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Commons discussion pages (index) Commons Help desk Commons:Upload help Community-wide general discussion Copyright Proposals Graphics and photography discussion Image improvement Photography critiques Categories for discussion Deletion requests OTRS noticeboard Translators' noticeboard Work requests for bots Contact administrators Vandalism User problems (Dispute resolution) Blocks and protections Bureaucrats' noticeboard CheckUser requests #wikimedia-commons webchat Commons mailing list (archive) Commons' bugs on Phabricator Welcome to the Village pump This page is used for discussions of the operations, technical issues, and policies of Wikimedia Commons. Recent sections with no replies for 7 days and sections tagged with {{section resolved|1=~~~~}} may be archived; for old discussions, see the archives. Please note If you want to ask why unfree/non-commercial material is not allowed at Wikimedia Commons or if you want to suggest that allowing it would be a good thing please do not comment here. It is a waste of your time. One of Wikimedia Commons' basic principles is: "Only free content is allowed." This is just a basic rule of the place, as inherent as the NPOV requirement on all Wikipedias. Have you read the FAQ? For changing the name of a file see Commons:File renaming. Any answers you receive here are not legal advice and the responder cannot be held liable for them. If you have legal questions, we can try to help but our answers cannot replace those of a qualified professional (i.e. a lawyer). Your question will be answered here; please check back regularly. Please do not leave your email address or other contact information, as this page is widely visible across the internet and you are liable to receive spam. Purposes which do not meet the scope of this page Please do not make deletion requests here: use the relevant process for it instead. For technical support and graphics talks (PNG, SVG, GIF, etc.), please post on the Graphics village pump. To ask for image improvement, see: Graphic Lab/Photography workshop for photographs. Graphic Lab/Map workshop for maps. Graphic Lab/Illustration workshop for other illustrations. For translation requests, please post at Commons:Requests for translation. For photograph requests, please post at Commons:Picture requests. Search archives   Start a new discussion

The last town pump to be in use in Saint Helier, Jersey, until early 20th century [add]

Centralized discussion See also: Village pump/Proposals • Archive Provide SVG help button (12 September 2015) Proposal to change the guidelines for promoting QICs (20 April 2015) RFC on the implications of Flickr's new PD license option (2 April 2015) RFC on Hosting files for 3D models (28 October 2014) Template: View • Discuss • Edit • Watch

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Oldies

Allow WebP upload

Moved to Commons:Village pump/Proposals#Allow WebP upload

June 29

Butko needs to stop splitting everything by country

Unidentified beach in identified country!

This is not the first such bad categorization spree; I hope it will be the last. Here’s an example: This misty beach photo was uploaded by me one year ago from http://unsplash.com/post/94204096994/download-by-ruxandra-mateiu, where it is licensed in CC-0 and where there’s no information about it apart from the author’s name (damned hipsters!); I searched online and found the same photo in the author’s Flickr stream, where it is tagged with two labels about Ireland. I therefore categorized this photo i.a. in Category:Unidentified beaches and Category:Unidentified locations in Ireland.

Now, there comes User:Butko and does what he did thousands of times in the past with items of such unidentified somethings-or-other: Moved it to Category:Beaches of unidentified countries — witch is patently false, as the country is known, just the exact beach is not (*). Later on (and we know this because it has happend a lot in the past — before beaches it was forests, mountains, lakes, you name it), someone, maybe Butko himself, will notice that the contry is identified, and Category:Beaches of unidentified countries will be removed from this filepage — which will end up with a photo of a beach, but no category about beaches! (The only sensible recategorization here, short of identification, of course, would be to create under both those parent cats a new subcat Category:Unidentified beaches of Ireland, which is likely very useful (*) — however Butko doesn’t seem to do this.^{(He’s doing it now, yay! -- Tuválkin ✉ ✇ 20:30, 16 September 2015 (UTC))})

This change affects this one photo and 27 other in my watchlist — the total is surely in the thousands. The result is damaged curation and reduced usefulness of Commons, which is called vandalism when done by an IP or a noob user. User:Butko, admin, please stop, please revert, please inform yourself about categorization.

(*) (Okay, Slovenia and DRCongo have only one sea beach a relatively short coastline which could be jokingly named one single beach, but most contries havd either many or none.)

-- Tuválkin ✉ ✇ 16:21, 16 September 2015 (UTC)

Wouldn't it be enough to just put the the unidentified Irish beaches under Category:Beaches of Ireland? It seems to me that not everything under that category needs to be in a subcategory. --Auntof6 (talk) 23:33, 16 September 2015 (UTC)

Not enough (unless we think it is good to have a category crowded with thousands of photos), but certainly correct. Having a beach photo with no beach categories (as happened in the past with mountains and lakes) is not, and that was my main point. -- Tuválkin ✉ ✇ 00:09, 17 September 2015 (UTC)

By the way:Ceo@trá is a strange meaningless filename.Smiley.toerist (talk) 22:28, 20 September 2015 (UTC)

It shows a beach with fog in Ireland: In Irish Gaelic "Ceo" means "fog" and "trá" means "beach". (Also: Derailing much? This thread is about an admin disrupting categorization — can we please focus on that?) -- Tuválkin ✉ ✇ 23:56, 20 September 2015 (UTC)

Unfortunately, this appeal in VP caused only the example image to be fixed: 9 days later, Category:Beaches of unidentified countries is still bloated from User:Butko stuffing into it everything other people categorized under Category:Unidentified beaches, regardless of the country in question being actually unidentified or not.

Go and take a glance at Category:Beaches of unidentified countries: Just from the filenames of its 180 images, a dozen or two countries can be readily identified. This causes the risk that a less attent fellow user might remove those images from this category — causing the “unidentifiedness” of the beach in question to be lost, thus reducing the amount and quality of the information provided by Commons and the chance of identification.

As said, Butko needs to stop splitting everything by country — were he a regular user, not an Admin, and this would have been swiftly dealt with in ANU…

-- Tuválkin ✉ ✇ 03:08, 25 September 2015 (UTC)

We can create Category:Unidentified beaches in Ireland^{(«of» -- Tuválkin ✉ ✇)}, Category:Unidentified beaches in France, etc., which should solve this problem. - Jmabel ! talk 06:53, 25 September 2015 (UTC)

Sure we can. There’s maybe 180 countries in the world with beaches of any kind, though, and once beaches are dealt with we should retrace Butko’s steps and do the same for lakes and mountains and forests and whetever. Or, as said at the begining, Butko could stop splitting everything by country, and for each of those the simple category "Unidentified whatever" (along with at least one country category, as “deep”/detailed as possible) would be quite enough thanks-very-much.

The problem here, though, is not just the needless creating of, the filing in, and the diffusing from what are essentially temporary categories, the main issue is the risk of losing category information when these instances of actual miscategorization are stumbled upon. As of course I (or any of us) could add back Category:Unidentified beaches to all these images where the country is known and properly identified in another category (like in the example above), but that would be edit warring (against an admin? I’d be toast!) and there’s no guarantee that it would not be soon changed back to Category:Beaches of unidentified countries.

