licensed accordingly by the copyright holders. Album covers, however, do usually not belong into either of those categories. De728631 (talk) 13:19, 20 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

File:MaharajaNarasingh.jpg[edit]

Painting that is very likely {{PD-art}}, considering that the person depicted died in 1850, but we need more precise source information to be sure. Who made this painting and when, and which collection is this painting from? –LaundryPizza03 (dc̄) 06:13, 20 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Pinging Moirangthemcha who uploaded this. Please note that a faithful reproduction of an out-of-copyright artwork does not create a new copyright, so unless you are the original painter of that image, the Creative Commons licence is not applicable. So what we need to know here is the name and lifetime of the original painter. De728631 (talk) 13:14, 20 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

File:Chi-FlorencePark-rules-May-2020.jpg[edit]

While add location information to this image I uploaded I realised there is perhaps an ever-so-slight slight risk it is a copyright violation. Any thoughts? Thankyou. Djm-leighpark (talk) 11:44, 20 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

I think the text is rather non-creative stating only facts. The prohibition icons and the wastebin sign might be more interesting though in terms of copyright. Since the entire photograph is about the current rules of the park, I think one cannot claim de-minimis for the graphics because they are part of the set of rules announced on that big sign. What do others think? De728631 (talk) 13:11, 20 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Modified Pixabay images[edit]

As we all know, the {{Pixabay}} license is not acceptable for Commons, because it prohibits "Sale or distribution of Content e.g. as a posters, digital prints, music files or physical products, without adding any additional elements or otherwise adding value". Therefore, Pixabay images from 9 January 2019 or later cannot be transferred to Commons, whereas images from before that date are OK under the {{Cc-zero}} license. My question is: Is a modified version of post-2019 Pixabay content acceptable for Commons, with a license from the creator of the derivative work? See Commons:Deletion requests/Files in Category:Stijn Van Cauter for context, where Svc nulll has uploaded his album art, some of which are derived from Pixabay images. The most recent discussion I can find is Commons:Village pump/Copyright/Archive/2019/01#Pixabay license renewal. -- King of ♥ ♦ ♣ ♠ 18:32, 20 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

The Pixabay license says, among other things,

"The Pixabay License does not allow:
1 Sale or distribution of Content as digital Content or as digital wallpapers (such as on stock media websites or as NFTs);
2 Sale or distribution of Content e.g. as a posters, digital prints, music files or physical products, without adding any additional elements or otherwise adding value."

Unfortunately this is self contradictory. While (2) appears to permit free use of Pixabay images if they have value added, (1) does not. It is also not clear that simply adding an album title over one of the Pixabay images adds enough value to allow use under (2). I am therefore disinclined to allow these to stay. .     Jim . . . (Jameslwoodward) (talk to me) 21:51, 20 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Copyright owned by subject[edit]

I want to upload a photo of a living person, taken by someone else, but which the subject owns. What do I have to declare regarding copyright? Tony Holkham (talk) 13:39, 22 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

In such cases the subject needs to email a copy of the contract of transfer of copyright from the original photographer to them. Please see COM:VRT for the address and for further details. Please note also that owning a copy of a portrait does not automatically make the subject own its copyright. In most jurisdictions, copyright needs to be transferred explicitly. De728631 (talk) 14:27, 22 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]
And in many, particularly European ones outside of the Anglosaxon sphere of jurisdiction, it cannot be transferred at all, except by death and inheritance.
In that case you would need the consent of the photographer no matter what the subject tells you about "owning" the photo. What they "own" is the right to use the photo under whatever licensing, but only the photographer can decide about that license. --217.239.1.129 08:13, 23 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]
P.S. In addition to the copyright issue, you might have to regard personality rights concerning the subject. It might be a good idea to have their consent too. --217.239.1.129 08:30, 23 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]
No reason to give a model release for upload here. You can put the {{Personality rights}} template on an upload to remind people about such usages. Privacy rights are a different matter, but if the subject has no problem uploading here, then that's not an issue. Carl Lindberg (talk) 01:46, 26 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

