Sure. Actually the New York chapter probably sends some press releases to US media too; I'm not sure.
------Original Message------ From: Thomas Dalton To: susanpgardner@gmail.com To: Wikimedia Foundation Mailing List Sent: Jul 11, 2009 10:41 AM Subject: Re: [Foundation-l] About that "sue and be damned" to the NationalPortrait Gallery ...
2009/7/11 Sue Gardner susanpgardner@gmail.com:
Point of clarification -- the Wikimedia Foundation sends out press releases to international media, not just US media. We have no plans to send out a press release on this issue.
Of course, what I meant was that only the WMF sends press releases to US media, not that the WMF only sends press releases to US media.
Local chapters can say something about whats going on, they can't make claims on behalf of others, but they can interpret written statements like any other blogger or news outlet. Just remember that wmf sends press releases on behalf of wmf, nobody else do that.
John
Sue Gardner wrote:
Sure. Actually the New York chapter probably sends some press releases to US media too; I'm not sure.
------Original Message------ From: Thomas Dalton To: susanpgardner@gmail.com To: Wikimedia Foundation Mailing List Sent: Jul 11, 2009 10:41 AM Subject: Re: [Foundation-l] About that "sue and be damned" to the NationalPortrait Gallery ...
2009/7/11 Sue Gardner susanpgardner@gmail.com:
Point of clarification -- the Wikimedia Foundation sends out press releases to international media, not just US media. We have no plans to send out a press release on this issue.
Of course, what I meant was that only the WMF sends press releases to US media, not that the WMF only sends press releases to US media.
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2009/7/11 John at Darkstar vacuum@jeb.no:
Local chapters can say something about whats going on, they can't make claims on behalf of others, but they can interpret written statements like any other blogger or news outlet. Just remember that wmf sends press releases on behalf of wmf, nobody else do that.
That doesn't mean it is a responsible thing to do. This case could bankrupt a member of our community, it has to be handled with care.
John at Darkstar wrote:
Local chapters can say something about whats going on, they can't make claims on behalf of others, but they can interpret written statements like any other blogger or news outlet. Just remember that wmf sends press releases on behalf of wmf, nobody else do that.
Where the Norwegian chapter can be helpful is in letting us know how such a thing might play out if we were concerned with pictures from Norway's national gallery.
Ec
Where the Norwegian chapter can be helpful is in letting us know how such a thing might play out if we were concerned with pictures from Norway's national gallery.
Ec
I guess you are speaking about GalleriNOR, which is a joint effort between Nasjonalbiblioteket and Norsk Folkemuseum. Sorry for my rotten english, but I guess the information is more important than the grammr! ;)
In the case of GalleriNOR several people uploaded images from the site without prior agreement with neither NB nor NF. After a while I get in touch with them and asked how we should handle the case, what people believed was the right thing to do from our side and what NB and NF wanted to do. First the stand was established as "the images must be deleted" and "we don't want to delete them", then we said "okey we will attempt to get them deleted through due process - but hey, how much of the traffic come from our site?" Then things get a bit amusing. The thing is, about 60% of the traffic originates from Wikimedia Commons and with the additional internal traffic generated from this we probably generates over 80% of the traffic on the site. This isn't neglible amouths of traffic on a site, removing the images on Commons would pull the plug on the majority of the traffic.
So the situation are they said they would not claim copyright on their own copies of works in public domain. The wording in Norwegian is slightly different but the net effect is about the same. They would although forward any claim on copyright that isn't in the public domain as no doing that would put them in an awkward position. Photographers that are clearly dead early enough for the law to apply would not be a problem, that is Axel Lindahl.[2] Photographers that died later and are in the "snapshot category" compared to the "work of art" are difficult. Typically this is Anders Beer Wilse.[3] The fist has a shorter time limit before they go into public domain. Our "understanding" is that we may claim a photo to be a snapshot but we may get a notice that a specific image is a work of art. In that case - woopsie, our fault, we start the process to remove it, no problem. We can't although get a written statement upfront from them wetter a specific photo is a snapshot or not simply because they are not in a position to make such a statement, its something the heirs has to agree upon, and probably the court if so. In that case we have more than enogh time to remove the images.
