Commons:Deletion requests/Template:Indian Army

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This deletion discussion is now closed. Please do not make any edits to this archive. You can read the deletion policy or ask a question at the Village pump. If the circumstances surrounding this file have changed in a notable manner, you may re-nominate this file or ask for it to be undeleted.

Template:Indian Army

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The license linked from this template is incompatible with Commons:Licensing since it requires the material "being reproduced accurately and not being used in a derogatory manner or in a misleading context", which amounts to prohibiting derivative works, at least ones the Indian Army might consider inaccurate or misleading. I also see no evidence that it's irrevocable. Huon (talk) 08:55, 22 August 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Last time my files were removed from Wikimedia-commons with the exact same reason. HIAS (talk) 09:05, 22 August 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Delete "Copyright © 2019 All rights reserved." is the key, mentioned at the bottom of page. HIAS (talk) 09:43, 22 August 2019 (UTC)[reply]
  • @HIAS: It seems you didn't even read the policy on the Indian Army website. :( Basically, images authored by the army are under the specified license. The rest of the website is ARR. Regards, Yann (talk) 10:26, 22 August 2019 (UTC)[reply]
@HIAS: From what I can see, the files you uploaded were from Pakistan's ISPR website, whereas this is from Indian Army's website. What is the connection between the two? Or am I missing something here? —Sarvatra (talk, contribs) 12:21, 22 August 2019 (UTC)[reply]
 Keep We already have had this discussion countless times. :( It was resolved that the restrictions are not copyright related. Regards, Yann (talk) 10:22, 22 August 2019 (UTC)[reply]
 Keep per Yann and earlier discussion. ‐‐1997kB (talk) 12:12, 22 August 2019 (UTC)[reply]
 Delete - the template currently does not contain a license (if the template is supposed to be a license itself, a much better text is needed) - Jcb (talk) 16:49, 22 August 2019 (UTC)[reply]
  • Do you really think "it is allowed" sounds professional as a license? Well, if you think that your reactions to me are suitable, you probably won't understand the problem with this poor text either. Unfortunately you are completely loosing it apparently. Jcb (talk) 09:55, 23 August 2019 (UTC)[reply]
  • I came accross this supposed "license" because you did half work as usual. That's not revenge voting. The sole fact that you are so resentful does not make that you victims are too? Jcb (talk) 15:31, 23 August 2019 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment - Yann or 1997kB, where were those previous discussions? The template was created today and its talk page was empty. Even if we accept that "This is subject to the material being reproduced accurately..." in a copyright policy is not "copyright related" (why wouldn't it be?), I don't see anything in the wording that says the license is irrevocable. Huon (talk) 20:58, 22 August 2019 (UTC)[reply]
  • I don't see a consensus regarding the implications of the "reproduced accurately" requirement there, and I see nothing at all about whether or not the license is revocable. Huon (talk) 10:55, 23 August 2019 (UTC)[reply]
  • @Huon: Carl Lindberg, certainly one of the most knowledgeable contributors on copyright here, wrote: we've had many similar discussions on the "accurately" wording (or maybe it's "distortion") which also appears in the FoP clauses of some countries (Germany, Mexico) and decided that was about moral rights. The mention of "derogatory" also points that way, strongly. Krishna Chaitanya Velaga, from India, said a similar thing. Blue Rasberry also agrees, as well as Jee, also from India, who also mentioned that we have had similar discussion earlier. Regards, Yann (talk) 12:29, 23 August 2019 (UTC)[reply]
 Keep The Berne Convention, in its moral rights section, says Independently of the author's economic rights, and even after the transfer of the said rights, the author shall have the right to claim authorship of the work and to object to any distortion, mutilation or other modification of, or other derogatory action in relation to, the said work, which would be prejudicial to his honor or reputation. The "free" status is based on the economic rights alone; moral rights are a Commons:Non-copyright restriction (in some countries, such rights never expire and cannot be transferred or given up). The Indian Army license seems to be claiming those moral rights to me -- the language matches up with that type of usage. Those are *always* restrictions, in many places in the world, even for "public domain" works. It would seem to be the "accurately" would be more in that sense (i.e. more of "not misleading"), and not in a "no derivative" economic rights sense. The wording is essentially the same as the original version of {{Attribution-IAF}} (the Air Force variant of this, and the subject of the previous discussions), which has now been redirected to GODL-India but that should be undone. The talk page of this new template should probably reference the other templates, since the "previous discussions" were for those and not this one particularly, and there are no pointers from here to find those. Carl Lindberg (talk) 14:46, 23 August 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Carl Lindberg, how would, in your opinion, the Indian Army have to word that part of their copyright policy if they meant to make that a copyright restriction and not a "moral right" one? Can you please also explain why you think this license is itrevocable? Huon (talk) 16:27, 23 August 2019 (UTC)[reply]
