Help talk:Adding open-license text to Wikipedia

How to translate this page

There are two steps to translating this page to be able to use open license text on your language Wikipedia:

1. Translate this page
2. Translate Template:Free-content attribution

Translate Adding open license text to Wikipedia

Which licenses does Wikipedia accept?

Change the links to Creative Commons to your language

Finding open license text to add to Wikipedia

Currently this resource only exists in English

Converting and adding open license text to Wikipedia

Change the internal links to the pages in your own language

Attributing text

Change the name of the template to the corresponding template in your language (described below). Make sure all fields are created and clearly described.

Measuring reach

Change the name of the template in the instructions an in the query to the name of the template in your language.

Share your content on Wikipedia

Change the internal links to the pages in your own language

Translate Template:Free-content attribution

Some languages already have a suitable template, many do not. Make sure to make the template compatible with Visual Editor.

Questions?

If you have any questions about translating this page and the template message me

John Cummings (talk) 21:32, 16 March 2018 (UTC)

Idea for implementation

(originally posted at meta:Grants talk:IdeaLab/An open license text reuse tool for the Visual Editor toolbar - I copied this here because it seems more relevant here. Blue Rasberry (talk) 20:02, 21 July 2016 (UTC))

One way to do this on the wikitext side is wrapping the cited text into a pair of templates:

• an opening template {{OpenCCText}} that would not render anything visible (but might insert an opening <span class="open-cc-text">)
• and a closing template {{CloseCCText}} that would add a <ref>[[File:CoolCCTextLogo.svg|25px]] {{Cite|blah...}}</ref> tag (and possibly a closing </span>tag.

This would achieve a semantic markup in the wikitext (and with the span tags also in the rendered html - additionally users could tweak their stylesheet to highlight text that is marked up this way).

The advanage is that we can completely rely on citoid and the visual editor plugin would only assemble a bit of wikitext. One thing to keep in mind is that adding support to edit such blocks once they are inserted might be non trivial (visual editor would still show the opening and closimg templates though). --Dschwen (talk) 19:15, 22 June 2016 (UTC)

Related efforts

(originally posted at meta:Grants talk:IdeaLab/An open license text reuse tool for the Visual Editor toolbar - I copied this here because it seems more relevant here. Blue Rasberry (talk) 20:02, 21 July 2016 (UTC))

Here are some precedents set by similar efforts:

• en:Category:Wikipedia articles incorporating text from Citizendium

Citizendium was an effort to create a Wikipedia equivalent with more control over who might edit. Licenses for both Citizendium and Wikipedia are compatible, and the projects exchanged a large amount of content. This category was created by TakuyaMurata in 2007 and might be the first effort to note on a large scale when Wikipedia included open text from another source. Takuya - do you remember anything earlier? Is this your original idea? I think that practices for using this category influenced how other projects addressed the issue.

• Category:Wikipedia articles incorporating a citation from the 1911 Encyclopaedia Britannica with Wikisource reference

The 1911 Encyclopedia Britannia is the newest editing in the public domain and was an early base for thousands of Wikipedia articles. The legacy of this text remains in English Wikipedia today. @PBS:, you made this category in 2011. Do you know what people were doing to note use of this text before you made the category? To give credit with this system, one only puts this category on a page incorporating text.

• Wikisource:Wikisource:WikiProject Open Access/Programmatic import from PubMed Central

This was a project of Wikisource:Wikisource:WikiProject Open Access most prominently led by Daniel Mietchen. It put open access articles in Wikisource, but also proposed to copy any or all of those articles into Wikipedia when appropriate. I am not sure if any best practices were confirmed in this effort, but the problem of giving notice of copied text was raised.

• Commons:Commons:Email templates

Note especially the Interactive Release Generator by @FDMS4:. With either the standard en:WP:OTRS process or this new automated release form, text releases into Wikimedia projects are getting more attention. The time to establish best practices is becoming much more ripe now. Two very common cases which will become more frequent as OTRS releases become more common are release of text by email to put into Wikipedia articles and release of text of requests for Wikipedia talk pages to change Wikipedia articles in some way. Although these processes do not currently have a best :practice for managing text releases, through OTRS there are at least 50 requests daily which could be interpreted as, "put this text in Wikipedia, and apply an appropriate copyright with appropriate credit for the text release".

• en:Heart

@CFCF: At en:Wikipedia_talk:Wikipedia_Signpost/2016-06-15/Op-ed#Articles_aren.27t_only_created_by_Wikimedians you say, "The text is taken in large part from the CC-BY textbook. In fact roughly 80% of it is an adaptation of that text..." CFCF has been particularly thoughtful about how this should happen, and might have something to say about a best practice followed by a tool developed in this project. That "heart" article is a high-profile case which could set an example.