LaLiga photos[edit]

From LaLiga, the association of soccer clubs in Spain, we are uploading different photos of which we have the copyright to Wikimedia Commons. Right now we have uploaded 3 photos of stadiums. For this, we created the editing account FotosLaLiga. Last week we sent an email to permissions-commons@wikimedia.org informing us that, from this editing account we were going to proceed to upload the photos that are in the image gallery of our website: https://www.laliga.com/sala-de-prensa/galeria-imagenes; and that therefore we permitted Wikimedia Commons for use with the Creative Commons Attribution ShareAlike 4.0 license. My question is if this is enough or if we need to do the procedure in another way. Thank you very much FotosLaLiga (talk) 16:13, 22 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

I have marked your account as verified, and you may proceed with uploading the photos. -- King of ♥ ♦ ♣ ♠ 17:14, 22 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks a lot, FotosLaLiga (talk) 15:37, 23 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

File:AfghanistanEarthquake.png[edit]

Judging from the poor resolution and absence of EXIF data i find it likely that this photo was taken from a video somewhere. There is also little indication that the uploader in question have actually been to Afghnistan Trade (talk) 23:27, 22 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

File:AfghanistanEarthquake.png was deleted @Trade: Mateusz Konieczny (talk) 12:12, 26 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Signature file copyright status[edit]

I'm not sure about the licensing of File:Pearce Robinson Signature.jpg. This can't be "own work" unless the uploader is also the person whose signature this is supposed to be (i.e. "Pearce Robinson"). It's possible that this might be PD per COM:SIG, but the file isn't being used anywhere and there isn't a current English Wikipedia article written about someone named "Pearce Robinson" (it was deleted in 2019). There's also the uploader's user talk page which is filled with notifications for file licensing issues, which also seems to indicate that the uploader probably misunderstands COM:L. If this can be converted to {{PD-Signature}}, then I guess it can be kept; however, there might also be a COM:NOTUSED issue that needs to be considered as well. -- Marchjuly (talk) 03:40, 23 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

I think that it is quite possible that the uploader is Pearce Robinson. However this upload looks more like a personal promotion (together with the photo). Ruslik (talk) 20:42, 25 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]
@Marchjuly: The file is COM:INUSE at Wikidata and has been for a few years. Wikidata editors will need to consider the usage there before we consider arguments about Commons scope. Ruslik0's point about this being promotional is also not relevant; while English Wikipedia wants to avoid promotional material, Commons is the opposite. Much of our modern content is provided by creators wanting to promote their work. So long as the work fits into our scope (and is appropriately licensed) we don't care about the uploader's motivations.
The copyright/licensing issue is something in our remit to consider though. From Hill To Shore (talk) 23:52, 25 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]
@From Hill To Shore: Are you sure about that? Please see COM:ADVERT and COM:CSD#G10.   — Jeff G. ツ please ping or talk to me 00:13, 26 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]
@Jeff G.: As I said, "So long as the work fits into our scope (and is appropriately licensed) we don't care about the uploader's motivations." The pages you linked to say, "For the policy, see COM:PS (Project scope: Must be realistically useful for an educational purpose)" and "G10... This includes only content uploaded to promote goods and services, outside our project scope." Both pages appear to agree with what I have said. From Hill To Shore (talk) 00:50, 26 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

VRT and other visibility[edit]

Question: if a Commons item has passed the COM:VRT process, or some other official verification, is there any indication (template, say) that is has done so on the item's main page or talk page? I found it odd to see an image deleted multiple times in the past for having not verified copyright release, but now seems fine, yet I can't find any trace of prior discussion. My interest, incidentally, is more to find the original source of the image and assess its credibility than it is copyright. If VRT already knows the original source, that would seem to be even more worth sharing (in some cases). SamuelRiv (talk) 18:32, 23 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