Can we fix this permanently, please? -- Tuválkin ✉ ✇ 13:25, 25 September 2015 (UTC)

Noob tries to change an image on a page... hilarity ensues

So this noob saw on a WMF wiki’s page an image the noob thought could be improved — it was a placeholder image, and the noob knew there was a better image in Commons. Then this noob clicked on the image, and eventually come to the file page of that placeholder image in Commons. There the noob in question edited the placeholder’s filepage and transcluded the better image — or tried to: Not with [[File:Example.jpg|thumb]] but with [[File:Http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Example.jpg|thumb]]… We all know what happens after this kind of edits: A mild wrist slap and a few pointers to the Help: name space — unless of course the said noob’s account name includes the string x005F x0028 x0057 x004D x0046; x0029;, in which case looks like nobody dares to do anything… -- Tuválkin ✉ ✇ 21:35, 19 September 2015 (UTC)

More info at diff. 1156230270, but only if you love octal. -- Tuválkin ✉ ✇ 21:41, 19 September 2015 (UTC)

That seems a bit snide... Its entirely understandable that a recent WMF hire, in a non-technical role, is not familiar with wikis. I don't particularly understand why the foundation doesn't give their new hires a crash course in MW. Notwithstanding that, its not like the foundation is going to bite your head off, if, seeing a confused staffer, someone gives her a polite note helping her accomplish whatever she's trying to do. Bawolff (talk) 04:52, 20 September 2015 (UTC)

I don't suppose someone wants to actually link to the diff in question...? - dcljr (talk) 17:44, 24 September 2015 (UTC)

I think the edit might have been in June, repaired in September. Revision of File:Wikimedia Foundation office camera shy 250px.png Delphi234 (talk) 14:51, 29 September 2015 (UTC)

Translation needed for categorisation

There are articles using this image and they include an other image of the same bridge. Unfortunatly this is in Arabic script. What is the location and how is the bridge called?Smiley.toerist (talk) 10:01, 21 September 2015 (UTC)

The usage in wp:fa suggests a location on the Turkish side of the Iran-Turkey border, near to the triple point with (independent) Azerbaijan. It is apparently the the largest bridge in the Middle East. -- Tuválkin ✉ ✇ 11:30, 21 September 2015 (UTC)

Looks like this bridge, on the Kopıköy-Razi border: 38°29′13″N 44°20′32″E. -- Tuválkin ✉ ✇ 11:40, 21 September 2015 (UTC)

Its on the Iranian side. Look at the panoramio picture. The correct category is Category:Ghotour Valley Bridge. Unfortunately this bridge is incorrecty put on the Category:Trans-Iranian Railway (look at the maps).Smiley.toerist (talk) 12:56, 21 September 2015 (UTC)

Good finding! (I did come across the name "قطور" but it is romanized in so many ways I missed the category.) As for the categorization, it’s just a matter of fixing it — it’s a wiki, right? -- Tuválkin ✉ ✇ 14:37, 21 September 2015 (UTC)

 Fixed: new Category:Khoy-Rezi Railway. -- Tuválkin ✉ ✇ 15:03, 21 September 2015 (UTC)

I can find Khoy, but Rezi is a place in Hungary. I take it you mean the borderstation Razi? The next junction with an other railway line is Soufian (No station but close to Tabriz). This is part of the Istanbul Theheran connection, but technically the line starts at the Van lake in Turkey where train have to take the boat. Beyond this it can be considered part of the Turkey - Iran - P±akistan railway connection. (with a gauge change at the Pakistan border).Smiley.toerist (talk) 18:01, 21 September 2015 (UTC)

Ugh, you’re right, I was short on coffee. The junction is at 38°16′23″N 46°00′09″E — سهلان (en:Sahlan) station. Will correct the cat. name now. -- Tuválkin ✉ ✇ 19:25, 21 September 2015 (UTC)

Looks like the geolocation of the bridge is rather 38°28′39″N 44°46′12″E, not 38°27′46″N 44°38′27″E as given in Panoramio. (This discussion should be moved to Category talk:Ghotour Valley Bridge sooner or later.) -- Tuválkin ✉ ✇ 15:03, 21 September 2015 (UTC)

Archiving  done. -- Tuválkin ✉ ✇ 13:30, 25 September 2015 (UTC)

WPA painting

I had asked this question at the Help Desk, and it was suggested I bring my question here.

The WP article for the American artist, Harry Sternberg, has no images and I found this image [1] of a 1939 painting of his on Flicker. The mural was done for the Works Progress Administration, Federal Art Project. The license for the Flicker image is described as "Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 2.0 Generic (CC BY-NC-SA 2.0)". Is it allowed to upload this image to Commons? Malcolm Schosha (talk) 21:24, 21 September 2015 (UTC)

See {{PD-USGov-WPA}}. --Fæ (talk) 21:53, 21 September 2015 (UTC)

If it was made as "work for hire" for the federal government, then it's in the public domain. If it wasn't, then there's a good chance that it's copyrighted, unless the artist or artist's estate has released rights. If "PD-art" reasoning (Bridgeman Art Library v. Corel Corp.) applies, then the photographer's claims are irrelevant here. AnonMoos (talk) 10:05, 22 September 2015 (UTC)

If the original poster is correct about it being WPA, then it should be work for hire. - Jmabel ! talk 15:56, 22 September 2015 (UTC)

yes go ahead, and upload. put PD-art license wrapper with PD-USGov-WPA. more metadata info here [2] Post Office in Ambler Pennsylvania. use artwork template, so you can credit artist and photographer. Slowking4♡Richard Arthur Norton's revenge 03:20, 28 September 2015 (UTC)

September 22

Category:Mustela eversmanni

Please rename 'Category:Mustela eversmanni' to 'Category:Mustela eversmanii' (I can't revert the edit of User:The Man in Question). See scientific references at wikispecies:Mustela eversmanii. Thanks --Murma174 (talk) 11:21, 22 September 2015 (UTC)

I'd prefer if you would talk to User:The Man in Question and seek consensus before the files are moved back to the old category: It´s redirected anyway, so there´s no hurry and both spellings seem to be in wide use in publications. --Rudolph Buch (talk) 11:44, 22 September 2015 (UTC)

I tried to take up contact already at w:en:User_talk:The_Man_in_Question. The spelling ..nni is a wellknown misspelling, but the decision should not be made by google statistics IMO, but by scientific references. Just my two cents ... --Murma174 (talk) 14:16, 22 September 2015 (UTC)

Solved redirects manually now. --Murma174 (talk) 05:17, 24 September 2015 (UTC)

Search

Tracked in Phabricator
Task T113518

When I use the search option, no matter what word I type in, it shows on the bottom of the page "\n". That's clearly not its intention... any idea where and how to report this? Trijnstel_talk 22:51, 23 September 2015 (UTC)

What are exact steps (click by click) to reproduce this? Which browser and browser version on which operating system? --AKlapper (WMF) (talk) 06:37, 24 September 2015 (UTC)

Ah. Found a related bug report: phab:T113518. So this problem got fixed already. --AKlapper (WMF) (talk) 08:05, 24 September 2015 (UTC)

September 24

White House Press Secretary on student Ahmed Mohamed

Can someone please help me clip out the relevant bits of video clips from this White House Press Secretary comments about student Ahmed Mohamed ?

They begin at the following two different time indexes on YouTube:

1. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zbu0Xmd1hn8#t=19m20s (text at File:2015 September 16 White House Press Secretary comments on student Ahmed Mohamed part 1.jpg)

   Time index = 19:20 - 21:36

2. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zbu0Xmd1hn8#t=38m28s (text at File:2015 September 16 White House Press Secretary comments on student Ahmed Mohamed part 2.jpg)

   Time index = 38:28 - 41:41

Or is there some way to do that using ffmpeg2theora ?

Any help with the video editing would be most appreciated,

-- Cirt (talk) 06:30, 24 September 2015 (UTC)

Added time index notes re start and stop to above. -- Cirt (talk) 00:12, 27 September 2015 (UTC)

Less than one week left for Individual Engagement Grant proposals!

There is less than one week left to submit Individual Engagement Grant (IEG) proposals before the September 29th deadline. If you have ideas for new tools, community-building processes, and other experimental projects that enhance the work of Wikimedia volunteers, start your proposal today! Please encourage others who have great ideas to apply as well. Support is available if you want help turning your idea into a grant request.

