User talk:Clindberg/archives 10

Commons:Deletion requests/File:IV light soaking.png

Hi Clindberg. Perhaps you can provide some insight into this? COM:CB#Scientific or technical diagrams speaks only in general terms which might not be easy to apply with respect to this file. -- Marchjuly (talk) 01:22, 16 March 2020 (UTC)

File:Image from page 296 of "Mount Everest, the reconnaissance, 1921" (1922).jpg

Hi! This photo is from a book from 1922. How do I decide if it really is PD? Do I also need to find out if the photographer was Charles or George (both mentioned on Flickr)? --MGA73 (talk) 20:52, 17 March 2020 (UTC)

@Elisfkc: just as info :-) --MGA73 (talk) 20:55, 17 March 2020 (UTC)

It's fine in the U.S., of course. For the UK... if it is known who took it, then yes it would be 70pma. If not, then I guess it would be PD-anon-70. Carl Lindberg (talk) 23:40, 17 March 2020 (UTC)

Thank you! Also I noticed that many old files have PD-old or PD-art. What would be the best license if the author died more than 150 years ago for example? I was thinking of having my bot fix licenses? --MGA73 (talk) 17:08, 18 March 2020 (UTC)

PD-Art is generally for photographs of paintings (or other works) that amount to copies. It needs a parameter for the PD status of the painting/work, which for something that old would be PD-old-100-expired. If the photo itself also has a license, there is Licensed-PD-Art (and some other variants). There is a similar PD-Scan wrapper template for scans as opposed to photos, though I think that is usually just used when a source is claiming a copyright on the scan itself. But not sure changing PD-old to PD-old-100 is worth the effort, really. Carl Lindberg (talk) 20:06, 18 March 2020 (UTC)

Yes I'm thinking of photos like File:ArchAngelMurillo.jpg and photos of art like Mona Lisa etc. As I understand it then all files in Category:PD-Art (PD-old default) should be checked and have their license fixed? I was also thinking of using the template where we add the year when the creator died and let the template do the job (like {{PD-old-auto|deathyear=1888}}). --MGA73 (talk) 21:05, 18 March 2020 (UTC)

Ah, fixing the ones which use PD-Art but without an argument would be a good idea, sure. PD-old-auto-expired can be used if the date is before 1925. Carl Lindberg (talk) 23:21, 18 March 2020 (UTC)

Thanks

For your detailed comments at Commons:Deletion requests/Files in Category:Heart Truth photos. When time permits, please have a look at Commons:Deletion requests/Files in Category:PD-RU-exempt (cropped postal covers)‎. This policy-wise DR is related to cropping postal stamps and covers, and it might not be limited to Russia. Best regards. Materialscientist (talk) 04:11, 22 March 2020 (UTC)

Category:Photographs by LBJ Library

Hi! Many of the photos in this category is uploaded with PD-mark. Some have a PD-USGov tag. How do I find out if the library is a part of the Government and the photos therefore PD? Do we have a list somewhere? --MGA73 (talk) 16:20, 22 March 2020 (UTC)

Presidential libraries are part of the National Archives, I think. There may be foundations which support them, which may be different. But if they are using PD-Mark for modern photos, you would think they would effectively be PD-USGov even if that was more by contract than being federal employees. Carl Lindberg (talk) 16:54, 22 March 2020 (UTC)

Thank you. So just to be sure (not being a native English speaker) you think it is safe for me to add {{PD-USGov}} right? --MGA73 (talk) 16:58, 22 March 2020 (UTC)

It would seem to be either accurate or the closest approximation. In the U.S., you can declare your works to be public domain, so I think using PD-Mark on your own works does have a real legal effect, but consensus here is to not accept that (probably because the better CC0 license is easily within reach at Flickr, but it's not named well at all unfortunately). Carl Lindberg (talk) 17:03, 22 March 2020 (UTC)

Something I'd like you to weigh in on

Given how strong your analyses have been over the years, there are a few things I'd like your opinion on. Two of them are about DRs I made on now-deleted (as of typing) files, but for now, I'm interested in hearing your thoughts on Commons:Deletion requests/File:Yamaha Hatsune Miku itansha 20110522c.jpg, regarding the use of copyrighted anime characters on motorcycles and whether they can be held to be acceptable for Commons. My thought was that some of them are de minimis and others are too derivative of the original works and should be deleted, but thinking about things some more, there may be an argument that the incidental approach seen in Ets-Hokin v. Skyy Spirits, Inc. applies here. -BRAINULATOR9 (TALK) 16:30, 25 March 2020 (UTC)

File:Phyrexian - Marina militare 009.jpg

Hi, I'm asking you about this edit. Are you sure the picture depicts the Eugenio di Savoia (the 1936 ship)? And how could you indentify it? Thanks. --Phyrexian ɸ 21:17, 28 March 2020 (UTC)

@Phyrexian: -- I really should remember to document what I was looking at ;-) It's either the Eugenio di Savoia or the Emanuele Filiberto Duca d`Aosta, or maybe the Raimondo Montecuccoli -- looking at www.navypedia.org], those are the only cruisers which matched. In looking at the area where the lower hull rises from where it is in the middle of the ship up to the level it is at the bow, there is an identifiable difference between the Emanuele Filiberto Duca d`Aosta and the other two -- in that first ship, it rises up to the top level quickly, while on the other two ships it goes up in two steps. The photo in question has the two steps. For the last two, I think the front bridge tower seems different -- the Eugenio di Savoia seems to have a enclosed band where the bridge area protrudes from the rest of the tower, as seen in the photo File:Destructor italià Eugenio di Savoia.jpg, whereas that area on File:Raimondo Montecuccoli SLV Green.jpg (and other photos of the ship searching the net) seems to show a tower without that type of protrusion. And in this photo, you can see the silhouette of the protrusion. I'm pretty sure that's how I arrived at that determination. Carl Lindberg (talk) 00:52, 29 March 2020 (UTC)

Thank you. I'm not an expert, that's why I categorized the pictures as "unknown ships". I'll change the description according to the category and link your explanation here as a reference. --Phyrexian ɸ 02:35, 29 March 2020 (UTC)

Regarding File:Meade, Schnatter & Smith at Charlotte Motor Speedway 2013 (8929996982).jpg

I have the file uploaded under the {{PD-USGov}} license. Does the upload check out? StrangeloveFan101 (talk) 20:11, 30 March 2020 (UTC)

lb:Fichier:Aktien_1.jpg and lb:Fichier:Albert-Breisch------w.jpg

For being awesome!

Hi! Can you think of a reason why lb:Fichier:Aktien_1.jpg should not be PD now? It's from 1898 so it should be PD in the US. The share is issued by a company and not a person. So would it be fair to say it is an "anonymous, pseudonymous or collective work" and therefore protected for 70 years only per Commons:Copyright rules by territory/France? --MGA73 (talk) 18:45, 10 April 2020 (UTC)

Yeah I would think that would be {{PD-anon-expired}}. Should have been PD for many decades. Carl Lindberg (talk) 01:13, 11 April 2020 (UTC)

And lb:Fichier:Albert-Breisch------w.jpg is from 1926 and taken from https://luxemburgensia.bnl.lu/cgi/luxonline1_2.pl?action=fv&sid=luxill&year=1926&issue=16&page=118&zoom=3 and I see no name next to the photos. So I would assume it is what could be called directed works and per Commons:Copyright rules by territory/Luxembourg "Copyright in directed works lasts 70 year from the year of publication.". Does that sound right? --MGA73 (talk) 19:01, 10 April 2020 (UTC)

Yes, but that means copyright may have expired in Luxembourg in 1997, after the URAA date. Which in turn would mean that the U.S. copyright was restored and would expire in 2022. If that was the first publication, anyways. But in looking... Luxembourg was 50pma on the URAA date, which which usually mean the anonymous term was 50 years, and should have avoided the URAA. So yes that should be {{PD-anon-70-EU}} and {{PD-1996}}. Carl Lindberg (talk) 01:13, 11 April 2020 (UTC)

Thanks a lot! I'm trying to empty lb:Kategorie:All fräi Medien :-) --MGA73 (talk) 10:04, 12 April 2020 (UTC)

Question where did you find the 50 years for Luxembourg? --MGA73 (talk) 10:22, 12 April 2020 (UTC)

Found it at en:Wikipedia:Non-U.S._copyrights#Dates_of_restoration_and_terms_of_protection. That is actually really important. Perhaps we should make a note at Commons:Copyright_rules_by_territory/Luxembourg that it was 50pma in 1996 when the URAA took place. --MGA73 (talk) 10:35, 12 April 2020 (UTC)

w:Wikipedia:Non-U.S. copyrights mentions it, though it's not complete -- per the law in 1995, photos were actually 50 years from creation. It appears they did not implement the EU directive until 1997. Simple photos are still 50 years from creation there, but ones which rise to "works" of course became 70pma, and anonymous ones to 70 years. Carl Lindberg (talk) 10:38, 12 April 2020 (UTC)

Does that mean that all photos prior to 1946 is always PD or was the copyright restored by the new law? --MGA73 (talk) 11:03, 12 April 2020 (UTC)

They were restored in Luxembourg. Anonymous ones from that era should still be OK, but ones with known authors are now 70pma. If they are "simple photos" which don't rise to "works" they are still 50 years from creation, but not a clue where they actually draw that line. Carl Lindberg (talk) 11:07, 12 April 2020 (UTC)

Thanks again. Too bad we can't say if we like the photo it is a "simple photo" ;-)

I'm importing 473 files from de.wiki (by Category:Daniel Sanders) and they are located in Category:Datei:Taschen-Lexikon des allgemeinen Wissens until I have fixed the pages. Would you use {{PD-old-auto-expired |deathyear=1897}} or is there a better license? --MGA73 (talk) 11:51, 12 April 2020 (UTC)

That is probably the best one.