As a note, for the moment there is quite a lot of images uploaded that are taken by Wilse, and I think they should be carefully examined to verify that none of them are in the category "work of art". It would be a shame if we upload images that creates trouble between us and NB/NF. Probably we need a writeup about some general guidelines, but if we can do without such a guideline it would be better.
NB/NF are asked if they want to join us in some future talks about how such images can be better utilized. For them it is a real bonus to get the traffic, especially that the images are of fixed resolution on Commons, as that makes it possible for them to add services to their own site, like selling copies of higher resolution. Sometimes it seems like people forget that we must cooperate with the museums and galleries to create a win-win -situation.
One of the things they are very eager on is to be able to add additional information to the images. When we add photos to an article on Wikipedia that will create additional information about it. Admins on Commons isn't very eager to utilize that additional information, but that is a prime selling point for those kind of pictures. I guess we need to really rethink how we can utilize the new world of mashable sites. How can GalleriNOR rip out the information we add to the images and reuse that on their own site?
A few days ago there was a contest in the newspaper (website only) ABC Nyheter where photos by Carl Curman owned by Riksantikvarieämbetet was localized.[4] Those images were from about 1890. Within hours they were pinpointed to locations in Valdres, Norway. This is extremely valuable for museums as images suddenly become part of history.
[1]http://www.nb.no/gallerinor/ [2]http://www.nb.no/gallerinor/fotografer/lindal.php [3]http://www.nb.no/gallerinor/fotografer/ab_wilse.php [4]http://www.abcnyheter.no/node/90741
John Erling Blad Wikimedia Norway
2009/7/11 John at Darkstar vacuum@jeb.no:
In the case of GalleriNOR several people uploaded images from the site without prior agreement with neither NB nor NF. After a while I get in touch with them and asked how we should handle the case, what people believed was the right thing to do from our side and what NB and NF wanted to do. First the stand was established as "the images must be deleted" and "we don't want to delete them", then we said "okey we will attempt to get them deleted through due process - but hey, how much of the traffic come from our site?" Then things get a bit amusing. The thing is, about 60% of the traffic originates from Wikimedia Commons and with the additional internal traffic generated from this we probably generates over 80% of the traffic on the site. This isn't neglible amouths of traffic on a site, removing the images on Commons would pull the plug on the majority of the traffic.
:-D
We should ask the NPG about their website traffic ;-)
Do all NPG images have a link back? They should.
- d.
David Gerard wrote:
2009/7/11 John at Darkstar vacuum@jeb.no:
In the case of GalleriNOR several people uploaded images from the site without prior agreement with neither NB nor NF. After a while I get in touch with them and asked how we should handle the case, what people believed was the right thing to do from our side and what NB and NF wanted to do. First the stand was established as "the images must be deleted" and "we don't want to delete them", then we said "okey we will attempt to get them deleted through due process - but hey, how much of the traffic come from our site?" Then things get a bit amusing. The thing is, about 60% of the traffic originates from Wikimedia Commons and with the additional internal traffic generated from this we probably generates over 80% of the traffic on the site. This isn't neglible amouths of traffic on a site, removing the images on Commons would pull the plug on the majority of the traffic.
:-D
We should ask the NPG about their website traffic ;-)
Well, their site had a problem after the story has appeared on Slashdot.
Do all NPG images have a link back? They should.
Yes, they have a link with this template http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Template:SourceNPGLondon
- d.
