Template talk:PD-Germany

lichtbilder ...

(from Commons:Deletion requests/File:SMS Pillau.jpg:) "It is a photographic work and 50 years have passed since the year of its creation" is a misinterpretation/mistranslation of the actual provisions. actually, it is wrong on two ends. first, the german term is "lichtbild" which by no means is equal in meaning to "photographic work". photographic works are granted protection for 70 years p.m.a. if they meet the criteria in § 2 urhg just like any other works. the protection of "lichtbilder" derived from § 72 urhg is a sui generis protection right for all photographs or all photographs that do not meet the general criteria for protection as works as outlined in § 2 urhg. here, it is by no means clear whether the image in question is protected through § 2 or not. except in cases like photo booths or satellite imagery that is very hard to tell. so please don't rely on such a classification and assume 70 years p.m.a. (just as it's done on dewiki). second, even if it were a "lichtbild", the fact that "50 years have passed since the year of its creation" is not a sufficient condition for being in the public domain as everyone can easily check herself in § 72 (3) urhg.

cheers, —Pill (talk) 01:04, 6 January 2012 (UTC)

Should we remove that condition? I knew about the problem of the "lichtbild" while creating the template. Many copyright laws do have such exceptions, and I included them in the templates, as we do not know about the exact definition of a "photographic work" in Haiti of the Democratic Republik of the Congo.--Antemister (talk) 10:20, 6 January 2012 (UTC)

Well, most importantly, we shouldn't try to translate these legal terms into English because if we do that, people get a wrong idea of the provisions. The downside to this is that people from Haiti probably won't understand what it means, but to be honest, the vast majority of people from Germany won't understand either. And that's good! If there's a whole body of literature dealing with classification criteria, giving people the illusion that classification is in any way an easy task, is far from desirable. Cheers, —Pill (talk) 05:13, 24 January 2012 (UTC)

The following is taken from Related rights:

The Berne Convention allows a shorter period of protection for photographs than for other works (twenty-five years from creation rather than fifty years post mortem auctoris, Art. 7.4), and many countries apply a different period of copyright protection to photographs than to other works An alternative approach, adopted notably by Germany and Italy, has been to offer full copyright protection to photographs that are clearly "artistic works" and protect all photographs, whatever their creative value, by a shorter sui generis related right. The sui generis protections are found at § 72, UrhG for Germany and the copyright runs for 50 years.

It seems to me that all German photos are PD so long as 50 years have passed after it publication in the public domain. 70 pma appears to only apply if a photo was not published within 50 years after its date of manufacture. (See http://www.wipo.int/wipolex/en/text.jsp?file_id=126255). Chesdovi (talk) 11:12, 23 April 2012 (UTC)

hi Chesdovi, this is not so. photographs that constitute works as defined in § 2 urhg (= Lichtbildwerke) are protected 70 years p.m.a., regardless of whether or not they have been published at some point (§§ 64, 69 urhg). Photographs that do not qualify for protection as works but are protected as Lichtbilder acc. to § 72 urhg enjoy protection until 50 years after their creation (if they are not published) or until 50 years after their publication (if they are published) (§§ 72, 69 urhg). this "duality", by the way, might even give rise to the seemingly astonishing constellation that Lichtbilder could be protected up to 100 years after creation if they are published exactly 50 years after their creation. hope that helps, —Pill (talk) 11:51, 23 April 2012 (UTC)

I see. Thank you. Chesdovi (talk) 17:23, 23 April 2012 (UTC)