Copyright and Terms of Use

[Findecanor]

I think that we need to formalize the Terms of Use for the Wiki and mark the Wiki with Copyright/Copyleft info.
I'm not suggesting that we change the open policy that we already have, just that we put it in print so that there won't be misunderstandings on how to use the content.

[002]

I think Daniel has brought this up a couple of times already? I am pretty sure there is a way to flag pages/images with no attribution details.

There's also this page: http://deskthority.net/wiki/Help:Contents#Copyright

[Daniel]

I think Findecanor post is related to this thread: http://deskthority.net/group-buys-f33/a ... t8598.html

Where someone basically wants to copy content of the Deskthority wiki and run it in a different form than MediaWiki.

I label almost all of my uploaded pictures with "Public domain or nearest equivalent".

Public domain: http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/

The person who associated a work with this deed has dedicated the work to the public domain by waiving all of his or her rights to the work worldwide under copyright law, including all related and neighboring rights, to the extent allowed by law.

You can copy, modify, distribute and perform the work, even for commercial purposes, all without asking permission. See Other Information below.

I always assumed that the complete wiki is under public domain. The use of any other license would be inappropriate and unsuited for a public wiki in my opinion.

There will always be people who copy content and try to make a profit with it but after all the people will come back to the DT wiki because it doesn't bug them with advertisements, log-in forms.

[Daniel Beardsmore]

The wiki doesn't have a single licence. Images posted to the wiki fall under a variety of licences, and particularly with keyboard manufacturers, I've never got any of them to commit to actual terms. The majority of images are likely to still omit licence terms (as well as a description, for that matter). Some are still pending deletion as stolen.

The best that we can can do is retroactively set terms for the text content.

Copying the wiki contents wholesale is not legally permissible; every image needs to be checked for its licence terms individually.

The only way to have all the images in the public domain is to replace all the ones that aren't, with new ones. This will never happen.

[Findecanor]

I think Findecanor post is related to this thread: http://deskthority.net/group-buys-f33/a ... t8598.html

Where someone basically wants to copy content of the Deskthority wiki and run it in a different form than MediaWiki.

The best that we can can do is retroactively set terms for the text content.

Yes. I am referring specifically to the text. While most images have copyright info attached, the texts in the articles don't.
The information in them is of course free. It is how the text is written, the actual wording that is copyrightable.

The devil is in the details, and the details have not been specified, really ...
I would like to advocate copyright terms where the text would be free to copy for whatever purpose, but where the source should be specified as the Deskthority Wiki if you publish text copied from the Wiki verbatim.
If you are the original author of a full piece of text that you enter into the Wiki, then you grant Deskthority ownership of that piece of text, but you retain ownership of any copy that you yourself possess.

The forum already has "© 2011-2014 deskthority" at the bottom of each page. Isn't it sort-of implicitly implied from the structure of the site that the Wiki also is, even if the Wiki articles don't actually have any copyright text?
What I think is needed is at least a copyright line somewhere in easy-to-find place in the Wiki, but it would help if the details of the copyright terms were also there to read.

[Daniel Beardsmore]

I assumed that IndexPlusPlus wanted to take the images as well as the text; it would be rather strange and rather pointless to duplicate only the text.

What exactly is "© 2011-2014 deskthority" anyway? Do I waive my rights to any image I upload and anything I write? For example, does Deskthority now own all my forum avatars? If it covers the look, feel and implementation, how does that factor in the fact that the masthead images are community-supplied?

[Daniel]

I always assumed that the complete wiki is under public domain. The use of any other license would be inappropriate and unsuited for a public wiki in my opinion.

The wiki doesn't have a single licence. Images posted to the wiki fall under a variety of licences, and particularly with keyboard manufacturers, I've never got any of them to commit to actual terms. The majority of images are likely to still omit licence terms (as well as a description, for that matter). Some are still pending deletion as stolen.

I realised that I wrote rubbish after reading your post. Just think about the pictures whose respective owners (for example clickykeyboards) granted the permission to upload them into the DT wiki.

[Findecanor]

Do I waive my rights to any image I upload and anything I write?

IANAL, but I have always assumed that copyright law works so that Deskthority's copyright would apply to:
- copying from the site,
- if copyright is not otherwise specified, and
- unless you had the work in your possession before it was uploaded.

If you specify something as being in the Public Domain, then yes you waive all rights to it.

If you wrote a long essay and you post it on Deskthority's forum, then the essay in its original form belongs to you and you have implicitly given Deskthority permission to publish it.
If it is edited (on the forum that would be by a moderator), then you won't own the edited essay - only the essay without the edits. You would be allowed to post the essay on another forum, but not with the edits.
Deskthority owns this thread, as a compilation of text and images, banners etc., but it may not own the individual texts and images.

phew, this is getting me a head ache...

[kebby]

I'd definitely like to see clear terms for the wiki text content just like most wikis have. With no clear terms I guess the original authors retain their copyright and it's unclear what rights exactly even deskthority itself has on the content... A wiki as a platform could be seen as implying at least the permission to publish it in that one place it was originally written to and also a permission to create derivative works but I doubt there are any precedents.

To add to the previous comment about what happens when someone edits an article you wrote, I believe you'll both have rights to the derivative work that results and so the person that made the changes can't independently control the copyright for the result.

[webwit]

What exactly is "© 2011-2014 deskthority" anyway?

Better late than never. This copyright applies to the format and design only, i.e. everything except the users and the content. The content on the forum is owned by the users, and by posting the users give a license to deskthority to use content on this site (that is, display a post in a topic). This gets a bit misty when the content is not owned by the user (such as a picture). We never formalized it for the wiki, until someone does that, the unwritten rules are that all content should be submitted under an open license or in the public domain. There are some exceptions such as rare switch photos where the author only gave us permission to use them in the wiki and it is better to have something instead of nothing. This should be avoided as much as possible though.