Help:Copyrights
![]() | This page is still under construction. Please do not initialize translations yet. |
![]() | This page in a nutshell: Copyright is desirable to model as semantic statements for works, in both the data stored on Wikidata and in Wikimedia Commons' structured data repositories; there are various means and strategies to do so. |
Wikidata offers several properties and qualifiers for storing copyright information, this page's goal is to explain how to use them. Many laws might restrict the use of various works and materials in addition to copyrights, for example laws related to trademarks, patents, personality rights, authors' moral rights, etc. This page covers only copyrights.
The aim of copyright data model is to allow works to have multiple copyright statuses for different jurisdictions (use applies to jurisdiction (P1001) qualifier), based on different principles (use determination method or standard (P459) qualifier) and time periods (use start time (P580)/end time (P582) qualifiers). That is accomplished by using copyright status (P6216) as an anchor property with additional qualifiers bundled within. An example might look as follows:
copyright status |
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add value |
Qualifiers for different types of work
[edit]Property copyright status (P6216) in great majority of cases will take only two values:
Qualifiers for copyright status (P6216) differ for copyrighted and public domain works. Whereas public domain works need qualifiers that help confirm the public domain status of the work, the copyrighted works need qualifiers that help determine the copyright holders and future public domain date.
Public Domain Works
[edit]Use copyright status (P6216)public domain (Q19652) with following qualifiers
Qualifier | Possible values | Explanation |
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determination method or standard (P459) (required) | See example items below. | justification why work is in Public Domain. |
applies to jurisdiction (P1001) (required) | See example items below. | stating a country or countries, where copyright applies, with default being worldwide. |
laws applied (P3014) | Items: | justification why work is in Public Domain linking it to specific law. In many cases laws applied (P3014) should be a property of items linked through determination method or standard (P459) property. |
start time (P580) end time (P582) |
Dates | start and end dates when statement is true. end time (P582) should not be used except for rare cases where PD works become copyrighted again. |
Copyrighted works
[edit]Works with copyright status (P6216)copyrighted (Q50423863) will fall into two broad categories: works released under a license, like one of Creative Commons licenses, and works for which all rights reserved is stated or assumed. Copyrighted works should use the following qualifiers
Qualifier | Possible values | Explanation |
---|---|---|
determination method or standard (P459) (required) | See example items below. | How do we know the work is still copyrighted? |
applies to jurisdiction (P1001) | See example items below. | Country or list of countries, where copyright applies. |
copyright license (P275) | See example items below. | Examples: GPLv2, Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International. |
public domain date (P3893) | Date | When will the copyright expire and work fall into Public Domain? |
start time (P580) end time (P582) |
Dates | Start and end dates when statement is true. start time (P580) should not be used except for rare cases where PD works become copyrighted again. end time (P582) should be used after work falls into public domain and statement is no longer true. |
copyright holder (P3931) | Items, person/organisation, untraceable copyright owner (Q60711924) for orphan works | copyright holder (P3931) is meant to store the copyright owner or the copyright representative of the work if known. Copyright ownership can be uncertain as copyright can be sold or transfered. The copyright owner can be a person, a collective right organisation, fund, or abstract like heirs (Q29902355). The copyright owner or representative of an author might be mentioned if known for the entry of that person with copyright representative (P6275). |
Wikimedia VRTS ticket number (P6305) | 16 digit number | Identifier linking file with email exchange stored in OTRS database confirming the validity of the license. |
Additional allowed qualifiers
[edit]Additional qualifiers that are useful for both public domain works and copyrighted works:
Qualifier | Possible values | Explanation |
---|---|---|
author (P50) creator (P170) |