That file and two others were uploaded the same day. The other two were nominated for deletion and deleted: Commons:Deletion requests/File:Bombing at Baghdad Airport 2020.png and Commons:Deletion requests/File:Bombing at Baghdad Airport 2020 1.png. I guess it's just that the one to which you linked in your question was not nominated. Feel free to nominate it for speedy deletion. The answer to your question is usually yes, if there was actually something that needed verification. -- Asclepias (talk) 19:04, 23 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Copyright question[edit]

@Jmabel: What is the status of a digitized version of a record originally recorded in Russia (1926)? – Ilovemydoodle (talk) 20:36, 23 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

  • @Ilovemydoodle: No idea why you are pinging me. I already told you I don't know. - Jmabel ! talk 20:47, 23 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]
    @Jmabel: Could you ping someone who might? – Ilovemydoodle (talk) 20:49, 23 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]
    • @Ilovemydoodle: No. Have some patience. Your question has been here all of 16 minutes. Someone knowledgeable will eventually see it. Jmabel ! talk 20:53, 23 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]
    • @Ilovemydoodle: I have no more info on the subject than COM:RUSSIA, please read that. You will need info on the names and lifetimes of the composer(s), lyricist(s), performer(s), and production company(ies).   — Jeff G. ツ please ping or talk to me 22:54, 23 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]
      @Jeff G.: In this case would the author be:
      1) The composer
      2) The conductor
      3) The record label
      4) The person who digitized it
      5) The website it was uploaded to
      – Ilovemydoodle (talk) 22:59, 23 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]
      @Ilovemydoodle: Probably the first three and performers, depending on contracts.   — Jeff G. ツ please ping or talk to me 23:32, 23 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]
      @Jeff G.:
      1) Pierre Degeyter
      2) Stanislav Kort
      3) Muzpred
      – Ilovemydoodle (talk) 00:05, 24 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Images from Twitter[edit]

I'm sure this has been raised here before but I just need some advice on images uploaded from Twitter. User:Stevan Mitnick uploaed six images today, of which three are obvious copyright violations (File:Richard Marles and Wei Fenghe.png, File:Australian Deputy Prime Minister Richard Marles and Chinese Minister of Defence Wei Fenghe meeting.png and File:Approval Rating of Australia Prime Minister Anthony Albanese 23 May to 21 June 2022 from Morning Consult.png) and have been nominated for speedy deletion by me. The other three all come from what appears to be the relevant politicians Twitter account (File:Anthony Albanese and Mark Brown in Sidney.png, File:Australian Education Minister, Jason Clare at Taminmin College in Humpty Doo.png and File:Anthony Albanese and Jacinda Ardern.png). Are these three permitted on Commons?I wasn't able to find anything stating that these have been released under Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0 International, as claimed. Calistemon (talk) 05:34, 24 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

This is obviously an Australian government account. Many governments publish works by government employees under free licence. It would therefore be possible to check on the government website whether the images come from there and whether they are freely licensed there. If this is the case: Download from there in a reasonable resolution and overwrite the existing image with it here and change the source from Twitter to the government website. C.Suthorn (talk) 05:44, 24 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]
Thank you for your suggestion. Two of the copyright violations have now been deleted, the third one is getting debated at Commons:Deletion requests/File:Approval Rating of Australia Prime Minister Anthony Albanese 23 May to 21 June 2022 from Morning Consult.png. The three I haven't nominated for deletion have now been tagged as Media missing permission by another user. I might look into your suggestion later on and see if the images are available under a free licence. Calistemon (talk) 07:21, 24 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Gratisography.com[edit]

The {{Gratisography}} template says that all images from gratisography.com are CC-zero.

In practice the site was CC-zero on (and perhaps up to) 2 January 2015 but by the time of 6 February 2015 a caveat had been added to that saying The only common sense limitations I have are that you can’t use any of my images for pornographic, criminal, defamatory or degrading purposes and you can’t build your own free stock photo website using my images.