Freud papers

Hello, I hope this finds you well. I have been asked by Pierrette13 whether the Freud papers here could be uploaded to Commons. LOC's position, indicated in the Rights and Access section, is not very clear and PD-US, if applicable, might not be sufficient. Your opinion would certainly be helpful to Pierrette13. Thanks, — Racconish ^💬 08:16, 1 May 2020 (UTC)

I think they state the large bulk of it is in the public domain. Since it involves works done by many different authors, including works contributed by others after Freud's death, that is probably where the uncertainty lies. There is also the possibility that works created before 1978, but first published between 1978 and the end of 2002, may be copyrighted in the U.S. for a long time yet. Also, for works where the U.S. is not the country of origin (probably a good many of them), copyright could have different lengths and you would have to research based on who the author is. I would think that any of the digitized works which are available in high resolution are works that the LoC thinks are public domain, at least in the U.S. Works by Freud himself should be OK, unless first published between 1978 and 2003 as mentioned (unpublished works as of 2003 would be 70pma in the U.S., which for him would then have become PD in 2010). Unpublished works by his wife (who died in 1951) would not yet be PD, though, for example (and would not be PD in Austria, if that is the country of origin). So the determination would probably be case-by-case, depending on who the author is. If they have passed 70pma (for other countries) and are available in high resolution, then they should be fine for Commons. Carl Lindberg (talk) 13:39, 1 May 2020 (UTC)

Thanks Carl. @Pierrette13: I hope this helps. — Racconish ^💬 06:01, 2 May 2020 (UTC)

Thank you @Clindberg and Racconish:  !!! Best regards, --Pierrette13 (talk) 06:09, 2 May 2020 (UTC)

The Imperial Gazetteer of India

Hi! We have Category:The Imperial Gazetteer of India and it mention the years 1881 and its subcategory mention 1885.

The article en:The Imperial Gazetteer of India says the original from 1881 was made by Category:William Wilson Hunter / en:William Wilson Hunter (1840-1900).

The article says there was 1908, 1909 and 1931 "New Editions". Further more the article say that after the death of Sir William Wilson Hunter in 1900 these men compiled the twenty-six volume Imperial Gazetteer of India:

• en:Herbert Hope Risley (1851-1911
• en:William Stevenson Meyer (1860-1922)
• en:Richard Burn (Indologist) (1871-1947)
• en:James Sutherland Cotton (1847-1918)

As I see it then all versions of The Imperial Gazetteer of India is PD. Do you agree? --MGA73 (talk) 15:21, 7 May 2020 (UTC)

Hmmm... As I read {{PD-India}} then "and works of corporate authorship ... enter the public domain 60 years after the date on which they were first published" but according to Commons:Copyright_rules_by_territory/India#Durations then it is "...copyright subsists in any literary, dramatic, musical or artistic work published within the lifetime of the author until 60 years after the author's death. ...The reference to the author shall, in the case of a work of joint authorship, be construed as a reference to the author who dies last." So perhaps 1931-version is restored by URAA? --MGA73 (talk) 15:35, 7 May 2020 (UTC)

Material done by Richard Burn which was new to the 1931 edition may have been restored by the URAA, yes, since he died 1941 or later. If it was a work for hire for a company, then the copyright should just be the 60 years from publication. Anything published before 1925 is of course OK in the U.S. That potential restored copyright would probably only apply to the selection and arrangement of the entire publication though; individual maps would have their own copyright, unaffected by the arrangement copyright. Carl Lindberg (talk) 16:11, 7 May 2020 (UTC)

Thank you very much! I will buy you a beer if you ever visit Denmark :-) I added a note on Category:The Imperial Gazetteer of India. Does it look right? --MGA73 (talk) 18:25, 8 May 2020 (UTC)

TOO for buildings

Hi Carl, I'm not sure you have Commons talk:Threshold of originality on your watchlist, but if you have the time and inclination, your knowledge of case law and ability to discern and explain would be greatly appreciated Commons talk:Threshold of originality#Buildings. Storkk (talk) 15:51, 14 May 2020 (UTC)

If I may ask you again I have 2 DR's about TOO I hope you could comment on: Commons:Deletion requests/File:Eschara.gif and Commons:Deletion requests/File:Bermudafunk Logo.svg. I'm trying to find out if we can set a level so we can speed up DR's. Pretty please :-D --MGA73 (talk) 19:08, 16 May 2020 (UTC)

Hi! I do not know if you noticed my request but if I can persuade you to have a look it would be appreciated. Perhaps it was because I forgot the "...with sugar on the top"? --MGA73 (talk) 21:22, 1 June 2020 (UTC)

Thanks a lot! --MGA73 (talk) 07:45, 2 June 2020 (UTC)

Derivates of free files

Hi! If you have 2 minutes perhaps you could comment on Commons:Deletion requests/File:Kentlogo.svg. The question is if a png file is PD can you make a svg-version based on that or does that also require a permission? The permission for the png is a mail saying that the seal is not copyrighted. --MGA73 (talk) 12:47, 8 July 2020 (UTC)

Monuments/stones

Helle again. I already made a request for today but I will try my luck anyway :-) Latvia have no FOP so when we look at monuments/stones that are not PD-old then I guess we have to look at the changes made to the stone. These 3 stones as example:

1. lv:Attēls:Diesmusvetki 100 2.JPG has very little changes: A rectangle and a short text. Do you agree that it is not relevant that the first stone has a "funny" shape? The artist did not make the stone. Artist made the rectangle and it is PD-shape and artist made the text and it is probably PD-text?
2. lv:Attēls:Ernests Brastins 2.JPG has some changes: A short text and some square-ish figure. As 1. Except we have to consider if the figure is above COM:TOO?
3. lv:Attēls:Barons monument.JPG has big changes: A head has been made. The stone is changed completely. Making the stone rectangle-ish is not above TOO but the head is?

Lv.wiki have a lot of photos of graves etc and many are simple shapes (cross-like and/or rectangle-ish) and a short text. So I hoped you could give some tips before I move them or tag them with "NoCommons". --MGA73 (talk) 14:55, 8 July 2020 (UTC)

For the first one, if the rock was specifically carved that way, sure it's copyrightable. But that just looks like a natural rock (shaped by nature) that they added an inscription to. That should be fine. The third one is a sculpture. The second one... yeah, would come down to that figure. You could argue you are taking a picture of a wider scene (the whole grave) and that figure is incidental. It's also a somewhat straightforward geometrical shape, a square with marks at the corners and the middle of the sides. I'd probably lean OK on that. Carl Lindberg (talk) 17:59, 8 July 2020 (UTC)

Thank you very much! --MGA73 (talk) 13:47, 9 July 2020 (UTC)

FOP in Vietnam

Hi! I made a nice little category on Vietnamese Wikipedia of derivative works: vi:Thể loại:Derivative works. There is Freedom of panorama in Vietnam. I wonder if it only covers buildings, statues, signs etc located in a public place or if it also covers product packaging and everything else you can place in a public place. Do you have an idea? --MGA73 (talk) 12:58, 23 July 2020 (UTC)

It doesn't have the "permanent" condition, which seems to mean almost anything is fair game, but it also doesn't define "public place". So that may well not include stores, museums, and things like that. Not much idea beyond the (translated) text of the law. Carl Lindberg (talk) 15:21, 23 July 2020 (UTC)

Thank. In that case I guess I will not start mass deletions on vi.wiki. --MGA73 (talk) 15:24, 23 July 2020 (UTC)

Oshima Shipbuilding

Hello Clindberg, I need your help. From my point of view is Oshima Shipbuilding only one shipyard, located in Saikai. Unfortunately, we have two categories for the ships built by this shipyard: Ships built at Oshima Shipbuilding, Saikai and Ships built at Oshima SB, Oshima. Please let me know, if you agree to merge both categories to one. Greetings --Ein Dahmer (talk) 18:41, 22 July 2020 (UTC)

@Ein Dahmer: Ah, I'd never looked into that. I think you're right. Ship-db has just one shipyard, Oshima Zosensho (Nagasaki-Oshima), and that list has ships from both of the categories here. It looks like Oshima was one of the five towns which combined (in 2005) to form the current city of Saikai, Nagasaki. I would probably keep the "Ships built at Oshima Shipbuilding, Saikai" name. I guess references would either use the older name of Oshima, or the newer city name of Saikai, and so I guess we ended up with two cats for the same yard. Carl Lindberg (talk) 18:52, 22 July 2020 (UTC)

Hello Carl, thanks for the quick response. Ship-db is a good source, but sometimes late with actualization. If we look to a register (for example DNV GL) is there also only one shipyard listed. My intention is to move all ships from Ships built at Oshima SB, Oshima to Ships built at Oshima Shipbuilding, Saikai and to redirect the first to the second. --Ein Dahmer (talk) 19:15, 22 July 2020 (UTC)