Items | specified as qualifier for the copyright statement if there are multiple authors/creators and we are tracking copyrights of each one separately. |
applies to part (P518) | Items: | allow us to specify copyrights of works current work was derived from, objects in the photograph, sound and video part of a movie, composer and performers, etc. |
comment (DEPRECATED) (P2315) | Free text | Free text explanation of whatever can not be explained through other means. Should not be used much. |
statement disputed by (P1310) statement supported by (P3680) |
Items | |
sourcing circumstances (P1480) | disputed (Q18912752) |
Helper items
[edit]
Items linked through applies to jurisdiction (P1001) qualifier
[edit]The property applies to jurisdiction (P1001), used as a qualifier of copyright statement should link to either:
- Items for countries, like United States (Q30), Germany (Q183) or Japan (Q17)
- For whole world use worldwide (Q13780930)
- Groups of countries and jurisdictions with similar copyrights (subclasses of grouping of jurisdictions around copyright legislation (Q63705939)), like
- Lists of countries with copyright terms based on authors' deaths (post mortem auctoris or pma)[1] (subclasses of countries with pma copyright (Q108698760)):
- countries with 15 years pma or shorter (Q114772623) & countries with longer than 15 years pma (Q114772416) - see countries with 15 years pma (Q114773644)
- countries with 25 years pma or shorter (Q68543134) & countries with longer than 25 years pma (Q108702088) - see countries with 25 years pma (Q114764460)
- countries with 45 years pma or shorter (Q114771767) & countries with longer than 45 years pma (Q114772428) - see countries with 45 years pma (Q114771351)
- countries with 50 years pma or shorter (Q59621182) & countries with longer than 50 years pma (Q87048619) - see countries with 50 years pma (Q114763455) - general Berne Convention minimum term
- countries with 60 years pma or shorter (Q105480667) & countries with longer than 60 years pma (Q114772452) - see countries with 60 years pma (Q114784833)
- countries with 70 years pma or shorter (Q59542795) & countries with longer than 70 years pma (Q60845045) - see countries with 70 years pma (Q73560261) - copyrights for European Union members, US works published after 1978
- countries with 74 years pma or shorter (Q114772665) & countries with longer than 74 years pma (Q114772499) - see countries with 74 years pma (Q114784954) - copyrights for "authors who worked during the Great Patriotic War" in Russia
- countries with 78 years pma or shorter (Q114772672) & countries with longer than 78 years pma (Q114772501) - see countries with 78 years pma (Q114785234)
- countries with 80 years pma or shorter (Q61830521) & countries with longer than 80 years pma (Q114772502) - see countries with 80 years pma (Q114785238)
- countries with 85 years pma or shorter (Q114772022) & countries with longer than 85 years pma (Q114772552) - see countries with 85 years pma (Q114771397)
- countries with 90 years pma or shorter (Q108698312) & countries with longer than 90 years pma (Q114772555) - see countries with 90 years pma (Q114785302)
- countries with 95 years pma or shorter (Q108698353) & countries with longer than 95 years pma (Q114772562) - see countries with 95 years pma (Q114785307) - copyrights for US works published between 1923 and 1978 - prior terms were 75 years, for 1909–1923 works; 56 years, 42 years, 28 years historically
- countries with 100 years pma or shorter (Q60332278) & countries with longer than 100 years pma (Q114772573) - see countries with 100 years pma (Q114785335)
reference:
also reference either:
- laws applied (P3014) -> instances of copyright law (Q67011165) such as copyright law of the United States (Q842270) or copyright law of the European Union (Q3829820)
- laws applied (P3014) -> instances of copyright act (Q63718677) such as Copyright Act of 1976 (Q3196755) or Directive on Copyright in the Digital Single Market (Q55110225)
Items linked through determination method or standard (P459) qualifier
[edit]- See list at Help:Copyrights/Copyright determination method
Property determination method or standard (P459) is used to express how do we know work is in public domain or still copyrighted. Each jurisdiction has unique copyright laws, but they follow broad trends except for contemporary works. Differences between jurisdictions are often most visible in how they treat older works and for example United States law is so complicated it has its own section below. You can see what determination method or standard (P459) properties are currently in use on Wikidata if you use this SPARQL query.
