Talk:GNU Free Documentation License/Archive 2

Archive 1

Archive 2

Pictures

What does all this mean in relation to pictures? I don't see how this applies to images. I've asked, no one has answered. Does it apply to images? Can it be compatable and used with images? KP Botany 02:00, 31 January 2007 (UTC)

Yes. Gronky 12:27, 12 February 2007 (UTC)

Yes, some people release their images under a GFDL license. However, many people seem to think the Creative Commons license is a better choice for images.[1],[2], [3], [4], [5], etc. --DavidCary (talk) 13:38, 31 October 2013 (UTC)

Hatnote linking to Wikipedia's copy of the GFDL

There was some reverting today about having a hatnote linking to Wikipedia:Text of the GNU Free Documentation License. I think having such a link would be a good idea, since the license itself is important to the workings of Wikipedia and a significant number of users might show up at the GFDL article looking for the actual GFDL. Having a prominent, self-referential link to the license would make sense in the same way as the internal links in the hatnotes at the articles "Sandbox" and "Glossary", for example. Thoughts? –Sommers ^(Talk) 23:49, 5 February 2007 (UTC)

The same link that is at the bottom of every single article? --Benn Newman 04:07, 9 February 2007 (UTC)

It's possible that a confused user could wind up at the GFDL article (by searching for it, for example) trying to find the text of the license, without realizing that the same link at the bottom of every article (which reads "GNU Free Documentation License") leads to something other than the article "GNU Free Documentation License". The hatnote could be helpful and there's no harm in having it there (Wikipedia isn't paper). –Sommers ^(Talk) 13:29, 9 February 2007 (UTC)

There is an external link to the text of the GFDL, there is a link on nearly every page to the GFDL, when people edit a page, there is a link to the GFDL. WP:NOT#PAPER refers to the content of Wikipedia, not including every possible thing that could be added. There is already a hatnote and I see no reason to add another. --Benn Newman 15:04, 9 February 2007 (UTC)

GNU FDL incompatible with the GPL

"The GNU FDL is incompatible in both directions with the GPL" - article should explain why. Shinobu 05:29, 10 March 2007 (UTC)

DRM clause and print only work

Printed only versions,does they qualifie as a form of drm?Imagine having to scan ,ocr and read proof pages and pages,it's even more hard to "crack" then normal drm(a program does this for you).from what i understould ther isn't any specific prohibition from not publishing an electronic form of the work.--87.65.171.46 19:33, 15 May 2007 (UTC)

Using Wiki articles on other websites?

What are, if any, the rules regarding taking an article from Wikipedia and using it on another website? Or how about an image? Can someone please help me undertsand this issue? Thank you. Jtpaladin 19:22, 21 May 2007 (UTC)

This page is like a ghost town; nobody seems to either read or answer questions here. It's too bad, because this is an important page and subject, one that is constantly discussed. Badagnani 17:03, 10 June 2007 (UTC)

Question

I notice that when you select the "GFDL" license from the drop-down menu (when uploading a photo) the tag shows up when editing as "GFDL -- no disclaimers." Is it possible to set it up so that there is a disclaimer stating that the photo may only be used (for any purpose) if the photo is properly captioned and credited to the photographer who took it? If so, this should be added in the drop-down list of image tags (i.e. "GFDL, with credit to..."). I think it's fairly important. The fact that this isn't made clear in the drop-down menu is why I've used, in the past, this license, which does allow one to stipulate that the photo should be properly credited to the name (and sometimes also the website) of the photographer. Thanks for expert input on this. Badagnani 16:32, 6 June 2007 (UTC)

Is there some reason why no one is answering this question? If the GFDL is so important to Wikipedia, why has no one taken a moment to address this important issue? Badagnani 23:01, 21 June 2007 (UTC)

Because “this is the talk page for discussing improvements to the GNU Free Documentation License article.” You do not want to use the template with disclaimers; see Wikipedia:GFDL standardization. If you include a copyright notice, the GFDL requires that it be preserved in copies, so {{GFDL-self}} does fine. —Benn Newman 01:13, 22 June 2007 (UTC)