• Submit a grant request
• Get help with your proposal in IdeaLab
• Learn from examples of completed Individual Engagement Grants

I JethroBT (WMF) (talk) 15:32, 24 September 2015 (UTC)

Wiki needs pictures: a new tool

Please take a look at this grant proposal here: meta:Grants:IEG/Wiki needs pictures. Feedbacks are welcome! --Alexmar983 (talk) 22:16, 24 September 2015 (UTC)

Category phantom

Help! Category:Internet Archive (uncrop needed) has File:America, from discovery in 1492 to the present time (1894) (14578385267).jpg in it. However the category was removed from the image page yet it persists in being linked to the category regardless of the image page contents. How do we fix this sort of problem?

Note, Faebot is routinely overwriting the file while it remains in the "uncrop needed" queue, thinking that it has been re-added deliberately... --Fæ (talk) 23:30, 24 September 2015 (UTC)

File:America, from discovery in 1942 to the present time (1894) (14578385267).jpg is a redirect to File:America, from discovery in 1492 to the present time (1894) (14578385267).jpg, and the redirect had the category in it. I removed it. It's odd that the category page will show a thumb from the redirect target but the name of the redirect source. Or is it showing a thumb of the supposedly deleted file? That could be an issue. BMacZero (talk) 01:32, 25 September 2015 (UTC)

Thanks for the fix, the system behaviour is unexpected. As a general rule, categories should not be added to redirect pages. I would have have expected a blank thumbnail or a faux thumbnail warning message. It's unhelpful to display a thumbnail from the target in the majority of scenarios I can think of for the mediawiki software to behave this way when displaying categories, and, as you say, if this is a glitch and the pre-redirect image was being displayed, then this is a bug of some sort. --Fæ (talk) 08:19, 25 September 2015 (UTC)

There is a certain logic to it. File:America, from discovery in 1942 to the present time (1894) (14578385267).jpg was in the category. So that page should be in the list. Redirects in general wikitext work just like their targets do, so why wouldn't they in categories. Bawolff (talk) 20:50, 26 September 2015 (UTC)

September 25

Categorization of WLM photos

Se here for a funny one: WLM coordinator says that «If any of the files are deleted before this date, or if further deletion requests of this type appear, the organizers will refrain from any further support to Wikimedia Commons regarding image categorization». Yep, let that sink in — blackmail, from guys who are actually getting paid for what most of us do for free. ^{(Striken at 19:16, 25 September 2015 (UTC): it is “only” blackmail for free, not paid for, after all…)} Aint it funny or what? -- Tuválkin ✉ ✇ 14:51, 25 September 2015 (UTC)

Without knowing anything about the background here, as the account you link to states "I am no longer interested in working on this project [Commons]", they are can no longer be interested in WLM projects either. The Commons community can presume they do not speak for any part of the WLM programme or its visionary goals for open knowledge. Rather than funny, it seems overly dramatic, if this is a response to deletion discussions resulting from unresolved copyright problems. --Fæ (talk) 15:44, 25 September 2015 (UTC)

Fæ, I called it funny as a figure of speech. I think this matter, and several others in the same vain, to be positively horrifying. -- Tuválkin ✉ ✇ 19:16, 25 September 2015 (UTC)

I am the organizer of WLM in Russia this year, and it is extremely naive to reject this fact. If you still don't believe it, check here (in Russian).

I have written in the deletion request and I confirm it here that all non-FoP images will be presented to Commons admins for deletion as soon as WLM ends on October 31 and images are transferred to other projects. We can't organize proper image transfer earlier. Regarding categorization, Atsibot has done it for thousands of images, but it will, of course, stop any activity if it turns out that the Commons community is completely ignorant to the work that we are doing for them. Of course, we do it for free. It is very hard to get money for prizes in Russia (note that we can't get any support from WMF because of the current Russian legislation), and we obviously have nothing to pay ourselves.

I would be very grateful if Romaine, Ymblanter and Hedwig in Washington comment on this situation and, specifically, on silly accusations concerning payment to WLM volunteers. --Alexander (talk) 17:08, 25 September 2015 (UTC)

Tuválkin, many if not most of WLM organizers are volunteers and do what they do for free. I agree that this line from Alexander was unnecessary − I kind of understand where he’s coming from, and the reason for the moratorium he asks, but I don’t think there was any need for this ultimatum − but let’s not escalate all that by throwing things about paid vs unpaid and so on, shall we? Jean-Fred (talk) 17:20, 25 September 2015 (UTC)

That line was harsh but intentional. The deletion request in question was not a standard one with 1-2-5 non-FoP images. It contained 200+ files that I myself have put in a special category for image transfer. So it was pretty obvious that someone will take care of these files, and they are selected with purpose. Instead of asking me or any of the Russian WLM organizers, one user (whom I won't mention in order to avoid further drama) decided to request the deletion of all these images at once without even checking that all of them should be deleted. Some of these photos were in fact old sculptures that are in PD since ages. You can see this from several images crossed out in the original deletion request.

Now, if you are unhappy with the ultimatum, it is in fact Commons users who started with this. Good files that are used in other projects are nominated for deletion and deleted after 7 days without informing any of the end users. This is an ultimatum. Endless ultimatum. I myself have saved hundreds of photos that we would simply miss because of this nice and careless deletion procedure. If all of you feel just fine to ruin the content that others create, why would you expect us to be soft and nice here? Especially in situations where we invested days and months of our time into running something like WLM, and the results of this WLM are completely destroyed because someone can't wait 2 months before files are deleted. --Alexander (talk) 17:45, 25 September 2015 (UTC)

Alexander, I also agree that the Deletion Request was unfortunate (even sloppy − as a general rule DRs that cover hundreds of files are rarely helpful), and that was not the brightest idea of the nominator ; but I also know that DRs are a (unfortunately) all-to-common mechanism here for « this needs to be discussed ». I simply regret how this all escalates so hard (a careless DR → a « harsh but intentional » line from you → Tuvalkin posting here about « blackmail » → what’s next?). For the record, I happen to be fairly involved in WLM so there really is no need for a us/them vision here. Now, folks seem to agree that there’s no rush, that we’re glad people are on deck with this, that we are happy cool content is here. So in definitive, the way I see it with my Assume-Good-Faith-Glasses™: « Nominator: “Hey, what’s up with these files?” ; WLM organiser: “Yeah, it can be tricky, but we take care of it. Fine waiting a few weeks about it?” ; Everybody: “Sure! Keep up the good work :-)” » Yes, I’m that AGF ;-)

Now, moving forward: I made a proposal to close this DR. Jean-Fred (talk) 00:19, 26 September 2015 (UTC)

I am certainly fine with this. However, it is not the first time that we have big problems with this particular nominator, and it's another reason why I was harsh (again, intentionally). Several months ago we could not do anything with hundreds of similar files deleted during a very short time, even though most of them were used on Russian Wikipedia. I still have a large amount of these files on my computer, because I could not organize proper image transfer, and uploading each file manually is, of course, a very time-consuming process. This massive file deletion had its repercussions on Russian Wikipedia where many people have (rightfully, in my opinion) claimed that Wikimedia Commons is a useless project that has its own goals, which are orthogonal to the goals of Wikipedia. Some of the Commons admins were aware of this discussion, but, unfortunately, no action was taken. This made possible the new massive deletion request that we discuss right now, and this was going to be vicious circle. I am happy that you want to break it, and I am very thankful for your active involvement, although we still have to see whether it will put an end to quick deletion of images, at least Russian images, that are useful and that are used by many WMF projects.

PS. Note also that deletion requests completely demotivate WLM participants, so they are obviously a very bad mechanism for «this needs to be discussed», at least in the WLM context. --Alexander (talk) 00:42, 26 September 2015 (UTC)

I do recognize your point about demotivation. Maybe we should just rename the process “Files for discussion” (just like we have “Categories for discussion”), to at least sound less hostile... Food for thought :)

I closed the DR. Jean-Fred (talk) 17:28, 26 September 2015 (UTC)

Thanks! --Alexander (talk) 17:56, 26 September 2015 (UTC)

(after edit conflict) @Tuválkin: Who is getting paid? Give a source for your statement or withdraw it. This kind of statements do not help in any way to get a solution for the situation.