@Ein Dahmer: Sounds good. Ship-db at least lets you search on the name of a shipyard, to see if they have separate lists under similar names. I haven't found many sources like that which list shipyards, then let you see the list under each yard, so it's hard to learn (and sometimes histories of name changes are also hard to come by). DNVGL may be an exception, but not sure that the exact text of the shipyard names in the registers is always consistent. Feels like I've seen cases where a company added a second shipyard, but the text for the original did not change, things like that. Or some use historical names as of when the ship was created, some use current names, things like that. But I'm not really sure, and don't have a great feel for things in this area, so I haven't done a lot of work on creating yard categories. Many of the yards in China seem particularly hard to get a grasp on -- lots of similar names. But this case seems obvious, once you look into it a little, which I had never done. Carl Lindberg (talk) 20:07, 22 July 2020 (UTC)

Done. Greetings across the ocean --Ein Dahmer (talk) 20:26, 30 July 2020 (UTC)

wow

Hi! You responded to a post I made about US state copyright law in an informative, cogent, and friendly manner a couple days ago. Since then, I've been peeking at the copyright Village pump archives for a bit, and I just wanted to express my appreciation for the quality and length of your involvement with this project. You rock! Jlevi (talk) 19:44, 12 August 2020 (UTC)

Machin stamp question

I had a discussion with Sv1xv on their enwiki page and he suggested asking your opinion. The stamps in question w:File:PostallyUsedMachins.jpg are the same design as the original issue in 1967 so my view is that the addition of the semi-oval cuts and different denomination do not make this a non-free image and it should be moved to the commons. I've already refined the details of w:File:Machind.jpg so it can be moved to the commons and File:UK-1D-1967 (block).jpg is already here. What do you think? Ww2censor (talk) 16:55, 2 September 2020 (UTC)

Making more copies in later years doesn't change the copyright really -- so if it's the exact same design, should be OK. Don't think the addition of the denominations would change anything. I don't know about the semi-oval cuts though. Are those used on other stamps in the same way? That's probably the only slightly concerning thing, really, unless there are small differences in the bust. The resolutions of those aren't enough to see the small details to see if it's exactly the same engraving / printing or something a bit different. Carl Lindberg (talk) 01:31, 3 September 2020 (UTC)

There appear to be two slightly different engravings used on these stamps over the last 50 years per this image: File:Comparaison entre ancienne et nouvelle gravure EME timbre Machin.png. Here File:Elizabeth II Machin series stamps sculpture.jpg is the original sculpture from which the stamps are made which makes the earlier engraving of the pendant looks smaller than the later version which is actually more like the original sculpture. If it makes a real difference to the issue, in 1997 the portrait was redrawn for new computerised printing machines per this Machin stamps webpage and Linns Stamp News. That may well make a copyright difference. The semi-oval cuts are a security addition that are used in many modern self-adhesive British stamps and imho are not a copyrightable concern as I don't think they change the stamp's copyright. In the same way that we would not consider a change in perforations as obtaining a new copyright I doubt they do. I'm well aware that UK copyright has a very low threshold of originality but think that change is too minimal for newer stamps to not be free as the originals are. However the portrait itself may remain an issue. Thanks for replying. Ww2censor (talk) 10:47, 3 September 2020 (UTC)

Australian copyright question

Hi Clindberg. I'm wondering if you'd mind taking a quick look at these files: File:1965 Castrol Drive Presentation 3.png, File:1965 Castrol Drive Presentation 2.png, File:1965 Castrol Drive Presentation 1.png and File:Castrol Drive info from Parliamentary Records.pdf. Based upon the discussion at en:User talk:Marchjuly#1965 Castrol Drive, it seems highly unlikely that the the uploader owns the copyright on the three photos (I think the pdf was just licensed as "own work" because the uploader didn't know what else to do). It might be possible that these are PD for some reason per c:COM:AUSTRALIA, but I'm not sure. Since the photos appear to have been taken in 1965, it might be another ten years until they fall into the public domain; the pdf might, however, be {{PD-AustraliaGov}} since fifty years have elapsed since it seems to have been first published. Anyway, I just thought I'd asked for another opinion before figuring out whether to DR the files. -- Marchjuly (talk) 11:25, 6 September 2020 (UTC)

The PDF is PD-AustraliaGov. If the photographer was a government photographer, seems like those would be PD-AustraliaGov as well. (As of 2019, the term for Australian government works changed to 50 years from creation.) Carl Lindberg (talk) 13:16, 6 September 2020 (UTC)

Thank you for taking a look. I'll see if the uploader can provide more information about who took the photos. -- Marchjuly (talk) 01:16, 7 September 2020 (UTC)

Philippines section on my FoP essay userspace page

Hello. Under my userspace essay User:JWilz12345/FoP#Philippines, is my interpretation of URAA correct? 95 years after completion date for copyrighted works that had US copyright restored in January 1996? Thanks for the response. JWilz12345 (Talk|Contrib's.) 14:14, 4 October 2020 (UTC)

Close. It's the earlier of 95 years from publication, and 120 years from creation. Defining "publication" for sculptures and paintings is difficult, though if they were put on permanent public display before 1978, that generally counted. We often do assume publication around the time of creation, unless something is documented to have remained unpublished or private to the author for longer. Works published 1978 or later can have different terms. The U.S. started using 70pma (well... 50pma at the time, but later increased to 70pma) as its general term for works created 1978 or later, but various grandfather cases make it more complicated for works created before 1978 but only published later. See Commons:Hirtle chart. Couple of other notes -- photos of architecture are not derivative works in the U.S., so for FoP purposes, the building only has to expire in the Philippines for photos of it to be OK; there is no URAA issue other than the copyright to the photograph itself (which is usually licensed). Also, works which were "simultaneously published" (within 30 days) in both the Philippines and the U.S. avoided the URAA, because the U.S. was allowed to treat those as "United States works" and not apply the URAA. That status is usually almost impossible to prove, but once or twice we've been able to show it for news photographs. Carl Lindberg (talk) 14:39, 4 October 2020 (UTC)

Notification about possible deletion

Some contents have been listed at Commons:Deletion requests so that the community can discuss whether they should be kept or not. We would appreciate it if you could go to voice your opinion about this at their entry. If you created these pages, please note that the fact that they have been proposed for deletion does not necessarily mean that we do not value your kind contribution. It simply means that one person believes that there is some specific problem with them, such as a copyright issue. Please see Commons:But it's my own work! for a guide on how to address these issues. Please remember to respond to and – if appropriate – contradict the arguments supporting deletion. Arguments which focus on the nominator will not affect the result of the nomination. Thank you!

Affected:

• File:Indiana-StateSeal.svg

Regards, AntiCompositeNumber (talk) 01:47, 24 October 2020 (UTC)

Australian FoP arrangements

Hi, I've started a discussion of this at Commons talk:Copyright rules by territory/Australia. I think that expert advice to substantiate the claim being made here is needed, as it seems to be risky advice without it. Regards, Nick-D (talk) 23:35, 30 October 2020 (UTC)

Incidental?

Hi Clindberg. Do you think the Peko-chan logo/sign in File:Fujiya restaurant.jpg would be considered incidental? -- Marchjuly (talk) 01:05, 30 October 2020 (UTC)

Sure seems like the photo was focusing on the restaurant signs in particular. The name, and the logo. They weren't trying to capture the whole building or even just restaurant. The restaurant name is fine, but... the other one not so much. You could try to argue that they were taking a photo of whatever logo happened to be there, as it was not the artistic expression itself which caused it. The likelihood of the photo being fair use is pretty high, in most contexts, for "real life" usage. But when it comes down to the technicality of "free" and relating to the Ets-Hokin decision... feels more like a photo focusing on the bottle's label, rather than a photo of the bottle where the label is unavoidably part of it. Carl Lindberg (talk) 04:22, 30 October 2020 (UTC)

I kind of thought the same, but thanks for taking a look at this. I could see if this was a photo taken from across the street or something, but it does look like the photographer was focusing on the sign and that rest is actually incidental. Obviously, the photo seems to lose its value so to speak without the logo; so, I don't think blurring is an option. Perhaps this would be good to further discuss at COM:DR? -- Marchjuly (talk) 06:38, 30 October 2020 (UTC)

See Commons:Deletion requests/File:Fujiya restaurant.jpg for further discussion on this. -- Marchjuly (talk) 01:25, 19 November 2020 (UTC)

China FoP - Cropping out photo to use as a copy of the original

Hi Carl. After reading your comment at Help Desk, I would like to get your opinion on this image: File:Mao Zedong portrait.jpg, which is a photographic copy of an outdoor painting in China and appears to be an abuse of FoP. I and other users have DRed it several times but it has been kept. Is it worthwhile trying to fight for its deletion one more time? Any comment on this is much appreciated! --Wcam (talk) 03:19, 8 December 2020 (UTC)

I would tend to agree that such photos compete with the original, and as such prejudice the original author's rights (as mentioned in the Berne Convention, and Article 21 of the regulations. On the other hand, article 22 of the actual law does list "copying" of works on public display as OK. I'm sure that particular portrait is iconic enough, and has been copied so extensively, that there isn't too much risk of a copyright lawsuit. While that really isn't a valid reason to keep by policy, and I would lean delete on that image, it's probably not worth bringing it up in a fourth DR. The last DR pretty much had all the arguments, which we could not add anything to, and it was kept in the end. If the artist's estate filed a DMCA takedown, it would get deleted I'm sure. If there is a new legal development (court case or something) which bring up some new arguments or solidify older ones, possibly start a new DR then. But not without bringing up an argument which was not previously discussed. Carl Lindberg (talk) 07:18, 8 December 2020 (UTC)

Thanks for your comment! --Wcam (talk) 15:07, 9 December 2020 (UTC)