Blue Rasberry (talk) 14:19, 29 June 2016 (UTC)

"en:Category:Wikipedia articles incorporating a citation from the 1911 Encyclopaedia Britannica with Wikisource reference" has nothing to do with licensing it is a hidden maintenance category. There are a number of different similar hidden maintenance categories such as under en:Category:Wikipedia articles incorporating a citation from the 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica. They are just maintenance categories, and nothing to do with licensing. In Wikipedia articles, the different types of licensing, and how to satisfy them, are covered in the en:Wikipedia:Plagiarism guideline. For text copied from copyleft and public domain sources (such as en:EB1911) into Wikipedia articles, there are attribution templates like en:template:EB1911 that place the appropriate attribution wording on to the article page. Incidentaly, it is templates such as en:template:EB1911 that generate the maintenance categories found under en:Category:Wikipedia articles incorporating a citation from the 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica.

The category en:Category:Attribution templates lists over 200 such attribution templates including en:template:Citizendium and en:template:Citizendium copy

-- PBS (talk) 15:46, 2 July 2016 (UTC)

The template en:template:EB1911 was created in 2003 and simply generated an attribution string. Its ability to add articles to hidden maintenance categories was added in 2010. -- PBS (talk) 15:52, 2 July 2016 (UTC)

Release by OTRS

{{ConfirmationOTRS}} is a template which has been in use since February 2006 for sending evidence by email to Wikimedia reviewers that a certain text has a free license.

This system and WP:OTRS in general has its drawbacks, but a major advantage is that there are certain people who will only communicate by email. If the wiki community needs to negotiate a license with any such person or organization, then the OTRS system can help with that and this template is the current tool used to note that.

If this template is used, then that means that the guidelines on this "Adding open license text to Wikipedia" text should be followed, but additionally, there should be an OTRS ticket and this template should be pasted on the talk page of the article containing the externally produced free text. Blue Rasberry (talk) 15:52, 2 February 2017 (UTC)

Open

We usually say "free licenses" and "freely licensed", not "open". --Nemo 16:19, 10 June 2017 (UTC)

The page made a lot of confusion between open content and Open Access, which are largely orthogonal. I've rewritten the confusing passages and removed certain harmful suggestions (such as the suggestion to search in repositories which mostly contain unfree text).[1]

I also suggest to change the page title, replacing "open license text" with "free content" or "freely licensed text", to avoid such confusion popping up again. --Nemo 11:51, 5 September 2017 (UTC)

I'm not sure I agree that we need to change from "open" to "free". I do however agree that this page confuses and intermixes the terms "openly licensed" and "open access" too much. For instance I would suggest to delete "(also known as Open Access)". Open licencing and open access are slightly different things. Open licence refers strictly just to the type of licensing of resource - it is clear and unambiguous. Open access is a lot more than that and in some cases "open access" [sic] resources are not openly licensed - e.g. it is sadly not uncommon to encounter journals that consider themselves open access, but which are licensed under CC BY-NC or some such non-open license. Thus to avoid ambiguity, with the aim of helping Wikipedia rules compliance, this page should refer to open licensing where possible, and perhaps even flag that some resources which may consider themselves "open access" do not in fact use open licensing. Metacladistics (talk) 08:15, 25 September 2017 (UTC)

Stating your images are CC-BY-SA on social media

The page is very good for explaining to outsiders how to make their text open and free. Would it be appropriate to have a short section that did the same for images. (That is a euphemism for please could someone write a section) I am looking at academics that have a Wordpress page- and the average mobile phone user that uploads his photos onto social media such as Facebook. If there isn't a tag already written All the photos on my XXXXXX account are CC-BY-SA 4.0, which means you are free to use them anywhere with my blessing, providing I get a credit can we work one up? ClemRutter (talk) 20:02, 24 September 2017 (UTC)

Errors

A couple of errors on the page:

• CC-BY-SA-4.0 is not currently a compatible license for text according to WMF Legal. This is because the text of 4.0 states that re-users using the Share Alike must publish under 4.0 or later. Since we publish under 3.0 currently, we are not complying with the terms. CC-BY-4.0 is fine, and CC-BY-SA-4.0 is fine for images, but not text. When/if the plan to update our license to 4.0 happens, then it will be fine, but for now it would be a violation of CC terms.
• GFDL, when the sole license on a source, is no longer compatible for importing content. This is true for all additions after November 1 2008, so including it here is misleading. See WP:LU for when that change was made. Dual-licensed content, where the other license is one of the compatible ones, is fine, but not any GNU-only license.

Crow^Caw 15:28, 27 September 2017 (UTC)

Thanks Crow, I must have read some out of date information about GFDL. John Cummings (talk) 15:02, 20 November 2017 (UTC)

Improvements to page

You can help to further develop the process in several areas:

• Improve guidance to help people adapt the tone of text to fit into Wikipedia, avoid sources that reference Wikipedia.
• Create guidelines for people adding text written by themselves or their employer.
• Integrate reusing open license text into Wikiproject workflows to share knowledge from experts on Wikipedia in specific subject areas.
• Collate open license resources on the Wikipedia Library.
• Create a process for expert suggestions for text that can be added to Wikipedia.
• Provide clearer guidance to organisations to make content available under open licenses.
• Translate the documentation into other languages, the page views tool will work in any language.
• Integration into editing toolbar, making it easier to reuse of open license text.

