Talk:Licensing update

Please help notify other GFDL wikis which need to relicense before August 1 to remain compatible with Wikimedia projects

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Most discussion took place on foundation-l.

• LSS: 2008 October 18-31, 2008 November 2-15, 2008 December 15-31, 2009 January 1-15, 2009 January 16-31, 2009 February 1-15, 2009 February 16-28, 2009 March 1-15, 2009 March 16-31, 2009 April 1-30, 2009 May 1-31, 2009 June 1-15, 2009 June 15-30.
• Most important (or at least, longest) threads: [1], [2], [3], [4], [5], [6], [7], [8], [9], [10], [11], [12], [13], [14], [15], [16].

cc by sa : US or unported

To my knowledge, the jurisdictional variant URL wasn't intentionally chosen in the hyperlinks in the Board resolution. The language of the proposed migration, which has been vetted by the Board, has consistently referenced the "unported" version. -- From Erik on the Foundation list.

Anthere 19:58, 20 April 2009 (UTC)

So let me get this straight...

If this vote does pass, and the Board of Trustees do pass this, then all content on Wikipedia will be under a license that states that if you'd like to republish this work, then you must give credit to Wikipedia? Or will you be able to use the GNU Free Documentation License with any content? 69.68.196.73 02:43, 22 April 2009 (UTC)

You will still be able to use the GFDL with all local content if you find the license terms easier to satisfy. Local contributors will be required to dual-license their contributions under both the GFDL and CC-BY-SA to facilitate that. Happy‑melon 09:24, 22 April 2009 (UTC)

What is the difference between a local contributor and any other contributor? 69.68.196.73 20:47, 22 April 2009 (UTC)

We can import content from other projects that use compatible licenses. So for instance the reason no one at Wikimedia is remotely concerned about the growth of Citizendium is because when they finally get around to writing a nice article, we can in many cases (will be all cases if this resolution passes) copy it to our own wikis, with suitable attribution, of course, because Citizendium's license is compatible with our own (GFDL for articles they pinched from us, CC-BY-SA otherwise). Now, if we move to dual-licensing, we will require anyone who edits directly to Wikimedia to dual-license their contributions, but we can't require that from outside sources. To avoid severely restricting our choice of sources, we will accept any imported content that is licensed under at least CC-BY-SA. So some of Citizendium's articles are GFDL 1.2+, which exactly matches our own. Other articles are 'only' CC-BY-SA. If we import one of those articles to Wikimedia, obviously that content can only be relicensed under CC-BY-SA. So the layman description is "all content can be relicensed under CC-BY-SA. Most content is also available under GFDL". Happy‑melon 21:08, 22 April 2009 (UTC)

How do I change my vote? I want to vote against it, I didn't realize what it really meant.

I just learned that we'd be cutting ourselves off from every other GFDL source in the world. I don't think there are that many CC-BY-SA sources that we'd want to incorporate into Wikipedia to make it worth losing every other GFDL source. I want to change my vote to be against it -- how can I do that? From the IRC chat group:

according to gnu.org/licenses/fdl-1.3-faq.html... If GFDL content was published somewhere other than a public wiki, it can only be used under CC-BY-SA 3.0 if it was added to a wiki before Nov 1 2008. So nothing added after that date can be relicensed as CC-by-SA and will need to be removed before we switch or as soon as possible afterwards

My response was:

So with the license transition, we won't be able to use anything added to pretty much every other wiki, unless they also switch to this cc-by-sa thing? I mean, pretty much every other wiki is using GFDL licensed content.

Honestly, why would we want to cut ourselves off of all GFDL sources? There just isn't enough CC-BY-SA stuff out there that we'd want to incorporate to make it worth it. Banaticus 18:35, 24 April 2009 (UTC)

I think you'd be surprised how many sites will follow our lead, whichever way we choose to go. Yes, there are other wikis out there, but we are without a doubt 'the daddy'. It won't be universal, naturally; but it probably will be widespread. Also consider that the new license will open up a whole new set of wikis and sources that weren't previously available; for instance, we'd be in license-compliance with Citizendium, so we really wouldn't need to 'worry' about their 'competition' (not that we really do at the moment!). Happy‑melon 18:54, 24 April 2009 (UTC)

