Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Fair use/Archive 1

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Archive This is an archive of past discussions. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page.

I created this Project after some discussions about "fair use" on the WikiEN-l mailing list. A few of the threads which led to me thinking a WikiProject might work for this are [1] (long, gets to talking about "fair use" towards the end], [2], and [3]. Nothing is set in stone here, though, and I am not a lawyer. Help is appreciated! Ideas are appreciated! --Fastfission 01:24, 11 August 2005 (UTC)

I think you're very much going in the right direction here. Personally I wouldn't try to introduce a high-maintenance double-checking system at this stage. Simply cleaning up the confusing fair use tags already existing will take a lot of careful work - which will hopefully trickle down to normal users and have a beneficial effect on the way images are used. That is probably well chosen as the project's initial focus. - Haukurth 01:43, 11 August 2005 (UTC)
Exactly my thoughts. If we can get that done, it will improve things quite a bit, and will get some of the important things moving. The other stuff is a good goal but a bit much to contemplate at this early stage. --Fastfission 01:48, 11 August 2005 (UTC)
I agree. --Phroziac (talk) 04:59, 11 August 2005 (UTC)

I'm not sure how committing to a particular rationale for fair use of any given picture is of help to WIkipedia. Fair use is a defense that can be used if someone maintains we've published a picture in which they have a copyright. The rationale for that fair use should be something a lawyer conjures up at the time that the defense is needed. I think there is no benefit...and much possibility of creating problems for ourselves.... in committing to a particular theory of fair use ahead of the time it's needed. Shouldn't Wikipedia be consulting an actual lawyer before doing this sort of thing? - Nunh-huh 04:26, 11 August 2005 (UTC)

Well, it makes you think about what you're doing before you do it, and tells others why you are doing it. Lawyers? With what money? Jimbo is not that rich. --Phroziac (talk) 04:59, 11 August 2005 (UTC)
All the more reason not to make problems by being explicit about reasoning, no? - Nunh-huh 05:01, 11 August 2005 (UTC)
What we're doing here is what I've been calling "pre-emptive fair-use". We're saying, "Look, we think our use of this would fall under the 'fair use' clause if we had to argue it in court. We think this because of X and Y and Z. You can still sue us, but we'll think we'll probably win for those reasons." We're not committing ourselves to anything, we're just putting out a little warning banner for people who think it might be copyright infringement, and making it clear under what rationale we think what we are doing is not infringement. If properly done, it should ward off trouble when properly applied ("fair use" is only "verified" in a court of law -- hopefully things won't get to that stage). As for actual lawyers -- sure, it'd be great to have their input. But there is a lot that can be done at the moment even without them, given a little knowledge of the "fair use" clause and the structure of U.S. copyright law. (For those looking for a quick though somewhat alarmist primer, I recommend Lawrence Lessig's Free Culture, which is available to download at the page for it. It can be skimmed over in about three hours.). Is this ideal? No, of course not. But if we are going to use images and claim them under the "fair use" clause, there should be some sensible system to it -- a haphazard approach results in a lot of copyright infringement, which is definitely a bad idea. Such is the goal of this project. --Fastfission 11:13, 11 August 2005 (UTC)
I added a few subpages to help facilitate looking at the image tags, and another one about articulating more concretely a "preemptive" fair use policy, using some previous notes I had written up on it (not very much at this point). At some point, if we can get a good policy, perhaps we can run it by a few actual lawyers and see if it squares up with them, and then propose it as an actual policy. --Fastfission 15:00, 11 August 2005 (UTC)

Contents

Re: {{Comiccover}}

Hi, just noticed the rewriting of Template:Comiccover. Most comic covers are used to illustrate the characters shown on them rather than the issue of the comic (since they're usually the most freely available/generic images of the characters). The new wording doesn't really reflect that. - SoM 20:14, 12 August 2005 (UTC)

Comic book covers should not be used to illustrate anything other than the issues themselves in my opinion. Media covers should only be used to illustrate the media itself rather than its contents. An easy way to make this work for comic book covers is to change the captions where they appear to something along the lines of, "Superman, on the famous cover of Action Comics #1" or something like that. The original wording of the template was far too vague and did not specify that use in particular which would be "fair" -- I think the usage described in the tag now would certainly be fair. --Fastfission 20:48, 12 August 2005 (UTC)
Actually, let me clarify one point. Fair use tags which are designed around certain types of media should only be used when the image is depicting the media itself. Which is not to say that you couldn't put a different template on it if it was being used differently (in a "fair" way). But I think it is important to make these "media-specific" tags more stringent, since they are the most often misused. --Fastfission 20:53, 12 August 2005 (UTC)
Well, let me pose these questions: would it be fair use to use an Ashlee Simpson (wow, all that controversy over her articles in Wikipedia makes me think of her every time I need an example of a singer or musician) album cover image to illustrate Ashlee Simpson? Would it be fair use to use a James Bond movie poster to illustrate James Bond, rather than the actual movie? I'd say the answer to these questions is yes, and that therefore, a Spider-Man comic book cover should be able to be used to illustrate Spider-Man. —Lowellian (reply) 20:35, August 18, 2005 (UTC)
The goal here is to make especially specific the use of copyrighted images to the media they represent. It makes the legal claim especially strong -- how else to illustrate an Ashlee Simpson album than the album cover itself? But when you start making things more generic, it becames less strong. There are other ways to illustrate Ashlee Simpson herself than an album cover, though that would probably be a fine use of it. But it is simply easier (legally speaking), and more accurate, to have the caption to such a picture be, "Ashlee Simpson on the cover of her album, Lip Sync Fun" or something along these lines. Further along that line disassociating content from medium is when a picture of Ashlee Simpson's album is used for an article like "hair dye" or "lip syncing" or things of this nature, which start to make our claims about the necessity of this picture to illustrate this particular article weaker. There's no iron rule about this, but I think pictures of specific media covers should generally be used to illustrate the media in question, because it makes the copyright claim rock-solid, and it is also incredibly easy to accomodate through captions. A picture of a James Bond poster/DVD cover/whatever would be fine to illustrate James Bond, of course, though the most accurate caption for it would be "Pierce Brosnan as James Bond in the movie Goldeneye" -- which is exactly the sort of thing I am hoping for. --Fastfission 17:36, 20 August 2005 (UTC)
Hang about, are you a lawyer, or just someone who has taken it upon themselves to rewrite the templates? It would have been nice had you consulted us at Wikipedia:WikiProject Comics before this rewrite, or at least given us a heads up. Anyway, off my high horse to ask a couple of questions. I'm not quite sure why you limit the use to the publication of the issue depicted rather than the publication itself, first up. Second, our understanding of copyright and fair use at the comics project, not being lawyers, led us to believe that using a comic book cover or interior page is covered by fair use due to it constituting less than 5% of the body of work, it being for nonprofit educational use and it being relevant to illustrate the article in question. I note you mentioned we could make a different tag, would one to that effect be acceptable? Hiding talk 21:15, 19 August 2005 (UTC)
High horse crap: I'm not a lawyer, I'm just a user who is "being bold" and is trying to fix up a lot of poorly written and inappropriately used templates. You're welcome to participate as well. I've read a bit about copyright law but I have no formal legal training. If you'd look at the project page you'd see that there are dozens of templates which are being rewritten along the same lines. If I tried to contact every potential interested party, I'd never get anything actually done. I didn't even know a WikiProject Comics existed before you came here. That being said, I assumed that if there were interested parties, they'd eventually see what I was doing, and by posting the name of this project in the edit summary, they'd know where to complain or ask questions or whatever. Which is exactly what happened.
Substantive discussion: See above for why I think it should be limited to the publication itself. However in this case it might make sense to add a few other specific uses, but the whole point of these reforms is to avoid blanket statements about usage (it is the use which makes it "fair", not the medium). If you want to come up with a list of these, it'd be helpful to me. The covers should not be used to illustrate things which are causally far away from the publication themselves, but I'm sure we can come up with a short list of appropriate usages.
On the question of 5%, etc. I'm pretty suspicious of putting hard numbers on this sort of thing (why not 6%? why not 10% why not 20% why not 50%?) and prefer to do it according to principles. The goal here is to avoid defrauding the publishers and to illustrate an encyclopedia; I prefer to just say that it should be "low resolution" and make sure that usage is defined as narrowly as possible.
There is currently no template for interior pages of comic books, to my knowledge. This one was only for covers, as its name suggested. If you wanted to create one for interiors, that would make sense, as they have somewhat different requirements than covers. Media covers, since their entire point is to sell the publication in question, are pretty easy to justify under fair use, in my opinion. Interior pages are actually the content being sold, so they have to be done more carefully. You couldn't do a written version of the Death of Superman story arc with small scenes from each part of it -- that would be too much and border on people not actually needing to purchase the original at all to appreciate the story and artwork. However a single famous or extremely important scene would be fine, of course, so long as the publication it was taken from was amply credited. --Fastfission 17:36, 20 August 2005 (UTC)
The 5% came from the the amount and substantiality of the portion used in relation to the copyrighted work as a whole; clause of Wikipedia:Fair use#Justification for fair use. Yes it is arbitrary, but we needed an arbitrary number and that number seemed to fit the clause above and be a round one, which is always nice. Obviously the covers shouldn't be used to illustrate the things that aren't fair use, but changing the template wording, I'd suggest, isn't going to prevent that. Anyway, the tag's been rewritten to include what we've come up with so far, which is nice, ta, and yes, I would appreciate help in wording an interior tag for comics. My suggestion, plagiarising heavily from your own wording:
  • This image is from the interior of a single issue of a comic book and the copyright for it is most likely owned by either the publisher of the comic book or the writer(s) and/or artist(s) which produced the comic book in question. It is believed that the use of low-resolution images of an interior page from an individual comic book to illustrate the issue of the comic book in question or to illustrate the periodical comic book series of which this issue is a part or to illustrate the copyrighted comic book character(s) depicted on the excerpted page of the issue in question on the English-language Wikipedia, hosted on servers in the United States by the non-profit Wikimedia Foundation, qualifies as fair use under United States copyright law. Any other uses of this image, on Wikipedia or elsewhere, may be copyright infringement. See Copyrights for more information.
Would this require another tag for interiors of graphic novels, or could the above be worded to include graphic novels? Hiding talk 18:31, 20 August 2005 (UTC)
If we're going to list three uses, it might do best to number them in a little list, but that is just an aesthetic thing, not a substantive one. I think a way to make the 5% thing less arbitrarily binding might be to just slightly loosen it by specifying that it must be "an insubstantial amount of the total page (around 5%)" or something like that. But anyway, that sort of thing does not concern me too much specifically so much as the overall structure of the tag being better arranged, which I think it is. In my opinion, the interiors of graphic novels are similar enough to comic books to be considered the same copyright situation. --Fastfission 19:24, 20 August 2005 (UTC)