Yann
Isn't it the best thing to remove the images, like they demand, and let someone from the UK Wikimedia foundation contact them about the part where they are saying "Our client remains willing to enter into a dialogue with the Wikimedia Foundation to discuss terms upon which low-resolution images of paintings in its collection can be made available on the Wikipedia website and our client will continue to write to the Wikimedia Foundation with requests for discussion. However, to date, the Wikimedia Foundation has ignored our client’s attempts to negotiate this issue, preferring instead to take a more harsh approach that one would expect of a corporate entity."... It looks to me they want to do it for free, if you put some notice amongst the picture.
They only thing that I don't understand is that they claim that no-one from the wikimedia foundation ever responded to this. Is there any reason for this?
2009/7/11 David Gerard dgerard@gmail.com
2009/7/11 John at Darkstar vacuum@jeb.no:
In the case of GalleriNOR several people uploaded images from the site without prior agreement with neither NB nor NF. After a while I get in touch with them and asked how we should handle the case, what people believed was the right thing to do from our side and what NB and NF wanted to do. First the stand was established as "the images must be deleted" and "we don't want to delete them", then we said "okey we will attempt to get them deleted through due process - but hey, how much of the traffic come from our site?" Then things get a bit amusing. The thing is, about 60% of the traffic originates from Wikimedia Commons and with the additional internal traffic generated from this we probably generates over 80% of the traffic on the site. This isn't neglible amouths of traffic on a site, removing the images on Commons would pull the plug on the majority of the traffic.
:-D
We should ask the NPG about their website traffic ;-)
Do all NPG images have a link back? They should.
- d.
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2009/7/11 Tom Maaswinkel tom.maaswinkel@12wiki.eu:
Isn't it the best thing to remove the images, like they demand, and let someone from the UK Wikimedia foundation contact them about the part where they are saying "Our client remains willing to enter into a dialogue with the Wikimedia Foundation to discuss terms upon which low-resolution images of paintings in its collection can be made available on the Wikipedia website and our client will continue to write to the Wikimedia Foundation with requests for discussion. However, to date, the Wikimedia Foundation has ignored our client’s attempts to negotiate this issue, preferring instead to take a more harsh approach that one would expect of a corporate entity."... It looks to me they want to do it for free, if you put some notice amongst the picture.
This is something to ask directly.
- d.
On Sat, Jul 11, 2009 at 5:49 PM, Tom Maaswinkeltom.maaswinkel@12wiki.eu wrote: [snip]
They only thing that I don't understand is that they claim that no-one from the wikimedia foundation ever responded to this. Is there any reason for this?
That isn't what they claimed.
They claimed: "Our client contacted the Wikimedia Foundation in April 2009 to request that the images be removed but the Wikimedia Foundation has refused to do so […]"
The initial complaint (OTRS #2009060110061897 for those with access) was made by a commercial partner (in the US) of the NPG, and was the typically legally uninformed nonsense that comes in often enough to have a boilerplate reply. They were given the standard "Wikimedia and it's servers are based in the US. Under US law such images are public domain per Bridgeman Art Library v. Corel Corp. Therefore no permission is required to use them." response. Presumably the commercial vendor got the NPG to make the legal threat under UK law because we adequately expressed that there was clearly no copyright concern under US law.
They also stated: "However, to date, the Wikimedia Foundation has ignored our client’s attempts to negotiate this issue, preferring instead to take a more harsh approach that one would expect of a corporate entity."
Please— allow me to translate: "We're confused. We're used to dealing with organizations like YouTube who will roll over instantly even for the most obvious cases of CopyFraud. Why wont you play along with our effort to lock up and monetize the public domain?"
Thank you, Wikimedia Foundation, for not being yet another Web 2.0 get rich quick scheme.
On Sat, Jul 11, 2009 at 6:17 PM, Gregory Maxwellgmaxwell@gmail.com wrote:
On Sat, Jul 11, 2009 at 5:49 PM, Tom Maaswinkeltom.maaswinkel@12wiki.eu wrote: [snip]
They only thing that I don't understand is that they claim that no-one from the wikimedia foundation ever responded to this. Is there any reason for this?
That isn't what they claimed.