Thanks for your response, but I'm afraid I can't make sense of it. Could you please address, in plain, clear English, the point I raised, about the stipulation that the photo be properly captioned and credited? I am not referring to my own photos, but to ones that have been released by the kind permission of Flickr users, and I want to make sure their kindness is properly credited. The GFDL license, as I've stated above, doesn't make it clear how to do this, and it certainly should be, as it's very important. Many thanks. Badagnani 01:17, 22 June 2007 (UTC)

Hello, it's been some weeks and I've still had no response to my query. If this license is of such great importance to Wikipedia, one would think that at least one knowledgeable editor would take a few moments to address this very important issue. Badagnani 07:40, 4 July 2007 (UTC)

As the first poster said, the GFDL requires that the attribution you add at the beginning continue to remain with the photo. So it is at least traceable, though it may require someone to go back through the whole edit history to find the data. What isn't so clear to me is if you add your name in the lower right corner of the image, does the GFDL prohibit someone from cropping it off because it's part of the documentation? For that matter, what if a photo bears a watermark with information about the author - does that have to remain? What if the watermark can be used by some "child safety" Internet censorship filter - does the license require it, prohibit it, or both? 70.15.114.89 18:59, 25 September 2007 (UTC)

GFDL-compatible licenses

Every Wikipedia edit references this article at the bottom of the page:

Do not copy text from other websites without a GFDL-compatible license. It will be deleted.

Unfortunately, what this links to is GFDL, not GFDL-compatible or GFDL-compatible license. And this article doesn't say what is a GFDL-compatible license. And based on the thing I just read about the 100,000 image files stuck with disclaimers, it sounds like quick and easy assumptions about this legal stuff can go terribly wrong, so... could somebody provide a full subsection (at least) explaining just what is a GFDL-compatible license? 204.186.19.105 20:27, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

Fair use and public licenses

Is there any information on how public license terms interact with fair use? I would think that if you copy a published work, which is available for free ($0 loss), and use it for noncommercial purposes (i.e. a different free license; $0 profit) that your legal position on "fair use" would be pretty good, unless maybe you copied the entire Wikipedia at one go. But I'm no lawyer... 204.186.19.105 20:37, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

That happens to be one of the reasons I came to this site. I've used two or three sentences from science news bulletins, and have been giving links to those bulletins in the talk section of articles. So far, nobody has criticized me for it, but I wanted to get the low-down on it, since there's a sentence that says: Do not copy text from other websites without a GFDL-compatible license. It will be deleted.

Brian Pearson 22:53, 21 August 2007 (UTC)

Actually, this question refers to "fair use" of material published under one free license to contribute to a project covered by another free license. When copying a commercial news site your fair use may be limited to sentences or paragraphs, but when there is clearly $0 lost and $0 gained, I'd expect "fair use" to be more generous. 70.15.114.89 18:53, 25 September 2007 (UTC)

Text of GNU Free Documentation License

what is the reason (i'm sure there is one) that the text of the GNU Free Documentation License is not included in this article? you could place it at the beginning or the end, and as long as it's listed in the table of contents a person could go right to it. it seems like it would be an improvement to have the text of the license and an in-depth explanation of the license all be in one place. for instance, i clicked on a link thinking i'd be sent to the text and was not. granted, one more click and i could be there, but it would be more usable if i could just page up or down to get to either.

however, as i began this inquiry, i suspect there is a reason. also, i should apologize, i suppose, for not having checked the history of either article, or the talk page of the license text's article. that is, forgive me if i could have found the answer by digging a little deeper.

WeaselADAPT 00:04, 28 August 2007 (UTC)

GFDL vs GFDL

Why does GFDL the license take precidence over GFDL the laboratory? Sure, as Wikipedians, the GFDL matters more to *us*, but that's not a good excuse. -- Rei 21:56, 12 September 2007 (UTC)

I wasn't in on the original editing, but this GFDL (1) is rated High rather than Mid importance by its Wikiproject, (2) is longer, (3) is linked to by more articles. If these measures disagreed with each other I'm not sure which I'd go by, but in this case it's clear enough. 70.15.114.89 18:41, 25 September 2007 (UTC)

Crazy "gift with strings" section

I removed the below blockquoted section which was part of the article. This is just someone's rant, and it doesn't even make sense. The GFDL doesn't impose legal obligations on people. If someone gives you a GFDL'd work, you can listen to it or read it or whatever, or you can delete it if you want. Just like any other work.

