Commons:Deletion requests/Files found with marco verch

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This deletion discussion is now closed. Please do not make any edits to this archive. You can read the deletion policy or ask a question at the Village pump. If the circumstances surrounding this file have changed in a notable manner, you may re-nominate this file or ask for it to be undeleted.

Files found with Special:Search/marco verch

[edit]

Files from an apparently malicious Flickr user, see Commons:Deletion requests/Files in Category:Images by Marco Verch

Ytoyoda (talk) 20:47, 8 April 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Also adding
Additional images:
Yet more images:


  •  Keep @Ytoyoda: But did you check if any of the photos was online before they were online on Flickr? User is marked as bad but that just mean that you have to be careful. This is the text in the review template:
"The image should be checked carefully because some Flickr users are blacklisted for only a limited portion of their uploads."
If it means we should always delete then we should just let the Flickrreview bot delete the photos.
I reviewed some of those files and I did not find any evidence that the photos were uploaded anywhere else.
So I think we should close this DR and start a DR for the files that may actually be taken from somewhere else.
Sometimes photos are uploaded to US-gov websites without photos being PD-USGov. But that does not mean we automatically delete EVERY photo from a US-gov website. We evaluate them one by one. --MGA73 (talk) 20:55, 8 April 2020 (UTC)[reply]
  •  Comment Reading back I see the old DR's is mainly because the photographer actually enforce his copyright. So if he require attribution and someone uses his photo without attributing him he will sue them. Well what is the purpose of letting Commons host photos that require attribution if we delete photos because someone is to lazy to attribute correctly?
If we do not like attribution then Commons should delete ALL photos that is not released as Public Domain. --MGA73 (talk) 21:05, 8 April 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Note: This photo require attribution. The creator of this file is known to enforce his copyright. So if you use this file make sure to attribute him correctly or you will risk to pay for your mistake. Just saying. Be lazy or sloppy if you want! Just don't complain to us if it will cost you!
If we wanna protect our reusers we could create some template to add on all his photos to warn them against just using files without giving the required attribution. --MGA73 (talk) 21:20, 8 April 2020 (UTC)[reply]

 Keep These are high quality photos that should not be deleted lightly. Tischbeinahe (talk) 05:57, 9 April 2020 (UTC)[reply]

I would like to delete https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Split_Harbour_Croatia.jpg. All this was just my school project and I honestly do not understand what is going on, but I would like it to be deleted immediately. Can you help me? Krexi — Preceding unsigned comment added by Krexi (talk • contribs) 23:24, 8 April 2020‎ (UTC)[reply]

