Q: Advice on Wiki Commons media
Hi,
I do apologize that this is not strictly an IBA-specific question, but I suspect a number of readers of this board will have knowledge of this issue, and may be interested in the answer. If there's a more appropriate forum that anyone knows, feel free to point me in the right direction :-)
I'm working on an iBook to "get my hand in" with IBA.
I plan to give away the book for free when it's done.
In addition to creating my own animated diagrams (in Keynote) and movies I'm sourcing a number of photographs on Wiki Commons.
I'm led to believe that it's "safe" to use these (ie. from a copyright point of view), and I've been checking the licenses of each one to make sure they really are public domain.
One common requirement is to acknowledge the original source, which is fair, of course. But is it OK to use the Wiki Commons link as the "source"? Wiki Commons keeps referring to this phrase:
"You must attribute the work in the manner specified by the author or licensor (but not in any way that suggests that they endorse you or your use of the work)."
For example, here's an image of a castle in Croatia. http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Veliki_Tabor.jpg
But the author is simply listed as "Suradnik13", and I can't find any particular conditions off attribution, or even any contact info to ask his/her permission.
Would the Wiki Commons link be sufficient attribution?
Cheers,
Geoff
Posted on Apr 3, 2012 2:48 AM
You can find more detailed explanations of the attribution requirements on Wikimedia: http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Commons:Reusing_content_outside_Wikimedia
Be aware that, if you use an image with a "Share Alike" license, use of the image "contaminates" your own work, in the sense that you must allow people to take your book, freely modify it, build on it, etc. (as long as they acknowledge you as a source). This may or may not be what you want. If you want to use an image without contamination, the image must be either in the public domain, or have a license that requires attribution, but without the "share alike" requirement, meaning that you can use the image, but still retain copyright on your own work.
You can contact the uploader of the image you linked to here: http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Ex13
It is usually possible to get in touch with pretty much anyone on Wikimedia via their user page.
In general, if there isn't any detail about the author of an image, it will be sufficient to say that the image was sourced from Wikimedia Commons; if you include a link to the Wikimedia page for the image, you will be in the clear.
Michi.
Posted on Apr 3, 2012 4:21 AM