The only difference is that while most licences say "you can't redistribute", the GFDL says "you can redistribute if...". There's no requirement to redistribute, so the obligations are completely elective.

== Gift with strings ==

While the GFDL is a self-described "free" license, it is akin to "a gift with strings" from a copyright law perspective.

Generally, a gift, once given, does not impose any future legal obligations on the part of a recipient to the gift giver. When an author dedicates his or her work to the public, anyone can legally reproduce, adapt, distribute, perform, or display the work without limitation. Thus, the author is considered to have gifted the work to the public.

In contrast, works covered by the GFDL are accompanied by the legal encumbrances set forth in the terms of the GFDL. While a recipient of a work covered by GFDL may be free to reproduce, adapt, distribute, perform, or display the work, such activities are not without limitations. The recipient is bound by the terms of the GFDL. The terms of the GFDL, from a legal perspective, are effectively "strings" that bind the recipient.

Accordingly, critics charge that the GFDL is deceptively named, as recipients of works covered under the GFDL are not "free" to distribute the work without legal limitation.

Section removed. --Gronky 20:13, 25 September 2007 (UTC)

Commercial use issues

Have there been no complaints about the commercial uses being a little too broad and unlimited in this license? I understand that the information in GFDL'd content is meant to be freely available, but it seems rather perverse that I, News Corp, or any other entity could, say, port over the entirety of Wikipedia to an ad-revenue generating site without exercising a single edit and not have any responsibility to the people who created such content. It seems like a bit of a dirty-little-secret that a project like WP, which is not publicized as a profit-making enterprise, can, in fact become one with a quick bit of copying-and-pasting. 206.218.218.57 (talk) 14:52, 28 November 2007 (UTC)

I don't understand what you mean by "not have any responsibility to the people who created such content". The GFDL uses a lot of words to spell out the responsibilities of people who make such copies.

Not only "could" other websites copy Wikipedia and slap a bunch of adds around the content, many websites have in fact done so. There's a long list at ABC - DEF - GHI - JKL - MNO - PQR - STU - VWXYZ. See Wikipedia:Mirrors and forks for more information. --DavidCary (talk) 15:34, 31 October 2013 (UTC)

Attribution

Is the removal of the option where you can require attribution recent? I normally select that option but it is now greyed out. It means that I probably will no longer be uploading any images to Wikipedia. --jmb (talk) 15:05, 8 February 2008 (UTC)

Problem with "Enforcement" section

"Wikipedia, the best known user of the GFDL, has never taken anyone to court to enforce its license."

Not only is this possibly irrelevant and/or incorrectly worded (the article itself makes several such mistakes), it is also incorrect, because Wikipedia does not own the copyright to any of the GFDL text it hosts. Who owns GFDL text? The individual editors themselves. There is a very widespread and needless to say extremely incorrect view among people that Wikipedia and the Wikimedia Foundation actually own the GFDL content hosted here. Totally wrong. Each individual editor "owns" the copyrights to their own edits, which they thus agree to release under the GFDL, allowing others to modify it. But by editing Wikipedia or any other Wikimedia project, they do not transfer said copyright to the Wikimedia Foundation. Too many people and too many press articles make this mistake of promulgating the myth that editors here "donate" their contributions to Wikipedia. Absolute BS. Editors donate their time and their effort, but not their contributions - because Wikipedia does not own the content nor the copyright to said content.

That said, the stupidity of the above quoted statement lies in the fact that it implies that Wikipedia does indeed own the content. But it doesn't, and therefore Wikipedia/Wikimedia is in absolutely no position to take anyone to court for GFDL violations. The only thing Wikimedia could do is to gather together editors whose copyrights (or copyleft, if you prefer) have been violated and hire a lawyer for them and so forth. However, this is extremely hypothetical and speculative and probably wrong since Wikimedia would most likely never do this, as such litigation would be costly.