@Wcam: I have discussed this on your talk page last year, but you did not respond. I was severely excoriated by Reke this year (see: 戶外藝術品著作權), because he thought I didn't ask anyone. No matter what I explain to him, he'll not listen. What's worse is that now he still thinks it is my fault and used threats to force me to do what he said (see: I woke up from a nightmare this morning...I was driven away from Wikimedia Commons by Reke). Can you help me explain to him?--Kai3952 (talk) 15:27, 12 December 2020 (UTC)

About Judgefloro's claim of "extinctive prescription" for RA 8293

Hello Clindberg. Sorry for another trouble. Judgefloro has claimed in his defenses against no FOP in the Philippines, like this contemporary Waltermart Mall of Plaridel, Bulacan and Jose Paua Monument from 1989, that the copyright law contains "4-year extinctive prescription" and that "from 2016 uploading, any and all photos of Commons can no longer be deleted much less be brought to the Special Court even by the creator artist or assigns of the artist sculptor...." Personally I heard the so-called extinctive prescription for the first time, even claiming that American copyright law has 3-year extinctive prescription. JWilz12345 (Talk|Contrib's.) 15:46, 16 December 2020 (UTC)

U.S. copyright law does have a three-year statute of limitations. I guess it's four in the Philippines. However, the existence of a photo here is ongoing exploitation -- the limitation would just mean that three years after deletion (or otherwise stopping exploitation of a work) that you could no longer be sued over it. Our question for uploads is more about policy -- if someone who creates a new exploitation using it could get sued, then it's not "free". So no, that aspect really isn't relevant for us. Carl Lindberg (talk) 16:09, 16 December 2020 (UTC)

Taiwan FoP - Image for painting in Taiwan's temple to use as own work of Commons user

I know I have asked the question about "FOP Taiwan" 24 days ago, but you and Reke only talk about murals or outdoor wall painting. I read Reke said on my talk page, he only cares about I submit that the photo for outdoor wall painting to COM:DR because he think that this practice should be stopped immediately. I explained to him that the problem should be solved from the FOP Taiwan policy and the community should discuss on that, but instead of listening to me, he accused me of evading responsibility. Actually, I have discussed about the policy on Wcam's talk page last year, but the difference is I talk about all images for Taiwan's temple arts and not this image: File:Memorybank2019-萬安國小振興分校.jpg. Because painting is widely and commonly used in Taiwan's temples. For example:

• Door: File:尖山顯濟殿｜門 太監門 (5).jpg
• Beam: File:大關口觀音廟 04 橫樑彩繪.jpg
• Ceiling: File:南甲海靈殿 03 天花板彩繪.jpg
• Indoor wall: File:2019 五德威靈宮 (8)公館彩繪.jpg
  

The problem is that COM:FOP Taiwan clearly states: "Not OK for indoor works and outdoor 2D artistic works". It has been changed by Reke since I submitted this image: File:Memorybank2019-萬安國小振興分校.jpg. I don't feel it appropriate to make such a change without discussion with the community on Commons. I request review of this situation again, and assistance in dealing with the issue of the FOP Taiwan policy for the images for temple painting.--Kai3952 (talk) 08:25, 16 December 2020 (UTC)

That is the question. I'm not sure there is any support for the "2D" part of our previous wording in the law itself -- paintings, murals, and sculptures would all seem to come under the definition of "artistic works" in the law. Part of the issue was that we interpreted clause 4 as a general non-commercial clause, which made murals not OK. But the interpretation Reke found would seem to indicate that probably only head-on photos which show only the painting, i.e. which could be deemed "copies" instead of derivative works, would be an issue there, since photos of buildings with outside murals were OK to sell as postcards, meaning clause 4 must be more narrow than how we had interpreted it before. Your first photo up there looks to be on the outside -- I don't think it matters if it's on the outside part of a door, a wall, or whatever, just that it's on the outside of the building. Not sure about the second one, if that is outside. The latter two are more problematic, it would seem. I think indoor photos of buildings in general are fine if it's just the architectural work -- but photos of artistic works on indoor walls would seem to be outside the FoP scope. The second question is how old are those indoor wall / ceiling works. If anonymous or corporate-owned, and more than 50 years old, they may be OK that way.

FoP deletions are always among the most contentious; since most such non-commercial uses are legal around the world, people aren't expecting problems uploading them, and it's always upsetting to have your work and effort uploading them eliminated -- plus, as here, there could be law interpretation problems (there are relatively few court precedents on such photos to help us, meaning people almost never get sued over them in the first place). People uploading copyrighted photos is a far bigger problem for Commons than these FoP situations, which are more on the edge of copyright law. If that is the only type of work you are putting up for DRs they may feel you are more hunting and targeting them. Carl Lindberg (talk) 16:04, 16 December 2020 (UTC)

I suggest you tell Reke the above. And you said: "They may feel you are more hunting and targeting them". Who are they? Taiwanese users? When I discussed the issue of the FOP Taiwan policy with Reke but his response was: One of the Five Pillars of Wikipedia is that Wikipedia has no firm rules (translated by Google). At this point his attitude towards FOP has become clear enough but in addition he even states explicitly: "這個規則一查文獻就知道錯了，智慧局出版品上明確寫出拍攝牆上彩繪無需授權，你什麼都不查。我們就算明白規定如此，也會努力先去查清來龍去脈。" What he meant was: "We can find that COM:FOP Taiwan is wrong by searching information about the Copyright Law of Taiwan. 智慧財產權月刊 was clear written that wall painting do not require any permission to takeing pictures. Even if we know what is written in the policy, we still think you (Kai) should search it on the internet first, but you didn't. Instead, you submitted that the photo to COM:DR." So, I could practically feel his hostility towards me. If you know what I am talking about, you should be able to feel my pain on this. No one wants to be a problem maker because my purpose of discussing COM:FOP Taiwan is to solve the problem. That's why I need your help to improve the policy.--Kai3952 (talk) 17:18, 17 December 2020 (UTC)

By the way, there is a more serious problem with COM:FOP Taiwan may cause new problem: If all images of 2D art work should be deleted per the policy on FOP, it would be a widespread disaster to all of Taiwanese users. Because too many people have such images. They don't understand what FOP is and they might never even heard about it. Outdoor walls as a painting surface, where such art works are common in Taiwan and became especially popular after 2000s. However, the problem is not only outdoor painting, but also indoor painting such as I mentioned above the issues of Taiwan's temple arts on FOP (painted door, painted beam, painted ceiling, painted indoor wall, etc). In my view, the images for painting art works in Taiwan are a particularly pressing problem on FOP.--Kai3952 (talk) 18:40, 17 December 2020 (UTC)

Artwork inside Philippine museums

Hello again Carl. Can some extracts or the interpretation of this IPOPHL article about Philippine museum artworks be incorporated too at Commons:Copyright rules by territory/Philippines? JWilz12345 (Talk|Contrib's.) 09:45, 17 December 2020 (UTC)

Don't see anything specific in there. What did you have in mind? Carl Lindberg (talk) 14:40, 17 December 2020 (UTC)

I thought that there is some wording there that would state that museum artworks might be copyright-protected. Anyway, can I add IPOPHL-Bureau on Copyright and Related Rights' reply on their November 30, 2020 FB post (seen at Commons talk:Copyright rules by territory/Philippines#Retroactivity of Philippine RA 8293 for FOP-reliant works), about government works. To quote:

The fact that the government owns a work does not necessarily mean that it is not covered by copyright law. Section 176.3 of the IP Code states that, “the Government is not precluded from receiving and holding copyrights transferred to it x x x x.” In other words, while Government works do not enjoy copyright protection, it may enjoy copyright protection over works transferred to it.

Section 178.4 of the IP Code provides that copyright over commissioned works remains with the author/creator but the work itself shall be owned by the person or entity who commissioned the work.

Though it was just a reply from IPOPHL-Bureau on Copyright and Related Rights. And I'm not sure if I'll put this on section about Government works or Freedom of panorama. JWilz12345 (Talk|Contrib's.) 15:19, 17 December 2020 (UTC)

Sure, it's possible that works are copyright-protected, but not simply because they are in a museum -- it would be if their author died less than 50 years ago. The copyright status does not change when the owner does, unless the owner explicitly releases it to the public domain. Like PD-USGov, the lack of government copyright is only for works authored by employees of the government -- if copyright exists on a work, that doesn't change if the government later comes into ownership of it. Carl Lindberg (talk) 15:26, 17 December 2020 (UTC)

Pre-1989 country of origin

Hello, sorry I didn't get back to this conversation before it got archived. You seemed to be suggesting that the country of origin can retroactively change as countries join the Berne Convention? Is there any authority to support that? It seems to me that this rule, if it were true, would have caused a great extinguishment of many copyrights in Berne countries in 1989. Consider a book written in England by an English author, published simultaneously in 1960 in England and the U.S., and for which the U.S. copyright was not renewed. If the U.S. accession to Berne applies retroactively, then the U.S. became the country of origin in 1989, because it provided the shorter copyright term at 28 years. Since the U.S. copyright expired in 1988, the author suddenly loses their copyright in all the other countries that follow the rule of the shorter term. So wouldn't the consequences of this retroactive rule be quite contrary to the intent of the Berne Convention to guarantee at least 50 pma? Toohool (talk) 20:13, 19 December 2020 (UTC)