They claimed: "Our client contacted the Wikimedia Foundation in April 2009 to request that the images be removed but the Wikimedia Foundation has refused to do so […]"
The initial complaint (OTRS #2009060110061897 for those with access) was made by a commercial partner (in the US) of the NPG, and was the typically legally uninformed nonsense that comes in often enough to have a boilerplate reply. They were given the standard "Wikimedia and it's servers are based in the US. Under US law such images are public domain per Bridgeman Art Library v. Corel Corp. Therefore no permission is required to use them." response. Presumably the commercial vendor got the NPG to make the legal threat under UK law because we adequately expressed that there was clearly no copyright concern under US law.
For clarity sake I should point out that the neither the complaint to Wikimedia, nor the response to the OTRS reply, included any offer of compromise.
In the past these kinds of arrangements have been negotiated. But escalating with legal force makes a sham of any good faith effort to negotiate, sadly.
As a practical matter, and a matter of principle, we can't accept that people can take exclusive ownership of the public domain simply by performing a little dance. Nor can we accept that UK law can be imposed on the Wikimedia Foundation or its US contributors, as under UK law our projects could likely not exist for a even day.
On Sat, Jul 11, 2009 at 6:42 PM, Gregory Maxwellgmaxwell@gmail.com wrote: [snip]
For clarity sake I should point out that the neither the complaint to Wikimedia, nor the response to the OTRS reply, included any offer of compromise.
Also worth mentioning is that a copyright complaint by the NPG in 2006 where the initial response from our side was "What we're doing is permitted by US law" was satisfactorily resolved by providing attribution and back-links on the image page.
I suspect the increasing number of commercial partnerships to provide access to PD works is moving the bar and sending some webtraffic and attribution is no longer competitive with with others are able to offer providing that the content can be locked up and exclusive access assured.
What an insult, Derrick only rates a solicitor
________________________________ From: Gregory Maxwell gmaxwell@gmail.com To: Wikimedia Foundation Mailing List foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Sent: Saturday, July 11, 2009 3:17:50 PM Subject: Re: [Foundation-l] About that "sue and be damned" to the NationalPortrait Gallery ...
On Sat, Jul 11, 2009 at 5:49 PM, Tom Maaswinkeltom.maaswinkel@12wiki.eu wrote: [snip]
They only thing that I don't understand is that they claim that no-one from the wikimedia foundation ever responded to this. Is there any reason for this?
That isn't what they claimed.
They claimed: "Our client contacted the Wikimedia Foundation in April 2009 to request that the images be removed but the Wikimedia Foundation has refused to do so […]"
The initial complaint (OTRS #2009060110061897 for those with access) was made by a commercial partner (in the US) of the NPG, and was the typically legally uninformed nonsense that comes in often enough to have a boilerplate reply. They were given the standard "Wikimedia and it's servers are based in the US. Under US law such images are public domain per Bridgeman Art Library v. Corel Corp. Therefore no permission is required to use them." response. Presumably the commercial vendor got the NPG to make the legal threat under UK law because we adequately expressed that there was clearly no copyright concern under US law.
They also stated: "However, to date, the Wikimedia Foundation has ignored our client’s attempts to negotiate this issue, preferring instead to take a more harsh approach that one would expect of a corporate entity."
Please— allow me to translate: "We're confused. We're used to dealing with organizations like YouTube who will roll over instantly even for the most obvious cases of CopyFraud. Why wont you play along with our effort to lock up and monetize the public domain?"
Thank you, Wikimedia Foundation, for not being yet another Web 2.0 get rich quick scheme.
_______________________________________________ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
Hoi, Please explain why would Derrick rate a solicitor ? Thanks, GerardM
2009/7/12 Geoffrey Plourde geo.plrd@yahoo.com
What an insult, Derrick only rates a solicitor
From: Gregory Maxwell gmaxwell@gmail.com To: Wikimedia Foundation Mailing List foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Sent: Saturday, July 11, 2009 3:17:50 PM Subject: Re: [Foundation-l] About that "sue and be damned" to the NationalPortrait Gallery ...