And for my understanding, the local Wiki Loves Monuments team has tried to find a solution that respects the rules/guidelines from Commons but also at the same time tries to find/use the most practical way to participate in Wiki Loves Monuments.

Also they seem to indicate that they feel being frustrated by other users who show a lack of understanding of their situation and follow the guidelines/rules in a blind and too strict way. Those other users who follow the guidelines too strictly in such way that they miss the goal of what the Wikimedia movement tries to do, by thinking about this subject too simplistic.

Seeing a reaction about refraining support shows that there has not been an appropriate dialogue why it should be deleted soon, and that the situation has been worsened too much already. As result the frustration levels are too high.

And calling refraining support "blackmail" I can only call stupidity, because there is no support for assuming bad faith and Hanlon's razor. Let's try to have a normal discussion first instead of starting false accusations. Romaine (talk) 17:33, 25 September 2015 (UTC)

• @Atsirlin: why can't we start image transfer right away on obvious copyvios that are needed on a fair use basis? - Jmabel ! talk 17:54, 25 September 2015 (UTC)

Because fair-use images should fulfill certain requirements. First of all, they should be used in the Wikimedia project where they are transferred to. All files in questions were uploaded very recently, so it takes time before they are linked from Wikipedia and Wikivoyage. Some of the linking can be done automatically, but as soon as we have more than one photo of a monument, we have to decide which photos to use and which photos to sacrifice because one can't accommodate an arbitrary large amount of fair-use images. All this work takes time, and we can't do it actively before October 1 because we have other tasks in September. --Alexander (talk) 19:31, 25 September 2015 (UTC)

• And to the community in general: can we perhaps come up with a gentler way to inform newbies who upload reasonable-seeming images that are FOP violations? - Jmabel ! talk 17:57, 25 September 2015 (UTC)

I have addressed this question to different members of this community, but I never got a meaningful answer... --Alexander (talk) 19:31, 25 September 2015 (UTC)

+1 to @Jmabel:. As I say above, Deletion Requests are the common mechanism here for « this needs discussion », but they quite understandably disturb good-faith uploaders. We should come up with a better system. Jean-Fred (talk) 00:19, 26 September 2015 (UTC)

I could imagine writing a small bot script to mirror any WLM images and their text pages under discussion to a handy public flickrstream or similar. If any get deleted they could still be reviewed and restored to other projects later. Though it's hardly ideal and I'd only be interested in spending my free time on it if folks want solutions in a collegiate way. --Fæ (talk) 18:02, 25 September 2015 (UTC)

This would be better than nothing, but the problem is not restricted to WLM images. It is about non-FoP images in general. Regarding WLM images, the easiest solution has been proposed and agreed upon by several admins. Everything stays on Commons till October 31. Then all non-FoP images are deleted at once. We can consider a different strategy for next year (if we ever continue to upload WLM images on Commons, given the attitude demonstrated in the beginning of this thread), but this year it is much easier to proceed with the strategy that has been agreed upon. --Alexander (talk) 19:31, 25 September 2015 (UTC)

• I'd have no problem with that last, as long as we come up with a template to use as a tag on the images that are liable to be deleted (probably should place them in a maintenance category as well). And, yes, we need to come up with a more robust strategy next year, probably a tag that indicates time of upload that these images will need review, much as we often do on batch uploads. - Jmabel ! talk 19:50, 25 September 2015 (UTC)

I don't see how it is different from what I am already doing. All "suspicious" images are placed into a special category. Then both humans and bots can work with this category, and they are indeed planning to do so over the next month. The best thing now is not to disturb me with complaints and accusations like those in the beginning of this thread. --Alexander (talk) 20:04, 25 September 2015 (UTC)

I for my part agree with Atsirlin. I talked with him via email as well and I do understand the problem the team is facing. So far, as I see, all no-fop files from the WLM event are in a special category. A category designed to transfer all non-fop cases to local projects and delete the files on Commons in one big sitting. No template needed. For next year it would be advisable to have one. Right now we are fine. DR backlog is long enough, no need to add several DRs with lengthy discussions. --Hedwig in Washington ^(mail?) 23:08, 25 September 2015 (UTC)

Very much agree with the above. I proposed a closing of the DR. Jean-Fred (talk) 00:19, 26 September 2015 (UTC)

• Sorry, but since we have Wikibase, why monuments which are not allowed by FoP in country of origin are still not warned BEFORE uploading? This should reduce number of misunderstandings. And all previous WLM stepped on same rake many times... — Preceding unsigned comment added by EugeneZelenko (talk • contribs)

Sorry, I do not understand how Wikibase is related to this issue. The WLM participants are warned about FoP problems, but 90% of the participants are completely new wiki-users who do not even know how to leave messages on the talk page. They can't (and they won't) care about long sophisticated texts about FoP and non-FoP. This is normal. We could simplify things a bit by labeling which objects are copyrighted and which are not, but this requires one to go through more than 100 thousand objects, and, apparently, nobody from Commons is interested in doing this tedious work (neither the organizers are interested, because we better deal with 1000 non-FoP images already uploaded than with 100 000 objects in the list). Lastly, it turns out that here on Commons parts of architectural monuments, such as sculptures on the building or inside subway stations, are considered non-architecture and thus not subject to FoP in Russia. We as the organizers consider this as an essentially weird and hostile approach, but we can't (and we won't) try to argue with fanatics of copyright who typically dominate deletion requests here. The difficult part is that for a given object you can't say a priori whether a photo is covered by FoP or not. What should one do in this case?

Regarding other countries, thousands of non-FoP photos were uploaded in the Ukrainian WLM last year. One infamous user who was recently de-admined on Commons made continuous effort and nominated many of them for deletion. Luckily, he was not very careful in going through categories, and many of the images are still available. But hundreds were lost... Nothing new, basically. I am just making more noise about the problem, and so you see it, finally. --Alexander (talk) 15:02, 26 September 2015 (UTC)

@Atsirlin: With caustic remarks like "fanatics of copyright who typically dominate deletion requests here" and the fact you are still using your user page to publicly state "I don't want to have anything in common with Wikimedia Commons", I am surprised that you want to lead a WLM project which is de facto tied to Wikimedia Commons. I have no interest in researching everything you and others have written on related DRs, but going by your responses here, which will probably be the first time most members of the Commons community will read your thoughts, the level of dramatic spin and persistent hostility make you appear quite unsuitable to officially represent either WLM or Commons. I hope you have a change of heart after some reflection, and will be able to discuss solutions to copyright problems in a collegiate way in the future. --Fæ (talk) 15:21, 26 September 2015 (UTC)

I will discuss copyright problems in a collegiate way as soon as I see the same approach here. What I heard for months was the following: "Images should be deleted from Commons, and we don't care about other projects". Is it collegiate way of handling the problem? I don't think so.

The current situation with WLM images looks reasonable, because we are allowed to work within a reasonable time frame. I have mentioned that I am fine with this approach, and I am thankful to everyone who made it possible. What else do you expect from me?

Finally, I consider your attempts to instruct me about the content of my user page as highly unpolite. I know that the text is provocative. It is intended to be provocative because non-provocative approaches simply do not work here.