At some point between 2015 and 2022 the CC-zero got dropped entirely, with the current licence now saying You can’t redistribute Gratisography pictures, including on other stock (paid or free) sites/apps, or give them to other people to use.

I believe those limitations would make the licence incompatible with Commons. Should the template be updated to say that only images taken from the site before 2 January 2015 can be accepted at Commons (and any later images deleted)? Lord Belbury (talk) 14:43, 24 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

@Lord Belbury: Yes.   — Jeff G. ツ please ping or talk to me 14:54, 24 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]
Done and done. --Lord Belbury (talk) 16:34, 24 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]
@Lord Belbury and Fæ: Most of our Gratisography photos are a mess as far as the metadata. The actual source (gratisography.com) and author (Ryan McGuire) are usually listed in the description rather than in the source and the author fields. And the licensing says that they are licensed under both CC0 and CC-BY-SA, which doesn't make any sense. Nosferattus (talk) 04:12, 25 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]
@Nosferattus: That was me batch-adding the {{Gratisography}} template to all the files which credited the site as their original source, which automatically adds a CC0. It looks like a lot of the images came here via https://www.flickr.com/photos/free_for_commercial_use which scraped them in 2014 and put them on Flickr under a CC-Attribution licence, which has been replicated here at Commons. --Lord Belbury (talk) 09:45, 25 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

File:Composite group portrait of members of the International Medical Congress, 1881.jpg[edit]

Hello this image Composite group portrait of members of the International Medical Congress, 1881 is available under public domain 1.0 https://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/mark/1.0 , https://wellcomecollection.org/works/xwer4dvq. How do I mark it as such? DoctorAB (talk) 16:21, 24 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

The artist, Herbert Rose Barraud died in 1896. The image is PD. Use {{PD-Art|PD-old-70}}. Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 18:19, 24 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]
My suggestion: PD-US-expired + PD-old-100. -- Asclepias (talk) 18:22, 24 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]
We usually don't use PD-Art for old pictures. {{PD-old-100-expired}} is enough. Yann (talk) 19:14, 24 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]
You're right - I hadn't realised from the preview image that this was photography, not painting. Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 12:45, 25 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Are SVG representations of graffiti allowed? Are photographs of non-authorized reproductions of graffiti allowed?[edit]

As I understand it, graffiti are generally allowed because it is hard to prove authorship and also because the illegality makes it harder to ask for copyright rights. COM:CB#Graffiti

First question: With that in mind, would drawings of a graffiti be accepted since no one could claim authorship?

Second question: Now, let's complicate it a little bit more. Suppose there is a graffiti, someone not on Wikimedia Commons draw a representation of it, makes a little poster and then glue it on a wall. Kind of a "lazy graffiti", instead of paint it is a paper glued on a wall. Then, another person sees it, takes a photograph and posts on Wikimedia Commons. Would it be allowed?

I think it is a mess of an explanation so I am gonna show real examples.

There is an anti-capitalist graffiti that is a little popular because there are many of them in different locations and they seem to be done by different people since they all have slight different styles:

  • Lübeck, Germany, 2006

    Lübeck, Germany, 2006

  • Northern Greece, 2011

    Northern Greece, 2011

  • Zagreb, Croatia (according to the Flickr page), 2014

    Zagreb, Croatia (according to the Flickr page), 2014

  • Monastir, Tunisia (based on title of image and the description in French), 2012

    Monastir, Tunisia (based on title of image and the description in French), 2012

  • Teruel, Spain (based on title and description in Spanish), 2011

    Teruel, Spain (based on title and description in Spanish), 2011

So, I thought it would be useful to have a SVG version of it since it seems to be a popular anti-capitalist representation. That is why I am asking the first question.

