Commons:Deletion requests/Template:Indian boundaries
Per the still-open discussion at Village Pump/Proposals on political restriction templates. While I oppose "nuclear-bombing" templates like Falun Gong and Nazi templates, I fully support "nuclear-bombing" templates that seem to help impress the territorial claims of all countries.
It is not the job of Wikimedia Commons to impress the governments of countries with disputed territorial claims, more so to warn Wikimedians and reusers that any reuses may violate the territorial laws of the said countries. We have a COM:General disclaimer page that already waives Commons the responsibility in such cases. It is mainly the job of individual Wikipedias to provide extensive information on territorial disputes. The users are responsible for their actions (as stated in our general disclaimer page); more so, the editors of all Wikipedias are responsible to ensure that their articles do not cross the line of fire of Indian (or even Philippine, Chinese, Taiwanese, Japanese, Vietnamese, Malay, Indonesian, or Pakistani) authorities with regards to insertion of such contentious maps in articles that may discuss territorial disputes.
Moreover, such restrictions on use of files are part of non-copyright restrictions, and we typically do not deal with such matters except in more frequent cases (which we typically respond by slapping {{Personality}} or other related templates to description pages of files).
The fate of {{Chinese boundaries}} will depend on the outcome of this template deletion request. JWilz12345 (Talk|Contrib's.) 22:50, 13 March 2024 (UTC)
Keep — despite having a COM:General disclaimer, experience says that most people ignore the disclaimers at the bottom of the webpage. So specific warning templates at image descriptions are needed, especially if the warning is too serious, like border disputes and personality rights. We already have the {{Personality}} template for the personality rights warning and the generic {{De facto boundaries}} template for the border dispute warning. Maybe {{Chinese boundaries}} and {{Indian boundaries}} should be merged into {{De facto boundaries}}. Sbb1413 (he) (talk • contribs) 03:21, 14 March 2024 (UTC)
- @Sbb1413 are we too concerned on the users' potential infringements on territorial laws of their respective countries? I don't see that such types of infringements are serious enough to warrant the need of templates. We here have ongoing territorial disputes with China regarding the islands of the South China Sea / West Philippine Sea, and there are regulations on what types of maps showing the Philippines are allowed to be distributed here. But such regulations are not the concerns of Commons, IMO (as based in the ongoing discussion on the Village Pump/Proposals to prohibit such templates). JWilz12345 (Talk|Contrib's.) 05:08, 14 March 2024 (UTC)
Delete. Upon review, the assertion made by this template appears to be false. The w:Geospatial Information Regulation Bill of 2006 would have established legal penalties for "inaccurate" depictions of India's boundaries. However, this bill was withdrawn after extensive public outcry; it is not law, and, as far as I am aware, no law has the effect which is implied by this template.- If that bill had been passed, however, this template would have been appropriate - innocent reuse of some Wikimedia images containing maps of India could have resulted in legal penalties to users in the country. The objective of these templates is not to provide information about territorial disputes; it's to warn users of specific and unusual legal risks involving the reuse of certain images. Omphalographer (talk) 22:33, 15 March 2024 (UTC)
- Delete, though appropiate instances can be replaced with {{De facto boundaries}} as a general service to our sister projects. Along with the dubious penalties described above, it is not the job of Commons to point out every single national law which may affect usage of a file. Non-copyright restriction warnings such as {{Trademark}}, {{Currency}}, and {{Personality rights}} exist because they mention restrictions that significantly affect commercial use, modification, redistribution, and other actions that copyright may also regulate, and non-experienced users frequently don't understand that these restrictions are separate from copyright, that affected files can be hosted here despite such restrictions, and that their presence doesn't release them from such restrictions. On the other hand, this template and {{Chinese boundaries}} deal with governments attempting to push a particular POV on a contentious topic with legal force. The issue is not the content of the file itself but rather the idea being expressed or implied not being in line with a state narrative, which is completely different from intellectual property or counterfeiting laws that affect the content itself or the publicity rights of an individual. We are able to host such files because Wikimedia Commons is based in the United States, a nation with a strong tradition of freedom of expression. It is true that many of Commons's reusers may live in nations that lack such freedom, but it is not the job of Commons to tell them what their government wants them to say or believe, especially when such ideas are often fundamental to the legitimacy or ideology of a ruling regime. If our sites, which are among the most visited and highly-publicized on the internet, can get blocked by governments for expressing verifiable facts which they may find inconvenient, we can assume that re-users in such jurisdictions are fully aware of the legal risk of using our content to challenge a state narrative without us having to tell them. funplussmart (talk) 19:12, 16 March 2024 (UTC)
- Keep per @Sbb1413: . Also, by retaining the template, Wikimedia Commons maintains transparency regarding the inclusion of contentious content. Users are informed about the presence of disputed boundaries and can make informed decisions regarding their usage. And to respond to @Omphalographer: I believe that (just read this somewhere; not sure) that even though making a map showing territorial discrepancies is okay, however endorsing it in any way would attack the sovereignty of the territories belonging to India and therefore would let incur legal damages upon the reuser. Also, I do not think that it doesn't hurt to provide a disclaimer to the reuser too. Thanks, Contributers2020Talk to me here! 15:19, 12 April 2024 (UTC)
- A source for the assertion made would be helpful. If there is an actual tort law risk for reusers, having that sourced would be helpful in deciding whether to keep or not. Abzeronow (talk) 20:09, 9 June 2024 (UTC)
Delete no need to get on the slippery slope of involving commons with internal squabbles of countries, as stated by policy mentioned above. (China templates ditto). --Zenwort (talk) 14:35, 16 April 2024 (UTC)
Delete per above. Zanahary (talk) 07:43, 21 May 2024 (UTC)
Deleted: per nomination. --Krd 07:52, 23 June 2024 (UTC)