There has been much in the press and social media in recent days about
a new "Aerial Photograph EXplorer" made by Historic England [1]. It is
indeed a treasure trove of aerial photography, including the Aerofilms
archive, much RAF imagery, and more recent equivalents.
Some of the material on the site, particularly RAF imagery made before
30 June 1957, is out of copyright [2] and could be uploaded to
Wikimedia Commons. However, trying to save those images from their
individual pages (by right clicking, in Windows) results in an
interstitial stating "This image is copyrighted" [3].
[1] https://historicengland.maps.arcgis.com/apps/webappviewer/index.htm
[2] "Crown copyright photographs created prior to 30 June 1957 have a
copyright term of 50 years from creation." -
https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Commons:Copyright_rules_by_territory/Uni…
[3] Example: https://historicengland.org.uk/images-books/archive/collections/aerial-phot…
--
Andy Mabbett
@pigsonthewing
http://pigsonthewing.org.uk
Last week, a report by Andrea Wallace, 'A Culture of Copyright: A
scoping study on open access to digital cultural heritage collections
in the UK', was published, examining UK GLAMs' claims of copyright on
reproductions of 2D works of art whose copyright has expired.
It's really well researched and written, and makes points which align
well with the Wikimedia movement's views on such Public Domain works.
The report (openly licensed and so naturally free to read) is here:
https://zenodo.org/record/6242611
and there's a good blog post about it here:
https://simon-tanner.blogspot.com/2022/03/the-revolution-starts-here-open-a…
--
Andy Mabbett
@pigsonthewing
http://pigsonthewing.org.uk
Dear all
I wrote to the Wikimedia UK membership on Saturday to outline some of the
activities that are taking place in relation to the terrible events in
Ukraine. In that email, I asked members to contact me if they are able to
offer accommodation for people seeking refuge from the war, and three
people have already been in touch. These offers are listed on this page
<https://uk.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?curid=4472720> and I've been in touch
with the Chair of Wikimedia Ukraine in case he is able to help connect us
to people.
Early on in the conflict, I signed CILIP's Statement of Solidarity
<https://www.cilip.org.uk/news/597028/Statement-of-solidarity-with-librarian…>
on behalf of Wikimedia UK in support of Librarian and Information
professionals across Ukraine. The Ukrainian Library Association responded
immediately, saying that “the support of the CILIP community, Government
and people of the UK is highly appreciated in Ukraine.”
As you will probably already know, the wider Wikimedia community has
self-organised extremely quickly to ensure that information related to the
conflict on Wikipedia is as accurate, up-to-date and comprehensive as
possible. In my email to the membership I highlighted the main meta page
<https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/2022_Russian_invasion_of_Ukraine> about
Wikimedia's response to the invasion, as well as the meta page
<https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Saving_Ukrainian_Cultural_Heritage_Online>
outlining ways to get involved with the campaign to save Ukrainian’s
cultural heritage.
Thank you to everyone who is continuing to stand in solidarity with
Ukraine. If you have any suggestions for other things that Wikimedia UK
could be doing (within the bounds of our charitable remit), please do let
me know.
With warm wishes
Lucy
--
Lucy Crompton-Reid (she/her)
Chief Executive
Dear all
We are currently recruiting for a part time (two days a week) Volunteer
Coordinator to join the Programmes and Evaluation team at Wikimedia UK. The
role has a particular focus on underrepresented groups, but will also
provide more general support to the UK volunteer community.
The post is fixed-term for a year, although we hope to raise funds to
extend the post beyond this timeframe.
The details are on wiki here
<https://wikimedia.org.uk/wiki/Volunteer_Coordinator> and the closing date
is Wednesday 30th March. Please do share this with your networks or with
anyone you think might be interested and suitable!
With many thanks and best wishes
Lucy
--
Lucy Crompton-Reid (she/her)
Chief Executive
Would it be possible for WMUK to join the government's sponsorship
scheme as a registered UK charity and provide organizational and
practical help and probably a very modest amount of funding for
someone fleeing the war in the Ukraine to stay in London? It's likely
that funding will be available from several sources if requested, so
WMUK may not need to directly fund anything apart from some
coordination time from an employee and of course interested
volunteers.
Talking to others that have sponsored political refugees in the past,
such as religious groups, there is an expectation that you have a
connection to the sponsored refugee, and it would seem appropriate to
seek to sponsor an academic or librarian, or even a past Wikipedia
volunteer who is unable to use the other routes as they don't have
existing close family living in the UK.
Could the trustees have a discussion about whether this is reasonable
and allowable under the "libraries" and open knowledge scope of the
charity and the agreement with the Wikimedia Foundation? If it's not
reasonable to take direct action, the trustees may have other ideas of
how WMUK can be seen to help.
Reference: https://www.gov.uk/guidance/local-sponsorship-scheme-for-ukraine
Thanks,
Lane
Dear all
I'm sure many of you will have seen this elsewhere but I just thought I'd
share the link to vote on the Universal Code of Conduct:
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Universal_Code_of_Conduct/Enforcement_guide…
As a chapter Wikimedia UK gave feedback that there should be a ratification
process for the enforcement guidelines - so I'm keen that people
participate! I think this is especially important if you have strong views
one way or another.
All best
Lucy
--
Lucy Crompton-Reid (she/her)
Chief Executive