This is simply one more example of how widespread misunderstanding is of the nature of Wikipedia and the GFDL - so widespread in fact that most Wikipedia editors themselves seem to be ignorant of them. Szygny (talk) 11:17, 10 February 2008 (UTC)

Editors are collaborators, not authors, and therefore have no rights (except for the right granted to them to reuse their contributions elsewhere). The rights are held by the individual projects, as publishers, and the foundation can act on their behalf. Guido den Broeder (talk, visit) 00:20, 4 October 2008 (UTC)

What is the basis for this statement? You've made a similar assertion elsewhere but not backed it up with anything. I think it's completely incorrect, and I suspect most of the rest of us do too. ++Lar: t/c 17:42, 10 October 2008 (UTC)

I'll explain. The basis is the general rules for authorship (irrespective of GFDL), which imply or state that in a collaborative effort any authors must be mentioned explicitly to be recognized as such and be able to claim author rights. Otherwise, the collaboration, here en:Wikipedia, counts as author-publisher. It is the same if you work for a research institute and the institute publishes a report. Sometimes the people who worked on the report are mentioned as authors on the front page, and at other times it's just the institute's publication and the employees have no author rights. In this particular case, I have talked it over with GNU experts, and they agreed with me what I already knew, that Wikipedia editors are not authors. To be authors, they would need to be explicitly declared as such. This is not done with open-encyclopedia articles like the ones on Wikipedia. For essays, the situation is different, e.g. here the author of the essay is explicitly mentioned and therefore is in fact an author in the legal sense. Guido den Broeder (talk, visit) 20:38, 10 October 2008 (UTC)

You've provided a more detailed assertion but again, without basis other than assertion "I've talked with..." Do you have any cites supporting this position? It goes against common practice so if there is a change needed, it will take some considerable convincing of a number of people to effect that change. ++Lar: t/c 23:54, 10 October 2008 (UTC)

Show me that common practice is different, since that would surprise me. Guido den Broeder (talk, visit) 13:19, 11 October 2008 (UTC)

The "authors" are explicitly mentioned in the history log of every article. I think you need to show evidence of why the history log is invalid as a record of authorship. Also, you use the phrase "an author in the legal sense". Which legal jurisdiction are you referring to? Copyright law differs greatly around the world and I would assume a legal definition of "author" would also vary. Road Wizard (talk) 13:38, 11 October 2008 (UTC)

No, the collaborators are (including bots, vandals, users undoing vandalism, spelling correctors, etc.) Copyright law doesn't differ that greatly around the world, btw, and the definition of author not at all, although there are philosophical discussions about the value of authorship (e.g. Foucault, "What is an author?"). Authorship must be claimed at the time of publishing. The assignment of authorship can differ vastly, see Academic_authorship, but an assignment must be made or there can be no claim. Guido den Broeder (talk, visit) 15:58, 11 October 2008 (UTC)

Again, you are asserting. I suggest you take this up with Mike Godwin, and ask him to render an opinion on whether the GFDL applies to contributions of WMF projects or not. ++Lar: t/c 01:15, 15 October 2008 (UTC)

Until there is a court ruling, all anyone can do is asserting re Wikiepdia editors. This is, however, the assertion of experts in the field. I've done my bit of asking around, and provided explanation. If you don't agree it's up to you to find a different expert opinion, or come up with an argument why e.g. a vandal would be an author. As for my general remarks, read any textbook. Guido den Broeder (talk, visit) 10:42, 15 October 2008 (UTC)

Feel free to write Mike Godwin and ask him to render an opinion, but otherwise, I think we're done here. I will, however point out that I would view a vandal as an author, of his vandalism, and note that the MediaWiki software properly tracks and attributes his contribution. Even if it's deleted, although in that case only admins can see it. Even if it's oversighted, although in that case it's very hard to track, but it's still trackable. Why wouldn't a vandal be an author of his vandalism? ++Lar: t/c 14:11, 15 October 2008 (UTC)

I suggest that you try and find out for yourself what the word 'author' means. Guido den Broeder (talk, visit) 16:27, 15 October 2008 (UTC)

I am not the one asserting there is a problem. Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence. And let us suppose for the sake of argument that you are correct. What is the action to be taken as a result? What should be changed? Or are you just arguing for the sake of it? That has not stood you well elsewhere. ++Lar: t/c 00:48, 16 October 2008 (UTC)

