On Tue, May 10, 2011 at 16:09, Ryan Kaldari <rkald...@wikimedia.org> wrote: > It's actually even worse than that. Due to the URAA, thousands of works > which are verifiably public domain in India have had their copyright > restored in the United States. For example, all of the works of Mahatma > Gandhi are public domain in India (since he died over 50 years ago), > however, most of them are copyrighted in the U.S. until at least 2055 (even > if they were never published here). Thus in order to host the files on > Commons we have to know all of the following: > * Who authored the work? > * What year did the author die? > * Was the work ever published in the United States? > ** If so, what year? > ** Were copyright formalities followed? > ** Was the copyright renewed? If so what year? > * If not, did the author die after 1945 (1996 - 50 - 1) > ** If so, what year was the work first published in India? Was it before > 1923? > > If you can't answer all of these questions, your image might get deleted. > Welcome to the insanity of U.S. copyright laws and treaties! > > Ryan Kaldari
There have been similar problems with material from Europe, where images are generally regarded as PD 70 years after the author's death. I'd like to see a situation where, regardless of what the Commons does, the individual Wikipedias are at least allowed to respect local PD status. But editors who focus on images repeatedly challenge their use -- forcing us to claim fair use, then saying they're not covered by the bizarre way Wikipedia interprets fair use. It's a situation people have tried to draw attention to for years, with no success. Sarah _______________________________________________ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
