[Commons-l] Making damn sure image attribution is very clear

Sat Aug 25 23:40:47 UTC 2007

First and foremost, I hit send a bit too quick on that last reply. I  
overstated a few things. I should of waited a bit longer... Please  
accept my apologies.

In any case, I think the fundamental disagreement is what is  
considered to be fair attribution. I consider Wikipedia's current  
practice to be lacking. It can be interpreted to be within the scope  
of the CC license, but I don't consider it to be fair. You consider  
it to be fair and acceptable, though indicate it could be done  
better. I don't think there's any easy resolution.

I have, however, provided my feedback to you and you can do with it  
as you will.

The one thing I'm concerned about about is the statement that  
attribution could be changed to Wikipedia with a change to terms of  
service. I'm puzzled by that. If I'm not the one uploading a CC- 
licensed image, how have I as an original Author or Licensor  
designated another party for attribution? If that's true, then the  
attribution requirement means very much less than what I thought it  
meant.

James Duncan Davidson
james at duncandavidson.com
+1 503 784 8747

On Aug 25, 2007, at 15:48 , Gregory Maxwell wrote:

> On 8/25/07, James Duncan Davidson <james at duncandavidson.com> wrote:
>> It's pretty hard to snag a photo from a book. I've tracked down many
>> violations of my CC-licensed photographs to people who "borrowed"  
>> them from
>> Wikipedia. WIthout any indication that they are subject to any  
>> kind of
>> license, well, people don't know. And that's what they've told me.
>
> These people are (copyright) idiots.
> Without some knowledge of the license status you have no right to use
> an image you found and didn't create. Full stop.
>
> If people are this ignorant there isn't much we can do to resolve  
> that.
>
> This is the same challenge faced by the big copyright holders when
> they find their content shared freely on file trading services. If
> they can't stop the public from ignoring their obligations under
> copyright law, how can we?
>
>
> [snip]
>> The credit is gone. Right click and save an image, the credit was  
>> never
>> seen.
>
> For a while we had a function to pop up a notice asking people to
> left-click for attribution and for a larger version of the image on
> the first time they right clicked an image.
>
> It was removed because overriding the context menu is considered
> harmful and it reminds users of "capture context menu to avoid saving"
> traps. A valid complaint. But without doing that we lose a useful
> tool.
>
> Do you think that doing that is a good idea?
>
>
>> The medium is the web. You guys know what the heck a mediawiki is.  
>> The world
>> that uses it sees web content and _may_ know that they can edit it. I
>> certainly don't care that the medium is a particular kind of  
>> software. It is
>> what shows up on my screen.
>
> Attribution on the web is very commonly provided via click-through.
> It's also very commonly provided buried elsewhere on the site.
>
> Providing attribution on a click-through is functionally equal to
> providing it on the next page of a book.  Where we're not doing so
> well today is making it clear that the click-through is possible. We
> plan to improve that where we reasonably can.
>
> You're also in a weak position to complain about attribution. I see a
> fair amount of Wikipedia content on your blog, even on just the single
> page that started this discussion,  and you've completely failed to
> name any of the authors of that content.
>
> Why are you trying to hold us to a higher standard than you  
> practice yourself?
>
> [snip]
>> That's what I'm doing here and trying to communicate, as a  
>> photographer. And
>> I'm not your average photographer. I'm one that spent 5 years in  
>> the Open
>> Source community and dealing with legal issues. Most photographers  
>> just want
> [snip]
>
>
> We have a huge number of photographers ourselves.  You're speaking to
> many right now by posting on commons-l. We care about having fair and
> reasonable attribution.
>
> As a photographer I think that you're demanding an unreasonable amount
> of attribution. Attribution should be readily available. It shouldn't
> be a blank check to have your name plastered all over the place.
>
> Please don't think that our images are mostly images we're finding on
> flickr. They aren't.
>
> [snip]
>> When it comes down to it, I have two options right now. I can saw  
>> that my
>> use of the CC licenses over the last few years was a blazing  
>> mistake and try
>> to find a different way to live in the brave world where copyright is
>> changing. Or I can try to communicate how you guys can meet us  
>> half way so
>> that we can get MORE photographers playing ball.
>
> Compromise is fantastic, but it also requires that you recognize when
> you're asking too much. We are willing to improve, but you need to
> recognize the challenges we face.
>
> And, again, as a photographer: Please don't claim to speak for me. You
> don't. You don't speak for all photographers.
>
>
> [snip]
>> I believe in the commons. I want it to grow. But if you're going  
>> to put
>> credit in a place where it's invisible and negates the whole  
>> intent of the
>> attribution request, then the CC is not a valid tool to use.
>
> We are in full conformance with the attribution requirements of CC-By.
> Under these licenses you have waved the ability to specify the exact
> character of attribution.
>
> Furthermore under CC-by-*-2.5 and later, with a change to our sites
> terms of service we could instead provide attribution to ourselves,
> rather than you, for CC-by images uploaded to us.
>
> "reasonable to the medium or means You are utilizing: (i) the name of
> the Original Author (or pseudonym, if applicable) if supplied, and/or
> (ii) if the Original Author and/or Licensor designate another party or
> parties (e.g. a sponsor institute, publishing entity, journal) for
> attribution in Licensor's copyright notice, terms of service or by
> other reasonable means,"
>
> We wouldn't do that.  But don't claim that we are not in conformance
> with the Creative Commons Attribution license.
>
>> From my perspective, your exposing internal implementation details  
>> as a
>> reason to not do something. Understand that I don't care what tool  
>> is used.
>> I'm simply stating that it is problematic when EXIF data is  
>> stripped and
>> making a request that important metdata be preserved.
>
> Preserving some EXIF fields is a very reasonable request. It's one
> which we're already working on and which we would have already were it
> not for some technical challenges.
>
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