Nothing needs to be changed if I am correct. There would need to be major changes if you were. And no, I am not arguing, I am explaining, but apparently so to deafman's ears. So this is my last response to you. If you insist on thinking that vandals are authors: fine. Guido den Broeder (talk, visit) 10:54, 16 October 2008 (UTC)

Absolutly Confused: Need Guidence

Hello! I am confused and need some guidence on navigating all this! Quite simply, I was given premission (by the party press secretary) from a political party to upload pictures of their members for their wikipedia entries. Certin of their members belong in government. Under what clause do I upload these images? Additionally, is there a certin verbage the press secretary needs to write out that would be acceptable for permissions? Any help here would be appreciated. Thanks! Drachenfyre (talk) 11:55, 14 February 2008 (UTC)

Dual licensed code

"Because of this, code samples are often dual-licensed so that &c." Is this really safe? For example, does this keep the code protected from being locked up in some proprietary system? Shinobu (talk) 14:09, 22 February 2008 (UTC)

GNU FDL 1.2 is old, and does not protect from the dangers described in GNU GPL 3. IMHO, GPL easily fits for most non-software uses, while FDL does not fit well for non-book usage. But that statement is about “code samples”, which may mean very small samples. --AVRS (talk) 15:41, 22 February 2008 (UTC)

Ah yes. Would you judge that that sentence needs clarification? Shinobu (talk) 11:58, 23 February 2008 (UTC)

DRM

In the SPIRIT of GPL, isnt the GFDL a DRM? Dosen't that make the self referential DRM statment a bit sticky? Would it be better to read: "You cannot publish copies and/or modified derivations under any OTHER Digital Rights Managment DRM systems, than The GNU free Documentation Liscense, to restrict the possessors of their copies, and or modified derivations." Simply:

1. You cannot use other DRMs

2. You must not restrict GFDLs DRM

3. The GFDL's DRM must accompany the work, i.e. covered under GFDL's DRM.

We now have a GFDLDRM: The GNU's Not Unix Freesoftware Document Liscense Digital Rights CopyLeft Managment System. GNUFDRCMS, or MUD. Multiple Utilitairan DRM. Wtfbbq? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.193.2.115 (talk) 21:16, 25 April 2008 (UTC)

Really simple question

I want to copyright, publish and sell book-length foreign language texts with vocabulary glosses. If I include some definitions from Wiktionary -- say the English translation of a word found in a Russian text -- will this put me in violation of the Wiktionary "copyleft"? 76.168.50.104 (talk) 20:34, 24 June 2008 (UTC)

ambiguous sentence

"It is the counterpart to the GNU General Public License that gives readers the same rights to copy, redistribute and modify a work and requires all copies and derivatives to be available under the same license"

It is not perfectly clear whether the word "that" and the description after it refers to the starting "It is" or to the "GNU General Public License". Maybe that's so just for a non-English native speaker. But even so there are a lot of such here, so may someone please rephrase this sentence to remove the ambiguity? VZakharov (talk) 09:37, 26 June 2008 (UTC)

GFDL 1.3 is released

It could allow us to move to CC-by-sa-3.0. Did anyone knows more? -- schwarze feder (talk) 19:17, 3 November 2008 (UTC)

• I'd like to discuss that more. I can see why this is useful, but... this effectively would mean that media released under GFDL 1.2 (which says that it is compatible with any future version) would effectively be released on CC-BY-SA-3.0 too. Isn't this morally bankrupt?? I'd be really upset if I released something SPECIFICALLY under the GFDL 1.2 because I didn't agree with CC-BY-SA licensing for whatever reason, only to find that they've added a clause that allows it to be changed without my permission. Doesn't this also mean that GFDL 1.4 could be released which allows any prior GFDL licensed content to be released into the public domain?? It just seems very wrong that GFDL is forward compatible. The terms of future licenses haven't even yet been written, yet we're explicitly agreeing with them when we release GFDL content.. Hmmmmm. :-/ Diliff | (Talk) (Contribs) 15:00, 30 December 2008 (UTC)

To prevent this from happening, the copyright holder may release content under a fixed version of GFDL, without the "or any later version" proviso. For example, Linux does this (with GPL rather than GFDL, but the same principle applies there). The license per se is not "forward compatible", it depends on its usage. — Emil J. 14:38, 7 September 2009 (UTC)

This may sound really stupid...