Regarding the organization of WLM in Russia, you are welcome to contact the Russian chapter and discuss whether I am a suitable person for doing this work. In the meantime, I represent WLM in Russia, at least in the year 2015, and you will have to live with that. By the way, I don't see how WLM is tied to Commons beyond the fact that Commons is a common image repository for all Wikimedia projects. --Alexander (talk) 17:02, 26 September 2015 (UTC)

lol, warning people not to get dramatic on comoons is hilarious. WLM happens every year, do you think people could not bite the newbies once a year? could we agree on a process to curate the uploads? it's the old delete first ask questions later; you should expect people to get irate about deletion just as you might be. and admins stomping off after getting a wrist slap has never happened before. WLM seems to get the work done, let them. Slowking4♡Richard Arthur Norton's revenge 03:43, 28 September 2015 (UTC)

Main page, weird behave in "mobile"

Guys: [3], why the main page appears to me as the link? -- RTA 19:36, 25 September 2015 (UTC)

That's about how I would expect the main page to appear in mobile. What do you expect to appear instead? mw:Mobile_Gateway/Mobile_homepage_formatting may also be of interest to you. Bawolff (talk) 20:54, 26 September 2015 (UTC)

Bawolff at least the Participating and Highlights boxes... because the link that you send, is the screen-shot that I linked here... -- RTA 03:16, 27 September 2015 (UTC)

I thought that was kind of intentional, to only show the most important sections. In any case, it can be changed by [someone with appropriate rights] editing the main page, to add the code to say which sections should be shown on mobile. Bawolff (talk) 03:55, 27 September 2015 (UTC)

Lenin jacket with bullet holes

I took a photo of Nikolai Lenin's jacket with bullet holes when it was on display at the former Lenin Museum in Moscow. Can I upload it, or is it under somebody else's copyright? Thanks. BeenAroundAWhile (talk) 21:10, 25 September 2015 (UTC)

As far as I'm concerned, you should be able to upload it; if you took the photo, it would be classed as Own Work, unless the museum has their own rules... Any other thoughts? BarkingFish (talk) 22:01, 25 September 2015 (UTC)

I don't think a jacket can get a copyright anywhere, so it should be OK. Killing people or making bullet holes in it do not either. ;o) Regards, Yann (talk) 10:02, 26 September 2015 (UTC)

By the way, "Nikolai Lenin" seems to be an old name confusion; I don't think he ever really went by that combination of names... AnonMoos (talk) 06:58, 29 September 2015 (UTC)

September 26

Unsigned bot

Hi, On the English Wikipedia, there is User:SineBot, which adds signature when users don't sign. I think it would be useful to have this here. It could work on every page, or only on some selected pages where new users often forget to sign (Help desk, etc.). Opinions? Regards, Yann (talk) 10:00, 26 September 2015 (UTC)

discussions on commons are not very crowded, I see no risk of edit conflict, it never occured to me in the past. for the same reason it takes some times before someone sees a missing signature and corrects it. For these reasons, I think the bot would work just fine. Let's start with some selected pages if we need to test it.--Alexmar983 (talk) 16:36, 26 September 2015 (UTC)

User:Yann: See Commons:Village pump/Archive/2013/04#Signature bot on Commons. There seems to be consensus for running a signing bot on Commons, but the problem is that no bot is available. --Stefan4 (talk) 17:01, 26 September 2015 (UTC)

I wasn't aware of this discussion. I contacted the owner of SineBot. Regards, Yann (talk) 17:14, 26 September 2015 (UTC)

@Yann: He edited enwp yesterday, but I don't see any replies on his talk page. Should I consider writing one myself? Or other bot writers? Al lot of users from the archive has gone inactive or left commons :/ --Zhuyifei1999 (talk) 10:50, 1 October 2015 (UTC)

@Zhuyifei1999: That may be great. Yann (talk) 12:40, 1 October 2015 (UTC)

Missing Commons image text pages

Tracked in Phabricator
Task T113878

This dissection of a hairy bug was caught up in an operational bug, leaving the image page blank.

In the last 24 hours I have seen quite a few 503 errors when uploading via the Commons API (HTTP Error 503: Service Unavailable). This results in the upload being re-tried and succeeding but leaving the text page blank. See example from today and this user page discussion. This error only started to be an issue on the 25th September, the same upload process not exhibiting this problem in the weeks preceding. Is there a known WMF operational problem or system change that may be the root cause of this drop-out issue? Thanks --Fæ (talk) 16:25, 26 September 2015 (UTC)

Nothing of note in the server admin log. File a bug. Bawolff (talk) 20:47, 26 September 2015 (UTC)

Raised. --Fæ (talk) 11:09, 27 September 2015 (UTC)

Typo in batch upload data

How exactly should we proceed when we find a typo (in this case affecting a title) in data uploaded from another site? File:FMIB 40519 Companularia minuta (Nutting) A and B Hydfrothecae.jpeg, in title and elsewhere, Companularia should be Campanularia (it's quite clear on the illustration itself).

• I'm guessing we should change the title and leave a redirect, but tell me if you disagree.
• Should we edit the description just like we would any other description? If not, what should we do?
• Should we somehow inform the holders of the source data?

This was uploaded by a bot (User:BMacZeroBot), but if anyone knows who triggered that bot request, please ping that user. - Jmabel ! talk 16:55, 26 September 2015 (UTC)

Spelling error of scientific name of a species is fully within COM:FR as a reason to rename a file. Warning the source owners is a nice thing to do, too. -- Tuválkin ✉ ✇ 11:35, 27 September 2015 (UTC)

That file comes from this batch upload request, which doesn't involve anyone actually affiliated with the source, so I don't think there's anyone who needs to be notified in this case, especially given that it's an obvious typo. BMacZero (talk) 16:39, 27 September 2015 (UTC)

September 27

What to do with non-Roman alphabet filenames?

It's a long time since I've dealt with this, so I need a bit of a refresher and I cannot remember where to get it from, so here is a good start. I recently came across a few files which have names in a non-roman alphabet (Armenian / HY) (example:

File:%D5%8D%D5%B8%D6%82%D6%80%D5%A2_%D4%B3%D6%87%D5%B8%D6%80%D5%A3_%D5%A5%D5%AF%D5%A5%D5%B2%D5%A5%D6%81%D5%AB,_%D4%BF%D5%B8%D5%B7,_2015,_ArmAg_(14).JPG

); now to my recollection, files are supposed to have a descriptive filename to aid in being found. So, with that in mind, how do we go about filenames like this? Obviously, they may be descriptive in Armenian, but to me at least, I haven't a clue... BarkingFish (talk) 11:40, 27 September 2015 (UTC) EDITED: 11:45, 27 September 2015 (UTC)

(link to the file above: File:Սուրբ_Գևորգ_եկեղեցի,_Կոշ,_2015,_ArmAg_(14).JPG) See Commons:File renaming#Which files should not be renamed?, there's no reason to favor English over other languages. Likewise, there's no reason to favor Roman alphabet over other scripts or writing systems. As for aiding in being found, that's what file descriptions, categories and galleries are supposed to do --Zhuyifei1999 (talk) 13:49, 27 September 2015 (UTC)

BarkingFish, if you don’t have a clue, get one. (And before someone comes over saying I’m being rude and inconsiderate with BarkingFish, just read the OP over again, then check your priviledge.) -- Tuválkin ✉ ✇ 14:22, 27 September 2015 (UTC)

There is nothing to do. Filenames are comletely unimportant. Tet the people from other countrys her Filenames. Not all speak english. --Ralf Roleček 14:46, 27 September 2015 (UTC)

You're not being rude or inconsiderate, Tuválkin. As I said, it's been a very long time since I've done anything like this, and I need reminding. I got reminded, and I now know that I need to do precisely nothing! Cheers for the assist, and don't be afraid to be blunt with me, I do the same with everyone else 😊 BarkingFish (talk) 16:25, 27 September 2015 (UTC)_

Wax Cylinders in the Public Domain?