But what about, say, Ballotpedia? What if other sites don't follow Wikipedia's lead? I mean, it apparently took a team of lawyers and the GFDL people had to specifically be on board for Wikipedia to make the change, how is anyone else honestly expected to be able to do that? But even if they're able to come in under the same terms that Wikipedia just had, they have to go back and review all stuff that was added since November for copyright violations? Again, it comes down to lawyers, funding, people -- how are other places supposed to take care of all that? Other than other wiki sites who are under the meta umbrella who would possibly have it all handled for them, I really don't think many other sites are going to go through all the time and trouble of switching. Banaticus 20:15, 24 April 2009 (UTC)

Simply vote again (preferably from the same starting wiki). In the event of multiple votes from a single account, only the most recent one is counted. Dragons flight 20:48, 24 April 2009 (UTC)

Thanks, I found the link at en.wikipedia by going to w:Special:SecurePoll/vote/1 Banaticus 04:38, 25 April 2009 (UTC)

I'd like to see some substantiation of the assertion that "pretty much every other wiki is using GFDL licensed content". I've personally seen far too many CC-licensed ones to take that statement at face value without further verification. – McDutchie 20:15, 27 April 2009 (UTC)

Credit imported CC-BY-SA content

The proposed termes of use include the following: "If you import text under the CC-BY-SA license, you must abide by the terms of the license; specifically, you must, in a reasonable fashion, credit the author(s). Where such credit is commonly given through page histories (such as wiki-to-wiki copying), it is sufficient to give attribution in the edit summary, which is recorded in the page history, when importing the content." No, it is not sufficient to give attribution in the edit summary. Authors of text under the CC-BY-SA licence published outside WMF-projects might have dicided on specific ways how they want to be given attribution. Furthermore, re-users applying the "expectations for re-users" will almost certainly fail to meet the CC-BY-SA requirements in this case.

Let me give an example: Netizen A writes an interesting article and publishes it on his private website. Since he wants to share his knowledge, he publishes the text under the CC-BY-SA licence, but requires attribution-by-name. Netizen B imports this text into a WMF wiki - let's say, the English Wikipedia -, crediting User A in the edit summary. Netizen C copies the article from the Wikipedia with a link to the article, thus using attribution-by-URL. By doing so, netizen C does not credit netizen A in the way that netizen A had required (to be precise, netizen A is not given credit at all!).

And if netizen A decides to re-use his own text in another context, everybody will think he has only copied from the Wikipedia... Adrian Suter 14:38, 28 April 2009 (UTC)

Same applies to imported images, i.e. tons of flickr-content. We cannot assume all flickr-contributors agree to the TOS. -- smial 12:07, 29 April 2009 (UTC)

There are some users of wikipedia too, that don't agree the proposed terms of service. The TOS may not change the licence in that way, or much content has to be deleted. --Stefanbs 15:25, 21 May 2009 (UTC)

What will happen to GFDL file in the case of...?

It is possible that, at some future point, GFDL 1.2 media may be disallowed. However, this will only happen if CC-BY-SA is modified to make it more explicitly a "strong copyleft" license for embedded media, requiring the surrounding content to be licensed under CC-BY-SA. Currently both licenses are somewhat ambiguous in this regard.

This means that in this occasion it could be a storm of deletions of all file licensed with GFDL, does this? I think it's legally impossible for other to change a license if decided by the author of the file. --Roberto Segnali all'Indiano 07:34, 2 May 2009 (UTC)

There aren't that many GFDL-1.2-only media currently on WMF; none on de.wiki, none on en.wiki; but there are 12,000 on Commons. Disallowing GFDL-1.2 would be conducted as a 'phasing out' rather than an outright cutoff to prevent precisely the deletion spree you mention. Happy‑melon 13:38, 6 May 2009 (UTC)

On an important note: all changes will be conducted over a period. Things won't necessarily change dramatically overnight. Things will gradually phase out – and in. —Anonymous Dissident^Talk 08:14, 11 May 2009 (UTC)

Update?