We can make a template to make something like {{Pixabay}} or this one:
Marco Verch, the copyright holder of this work, hereby publishes it under the following license:
w:en:Creative Commons
attribution
This file is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 2.0 Generic license.
Attribution: Photo by Marco Verch. Please link to the original photo and the license.
(Please notice the photographer is known to enforce his right to require attribution!)
You are free:
  • to share – to copy, distribute and transmit the work
  • to remix – to adapt the work
Under the following conditions:
  • attribution – You must give appropriate credit, provide a link to the license, and indicate if changes were made. You may do so in any reasonable manner, but not in any way that suggests the licensor endorses you or your use.
We have other templates where license reviewers is needed to make sure everything is okay. --MGA73 (talk) 08:47, 9 April 2020 (UTC)[reply]
  • @MGA73: I nominated all images from the user was because the previous DRs seemed to indicate there was a blanket ban on images from the Flickr account. If it's merely the Flickr being picky about attribution, then yeah, your suggestion of a custom template could work. I'd like the closing admins from the previous deletions — Srittau, Túrelio, A.Savin and Didym — to weigh in if possible. Ytoyoda (talk) 13:23, 9 April 2020 (UTC)[reply]
  • @Ytoyoda: Great! Thanks a lot. Then we do not have to worry about Flickrwashing but "only" the Flickr user being picky :-) And yes the DR history would indicate that we usually just delete his photos. But since many of the files on Commons require attribution I think we should be able to handle situations where photographer really do require attribution. --MGA73 (talk) 13:35, 9 April 2020 (UTC)[reply]
  •  Delete all. This guy is known to take actions against even the slightest faults in attributions, usually very expensive for the reusers. --Didym (talk) 19:43, 9 April 2020 (UTC)[reply]
@Didym: is that not the same as supporting users who do not attribute the photographers correctly? Photographers let us use their photos for free and all they require is to be attributed. --MGA73 (talk) 20:47, 9 April 2020 (UTC)[reply]
No. When the attributions are missing or contain major faults, this may be justified. But a missing link to the license or using CC BY 3.0 instead of CC BY 2.0 is not a reason to demand about 500 euros. You can read more about this here (in German). --Didym (talk) 21:13, 9 April 2020 (UTC)[reply]
But Commons have a very clear link on the main page to Commons:Reusing content outside Wikimedia and #4 clearly specify: "Attribution: If attribution is required, provide attribution. If the copyright holder (usually the content creator[2]) has specified how, be sure to follow this."
We may find it silly to require 500 EURO if someone does not attribute correctly. But the only way to protect our users from claims is to ban all files that require attribution and only allow PD files. --MGA73 (talk) 22:12, 9 April 2020 (UTC)[reply]
We have the General disclaimer, found at the bottom of every page. We do our best to faithfully validate and display correct licenses, but it is nobody's responsibility but the user's to ensure they don't misuse them. Any misuse or licence violation that happens off Commons is strictly between the reuser and the copyright holder. We shouldn't cripple Commons because some people might do dumb things. --Animalparty (talk) 06:31, 10 April 2020 (UTC)[reply]
  •  Delete Personally I believe these files should be kept as attribution is the responsibility of the reuser (though we should probably add a template so that reusers know that attribution is strictly enforced for such files). However consensus says that all files by this user are banned. To overturn such ban should be discussed in a more appropriate place. --pandakekok9 14:50, 10 April 2020 (UTC)[reply]
After reading some related threads, this issue is indeed very serious. Commons should not be turned into safe haven for copyright trolls. Even dewiki is complaining about this problem. I think we can argue that all images by this banned user are out of COM:SCOPE because they are not made in good faith. Therefore, I fully support the deletion of these files and all future images by this user, until they stop being a copyright troll. pandakekok9 14:57, 10 April 2020 (UTC)[reply]
  • Question: Is the files licensed under a free license? Answer: Yes. Question: Is the copyright holder free to pursue any and all violations to said license if not followed? Answer: Yes.
We should not delete all images licensed under a free license where copyright holders enforce that those licenses are followed, because if we would do so, in turn that means we only want public domain images.
If e.g. Disney were to be kind to license a short trailer, or a still from one of their movies under a Creative Commons license, you bet they would pursue anyone not abiding by the license, however we would be derilict in our duty to uphold Wikimeida Commons mission if we would not host that file.  Strong keep --Jonatan Svensson Glad (talk) 14:53, 10 April 2020 (UTC)[reply]
  • (a) It's not our fault if reusers get sued because they make attribution errors, or
  • (b) If we delete this guy's files, why even allow Creative Commons images at all?
Neither is a completely unreasonable point, but (a) is unconvincing to me because it runs counter to the foundation's mission, to have informative, useful images that can be used by anyone without restrictions. If a simple attribution error leads to legal issues, then it's not a very user-friendly experience at all, not at all "free" and (b) doesn't work for me either, because for the most part, Creative Commons is a system that seems to work well for creators and reusers for the most part. We're talking about one creator out of thousands who's operating in bad faith. You should be able to use Commons files without needing a lawyer.
Yes, these are high-quality photos, but I don't think of any of his contributions are irreplaceable. Deleting a handful of photos to keep Commons useful is not a huge loss. Ytoyoda (talk) 18:56, 10 April 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Indeed. It's like keeping GFDL-only or GFDL+CC-BY-NC photos just because it uses a "free" license. Licenses alone don't define what "free" is, the realistic usage does. If you can't easily use GFDL-only or GFDL+CC-BY-NC photos for a commercial purpose without having to fear violating one's copyright, that ain't free. "Commercial use" is not even defined such that everyone accepts it. Are "xerox" shops who charges you for each paper "commercial use"? This is why we stopped allowing such photos since 2018. pandakekok9 04:13, 11 April 2020 (UTC)[reply]
