[Commons-l] Writing Public Domain Guidelines

[Paul Houle]

  On 6/4/2011 10:01 AM, Maarten Zeinstra wrote:
> User:Jean-Frédéric created this page 
> http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Commons:Public_domain_works_guidelines 
> to draft and discuss this idea. I am looking forward to wider 
> discussion on this topic.
     It would be nice if there was something "there" on the page.

     The largest legal issue with w/ public domain in commons is that 
the label is frequently used in cases where it doesn't apply.  For 
instance,  person X takes some pictures in 2011,  uploads them to 
wikimedia commons and claims they are pd-self.

     This doesn't make sense because you can't just say "this is public 
domain",  but rather things are in the public domain for specific 
reasons:  for instance,  something produced by a U.S. government 
employee or something that was produced Y years ago in jursidiction Z.

     CC0 exists to simulate "I release this to the public domain" but 
fewer than 5% as many people use this as use pd-self.

     The largest practical issue I run into w/ public domain in commons 
is a lack of provenance information.  Quite a few things are public 
domain that are scanned from books and I get an inquiry at least every 
week from someone who needs to know more about the provenance.

     For instance,  somebody finds an image of an old king or politician 
and they want to use it in a book.  Looking at the image it appears to 
have been scanned from a book,  and given the style of the illustration 
and the age of the subject it's plausible that the image is really 
public domain.  Two issues turn up:  (i) is this really in the public 
domain?  and (ii) can I get a higher quality version of this image?  I'd 
really like to see a citation of the book so that a motivated person can 
go find the book and rescan the image themselves.

     A high fraction of the Europeana usage guidelines would apply to 
CC-BY-* and even other kinds of images.  Even if I bought an image for a 
few bucks from a stock site,  I'd advise people to "show respect for the 
original work",  "show respect for the creator",  "be culturally aware" 
and "protect the reputation of creators and providers" even if the money 
paid absolves me from the need to "give credit where credit is due" and 
"preserve marks and notices".