It's certainly possible, yes. However, I don't think the "shortest term" calculations would involve the old U.S. notice and renewals if simultaneously published -- it would be 95 years from publication only, I think. So for your example, only if the author died after 1985 would the U.S. be the country of origin, and even then, the "shorter term" probably would not expire until 2056. Even the 95 years is a bit odd because that was a compromise during the Uruguay Round of talks; the nominal U.S. term is 70pma, other than corporate works, which remain 95 years from publication -- so it's possible 70pma would be used for calculating the country of origin (and certainly would for any 1978 or later works). I'm not sure there have been any rulings on this kind of thing, which leaves a lot of possibilities open, but the act of joining the convention should have *some* effect. Certainly, the plain wording of the convention does get "interesting" in these situations -- but there is nothing in there that says the country of origin, or term to use in the calculation, is cemented at the time of publication. The UK was 50pma then. If a country joins Berne, can it really not be the country of origin for any of its previously-published works, since they were a non-Berne country at the time, if they were also published in non-Berne countries? What would be the country of origin of works published in Czechoslovakia? If a country of origin changes their law to extend the copyright terms, should that have no effect at all on existing works? Keep in mind that getting countries to increase their copyright terms is the main idea behind the rule of the shorter term in the first place -- it's an incentive to get increased protection in foreign countries, which they would not if the calculation term was frozen at the time of publication. By that logic then, the country of origin could then certainly change in simultaneous publication situations if a country increases their own term. For example if an author published in a country which went from 50 to 70pma, plus say India, why wouldn't the country of origin change to India, given that the first country was only the country of origin by virtue of being shorter than India? Or would the shorter term of 50pma still apply even though that is no longer the term in either country? If the country of origin can change due to that sort of thing, I don't see any reason why it can't also change dynamically when countries join Berne. Or split apart, etc. Of course, that could supposedly bring something back *into* copyright in a country where the law didn't change at all. I suspect that existing exploitations would still be allowed in such a case, but that situation isn't really spelled out either.

It's the type of thing where you could get really different rulings based on the case or court. Sometimes, a judge will go with the most ridiculous interpretation, more as a message to legislators to fix the ambiguity themselves rather than leaving it to courts. I think there have been a couple U.S. cases where it was a question if works published on the Internet were simultaneously published in all Internet-connected countries, or just the main country of the website in question (or the country where the person was when they uploaded it). One case ruled for global simultaneous publication, one did not, if I recall. I'd have to look those up to find them. In general though, by the written rules, the country of origin can jump around some, so I don't see why the U.S. (or any other country) joining Berne wouldn't cause some to jump. In the end, the simultaneous publication situation is probably rare enough so that politicians can ignore it, even if there are weird results sometimes. Carl Lindberg (talk) 07:23, 20 December 2020 (UTC)

Taiwanese FOP Problem-Aftermath

Kai3952 contacted me again regarding the problem of Taiwanese FOP. To determine appropriate actions, I have read through your comments on the HD discussion thread. However, I'm not sure about what is your exact opinion regarding the issue, besides from the factor of de minimis.
I'll be grateful if you can summarize your viewpoint and opinion to me, so that I can explain some more authoritative opinion to the stakeholders, and determine follow-up actions (such as opening a amendment discussion on COM:VPC, etc.). Many, many thanks.廣九直通車 (talk) 12:58, 5 January 2021 (UTC)

By the text of the law, I think we had always assumed there was at least a non-commercial restriction on FoP in Taiwan. Japan has much the same wording in their law, and we have had a similar interpretation there. Of course, it's always possible we are reading the laws wrong, which can especially happen when we are going by an English translation and not the native text. Reke's finding of a government opinion was pretty persuasive to me, that we had been reading the law incorrectly -- that pretty clearly says that commercial use of photos of buildings with graffiti (and therefore murals) on them would seem to be OK, in which case our interpretation must have been wrong. So, I was mostly OK with the changes to policy that Reke made. I assume that Kai3952 had been nominating a number of works for deletion under the original policy text. FoP deletions are always controversial, especially of buildings, since we hardly have any court precedence that such things are really a problem, and none in Taiwan -- so such deletion requests do tend generate anger, even in places where there are some precedents. It can conflict with typical practice in a country, or people think it's OK since all non-commercial uses are OK and that is mostly what they see. Without court case interpretations, we have to judge the wording in a law based on similar wording in other laws. The most effective way to argue against our interpretation is to find some court precedents, or at the very least some significant legal opinions, which Reke did for Taiwan. Carl Lindberg (talk) 13:53, 5 January 2021 (UTC)

I think you need to take a good look at Reke's talk page. He basically keep faulting me for my mistake and has told me to “no common sense, lack of correct judgment about policies.” This type of thing has annoyed me for a long time. I don't know what he wants from me. Now Reke is coming to my talk page on zh.wikipedia and attacked me personally (he said I have Asperger's syndrome). I have been harassed by him for more than a month. Who can help me?--Kai3952 (talk) 12:39, 12 January 2021 (UTC)

Ship categories

Dear Carl,

first of all, I would like to thank you for making such an effort to categorize ships and creating new categories. I have now tried to create a category for tugboat following your example, but I could not find a reliable source that would provide substantial technical data on the ship itself. Can you please help? Best regards, Mosbatho (talk) 10:20, 15 January 2021 (UTC)

Great, thanks for that. I added some details. fleetphoto.ru is a good source for info on a good many Russian (and Soviet bloc) ships. They will typically have a link to the Russian ship register too, like they do for your tugboat, if registered there -- that has a lot of the technical data. But you can also search directly on the register as well. Marinetraffic or many of the other general ship databases often has some of the technical info, but the registers are usually the most accurate and complete. Carl Lindberg (talk) 11:25, 15 January 2021 (UTC)

Thank you for your assistance and for completing this categroy with the missing information. So far i have only used marinetraffic, but not all infos were to be found there. --Mosbatho (talk) 20:19, 15 January 2021 (UTC)

Template:PD-Philippines-artistic work

Hello. Is the wording at {{PD-Philippines-artistic work}} OK? I moved this from "Template:PD-Philippines-architecture", so that this will become a multipurpose template for Philippine DW works (of artistic works including architecture), and heavily revised it according to prevailing status right now. Hopefully there shall come the Wikimedia Foundation-IPOPHL dialogue, of which IPOPHL has been open since November 2020 (per their Nov. 2020 email reply to Higad Rail Fan), in which FOP will be the principal matter. JWilz12345 (Talk|Contrib's.) 15:04, 18 January 2021 (UTC)

@Clindberg: hello. Is the revision of the template now OK? JWilz12345 (Talk|Contrib's.) 04:44, 21 January 2021 (UTC)

So we are using 1951 as the architectural line, but 1972 for registration? If works were still subject to registration, wouldn't architectural works be the same? Copyright became automatic with Berne (not requiring registration). That may not matter much, because any work registered after 1942 would still have been under copyright in 1972 and its copyright got extended then. I might move the wordy citations to the talk page, to try and keep the size down, and have more room to explain it better (and document the uncertainty of the 1951-1972 period). I might make the 50pma provision first, as it applies to all works and is the most common one and needs no qualifiers. Then make a second section about architecture before 1951, then I guess another on the registration. Unpublished works sounds like they kept their copyright forever, so date of creation did not mean too much. Carl Lindberg (talk) 06:45, 21 January 2021 (UTC)

Feel free to modify so, to make it more concise and readable but still containing essential elements. By the way, I once again messaged IPOPHL-Bureau of Copyright and Related Rights via Messenger yesterday (Wednesday), in an attempt to get the clarification on the status of the 1951–72 buildings, in relation to the accession to Berne plus the 1955 Presidential Proclamation. However, I browsed IPOPHL's article on the history of IP in our country, the Berne was mentioned once but the Presidential Proclamation wasn't. JWilz12345 (Talk|Contrib's.) 09:46, 21 January 2021 (UTC)

@Clindberg: I already summarized the template, migrating details at COM:CRT/Philippines#Freedom of panorama section (but added a subsection for public domain works, so that the relevant link at the template will just link to that subsection). For the attempt to contact, I emailed IPOPHL-Bureau of Copyright, and for the response: see w:Wikipedia talk:Tambayan Philippines#Possible online meeting with IPOPHL on freedom of panorama (and possibly government-published images). It seems that I was not the first one to ask about that matter. JWilz12345 (Talk|Contrib's.) 11:54, 31 January 2021 (UTC)

Group of Four Trees in NYC

Hello. Is the sculpture Group of Four Trees by w:Jean Dubuffet in public domain, because it had no copyright notice? Concerned file: File:Tree Sculpture at Chase Manhattan (14630790024).jpg, and link to SIRIS database: [1]. Thanks for the response. JWilz12345 (Talk|Contrib's.) 09:34, 31 January 2021 (UTC)

SIRIS is pretty good about documenting the copyright notices in their Inscriptions section. So, would appear to be PD-US-no_notice. Carl Lindberg (talk) 10:43, 31 January 2021 (UTC)

 Done adding {{PD-US-no-notice}}. :-) JWilz12345 (Talk|Contrib's.) 11:50, 31 January 2021 (UTC)