Going back to the comiccover tag, I've thought of another couple of instances of fair use I want to run by you. Using the cover in the cover artist's article or the publisher's article. I would think they are covered by fair use, for example see DC Comics or Jack Kirby. Thoughts? Hiding talk 19:45, 21 August 2005 (UTC)

The way they are used on both of those pages seems to fit fine with the current text. On the Kirby page, they are illustrating the characters and the individual issues themselves; on the DC page they are illustrating the individual issues. In my mind, those usages count as "illustrating the issue in question" and "illustrating the characters on the cover of the issue in question". --Fastfission 20:18, 21 August 2005 (UTC)

Question

{{Comicpanel}}, {{Comicscene}} - SoM 17:16, 22 August 2005 (UTC)

Regarding the above two templates, which we have now put into use, Lvr asked over at Wikipidia talk:WikiProject Comics the following, to which I am clueless, so we seek your expertise:

Another important reason to have single- or multiple-panel images from a comic book is to depict the artist's style (as in Paul Grist). Is it wnecesary to mention this usage in the templates ? Lvr 10:01, 6 September 2005 (UTC)

I hope you can clarify. Hiding talk 18:04, 6 September 2005 (UTC)

Well, I've got no expertise, but in my view I don't see why this sort of use couldn't be added to the list of uses on any of these tags (i.e., that they are used to illustrate the specific style of the artist who drew them). It seems like a pretty legit usage to me. --Fastfission 23:16, 6 September 2005 (UTC)

Another opinion ? Lvr 13:59, 8 September 2005 (UTC) (Thanks for your answer, Fastfission)

Dandy, that's brilliant. I thought it was fair use but I now see you as an expert in the field. :). I have another question you might be able to shed some light on or point me to a better arena for the problem. We currently have users who are uploading images from Official Handbook of the Marvel Universe, DC's Who's Who and roleplaying games to illustrate articles. Our consensus at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Comics is that these illustrations are used in competing products, those products being encyclopedic in nature, and thus we can't claim fair use, since we are infringing on commercial rights. An outside opinion would be welcome, and you seem to have some idea on this sort of thing, so, any thoughts? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Hiding (talk • contribs) 7 Sept 2005

Other media

This WikiProject is a great idea. Something we might want to think about is fair use for other media. There are already a large number of sound clips on Wikipedia for which fair use is claimed, and I think we will be starting to see a lot more. AFAIK, there is only the basic fair use tag available for these at the moment. the wub "?/!" 21:58, 12 August 2005 (UTC)

That sounds like a good idea too and well within the scope of this project. I think what exactly would constitute a "fair use" use of sound clips needs to be talked about a bit, though -- it seems less clear to me than pictorial imagery, and even more legally precarious (given the whole mp3 thing). --Fastfission 22:30, 12 August 2005 (UTC)
Some beginning guidelines for "fair use" sound clips on Wikipedia:
  1. No more than 30 seconds
  2. No more than 10% of the total length of the work
  3. Only one clip from a single work
  4. Low sampling rate: equivalent of a 128kbps MP3
  5. Unless the stereo effects in the work are being commented on, the sample should be monaural
  6. The sample should only be linked from the article on the work and the article on the creator.
How does that sound? --Carnildo 22:46, 12 August 2005 (UTC)
Possible addition -- "Whenever possible, links should be made to authorized sound clips already made available under the authority of the artist." Monicasdude 20:16, 13 August 2005 (UTC)
These sounds good — if anything they would err on the side of being overly conservative, but I think that's probably a good thing. One other caveate on the use might be to specify that the music in question must be discussed in the article -- not just the lyrics or something else which could be represented in a non-aural way, but the actual music itself. Of course setting such a standard would simply mean people would change existing article text to make the use fit that, but that wouldn't be so bad. The advantage of this would be that one could always say that the sample was directly related to the article text as a form of analysis or criticism. It'd probably improve the articles too, as an added bonus. --Fastfission 01:26, 16 August 2005 (UTC)

Since posting this I found {{Sample20s64k}}: {{Non-free audio sample}}. This is used on a few sound description pages. However there are several problems with it.

  • Strictly limiting editors to uploading 20s sounds is not a good idea (and seems to have been ignored), IMO this should be 30s or less, allowing the upload of the minimum amount to illustrate the article, and creating less artificial jarring cuts.
  • Ogg Vorbis doesn't use bitrates. Even then I think 64kbit/s is too low quality, either -q3 (~112 kbit/s) or -q4 (~128 kbit/s) would be better IMO.
  • This template doesn't give any information on the use, and why it is considered fair use.

I'm working on a new template to replace this and other templates where appropriate. I will post it up soon for discussion/editing (bear with me, templates are not really my strong point). the wub "?/!" 09:27, 16 August 2005 (UTC)

OK done, the template is at {{User:The_wub/Fairusemusic}} for now. User:The wub/Fairusemusic This also puts files in the new Category:Fair use music samples as well as Category:Ogg files. I know it seems a bit long and wordy, but I tried to take the best parts from {{fairuse}} and {{Sample20s64k}}, as well as adding specific criteria. Feel free to propose and/or make any changes. the wub "?/!" 10:07, 16 August 2005 (UTC)

I think it looks pretty good. I changed a few small things (I wanted to make it clear that its fair use status might only be valid on the English language Wiki, and point out that Wikipedia was non-profit, as well as put a nasty scary infringement notice on there for people who use it otherwise), but otherwise I think it is pretty good to go. --Fastfission 11:01, 16 August 2005 (UTC)
Nice, I think bold is our friend here :) I guess music companies have bigger problems to worry about than a few samples on Wikipedia, but we can afford to be on the safe side. I've moved it out to Template:Fairusemusic if anyone wants to use or edit it. I've also started a WikiProject Sound (though I'm still hacking through the overgrown Wikiproject template) if anyone's interested to improve Wikipedia's provision and organisation of sound files. the wub "?/!" 10:15, 18 August 2005 (UTC)
Personally I think it would make more sense if the template was somewhat more generic. For example, saying "the sound sample is short, both overall and in relation to the length of the track" instead of "less than 30 seconds in duration", and remove the q4 bit in brackets. I think the specific guidelines for fair use should be a page that's linked to from the template, not the template itself. Other than that it looks good. JYolkowski // talk 18:51, 20 August 2005 (UTC)
I agree for the most part but am wondering if it doesn't make sense to be at least somewhat strict on this issue (in one form or another), due to the contentiousness of sound copyright infringement these days. --Fastfission 19:12, 20 August 2005 (UTC)
Perhaps, but I think that the boundary between fair use and copyright infringement can in general be rather fuzzy, so I think the templates should reflect that. For example, if we agree that, under the right circumstances, a 30 second sound clip is fair use, what about a 31 second sound clip? Like anything else, we need to make a fair use determination on a case-by-case basis. In some cases, a 30 second one might not be fair, while in another case a 31 second one might be. I think that having a bit of wiggle room in the template is a good idea. JYolkowski // talk 09:07, 21 August 2005 (UTC)
Hmm, okay, I think you've convinced me. Having an arbitrary number set gives it an aura of false precision, implying a "right or wrong" that the legal structure of this law just doesn't have. Better to word it in a way which reflects this and let it fall back on judgment than to pretend it is black and white. --Fastfission 14:37, 21 August 2005 (UTC)
I think 128kbps is kind of high to consider "low sampling rate". It's not that high, but it's not that low. I can't think of one to use other then "low" though, which is pretty vague.. --Phroziac (talk) 14:58, 21 August 2005 (UTC)
What's radio quality, generally speaking? 96 kbps? 64 kbps? Whichever it is, it might be better. It would also keep the file sizes a bit smaller (which doesn't matter for the Wiki of course but for the users without high speed connections). --Fastfission 15:43, 21 August 2005 (UTC)
An additional comment: according to this page, in the case Keep Thomson Governor Comm. v. Citizens for Gallen Comm., 457 F. Supp. 957 (D. N.H. 1978), the use of 15 seconds of a song was declared as "fair use" when used for criticism or commentary. They didn't say "one more than 15 seconds would not be", I'm fairly sure, but it gives good concrete idea of what a "small portion" might mean in the eyes of the law. --Fastfission 00:19, 2 September 2005 (UTC)

