వికీపీడియా:Non-free content
Wikipedia's goal is to be a free content encyclopedia, with free content defined as content that does not bear copyright restrictions on the right to redistribute, study, modify and improve, or otherwise use works for any purpose in any medium, even commercially. Any content not satisfying these criteria is said to be non-free. This includes all content (including images) that is fully copyrighted, or which is made available subject to restrictions such as "non-commercial use only" or "for use on Wikipedia only". (Many images that are generally available free of charge may thus still be "non-free" for Wikipedia's purposes.) A full definition can be found at http://freedomdefined.org/Definition
The licensing policy of the Wikimedia Foundation requires all content hosted on Wikipedia to be free content; however, there are exceptions. The policy allows projects to adopt an exemption doctrine policy allowing the use of non-free content within strictly defined limitations. Non-free content can be used on Wikipedia in certain cases (for example, in some situations where acquiring a freely licensed image for a particular subject is not possible), but only within the United States legal doctrine of fair use, and in accordance with Wikipedia's own non-free content criteria as set out below. The use of non-free content on Wikipedia is therefore subject to purposely stricter standards than those laid down in U.S. copyright law.
Policy
Transcluded from Wikipedia:Non-free content criteria; this is the part of the current page that is official policy
- As per the March 23, 2007 Wikimedia Foundation Licensing policy resolution this document serves as the Exemption Doctrine Policy for the English Wikipedia.
Rationale
- To support Wikipedia's mission to produce perpetually free content for unlimited distribution, modification and application by all users in all media.
- To minimize legal exposure by limiting the amount of non-free content, using more narrowly defined criteria than apply under the fair use provisions in United States copyright law.
- To facilitate the judicious use of non-free content to support the development of a high-quality encyclopedia.
Policy
- WP:NFCCP
There is no automatic entitlement to use non-free content in an article or elsewhere on Wikipedia. Articles and other Wikipedia pages may, in accordance with the guideline, use brief verbatim textual excerpts from copyrighted media, properly attributed or cited to its original source or author, and specifically indicated as direct quotations via quotation marks, <blockquote>, or a similar method. Other non-free content—including all copyrighted images, audio and video clips, and other media files that lack a free content license—may be used on the English Wikipedia only where all 10 of the following criteria are met.
- No free equivalent. Non-free content is used only where no free equivalent is available, or could be created, that would serve the same encyclopedic purpose. Where possible, non-free content is transformed into free material instead of using a fair-use defense, or replaced with a freer alternative if one of acceptable quality is available; "acceptable quality" means a quality sufficient to serve the encyclopedic purpose. (As a quick test, before adding non-free content requiring a rationale, ask yourself: "Can this non-free content be replaced by a free version that has the same effect?" and "Could the subject be adequately conveyed by properly sourced text without using the non-free content at all?" If the answer to either is yes, the non-free content probably does not meet this criterion.)
- Respect for commercial opportunities. Non-free content is not used in a manner that is likely to replace the original market role of the original copyrighted media.
- Minimal usage:
- Minimal number of items. Multiple items of non-free content are not used if one item can convey equivalent significant information.
- Minimal extent of use. An entire work is not used if a portion will suffice. Low- rather than high-resolution/fidelity/bit rate is used (especially where the original could be used for deliberate copyright infringement). This rule also applies to the copy in the File: namespace.
- Previous publication. Non-free content must have been published or publicly displayed outside Wikipedia.
- Content. Non-free content meets general Wikipedia content standards and is encyclopedic.
- Media-specific policy. The material meets Wikipedia's media-specific policy. For example, images must meet Wikipedia:Image use policy.
- One-article minimum. Non-free content is used in at least one article.
- Contextual significance. Non-free content is used only if its presence would significantly increase readers' understanding of the topic, and its omission would be detrimental to that understanding.
- Restrictions on location. Non-free content is allowed only in articles (not disambiguation pages), and only in article namespace, subject to exemptions. (To prevent an image category from displaying thumbnails, add __NOGALLERY__ to it; images are linked, not inlined, from talk pages when they are a topic of discussion.)
- Image description page. The image or media description page contains the following:
- Identification of the source of the material, supplemented, where possible, with information about the artist, publisher and copyright holder, and year of copyright; this is to help determine the material's potential market value. See: Wikipedia:Citing sources#Multimedia.
- A copyright tag that indicates which Wikipedia policy provision is claimed to permit the use. For a list of image copyright tags, see Wikipedia:Image copyright tags/Non-free content.
- The name of each article (a link to each article is also recommended) in which fair use is claimed for the item, and a separate, specific non-free use rationale for each use of the item, as explained at Wikipedia:Non-free use rationale guideline.[1] The rationale is presented in clear, plain language and is relevant to each use.
Enforcement
- WP:NFCCE
- A file with a valid non-free-use rationale for some (but not all) articles it is used in will not be deleted. Instead, the file should be removed from the articles for which it lacks a non-free-use rationale, or a suitable rationale added.
- A file on which non-free use is claimed that is not used in any article (criterion 7) may be deleted seven days after notification.
- A file in use in an article and uploaded after 13 July 2006 that does not comply with this policy 48 hours after notification to the uploading editor will be deleted. To avoid deletion, the uploading editor or another Wikipedian will need to provide a convincing non-free-use defense that satisfies all 10 criteria. For a file in use in an article that was uploaded before 13 July 2006, the 48-hour period is extended to seven days.