Should we put a banner of some kind on top of the lemma which tells that the voting has stopped and where to find the announced results on March 10th? I for one am not sure where to look at that day (though it most probably will be in the media anyway... But I'd like to read the regular announcement too). Konsumkind 00:13, 6 May 2009 (UTC)

Do you mean May 10? And we have placed the message on Meta's home page. OhanaUnited^{Talk page} 01:29, 6 May 2009 (UTC)

Yepp, meant May 10th (sorry). You're right with the home page, though some people set direct links to this page. Some sort of message that it is obsolete now might be a benefit. Konsumkind 09:50, 6 May 2009 (UTC)

A notice to tell people when the results are available is currently being translated. It will be used when the results are posted and will contain a link to them. :-) Cbrown1023 talk 01:37, 6 May 2009 (UTC)

Ah ok, thx :-) Konsumkind 09:50, 6 May 2009 (UTC)

May 10

It's may 10, any word on the results? 189.105.47.35 10:47, 10 May 2009 (UTC)

Seems it becomes May 15. 百家姓之四 01:48, 12 May 2009 (UTC)

May 11

+1 Syrcro 06:27, 11 May 2009 (UTC)

+1 -- smial 07:11, 11 May 2009 (UTC)

Hello, You are placing here messages like +1, but that will not make us work more fast. Please remenber that we are just humans just like you ;-) We are doing what we can, please have a little bit patiënce. Huib talk 07:22, 11 May 2009 (UTC)

I wonder exactly what has to be done? Tallying is done by software I guess, vote eiligibility seems to be done by software, what is exactly what has to be done manually? (The question is based on curiousity and not on the wish to hurry you by any means.) --grin ✎ 07:47, 11 May 2009 (UTC)

Double votes have to be manually extracted. More than that, there have been or would have been problems with sockpuppetry. —Anonymous Dissident^Talk 08:11, 11 May 2009 (UTC)

Thanks for the info. Anything on how many votes approximately were cast? --grin ✎ 11:53, 11 May 2009 (UTC)

Day-by-day breakdown of ballots cast

This is not a forum, doing messages like "+1" are really immature even in the forum environment, let alone here. Please don't rush us. Rushing only increases our pressure and further reduces productivity. To answer your question, a total of 18,707 ballots (see graph on the right). That's the grand total, including socks and double-voting. OhanaUnited^{Talk page} 15:59, 11 May 2009 (UTC)

I have to say, that's a bit mean :D Raising our hopes like that... Happy‑melon 21:45, 15 May 2009 (UTC)

I thought of adding another +1 and decided that it's silly, but this "mid-may" thing starts to look pretty bad.

And why are votes changed manually anyway? Votes? Changed? Manually? Where else in the world votes are changed manually? --79.176.241.146 06:47, 16 May 2009 (UTC)

I think you understand us wrong, we removed double votes manually. We didn't change votes :-) Huib talk 07:03, 16 May 2009 (UTC)

Is there a way to get the results with and also without your manual handling? I agree in 79.176.241.146's doubts. -- Sozi 07:54, 16 May 2009 (UTC)

Struck votes, which are mostly duplicate votes where the same individual voted multiple times, are never opened. As a security matter, vote content is encrypted and no one has access to the actual vote content during the period that duplicate votes are handled. There are also multiple people available to review this process, and a written (though not public) reason is required for each removal. It would be very difficult to remove enough votes inappropriately to influence the result without being noticed. (Incidentally, a better system could probably do >90% of the duplicate vote reduction automatically, but that's not the system we have.) Dragons flight 16:10, 16 May 2009 (UTC)

That's certainly not the level of transparency I expect from an organization that promotes open knowledge. And I think that I'm not alone. The overall picture of the whole voting process is, well, not the best. Very disappointing... --Berntie 11:44, 18 May 2009 (UTC)

I think it's entirely misguided to even begin to suggest that anything under the table or out of form is occurring in the manual checking of the votes here. It's for the quality and the accuracy of the vote that this time is taken. As it is, this process has been completed; all that remains is for the formalities to be executed with the Board before things go public. Patience. —Anonymous Dissident^Talk 12:08, 18 May 2009 (UTC)

Just to make it clear: I'm not impatient, I don't care if we have to wait a few weeks for the result. What I do care about is that nobody can follow what's going on during these weeks. Nothing is made public. --Berntie 11:31, 19 May 2009 (UTC)