Just though I'd mention that I removed the "OGG file" category from the "sound sample" template above a few days back. We should not mix file formats with copyright tags, OGG might be the "prefered" format (don't recall seeing any policy on it though), but anyting from a mp3 to a midi "instrumental" version could also qualify under fair use. --Sherool 17:53, 3 October 2005 (UTC)

Right but MP3s are not permitted on Wikipedia any more, and midis are currently discouraged. It is a matter of policy that only free formats are permitted, and MP3 doesn't meet that criteria. --Gmaxwell 13:20, 8 October 2005 (UTC)

Fair use tags detailed claims page

One possible addition as well might be a detailed "Why this is fair use" blurb for every fair use tag on a different page. There could be one centralized page with separate headings for each tag (i.e., one for {{DVDcover}}, another for {{Albumcover}}) which could be linked to from those tags, which would outline it more towards the point of view of the copyright holder (we're nonprofit, we aren't cutting down on your future profits, etc.). Any thoughts on this? --Fastfission 17:56, 21 August 2005 (UTC)

Here is the sort of thing I am talking about: Wikipedia:WikiProject Fair use/Fair use rationale. Each of the media cover templates could have a small link to the appropriate section of this page. --Fastfission 15:11, 22 August 2005 (UTC)

TIME Magazine covers

I think template:TIME is used for "covers of an issue of TIME magazine". Fine, surely one or two are okay to illustrate TIME Magazine, but pinching every one from their gallery to illustrate articles on everyone who's ever been on the cover seems a bit off. Dunc|☺ 21:26, 28 August 2005 (UTC)

I agree. I think that Fastfission's rewording of the template should help in this regard (at least eventually). JYolkowski // talk 22:20, 1 September 2005 (UTC)
It's an easy fix, the way I've worded it. Instead of the caption being, "Here is a picture of Joe Shmoe", you change it to, "Joe Shmoe was featured on the cover of TIME magazine August 1, 1945." This makes the picture an illustration of the event of the magazine's publication, for which any "freer" version is likely unavailable. Since TIME magazine is a big famous magazine (as they themselves would agree), it is hard to argue that illustrating someone being featured on the cover of it is non-notable or non-encyclopedic. That was my reasoning, anyway. --Fastfission 00:16, 2 September 2005 (UTC)

Australian parliament

There appear to be a large number of fair use images with the description

This photograph of a member of the Parliament of Australia is held under Crown copyright. The use of this image is contended to be fair dealing in Australia and fair use in the United States, so long as the image is used in educational articles related to this person.

I'm about to create a tag to express this - {{ParliamentofAustralia}}. Thryduulf 14:48, 31 August 2005 (UTC)

Cool! I've reworded it to bring it more in line with some of the other tags and move the fair dealing bit to the second paragraph. See also my comments on {{AustraliaGov}} on Wikipedia:WikiProject Fair use/Fair use tag reform, but I think that {{ParliamentofAustralia}} is much better because it specifies what the image is and where it's fair use. JYolkowski // talk

Suggested copright improvements

Please take a look at Wikipedia talk:Copyright FAQ#Proposed improvement and Wikipedia:Village pump (proposals)#Proposal for new copyright notice and offer your comments. Bovlb 06:36:37, 2005-09-02 (UTC)

Verified fair use

Shouldn't the so-called {{verifieduse}} be deleted by way of WP:TFD? I know, it once may have made sense, when Wikipedia:Fair use was (experimentally) used as a discussion forum to determine whether particular uses were indeed "fair". However, the tag's wording doesn't indicate what uses were considered "fair", nor does it give any link to the discussion that once may have taken place. Since that old "forum" use of Wikipedia:Fair use was discontinued looong ago (must've been first half of 2004, IIRC), any newly uploaded image with that tag is mis-tagged anyway. There are currently exactly 56 images tagged as "verifieduse", but apparently a lot of them uploaded in 2005. (See e.g. Image:Dogpatch USA trout farm.JPG or Image:Crossprocess.jpg.) I think the best is to get rid of this tag altogether, and re-tag these images as appropriate; either as "fair use", or one of the "cover" tags, or as PUI. Lupo 15:33, September 6, 2005 (UTC)

I agree. It's a very poorly worded tag and doesn't really accomplish much. The fact that there are only 56 images makes it both easy to replace while also serving as a testament to its uselessness. --Fastfission 16:05, 6 September 2005 (UTC)
I looked it up: Wikipedia:Fair use was used only from February 20, 2004 to May 31, 2004 as a forum to determine fair use. See the page history. I'm now going through all these 56 files to retag them before putting the template up for deletion. Lupo 07:36, September 7, 2005 (UTC)
The tag is now up on WP:TFD; the associated category at WP:CFD. Most of the about 60 files (found a few extra ones in the category) were {{albumcover}}s anyway. Lupo 09:17, September 7, 2005 (UTC)

Problem with user

I was told to come here and ask about this problem I'm having. Empty2005 uploads many images and doesn't add an image tag to them. I've asked them politely on their talk page twice, but they seem to be ignoring me. They have also been asked once before me (see their talk page.) Should something be done, such as a temporary block, or what? Thunderbrand 01:17, September 7, 2005 (UTC)

While blocking over copyvios have been done before, but I am not sure if that is needed in this case. However, I can suggest just speedy every image that upload until he/she gets the message. Zscout370 (Sound Off) 17:06, 7 September 2005 (UTC)

Fair use & resolution of images

I've been taking part in a discussion about if the resolution of an image can determine whether it can be used under fair use. The discussion can be found @ Template talk:Gamecover. Please give your thoughts on the discussion, I think having a policy that forces us to restrict the resolution size is not a good thing. Jacoplane 18:38, 8 September 2005 (UTC)

Speaking of resolution, this brings up something I've thought of lately. What sort of rough guidelines do you think would be appropriate for the size of poster images? For most media, scanning them at 75 dpi or something else approximating screen resolution is probably okay. However, posters are pretty big. If you scan a poster at 75 dpi, and it's (measuring the movie poster by my desk) 22"x33", you get a 1650x2475 image. While we don't need to be exact, it might make sense to think about a recommendation for image sizes for these. JYolkowski // talk 21:37, 8 September 2005 (UTC)
Well, the main rationale for low-res images is that 1. they are inferior to the original image (and thus not a complete substitute for it) so we can plausibly claim that we're not cutting into the profits of a copyright holder, 2. they do not allow "real world" piracy of media (you can't print out a Wikipedia album cover scan to go with your pirated CD) and thus don't likely cut into anybody's profits that way, and 3. they are roughly only as large as they need to be to serve their purpose in illustrating a free encyclopedia (having a 1600px wide scan of a magazine cover, which is only reproduced at 300px across on the page, and might at most need 500px to see every detail relevant to the article, would be far more than we would need for our stated claim). At least, that's what I see the main rationale as being, but it's of course open to discussion. The case law on this sort of stuff is still being worked out and there's no clear answer, like most of this stuff.
I'm generally against recommending specific guidelines for dpi and what is "hi-res" vs. "low-res", in part because I think such guidelines given a false assurance in what is "legal" or "illegal" (false because the courts don't work that way), and I'm also not sure on what grounds such guidelines could be rationally based (they will always be somewhat arbitrary). My general thoughts are that rationale #3 should be the one which provides the most insight into policy: images should be as low-res as they can be while still providing adequate educational, encyclopedic content. A poster needs to only be as big as one needs it to understand whatever it is meant to convey in the article: an artistic style, a political movement, the image depicted. Anything more than that is probably too much, and stretches our legal claim about the nature and substantiality of the use fairly thin, in my non-lawyerly opinion. --Fastfission 23:46, 8 September 2005 (UTC)
Another way to state one part of this which just occurred to me is that there are many markets which sell print-resolution or high-resolution images; there are not any markets that I know about which make their profits from low-resolution computer images. Keeping things low-res, for now, would make it guaranteed that we'd not impinging on any currently existing markets.--Fastfission 16:58, 22 September 2005 (UTC)

I agree strongly on this matter. However, it would be useful to set some upper-bounds to reduce the level of needless arguing over each and every image. How about some proprosed criteria, fair use images never wider than 600 pixels no matter what the application. We wouldn't use a 600 pixel image directly inline in an article, which is our fair use... If someone needs to discuss some detail from a poster no visable in the 600px version, they should upload a crop, which is better from a fair use perspective in any case. I might even suggest no larger than the size where they are being used, but it would be nice to leave us with some flexibility. If we ever move user page images out of en, leaving EN only with fair use content, I'd advocate setting a small maximum filesize on uploads as well. --Gmaxwell 13:31, 8 October 2005 (UTC)

Template:Fairusedisputed

I've created Template:Fairusedisputed. I think a tag like this would be useful for adding to images that have been tagged as {{fairuse}}, but there doesn't seem to be any possible rationale for fair use. Any comments or edits to the template would be welcome. Thanks, JYolkowski // talk 22:38, 8 September 2005 (UTC)