Thanks

John Cummings (talk) 15:30, 20 November 2017 (UTC)

Village pump discussion

See Policy / technical / other questions regarding links to the project namespace from articles and citation templates for a topic I started about this page at the Village pump (miscellaneous) - Paul^T+/_C 17:11, 13 April 2018 (UTC)

Updates to the "creating articles" section

I applied some updates to the Wikipedia:Adding open license text to Wikipedia/creating articles#Converting and adding open license text to Wikipedia section, following from a discussion at Talk:Children in emergencies and conflicts#Issues. Maybe these rewrites need to be discussed here (too), but for the time being, I just link to the discussion we're having at that article talk page, a discussion which prompted me to update the guidance. --Francis Schonken (talk) 10:31, 6 May 2018 (UTC)

• Apart from this I still wanted to add a caveat regarding a new article needing to have an article title conforming to the WP:AT policy. --Francis Schonken (talk) 10:56, 6 May 2018 (UTC)
• This feels like you're trying to fit the entire Wikipedia manual into one page. It won't work. The page should focus on advice specific to the task at hand. --Nemo 20:13, 6 May 2018 (UTC)

Question: why is the guidance split up in subpages such as Wikipedia:Adding open license text to Wikipedia/creating articles? Guidelines should usually be coherent imho, which is afaics easier to realise when it's all on the same page. --Francis Schonken (talk) 07:18, 8 May 2018 (UTC)

@Francis Schonken: Since your edits are proving controversial, would you be happy to undo them leave the page as it is until there's a consensus for the changes? As a step towards building that consensus, what do you envisage being the problem with mirroring in regards to copying open access material? Richard Nevell (talk) 21:11, 8 May 2018 (UTC)

Re. "what do you envisage being the problem with mirroring in regards to copying open access material" – primarily, editor retention. Quoting John Cummings: "Susan stopped contributing to Wikipedia months ago...", and that is only one of many examples. The Osmosis debacle is more of the same. Time and again merely copy-pasting open access material leads to frustration, and Wikipedia loses editors as a result of such frustrations. SlimVirgin worded it thus: "We shouldn't allow outside organizations to use Wikipedia as extensions of their websites." Pointing to the well-established WP:NOTMIRROR policy thus fits well in this effort to prevent frustration, and to retain good faith editors. --Francis Schonken (talk) 23:22, 8 May 2018 (UTC)

But what specifically is the problem that WP:MIRROR solves here? If we're not specific, we're leaving the reader to guess. Richard Nevell (talk) 00:06, 9 May 2018 (UTC)

WP:MIRROR? No, that's not what I'm talking about. I'm talking about the WP:NOTMIRROR content policy. I think I linked it correctly each time. --Francis Schonken (talk) 00:33, 9 May 2018 (UTC)

There is a discussion concerning arbitration that is on-going and involves the OP: it involves established arbitrators and administrators; it is not forum-shopping, subliminal suggestion, trolling, hounding or any of the other things that the OP has been suggesting in his edit summaries. The OP has been attempting to steamroll through new policies on stable content that were never intended to apply to the majority of wikipedia articles. They would not apply to plot summaries of plays of Racine, novels of Dickens, etc, etc. Stable articles like that are always modified cumulatively, in the standard way. The OP himself made controversial edits on BWV 769 in January 2018 which contravened almost every rule, e.g. ignoring the tag {{in-use}}. Mathsci (talk) 03:23, 9 May 2018 (UTC)

Re. "... new policies ..." – incorrect: WP:PAID, WP:NOTMIRROR and WP:AT all already exist many years.

Re. "... policies ... that were never intended to apply to the majority of wikipedia articles" – incorrect: these policies have always been intended to apply to all Wikipedia articles.

Re. "... steamroll ..." – the problems related to adding open license text to Wikipedia have been discussed at WP:COIN (June 2017), at WP:VPP (September 2017), and have continued since. After so much time slowly moving towards the confusing guidance (which presents core content policies as style guidance...) at the root of such re-emerging problems, is of course far from steamrolling. --Francis Schonken (talk) 06:13, 9 May 2018 (UTC)

So then what is the key point in WP:NOTMIRROR that is relevant here? Richard Nevell (talk) 07:13, 9 May 2018 (UTC)

"Wikipedia articles are not merely collections of ... source material ..." (original emphasis), with all the caveats that are part of the WP:NOTMIRROR policy. --Francis Schonken (talk) 07:39, 9 May 2018 (UTC)

@Francis Schonken: We're making progress but that doesn't give the reader an action, something they can actually do to check they are satisfying policy. Are you asking editors to make sure the topic is the kind of thing you would expect to find on Wikipedia (eg: look for articles on similar topics and see if they exist, and if they do/don't do x/y) or something else? The proposed addition of Imported text may fall under the policy against mirroring is open-ended enough to not be very helpful to the reader. Richard Nevell (talk) 17:26, 9 May 2018 (UTC)

It's more like a (policy-based) rationale why the suggested adaptations in the ensuing step-by-step scheme are essential to make the addition of open license text to Wikipedia successful (or, the positive formulation of "a mere cut-and-paste of open license text found elsewhere has a high risk of running against a brick wall"). I'll try to work out a wording that puts it in this light. --Francis Schonken (talk) 18:03, 9 May 2018 (UTC)

This is the proposed update. --Francis Schonken (talk) 18:12, 9 May 2018 (UTC)

Thank you for that change, the wording is better as it's now clearer why it's relevant. But since the content is under discussion, please would you restore the previous version of the page until there is a consensus.