You should be able to use Commons files without needing a lawyer. We can talk all day about what "should" be and how copyright law "should" work. It remains a fact that CC licenses are very long, complex legal documents, and due to the way copyright law works, it is certainly advisable to get legal advice if you do not fully understand them, because if you do not comply with them, you risk breaking copyright law. No one who simply clicked "I agree to license this under this-and-this license" in UploadWizard ever legally agreed to "but I'm not going to try to enforce this provision or this one against these kinds of reusers under these circumstances". All of us agreed only to the exact license text and there is always a risk that any media file hosted on Commons may be tested with the Tentacles of Evil test. As far as I can see, no one has yet come up with an actual policy-based argument to delete these files, or even with an exact set of criteria what constitutes license enforcement that is too strict. It's all just appeals to essentially "ignore all rules", but that's meant to be used in cases where the wiki is actually improved: how does deleting freely licensed educationally useful files improve anything?
Interesting too that the decision to ban GFDL-only uploads is now being used as a precedent of some sort: this was a decision by a small group (around 30) of contributors in a discussion not nearly as widely advertised as such, frankly, revolutionary policy changes should be, and I think it may have gone very differently if there had been more participation by people like me who do not follow village pumps nearly as closely. I'm not here to relitigate this, but citing it as a new principle we can derive new ideas from isn't a very good argument. Tokfo (talk) 08:31, 11 April 2020 (UTC)[reply]
  • @Pandakekok9: there were like 6 users who voted delete in the first DR. If you include the nominator and the deleting admin that makes 8. Second DR was the same. After that the same group of users started speedy deleting. So a group of perhaps 10 users implemented a ban for photographers that require attribution. I do not think that is true consensus. Especially not when there are a few users that opposes and vote keep.
I don't know what the best way to sort this is but I try to get more users to comment and I suggested other solutions. For example that we add a template explaining to reusers that they have to make sure that they attribute the photographer correctly. --MGA73 (talk) 08:57, 11 April 2020 (UTC)[reply]
  •  Keep (This is not "a vote"), The Marco Verch thing has bothered me for years, I know that he is a rent-seeking scammer that leeches of Germany's draconic copyright laws, furthermore by hosting his “trap” images we are endangering the reputation not just of Wikimedia Commons, but Wikimedia websites as a whole. Imagine getting sued because you used free images from a website that promotes the free re-usage of educational content at no cost and then being dragged to court over it threatened with legal action. By hosting his images we have a ticking time-bomb on our hands. That being said, I hate these deletions as well, Marco Verch is an extremely talented photographer that makes high quality educational pictures with a free license of subjects we need illustrations of and the exclusion of his work is detrimental to the mission of Wikimedia websites. This puts us at a conundrum.
Personally I see a number of options, (1), my preferred choice”, we create “{{Copyright troll}}” and explain on the file pages that re-users should know that the source is a “copyright troll” and that by using it it’s their own risk, this basically cleanses our (and the Wikimedia Foundation’s) hands 👐🏻 by choosing to host his work. (2), we keep all of his work deleted and say that the issues he cause outweigh the benefits of his fantastic educational works. This is the status quo and it bothers me because it could essentially be seen as a message by Wikimedia Commons users that we should not treat copyright violations as of our work as copyright violations, maybe I’m reading too much into it, but if Wikimedia Commonists aren’t allowed to rightfully sue copyright violators it means that all of our (own) works are already de facto in the public domain. While I would never sue any copyright violators making my work also de facto in the public domain, I don't want such a mentality to scare away professional photographers who do this for a living and take the rights to their works more serious. (3), this is “the vulture option” and we wait until Marco Verch is incapable of filing legal actions against anyone and then mass-Undelete his files. Personally I’m more inclined towards the 1st (first) option. --Donald Trung 『徵國單』 (No Fake News 💬) (WikiProject Numismatics 💴) (Articles 📚) 11:26, 11 April 2020 (UTC)[reply]
@Donald Trung: I agree with your arguments but I would find another name for the template than "Copyright troll" ;-)
As for the comment about "not a vote" then the templates are called Template:Vote keep and Template:Vote delete. That's why I like to call I at vote even if the result not always is that the side with the most "votes" win :-) --MGA73 (talk) 17:31, 11 April 2020 (UTC)[reply]
  •  Delete Commons is not a place to feed mobsters. They even sue people who use their pictures the same way as we do (like on a Wordpress Site) and argue, that they are wrong licensed, since there is a page (called "full view") where the picture is not attributed at all. They just don't do it here, since they live from the free promotion they get from commons the projects. Unbelievable ... but if we allow these pictures here, we are acting as partners in crime. --Mirer (talk) 02:22, 16 April 2020 (UTC)[reply]
@Mirer: If you read en:Copyright troll you will see that we have other images from photographers that are "aggressive": File:Daughtry 2013.jpg as an example. --MGA73 (talk) 19:50, 27 April 2020 (UTC)[reply]
  •  Delete A known "copyright-troll" (see [1]). We should not provide users like this with a free platform where they can make shady business - that is not what Wikimedia Commons (or Creative Commons) is for. /Sofie Sigrinn (talk) 13:34, 8 June 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Deleted: --Pitke (talk) 09:06, 5 August 2020 (UTC)[reply]

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