Pray tell, what exactly did you expect? Happy‑melon 12:20, 18 May 2009 (UTC)

The current voting process is brand new. It has some serious limitations. It also has some design flaws that could be improved for better transparency. I think we certainly do want to improve this going forward, so if you'd like to offer constructive feedback about what you'd like to see in the future, I'm sure people will take it into consideration. Dragons flight 17:58, 18 May 2009 (UTC)

What I'd like to see in the future? It would be a good start if you could just provide the result before the "cleaning". That's not a technical issue and I don't see why that should be impossible or harmful. --Berntie 11:31, 19 May 2009 (UTC)

I know I can see why it would be harmful to release the result before cleaning – because it's extremely subject to change. You could have an entirely different result by the end. —Anonymous Dissident^Talk 12:14, 19 May 2009 (UTC)

That's exactly the point. I want to know what was changed during the non-public cleaning. What's harmful about telling people: "The raw voting result is: ... After removal of multiple the result looks like: ..."? As I said before, that doesn't have to be right now. But when the final result is announced, I can't see any reason for not giving both results. (Well, I do see a possible reason, but a rather unpleasant one: If the result before the cleaning does not reflect the desired outcome, and the result after cleaning does.) The community should be allowed some controlling of what the foundation did with the votes. --Berntie 14:36, 19 May 2009 (UTC)

The number of removed votes and the reasons for removal is already public. There is no "raw voting result", because the votes were removed prior to the vote being counted (when they were removed, we had no idea whether someone was voting +, -, or =). Cbrown1023 talk 15:07, 19 May 2009 (UTC)

Having now seen the final tally, I suppose it doesn't make a difference since if you were to place all the rejected votes in any category, you would not change the outcome (in addition to the fact that it was done blinded). --Falcorian 06:45, 21 May 2009 (UTC)

Exactly. The whole point is that no one knows how those duplicated votes were cast, so any bias in the reviewing team is not able to affect the outcome. Correct me if I'm wrong; my understanding of the process is that the vote was held on external servers (run by the FSF SPI) so that the Foundation was not in control of the data: once the vote was over, the FSF SPI released the data of who had voted, and from where, but not how each vote was cast. So the team from Wikimedia who went through and removed duplicate votes only saw that a vote had been cast, not how it had been cast. Once they compiled a list of which ballots to count, the FSF SPI reunited each ticket with the actual vote, compiled the results, and returned them to licom, which has now sent them to the Board. I assume that licom does not, therefore, know anything more than aggregate results? That is, you don't have a list of who voted how, only separate lists of who voted, and what votes were cast? Happy‑melon 15:35, 19 May 2009 (UTC)

The external server was run by the non-profit Software in the Public Interest (FSF arguably has a stake in the outcome). Otherwise you are basically correct. Neither WMF nor Licom knows who voted in what way. As you say, there is a list of who voted and a separate tally of the votes cast, but they were prepared in such a way that no one on our end has access to the details of who voted in what way. Dragons flight 19:22, 19 May 2009 (UTC)

Doh <facepalm/> Glad I got the basics right though. Happy‑melon 20:39, 19 May 2009 (UTC)

Vote result distributed

The result of the vote has been shared amongst members of the Licensing Update Committee and with the WMF Board of Trustees. In accordance with our prior agreement, the Board will be given a couple days to prepare a reaction before the tally is announced to the public. Dragons flight 18:54, 16 May 2009 (UTC)

Vote result announced

The results of the poll have been published at the results page. Dragons flight 06:04, 21 May 2009 (UTC)

On the Norwegian wiktionary, the link to 'see the result' is towards a local page which does not exist, rather than towards the meta page, where the result actually is announced. V85 08:25, 21 May 2009 (UTC)

Source data for image?