There's a similar issue with directing people to WP:COI and WP:PAID. The COI page in particular goes pretty in-depth. This guidance needs to highlight the key parts. What bits of the COI guideline and paid editing policy are relevant here, and what are we actually asking people to do? It's one thing to point to those pages for more information, but we should be able to succinctly summarise it if it's important here. Richard Nevell (talk) 18:21, 9 May 2018 (UTC)

I have restored the content here. The idea of @updating@ has no meaning. Francis Schoinken has engaged in his own version of "updating" on BWV 769: there was no consensus and the usual method of cumulative editing was not used. All stable articles (e.g. in this case created in 2009) are updated in a similar cumulative way: that has been always the case. The Chateau of Vauvenargues was similar; so was Porte d'Aix. Mathsci (talk) 06:07, 10 May 2018 (UTC)

The guidance here is about "Adding open license text to Wikipedia" (emphasis added): BWV 769 is not based on open license text afaik, so is unrelated to this guidance. Similar for Château of Vauvenargues and Porte d'Aix afaics: these articles are not based on open license text, so unrelated to this guidance. --Francis Schonken (talk) 06:23, 10 May 2018 (UTC)

@Francis Schonken: It would help collaboration if you removed your text from the page until there is a consensus. Richard Nevell (talk) 06:56, 10 May 2018 (UTC)

The cumulative edits involved in editing a stable article do not match Francis Schonken's description of "updating." There seems to be no consensus for that at all. One of the latest edit summaries rvv was inappropriate. Mathsci (talk) 07:53, 10 May 2018 (UTC)

I will describe below how in practice Francis Schonken updated BWV 769 in January 2018: he has misrepresented how that "updating" happened; the diffs are clear enough. I will add the diffs, bit by bit. Mathsci (talk) 08:05, 10 May 2018 (UTC)

Timeline.

1. Stroke between 20:14–22:24, 29 December 2017.[2] Discussion on BWV 142 and sources (including Buelow & Telemann's entry on Grove Music Online).
2. Hospitalisation, 30 December 2017–11 January 2018.
3. 12 January [3]
4. 22 January [4][5]
5. 23 January [6][7][8]
6. 24 January, lecture to Doug Weller.[9][10]
7. 28 January, "revenge" edits[ on BWV 769. [11][12][13][14][15][16][17][18][19][20][21]
8. 28 January, complains about "one source" [22][23][24] (Schonken edits through the {{in-use}} tag) [25][26][27] (removes in-use tag without consensus) [28][29][30][31] (claims trying to create more collaborative environment) [32] (one source again) [33][34][35] (removes in-use tag because of stress)
9. 29 January, [36][37][38][39][40][41] (removes in-use tag several times) [42][43][44][45][46][47] (edits through in-use tag) [48] (edits through in-use tag) [49] (removes in-use tag) [50] (edits through in-use tag) [51] (while in-use tag is active, Schonken explains how the preview button works) [52] (edits through in-use tag) [53] (edits through in-use tag, claims inaccurary) [54][55][56] (all edits during in-use tag)[57][58] (in-use tag)
10. Multiple statments by Francis Schonken on WP:OWN assembled into a segment on his user talk page on "ownershop".[59]
11. Two blackouts, c 18:45, 2–8 February 2018, hospitialisation (cardiology).
12. Started to add German translation/summary/paraphrase of John Butt's article on BWV 769. The updated content was almost all written by me. It changed from 26,795 bytes to 43,923 bytes, almost doubling the content. Between 9 February and 9 March I made 329 edits.
13. 9 February, [60][61][62][63][64][65][66][67]
14. 13 February, [68][69][70][71][72][73][74]
15. 19 February, [75][76][77][78][79][80][81][82]

Summary. In 2009, during the period of advent, I created the article Canonic Variations. Prior to January 2018, it had been a stable article, similar to the series of articles I have written on Bach's sacred organ works. The same secondary sources and method of editing were used; similarly for Clavier-Übung III.

The previous policy for creating wikipedia articles from scratch makes a lot of sense. However, Francis Schonken's policy to include what he calls "updating" does not make any sense at all: once a roughly stable article has been created, it will evolve through cumulative and serendipitous edits. In the case of a specialist article, from a high-quality encyclopedic source, often one source is sufficient, depending on the context. That was certainly the case here.