On Sat, Jul 11, 2009 at 5:49 PM, Tom Maaswinkeltom.maaswinkel@12wiki.eu wrote: [snip]
They only thing that I don't understand is that they claim that no-one
from
the wikimedia foundation ever responded to this. Is there any reason for this?
That isn't what they claimed.
They claimed: "Our client contacted the Wikimedia Foundation in April 2009 to request that the images be removed but the Wikimedia Foundation has refused to do so […]"
The initial complaint (OTRS #2009060110061897 for those with access) was made by a commercial partner (in the US) of the NPG, and was the typically legally uninformed nonsense that comes in often enough to have a boilerplate reply. They were given the standard "Wikimedia and it's servers are based in the US. Under US law such images are public domain per Bridgeman Art Library v. Corel Corp. Therefore no permission is required to use them." response. Presumably the commercial vendor got the NPG to make the legal threat under UK law because we adequately expressed that there was clearly no copyright concern under US law.
They also stated: "However, to date, the Wikimedia Foundation has ignored our client’s attempts to negotiate this issue, preferring instead to take a more harsh approach that one would expect of a corporate entity."
Please— allow me to translate: "We're confused. We're used to dealing with organizations like YouTube who will roll over instantly even for the most obvious cases of CopyFraud. Why wont you play along with our effort to lock up and monetize the public domain?"
Thank you, Wikimedia Foundation, for not being yet another Web 2.0 get rich quick scheme.
foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
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2009/7/12 Geoffrey Plourde geo.plrd@yahoo.com:
What an insult, Derrick only rates a solicitor
As opposed to a barrister? You're mistaken; solicitors would be involved in such matters before going to court. Barristers would only be instructed by the solicitors when they were going to court (or, conceivably, to consider a point of law; hiring an expensive silk for a day can be a relatively cheap way of settling such points).
J.
2009/7/12 Gregory Maxwell gmaxwell@gmail.com On Sat, Jul 11, 2009 at 5:49 PM, Tom Maaswinkel<tom.maaswinkel@
12wiki.eu> wrote: [snip]
They only thing that I don't understand is that they claim that no-one
from
the wikimedia foundation ever responded to this. Is there any reason for this?
That isn't what they claimed.
They claimed: "Our client contacted the Wikimedia Foundation in April 2009 to request that the images be removed but the Wikimedia Foundation has refused to do so […]"
The part I am talking about is the part where they say that they want to talk to the Wikimedia Fundation to have a discussion about making low-resolution images of paintings in its collection available!
2009/7/12 Gregory Maxwell gmaxwell@gmail.com
On Sat, Jul 11, 2009 at 5:49 PM, Tom Maaswinkeltom.maaswinkel@12wiki.eu wrote: [snip]
They only thing that I don't understand is that they claim that no-one
from
the wikimedia foundation ever responded to this. Is there any reason for this?
That isn't what they claimed.
They claimed: "Our client contacted the Wikimedia Foundation in April 2009 to request that the images be removed but the Wikimedia Foundation has refused to do so […]"
The initial complaint (OTRS #2009060110061897 for those with access) was made by a commercial partner (in the US) of the NPG, and was the typically legally uninformed nonsense that comes in often enough to have a boilerplate reply. They were given the standard "Wikimedia and it's servers are based in the US. Under US law such images are public domain per Bridgeman Art Library v. Corel Corp. Therefore no permission is required to use them." response. Presumably the commercial vendor got the NPG to make the legal threat under UK law because we adequately expressed that there was clearly no copyright concern under US law.
They also stated: "However, to date, the Wikimedia Foundation has ignored our client’s attempts to negotiate this issue, preferring instead to take a more harsh approach that one would expect of a corporate entity."