It seems worthwhile, though something less harsh might be nice for things which "should be reviewed". I created a little template at {{fairusereview}} which is sort of an example of what I mean. It is something that someone could just throw on anything they were suspicious about, and it would put it into a category for later review — less urgency, and a less accusational approach, for people who aren't sure if it's fair use or not but would like an independent opinion. It wouldn't be meant to replace the fair use tag on the image page, but to be additive (two tags on the same page). --Fastfission 23:36, 8 September 2005 (UTC)
I thought I'd tone down the wording a small bit on Template:Fairusedisputed a little too, just so that we don't look too unfriendly (-: I think it does make sense to have a template where we're not sure and a review makes sense, and a separate one where there almost certainly isn't any valid rationale, so we can comb through the category at a later date and nominate them for deletion.
I agree. Now maybe what we need is some sort of little "This image was reviewed by (username) and its use on the page (pagename(s)) was deemed likely to be fair use" tag which would also be additive (that is, it wouldn't replace the specific fair use tag, it would just co-exist along side it). --Fastfission 21:49, 9 September 2005 (UTC)
I suggest that if we want a template that says a review was done, it could be called {{oldfairusereview}}. It will have the above stuff like user who reviewed it and when it was done, but the use of tildes can be just fine. Zscout370 (Sound Off) 05:45, 10 September 2005 (UTC)
I've created {{oldfairusereview}}. I've made it pretty brief but feel free to edit it mercilessly as no-one's using it yet. JYolkowski // talk 17:09, 10 September 2005 (UTC)
It looks fine to me, though I wish to see an example on how it will going to be used or how to use the template. Zach (Sound Off) 19:14, 10 September 2005 (UTC)
(Too may colons) Here is an example Image:As03-martha_updat.jpg. Its one of my favourite fair use images - you cant dispute that photo manipulation in news articles needs to show th pictures. The OJ ones should be tagged too. Justinc 01:16, 23 September 2005 (UTC)
These templates will be used as part of our monitoring process. Looking at the project page, our Monitoring link is still red, so we can use them in whatever way we want for now (-: My general thoughts were to use the disputed one in cases where the image is likely not fair use for any article in the encyclopedia, the review one where the image may be fair use but could use review by more knowledgeable eyes, and the old...review one where the image seems likely to be fair use in the places where it is used. I might write up a draft monitoring page later on. JYolkowski // talk 18:08, 11 September 2005 (UTC)
I think playing with them a little -- trying them out -- will be good. It'll give us a sense of their limitations. I've labeled a few disputed images so far. --Fastfission 21:38, 11 September 2005 (UTC)
I played with it a little, and I think it looks pretty good as far as I can tell. --Fastfission 19:14, 10 September 2005 (UTC)

As is noted in many places, claims of fair use are related to the use, not to the image itself. Yet {{fairusedisputed}} gives no reference to objecting to a particular use, and no place for indicating the objectionable use in a particular article. In fact, it says "Please provide a rationale as to why this image qualifies as fair use." This seems confusing, because an image in itself does not qualify as fair use. {{fairusereview}} has similar problems. The distinction is important and so widely misunderstood that I think we can't afford to muddy it. --Tabor 07:13, 29 September 2005 (UTC)

I've changed the wording of {{fairusedisputed}} to "the use of this image qualifies..."; feel free to reword it further if you want. As for the review one, I think the review one can be implied to include all use of this image, so I'm not sure it needs rewording. JYolkowski // talk 23:03, 29 September 2005 (UTC)

{{Fairuse}}

Shouldn't this at least mention "Low-resolution", especially since it's the fallback-tag? - SoM 15:50, 9 September 2005 (UTC)

There are a lot of things this tag should probably mention that aren't on it. Having said that, I think that we should generally be discouraging the use of this tag, and trying to fit as much as possible into one of the more specific tags. Of course, I have no problem updating this template if we agree on what we want to put on it. JYolkowski // talk 21:44, 9 September 2005 (UTC)
Yeah, I was putting that one off for awhile. Re-writing other tags has made me think very concretely about what tags ought to say in different contexts, and the hope was that after doing that for awhile I'd have a better idea of what an ideal "generic" tag would say. --Fastfission 21:45, 9 September 2005 (UTC)

Fair use outside of article space

Would I be right in thinking that "fair use" images are never (or almost never) appropriate to use outside the Wikipedia namespace? I seem to see a lot of User: pages, Wikipedia: pages, and even talk pages where people have inlined images with no regard for fair use rationale. Can I shoot these on sight?

As an aside, wouldn't it be nice if images not tagged as free (e.g. GFDL, PD) got bright red frames whenever they were used in articles? That would encourage people to replace them with free alternatives. I know, I know. It would only encourage people to mis-tag images as GFDL or PD. Never mind.

As another aside, there seem to be some users who never seem to "get it" about copyright and fair use. They go on their merry way, uploading images, claiming to know all about copyright law, despite all remonstration and explanation. I don't recall ever seeing an RFC or RFAr based on fair use abuse. Would it work?

Bovlb 07:09, 15 September 2005 (UTC)

If WP:CP weren't so badly overloaded, I'd suggest listing such images there. As is, I'd suggest a trial run of a dozen or so images from the Talk: and Wikipedia: namespaces listed on WP:IFD as either "unfree images" or "copyright violations".
I've seen at least one ArbCom case for persistent copyright violations, and I think there was one for persistent uploading of untagged, probable-copyvio images, so it might be worthwhile opening an RfC on someone who persistently makes invalid "fair use" claims. --Carnildo 19:00, 15 September 2005 (UTC)
Copyright infringement is copyright infringement; the law does not recognize differences in namespaces, and so neither can we. I doubt there are many ways in which something could be "fair use" on a user page. Right now we don't have any policies with real "teeth" for dealing with persistent copyright infringements -- RfCs and RfAs are really too slow and messy for that. It'd be nice if we could just eliminate their ability to upload images for a set amount of time. --Fastfission 19:09, 15 September 2005 (UTC)
See Wikipedia:Requests for comment/Cheung1303 for an example of an RfC against someone who was persistently infringing copyright. Looks like they decided to speedy all of his images until he got the point. Probably worthwhile opening an RfC for stubborn, persistent offenders and then escalate from there. JYolkowski // talk 21:07, 15 September 2005 (UTC)
I talked to my legal ethics professor and he suggested we should get an attorney who is very good at dealing with copyrights and intellectual property. With yall's permission, I will try to find one and see what he/she says. Zach (Sound Off) 22:53, 15 September 2005 (UTC)
The jurwiki-l mailing list (however you contact it) is supposed to be for this purpose. I'd suggest contacting Jimbo. --Carnildo 23:19, 15 September 2005 (UTC)
Well, obviously it'd be nice if we had more "lawyer lawyers" here. Most lawyers don't work for free, though, and in the end a lot of these issues are legally murky and have no set answer. But if you can get the opinions of real lawyers, they are always welcome to the mix of things. The jurwiki list is in my experience very slow to respond to anything, but I have no idea how many people are on it (I imagine very few) and they don't post their proceedings publicly, so it's hard to know how that works. --Fastfission 23:54, 15 September 2005 (UTC)
I will talk to Jimbo. Zach (Sound Off) 01:32, 16 September 2005 (UTC)

I created a template which can be used to warn users about "fair use" images on their user pages, {{fairuseuserpage}}. It takes one argument, the link to the original image. So if the user had the following code on their page: [[Image:Bad.png|thumb|This is a copyrighted image]], you would replace it with {{fairuseuserpage|Image:Bad.png}}. Basically it is a red copyright sign and it just says that this image has a fair use license and hence can't be used on user pages, see WP:FU for more information, etc. --Fastfission 15:28, 25 September 2005 (UTC)

Images w/o source

How can there be "fair use" on images where the source is unknown? We have {{fairuseunknownsource}}, {{fuus}}, and also {{unknownsource}} and {{nosource}}, although the latter two are not "fair use"-related. BTW, why do we have duplicate templates for these? Do redirects in the template space not work? If they do, we could at the very least redirect the two "unknownsource" templates to the other ones. Lupo 09:29, 15 September 2005 (UTC)

Also see Jimbo's talk page. Lupo 09:34, 15 September 2005 (UTC)
It seems to me that {{fairuseunknownsource}} and {{fuus}} are the same sort of tag as {{noncommercial}} and {{permission}}: a quick way of identifying images that should be listed for deletion. --Carnildo 18:29, 15 September 2005 (UTC)
I've redirected {{fuus}} to {{fairuseunknownsource}} (it was previously transcluded). Would anyone object if I re-tagged all {{fairuseunknownsource}} images as "{{no source}}{{fairuse}}{{fairusedisputed}}No source. ~~~~" and listed the template for deletion? Also, that way we can browse the images in gallery mode (in Category:Disputed fair use images) for future deletion. If I don't hear anything by tomorrow I'll start going ahead. JYolkowski // talk 22:17, 15 September 2005 (UTC)
No objections from me. Zach (Sound Off) 22:54, 15 September 2005 (UTC)
Cool, I'll go ahead. If anyone wants to help, feel free. JYolkowski // talk 20:48, 16 September 2005 (UTC)
Even better, see User talk:Jimbo Wales. These images are going to be gone soon unless someone comes up with a source. If anyone wants to track down any sources before they're gone, I've created a list of them on User:JYolkowski/fuus. However, a lot of them have a pretty dubious fair use claim anyway, so it might not be worthwhile. JYolkowski // talk 15:41, 18 September 2005 (UTC)

Wikipedia policy vs. Copyright policy

I've been thinking about a few things which I consider to be good "fair use" guidelines and it occurs to me that many of them are not necessarily codified in copyright law, but are good ideas for avoiding copyright infringement overall. I wanted to bounce this around a bit and see if there would be a good reason for trying to specify in our own policies which of these are specifically related to, say, case law.