Are these 100+ year old wax cylinder recordings in the public domain? They are labeled as being cc-by nc 2.5, but I think based on Bridgeman Art Library v. Corel Corp., that they are actually Public Domain. Does anyone have any guidance here? Victorgrigas (talk) 22:29, 27 September 2015 (UTC)

As a counter-example, looking through, I notice one recording of Bohumir Kryl. He died in 1961, so I would guess the recording copyright would not have expired until after 2031, unless there is some rationale otherwise. --Fæ (talk) 22:37, 27 September 2015 (UTC)

except he appears to be published in the US with Edison w:Blue Amberol Records [4] , not Edison-Bell, so pma would not apply. Slowking4♡Richard Arthur Norton's revenge 03:53, 28 September 2015 (UTC)

True, however I believe there is no evidence that all recorded performances by Blue Amberol were in the U.S. It would be worth doing a bit more research on the artists and how agreements were made for the recordings and their rights. --Fæ (talk) 04:01, 28 September 2015 (UTC)

well, the w:Edison Records article says produced in ?New Jersey, the london label w: Edison Bell was separate. no london bell recordings on the list. what kind of evidence would you like to see? Slowking4♡Richard Arthur Norton's revenge 04:05, 28 September 2015 (UTC)

What we need for this to be a mass upload project, would be an extended rationale for PD to be laid out for the record on, say, a batch upload project page at COM:BATCH. This would avoid DRs or uncertainty in the years to come, as well as being a place to cross-link to any DRs that do get raised against specific recordings. That a recording was produced on the Blue Amberol Recordings label, does not mean that there can never be any artist rights outside of the USA for all the various performers and composers, or that some recordings were themselves made outside of the USA. --Fæ (talk) 04:11, 28 September 2015 (UTC)

the blue amberol label is a strong indication of first publication in the US before 1923. shouldn't be too hard to find a history book confirming that. you would be hard pressed to find a blue amberol recording first published in Europe, given the difficulty in analog reproduction. they instead exported cylinders. here is the finding aid for the foreign releases of cylinders [5] - library are however saying "Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial 2.5" [6]. Slowking4♡Richard Arthur Norton's revenge 04:18, 28 September 2015 (UTC)

Sound copyrights in the US are a mess. Prior to 1972, there were no federal copyrights on recordings, and they were not brought under federal copyright; they are covered by state copyright, perpetually in all cases I'm familiar with, and will be until 2067, when federal law will sunset those laws. There were some cylinders given to the US Government and released as PD, but otherwise virtually all audio recordings are under copyright.--Prosfilaes (talk) 04:32, 28 September 2015 (UTC)

right m:Wikilegal/Copyright Status of Sound Recordings Fixed Prior to February 15 1972 Slowking4♡Richard Arthur Norton's revenge 04:47, 28 September 2015 (UTC)

but had the archives not put NC on them, then good to go right? we would be relying on them. maybe an email is in order. Slowking4♡Richard Arthur Norton's revenge 02:24, 29 September 2015 (UTC)

We have a category of license templates related to audio. Please see Category:License tags for audio files. If the files fulfill conditions specified in those templates than they should be OK. --Jarekt (talk) 17:04, 29 September 2015 (UTC)

September 28

Public pianos at train stations

In Europe there is a trend to place pianos in the main train stations for members of the public to play on. This is a big succes with the players being generaly of a high level. Could we create a category for this? and to take pictures and move files to the category?Smiley.toerist (talk) 08:50, 28 September 2015 (UTC)

We have "Category:Street pianos" (see also "w:Street piano"), but maybe this category is better used for pianos that are situated in open-air venues. Perhaps the following category tree could be created:

• Pianos in public spaces (parent categories: "Category:Pianos", "Category:Public space")
  • Pianos in airports, Pianos in hotel lobbies, Pianos in shopping malls, Pianos in train stations, Street pianos, etc.
    • Pianos in train stations in [XYZ country], etc.

— SMUconlaw (talk) 09:00, 28 September 2015 (UTC)

Well it should be "railway stations", not "train stations", but I'd be dubious as to whether we really need to disperse this category yet. -mattbuck (Talk) 09:09, 28 September 2015 (UTC)

"Category:Railway stations" is currently a redirect to "Category:Train stations" ... — SMUconlaw (talk) 09:13, 28 September 2015 (UTC)

snow/ice clearing in Lviv

I am scanning and uploading pictures of a wintry Lviv in 2004. How can a classify this vehicle? motorised cart? What is the name of the tool to break the ice? As the drainage was clogged up the snow and ice refroze every evening.Smiley.toerist (talk) 11:07, 28 September 2015 (UTC)

Hi, Smiley.toerist, zou dat een Crowbar (tool) kunnen zijn? Lotje (talk) 12:24, 28 September 2015 (UTC)

It is used as a long chisel (beitel) instead of a crowbar as in pulling out nails or opening boxes. Once it gets between the ice and the pavement, the ice mostly breaks of when its melting. (When its frozen solid on the pavementsurface its no use)Smiley.toerist (talk) 15:39, 28 September 2015 (UTC)

How about Category:Cargo motor trikes for the vehicle? --ghouston (talk) 02:09, 29 September 2015 (UTC)

The tools would probably go in Ice chisels. I think the kind used for ice-fishing tend to have narrower blades than those designed for clearing pavement, but they’re essentially the same.—Odysseus1479 (talk) 06:35, 2 October 2015 (UTC)

Use an existing template or create a new one for UNESCO publication content?

Hi All

Would it be best to create a new one or use an existing template when importing publications (mainly reports and books) from UNESCO to Wikimedia Commons to capture all the metadata? Here are the fields they use:

• Title
• Added title
• Series title
• Series (vol/issue)
• Other language series title
• Authors
• Corporate author
• Imprint
• Edition
• Country
• Year
• Collation
• Original language
• Other languages
• Other language title
• Non-latin script title
• ISSN ISBN
• Document code
• General notes
• Main descriptors
• Secondary descriptors
• Identifiers
• Name of person as subject
• Corporate body as subject
• Meeting as subject
• Meeting
• Meeting session
• Meeting place
• Meeting date
• UNESCO Library Location Documentation Centre call nr.
• Documentation Centre languages
• Internet address
• Nature of contents
• Document type
• Catalog number
• Form of document
• Source code
• URL
• URL Notice

Here's an example, not all publications use all fields

Thanks

John Cummings (talk) 14:28, 28 September 2015 (UTC)

The best existing guidance is at Commons:Guide to batch uploading and checking previous examples of custom templates at Category:Data ingestion layout templates, with the GWT manual being useful. There are no hard community agreed best practices for precisely when to create a custom ingestion template, with some being fans of that workflow and others preferring to fall back on templates that (in years to come) might be easier to reverse engineer with Wikidata.

You could reframe your project and ask a different question by starting with a Wikidata import of your UNESCO data, then thinking about how to use that to populate image pages on Commons automatically.

As highlighted by others in the threads and email discussions you have created about this same project, mass importing raw documents to Wikimedia Commons may be out of scope and become controversial.

Taking the example document given above of over 300 pages:

1. there is one photograph (the cover) where the photographer does not seem attributed, this would be more useful uploaded as a jpg for illustrative reuse
2. there are some small icons in black and white, which appear too poor quality to be useful to extract
3. there are a couple of charts, which might have educational use if extracted and given the context of their source data
4. the rest of the document is pure text which could be made available on Wikisource in a more easily reusable format than the pdf given
5. the document's license is given as all rights reserved within itself, and co-copyrighted with Akhtar Soomro (presumably a UNESCO employee at the time, but this is not stated). This is confusing when compared to the CC-BY-SA-3.0 as UNESDOC

--Fæ (talk) 14:54, 28 September 2015 (UTC)

@John Cummings: before you start uploading, how are these files in scope? The example you gave seems to be one cover photo and rest all text. Multichill (talk) 18:28, 28 September 2015 (UTC)

They're at least arguably material for Wikisource.--Prosfilaes (talk) 23:53, 28 September 2015 (UTC)

Thanks for your suggestions, as Prosfilaes says, I think that all the publications will be useful for Wikisource, additionally many of the publications also include multimedia content so the content included will be useful for Wikipedia etc. I'll be running other trials shortly with other content that will be a more obvious fit for multiple Wikimedia projects. Cheers John Cummings (talk) 14:02, 29 September 2015 (UTC)

John, maybe you can get some stuff from the UNESCO photo library? Multichill (talk) 20:20, 1 October 2015 (UTC)

Reimagining WMF grants report

(My apologies for using English here, please help translate if you are able.)

