Commons:Office actions/DMCA notices/2012

Notification of DMCA takedown demand - Tonga#Economy

While not a Commons matter, the Wikimedia Foundation received a takedown request in complaint with the provisions of the US Digital Millennium Copyright Act. Our community and legal teams spent significant time on this DMCA request as part of our ongoing vigilance against improper, sloppy, erroneous, and sometimes intentional misuse of the DMCA. This is one case where the DMCA request was wrong.

In its DMCA notice, the company involved charged infringement, claiming that the article “Tonga” on the English Wikipedia contained content copied from their publication. Our investigation showed that the content in question had been on Wikipedia for years before their work was published, having been taken from public domain publications by the US Department of State (with proper attribution at the time of the edit). The company publication apparently copied from the same source. They have withdrawn their takedown notice, with apologies. We have reported this erroneous report to http://www.chillingeffects.org/.

The takedown can be read here. --Maggie Dennis (WMF) (talk) 21:35, 18 January 2012 (UTC)

Thanks for sharing! --Philosopher ^{Let us reason together.} 15:41, 28 January 2012 (UTC)

Notification of reversal of takedown

I'm thrilled that today I reversed the OFFICE action on the Loriot signature to restore it. It now lives at File:Wohlfahrtsmarke Loriot HerrenimBad cropped.jpg. Thank you. Philippe (WMF) (talk) 15:47, 13 April 2012 (UTC)

For the uninitiated, this relates to Commons:Loriot Signature Background. Rd232 (talk) 15:50, 13 April 2012 (UTC)

Notification of DMCA takedown demand - Wailua-Falls-Kauai-Hawaii

In compliance with the provisions of the US Digital Millenium Copyright Act (DMCA), and at the instruction of the Wikimedia Foundation's legal counsel, one or more files have been deleted from Commons. Please note that this is an official action of the WMF office which should not be undone. If you have valid grounds for a counter-claim under the DMCA, please contact me. The takedown can be read here. Philippe (WMF) (talk) 06:27, 31 May 2012 (UTC)

link service: File:Wailua-Falls-Kauai-Hawaii.jpg --Saibo (Δ∇) 19:44, 2 July 2012 (UTC)

Notification of DMCA takedown demand - Wild-sheep-model-1

In compliance with the provisions of the US Digital Millenium Copyright Act (DMCA), and at the instruction of the Wikimedia Foundation's legal counsel, one or more files have been deleted from Commons. Please note that this is an official action of the WMF office which should not be undone. If you have valid grounds for a counter-claim under the DMCA, please contact me. The takedown can be read here. Thank you! Maggie Dennis (WMF) (talk) 18:14, 2 July 2012 (UTC)

link service: File:Wild-sheep-model-1.jpg --Saibo (Δ∇) 19:44, 2 July 2012 (UTC)

Notification of DMCA takedown demand - C. atratus gliding diagram

In compliance with the provisions of the US Digital Millenium Copyright Act (DMCA), and at the instruction of the Wikimedia Foundation's legal counsel, one or more files have been deleted from Commons. Please note that this is an official action of the WMF office which should not be undone. If you have valid grounds for a counter-claim under the DMCA, please contact me. The takedown can be read here. Thank you! Maggie Dennis (WMF) (talk) 18:39, 2 July 2012 (UTC)

link service: File:C. atratus gliding diagram.png --Saibo (Δ∇) 19:44, 2 July 2012 (UTC)

Notification of DMCA takedown demand - Claes Oldenburg

In compliance with the provisions of the US Digital Millenium Copyright Act (DMCA), and at the instruction of the Wikimedia Foundation's legal counsel, one or more files have been deleted from Commons. Please note that this is an official action of the WMF office which should not be undone. If you have valid grounds for a counter-claim under the DMCA, please contact me. The takedown can be read here. Thank you! The list of affected files is below. Philippe Beaudette, Wikimedia Foundation (talk) 21:32, 9 November 2012 (UTC) Involved images

File need to be restored and checked on a case-by-case basis, at least images taken in Germany may fall under {{FoP-Germany}}. This one is a perfect example for FoP-Germany. The blank deletion without questioning it is rather surprising to me. --Denniss (talk) 22:26, 9 November 2012 (UTC)

Denniss, as I've explained, it was seriously looked into. Your understanding of the laws under which we operate simply does not agree with the legal counsel's understanding. Philippe Beaudette, Wikimedia Foundation (talk) 01:26, 10 November 2012 (UTC)

Then please ensure all images uploaded with the various FoP rules are transferred back to their local wikis and then deleted from Commons as none of them complies with US law. --Denniss (talk) 08:34, 10 November 2012 (UTC)

That's not up to WMF. Do you understand that WMF isn't responsible for Wikimedia content, and it's precisely to avoid having take responsibility for it that it has to (i) respond to correctly formulated DMCA takedowns (even if blatantly wrong) and (ii) not doing anything (contentwise) it doesn't legally have to? WMF is responsible for the Wikimedia infrastructure, not the content. Rd232 (talk) 18:19, 10 November 2012 (UTC)

Could we link to the legal counsel's understanding please? Is it summarised in the second paragraph at User talk:Raymond#Notifying you of an image removal under the DMCA? If yes, could we mitigate the losses by giving Commons and the affected language projects a chance to upload suitably cropped or blurred out derivatives (as appears to have been done here where the ice cream cone statue was cropped out)? I have made this suggestion at Commons talk:Freedom of panorama#German FOP vulnerable to DMCA. -84user (talk) 17:41, 10 November 2012 (UTC)

Hi. That's it, yes; it's also at Commons:Village_pump#DMCA_Take-Down (permanent diff. I'm afraid that I can't address the question of blurred derivatives. I would imagine cropping out the sculptures would eliminate all issues, but don't know about blurring. :/ --Maggie Dennis (WMF) (talk) 18:40, 10 November 2012 (UTC)

I am trying to understand WMF's position on the matter of choice of law for freedom of panorama cases. Is it WMF's position that, since the servers are in the US, American FOP law is to be used regardless of the location of the work, the nationality of the copyright owner, etc.? Are there circumstances in which American FOP law might be ignored, or in which we must follow another country's FOP law? Thanks, cmadler (talk) 15:02, 12 November 2012 (UTC)

I believe that per Commons:lex loci protectionis, US FOP applies for claims of infringement in US courts. Other countries' FOP will apply in their courts. That's the lex loci choice of law rule, anyway. But applying US FOP doesn't necessarily mean it's an infringement - see eg " a photograph of a sculpture should not be considered a derivative work under U.S. law." as an opinion of one leading lawyer (see Commons:Village_pump#UK_law_blog_mention). Rd232 (talk) 01:10, 13 November 2012 (UTC)

Please see Commons:Requests for comment/non-US Freedom of Panorama under US copyright law. Rd232 (talk) 01:10, 13 November 2012 (UTC)

Update: wmf:DMCA Oldenburg counternotice covers 3 photos uploaded by User:Smallbones. Rd232 (talk) 15:34, 5 December 2012 (UTC)

Notification of DMCA takedown demand - File:1.5.2_ECONOMICs.pdf, File:2.3.5_ECONOMICs.pdf, File:4.4.4_ECONOMICs.pdf

In compliance with the provisions of the US Digital Millenium Copyright Act (DMCA), and at the instruction of the Wikimedia Foundation's legal counsel, one or more files have been deleted from Commons. Please note that this is an official action of the WMF office which should not be undone. If you have valid grounds for a counter-claim under the DMCA, please contact me. The takedown can be read here. Thank you! Philippe Beaudette, Wikimedia Foundation (talk) 02:04, 17 November 2012 (UTC)