They would explicitly mention derivative works, I would think, and at least restrict the term "reproduction". In the Indian law, most derivative works are included in the term "reproduction". It seems to be part of the same thought as "not being used in a derogatory manner or in a misleading context", which is clearly moral rights, and not a separate restriction. As for revocability, there is nothing to say it's revocable, which generally means if you got it by an unlimited license, you still have it under that license. Much like if they don't mention any commercial use restrictions, then it's OK for commercial users too. We usually prefer more clarity on a quick license given by someone without much thought, but for a major governmental institution that would have gone through lawyers etc. The intent seems pretty clear. Carl Lindberg (talk) 17:19, 23 August 2019 (UTC)[reply]
So in your opinion every license that doesn't explicitly mention that it's revocable is irrevocable? I would have thought that the opposite holds - if the Indian Army changes its copyright policy tomorrow, I don't think I can still continue to use their stuff because the policy today allows me to use it. Huon (talk) 18:30, 23 August 2019 (UTC)[reply]
You can no longer copy stuff off their page if they do that, certainly. Stuff already copied may still have the same license -- that was the legal agreement under which copying/reproduction was allowed. Courts could rule either way if neither "revocable" nor "irrevocable" are mentioned in the license -- historically, for simple non-exclusive licenses to particular people, I think it probably defaults to revocable. The usual understanding with "free" stuff these days may be different though, which could lead to different court results/expectations for licensing statements like this one. I'm not sure if there is a precedent along these lines. It's best to specify of course, but I don't think we should delete everything where we don't have full certainty. We have allowed stuff like {{Copyrighted free use}} since the beginning. For a major governmental entity, which should have carefully considered a licensing statement like that, and which government is moving in the direction of open licenses anyways, I don't think it's worth deletion over that point. Carl Lindberg (talk) 20:21, 23 August 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Looking further, there is this stackexcange question "Are licenses irrevocable by default?" where the main answer says:
A non-exclusive copyright license (such as most FOSS licenses) can be revoked at any time only if there was no consideration involved. The United States Federal Circuit Court of Appeal took this on in Jacobsen v. Katzer in 2008 and ruled that there is consideration exchanged in the use of FOSS by a licensee. This indicates that an FOSS license that's silent on revocation is likely revocable only for violation of it's conditions.
While the court case doesn't specifically mention revocability, it may not be possible for existing uses since they author has gotten some consideration back (acknowledgement of the author, etc.) provided the terms of the license was followed. Neither of the acknowledged-free licenses {{MIT}} and {{BSD}} mention revocability either, and those are generally considered irrevocable (again, provided the conditions are adhered to). Carl Lindberg (talk) 20:49, 23 August 2019 (UTC)[reply]
  •  Keep Mostly per the discussion and my own comment at a similar 2016 conversation. I see a two objections here - that "being reproduced accurately and not being used in a derogatory manner" is in conflict with Commons' requirement to allow derivative works, and that there is no mention of irrevocability. For the first point I interpret this to mean that they want attribution of the original work and also for an attribution to carry into derivative works, which is a normal request. For the second part the Creative Commons license does explicitly offer irrevocability, but we have not demanded such an explicit statement from other free culture licenses. Commons has never deconstructed the various licenses that we do allow and listed their essential and nonessential components; and if we ever did that, then based on precedent and allowing licenses without this part through so often that we would require it. I can support anyone raising the issue of irrevocability higher than this discussion but within this discussion, the status quo that I see is that there is nothing unusual about this license in that regard. Blue Rasberry (talk) 18:13, 25 August 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Kept: The consensus appears to be that the license is valid, particularly per the arguments put forward by Yann, Carl and Blueraspberry. The license statement does need rewriting though. --Green Giant (talk) 00:29, 10 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

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