House Bill 8620 and future Philippine FOP

Hello @Clindberg: . There is now a pending house bill in the Philippine House of Representatives, the House Bill No. 8620. The pending bill seeks for amending certain provisions on the IP Code of the Philippines (Republic Act No. 8293). There is now an additional provision for the Section 184 (the limitations to copyright), the provision (m). According to the IPOPHL-Bureau of Copyright and Related Rights, in the February 10, 2021 Zoom dialogue on FOP with Wikimedia and several Filipino Wikimedians (based on some Filipino Wikimedians), the provision is based on the Section 65(2) of the Australian FOP. Will this suffice the need for a Commons-applicable freedom of panorama in the Philippines? In any case, however, the no FOP status will still remain (per IPOPHL-BCRR) until the amendment is passed and the accompanying IRR (Implemeting Rules and Regulations) is created. JWilz12345 (Talk|Contrib's.) 15:09, 12 February 2021 (UTC)

That would be great, if it passes unchanged. Looks like they might be trying to address orphan works as well... which may not help here, but it's interesting to see it attempted. A few other countries have some provisions, but not many. Carl Lindberg (talk) 06:05, 13 February 2021 (UTC)

**

Hello Clindberg, I saw your comment when I was reading this VP thread about FOP in Kuwait in which you have used *think*. I have seen this kind of "punctuation" multiple times by multiple users on different projects and platforms. According to my search, that is used to emphasize when italicizing the text is not possible such as in Twitter. But on Commons, italicizing is possible. I would like to know if you had anything special in your mind when using this kind of punctuation. Sorry if my question seems a little bit off-topic or wired. I just want to learn from you, because I have found you a knowledgeable and insightful person. Thank you in advance 4nn1l2 (talk) 09:13, 19 February 2021 (UTC)

@4nn1l2: Nope, just habit from plain-text contexts. Just meant for emphasis; italicizing would probably do the same (though it stands out better if you are italicizing quotes elsewhere). Some platforms bold that syntax instead of italicizing (whereas they turn syntax like _think_ into italics). Carl Lindberg (talk) 23:31, 19 February 2021 (UTC)

Differing versions of a book published (simultaneously) in the US and UK

Hello Carl

Can I pick your brains about an unusual circumstance? In 1938 Katherine Mayo published a book entitled General Washington's Dilemma As far as I can tell US publication was first and it is appropriately registered in the CCE for 1938. It looks like UK publication was pretty much simultaneous. Mayo died in 1940 so at the latest the UK copyright expired on 1 Jan 2011. First query - did the UK copyright expire then having been extended by EU harmonisation or did it expire on 1 Jan 1991 under the older terms?

The other issue is that the UK edition included at least two appendices which were not in the original US edition but do appear in a 1970 US edition. Appendix 2 contains a transcription of some letters written in 1782 (please see w:User:Arbil44/New sandbox4) Assuming (and this appears to be the case) that UK publication constituted first publication of the letters what is the US copyright status of the letters? Did is expire many, many years ago i.e. prior to 1938 as this copyright circular suggests to me, or if the UK publication in 1938 generated a copyright did/does it still exist if first US publication was not until 1970.

Thanks for any light your can shine. Nthep (talk) 17:00, 16 March 2021 (UTC)

The UK copyright expired in 1991, was restored in 1996, and expired again in 2011. It sounds like the U.S. copyright was not renewed, so would have expired in 1967. Since the author was American, living in the U.S., there were no URAA restorations (and it was a U.S. work anyways).

As for the letters, more information is probably required. The letters could have easily been "published" in the U.S. sense long before then -- you would have to explain how the letters actually remained unpublished all those years, and how did Mayo come into them without being published first. If that was shown, you would also have to show that the publication was with permission of the original author or their descendants (or if there was a legal transfer of copyright, the owner of that copyright). Permission of the letter's recipients would not count, necessarily. If they were simply "found" letters published without such permission, they would technically have remained "unpublished", and expired in the U.S. in 2003. If 1938 was indeed the first legal publication, they should also be fine. The UK did have a 50 year from first publication term for unpublished works, but that would have expired in 1989, and would have remained PD (the 1996 extensions would only go to 70pma at most, which was long long gone). So, no URAA restorations. The U.S. copyright then, if that was indeed the first publication, would presumably have also expired in 1967 if the foreign publication was not renewed, so by 1970 they should have been PD in the US, and they would have remained so. That latter part might be different under some U.S. judicial circuits, but Commons tends to use the rule that the U.S. copyright started on first publication abroad, and it would definitely be complicated by the age of the works. But most likely they were either technically published a long time ago, or remained "unpublished" until 2003. Carl Lindberg (talk) 13:35, 17 March 2021 (UTC)

Thanks for this. I'll ask about the letters but I think Mayo found out they were in the possession of someone and copied them from the originals i.e. they hadn't been published. I don't know what the relationship of that someone to the original author is, again I'll ask. Nthep (talk) 14:42, 17 March 2021 (UTC)

"Published" was a very tortured term in U.S. copyright law before 1978. By some definitions, giving the copies to someone else could constitute publication, depending on the circumstances. For one example, movies are "published" when copies are sent to distributors, not when it's shown to the public. A preliminary screening by the production company (say an audience test or special premiere) is not "published", but they are legally published before the general premiere night, usually (the same is true after 1978). For this type of thing, it would get murkier. Carl Lindberg (talk) 19:49, 17 March 2021 (UTC)

And I though UK copyright had some complexities in it :-) Anyway it looks like Mayo copied the text from the original letters so they were probably unpublished at the time. It also looks like there is no connection between the person is whose custody they were and the original authors of the letters. Nthep (talk) 19:23, 18 March 2021 (UTC)

If the letters had been passed around, sold, etc., they would probably have been "published", even if the text was not widely known. It can get difficult. But, if the owner of the physical letters had no relation to the original author or its copyright, then that publication would not be authorized. Either they were already public domain, or they remained technically unpublished. If it's the latter, the US copyright has expired. The UK copyright, could be interesting -- technically, anything unpublished as of 1989 got 50 years protection starting then. But also under current law I guess, once 70pma passes, there is a 25-year "publication right" for items published after the 70pma term, and that is owned by the publisher -- so under that, I guess the 25-year clock would have started in 1938. Anyways, this is getting into pretty theoretical territory. I would just call the letters PD-old, frankly. It would be an extraordinary case for anything from the 1700s to still have a valid copyright. In theory it's possible but it usually would involve something staying within the family for hundreds of years. Carl Lindberg (talk) 02:40, 19 March 2021 (UTC)

Thanks for the confirmation. Nthep (talk) 20:56, 19 March 2021 (UTC)

IMO template

Hello Carl, I would like to inform you, that an IMO category with Template:IMO is automatically categorized in the Category:Ships by IMO number (for example Category:IMO 9483346). Easter greetings from Germany --Ein Dahmer (talk) 13:57, 3 April 2021 (UTC)

@Ein Dahmer: I am aware, but I don't necessarily like the primary category being added by template. Maybe I'm incorrectly applying the Wikipedia guidance in en:WP:TEMPLATECAT, but I don't like the primary category name to be "magic", and invisible when editing the text (especially when that is the *only* category). I don't mind it supplying the sort key I guess, to reduce the number of places the IMO number needs to be specified in a page, but since "Ships by IMO number" is the primary category that an IMO cat needs to belong to, I prefer to make that the first category listed, and visible. Also if mistakes happen to to the IMO template, or there is a decision to remove the auto-categorization (it has not always been part of the template) it could result in a massive decategorization, so prefer having the explicit category as a stopgap. I don't think it hurts to have that category explicitly named as well, so I tend to keep those when editing. Carl Lindberg (talk) 15:22, 3 April 2021 (UTC)

File:Medallion2021.jpg

Would you mind taking a peek at File:Medallion2021.jpg? Are there any DW issues which should be taken into account? I don't think the file is too simple to be ineligible for copyright per COM:CB#Noticeboards and signs, but I know nothing more about the image from en:Draft:Metro Theater (New York) other than the theater itself was opened some time in the 1930s. -- Marchjuly (talk) 01:25, 20 June 2021 (UTC)

As long as that sign was from before 1978, it should be fine (published without notice). Carl Lindberg (talk) 06:21, 20 June 2021 (UTC)

Thank you for taking a look at this. I've asked the uploader of the file about this at en:User talk:Enniferj#File:Medallion2021.jpg. If I got anything wrong or left anything out, please feel free to comment as needed. -- Marchjuly (talk) 01:23, 21 June 2021 (UTC)

The Spanish Frigate ‘San Carlos’ off Port Mahon

I would be grareful for your thoughts on this picture, File:ARC Amilcar.png? which I have nominated for renaming. It was cropped from File:John Thomas-Serres - The Spanish Frigate ‘San Carlos’ off Port Mahon.jpg. Broichmore (talk) 11:23, 30 June 2021 (UTC)

@Broichmore: Not sure exactly what the question is... from your description, there was no ship named "San Carlos" (which would have been the ship-of-the-line also depicted, and not the frigate in this detail anyways). It's always hard to tell if paintings were meant to be of specific ships, or were just figments of imagination. Some could be mainly symbolic, depicting something that did not actually happen as shown but got the point across for something that did. Or some may depict a specific event/ship, but the fringe details were invented. I don't think the Spanish Navy was very large in 1814, so it should be possible to figure out the possible ships-of-the-line extant at that date, and maybe find out if they ever visited Minorca. I would probably prefer not to perpetuate the name "San Carlos" in filenames if that is known to be incorrect. I would also like to see why the other ship was identified as "Amilcar", which was not given, although it can be difficult for non-speakers to search effectively for such things, so maybe it's obvious despite my not being able to find it with a quick search. So... hard to know what to do given not a lot of information. Carl Lindberg (talk) 14:07, 30 June 2021 (UTC)

