[WikiEN-l] Image of Gandhi

[Jens Ropers]

Dear Danavir,

You recently enquired about the copyright situation as regards a Gandhi  
image on our site and requested permission for reuse.
I saw our fellow contributor Aevar Arnfjoerd Bjarmason  
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:%c6var_Arnfj%f6r%f0_Bjarmason) has  
already replied as follows (please read on below):

On 26 Aug 2004, at 23:02, wikien-l-request at Wikipedia.org wrote:

> Message: 8
> Date: Thu, 26 Aug 2004 21:05:25 +0200
> From: ?var Arnfj?r? Bjarmason <avarab at gmail.com>
> Subject: Re: [WikiEN-l] Image of Gandhi
>
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Mahatma_Gandhi.jpg
>
> "This image may not have information on its source. It may be usable
> under fair use but this has yet to be verified. It might be public
> domain or under a licence compatible with the GNU FDL. To the
> uploader: Please provide licensing information as soon as possible.
> Images without this information may be deleted in the future. If you
> want to publish an image as fair use, please list it on Wikipedia:Fair
> use."
>
> We do not know.

In case you are already familiar with the details of how our system  
works, please disregard this message.
In case you might not be, please allow me to explain:

- Wikipedia is a volunteer-driven effort. There currently are no full  
time employees.
- One of our effective operating principles is to lower any bars to  
entry as much as possible, if not to outright abolish them.
- As part of this philosophy, and contrary to what it possible with  
paper-based works, editorial review of any contribution, including  
images takes place /after/ publication.
- Any freely registered user thus can technically upload and submit any  
image file of his or her choosing and it will be available online right  
away.
- Submitters are however required to adhere to our copyright terms,  
which including our image guidelines  
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Copyrights#Image_guidelines).  
This is further explained by our _Image use policy_  
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Image_use_policy) and by our  
_Uploading images_ article  
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Uploading_images). Our terms  
contain a clear requirement that the uploader ensure compliance with  
copyright legislation AND explain why the image is copyright law  
compliant AND also classify the rationale for legal use of the  
respective image through the use of an appropriate tag. Again, the  
legal responsibility to ensure copyright compliance lies squarely with  
the submitter.
- It is only /after/ such submissions are made that these uploaded  
images go through various review processes (e.g. listing and review at  
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Imagelist) to verify that they  
meet our standards (which includes adherence to copyright regulations).
- If violations are confirmed, any offending images are _permanently_  
deleted, unlike other submitted content, which remains available via  
article history pages.
- Because such deletions are permanent and because the responsibility  
for ensuring copyright compliance lies squarely with the submitter, we  
are sometimes cautious about deleting images in cases of doubt.

Finally:
- In the case of the picture you asked us for permission about, the  
contributor has so far failed to classify and explain the uploaded  
image's copyright compliance.
- With virtually all images on the Wikipedia, you can check their  
respective copyright and submission details just by clicking on them in  
the article, which should take you to an image descriptor page.
- In case of the Gandhi image, that page is:  
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Mahatma_Gandhi.jpg. This contains  
the text which Aevar Arnfjoerd Bjarmason included in his email (see  
above).
- From this page, it can be seen that the submitter was our fellow  
contributor Netoholic (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Netoholic). I  
am contacting him for clarification via his Talk page. (This is  
something you could have done do directly as well -- you can leave him  
a message  
(http://en.wikipedia.org/w/wiki.phtml?title=User_talk: 
Netoholic&action=edit&section=new) on his Talk page  
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:Netoholic). That goes for any  
user.

- I am asking Netoholic to get back to you direct, but because of the  
volunteer nature of our project there is no guarantee that he does so  
(in time).

- Until Netoholic has confirmed the copyright situation, we would  
strongly suggest for you NOT to use the respective Gandhi image as the  
legality of its use is not presently clear to ourselves. (That is  
unless you were to find out from other sources that the image can  
legally be freely used. In this latter case -- or if you find out that  
it CANNOT be used, we would be rather grateful to be notified as well.)  
If you were to re-use the image without further enquiries, you would be  
doing so entirely at your own risk.

Please accept my apologies for a lengthy email relating a complex  
procedural and legal framework and please understand that in the  
absence of more information we cannot grant permission for reuse of the  
image. Indeed, if we do not receive such clarification, the image is  
likely to sooner or later get deleted from our own servers as our  
fellow Wikipedians follow our continual review processes.

Yours sincerely,

Jens
Wikipedia contributor
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Ropers
http://www.ropersonline.com

original message follows:

> Message: 4
> Date: Thu, 26 Aug 2004 08:15 -0700
> From: "Danavir Goswami (USA)" <Danavir.Goswami at pamho.net>
>
> Dear Friends,				Aug. 26, 2004
>
> Greetings. I am a monk writing a book on celibacy---the title is "Brain
> Gain" (1,000 copies) and would like to use, within the book, an image  
> of
> Gandhi I found on your website.
>
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mahatma_Gandhi
>
> If you could be so kind as to inform me A) whether the image is in the
> public domain (copyright-free), or B) if you have the ability to grant
> permission for its use, or C) you could suggest how I might seek  
> permission.
>
> The seminary is non profit and the publication is also not a profit
> enterprise.
>
> Thank you so much for your help.
>
> With best regards,
>
> Dr. Dane Holtzman
>
> Rupanuga Vedic College (USA)
> 5201 Paseo, Kansas City, Missouri 64110
> Tel: (816) 924-5619, (800) 340-5286, Fax: (816) 924-5640
> E-mail: danavir.goswami at pamho.net  Website: www.rvc.edu
>
>
>