Commons:Deletion requests/File:GFDL (English).ogg

This deletion discussion is now closed. Please do not make any edits to this archive. You can read the deletion policy or ask a question at the Village pump. If the circumstances surrounding this file have changed in a notable manner, you may re-nominate this file or ask for it to be undeleted.

File:GFDL (English).ogg

This is a derivative work of the GFDL. The GFDL says "Everyone is permitted to copy and distribute verbatim copies of this license document, but changing it is not allowed.". This doesn't fall under Commons:Licensing § Acceptable licenses, as it prevents derivative works. --Matr1x-101 {_{user page} - ^{talk with me :)} - _contribs!} 10:59, 17 December 2022 (UTC)

• Strong  Keep: it is a spoken word version of the Wikipedia article, not a modified version.Accipiter Gentilis Q. (talk) 12:13, 17 December 2022 (UTC)

  @Accipiter Gentilis Q., it's a spoken version of the exact words of the GFDL, which prevents derivative works (as stated above). That's incompatible with Commons:Licensing § Acceptable licenses, which states that "[p]ublication of derivative work must be allowed". --Matr1x-101 {_{user page} - ^{talk with me :)} - _contribs!} 14:39, 17 December 2022 (UTC)

  The ‘article’ in question is en:Wikipedia:Text of the GNU Free Documentation License, which is (except for a notice about the license migration) just the text of the GFDL document. This is not a Wikipedia article!

  There are two issues here:

  1. Changes involved in going from the text form of the GFDL document to the audio form. These changes may or may not be technically forbidden, but they are unlikely to be a problem in practice.
  2. Further changes that future users might want to make to the audio form, including changes to the wording. These changes are the problem: Commons policy demands that such changes be permitted, but the license of the GFDL document forbids them.

  Brianjd (talk) 12:33, 19 December 2022 (UTC)

  Pinging @Accipiter Gentilis Q.. Brianjd (talk) 12:33, 19 December 2022 (UTC)

Yes, I should have written above: "a spoken word version of the documentation licence", not "a spoken version of a Wikipedia article"". Accipiter Gentilis Q. (talk) 19:51, 19 December 2022 (UTC) P.S. On the other hand, it seems to me that the lack of such a file will force a blind person to ask someone to read the text to them, which introduces a significant limitation.

@Matr1x-101 and Accipiter Gentilis Q.: Yes, it is silly that we can’t host an audio version of this page when hosting audio versions of other pages is standard practice. The text version is already an exception to the rule that text is released under CC BY-SA (and that exception is made on Commons too: Commons:GNU Free Documentation License). Can we declare an exception here too? Brianjd (talk) 06:20, 20 December 2022 (UTC)

@Brianjd, we can't make an exception here. If you want/need to make an exception, move the file to enwiki and ask there. --Matr1x-101 {_{user page} - ^{talk with me :)} - _contribs!} 12:27, 20 December 2022 (UTC)

@Matr1x-101 This isn’t like fair use cases. Anyway, the file is used at en:Wikipedia:Text of the GNU Free Documentation License, version 1.2 and equivalent pages on (at least) the following projects: eswiki, euwiki, incubator/Wp/yua, la.wikiquote, mlwiki, nlwiki, plwiki, ptwiki, siwiki, zh-yuewiki. Brianjd (talk) 12:08, 23 December 2022 (UTC)

@Brianjd, to keep the file, we'd have to make changes to Commons:Licensing to detail exceptions like this. That would require consensus, so we'd need to create an RfC or some other kind of proposal on the file's talk page. --Matr1x-101^{Pinging me doesn't hurt!} {user - talk? - useless contributions} 18:43, 23 December 2022 (UTC)

• Note Previously kept at DR: see Commons:Deletion requests/Image:GFDL (English).ogg. —‍Mdaniels5757 (talk • contribs) 18:26, 22 December 2022 (UTC)

•  Speedy delete WMF:Licensing policy prohibits Commons to have an EDP. A4531826 (talk) 20:08, 22 December 2022 (UTC)
•  Keep For practical reasons (i.e. being able to link to an internal copy of the license on file description pages), the text of free licenses is a special exception to our licensing policy. It might not be explicitly stated anywhere, but given the number of policy pages that link to Commons:GNU Free Documentation License, surely this practice is de facto accepted as policy-compliant. And if it is OK to host the text itself, then I see no reason why making an audio version of it (which is important for people with visual disabilities) would be prohibited. -- King of ♥ ♦ ♣ ♠ 00:38, 23 December 2022 (UTC)

  @King of Hearts, then we'd have to make changes to Commons:Licensing to detail exceptions. That would require consensus, so we'd need to create an RfC or some other kind of proposal on the file's talk page. --Matr1x-101^{Pinging me doesn't hurt!} {user - talk? - useless contributions} 14:49, 23 December 2022 (UTC)

•  Keep: by the nomination's logic, we can't host the GFDL's text at Commons:GNU Free Documentation License (even though it remains a valid license for some files). That is an obviously absurd result that we should not cause. We should abide by the previous consensus regarding this file. —‍Mdaniels5757 (talk • contribs) 18:54, 23 December 2022 (UTC)

  @Mdaniels, then we need to make it clear with a template that the GFDL is not released under a free license. --Matr1x-101^{Pinging me doesn't hurt!} {user - talk? - useless contributions} 11:34, 24 December 2022 (UTC)

• @Matr1x-101, King of Hearts, and Mdaniels5757: Commons:Licensing § Acceptable licenses says (emphasis added): All copyrighted material on Commons (not in the public domain) must be licensed under a free license …. What is material? Does it include text? Most other statements in the licensing policy are clear: they apply only to files. Brianjd (talk) 11:05, 24 December 2022 (UTC)

  Possibly related: Commons:Village pump/Copyright/Archive/2021/12#Is legislation free? (regarding fair use in Commons namespace) Brianjd (talk) 14:31, 24 December 2022 (UTC)

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Kept: Per discussion. --IronGargoyle (talk) 22:39, 26 December 2022 (UTC)