Yes its a problem. I'm at a loss myself. The Spanish Frigate ‘San Carlos’ off Port Mahon is the title given to the piece by the artist. So no choice there. The majority of Serres pictures, like the Dutch, don't name the ship,; but here he does. Serres has a reputation for accuracy, geographically at least. All this information about Amilcar is unsourced. Presumably the contributor was talking about the Punic general en:Hamilcar Barca. You will notice that the cropped picture was uploaded without a satisfactory source. I found the missing source? and original picture today. I'm reticent about leaving this unsourced information attached to the file, unless we can find some corroboration for it. Shall we delete the extra stuff? The only corroborated information here is the name of the picture and the artist. Broichmore (talk) 14:48, 30 June 2021 (UTC)

Commons doesn't have the same sourcing rules as Wikipedia, so may as well leave it -- whether the image is used in articles elsewhere is up to those projects, if the information is good enough for them. The caption does say that there was a frigate named Amilcar named after the figure you linked. They may well be right, so I would not want to remove it. List of ships of the line of Spain does actually list a San Carlos ship of the line, launched 1765, and not broken up until 1819, so it could be that ship I guess (would have been a three-decker at the time). Maybe there is documentation somewhere on the ship that accompanied it. Carl Lindberg (talk) 16:50, 30 June 2021 (UTC)

Okay. I'll follow your lead. I have however made some tweaks to the file on the basis that I've never known the artist to have dealt out fantasy names before. If he doesn't know the name of a ship, he just doesn't name it. I think its the Spaniard you mention. Broichmore (talk) 18:20, 30 June 2021 (UTC)

OK, if the artist had that reputation, I'm sure it is that San Carlos which is depicted (in the full painting, not this crop -- I removed the "named San Carlos" category from this crop). We would need to find some documentation on the visit, and which frigate went with the San Carlos, to know which one this is. Carl Lindberg (talk) 03:52, 1 July 2021 (UTC)

A barnstar for you!

	The Original Barnstar
	I could not find the "barnstar of terrific answers". Possibly (talk) 05:58, 16 July 2021 (UTC)

Discussion at COM:VPC#Money box based on a 1935 radio - your thoughts?

 You are invited to join the discussion at COM:VPC#Money box based on a 1935 radio - your thoughts?. -- Marchjuly (talk) 00:27, 19 July 2021 (UTC)

Hi Clindberg. Would you mind taking a look at this? I don't want to give anyone bad information; so, please feel free to correct me as needed. -- Marchjuly (talk) 00:29, 19 July 2021 (UTC)

source data correction

Hi - please forgive my asking you this (such a trivial question) but you helped me to find a way through understanding how to attribute copyright correctly for some images I loaded on to wikimedia commons. I had originally (and erroneously) attributed them as "own" and have attempted to correct them but by removing any source data. But that alone is not enough because doing so creates a conflict (picked up by a bot), which I assume is because the ownership is not reset in some way by just deleting "own" from source (some other attribute still assigned it as "own"?). Is there a way to reset the attribution to satisfy that algorithm? Many thanks in lieu Guy WF Loftus (talk) 06:02, 9 August 2021 (UTC)

@Guy WF Loftus: We always want to know the source of the work -- where did you find the image. If it's not your own, then which website or book did you find it in, that sort of thing. We want to know and document as much of the provenance as possible. The source field just cannot be empty, that's all -- there should always be source information if it's not your own work. Once you add that information, you can remove a "no-source" template if someone or a bot added it. For determining the copyright of an old work, we generally want to know the country it was first published in, and who the author is (how long did they live especially), and that sort of thing. The copyright term is usually based on the lifetime of the author, but can be based on date of publication, or (very rarely) date of creation. We need to show that a work is public domain in the United States (using their copyright terms, which are usually based on date of publication for works old enough we can host), and by the laws of the country of origin (which is the country of first publication). For the U.S., it's typically 95 years from publication, and the EU, it's usually the life of the author and 70 more years, but (as usual with copyright) there can be a lot of complicating factors with that. Carl Lindberg (talk) 13:19, 9 August 2021 (UTC)

Understood Carl Lindberg - I think that is where I come unstuck: where I have attributed images in the past as "own", it is because I do actually own the image but this has attracted corrective action as there was no supporting attribution at the time (yes - I own but did not create). I have, with your guidance, corrected that now and can simply re-instate "own" in the source tag. But I am still a bit confused because Wikipedia does not allow original work (primary sources, like a birth certificate for citation) relying on secondary (derivative) citations only, which is clear, unambiguous and easily observed. Wikimedia does seem to allow original work but I am a little cautious of doing so (no bad thing), so long as I can prove that the creator or author is well clear of copyright restrictions (like 100 years). But still, the images have never been published - Wikimedia is not a publishing house so is that even permissible? I suspect I may be over-engineering this a little... Guy WF Loftus (talk) 16:14, 9 August 2021 (UTC)

"Own work" means you own the copyright, i.e. you are the author -- ownership of a physical item like a painting or photographic print or a book does not mean you own the copyright. If you actually took the photo, or if you inherited the copyright and you own it, then it can be "own work". These days, the author would actually need to give you a written copyright transfer (so yes, in the U.S. at least, the photographer would own copyright to wedding photos unless the contract said something different). If it's something you have in your collection, give as much information as you can -- author and where published if known, and failing that where did you obtain it from, was it from a published source or might it have been a private unpublished copy, is any information listed on the back, etc. If you really don't know anything about where it came from or who made it, then it may need to wait for 120 years after creation (so, 19th century works should usually be OK). That is the {{PD-old-assumed}} tag. Otherwise, we need to determine a country of origin (where first published), then determine why the work is public domain per that country's laws. If we can't show it is public domain, at least beyond a significant doubt, then we can't host them. Many countries do have an "anonymous" term which is much shorter than 120 years, but we usually prefer to know the original publication, to make sure the author was not named then, instead of just not being attributed in later years (if an author was named, even if we have no idea when they died, it's not "anonymous"). Uploading unpublished works is perfectly fine, if they are public domain -- it's just that the copyright situation can get more complicated in those cases. A work must be public domain in both the U.S. and the country of origin, so both laws must be satisfied -- for the U.S. part, the copyright term on unpublished works today is either 70pma if you know the author, or 120 years from creation if you don't. Carl Lindberg (talk) 02:50, 10 August 2021 (UTC)

@Carl Lindberg: Much clearer - many thanks for going to the trouble to lay it out in this way. I understand that we always walk on eggshells around US copyright laws because of the risk of litigation; is there a more practical reason like the data are actually stored on US servers? Guy WF Loftus (talk) 05:35, 10 August 2021 (UTC)

The choice of the U.S. is likely because Wikimedia is a U.S. organization. The choice of the country of origin (country of first publication) is 1) that is the most likely country the photo would be used in and 2) many countries use the "rule of the shorter term", meaning a work will expire in that country with the shorter term of that country's laws, and the country of origin (this is part of the Berne Convention). The "walking on eggshells" part is really more a dedication to the "free" concept throughout Wikimedia projects -- we want works to be "free", which is not meant as "free of charge", but in the sense of "free to be used without copyright repercussions". That is why we don't accept fair use works, or non-commercial works, or things along those lines which we could definitely use legally -- so policy draws the line more, and we follow the laws until we know (at least beyond a significant doubt) that a work is truly public domain before we host it. You will find uneven enforcement sometimes of the U.S. side of things if they have expired in the country of origin, but it is policy. But if you can't show that a works is almost certainly public domain in that country, based on the rules in the law, we don't host it. What country are most of your works from? Carl Lindberg (talk) 06:00, 10 August 2021 (UTC)

Mostly from the UK, some from Australia. I try to take straight copies of the images, so that there is no creative content from my side - but sometimes I crop the image to pick out a subject or enhance it to balance the tone or highlight content keeping it to a minimum to preserve authorship. One example was a WW2 ID photo of an individual, where I had "sprayed" out the unsightly rusted staple marks (despite their contextual value) - that is not creative in my book - it is just cleaning up. For more recent images where the author or creator of an image has given permission to bring the image in to the public domain, how do I represent that authorisation in Wikimedia? (tell me to stop asking stupid questions - because you are not my teacher!) Guy WF Loftus (talk) 09:18, 10 August 2021 (UTC)

Correct that cropping is generally not considered a creative act -- those would carry the same license as the original. Same with image adjustments like brightness, so agreed, those are just cleaning up. A WW2 ID photo would likely be a government work -- there is more possibility with those, see {{PD-UKGov}}. UK photographs once had a term based on date of creation, and older Crown Copyright photographs still do. Private photographs had copyright restored in the UK in 1996 along with most of the EU. There are flowcharts to help determine the terms of various UK works, one for regular works and one for Crown Copyright works. If a Crown Copyright work has expired, then it's fine in the U.S. as well -- no need to also apply U.S. laws. Australia, too, had a similar situation for photographs -- see {{PD-Australia}} and {{PD-AustraliaGov}}. Australian photographs taken before 1946 should be OK in both Australia and the U.S. If a private photo was still in copyright in the Australia in 1996 though, its U.S. copyright was likely restored to the shorter of 95 years from publication, or 120 years from creation, which is the reason for the 1946 line above.

As for recent images by others... see Commons:VRT for the preferred approach. That involves having the copyright owner send a confirmation email of a free license (such as some of the Creative Commons licenses), or choose {{CC-Zero}} if they want to place it in the public domain. There are some Commons:Email templates provided which are the preferred format, to make sure there are no misunderstandings as to the rights being given up. Carl Lindberg (talk) 14:23, 10 August 2021 (UTC)

Wow - I now feel I am compromising your IP, so I will suspend further interrogation - but thanks for the instruction; it has found a grateful home. Guy WF Loftus (talk) 14:47, 10 August 2021 (UTC)

HMS Peetolas, 1910?

