SpottingWorld:Requesting copyright permission
To use copyrighted material on Spotting World, it is not enough that we have permission to use it on Spotting World alone. That's because Spotting World itself states all its material may be used by anyone, for any purpose. So we have to be sure all material is in fact licenced for that purpose, whoever provided it.
To do this, we must often email or contact the copyright holders and ask them to allow us to use it under the GFDL or a GFDL-compatible license, which would be compatible with how we want to use it. See Copyrights for more.
The main legal thing that is important to explain to potential contributors: they would be agreeing that their picture (or text) can be used freely by Spotting World AND its downstream users, and that such use might include commercial use, for which the contributor is not entitled to royalties or compensation. Wikimedia itself is a non-profit organization, and any money raised from the re-use of Wikimedia content would go to furthering our aims—buying new servers to keep the websites running efficiently, producing print runs, making Spotting World available on CD/DVD for schools and developing countries. However, not all of those who re-use our content are so high-minded.
This means that a contributor's work might appear in print or digital versions of this encyclopedia that are sold in stores. It might appear in WikiReaders, or other specialized subsets of the full text—teacher curriculum packets, publicity brochures, other uses we haven't thought of yet. It will certainly be used by other websites that legally copy our content.
About half the people we ask say yes, especially if it's explained that the license terms mean it is wider appreciated and that we do not want to use all their material, but just one image or item.
This page explains what must be done, if you want to use content that's copyrighted, whether you know who produced it or you don't.
More
It sometimes happens that users post text from other websites claiming to have permission to do so. Sometimes, images from other websites are uploaded and claimed to be under a ree license (GFDL, public domain, {{No rights reserved}}, or others.) If the external website does not have any indication that such claims are well-founded, it sometimes is a good idea to try to verify such claims by contacting a representative of that website directly. You should, however, basically assume good faith and judge for yourself whether a claim made appears credible or indeed does warrant following up with an attempt to have it confirmed.
If the poster or uploader claims to be the copyright holder and website owner him- or herself, leave them a message on-Wiki telling them to include a license statement on their website that says that the text or image in question is indeed published under the claimed license. That's the easiest way to confirm such a claim. If they don't do that, or claim to have permission from some third party (usually the original author or photographer), contact them or the third party via e-mail.
If you yourself have found an image and want to contact the photographer or copyright holder up-front to secure permission before uploading the image, you should also follow these guidelines.
How to ask for permission
Search the external website and try to find a contact address. Most websites give an e-mail address of the webmaster; if the author of the text or the photographer of an image is known, try to contact the author or photographer directly. In general, do not send an inquiry to an e-mail posted on Spotting World if you have reason to question a license claim made on Spotting World, you also have reason to wonder whether contact data given on Spotting World is correct. Try to find a contact address off the Wiki. Send them an e-mail explaining the situation and asking for their permission. If authorship is unclear, ask them to confirm that the text or image is indeed theirs.
For text
Text in Spotting World articles must be licensed under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License. When asking for permission, you should explain that this means that
- The text or image may be freely redistributed and used.
- It may be freely modified, and modified versions may also be freely redistributed and used.
- Any redistribution must include the full text of the GFDL itself.
- In all cases, the GFDL requires proper attribution of the author(s).
- The GFDL allows commercial re-uses provided such re-use is also under the GFDL.
You may also choose to explain that the author does not give up any of his or her rights: he or she is still free to publish the text elsewhere or to license the same text to other parties under any other license. You may also want to mention that the requirement to include the full text of the GFDL with any redistribution makes stand-alone commercial reuse of the item unlikely in practice.
For images
For images, you are not limited to the GFDL: any free license will do. If the photographer's identity is unclear (for instance, if an image was uploaded stating the photographer's name and claiming a free license, but the image cannot be found on the web), ask them to confirm that the image is theirs. In any case, ask them to confirm the claimed license. For the GFDL, point out the points mentioned above. Any free license must allow all of the following, for both the image itself as well as any modified versions based on it:
- Modification
- Redistribution
- Use for any purpose, including commercial purposes.
The only restrictions allowable are proper attribution of the creator and the requirement that derivative works are similarly licensed.
