Commons:Deletion requests/World War I era images (02/08/2006)

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World War I era images

The following halftone images I've uploaded, their status as PD-old etc. was contested a while ago. No help from the village pump. One admin suggested that I'd research who actually the photographer is, something which I can't (needle in a haystack..). More detail here.

Original upload: Image:Horse simulator WWI.jpg, Image:East Prussia war grave 1914.jpg, Image:Ferdinand Foch pre 1915.jpg, Image:Friedrich von Ingenohl pre-1915.jpg, Image:Paul von Hindenburg pre-1915.jpg, Image:Rear Admiral David Beatty pre-1915.jpg, Image:SMS Mainz sinking (photo).jpg, Image:Imperial Russian artillery ammunition baskets WWI.jpg, Image:Crew of Unterseeboot 9 (WWI).jpg

Later addition: Image:HMS E7 (WWI).jpg, Image:HMS Shark (WWI).jpg, Image:George V and Admiral Callaghan onboard HMS Iron Duke.jpg, Image:HMS D1 (WWI).jpg

The latter series and some of the original ones I would put as {{PD-BritishGov}} (British armed forces photos), the rest as perhaps {{Anonymous work}} because it will be very difficult to determine the original author. That they were in widespread circulation (newspapers etc.) I do know, some of the images in the book I scanned them from have been put on commons via Project Gutenberg and the Imperial War Museum.

What to do? Scoo 06:12, 2 August 2006 (UTC)

• I suppose those credited to "Det stora världskriget vol. II, p. 347. Printed in Stockholm 1915." would fall under whatever the copyright status of that 1915 Swedish book is? -- Infrogmation 01:10, 3 August 2006 (UTC)

I'd consider the book PD, though apparently the photos status as PD is contested. See also the discussion at Image talk:Horse simulator WWI.jpg. Scoo 07:36, 9 September 2006 (UTC)

• Keep. Based on [1], it seems that these photos published in 1915 or earlier are out of copyright in the USA. Even if the main editor/author of the book, Major General Carl Otto Nordensvan who died 1924 had individual's copyright, Swedish copyright duration of life + 70 years would have expired.--Jusjih 14:30, 17 September 2006 (UTC)

There seems to be an error in the logic of your quote: Normally, an unregistered foreign work's copyright would have expired and then be restored by the URAA. The court case you are quoting claims that there is nothing to be restored because the work is to be regarded as unpublished in the US, so copyright was determined by the URAA to begin with (without restoring anything). In both scenarios, such images are not PD in the US. It's only the rational that changes. --Wikipeder 12:42, 20 September 2006 (UTC)

• Delete. We do not know if the authors died more than 70 years ago, and we have no reason to be sure any exception to this will apply. As long as we are not 100 per cent sure images are free content we must not use them. --Wikipeder 12:42, 20 September 2006 (UTC)

• Keep Isn't this exactly what {{Anonymous work}} is for? What we are saying otherwise is that we can never be sure that a work was truly anonymous and that thus all images on Commons which are PD due to having been published (without known photographer) after say 1850 would have to be deleted. I'd like to point out that this probably includes several thousand images. /Lokal_Profil 21:37, 20 September 2006 (UTC)

The 70 year provision is for anonymous images, i. e. images of which the author never claimed authorship. That we, after glancing at a scanned image, do not know who the author was, is something completely different and does not at all mean that the image is in the public domain after 70 years.

In fact, you are very right with your observation that there probably are loads of images that are not free content among those simply tagged "anonymous" for convenience. We can hardly ever proove that the author really never ever has claimed authorship. For that reason, e. g. the German WP does not accept anonymous images if they are not at least 100 years old (which is arbitrary, too, but certainly safer). --Wikipeder 08:29, 21 September 2006 (UTC)

And when would we ever know that an image is anonymous? Does it have to be signe anonymous, what about if the author used the pseudonym anonymous. What you are saying is basically that everything marked anonymous (less then ~170years old) should be deleted.

Also what I was trying to point out is that this image is argued to fall under the copyright of the book it was published in since they didn't specify a source (wherby it's possible that the photographer was a contributor). An argument agaiinst this would mean that all(most) images tagged with e.g. {{PD-Ugglan}} and {{1922 cyc}} would have to be deleted. /Lokal_Profil 12:50, 21 September 2006 (UTC)

• Keep German copyright laws/WP rules can not be used generally for the works of the pictures here, some are being uploaded from Singapore, some from Argentine. This suggestion simply ignores the laws of other states. Do not implement this rule! MoRsE 12:30, 3 November 2006 (UTC)
  • This argumentation is not valid. You have to obbey the law of the country were the image was taken not from were it was uploaded. --ALE! ¿…? 16:59, 21 November 2006 (UTC)

What about {{PD-US}} then? It's a difficult question though. Scoo 16:48, 23 November 2006 (UTC)

• Delete in doubt delete --ALE! ¿…? 16:59, 21 November 2006 (UTC)
• Keep all the images of UK origin here at least. These all look fairly safe (and are quite likely to be government works). Unsure about the German pics, more sourcing would be good but as thats unavailable...--Nilfanion 19:25, 23 November 2006 (UTC)

I believe to remember that the UK, US and French government didn't accept German copyright from prior and during WWI as a result of the war. Naturally this led to massive problems for the German economy and busted the development of new solutions. So we could look if these rules could apply. I will do some research (but I guess nobody minded to abolish the concerning laws). Wandalstouring 14:43, 7 December 2006 (UTC)

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Keep. While caution (as Wikipeder and ALE! urge) is good, in this case I think they're all anonymous, and covered by the 70 year doctrine and are safe to keep. If not, I suggest individual deletions, not en masse. ++Lar: t/c 20:24, 3 January 2007 (UTC)