Francis Schonken did not even have access to the "updated" source about which he complained (John Butt's German-language chapter on the Canonical Variations from Laaber Verlag.) Similarly his essay on "ownership" in his user talk page was unhelpful. Apart from a few commas and alignments of images, Francis Schonken contributed very little. Indeed his contribution seems on balance to be negative: he had to have it explained in detail why it made no sense to blank the text. That was already apparent in the 2009 article.

His habit of ignoring {{in-use}} tags was just one of several ways of evading WP:consensus. His confusion on the registration of the organ stops (Variatio IV) was not helpful at all. At some stage he decided to explain to an experienced editor how the preview button worked. At no stage did he make any major edits to the article.

This was one example of "updating" a wikipedia article. I think the previous rubric was fine: what Francis Schonken wrote later has no consensus and still makes very little sense after tweaking.

Mathsci (talk) 12:58, 10 May 2018 (UTC)

I sense there is some confusion about the scope of this guide: sure any edit adding (previously unpublished) text is also "adding open license text to Wikipedia", which is however not the kind of editing covered by this how-to guide, which is about importing text that has been previously published under an open license, that is, outside Wikimedia projects. Tried to make that clear with a scope definition.

I return to a question I asked above: why was this guide ever split in subpages? One may arrive at such a subpage without being aware that this guidance has a defined scope. I'll proceed with undoing these splits, which seem to have no previous discussion either, and make it near impossible to make a coherent guide.

Additionally, renaming the guide might be advisable. How about Wikipedia:Importing open license text from non-Wikimedia projects? --Francis Schonken (talk) 10:01, 10 May 2018 (UTC)

Francis Schonken, I've asked you three times to please leave the page in its previous state until there is consensus for change. I'm happy to keep discussing the content on the talk page, but it's disheartening that you have ignored my requests. If we are going to work together to establish a consensus there needs to be better communication. Richard Nevell (talk) 20:04, 10 May 2018 (UTC)

@Francis Schonken: Please leave it as subpages: this allows for simplication of formatting, and allows for transclusion in other pages or resources. Sadads (talk) 13:44, 10 May 2018 (UTC)

@Francis Schonken:, as User:Sadads says the page was broken up to allow parts to be trasnscluded more easily, e.g Wikipedia:WikiProject_United_Nations/Open_Access_text. Thanks, John Cummings (talk) 13:57, 15 May 2018 (UTC)

Re. "... tra[s]nscluded more easily": you'd be looking for WP:SELECTIVETRANSCLUSION, or the more specific Help:Labeled section transclusion. Well, that's easier because one doesn't need to create cut-up pages (the syntax is maybe used less frequently, which is not the same as "difficult", just takes the habit to use it). Wikipedia:Defining is an example of a page that largely imports its content in this way. No sectioning off of guideline parts to separate pages was needed to create that page.

Also, even if it were more difficult to use that method: ease to keep the guidance coherent takes precedence over easiness to use a particular transclusion syntax I suppose. --Francis Schonken (talk) 15:17, 15 May 2018 (UTC)

Follow-up

Seems like the issues mentioned above remain as yet unaddressed, example: Talk:Access to information#Extreme bias. --Francis Schonken (talk) 11:44, 14 February 2020 (UTC)

Comments from the sidelines

Just a few observations

1. A nice succinct page
2. Exceeding its scope. There is a lot of good stuff- that would be more apprpriate in a page on editing your first page, rather than adding OS text. The last two sections in how to access pageview counters, is informative but not in scope
3. The CC-BY-SA 4.0 was news to me. A reason in a footnote is needed.
4. If CC-BY-SA 4.0 is not acceptable why is it that it is the default license for the Wikimedia Commons Upload Wizard?
5. My comments about images don't seem to have been addressed

Still if is a nice page, obviously prepared for a specific clientele at a training session. Could you just divide it into two?

--ClemRutter (talk) 08:05, 8 May 2018 (UTC)

Hi @ClemRutter:, my understanding of the issue with no 4.0 text on Wikipedia is that the changes between 3.0 and 4.0 which mean they are not interchangable (this is partly to do with an extra protection in the 4.0 license which orginally came from a special 3.0 license for UN agencies). Can you clarify what you mean by 'My comments about images don't seem to have been addressed'? Thanks, John Cummings (talk) 10:02, 9 May 2018 (UTC)

@John Cummings: Thanks- but are we saying that we are going to cull every 4.0 photo on the entire (en) wikipedia? 4.0 is the default license for the Wikimedia Commons Upload Wizard! If you look above I wrote a section #Stating your images are CC-BY-SA on social media which has attracted no comment I just wondered if it was now time to address the issue. ClemRutter (talk) 10:51, 9 May 2018 (UTC)