This is what i had in mind when i asked for the data

Where is the raw numeric data available at for File:WMF licensing update vote ballots.JPG? (added and created by OhanaUnited). Would it be possible to have a breakdown of votes per day (Like "first day, 420 +, 69 =, 24 -", etc)? Thanks. -- Jokes Free4Me 09:37, 21 May 2009 (UTC)

I rounded the figures to nearest 100. It would be impractical to get the exact votes per day. Besides, the graph is intended as an assistance tool, so I don't get why someone is complaining about me using wrong image file type for the graph. The graph is not a big deal! OhanaUnited^{Talk page} 18:36, 21 May 2009 (UTC)

I wish I'd known about this vote

I'd have opposed. Not that my vote would have mattered, but perhaps I could have made an impact by sharing this. Eh, who am I kidding? Anyway, this stinks. --Leavestock 07:05, 23 May 2009 (UTC)

Hello,

We tryed very hard to make sure that all users did know about the vote (multible emails to mailinglists, globalsitenotice, messages in local villagepumps) I am very sorry to hear that you didn't know about the vote. Huib talk 08:14, 23 May 2009 (UTC)

Thanks. It's no biggie. --Leavestock 20:29, 23 May 2009 (UTC)

To anyone who comes back to read this, I can't let this stand without comment. The article given is rather bunk. Yes, Creative Commons provides other licenses that are not copyleft. But the one Wikimedia switched to very much is copyleft. The only functional difference between it and the GFDL is that the full license need not be included. Trlkly (talk) 04:25, 12 March 2012 (UTC)

The new warning message

Why doesn't it include the word "irrevocably"? This is an important thing that must be in there, because that is the case. ViperSnake151 18:59, 24 May 2009 (UTC)

Hello,

I am not sure if I understand what you mean.

Huib talk 16:50, 26 May 2009 (UTC)

He means that the proposed text for the message under the edit screen says "By submitting an edit, you agree to release your contribution under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License and the GNU Free Documentation License.", while the current version usually says "By submitting an edit, you agree to irrevocably release your contributions..." I think he might have a point; even if it's not legally necessary, it's language a layman can understand, which is helpful for dealing with complaints along the lines of "i revoke my permission, remove all my edits". I agree the word should be retained. Happy‑melon 17:07, 26 May 2009 (UTC)

Revocation

So, presumably, all edits done to, say Wikipedia, were done so under GFDL. Now that it's being changed, does a user have the right to have his work removed from the project because he doesn't consent to a license that wasn't an option when the user contributed? - ALLST✰R▼^echo _{wuz here @} 07:45, 29 May 2009 (UTC)

No, because there is no change in license. The user agreed to irrevocably release his work under the GFDL, version 1.2 or any later version. A later version of the GFDL is version 1.3, the users' contributions are also irrevocably released under this license. The GFDL-1.3 states that a wiki may dual-license content released under GFDL-1.3 also under CC-BY-SA-3.0. The user has already given explicit consent to the relicensing (and any other changes that have occured between GFDL-1.2 and GFDL-1.3, or which may occur in the future) by accepting the open "and any later version" clause. Happy‑melon 09:25, 29 May 2009 (UTC)

Lesson learned... do not trust the FSF or Wikia. If the FSF got into the wrong hands it could change the license to anything they wanted. Shame on wikipedia for so exploiting its contributors and back-stabbing them.--58.111.132.76 09:15, 15 July 2009 (UTC)

Lol. Texcarson 23:16, 15 July 2009 (UTC)

Also, the extremely long new notice

Aren't we pushing it a bit too far with the length of the new footer message about licensing and what not? I think we should make it shorter, while still conveying some of the same information. Or maybe even, we shouldn't directly promote the fact that it's also under the GFDL on the footer at all. ViperSnake151 22:41, 3 June 2009 (UTC)

History

Are we, the creators of content, still requiring the WMF to maintain the history tab, or are we giving up that right by setting the URI of our contributions to the articles page? I'm confused by how I maintain my attribution on Wikipeda for my contributions - what stops the WMF from ceasing to maintain the history tab? Please point to the specific text in the TOS or licence that explictly requires the maintence of the history tab. Thanks. Hipocrite 20:56, 16 June 2009 (UTC)

History has never been a license obligation: MediaWiki history section has nothing to do with GFDL history section. Our interpretation of GFDL was quite imaginative. The new terms of use, however, state that credit is given with an URL or a list of all authors. Since it makes no sense that an articles gives credit to authors simply linking himself, the site must show the full list of authors. --Nemo 06:51, 3 August 2009 (UTC)