copyright determination method (Q61005213)
- Based on authors' deaths (post mortem auctoris or pma)[1]
- results in works protected by copyrights (Q73555012)
- results in copyrights on works have expired (Q71887839)
- 15 years or more after author(s) death (Q68542701)
- 25 years or more after author(s) death (Q108702158)
- 45 years or more after author(s) death (Q114818692)
- 50 years or more after author(s) death (Q29870405)
- 60 years or more after author(s) death (Q114818719)
- 70 years or more after author(s) death (Q29870196) - applies to European Union members, US for works published after 1978 and other countries
- 74 years or more after author(s) death (Q114818787) - applies to "authors who worked during the Great Patriotic War" in Soviet Union and successor states
- 78 years or more after author(s) death (Q114818791)
- 80 years or more after author(s) death (Q29940641) - applies to Spain
- 85 years or more after author(s) death (Q114818794)
- 90 years or more after author(s) death (Q114818795)
- 95 years or more after author(s) death (Q114818797)
- 100 years or more after author(s) death (Q29940705) - applies to Mexico
also reference either:
- laws applied (P3014) -> instances of copyright law (Q67011165) such as copyright law of the United States (Q842270) or copyright law of the European Union (Q3829820)
- laws applied (P3014) -> instances of copyright act (Q63718677) such as Copyright Act of 1976 (Q3196755) or Directive on Copyright in the Digital Single Market (Q55110225)
- Based on publication date
- 25 years or less since publication (Q61752729) - applies for example to photographs in Cuba, (see copyright law of Cuba (Q61729533))
- 25 years since publication of previously-unpublished posthumous work (Q29940790) - applies to formerly unpublished material in the European Union and US
- 60 years or less since publication (Q60628165) - applies to India, Venezuela
- 70 years since publication by anonymous author (Q60628769) - applies to European Union members and other countries
- 95 years after publication works made for hire and anonymous and pseudonymous works (Q61138249)
reference:
also reference either:
- laws applied (P3014) -> instances of copyright law (Q67011165) such as copyright law of the United States (Q842270) or copyright law of the European Union (Q3829820)
- laws applied (P3014) -> instances of copyright act (Q63718677) such as Copyright Act of 1976 (Q3196755) or Directive on Copyright in the Digital Single Market (Q55110225)
- Government works
- 50 years after publication of Crown work (Q61889273)
- official text of a legislative, administrative or legal nature (Q61002900) - edicts of government doctrine
- Other
- ineligible for copyright protection (Q61005058) - works not meeting the legal requirements to be "valid subject matter", such as threshold of originality (Q707401) or human authorship
- news of the day (Q114794167) - specifically excluded by law from copyright protection in some jurisdictions - please research exact applicability before use - see w:Wainwright Securities v. Wall Street Transcript Corp
- simple facts (Q114798319) - specifically excluded by law from copyright protection in some jurisdictions please research exact applicability before use - see w:Feist Publications, Inc., v. Rural Telephone Service Co.
- no copyright because created by a non-human animal (Q77406753) - such works lack "human authorship", as required for threshold of originality (Q707401) - see w:Monkey selfie copyright dispute#Copyright issues
- public domain as not covered by copyright law (Q50551851) - works explicitly excluded from protection by the copyright laws of specific jurisdictions, like methods of operation, clothing and utilitarian objects in US, etc. More specific rules listed below may apple.
- state symbols and signs (Q114794799) - specifically excluded by law from copyright protection in some jurisdictions - please research exact applicability before use
- national folklore (Q114796148) - specifically excluded by law from copyright protection in some jurisdictions - please research exact applicability before use
- means of payment (Q114798305) - specifically excluded by law from copyright protection in some jurisdictions - please research exact applicability before use
- ideas, theories, concepts, discoveries and inventions (Q114798293) - specifically excluded by law from copyright protection in some jurisdictions - please research exact applicability before use
- stated by copyright holder at source website (Q61045577)
- determined by GLAM institution and stated at its website (Q61848113)
Works in the US
[edit]US copyrights are explained at Wikidata:Hirtle chart. You can see what determination method or standard (P459) properties are currently in use on Wikidata if you use this SPARQL query.
The below helper items are created specifically for categories of works that are in the public domain based on either creation date or publication date.
- 120 years after creation of unpublished anonymous and pseudonymous works, and works made for hire (Q61138764) - applies to US
- 120 years after creation of unpublished work by an author whose year of death is not known (Q29940870) - applies to US
- 100 years after creation by anonymous author (Q60952328) - applies to US
until 1924
- published more than 95 years ago (Q47246828) - applies to US, with specific subclasses, all those entered public domain:
between 1924-1963
- copyright not renewed (Q29941035)
- 95 years after publication with notice and renewal (Q29940912) - see help page Wikisource for Copyright renewals
between 1964-1977
Other
[edit]- work of the federal government of the United States (Q60671452)
- official text of a legislative, administrative or legal nature (Q61002900) - edicts of government doctrine - for edicts of the US federal government use above - see w:Georgia v. Public.Resource.Org, Inc.
- no copyright due to missing copyright notice (Q47012574)
- no copyright due to error in copyright notice (Q61062601)
- news of the day (Q114794167) - see w:Wainwright Securities v. Wall Street Transcript Corp
- simple facts (Q114798319) - see w:Feist Publications, Inc., v. Rural Telephone Service Co.
Items linked through copyright license (P275) qualifier
[edit]All the items linked through copyright license (P275) property should be of the type (or sub-type):
- public license (Q7257461) - work uses one of the many standard public copyright licenses, like free or open source licenses
- proprietary license (Q3238057) - work (usually software) uses some one-of-the-kind propriatary license
- all rights reserved (Q1752207) - copyright holder reserves all the rights provided by the copyright law
In case of public license (Q7257461) items, ideally they will come with the following properties :
- topic's main template (P1424) link to actual license templates used on Wikimedia Commons and other projects.