- Note that it is the duty of users seeking to include or retain content to provide a valid rationale; those seeking to remove or delete it are not required to show that one cannot be created—see burden of proof.
Deletion criteria for non-free content are specified in Wikipedia:Criteria for speedy deletion.
Footnotes
Implementation
The implementation of the non-free content criteria is done by having two specific elements on the non-free media's description page:
- A copyright license template
- The copyright license template identifies the type of copyright that the original work is under license. This is necessary to demonstrate that the image complies with United States fair use laws.
- You can find a list of these copyright license templates at Wikipedia:File copyright tags/Non-free.
- A non-free rationale
- The rationale to use the image is necessary to show that the non-free content criteria has been met. The rationale should address all ten points of WP:NFCC. Template versions to generate such rationales do exist, and include:
- {{Non-free use rationale}} - A generic template applicable for any non-free media.
- {{Non-free use rationale 2}} - An alternative template to the above.
- {{Non-free use rationale logo}} - A rationale template for logos, assuming they are being used as a header image (standalone or infobox) for the entity the logo represents.
- Several other boilerplate rationale templates can be found at Category:Non-free use rationale templates, but editors are cautioned that these are generally tenuous in terms of supporting WP:NFCC#8, and are encouraged to improve upon rationales if they can do so. You are not required to use the template forms, but whatever form you chose needs to clearly address all 10 points in WP:NFCC.
- It is important to remember that a non-free rationale is needed for each use of the image on Wikipedia. If the image is used in two separate articles, two separate rationales are needed, unique for both articles.
Both the license and the rationale need to be included on the non-free media description page. The standard upload tool for Wikipedia will ask you enough questions during the process to fill in both the license and rationale for you, thus simplifying the process. If they are added manually, with or with the help of a template, it is recommended to put the rationale and license under separate sections "Rationale" and "Licensing" respectively.
Failure to include a licensing template, or a rationale that clearly identifies each article the media file is used in, will lead to the media file being deleted within 7 days after being tagged with warning messages.
Sourcing
While identifying a source is not specifically required by the non-free content policy, editors are strongly encouraged to include a source of where a non-free file came from on the media's description page; many of the non-free rationale templates already include a field for this information. This can aid in the cases of disputed media files, or evaluating the non-free or free nature of the image. Lacking a source is not grounds for media removal, but if the nature of the media file is disputed, the lack of a source may prevent the file from being retained. Non-free media must be from a published source; the unpublished non-free media is forbidden. Identification of the source will aid in validating the previous publication of the material.
The source information should be sufficiently complete to allow any editor to validate that material. While completeness is not required, editors are encouraged to provide as much source information as they can. Some ways to source media files include:
- Scanned images
- Identifying the published work, page numbers, and the copyright owner
- Screenshots and video clips
- Identifying the movie, television show, or other video source, its copyright owner, and the approximate timestamp where the shot or clip was taken
- Images from the Internet
- Identifying the URL of the image itself or web page hosting the image, and the image's copyright owner (not necessarily the same as the website's).
- Music samples
- Identifying the album, artist, track number, and approximate time stamp of the sample.
Image resolution
- WP:Image resolution
There is no firm guideline on allowable resolutions for non-free content; images should be rescaled as small as possible to still be useful as identified by their rationale, and no larger. This metric is very qualitative, and thus difficult to enforce. Some legal proceedings have discussed the issue, but are inconclusive here.
At the low pixel count end of the range, most common pictorial needs can be met with an image containing no more than about 100,000 pixels (0.1 megapixels), obtained by multiplying the horizontal and vertical pixel dimensions of an image. This allows, for example, images with a 4:3 aspect ratio to be shown at 320 x 240 pixels (common for screenshots from TV, films, and videogames), while allowing common cover art to be shown at 250 x 400 pixels. To scale an image down to a specific number of pixels, use this formula:
or use this tool to compute it for you.
At the extreme high end of the range, non-free images where one dimension exceeds 1,000 pixels, or where the pixel count approaches 1 megapixel, will very likely require a close review to verify that the image needs that level of resolution. Editors should ensure that the image rationale fully explains the need for such a level of detail.
An original, high resolution image (that can be reasonably scaled down to maintain overall artistic and critical details) may lose some text detail. In such cases, that text should be duplicated on the image description page. Care should be given to the recreation of copyrighted text: while it is appropriate for credits from a movie poster as factual data, such duplication would not be appropriate for an original poem embedded within an image.
If a small area of a large image needs high resolution to see details that are discussed in the article text, it may be better to crop the section to show the critical portion at a higher resolution, than to try to reduce the full image. If cropping is performed, editors should indicate the original source of the image and what modifications were made.
If you believe an image is oversized, either re-upload a new version at the same file location, or tag the image file page with a {{Non-free reduce}} template, which will place it in a maintenance category to be reduced by volunteers or a bot like User:DASHBot.
Note that these guidelines apply to the resolution as stored on the image file page; the reuse of these images in mainspace should follow the Manual of Style for image use, such as deferring to default thumbnail size to allow the end-user control of the image display.
Both non-free audio and video file have more explicit metrics for low resolution, which can be found at Creating Media Files.
Guideline examples
- WP:NFCCEG