Please— allow me to translate: "We're confused. We're used to dealing with organizations like YouTube who will roll over instantly even for the most obvious cases of CopyFraud. Why wont you play along with our effort to lock up and monetize the public domain?"
Thank you, Wikimedia Foundation, for not being yet another Web 2.0 get rich quick scheme.
foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
On Sun, Jul 12, 2009 at 2:11 AM, Tom Maaswinkeltom.maaswinkel@12wiki.eu wrote:
The part I am talking about is the part where they say that they want to talk to the Wikimedia Fundation to have a discussion about making low-resolution images of paintings in its collection available!
Incidentally, the NPG appears to have removed the zoomify feature from their website (or at least it wasn't present on the sample of images I looked at). As a result, it would appear that WMF presently has more detailed images on Commons than are available in any form on NPG's website. In the typical case, our images appear to be 3 or 4 times larger in linear dimension than the largest view they currently make available.
-Robert Rohde
2009/7/12 Robert Rohde rarohde@gmail.com:
On Sun, Jul 12, 2009 at 2:11 AM, Tom Maaswinkeltom.maaswinkel@12wiki.eu wrote:
The part I am talking about is the part where they say that they want to talk to the Wikimedia Fundation to have a discussion about making low-resolution images of paintings in its collection available!
Incidentally, the NPG appears to have removed the zoomify feature from their website (or at least it wasn't present on the sample of images I looked at). As a result, it would appear that WMF presently has more detailed images on Commons than are available in any form on NPG's website. In the typical case, our images appear to be 3 or 4 times larger in linear dimension than the largest view they currently make available.
Oh, that's good. "We had to destroy the images to propagate them."
- d.
A Wikipedia Signpost article intended to recount the facts and context of the legal threat is in progress: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Wikipedia_Signpost/2009-07-13/Copyrig...
Comments, suggestions, and contributions are welcome. In particular, there is some discussion on the talk page of a few issues where more input would be helpful.
Cheers, Sage (User:Ragesoss)
On Sun, Jul 12, 2009 at 5:22 AM, Robert Rohderarohde@gmail.com wrote:
On Sun, Jul 12, 2009 at 2:11 AM, Tom Maaswinkeltom.maaswinkel@12wiki.eu wrote:
The part I am talking about is the part where they say that they want to talk to the Wikimedia Fundation to have a discussion about making low-resolution images of paintings in its collection available!
Incidentally, the NPG appears to have removed the zoomify feature from their website (or at least it wasn't present on the sample of images I looked at). As a result, it would appear that WMF presently has more detailed images on Commons than are available in any form on NPG's website. In the typical case, our images appear to be 3 or 4 times larger in linear dimension than the largest view they currently make available.
-Robert Rohde
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I don't suppose anyone has a mirror of our copies, just in case Foundation decides to comply with NPG's demands (a long shot, for sure)? Probably be best to make sure this information isn't lost, especially since NPG has now made the high-res images unavailable to anyone.
--Dan
On Sat, Jul 11, 2009 at 1:43 PM, Sue Gardnersusanpgardner@gmail.com wrote:
Sure. Actually the New York chapter probably sends some press releases to US media too; I'm not sure.
FYI We have had a number of contacts with journalists, but so far we have not been in the habit of putting out formal press releases. This may change in future; it's just a question of the particulars of public relations management.
Thanks, Richard (User:Pharos) Wikimedia NYC
------Original Message------ From: Thomas Dalton To: susanpgardner@gmail.com To: Wikimedia Foundation Mailing List Sent: Jul 11, 2009 10:41 AM Subject: Re: [Foundation-l] About that "sue and be damned" to the NationalPortrait Gallery ...
2009/7/11 Sue Gardner susanpgardner@gmail.com:
Point of clarification -- the Wikimedia Foundation sends out press releases to international media, not just US media. We have no plans to send out a press release on this issue.
Of course, what I meant was that only the WMF sends press releases to US media, not that the WMF only sends press releases to US media.
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