- full work available at URL (P953) and official website (P856) links to URL with text of the license
- ...
Below is a list of some standard licenses. The list was generated with this SPARQL query.
Creative Commons Licenses
[edit]Free Software Foundation Licenses
[edit]
Other Licenses
[edit]Properties relevant to copyrights
[edit]Those might relate to the same item, but are not qualifiers of copyright status (P6216).
Legal geographical aspects
[edit]- country of origin (P495) jurisdiction for creation, is in certain cases important to calculate copyright terms. For example, in the US there are other rules for works first published abroad. Also in the situation of rule of the shorter term (Q1318221)
- place of publication (P291) jurisdiction for first publication
- location of first performance (P4647) jurisdiction for first presentation
Legal date aspects
[edit]- inception (P571) relevant to calculate dates after creation
- publication date (P577) relevant for literature as this declares the first publication
- date of first performance (P1191) relevant for artworks like paintings to declare the published/unpublished situation
Legal authorship aspects
[edit]The following creator properties include possible copyright owners in copyright laws:
- author (P50)
- creator (P170)
- publisher (P123)
- director (P57)
- screenwriter (P58)
- producer (P162)
- lyricist (P676)
- composer (P86)
- performer (P175)
- possible creator (P1779)
- author of foreword (P2679)
- editor (P98)
- illustrator (P110)
- author of afterword (P2680)
- contributor to the creative work or subject (P767)
- translator (P655)
- architect (P84)
- landscape architect (P7514)
- designed by (P287)
- performer (P175)
- discoverer or inventor (P61)
- voice actor (P725)
- film editor (P1040)
- choreographer (P1809)
- costume designer (P2515)
see also modeling Commons discussion on authorship properies
Relevant copyright properties on authors
[edit]- employer (P108) - if working for an organisation and the work is work related, copyright might belong to that organisation
- copyright representative (P6275)
- date of death (P570) - relevant for p.m.a.
- author copyright status (to be proposed)
RightsStatements
[edit]RightsStatements.org is an international effort among major cultural heritage institutions to create a global standard for rights statements for works. It has already been implemented by major repositories such as Europeana and DPLA, and many others. A work might be assigned one of a dozen possible statements, which can be stored on Wikidata using RightsStatements.org statement according to source website (P6426) property.
As discussed and agreed during the Property Proposal, this property may ONLY be applied to Items about copyrightable works for which the organisation that owns the original work has itself placed one of the official RightsStatement.org labels in the metadata.
As of the date of approval of this Property there are 12 such Statements. Furthermore, only some of those 12 Statements are applicable to be modeled in Wikidata and Wikimedia Commons due to the policies of those projects.
The table below indicates which of the RightsStatements.org statements can be applied to the works' Wikidata item (if the above criteria is met) or Structured Data on Commons. The table is partially based on RightsStatement.org blog post clarifying the scope of each statement.
Icon | Meaning |
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May be used on a Wikidata item |
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May be used within Wikimedia Commons Structured Data information and the file very likely meets Commons Licensing policy |
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May be used within Wikimedia Commons Structured Data information; however, the file will have to be individually evaluated to determine if it meets Commons Licensing policy |
RS.org Statement + QID | Statement refers to: the original work or |
Permitted to be used on: Wikidata and/or |
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In Copyright (Q47530729) | original + reproduction | ![]() |
In Copyright - EU Orphan Work (Q47530688) | original + reproduction | ![]() |
In Copyright - Rights-holder(s) Unlocatable or Unidentifiable (Q47530802) | original + reproduction | ![]() |
No Copyright - United States (Q47530911) | original + reproduction | ![]() ![]() |
No Known Copyright (Q47530955) | original + reproduction | ![]() ![]() |
Copyright Not Evaluated (Q47530926) | original + reproduction | ![]() ![]() ![]() |
Copyright Undetermined (Q47530946) | original + reproduction | ![]() ![]() ![]() |
No Copyright - Contractual Restrictions (Q47530853) | reproduction | ![]() ![]() |
No Copyright - Non-Commercial Use Only (Q47530884) | reproduction | ![]() ![]() |
No Copyright - Other Known Legal Restrictions (Q47530902) | reproduction | ![]() ![]() |
In Copyright - Non-Commercial Use Permitted (Q47530780) | reproduction | – |
In Copyright - Educational Use Permitted (Q47530757) | reproduction | – |
Examples
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Copyrights have expired 100 years after author's death. Woman of the Mango (Q18357854), is a painting by Paul Gauguin (Q37693) who died in 1903, or more than 100 years ago. Such work would be in public domain in all the countries where copyright expires some number of years since author's death (Latin: Post mortem auctoris or pma), since there are no jurisdictions where that period is longer than 100 years[1]. Equivalent to template:PD-old-100 on Wikimedia Commons.