For example: one of the standard policies of "fair use" here going back a long way is that if there is an adequate "free" replacement, "fair use" cannot be claimed. This is not, to my knowledge, strictly in case law or copyright law in any particular place -- that is, there's nothing that specifies "if you used a copyrighted source when you could have chosen not to, that invalidates your fair use claim." Our policy in that regards is not one strictly of copyright law -- it's more along the lines of a principle of least liability; if we can avoid even creating a copyright question, then we should, because it saves us even the possibility of legal difficulties.

I think delineating between these in our policies would make some of our policies and decisions more clear to others. But I haven't completely worked this all out yet. I'd be interested in any thoughts others had? --Fastfission 15:39, 16 September 2005 (UTC)

I also want to add, which I think it is the most principle of fair use: use it. If it is not being used, it should be gone. Zach (Sound Off) 18:28, 16 September 2005 (UTC)
Well I think the best argument here is that wikipedia is "The Free Encyclopedia", where we use Free in the freedom/free software sense. When we provide fair use images we are failing to provide free content, we fail at that part of our charter even if we can do it legally. However, when we fail to use fair use in a place where we have no alternative we fail to be a good encyclopedia. The comprimise is to only use fair use where are legally able and only we must because we have no free choice, and only in the most limited capacity required to meet our obligation of being a good encyclopedia. It is only a positive side effect that a policy to only use fair use when there is no other choice gives us a stronger defense on fair use grounds in the US. --Gmaxwell 13:37, 8 October 2005 (UTC)

Removed bogus fair use claim

I removed the following item from the list because it is inaccurate:

  1. They should make clear that in most cases, if "free" images are available, the use of a copyrighted image is probably not "fair".

The availability of other works without charge or in the public domain is not a fair use factor. Jamesday 17:09, 16 September 2005 (UTC)

However, I wish to contend that if anyone wants to use a fair use photo, they should try to check and make sure that a free image is available first. Zach (Sound Off) 18:24, 16 September 2005 (UTC)
Well, this is actually exactly what I was talking about in the section above. I'll try to reword it as a Wikipedia policy. It is in the interest of Wikipedia to avoid using copyrighted material whenever possible because 1. it invites unneccessary trouble if there are free alternatives available, and 2. it is in line with the general goal of creating a "free" encyclopedia. --Fastfission 19:27, 16 September 2005 (UTC)
Thats already policy at WP:FAC, and while there has been some confusion over it, pretty much everyone got the whole picture (pun intended) oh what Carnildo is trying to do. Zach (Sound Off) 19:29, 16 September 2005 (UTC)

Template:PressKit and Template:Sesamestreetscreencapture

I stumbled upon these two fair use tags that aren't documented anywhere. Do you think that one or both have sufficient potential to make rehabilitating worthwhile, or should I just TfD them? JYolkowski // talk 22:29, 17 September 2005 (UTC)

PressKit seems like the same thing as {{Promotional}}. The SesameStreet one seems a little over-specific, but I haven't really taken the time to find out whether or not there are really that many Sesame Street images. I am a little fearful of these "franchise-specific" tags, mostly because they seem to encourage people to upload as many images as possible without any real consideration. They also seem to promote an idea about "fair use" which is entirely false -- that there are specific websites or companies which are inherently "fair use" (hence all the queries one gets about "is this a fair use website?"). But that's a somewhat different issue than this particular template... --Fastfission 00:47, 18 September 2005 (UTC)
Presskit has the advantage over promotional of forcing a source to be specified though, to look at it. - SoM 01:34, 18 September 2005 (UTC)
Sounds like the Sesame Street one is a problem, and that the Press Kit one is redundant but might possibly have some advantages. So, I've TfD'd {{Sesamestreetscreencapture}}. {{PressKit}} does overlap a fair bit with {{Promotional}} and {{Promophoto}}, but could be a bit different. I won't claim whether these differences are significant enough to merit a separate tag, but {{Promotional}} seems to be primarily for advertising material, which might be slightly different, while {{Promophoto}} appears to be only for photos of people from press kits (as well as from a number of sources which don't seem to be fair use at all, but I digress). I'll leave it for now and document it on the fair use tag reform page, and we can decide whether it serves a need or not later.
 JYolkowski // talk 23:02, 19 September 2005 (UTC)

Jimbo's pronouncement on sourceless images

Did everyone on the project see this? Bovlb 04:32, 18 September 2005 (UTC)

Yes, and I'm busy deleting away. --Carnildo 06:50, 18 September 2005 (UTC)
Alas, I cannot join the fun, as I have no mop and bucket. Bovlb 07:46, 18 September 2005 (UTC)
If you want to help, you can orphan images with {{no source}} (I find orphaning images the most inane part about deleting them, so that would probably be greatly appreciated). Another way you can help is to tag images that have no source as {{no source}} (a good place to find some is in Special:Whatlinkshere/Template:Fairuseunknownsource) JYolkowski // talk 15:45, 18 September 2005 (UTC)

{{fairuseunknownsource}} on TfD

I've listed this template on TfD per suggestions above. Please visit Wikipedia:Templates for deletion#Template:Fairuseunknownsource to comment. Thanks, JYolkowski // talk 23:15, 20 September 2005 (UTC) Oh yeah, I've also nominated a bunch of other "fair use" tags there, feel free to comment on those too. JYolkowski // talk 23:16, 20 September 2005 (UTC)

  • I don't normally lobby for votes, but right now there is no consensus on my listings of Template:JapanCopyright and Template:Fairuseunknownsource. I'd welcome any comments on TfD, even if you don't agree with me (-: JYolkowski // talk 22:02, 22 September 2005 (UTC)

Funny upload

Take a look at Image:Brianabanks.jpg (only if nudity doesn't bother you :-). The uploader himself tagged it as {{PromoPhoto}}{{fairusedisputed}}! Obviously, he knows it's a copyvio. Shall we speedy such bad-faith uploads? Lupo 07:38, 21 September 2005 (UTC)

It is from famousbabes.com, which if you look does not own copyright on any pictures, so it is not a valid promo source. Needs to be copyviod or sppedied. Justinc 13:26, 22 September 2005 (UTC)
It this photo might be too big to even claim fair use, since this photo sized is used for the various adult websites. Zach (Sound Off) 13:41, 22 September 2005 (UTC)

DVD/album/magazine covers; screenshots

I notice that we have a lot of DVD, album, CD, and magazine covers or screenshots, claimed fair use, but then used to illustrate articles about persons depicted, not the DVD, album, CD, magazine, or TV show. I feel that this is a huge stretch of "fair use"; in fact, my personal opinion is that this is simply a copyvio. I think this should be clarified on Wikipedia:Fair use and in other policies. Lupo 12:39, 22 September 2005 (UTC)

