Commons:Requests for comment/Merging all history fron imported files

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Problem[edit]

Hello, I want to address a problem with files that are imported from other wikis (like enwiki, dewiki, etc.). Attribution is legally required to be in the history (see w:Wikipedia:Copying within Wikipedia § Attribution is required for copyright); for licenses like the GFDL (see GFDL, section 4-I)[1]. Many files have been sloppily copied over, with no upload log from the original wiki, often just copying and pasting the original wiki's source URL in the source and re-uploading the image to Commons. This is a potential license violation.

For example, see this file. Rather than using an actual FileImporter tool, it has been sloppily reuploaded (it was originally reuploaded with no wikitext!), with no original upload log. This is a problem, as discussed above.

In other words, many images have been "cut and paste moved" from other wikis. In my opinion, we need to find a way to

1) Retrieve the original upload log (Quite hard since the original files were probably deleted on the home wiki.)

2) Add it to Commons either:

a) Directly to the history or
b) Using {{Original upload log}}

This will probably involve the creation of a maintenance category. --Matr1x-101 {user page - talk with me :) - contribs!} 23:15, 12 December 2022 (UTC)Reply[reply]

  1. ↑ [Section 4: Modifications, Clause I:] Preserve the section Entitled "History", Preserve its Title, and add to it an item stating at least the title, year, new authors, and publisher of the Modified Version as given on the Title Page.

Discussion[edit]

Attribution is not legally required to be in the history. All that is required is that the file is attributed "in any reasonable manner". GFDL is a nonsense license for images, which is why we did the whole license migration thing back in 2009. Strictly following the GFDL for images is impossible because it's a software documentation license. Regardless, the section of the GFDL you are quoting is for modifications, not for rehosting. My opinion is that the problem is not a problem. Nosferattus (talk) 16:03, 19 December 2022 (UTC)Reply[reply]

I support the idea of documenting the history of imported files using upload logs and page creation logs. Admins on source wikis can provide history of file description pages. A bot can be requested to do it at Commons:Bots/Work requests. Sloppy uploaders can be warned for not providing sufficient evidence.   — 🇺🇦Jeff G. ツ please ping or talk to me🇺🇦 21:55, 20 December 2022 (UTC)Reply[reply]
We probably need to split each file by the wiki it was imported from, and form maintainence categories. Then we would need a bot to retrieve the deleted file on the original wiki's revisions and store the (probably deleted) edit history, the usernames, edit summaries and dates. Then the bot would need to format this data using {{Original upload log}} and some kind of wikitext/wikitable. The bot would need some kind of global sysop/admin to work because it would be digging through deleted revisions, which requires sysop permissions. --Matr1x-101 {user page - talk with me :) - contribs!} 21:44, 22 December 2022 (UTC)Reply[reply]
The first part of the plan I put above can probably already be conducted! We can create a template (like {{Original upload log missing}}) and we can sort images by wiki and the template will place them in the corresponding maintainence category. The template should have a parameter for the file name at the original wiki if it's different from the file name at Commons. --Matr1x-101 {user page - talk with me :) - contribs!} 21:49, 22 December 2022 (UTC)Reply[reply]
In general, the copyright of the image itself does not need any editing history, unless it was an "own work" (and then we only need the original upload). Images copied from external sources should still have verifiable copyrights. The full history is still helpful, since it documents when things changed (maybe the original license on en-wiki was different but then changed; technically both licenses could be valid). The description text *might* have a copyright though, and that is where editing history could be helpful to conform to the license for that text. So, certainly if we could preserve it, we should. It wasn't always done (sometimes just a log pasted in, since we couldn't do anything more for a long time), though newer migration tools are improving over time. So... if we can, sounds good. But I don't think it's a huge problem. You may have a problem with early uploads, since I'm not sure their history was preserved when they were deleted. Carl Lindberg (talk) 22:04, 26 December 2022 (UTC)Reply[reply]

Possible solution(s)[edit]

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