@John Cummings and ClemRutter: Regarding CC-BY-SA 4.0 and the Upload Wizard: We don't mandate set licenses for file uploads (either locally at en.wp or at Commons), unlike for text contributions. Any license that meets the Definition of Free Cultural Works is allowed. Of these CC-BY-SA 4.0 is considered the "best". There is no problem with license compatibility because multi-licensing them is entirely optional. Our licensing policy and ToS treat text and file licensing separately. See Wikipedia:Copyrights#Contributors' rights and obligations and wmf:Terms of Use/en#7. Licensing of Content (d. Non-text media). – Finnusertop (talk ⋅ contribs) 19:25, 9 May 2018 (UTC)

Thats a relief! Thanks for the clarification. This snippit of information needs to go onto the article/page too. Maybe as a footnote.ClemRutter (talk) 20:11, 9 May 2018 (UTC)

Note, I was able to track down some more information about the issues with the 4.0 license here: meta:Terms of use/Creative Commons 4.0. Apparently there was a dicussion in 2016 to "upgrade" the Wikimedia license from 3.0 to 4.0 but as far as I can tell after a whole bunch of well-intended but often misinformed discussion, nothing has happened since then... It looks like this isn't something that is still being considered, but if there is more info out there I'd be interested in seeing it! I agree with Clem though that it would be helpful if there was some kind of footnote or link in the instructions pointing to an explanation for why 4.0 text is not compatible with the current license. - Paul^T+/_C 07:40, 25 February 2019 (UTC)

Suggestion: add Public-domain.

Material in the public domain also has a compatible (non)license and should be treated exactly as stated here. In the PD case, the attribution is needed to avoid plagiarism, not a copyright license violation, but the same process steps are needed. -Arch dude (talk) 04:28, 2 June 2018 (UTC)

Public domain text fits into a very similar process. What do you reckon, John Cummings? Should it be mentioned here, or if the page is aimed at people working in organisations are they likely to come across much public domain material? Richard Nevell (talk) 10:17, 10 June 2018 (UTC)

• It may make sense to include a small section on PD linking to the main PD & attribution pages, as the nuances between PD and Open License may cause people to look here. We've got many many attribution templates for PD beyond the Free Content template as given here. Crow^Caw 19:40, 10 June 2018 (UTC)

Suggestion: change the order of the steps

When adding open license text it is a good idea to capture the unmodified text in the history first, before modifying it. In the case of of a new article, this can be done as the first step fo article creation. You do need to add the attribution and some sort of "in process" template, but that's all. In the case of an addition to an existing article, the unmodified text can be added to the talk page or perhaps to a temporary page that can then be merge, preserving the history. The object of this exercise is to permit a later editor to see all the steps you took to get from the source to the article. -Arch dude (talk) 04:34, 2 June 2018 (UTC)

Requested move 25 February 2019

The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review after discussing it on the closer's talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

The result of the move request was: Moved. (non-admin closure)  samee  converse  18:29, 4 March 2019 (UTC)

---

Wikipedia:Adding open license text to Wikipedia → Help:Adding open license text to Wikipedia – The "Help:" namespace is more appropriate for this content. My understanding is that all tutorials and "how-tos" that are not userspaced essays belong there. See a similar move from Wikipedia:Picture tutorial to Help:Pictures. - Paul^T+/_C 19:18, 25 February 2019 (UTC)

• Support. Makes sense. – Finnusertop (talk ⋅ contribs) 19:21, 25 February 2019 (UTC)
• Comment. Note that there are some parts of this page that are transcluded into other pages (and there are also subpages - i.e. /creating articles and /how to). A move will likely impact this, but it would be best to confirm this before executing the move, if that is what is decided. - Paul^T+/_C 19:36, 25 February 2019 (UTC)
• Support -- sounds reasonable to me, but we need to pay attention to the fixing of stuff (and leaving a redirect), mentioned by Psantora, Sadads (talk) 17:13, 26 February 2019 (UTC)
• Supportbut please please don't break anything :) John Cummings (talk) 21:26, 26 February 2019 (UTC)
• Support Sounds like a sensible move. Richard Nevell (talk) 21:27, 26 February 2019 (UTC)
• Comment – or question, really: has there been a recent community discussion of whether we actually want to encourage addition of open-source content? How is this/will this be monitored (there seems to be ample scope for misuse by unscrupulous commercial entities and editors, for example)? If this were endorsed by the community s a guideline, the move wouldn't be needed. And until/unless that happens, perhaps it would be better classified as an essay? Justlettersandnumbers (talk) 23:02, 26 February 2019 (UTC)
  • I don't really see what the issue is as long as the content is properly sourced and complies with our other policies. It seems like a great way to easily add good information to the project, again assuming reliable sources etc... What would the potential downsides be? What kind of misuse has been an issue in the past? (But, this probably isn't the right place to have this discussion. Perhaps a new section? Or maybe at the village pump?) - Paul^T+/_C 03:04, 27 February 2019 (UTC)

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The above discussion is preserved as an archive of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page or in a move review. No further edits should be made to this section.