Last month, we asked for community feedback on a proposal to change the structure of WMF grant programs. Thanks to the 200+ people who participated! A report on what we learned and changed based on this consultation is now available.

Come read about the findings and next steps as WMF’s Community Resources team begins to implement changes based on your feedback. Your questions and comments are welcome on the outcomes discussion page.

With thanks, I JethroBT (WMF) 16:56, 28 September 2015 (UTC)

@I JethroBT (WMF): There is too much text, i fail to see how to request a grant for example (i don't need a grant, just curious). I also fail to see where to discuss existing grant request. Too much text, too less simple english. Sometimes less is moor. --Steinsplitter (talk) 13:35, 1 October 2015 (UTC)

September 29

Commons featured cover images?

Since we have Category:Commons featured desktop backgrounds, is there any way to make a list of featured images in vertical orientation, say between 1.29 (US letter) and 1.5 (6" x 9") (with 1.414 being the international standard An ratio)? Maybe a little wider; 1.2 to 1.6 would get everything on File:Comparison book sizes.svg and File:GOST 5773-90 book sizes 1to1 scale.svg at first glance. It could be done as a bot run, but I'd be happy to see how to do it automatically, or just somebody make a list.--Prosfilaes (talk) 05:54, 29 September 2015 (UTC)

What's your intention? That the images get used on book or magazine covers? Such an image is quite likely to be cropped and arranged such that a plain bit (e.g., sky) is located where the title/author or other text appears. The image doesn't even have to fill the cover space. I don't think the source-image aspect ratio is particularly important. -- Colin (talk) 07:03, 29 September 2015 (UTC)

But the image doesn't have to fill the space on a desktop background, either, and there's certainly an option to crop desktop backgrounds. Pretty much anything in the featured desktop backgrounds is going to be very hard to use to fill a full-page cover; File:1928 Model A Ford.jpg, for one example, can't be cropped to come close. I don't want to see the perfect to be the enemy of the good here.--Prosfilaes (talk) 20:57, 29 September 2015 (UTC)

Batch uploader for inexperienced users: new tool project using Excel spreadsheets

Hi,

Please take a look at this project by Yarl of a new tool for performing simple batch uploads - Batch uploader for small GLAM projects. This is meant as a tool for small-to-medium batch uploads by GLAM institutions, cultural centres and other parties who find the Upload Wizard too limited (it is not possible to provide adequate file descriptions, easily incorporate Artwork fields at the stage of upload...) and the GWT too complex. Please look at the proposal and feel free to comment. Thanks! --Marta Malina Moraczewska (talk) 21:17, 29 September 2015 (UTC)

This looks like a very interesting project; I like especially the approach of gathering speadsheet-entered or -compiled data. I’m usually very sceptical, even suspicious, of such projects, but this one looks like a good thing: Well thought out and likely to improve the contents of Commons and the make the best of volonteers’ time. -- Tuválkin ✉ ✇ 23:23, 29 September 2015 (UTC)

September 30

What to do with German Stamps?

We have several license templates related to German stamps:

• Template:PD-DBZ_stamps
• Template:PD-Deutsche_Bundespost_Berlin_stamps
• Template:PD-Deutsche_Bundespost_stamps
• Template:PD-German_Empire_stamps
• Template:PD-German_stamps

and over 9 thousand files that use those templates. All of those templates are marked as "NOT in the public domain". We have Commons:WikiProject Public Domain/German stamps review process which stalled about 3 years ago. We have m:Wikilegal/Copyright of Images in German Postage Stamps saying that "Copyright law is complex" and not much more.We also have plenty of discussions on the subject here, here or here. Is anybody still working on reviewing those files? and if not than what shall we do with all the files still left? A DR for 9k files seems a little drastic... --Jarekt (talk) 20:23, 30 September 2015 (UTC)

• I think that the stamps will have to be reviewed and nominated individually. Some of the {{PD-German Empire stamps}} files will qualify for {{PD-old-70}} because the stamp designer died long ago, some stamps reuse old artworks and some are {{PD-ineligible}}. I suggest keeping the templates for now until all stamps either have been deleted or retagged as something else. --Stefan4 (talk) 20:42, 30 September 2015 (UTC)

Any stamp should be considered an official work on behalf of the state-owned post (BRD/DDR and earlier german post stamps). This changed in 1995 when it became a shareholder company so any stamp from 1995 or later should not be an official work. --Denniss (talk) 21:08, 30 September 2015 (UTC)

Commons:WikiProject Public Domain/German stamps review reveals that the 'official work' exception only applies to text but not to images, so it is irrelevant whether the post was part of a government or not. --Stefan4 (talk) 22:31, 30 September 2015 (UTC)

This court ruling is only applicacable to DPAG stamps, not to older stamps issued by Bundespost or older/other government agencies. --Denniss (talk) 07:39, 1 October 2015 (UTC)

The court ruling is applicable to § 5 Abs. 1 UrhG, on which all of the templates are based: "the Landgericht Berlin decided that § 5 Abs. 1 UrhG only applies for literary works (Sprachwerke) and not for works of the visual arts (Werke der bildenden Kunst)" (quote from Commons:WikiProject Public Domain/German stamps review). Furthermore, the ruling is also applicable to {{PD-GermanGov}}, which is also based on § 5 Abs. 1 UrhG. Since § 5 Abs. 1 UrhG only applies to literary works, none of the templates can be used for artworks. --Stefan4 (talk) 11:18, 1 October 2015 (UTC)

In the old days, stamp illustrations were "defaced" which then made them usable in publications. At first the defacement was a wide white line through the stamp, but generally now is just a black line through the denomination of the stamp. Collect (talk) 23:28, 30 September 2015 (UTC)

That's because the postal services don't like forged stamps. It's a non-copyright restriction. --Stefan4 (talk) 11:18, 1 October 2015 (UTC)

A mass deletion request for several thousand stamps is exactly what could've happened in 2012. Opting for an individual review process was a compromise between deleting and keeping files. As you might imagine, reviewing copyright for German stamps was and is done by a limited number of users. Therefore few stamps were reviewed in the last three years and the larger portion of unreviewed stamps remain. The stamps were uploaded by individual users, all assigning public domain status based on §5 of German copyright law. In the past we've seen a number of batch uploads with third parties (usually cultural institutions) assessing a certain copyright status for their uploads as well. No individual copyright assessment is done in both cases. In the case of batch uploads user reviews and error report systems allowed to identify some files didn't meet our copyright policies (e.g. they are not yet in the public domain) and had to be deleted in the process. The German stamps are different in that no single third party vouches for their copyright assessment, but a number of individual users did when they initially uploaded these files. The question is if we want to treat German stamps different than any batch upload when it comes to copyright assessment of individual files. A mass deletion request would result in a lot of false positives and is neither reasonable nor productive. My impression was that we came to this conclusion in 2012 already and therefore didn't follow through with this idea. Individual deletion requests for several thousand files would create an immense backlog and will occupy a lot of users for a long time. Moreover I think it's unlikely that these individual requests would get the attention they require, unless someone has a couple of experts on German stamps and copyright hidden somewhere. I can understand the urge to do something about this pile of unreviewed files. A modus vivendi could be to nominate smaller batches for deletion at a time. Say a couple of dozen individual deletion requests simultaneously. Regards, Christoph Braun (talk) 23:57, 30 September 2015 (UTC)

OK so lets go through "individual review process". I nominated files that failed the review for deletion at Commons:Deletion requests/Stamps in Category:German stamps review delete. We should probably have occasional mass deletion requests, for small (50-100) batches of files, so the process continues. --Jarekt (talk) 12:57, 1 October 2015 (UTC)

October 01

Where could I find related slides?