Well, in this case I think it depends on the captions more than anything else, which are easily changed. If a picture of a TIME magazine with Michael Jackson on the cover is used in the "Michael Jackson" article, it should be used in a way which makes it seem that the appearance on the cover is the subject illustrated by the picture. That is, the difference would be between a caption which says "This is Michael Jackson" and one which says "In June of 1985, Michael Jackson appeared on the cover of TIME magazine." Obviously this is somewhat imperfect, but I think such a clear attribution of copyright holder, and the use of "cover media" to illustrate something pertaining specifically to that cover media, would not run into copyright problems in any major way. But that's just my feeling on this; there's no case law that I know of which is particularly informative on this point, but I'm neither a lawyer nor an expert in fair use case law. What this model would imply, if others feel it is sensible, is a use reform which would manifest itself primarily as caption reform. --Fastfission 12:50, 22 September 2005 (UTC)
Covers are no less copyright protected than other images. Using a cover image in an article that is basically unrelated to the medium whose cover is shown falls outside any criticism, analysis, or other "fair use" criteria; it's just a rip-off for want of a better image and as such a copyvio, irrespective of the caption. (Unless the article happened to discuss significantly that particular appearance of a person on the cover.) Lupo 13:02, 22 September 2005 (UTC)
The question isn't "copyright protection", it's the fair use criteria. Cover art is generally used to sell a product, it is not generally the product itself. Using a small image of an album to illustrate and identify the album wouldn't plausibly limit the future markets of the copyright holder (if they were very high res, then yes: they'd limit the ability to re-sell the image as a poster or print if people could make their own large versions of them). Using it in a way which clearly indicates that the image is meant to illustrate the event of the creation of the copyrighted media (as I suggested above) even more cements the "nature of use" clause -- it makes it practically academic and makes the attribution of the copyright holder quite specific and explicit. On Wikipedia (a not-for-profit encyclopedia), I think this sort of use would be certainly "fair", and I find it extremely unlikely that any of these copyright holders would take umbrage with this. I wrote more of this out actually at Wikipedia:WikiProject_Fair_use/Fair_use_rationale#Media_covers, and your thoughts on that are of course appreciated. Again, it's about the use, hence the importance of having their use be as I specified above, which can be generally done by modification of the caption. Note that I don't think this would at all apply if the title of the magazine was cropped out of the picture -- that's substantial modification, and one which removes explicit attribution of copyright, which I think is bad and dangerous. --Fastfission 16:55, 22 September 2005 (UTC)
Another way to think about it: Is there any market which the use of low-res cover images would impinge upon? Not that I know of. For high-res images -- definitely. But there's no possible loss of profit from our use of the images on Wikipedia, the way we use them. Which by itself makes the fair use claim pretty strong, in my opinion, though that's only one part of the overall "rationale" equation. --Fastfission 17:00, 22 September 2005 (UTC)
I do not dispute the use of media covers in articles on the media. I do, however, dispute the use of media covers in articles on events or persons that just happened to be covered by some media, unless our article specifically discusses the media coverage the event or person received because that in itself was somehow noteworthy. Take the Brooke Shields case mentioned below: I see no reason why the use of these two images should be fair: the images are used not to illustrate the magazine, but to illustrate Brooke Shields. Heck, even the {{magazinecover}} tag itself says fair use applied only "to illustrate the publication of the issue of the magazine in question". This is not the case here (and in a lot of similar cases). Lupo 19:49, 22 September 2005 (UTC)
I tend to agree for the most part. Taking the TIME example, appearing on the front cover of TIME is quite noteworthy so it would make sense to write about that in the article and in the image caption. However, not every magazine is like that so in those cases the covers aren't essential to the article. I think that in these cases our fair use claims may be valid, but are a bit more shakey, and we should try to avoid it because (1) slippery slope, (2) fewer of our reusers might be able to use the image legally, and (3) it should be easier to get a free (or minimally better fair use) replacement for an article about a person compared to an article about an album. The same discussion is also going on at Wikipedia talk:Fair use#Cover_Photos. JYolkowski // talk 21:03, 22 September 2005 (UTC)
I don't see anything wrong with the Brooke Shields cover, though it's about 200px larger all around than it needs to be to adequately serve such a purpose on Wikipedia. If the caption was, "Brooke Shields was featured on the cover of Marie Claire in March 2000" (or whatever the details are), then that image would illustrate it just fine, would it not? Is it not notable to be on the cover of a major national beauty magazine? Let's look at this in terms of the four factors:
1. Character of use & 2. Nature of work: illustrating a "notable" event (I think our definition of notability can be fairly slim here; I doubt a judge would hold it to a very high standard given the way these sorts of vague categories are usually interpretted to a lowest-common-denominator) on a not-for-profit encyclopedia article on the subject of the event in question.
3. Substantiality of use: we use the entire cover. Arguably using only a part of it, though, would make less explicit the copyright status of the cover and would decrease our "nature of the use" clause, so I don't see any problem with that in this particular type of instance. This isn't a form of media which can be meaningfully "less used" (unlike sound clips or movies, etc.) Making it lower resolution could potentially be a form of less-substantiality (it would be detail-removing, and thus assert the importance of the original media).
4. Effect on potential market: no reason to think it would adversely affect the potential future market of the work. Does not decrease its value. Fact that magazine is five years old makes this even more the case.
This is the kind of reasoning we'd have to do on this (which is not saying that my reasoning on it is necessarily correct, but it's the mode of discourse which needs to be used). As for two covers, I'm not sure that matters much. Two is not that many, and each is a separate fair use question. Even if they had the same copyright holder, there are a number of cases which have made the point that it is not the number of separate fair use claims which matter, but the strength of any individual fair use claim on its own. That's at least my reasoning, willing to hear other thoughts. I'm still not sure why these particular magazine covers would not be "fair use" (with the exception of the pixel problem, but that is easily fixed). --Fastfission 01:16, 23 September 2005 (UTC)
Hmm, I agree with Lupo. Notability of appearing on the cover of Marie Claire or similar is pretty low (you just pay for it basically). I am prepared to be lax some issues (though Playmate of the month is a bit extreme as there is one a month; Time man of the year seems a little better). If there is no actual critical discussion there is no fair use as far as I can see. However I do think that probably List_of_people_in_Playboy_1970-1979 is fine as fair use (whether you think it is encyclopaedic is another question). Justinc 01:33, 23 September 2005 (UTC)
People do seem to have a very vague understanding of fair use. I removed the images from Brooke Shields, magazine covers not used in any way that could be construed as fair use, but have been reverted. The view seems to be that the fairuse tag means the pictures are basically free, which is of course not the case. I dont see any caption rewrite could make them fair use either. Justinc 13:46, 22 September 2005 (UTC)
{{fairusedisputed}} Zach (Sound Off) 13:51, 22 September 2005 (UTC)
The probelm I have about fairusedisputed and fairusereplace and such is that they refer to the image, not the context of use. A tag on the article using it would be better. But I will put these in where there is only one current use I guess. Justinc 14:34, 22 September 2005 (UTC)
In this case I would suggest adding some explanatory text in the image page itself, just briefly explaining why the image might not be fair use on the specific page itself. JYolkowski // talk
Agreed. Zach (Sound Off) 01:18, 23 September 2005 (UTC)

movieposter

"This image is of a movie poster..." - I've been retagging images which were previously labelled {{poster}}, and a few are posters for TV series. Should these be tagged as movies? The same basic rationale seems to apply... Shimgray 20:42, 22 September 2005 (UTC)

If it's a promotional poster, I would go with {{eventposter}} (if it's for a special episode or the like) or {{promotional}} (if not). I don't think it matters too much though as long as it's a promotional poster. JYolkowski // talk 21:51, 22 September 2005 (UTC)
Yeah, the differences there are mostly for categorizational purposes. There shouldn't be any legal distinction between the two that I can think of. Just do whatever feels most intuitive on borderline categories. --Fastfission 01:03, 23 September 2005 (UTC)
Okay. Posters for theatrical plays are going to eventposter, TV to movieposter, lots of the "not under our poster classification" stuff (say, Image:Puckman-flyer.jpg) to promotional. Shimgray 12:59, 23 September 2005 (UTC)
Category:Fair use posters is now empty. If anyone objects to {{poster}} being listed on TfD, please let me know; otherwise I'll nominate it tomorrow. JYolkowski // talk 22:23, 23 September 2005 (UTC)
Ah, thankyou. I got about three hundred in and then couldn't face much more... Shimgray 22:52, 23 September 2005 (UTC)
You guys are, by the way, awesome. Sorry I've been very MIA lately myself; classes started up again and I'm positively swamped at the moment. --Fastfission 02:06, 27 September 2005 (UTC)

Verified fair use

Ok, I have now tagged two pictures (3 usages) with the {{oldfairusereview}} (not the best name) tag. I believe these are genuine fair use and am prepared to act as expert witness and pay lawyers to defend these fair use rights. I havent yet found any other tagged things that I am prepared to put myself on the line for in my trawls, but I am sure others have, so please tag what you are prepared to defend as genuine fair use. (Then we can look at deleting the rest). Justinc 11:01, 23 September 2005 (UTC)

    • I think it would be a good idea if images are not reviewed by either the uploader or whoever contributed them to a particular article because they might be looking at it with a biased eye. Perhaps we could start a page in which images could be listed for review by other users. I've uploaded about a dozen images that I'm satisfied are fair use, and other users have agreed, however I'm obviously not the right person to be reviewing and tagging them. Also if {{oldfairusereview}} is not the best name, maybe that should be decided upon before moving too far forward. Rossrs 00:57, 24 September 2005 (UTC)
      • Can you list these here now, and I will review them. Also please review the ones I added. I agree that it is best if someone else reviews, actually lots of independent reviews is best (the template has a date and person so is fairly clear). Justinc 01:39, 24 September 2005 (UTC)
        • Thanks for the offer. I'll list them when I get some further responses to my screenshot question. I suppose there's no limit to the number of reviews an image gets, as long as one is considered sufficient. Additional ones, I guess would just add to the integrity of the process, but I'd hate too many layers to be added. I'd like the process to be so clear and so simple that anyone with a basic understanding of what we're about could do a good job of reviewing. Rossrs 07:39, 24 September 2005 (UTC)
      • Though the template can me moved to {{verifiedfairuse}} or {{verifiedfu}}, we could start a page listing. I am not sure if you want to start it in the WP name space, but yall can use my name space to try it out. Zach (Sound Off) 01:09, 24 September 2005 (UTC)
        • I prefer {{verifiedfairuse}}, as it's less ambiguous that the other two template names. Rossrs 01:18, 24 September 2005 (UTC)
I would prefer {{reviewedfairuse}} as there can be no verification outside the courts. There should be a category rather than a page (although in the short term a page is good, but it can be here). We shouldnt use your user page - we need to get this official and working as soon as possible. I was hoping that other people might add to this. More than one person can perfectly well review fair use, and also use {{faireusedisputed}} if they disagree. I do hope that there are more than 3 uses that people can justify with these tags. Can we decide the final template and category names as soon as possible. Justinc 01:33, 24 September 2005 (UTC)
{{reviewedfairuse}} is a much better choice. You're right - we're reviewing rather than verifying. I didn't think of that. I'd also like to see a start made quickly. The same format as the images for deletion page would be fine. ie a paragraph or two at the top of the page defining the aim and inviting users to review the images as listed below, followed by a list broken by the date added, and with the nominators sig following.
On a related topic, there are lot of screenshot images that need to be reviewed but which I see as falling into a very grey area because of the way in which they've been used. I've posed a question at [4] giving examples of images I've uploaded that I think could be considered fair use in some cases and not fair use in others, but seemingly at odds with the definition of their use which appears on the film screenshot tag. I'm hoping that people will comment on it, so if you want to have a look at it..... that would be great. Rossrs 02:54, 24 September 2005 (UTC)