Hi Carl, Thanks for your last message, let me study it some more...

Can you shed any light on this picture? In the link there's a snap of the picture in a frame, where someone wrote on it HMS Peetolas, 1910, I have no idea who? I don't have a clue... Made up name?

The artist often signed their work, but didn't make a habit of identifying the ship portrayed within the work or on the back. His work period is generally given as ending in 1892, but this is 1910, and the hull paint job certainly justifies a date as late as that. Interested in your thoughts before I throw it onto the Ships page. Broichmore (talk) 14:59, 6 September 2021 (UTC)

@Broichmore: That is a Pelorus-class cruiser, so I'd have to guess... HMS Pactolus (1896) ? Seems the most likely misreading, given that list of names. Carl Lindberg (talk) 15:54, 6 September 2021 (UTC)

LOL, of course it is. I should that got that, thanks again... Broichmore (talk) 15:59, 6 September 2021 (UTC)

Junction in choppy seas

Hey Carl, Perhaps this picture of 1875, entitled Junction (Knudepunkt) in choppy seas catches your interest. The Jylland (ship, 1862) is in the background but I dont know the main player. Broichmore (talk) 17:24, 1 October 2021 (UTC)

@Broichmore: I think it can only be the Category:Odin (ship, 1872). Carl Lindberg (talk) 06:10, 2 October 2021 (UTC)

Well done. I agree, consdering Altamoura must have had only moments at distance to take a sketch of it, he didn't do too badly. Broichmore (talk) 14:40, 2 October 2021 (UTC)

File:2020 Bols Blue.jpg

Hi Clindberg. Would you mind taking a look at Commons:Village pump/Copyright/Archive/2021/10#File:2020 Bols Blue.jpg? That VPC discussion has already been archived, but it only received a few comments. I could start a DR about this file to see if things can be further sorted out, but only want to do that if there are serious COM:PCP concerns. The label seems to be OK per the TOOs of the US and Netherlands, but the design of the bottle makes things a little more complicated. The file's being used in quite a number of articles on lots of different Wikipedias; so, if it needs to go, I think that should be via a DR and not speedy deletion. I'd like to have a little more feedback though before I go ahead a start a DR. The fact that the file is also marked as a "Quality image" may also be an additional reason to move a bit more slowly here. -- Marchjuly (talk) 22:25, 16 October 2021 (UTC)

I would vote to keep that one, pretty easily, per s:Ets-Hokin v. Skyy Spirits, Inc.. The very subtle background of the lettering might well be copyrightable, but that's about it. The bottle itself is utilitarian, and the photo (per that court case) would not be derivative, since it's not focusing on the label itself. Carl Lindberg (talk) 02:55, 17 October 2021 (UTC)

Thanks for taking a look. I was more concerned about the signature near the bottom of the bottle than its overall shape and labeling. I thought that could somehow be an issue (perhaps per COM:CB#Engravings or COM:SIG), but it's only partially visible and certainly not the focus of the image. -- Marchjuly (talk) 07:26, 17 October 2021 (UTC)

Signatures not copyrightable in the U.S., and probably not most other countries (though it has not been addressed in courts for the most part, which means people aren't trying to protect them either). And yes, not the focus of the photo anyways. Carl Lindberg (talk) 17:44, 17 October 2021 (UTC)

HMS Cruizer

Grateful for your opinion of this picture. Also of the variants listed at en:HMS Cruizer, and hanging off that, the wikipedia article image for en:Doterel-class sloop. Some worries there? At the least, the auction house has something wrong perhaps?

The artist is definitely Antonio de Simone (II), not his father. Christie's summary isn't well drafted here, pretty confused... Broichmore (talk) 11:42, 17 October 2021 (UTC)

Seems to match the photos on HMS Kingfisher (1879). Would make sense as a training ship based in the Mediterranean that it would visit Naples. This page states there were two groups of that class with different-shaped bows. Carl Lindberg (talk) 12:03, 17 October 2021 (UTC)

Kingfisher looks so big (longer) in comparison? I think it looks closer to File:StateLibQld 1 142431 Cruiser (ship).jpg which is 1852. However the headline picture at HMS Kingfisher (1852) looks so much bigger. I'm thinking there is a mix up going on both at commons and Wikipedia of these two or more? Broichmore (talk) 14:14, 17 October 2021 (UTC)

Have to admit, that does look like the same ship in the painting. HMS Cruizer (1852) also became a training ship stationed at Malta, though it was renamed Lark for that -- maybe the painting was from before that, or just used the original name. Although apparently the spelling was changed to Cruiser in 1857, and it was serving in China through those years, so nowhere near Italy. (The 1879 ship was also briefly named Lark before it was renamed Cruizer, oddly, so it had some of the same names but going the other way.). The 1879 ship was only 10 feet longer though, so may be hard to tell between them. They seem to have the same number of gun ports. Both classes were supposedly barque rigged, but I do wonder about that lead photo on the 1879 ship -- sure looks like the third mast is also square rigged (though maybe it had both square and fore-and-aft sails; the HMS Gannet setup today looks similar). The 1879 ship photo at the bottom of the article, as the Cruizer, seems to be barque rigged though. Just not sure -- they do seem to be similar ships, with similar names, so you wonder if the other photos are correctly identified as well. If the name spelled Cruizer is correct though, it would have to be the later ship, to be in that area in the painter's date rate. May have to look more later. Carl Lindberg (talk) 17:43, 17 October 2021 (UTC)

Think the spellings of Cruiser and Cruizer are interchangeable, a red herring!

The dimensions in Wikipedia for Cruizer-class sloop and Osprey/Doterel need checking. Cruizer-class is considerably shorter. The images for Kingfisher and the Doterel-class look considerably longer than the 1852 ship.

Osprey and Doterel-class sloop's: according to Wikipedia the former is a knee bow and the latter vertical. I'm starting to think that this is not a true statement, and that the bow is not a defining feature between the two. The Ospreys look all knee style, but the Doterels are varied. The change in bow was on a case by case basis. Of the Doterel's (at the least) Gannet, and Kingfisher are knee bows. Phoenix and Pegasus, need checking; not enough images at commons.

If however Wikipedia's correct on the classes then the image File:HMS Kingfisher (1879).jpg is an Osprey class ship. However Wikipedia says the Kingfisher is Doterel, when the image is saying Osprey.

File:HMS Cruizer (1854).jpg is also on commons as the representative image for "Cruizer class sloops", but I dont think it is. Its far too long, definately longer than an extra 10 feet. Think (if Wikipedia is correct) it's an Osprey class. In any event its probably Kingfisher (1879) as named Cruiser between 1893 and 1919.

File:LAMBART(1897) p042 H.M.S. CRUISER LEAVING CORFU.jpg Think this is actually Cruiser 1852, think Lambart is using the old name (Cruiser) for her. Broichmore (talk) 11:37, 19 October 2021 (UTC)

Not sure which photo to believe anymore :-). Navypedia also states that the Osprey class was knee bowed, with the Doterel class having a vertical stem. At first I read that as there being two groups of Doterels, some with vertical stems and some not. However... HMS Gannet (1878) still exists and is most definitely not a vertical stem, so the Kingfisher could easily be the same. The Doterels were clearly not all vertical stems. Navypedia does say the later classes were 58.8 m long, whereas the earlier Cruizer class was 48.8, so that is a 10 meter difference -- far more than 10 feet. Still, might be a bit hard to judge based on individual photos. The biggest difference would be the armament, I think -- the Cruizer-class was a 17-gun sloop, with traditional cannons largely broadside. By the Osprey/Doterel class period, they were much larger guns, and fewer -- a couple at the bow, and two on each side. The Osprey/Doterel class then does not seem to have as many gunports. And most obviously, the bow had an indented area for the embrasure of the forward guns, so they could more easily fire forward. The composite construction was probably necessary for that type of feature, and exists on photos of both Osprey and Doterel classes.

Based on that, the painting must be the 1852 ship then. File:HMS Cruizer (1854).jpg however looks correct to me. Same basic number of gunports and placement relative to masts. Don't see the indentation. And the lifeboats seem to be in about the same spots. File:StateLibQld 1 142431 Cruiser (ship).jpg would also appear to be the same ship. The photo of the Kingfisher is too poor quality to see if it has that indentation at the bow, but otherwise I could believe the identification (but would also not be terribly surprised if it was a completely different class). File:LAMBART(1897) p042 H.M.S. CRUISER LEAVING CORFU.jpg ... really not sure. It does have a lifeboat across the stern, which is also seen in this photo of the Espiegle (Doterel-class). But the Lark photo seems to have the same. And while hard to see, it does seem to have gunports on the side which could well be the earlier ship. Doubly confusing because the ships apparently switched names in 1893 -- seems like the original Kingfisher was renamed Lark in November 1892, then the Cruizer in May 1893, while the 1852 Cruiser had that name until May 1893 when it was renamed Lark. So it seems as though the two ships switched names in May 1893. You'd think Lambert would have used the correct name at the time (1895), but who knows -- the name switch could cause plenty of confusion. I could believe either way on that one. But, no way is the painting the Osprey or Doterel class, given the gun placements. Carl Lindberg (talk) 14:11, 19 October 2021 (UTC)