...but what does the 'GNU' stand for? =) 58.170.148.86 (talk) 13:37, 29 January 2009 (UTC)

I recommend looking this up in wikipedia. GNU JoshuaRodman (talk) 00:56, 2 March 2009 (UTC)

How can I know?

I would like to create some articles with lists of parliamentary speakers. Their names can be found in the websites of the national assemblies. How can I know if the website of the national assembly in question has a GNU Free Documentation License? Can somebody help me with information about such matters?

Mbakkel2 (talk) 16:57, 11 April 2009 (CEST)

Enforcement section

The content of the Enforcement section is currently:

Wikipedia is one of the best-known works to use the GFDL, but as of 2007, no Wikipedia contributor has yet attempted to enforce the GFDL in court, although its sister, the GNU General Public License, has been successfully enforced in a court of law.

While I don't dispute any of this, it does give me the impression that we're saying that Wikipedia is the yard-stick for GFDL enforcement, i.e., we need not check for other instances of attempted GFDL enforcement, because they're bound to not happen until after Wikipedia first tries to enforce it. I'm sure this isn't the intent of the editors. Perhaps an additional sentence along the lines of

There are no other known attempts to enforce the license.

should be added to make this more clear. If the non-citeability of that sentence is unpleasant, another option would be to preface the section with something like "Although Wikipedia is not the only user of the GFDL, it is one of [...]". 142.103.235.47 (talk) 02:00, 4 July 2009 (UTC)

That would duplicate what it already says, "There have currently been no cases involving the GFDL in a court of law," so no sense adding that sentence. --Ashawley (talk) 04:16, 5 July 2009 (UTC)

It didn't say that when I wrote the above, but I see ViperSnake151 has already improved the section. Thanks. 142.103.235.47 (talk) 22:12, 6 July 2009 (UTC)

I was curious if that was the case. Thanks for confirming and apologies, --Ashawley (talk) 14:25, 8 July 2009 (UTC)

Acta

Will acta abolish this? 82.112.137.114 (talk) 07:52, 1 September 2010 (UTC)

Unattributed re-use of photos etc on Facebook and other social sites

After recently joining Facebook, I found that one of my original photos on Wikipedia, and subject to the terms of this license, had been posted without any comment or attribution on a Facebook community group page. Friends of Lightwoods Park[[6]] an scroll down to April 2013 for my image of Lightwoods House in winter [7], which is used in the Wikipedia article on Bearwood[8].

This use is in breach of the license terms of the Wikipedia licenses, not because of the re-use, which we encourage, but because of the failure to give attribution and re-post the license as required.

I have raised this with the Facebook user, and the Facebook community page "owner", with no response. I have now raised this with feedback to Facebook managers, suggesting (a few minutes ago) that they write robots on Facebook to facilitate the Wikipedia license conditions.

Perhaps any Wikipedia management picking up this post may be able to contact Facebook management to discuss this issue. One problem is that posting photos on Facebook without any comment or attribution carries the implication that the poster of the image is the original author / photographer / artist. Robert of Ramsor (talk) 10:43, 27 February 2014 (UTC)

--184.167.192.178 (talk) 17:22, 2 April 2014 (UTC)

unclear

can someone tell me what this means, it is in Section 2.2 of the article, it really should be written more clearly: "Material that restricts commercial re-use is incompatible with the license and cannot be incorporated into the work. However, incorporating such restricted material may be fair use under United States copyright law (or fair dealing in some other countries) and does not need to be licensed to fall within the GFDL if such fair use is covered by all potential subsequent uses. One example of such liberal and commercial fair use is parody." Greg Dahlen (talk) 13:20, 14 May 2015 (UTC)

legal cases

"There have currently been no cases..." - when was "currently"? It is important for the readers to know how large a search do they have to do between that "currently" and their own. --Oop (talk) 15:32, 13 March 2016 (UTC)

TODO LO RECAUDADO EL DIA DE HOY 500 HORAS CONTINUAS. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 170.231.170.46 (talk) 00:15, 3 April 2022 (UTC)