Just the Facts
A publisher of autobiographical materials reached out to the Foundation regarding the Polish Wikipedia article biography of one of their clients. In their request, they alleged that the inclusion of the client’s date of birth was an improper use of copyrighted information. The publisher’s client had previously unsuccessfully requested that the information be removed from the article. In any case, birthdates are not copyrightable.
Shared Goals
A concerned parent contacted us regarding a photo of her and her minor child(ren) being uploaded to a Wikipedia article without their consent, and the photo subsequently being used on other pages in several different languages. Freedom of panorama rules held to apply—because the photo was published on Commons, there was no restriction against the use of the image on other Wikipedia pages. This is an exception to the normal rule that the copyright owner has the exclusive right to authorize the creation and distribution of derivative works.
We responded and let the parent know that, although an image rights claim would likely fail to get the photo removed, we noted that it may be possible for the volunteer community to have the faces in the image blurred and re-uploaded. Ultimately, the community blurred the image.
Word Ownership
A German company contacted us alleging that a Wikipedia article about a Korean music group constituted an unauthorized use of the German domain of the same name. We responded by informing them of how Wikipedia works: that the trademark ownership of the domain name does not constitute a right to control all uses of that word in any language, or prevent the use of the word or phrase by the public at large. We also explained how to create a potential Wikipedia article for the German domain name.
April Fool’s Song
A music producer contacted the Foundation about a court order they allegedly received in their favor, stating they should be included as the producer of a popular song on that song’s Wikipedia page. Instead of raising this situation with the community and sharing proof, they directly edited the music’s page, identifying themselves as a representative of the production company. This clearly violates conflict of interest (COI) policies—no self-promotion or marketing on the projects. The edit was almost immediately reversed by the community, who thought it was an April Fool’s joke because the edit was made on April 1st.
Servitors of Truth
An elected official of a foreign country contacted the Foundation regarding the biography on his Wikipedia article. The article included information that the subject had a child outside of marriage. The subject requested that we remove the information, asserted that it was entirely false, and requested that we take all necessary steps to prevent the future re-introduction of that information to the biography of living persons (BLP). The BLP policy dictates that the article documents what the high-quality, reliable sources say, even if it is negative and/or the subject dislikes it.
We explained that since the allegedly false information was well-sourced, it would be best to first ask the sources to make corrections or retractions. We also noted that if the community held the sources to be reliable, the information could be re-introduced into the article even if it was previously removed.
Photo credits