Copyright situation in the United states is less clear, and depends on information if the work was published with approval of the copyright holder or not. If a reproduction of this work was published more than 95 years ago than the work is in Public Domain in the US. Same if it was never published, since than copyrights have expired 70 years after author's death. However if the first authorized publication occured less than 95 years ago than there is a chance that this work is still copyrighted in the US[2]. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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Copyrights in US have expired in the US 95 years after publication (before 1930).
In the US Copyright term is calculated based on date of publication. Since author George M. Cohan (Q563017) died in 1942, the musical is in Public Domain in most of the world. Equivalent to template:PD-old-70-expired on Wikimedia Commons. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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Google Logo is protected by trademark laws, but it is not copyrighted. The reason copyright laws do not apply to Google Logo is that you can not copyright a word, typed using standard Sans-serif font and primary colors (plus yellow)[3]. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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Works prepared by an officer or employee of the United States Government as part of that person's official duties are in in the Public Domain in the US. Equivalent to template:PD-USGov on Wikimedia Commons. Since the photographer Charles Levy (Q55437350) died in 1997, this work might not be in Public Domain in other jurisdictions. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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Copyright rules chart by Peter B. Hirtle was released under Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 license. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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The grapes of wrath novel by John Steinbeck is still copyrighted in the US and in most of the world | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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In case of 1st edition of Anne Frank diary Het achterhuis (Q14624856) the copyright should be straight forward:
However, the case become more complicated after, Anne Frank Fund the foundation that held the copyrights to the book, made a claim that Anne Frank's father, Otto Heinrich Frank was not just the editor of the book, but also a coauthor. That would extend the copyrights to 2050, 70 years after Frank's death. This claim is disputed. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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How to add Copyright statements?
[edit]Copyright statements are a bit clunky to add by hand, as they always require multiple qualifiers. In the future we should build tools for easily adding a some of the most often used statements. Below are some of the existing tools which might be useful.
moveClaim.js
[edit]MoveClaim is a very useful tool designed for moving and copying statements from one item to another. Installation tips can be found at Wikidata:Tools/Edit items. In case of Copyright statements one can use it to copy statements from one item with properly set up copyright statements to another. All you need is an item number of the destination item. Use this SPARQL query to find exemplar items for different cases.
QuickStatements
[edit]QuickStatements is an excellent tool for adding statements to batches of items. See Help:QuickStatements to learn how to use it. QuickStatements can be used without issues when adding single new statement to an item without any. However it has some unexpected behavior when one wants to add multiple statements. For example, importing the following V1 commands:
Q70784 P6216 Q19652 P1001 Q30 P459 Q47246828
Q70784 P6216 Q19652 P1001 Q60332278 P459 Q29940705
should have resulted in
copyright status |
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add value |
However QuickStatements currently produces
copyright status |
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add value |
You can get desired effect by using
Q70784 P6216 Q19652 P1001 Q30 P459 Q47246828
Q70784 P6216 Q15687061 P1001 Q60332278 P459 Q29940705
which uses public domain (Q15687061), a permanent duplicate of public domain (Q19652). All public domain (Q15687061) are automatically replaced with public domain (Q19652), see {{Autofix}}
template at Property talk:P6216.
When using QuickStatements always inspect the output of small test runs before doing any larger batches.
See Also
[edit]- Help:Copyrights/maintenance - page listing SPARQL queries used for adding and maintaining copyright statements.
- Help:Copyright legislations - page to model copyright legislation in wikidata
- Earlier discussions and proposals:
- File:Licensing model framework discussion.pdf (2014)
- Wikidata:Property_proposal/Archive/48#Copyright_status (2016)
- Property_talk:P275#Public_domain (2018-01)
- Wikidata_talk:WikiProject_sum_of_all_paintings#Shall_we_introduce_properties_indicating_copyright_status (2018-02)
- c:Commons talk:Structured data/Get involved/Feedback requests/First licensing consultation (2018-03)
- Wikidata:Property proposal/copyright status (2018-07)