I've reviewed a few, but let's agree on the template first rather than create more work for ourselves moving from one review category to another. Rossrs 03:08, 24 September 2005 (UTC)

Actually I dont think I agree with yours (ie all the Thunderball ones). First you cite that the images are previously used on other web sites and books. This is not justification for copyright (unlike trademark). We dont know if the other sites got some sort of permission even. The fact that you say we "cant" get free or public domain versions is not a justification - after all we could pay Penguin books enough money to release the cover as GFDL, we just cant afford it. We dont have a right to illustrate our articles for free. And I dont see any critical commentary of the covers and posters in the article at all. Justinc 03:28, 24 September 2005 (UTC)
I don't think we're on the same page at all. "First you cite" - I don't "cite" anything but my agreement, these are not my rationales, though I agree with them, and they were considered correct when it went though FA, so it's not only me that has looked at them. Nowhere does it say we "can't" get PD versions. It's says none have been located. Totally different thing. The template for the book cover says use should be to illustrate the book. It doesn't say the book cover has to be critiqued, same with the film poster. The requirement is not discussion of the book cover or the poster itself, but of the book or the movie. Both are adequately discussed to meet the requirement. The bit about it being used on other websites, is not an argument in itself but part of a greater argument saying that our use does not diminish the copyright status of the work. This is going to be a very hard issue to deal with if there are going to be such widely diverse interpretations of, not only the guidelines, but what it actually says in the existing templates. Rossrs 03:41, 24 September 2005 (UTC)

I've been thinking that we've both made the error of attempting to verify images without agreeing on criteria. If the two of us can't agree on 6 images, how can 1000 people agree on 10000 images? Ideally I think we should end up with a page that provides guidelines, and this guideline page should be linked from each of the "fair use" templates. The page itself could link to the relevant policy and guidelines pages to make it easier. Also, there could be a second template, essentially the same as the first, except saying "this image has been reviewed etc and is considered to not currently meet the fair use guidelines because......", so that if it's not blatantly copyvio and potentially ok, there is an opportunity to correct it. If it's something easily fixed the reviewer could do so, otherwise leave it for someone else. I think the guidelines need to be fairly stringent in supporting existing policies, and I would suggest the following (by which possibly none of the images we've looked at would qualify) (I've gone back and looked at the images - I think all 6 of them are fine):

In order for the use of an image to be considered as fair use, each of the following criteria must be met:
1. The image description page must be complete and accurate as per Wikipedia: Image description page. The image must:
a. be considered to be the type of image for which a public domain or free use image would be unlikely to be available, or to become available in the near future.
b. be considered as being impossible to duplicate by other means such as a Wikipedian with a camera.
c. be correctly tagged. ie the tag must correctly identify the type of image.
d. contain source information.
e. identify the copyright holder.
f. be of sufficiently low resolution. (to be determined)
g. contain a fair use rationale as explained in Wikipedia:Image description page. The rationale may be accepted in good faith as long as it does not contain incorrect or misleading information.
2. The use of the image in the article must:
a. identify the subject of the article, or specifically illustrate relevant points or sections within the text, and must not serve a purely decorative purpose.
b. add to the quality of the article without duplicating information contained in other images.
Reviewers are urged to consider that some discretion and personal judgement is required in assessing whether certain of these requirements are met, and in these cases may choose to assume good faith, unless there is reason to doubt. Images may also be referred to (somewhere) for (some kind of Peer Review) if a clear decision can not be made. These should be marked as (something to indicate they've been referred).

Just an idea, but I think without a standardised approach we're going to be creating chaos. Rossrs 07:39, 24 September 2005 (UTC)

Sorry, I was perhaps a little hasty and paranoid. What I meant is that I didnt think the reasons you gave were really the right ones. Thinking about it I think that in the case of book covers the wording on the current template is fine and it should only need a review that the uses are indeed just of the book in question. Nothing additional needs to be written to justify this - I just thought your reasons actually weakened the case and the book cover fair use is much simpler. If we simply add a reviewed list of articles to the book cover template (also the otehr ones) then I agree that all the uses you give in the article Thunderball are fine. Then we only need reviewed fair use with the additional explanations for uses falling out side this. But all the other tags needs the articles they refer to adding. Justinc 11:11, 24 September 2005 (UTC)
Actually I like your list too. Maybe we could have a template {{fairuseclaim}} that says I assert (your list of things). Then use either a fair use tag eg {{bookcover}} if the usage claimed is that listed in the tag (eg Thunderball book cover) or a written explanation (as in Newsweek Time, which happens to be some magazine covers but is not in fact claiming fair use on that basis at all, it is claiming it as critical commentary). Then the reviewed template. So the creator can add the claim and the reviewers can review. This also forms the basis of a procedure. Justinc 11:33, 24 September 2005 (UTC)
If this looks ok I will write it into a procedure and work on the templates later. Right now I am off to take some free pictures to replace some unfree ones... Justinc 11:35, 24 September 2005 (UTC)
I'm reluctant to have the list included in a template. What I really would like is for people to think about and examine the images they upload, and make a reasonable fair use decision for each one themselves. I don't want to create a template with a generic fair use rationale, or else we're going to see it plastered all over the place, often wrongly, and then the reviewer's task will be that much more difficult. I think the checklist should be a guide for the people uploading, and for the people reviewing. If users want to copy it verbatim, that's their choice, but I think it would be dangerous to just give them {{fairuseclaimallthethinkinghasbeendoneforyou}} because it will be abused like crazy. "Fair use" rationale can and should vary from situation to situation - I don't think it's possible, even if I thought it desirable, to come up with a blanket rationale to suit each and every use. I'd be much happier being able to point people in the right direction, give them very simple, clear and explicit criteria that they can trust, but leave all the value judgements relating to uploading and using the image to them. Then the reviewer can do their bit. I think we're really on the right track with this, and I'm glad you raised this subject. Reading through Wikipedia:Image description page, things like book covers, CD covers etc still require a fair use rationale. To me it's kind of a no-brainer, because the rationale is going to be identical for each one, but I still think it's important that people uploading images, are thinking about their use and implications while they're doing it. Hope you had a fruitful photographic expedition! Rossrs 14:38, 24 September 2005 (UTC)
I've been playing around with templates. If they're not right, just change whatever. If you don't like the name etc, that's fine, change them. It's just an experiment,but I think they're ok.
The templates are at Template:reviewedfairuse and Template:reviewedfairusedisputed, and I've put the list at Wikipedia:Fair use criteria. I thought it would be easier to tweak them if we had something to work on, rather than discussing what we thought was needed. I'm sure a lot of tweaking is needed. Rossrs 16:07, 24 September 2005 (UTC)
ok, I know this is getting long, but it is very important we get it right because it will have to become policy. (Indeed I was extra pedantic earlier because we should be now, so the policy ends up right) . I see what you mean about "no thinking" but I also so think that the basis of the existing tags is kind of ok. I think we should begin to draft a process to make this concrete (either using existing tags or just suggestions). I think that concrete process suggestions will help us along like the taggings we have done have (which have all been very helpful - more ould be good too). But its 3am in my timezone so must sleep. I think I can replace 2-3 {{permission}} pictures though from my little tour today... Justinc 02:05, 25 September 2005 (UTC)
I agree. let me know when you're ready to begin. Rossrs 09:05, 25 September 2005 (UTC)
This reminds me... I'm sure I saw a tag somewhere for "is currently claimed as fair use, we ought to be able to replace it with a free image", but I can't find it again - does this exist, or am I mistaken? (One for "claimed fair use but is currently orphaned" would be handy, too) Shimgray 14:55, 24 September 2005 (UTC)
There is a tag like that. I can't think how it's worded but I've seen something that conveys exactly that message. I'll try to find it. I don't think "claimed fair use but currently orphaned" is likely to be needed, simply because the use of the image is what makes it fair. Just having an image on standby isn't enough to claim that it's fair use because the image could be used in a million different ways, and 7 of the uses might be fair. If it's orphaned, I guess checking to see if there are articles that would benefit greatly by the use of the image, would be a good idea, but if not, should be nominated for deletion. Rossrs 16:01, 24 September 2005 (UTC)
Having poked around a bit - {{fairusereplace}} seems to be the replacement request. Shimgray 16:47, 24 September 2005 (UTC)
I've never seen that one before, and it's not the one I was thinking of. Looking at the history of this one, it was only created September 18. The one I was thinking of, I can't remember seeing for a long time, and was very similarly in appearance to the generic {{fairuse}} tag, but it had a sentence at the end basically saying that a free image may be available and should be replaced as soon as it could be found. Rossrs 17:07, 24 September 2005 (UTC)

reviewed so far

Rossrs writes "I think it would be a good idea if images are not reviewed by either the uploader or whoever contributed them to a particular article because they might be looking at it with a biased eye." Well, certainly the uploader should not unilaterally sign them off as OK, but, folks: contact the uploader! See if they can explain! A bunch of material was recently deleted that I (variously) either had created myself or uploaded with permission, and in all cases I had explained the provenance of the images in the image comments, but this was years ago and these tags mostly didn't exist. People deleted them without getting hold of me; if they'd contacted me, I'd have been able to explain that this wasn't even a fair use matter, it was a straight-out unquestionable licensing matter. -- Jmabel | Talk 06:51, 24 September 2005 (UTC)

