On 9/6/06, Brianna Laugher brianna.laugher@gmail.com wrote:
On 06/09/06, Anthony wikilegal@inbox.org wrote:
Anyway, thinking about this more I have to say that providing free images for people to use on their bottles of dish detergent is at least currently outside the scope of Wikimedia.
So you propose to change (or make more specific) the [[Commons:Project scope]]. I am not necessarily opposed to that either. I just dislike living in perpetual limbo-land and with the lack of guidance from on-high, making concrete policies is one way to resolve it.
Actually, I don't see anything in the project scope that needs to be changed. It says it right in the project scope: commons is for media that is "useful for some Wikimedia project". The purpose is not to collect images to use on your products.
But anyway, I note that we've (the collective Wikimedia community, that is) abolished WikipediaOnly permissions. Do you support that or not?
Yes, I support that.
Because you can use those in Wikipedia et al, yet we require stronger permissions.
You can legally use them in Wikipedia, but you can't use them in any other encyclopedia. That's the problem. Furthermore, they *are* banned from Wikipedia, not just the commons. Trademarked images *aren't* banned from Wikipedia. Do you think they should be?
We also abolished non-commercial (NC) clauses, even though Wikipedia itself is a non-commercial enterprise. Do you support that?
Actually I think it's debatable whether or not Wikipedia is a non-commercial enterprise. They're non-profit, but they do engage in commerce under the definition in US law. But anyway, I'd go back to my comment about Wikipedia-only permissions. NC-only images are banned in Wikipedia, not just commons.
I am not trying to be paranoid here, but I feel uneasy that we recognise a (2D) video cover design is not free and yet somehow we accept the infamous "Pringles photo" ( http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:Pringles_(aka).jpg ) simply because the original object is 3D. And also http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:BibelTV-logo.jpg ... doesn't seem quite right.
Brianna
IMO the Pringles photo is restricted by copyright and is not free. The pringles can design is a 2D work which is not freely licensed.
The Bibel TV logo is trickier. I think it's a borderline case, because it's somewhat free in many jurisdictions. But this has far more to do with copyright law than it does with trademark law.
In what jurisdictions is it legal to put the Bibel TV logo in an encyclopedia article? Presumably Germany (not copyrightable) and the United States (fair use), but I don't know the complete answer to this question, and I think the answer to it is the key to whether or not it's an acceptable image.
Anthony