CC-BY-SA 4.0

Why is CC-BY-SA 4.0 not an acceptable licence for text? I can't seem to find any further information on this anywhere, seems like an arbitrary assertion...--176.250.94.164 (talk) 22:39, 7 November 2019 (UTC)

• CC-BY-SA 4.0's terms state that the Share Alike part must be at version 4 or any later version. Since we're published under CC-BY-SA-3, we can't currently meet that requirement. There is talk underway of upgrading our license to 4.0 but as of right now we're at 3.0. Crow^Caw 17:20, 8 November 2019 (UTC)

📋 Instructions for simplifying process of importing CC BY 4.0 material authored by others, into Wikipedia, or other site governed by Wikimedia Foundation terms

I drew up these instructions for importing CC BY 4.0 material hosted in the GitHub repository for Microsoft's VBA documentation, into Wikibooks. Adding it here in case it is of use to others.

1. If:
   • Wikimedia Foundation project changes such that it mandates different licences to the ones stipulated in the foundation.wikimedia.org terms,
   • the 16th June 2014 version of the Wikimedia Foundation terms no longer applies (i.e. it is revised or replaced with a newer one),
   🄾🅁
   • additional terms are agreed pertaining to the Wikimedia Foundation project that are in addition to the 16th June 2014 version of the Wikimedia Foundation terms,
   then these instructions cannot be used.


2. Applicable law that you are under contract to follow, includes the laws of the USA and of California.


3. Read and abide by the text under the "Paid contributions without disclosure" heading of section 4 ("Refraining from Certain Activities") of the Wikimedia Foundation terms.


4. If you own copyright in the material to be imported, read and abide by part a of section 7 ("Licensing of Content") of the Wikimedia Foundation terms.


5. If the licensed material is non-text media, read and abide by part d of section 7 ("Licensing of Content") of Wikimedia Foundation terms,


6. You must abide by the mandatory project policies released by the Wikimedia Foundation Board of Trustees (these are not the community policies of the project); they are available via https://foundation.wikimedia.org/wiki/Resolutions, check to see whether anything needs to be read.


7. By the importation, do not modify the applicable terms and requirements of any free license authorized by the Wikimedia Foundation terms of use.


8. The project site must not apply any effective technological measures to the imported material if doing  so  would restrict exercise of the rights granted under the CC BY 4.0 licence by any recipient of the licensed material.


9. If you are worried that importation may infringe the
   • moral rights (such as the right of integrity),     or
   • publicity,  privacy, and/or other  similar  personality  rights,
   of the licensor(s) of the CC BY 4.0 material, read and abide by section 2b(1) of CC BY 4.0 licence.


10. Patent and trademark rights are granted neither to the user(s) adapting or importing the material, nor to the reusers of the imported or adapted material (so take care not to infringe such rights [might mean removal of trademarks from material]).


11. Whilst the licence largely waives royalty-collecting rights attached to use of the CC BY 4.0 material, some such rights may remain unwaived. If concerned about such remaining rights, in order to discover how to determine those rights, simply read the whole of 2b(3) of CC BY 4.0 licence.


12. Either follow the following numbered list of instructions, or more liberally abide by section 3a(1) and 3a(2) of the CC BY 4.0 licence:
    1. In these instructions, by permanent hyperlink/URI to a particular resource, is meant a hyperlink/URI that, over the course of years, is unlikely to become invalid in regard to its linkage to the particular resource.
    2. If the licensor(s) explicitly state that the method of attribution in the steps of 3 is not acceptable, then these instructions cannot be used [instead, abide by section 3a(1) and 3a(2) of the CC BY 4.0 licence by some other way.]
    3. 1. Create a permanent hyperlink to the history of the source CC BY 4.0 material, where the history is hosted on the internet in such a way that it appears the licensor(s) endorse(s)/request(s) that reuse of the material be attributed by linking to the hosting of such history, and where the history includes information on the entities designated to receive attribution under the licence (such entities include the creators of the material), and precisely what those entities contributed to the source material.
       2. The hyperlink created in step 3a, should appear on the "Wikimedia Foundation site" page designated to host the imported material, "... for example in a banner or other notations pointing out that some or all of the content was originally published elsewhere...", with labelling indicating that the hyperlink links to attribution information for that imported CC BY 4.0 licensed material.
       3. If there is other attribution information of the same kind, not present at the ultimate destination of the hyperlink, but still supplied alongside the material or in the actual material, then that information must also appear with the hyperlink in the same fashion dictated by 3b, on the "Wikimedia Foundation site" page. However, if it doesn't appear the licensor(s) endorse(s)/request(s) that reuse of the material be attributed in the manner just outlined concerning this other information, then these set of instructions cannot be used [instead, abide by section 3a(1) and 3a(2) of the CC BY 4.0 licence by some other way.]
    4. 1. The following two things must be made known in the importation:
          • that the CC BY 4.0 material is licensed under CC BY 4.0     and
          • where, in terms of the precise hyperlink to the licence's text, the licence can be obtained on the Creative Commons website.
       2. 1. If the CC BY 4.0 licensed material is text, the things of 4a should be made known via the page footer, page history, and/or discussion page, of the "Wikimedia Foundation site" page to which the CC BY 4.0 material is to be imported.
          2. If on the other hand, the CC BY 4.0 licensed material is not text, the things of 4a should be made known in the licensing section of the media's description page or the applicable source page for the media, such pages being the pages related to the imported media, that are hosted on the Wikimedia Foundation site.

