File talk:Ulla engel.JPG

A user revert warred over this, finally accepting what he may have thought was some sort of compromise, though it would set up likely problems in the future.

The user had properly tagged this file as missing creator or ownership information, there was merely a release under the license. Now the upload sequence does require a user to agree that they have the right to upload the file. However, to make sure, we want users to state information about the file origin. I had first stated, in the file:

15 March 2014‎ Own work of uploader.

Now, I'd entered the wrong revision number in the Diff. It was actually two revisions later or so, easily found, it's
 * Own work of uploader.

(And I didn't check, later, until now, and the user didn't notice this, apparently. The user was aware of what the uploader had claimed, that's clear.

What the user had actually written, as shown in that corrected diff:
 * I don't need the image. So you can delete it. But I have the copyright.

Now, there are possibilities:

1. The image is the user's own work, so the user has the copyright. 2. The image was made by someone for the user, i.e, for hire or similarly, so the user has the copyright. 3. The image is some other person's work and the user obtained permission. 4. The user is not telling the truth.

We set aside the fourth possibility routinely. If the user says "own work," and unless we find evidence otherwise, we are done.

With the third possibility, the user would almost certainly not have said "I have the copyright." He would have said "I have permission." Thus from ordinary language, we can set this aside.

With the second possibility, the user has the copyright and may release the file, and has done so. Given the nature of the image, the second possibility cannot be linguistically ruled out, but it is quite unlikely and, besides, it is moot. While the file might not then satisfy the letter of a rule that the "source" must be known, it satisfies the substance and purpose of the rules.

In another image issue today, there was reference to a pdf published in a journal, and a copy of the pdf was uploaded to Commons. That pdf was published, by the journal publisher, with a CC-BY-3.0 license, but the specific source of each specific part of it was not stated. And that is routine. If something has been published under a CC license, and if no other source is known but the publisher, we routinely attribute the material to the publisher. In this case, the publisher is the uploader, here.

But 99% or better, the user made the image himself. And simply didn't realize that it would be helpful if he specifically said that, thinking that it was enough to say he had the copyright. And really, it should be enough. Sure, he might have bought it from someone, but to not be defrauding the copyright owner, he'd have to have purchased all rights, including the right of attribution, since he did not attribute it to anyone else.

That leaves us the first possibility, which is what I asserted as my belief, because it is so likely to be the case. Did we really have to make this complicated?

Anyway, the user reverted me, removing that comment about own work, and restoring the tag, then apparently thought better of that latter part and removed the tag as it was disputed.

I thanked him for that, but citing the comment of the uploader was the core of what I'd done. So I restored it and this time signed it. Of course, the diff was still wrong, but it all comes out in the wash.

and my edit summary was (thanks for removing the deletion tag, but this note needs to be there. I signed the comment.)
 * Own work of uploader, per user talk page note added by Abd (discuss • contribs) 20:25, 15 March 2014 (UTC)

The user reverted that, blanking it again, with:


 * (Undo revision 1160702 by Abd (talk) not asserted to be own work, please learn this distinction

He was technically correct. It was not asserted to be "own work." What was asserted was *almost* equivalent, as I describe above. I know the distinction and have known it possibly for more years than this user has been alive. Maybe a lot more years. But I was trying to be brief. Fat lot of good that did.

Meanwhile, I did ask the uploader to clarify. He may. If not, we still do not need to delete this file. I've told the user that if he wants it deleted, how to do it, and, indeed, I did this from the beginning.

We will avoid a lot of this when we have designed a cleaner, clearer upload system, probably with a flowchart or similar device to guide users in making the choices. I can testify, it's bewildering, figuring out how to provide what is needed for images. And the proof that it is not just me, is how many images are missing simple information that a user could easily have provided when they were available. And nobody asked until much later, when they are often gone, and there we have a resource using the image, and what do we do?

Fair use claim is available on Wikiversity, unlike on Commons. Yet we want to limit fair use, which requires, among other things, that we catch image problems as quickly as possible.

I have restored the pointer to the user's talk page, this time with the correct diff.

Let's hope we are done here. The uploader may touch the file, I invited that, to nail this down. --Abd (discuss • contribs) 00:11, 16 March 2014 (UTC)