Bug 19280: PDF generator license terms should reflect dual license

This is a pointer to bugzilla:19280. — Carl (CBM · talk) 15:41, 18 June 2009 (UTC)

It is marked as solved, now. (Although only the new licence is mentioned apparently, because currently there is no way to tell if CC-only content has been added to any given page, removing the dual licence. Also, this way, I think, there is no need to waste a lot of paper on printing the text of the GFDL).--Dami 20:24, 29 June 2009 (UTC)

HTML Tags

Most projects still have

<link rel="copyright" href="http://www.gnu.org/copyleft/fdl.html" />

in their source. This should be updated to reflect the switch. ContinueWithCaution 12:50, 21 June 2009 (UTC)

In due time; see Licensing update/Implementation. This is to be a gradual movement. —Anonymous Dissident^Talk 13:05, 21 June 2009 (UTC)

That page doesn't make it clear whether all projects are now considered CC-BY-SA with an out of date footer, or whether the migration of all but the English Wikipedia has yet to happen. I've read through the licom archives but not found anything relating to the date when the other projects are officially switching. Angela 14:18, 22 June 2009 (UTC)

Erik says we'll start pushing the new licensing terms out to other wikis as early as Monday, June 29. Kaldari 18:05, 24 June 2009 (UTC)

On a couple of projects I checked it seems to have been already updated, so it is indeed happening as early as today :) --Dami 20:11, 29 June 2009 (UTC)

Applicability to Wikisource

Hi all!

I was wondering how the licence change and the new terms of use apply to Wikisource (and its different editions). The examples that came to mind are the inclusion of works under different licences, and the attributions of works published on Wikisource. (If a member of academia agrees to publish his work under a free licence on Wikisource, can he set the terms of attribution for his work, or does he have to accept attribution by URL and the mentioning of "Wikisource"?).

Thanks, --Dami 19:11, 24 June 2009 (UTC)

The only change should be that eligible stuff under GFDL is now also available under CC-BY-SA. But otherwise Wikisource policy on what it accepts and doesn't shouldn't change. The new MediaWiki messages as per Licensing update/Implementation may override some language that was previously used, please feel free to clarify these terms on Wikisource by updating the relevant system messages.--Eloquence 23:44, 29 June 2009 (UTC)

Compatible license?

Hi!

I would like to know if the new licensing terms are compatible with this: http://www.panda3d.org/wiki/index.php/License_Info

At pt.wikibooks there is someone interested in doing a translation of the manual. But I don't know if this can be done... Helder 21:28, 26 June 2009 (UTC)

IP edits

The GFDL and CC require that any edit is attributed to a single editor (a single person behind a single username). Role accounts, which are usernames used by more than one person, are blocked. What about IP addresses which are shared by many people? You can't know whether an IP address has been used by just one or more people, so by definition any shared IP is a role account, albeit involuntarily. Texcarson 23:14, 15 July 2009 (UTC)

Opt out notice

I, Infrogmation, hereby opt out of the involuntary "license migration" of any and all of my original images and files which I have uploaded to Wikimedia. Notes: The vast majority of my contribution I would happily agree to add cc-by-sa-3.0 to the listed license option (if that license is not one of the listed options already) IF I were ASKED. I do NOT consent to any change license of any of my copyrighted works that I have not personally authorized. I have NOT authorized any party other than myself to change licensing of any of my works without my explicit permission. Any party which changes the license of any of my works without my expressed permission I consider to be conducting an act of fraud and a copyright violation.

I appreciate the utility of cc-by licenses, and the vast majority of my images are already so licensed. I consider any change of license by third parties to which the copyright holder has not explicitly consented to be an attack on the rights of authors, of questionable legality and certainly unethical. Whatever the utility of the goal, I cannot think of a kinder term than "sleazy" for any move by Wikimedia to change the license of any work by any author without their consent. Infrogmation 20:10, 16 July 2009 (UTC)

I'm afraid that will not be possible, as we all have implicitly already given consent to this change. Read Happy-melon's reply in topic Revocation above to understand what I mean. Capmo 22:16, 16 July 2009 (UTC)