          
          

    5. 1. Do not remove the following if it is present in the actual CC BY 4.0 content:
          1. attribution information,
          2. copyright notice(s),
          3. notice(s) that refer to the CC BY 4.0 licence,
          4. notice(s) that refer to the disclaimer of warranties,
          5. a URI or hyperlink to the CC BY 4.0 licensed material, to the extent reasonably  practicable,     _🄰🄽🄳
          6. an indication of any previous  modifications to the material.
       2. For each of the things listed in 5a(i) to 5a(vi) that are supplied with the content (as opposed to in the actual content), if it has not already been added somehow to the "Wikimedia Foundation site" page designated for receiving the imported CC BY 4.0 material (including to the associated talk/discussion page), do either of the following:
          1. Place it on the talk/discussion page of the "Wikimedia Foundation site" page designated for receiving the imported CC BY 4.0 material.
          2. If it is not already hyperlinked-to in a reasonably direct way on the "Wikimedia Foundation site" page designated for receiving the imported CC BY 4.0 material, create a permanent hyperlink to it and somehow add the newly created hyperlink to the "Wikimedia Foundation site" page. Make sure that the page's hyperlink to the resource, is clearly labelled as pointing to the resource.

       
       

    6. If you modified the CC BY 4.0 material, and that modified material is the material to be imported, indicate this somehow on the "Wikimedia Foundation site" page to which the CC BY 4.0 material is to be imported. It may be acceptable to do this on the associated talk/discussion page.


13. If the licensor(s) of the material that is licensed under the CC BY 4.0 licence, request that you remove any of the information specified as being required by section 3(a)(1)(A) of the licence, you must do such removal to the extent reasonably practicable. In reality though, for historic imports to Wikimedia Foundation sites, such removal may always be not reasonably practicable.


14. If the CC BY 4.0 material includes Sui Generis Database Rights (that is, if the licensed material contains or is a database), read section 4 of the CC BY 4.0 licence and abide by it.


15. During the process of importation, you must not do any of the following in your modifications to, and/or adaptation of, the material:
    • binding the licensor(s) of the CC BY 4.0 material to terms or conditions additional or different to the terms of the CC BY 4.0 licence (cf. term 7a of CC BY 4.0 licence)
    • waiving a term or condition of the CC BY 4.0 licence without the express agreement of the licensor(s) [cf. term 8c of CC BY 4.0 licence]

    
    

--MarkJFernandes (talk) 07:58, 20 July 2020 (UTC)

Upcoming artist

I would like to add a biography about rapper 00dereio to Wikipedia for Spotify and apple artists bios. 2601:140:C180:6270:B1F6:347A:2CD3:24DD (talk) 16:29, 3 September 2022 (UTC)

Please see WP:YFA. But first read WP:TOOSOON. -Arch dude (talk) 16:29, 4 September 2022 (UTC)

Suggestion to change the guideline about the sources

I don't like how the statement in the sources doesn't say where the content was added. I mean this statement for example: :

•  This article incorporates text from a free content work. Licensed under CC BY-SA 3.0 IGO (license statement/permission). Text taken from Rethinking Education: Towards a global common good?​, 74-75, UNESCO. UNESCO.

When I come to an article years after that content was added it is quite possible that the text block in question is actually no longer there (e.g. if the article has been culled, condensed, split, or otherwise changed). Then that statement under "sources" just remains there but is no longer relevant. I think it's far better to use in-line citations like this:

• When using content from open access publications add this to the reference in source editor: |doi-access=free}} [[File:CC-BY icon.svg|50px]] Text was copied from this source, which is available under a [https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License]</ref>

This way, the licence info stays together with the content and won't get separated. EMsmile (talk) 08:19, 8 February 2023 (UTC)

A further complication is that when content from free-content sources, the source's sources are often added as references, which makes it look like the Wikipedia article has been written based on those, rather than being a replica of the free-content source that has summarised them. Cordless Larry (talk) 08:35, 8 February 2023 (UTC)

Do you know if there is a template that makes that handily, EMsmile? Eric Luth (WMSE) (talk) 14:13, 8 February 2023 (UTC)

Not a template but I just add it to the reference itself. Compare with how I did it at ocean acidification. The reference then looks like this in the list: EMsmile (talk) 14:26, 8 February 2023 (UTC)

References

Yeah I came here to say the same thing. The instructions here violate the layout guide, along with other general practices encouraging references to be a ttributed to certain statements. In fact right now there's a village pump discussion about deprecating general references like the ones people are being instructed to add using this page. Graham87 09:48, 14 May 2023 (UTC)