Now, explaining the second question, there is an image of a poster of the same anti-capitalist representation:

  • Probably Germany (based on author), 2009

    Probably Germany (based on author), 2009

Usually posters are not allowed on Wikimedia Commons COM:CB#Posters, but this one is a representation that is most likely from a graffiti. The poster image is from 2009, there are graffiti images that are from 2006. I think it is safe to assume the graffiti came before the poster, so the poster is a non-authorized reproduction of a graffiti (the author seem to be anonymous so it is impossible to even ask for authorization). So, we have a non-authorized reproduction of a certain graffiti that we do not know who painted it or even who made the first one, since there are many of them. I assume in that case the person who made the poster is not eligible to ask for copyright rights and so the photograph of the poster would also be accepted? AnAkemie (talk) 00:18, 27 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Image use without attribution[edit]

What's the normal procedure when we discover external website using our images without the licence required attribution or original commons source? Ww2censor (talk) 09:06, 27 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

The images do not belong to Commons: they are not "our images". So, it is up to their authors to enforce the license terms. Ruslik (talk) 11:08, 27 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]
Indeed Ruslik0 you are correct to the letter but what suggestion are there for editors, like myself, who find their own work not attributed or the commons not being sourced. Does the commons not care about sourcing even if you leave the lack of attribution to individual editors to follow up with? I have seen several files of mine online but what practical advise is there I can use? Ww2censor (talk) 11:58, 27 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]
Wikipedia has some general advice for dealing with non-compliant reuse of its CC-BY-SA content, which looks adaptable for Commons images (and simpler, since there is usually only a single author). --Lord Belbury (talk) 12:28, 27 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

File:Kidney-stones-s2-illustration.webp[edit]

The summary for this image at https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Kidney-stones-s2-illustration.webp says the source is the author's own work and that the author is Martingerg. The licensing section says it is "licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0 International license."

However, the image itself has a copyright notice on it that MedicineNet, Inc. owns the copyright. The MedicineNet, Inc. website says "The Content posted on this Site is protected by the copyright laws in the United States and in foreign countries." (MedicineNet Terms and Conditions of Use at https://www.medicinenet.com/script/main/art.asp?articlekey=12596.)

Can someone clarify whether this Kidney-stones-s2-illustration is really licensed under Creative Commons?

I also posted this on the file talk page at https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File_talk:Kidney-stones-s2-illustration.webp and then discovered perhaps I should post it here as well.

Thanks. PixQuester (talk) 15:06, 27 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

@PixQuester: You could ask MedicineNet and use internal links. Pinging @Martingerg for comment.   — Jeff G. ツ please ping or talk to me 15:18, 27 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]
You found a file that has many typical looks of a violation of copyright. You can send that type of file to speedy deletion with the template Copyvio. -- Asclepias (talk) 16:22, 27 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Australia (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0 AU) image[edit]

I just came across the image File:Official parliamentary portrait of Tony Burke.png, which was tagged with cc-by-sa-4.0 by the uploader, which I changed to CC-BY-3.0-AU, thinking that was the correct one. The image is from the Parliament of Australia website and, looking at the copyright rules there, it appears the correct tag should be Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Australia. Digging deeper, I found that Template:Cc-by-nc-nd-3.0-au redirects to Template:Cc-non-compliant. Now I'm wondering, what tag to use or whether this image can actually even be uploaded to Commons. Can somebody more experienced with this shed some light? I had a look at Commons:Copyright rules by territory/Australia, but nothing there about images from the Parliament of Australia website. Calistemon (talk) 15:48, 27 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

@Calistemon: That website is not mentioned on that page because it falls under the generic COM:NETCOPYVIO.   — Jeff G. ツ please ping or talk to me 16:09, 27 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]
@Jeff G.: The whole arrangement is a little odd, because content on the Australian Government website is released as Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International licence (see here), which should be ok to use as a source for Commons, while the Parliament of Australia seems to use the above licence, which is not. The same uploader also uploaded File:Official portrait of Jim Chalmers.png, which is from the Australian Treasury website, an agency of the Australian Government, which uses Creative Commons (CC) BY Attribution 3.0 Australia licence (see here) which, I believe, is acceptable for use here. There doesn't seem to be a uniform approach in regards to copyrighting by government sources in Australia. Calistemon (talk) 18:51, 27 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]
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