I believe you are much mistaken. Happy-melon's comment is relevent to Wikipedia article content, which is collaborative, and which I am not discussing. I am discussing distinct works of which I am the sole author and the copyright holder. I have uploaded copies of some such works to Wikimedia under various licenses mutually acceptable to myself and to the Wikimedia projects to which I uploaded them at the time. I did not grant Wikimedia exclusive rights. I have never granted Wikimedia power of attorney. I granted permission to share my works under the licenses specified. I am content to continue irrevocably to share my images under the licenses specified. (For the record, I am also frequently willing to share many of my works under even broader licenses IF asked.) Should Wikimedia decide it no longer wishes to host works with certain licenses, that is Wikimedia's perogative which I have no argument with. Wikimedia may change their end of our mutual agreement. I am simply stating for the record that I do not consent to Wikimedia nor any other unauthorized 3rd party claiming it can change MY end of the mutual agreement, by changing the copyright licensing of my copyrighted individual works without permission of me, the copyright holder.

Additionally, I see that according to Commons:Commons:License_Migration_Task_Force#Images_affected, images elligable for relicensing include:

"Any image correctly licensed GFDL 1.3, or any earlier GFDL version with an "or later versions" clause, provided that:

"The copyright holder first published the image under the GFDL at a WMF site,

"OR the image was first published under the GFDL elsewhere and was incorporated into a WMF site before November 1, 2008."

A good number of my images were first published elsewhere than Wikimedia, and not under GFDL. I don't recall ever being asked if this was the case. Has there been any effort whatsoever to deterimine whether or not individual images fit within the guidelines spelled out above before the bots tag them as forced relicensing eligable? I have not seen any evidence of any such effort, but have seen images which do not fit into the specified guidelines tagged as supposedly eligable. Infrogmation 02:02, 17 July 2009 (UTC)

Oh, I see. Then it all will depend on what licence you chose when you uploaded the images to commons. Quite tricky. But I guess you still can tag your images with the {{nobots}} warning so that bots leave them untouched. Capmo 03:05, 17 July 2009 (UTC)

Hello,

The WMF has given users a way to opt-out like that is written here, opting out is a acting that needs to be done by the users and not by the people working hard to make sure the license change will happen correctly.

When you have opt-out you should have placed the {{GFDL|migration=opt-out}} on your images, the bots currently running for the license migration are respecting that tag and will not change it. When you didn't place that tag you are free to revert the bot actions off course, but the current process that is doing 50.000 images a day will relicense the images.

You could always ask a bot operator to add the tag to all your images, or revert them all to the old state.

Best regards,

Huib talk 04:37, 17 July 2009 (UTC)

Just to quickly comment that Infrogmation is correct that my explanation above applies to text, not media files, which are being handled differently. I'm not fully familiar with how the image relicensing is being undertaken. Happy‑melon 13:29, 17 July 2009 (UTC)

GFDL files not meeting relicensing criteria

How should we make GFDL-only files not meeting relicensing criteria? They must be deleted because we do not accept to import GFDL-only contents to our wikis , is it right?--aokomoriuta 17:50, 27 July 2009 (UTC)

The License migration applies only to the text content. We continue to accept media in a large number of free licenses and license combinations, including (ATM) GFDL. There is a movement to discourage the upload of GFDL-licensed images, but this is only tangentially connected to the license migration. Happy‑melon 22:39, 27 July 2009 (UTC)

Images are affected by the migration, just like text. Huib talk 13:47, 3 August 2009 (UTC)

Q & A link broken?

When I click on "Questions and Answers", this link http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Licensing_update/Questions_and_Answers, I am taken to a page that says, "Override this function." Is there some way to fix this? I only wanted to look at a FAQ or similar document to learn more about the Licensing Update. 207.34.229.126 21:09, 6 August 2009 (UTC)

Works for me. OhanaUnited^{Talk page} 21:20, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

Well, it works for me too now. And I can't see any relevant changes in the history. Thanks anyway. 207.34.229.126 14:36, 3 September 2009 (UTC)

First point

"Without the change, we could not (in either direction) with projects that use the Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike Licenses" - that sentence lacks a verb, right? Hekerui 07:39, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

It does have a verb ("use"), but it doesn't make much sense. I've corrected it. —Anonymous Dissident^Talk 14:43, 3 September 2009 (UTC)