I agree with you. I'm not advocating that this review process should lead to deletion, especially without uploaders being consulted. Deletions should be further down the track and part of a different process, however it's logical to assume that this process will identify "suspect" images that require further investigation. I was looking at this step in the process from the point of view of identifying which images meet the "fair use" criteria and then putting them in a category that would prevent them being unilaterally deleted.Rossrs 07:39, 24 September 2005 (UTC)

I'm supposed to be on WikiVacation, but I couldn't resist contributing my twopenn'orth. I agree that we don't want to include a blanket "all the thinking has been done for you" list of rationales, but we do want to make things easier for people. How about a {{fairuserationale}} template which says "It is claimed that the fair use exception applies for the following reasons:" and takes keyword arguments that expand into a list of the rationales that specifically apply. That way it's easy to add or remove them as appropriate, and we can find all images that rely on a specific argument. (Technical template explanation, each keyword is associated with a sub-page of the template that contains a single rationale as a list item. Absent arguments expand into an empty sub-page.) Bovlb 15:34, 25 September 2005 (UTC)

My general preference is to have the rationale on the image page itself instead of in a template, since right now it's generally a rather free-form field. However, if someone is creative enough to create a template that could include all valid fair use rationales, that would be really good. Of course, we'd have to figure out what all the valid fair use rationales are first... JYolkowski // talk 02:16, 26 September 2005 (UTC)

Wartime images

Here's a question for you: what should we do with non-US images from the World War II period? Many (if not most) of them are under unknown private copyright. I agree that we can't go about setting our own special criteria for each group of images, but I don't think we should delete them on mass without a bit of discussion first. Physchim62 15:12, 24 September 2005 (UTC)

Can you give a few examples of this? I'm not sure I understand exactly what sorts of images you are referring to. --Fastfission 15:27, 24 September 2005 (UTC)
To give you some idea, see Image:17SSGrenadiers.jpg, Image:Rheinbote.jpg, Image:He 113.jpg, Image:GerhardFlesch.jpg. There's quite a variety out there; others can be found at User:Physchim62/German images. Physchim62 15:39, 24 September 2005 (UTC)

Copyright and "factual data"

Here's a little question I was interested in some input on. Consider the following situations:

  1. A person compiles public domain factual data and re-sells it in an un-creatively arranged (e.g. alphabetical, not selected) form
  2. A person compiles public domain factual data and re-sells it in a semi-creatively arranged (e.g. alphabetical, perhaps selected) form
  3. A person makes measurements of some factual quantity (e.g. temperature outside their house) and publishes it in some numerical form (e.g. in a table)
  4. A person takes measurements of some factual quantity and publishes it in some non-numerical form (e.g. as a graph)

What's the copyright status of the factual data itself in these instances, when taken from the forms as published? The first is easy: it is basically Feist v. Rural, which says that the sheer investment of compiling public domain data and re-selling it does not generate a copyright, as no "creativity" is in any way instilled. The rest I am less clear on. The question, again, is not about the specific published publications, which are clearly subject to some copyright on the whole, but on the informational content contained within. In particular, I am interested about this in the context of "fair use" — is it "fair use" to use the source data of a study from a given publication and turn it into a graph of the data (citing the study as a source)? I imagine so -- in fact the graph may itself generate a seperate copyright if the data itself doesn't count as a copyright. Does the form of the information have to change (i.e. from numerical to graphical) to make it so, though? Or is it the fact that the data itself is likely not copyrightable ("scientific facts" are not, I believe, copyrightable) that makes it so? How would this apply where the data is factual but the form is graphical -- such as in the drawing of a map? Would one have to recompile a map from the raw cartographic data (measurements, satellite photos, etc.) to make a map which could generate a new copyright? Or would using a source map as a data base, but applying new forms of information arrangement and selection, be enough? How strong would the connection between form and information have to be to make this derivative in a copyrightable sense? I've been going back and forth in my reasoning on this. In particular, I'm wondering because I'm interested in developing better "re-creation" guidelines, that is, guidelines explaining what sorts of information can be "re-created" freely rather than being claimed as "fair use". --Fastfission 16:37, 24 September 2005 (UTC)

I am sure scientific data isnt copyright. But if you extract data from another source (such as another map) rather than raw data I think it might be considered derived in some circumstances, on a case by case basis. What you are working on sounds very useful. Good examples are the new maps of London Underground, done from GPS coordinates to work around the strong copyright enforcement on the famous topological maps. Justinc 12:28, 30 September 2005 (UTC)

Flag images

Due to the various copyvios I have found at Category:Flag images, I have changed and moved {{PD-flag}} to {{Flagimage}} ({{flag}} was taken). I believe most flag images can be used under fair use, but most are copyvios or non-commercial images. Zach (Sound Off) 22:29, 25 September 2005 (UTC)

Cool. Maybe we should create {{flagfairuse}} and {{flagpd}} tags? That way, if we find things that really are fair use or public domain, we can remove them from the ambiguous category that they're in, and then we can deal with all the junk tagged with {{PD-flag}} afterward. JYolkowski // talk 22:45, 25 September 2005 (UTC)
Usually, when I draw my own flag images, I just tag as {{GFDL}}. Zach (Sound Off) 22:48, 25 September 2005 (UTC)
Do you think there's a significant amount of stuff in Category:Flag images that could be claimed as fair use? If so, I think it might make sense for us to create a {{flagfairuse}} tag. On second thought, I'm not going to bother with {{flagpd}} or anything like that; I'll let Wikipedia:WikiProject Public domain worry about that (-: JYolkowski // talk 00:46, 27 September 2005 (UTC)
I am still going through it myself and clear out the non-commercial images. After that, I will see what is left and make a suggestion of what to do next. Zach (Sound Off) 00:52, 27 September 2005 (UTC)

Stamps

{{Stamp}} currently says:

It is believed that the use of postage stamps to illustrate the stamp in question (as opposed to things appearing in the stamp's design) ... qualifies as fair use.

Many of our existing stamps, however, are used to illustrate articles about people, which is a bit of a grey area. It's clearly not fair use to have a stamp with a dog on it to illustrate an article on dogs; is it fair use to have an image of a stamp showing an individual to illustrate an article on that individual? As an example, a lot of people have covers of Time magazine in their articles, claimed as fair-use, because appearing on the cover of Time is apparently a pretty big event. It strikes me the same logic must apply to stamps - in most countries, having yourself put on a stamp is A Big Deal, and thus the sort of thing worth mentioning in an article. Would it be worth expanding {{stamp}} to clarify that fair use can be claimed for articles relating to the issue of that stamp? Thoughts appreciated; let me know if I've grabbed the wrong end of the stick! Shimgray | talk | 12:42, 26 September 2005 (UTC)

Did you see DVD/album/magazine covers; screenshots above, where I had argued basically the reverse? I don't know who of us has the wrong end of the stick, but it's clear as fog that this is a gray area. Being on the cover of Time may be a big event, and so may having a stamp designed after oneself, but unless the article discusses this in some detail, I don't think such uses in articles not about the stamp but the event or person depicted would fall under "fair use". A simple caption like "X on the cover of Time" is not good enough, IMO, but maybe "Doing ABC generated much public interest in DEF issues, and made the Time magazine feature X on its cover" or some such might be. I just don't know. Lupo 13:09, 26 September 2005 (UTC)
I think some articles use the stamp as an "easy" image although the text does not discuss the stamp or the significance of someone getting their face on one. Discussion of the stamp would strengthen a fair use claim, but looking at a cross section of articles illustrated by the stamps at , I think few, if any, would genuinely qualify as fair use. The template says "stamp in question (as opposed to the subject of the stamp)" and it's clear that the images are being used as illustration for the subjects. Rossrs 13:21, 26 September 2005 (UTC)
Yeah, the previous wording of the template has probably caused some confusion about this. I tend to agree with the above comments; the stamp images are probably only fair use if the article discusses the stamp. Uses such as the one at Snoopy look like the person who added the image may have been misled by the stamp template and decided to use an "easy" image that probably isn't fair use. JYolkowski // talk 20:35, 26 September 2005 (UTC)
I think being on a stamp would be A Big Deal. Changing any given caption to something along the lines of: "The U.S. postal service honored Mr. T by creating a commemorative postage stamp in 1986" would be an adequate way to do this for most. In any event, I think this is what I'd call a "low-risk" area (it's very unlikely that any governments are going to sue about their stamp use on here in any context), so I don't think a radical re-captioning effort is really necessary at the moment. --Fastfission 01:57, 27 September 2005 (UTC)
Note that many postal administrations are now private corporations who license out their copyrighted images for other kinds of products (mugs, t-shirts, etc). Stamps honoring people are perhaps less likely to be used in this way than, say, a Christmas-related image. I would be inclined to only allow stamp images as adjuncts to main image, to illustrate "X was honored on a stamp". Stan 05:10, 13 October 2005 (UTC)