Hello,

Looking at File:Wikimania 2015 - Edward Zalta.webm, I would be interested to have the corresponding slides. Do we have them somewhere? If no, any idea how to get in touch with the lecturer or any relevant person and ask to upload it? --Psychoslave (talk) 09:51, 1 October 2015 (UTC)

• Zalta is Senior Research Scholar at the Center for the Study of Language and Information (CSLI) at Stanford University. I suggest you contact him there. - Jmabel ! talk 15:30, 1 October 2015 (UTC)

Scan of a book cover released in 1929

Hi - someone may be kind enough to recommend a license tag for a scan of a French cooking book released in 1929. -- MaxxL - talk 12:10, 1 October 2015 (UTC)

You have to presume it's all rights reserved, unless you know a bit more about the author(s) and how old they are or when they died. --Fæ (talk) 12:14, 1 October 2015 (UTC)

That's all we know: "E. Sant'Angelo remains an enigma (it is not known their dates of birth and death), but we enjoy flipping through the pages 1280 - 1.3kg, weighed - its Cookbook." -- MaxxL - talk 12:29, 1 October 2015 (UTC)

It could depend on the nature of the cover - if it's just the title of the book and the name of the author in a standard typographic font, then it's probably not copyrightable (certainly not under United States law). If there's an illustration on the cover, it could depend on the status of the illustration author (not necessarily the same as the cookbook author). AnonMoos (talk) 12:33, 1 October 2015 (UTC)

Second choice would be this cover without any grafics. -- MaxxL - talk 12:43, 1 October 2015 (UTC)

Such a cover would be {{PD-ineligible}}. Regards, Yann (talk) 13:09, 1 October 2015 (UTC)

Thanks a lot -- MaxxL - talk 13:17, 1 October 2015 (UTC)

Category Marian Marion Dickerman

Hello. Earlier today I moved a category from Marion Dickerman to Marian Dickerman, since virtually all of the NARA image file descriptions had her first name spelled in that way. I've since determined (via Blanche Wiesen Cook's biography of Eleanor Roosevelt) that her first name is correctly spelled with an O rather than an A. I'm unable to move the category back, and rather than muck things up any further I'm here asking that someone do that. The correct name is Marion Dickerman. I'll clean up the category names on the image files after the move back, of course. Thank you. — WFinch (talk) 21:34, 1 October 2015 (UTC)

• Done, but this was simply a bunch of file edits; I can't think what here you might not have been able to do. What were you prevented from doing? - Jmabel ! talk 22:58, 1 October 2015 (UTC)
  • I was trying to move the category a second time, from the Marian Dickerman back to Marion Dickerman, and after submitting it I got a red alert notice telling me I didn't have the authority. I was a little puzzled since I've moved things over redirects on Wikipedia, but this was a first for me at Commons so I didn't want to push it. I'll use more caution when reading NARA file names and descriptions, I promise. Thanks for your help. — WFinch (talk) 23:19, 1 October 2015 (UTC)

October 02

Why do 6% of all Commons images get uploaded with no text?

I have been making a fuss about finding that 0.3% of my uploads have been created with no text pages since the weekend, due to a apparent unknown WMF operational glitch (phabricator:T113878). However, on investigating the numbers more widely for how often images are uploaded to the project with no initial description, I was completely astonished to find over 1/20 images starts out with a blank page. The numbers have been hovering at 5% to 7% over the last two years:

Count of images uploaded with blank text pages since 2014
+-------+--------+-------+---------+
| Empty | Total  | Ratio | Date    |
+-------+--------+-------+---------+
| 16815 | 274167 | 6.13% | 2014-01 |
| 16724 | 280361 | 5.97% | 2014-02 |
| 23763 | 330847 | 7.18% | 2014-03 |
| 21041 | 347804 | 6.05% | 2014-04 |
| 31505 | 400109 | 7.87% | 2014-05 |
| 23422 | 330580 | 7.09% | 2014-06 |
| 26597 | 501389 | 5.30% | 2014-07 |
| 20937 | 461944 | 4.53% | 2014-08 |
| 31159 | 556161 | 5.60% | 2014-09 |
| 38821 | 502623 | 7.72% | 2014-10 |
| 19844 | 340082 | 5.84% | 2014-11 |
| 18789 | 347873 | 5.40% | 2014-12 |
| 15593 | 317435 | 4.91% | 2015-01 |
| 16583 | 326198 | 5.08% | 2015-02 |
| 24271 | 400304 | 6.06% | 2015-03 |
| 25536 | 373784 | 6.83% | 2015-04 |
| 31919 | 522749 | 6.11% | 2015-05 |
| 21764 | 430148 | 5.06% | 2015-06 |
| 25758 | 522582 | 4.93% | 2015-07 |
| 38971 | 589282 | 6.61% | 2015-08 |
| 47666 | 867802 | 5.49% | 2015-09 |
+-------+--------+-------+---------+

Can anyone work out why so many uploads start out blank, and if there might be ways of decreasing this number, on the presumption that a significant proportion of these must create work for volunteers to repair them? I'm half expecting to discover that one of our popular upload tools does its uploads in a weirdly unexpected way. Thanks --Fæ (talk) 01:00, 2 October 2015 (UTC)

Flickr importing in UploadWizard no longer limited to 50 images

Tracked in Phabricator
Task T44979

The Flickr importing in UploadWizard used to be limited to 50 images. Now it's limited to 500 images (which is actually a limitation imposed by Flickr, not by UploadWizard). If you would like the ability to import Flickr images via the UploadWizard, please apply for the right at Commons:License review/requests. Kaldari (talk) 01:25, 2 October 2015 (UTC)

User:Wikimedia Commons Welcome marking new page creations as minor edits

I thought the ability to create new pages and at the same time classify your edit as "minor" has been disabled on MediaWiki, as there is no checkbox to do so. However, apparently the welcoming bot is able to create new pages and mark them as minor edits, which shouldn't be happening. Could someone please fix the welcoming bot to not do so? Gparyani (talk) 01:28, 2 October 2015 (UTC)

I don't see any problems for welcoming bot to have creations as minor. Besides, it's a MediaWiki extension working on the servers, so what it can do is not limited to what checkboxes we can see or what api options there is. --Zhuyifei1999 (talk) 02:51, 2 October 2015 (UTC)

Any API to get Commons categories that are near a particular latitude/longitude?

I have a coordinate, and I want to know what categories are nearby.

For instance, for 40.7576,-73.9857 I would get [[Category:Times Square]] and probably [[Category:Broadway]] and a few others nearby.

Is there an API that gives this?

If not, is there a way to get the same via several APIs calls? 50% of false positives is OK. Using third-party APIs is OK.

A problem is that {{Object location|40.75773|-73.985708}}-type tags are not widely used, many place-related categories lack it, so a trick could to serach for nearby pictures and then take the categories of these pictures, any better idea?

Thanks a lot! Syced (talk) 05:01, 2 October 2015 (UTC)

The President Delivers a Statement on the Shooting in Oregon

• File:The President Delivers a Statement on the Shooting in Oregon.ogv

I was unable to upload a larger, higher quality file.

If anyone can upload the highest quality file available to that file page (or to another separate file page with the WEBM extension), that would be most appreciated.

Thank you,

-- Cirt (talk) 05:14, 2 October 2015 (UTC)