Talk:Avoid copyright paranoia

DMCA

Copyright Paranoia is a problem I have ran into in several online communities that allow user created and I don't see many people mention the DMCA of 1996.

The Digital Millennium Copyright Act of 1996 basically acts as a shield for online service providers. The law basically says that a service provider (and I believe Wikipedia can be loosely classified as an online service provider, most websites are) cannot be held liable for the copyright infringement of its users if it follows a notice and take down procedure. The provider (or website) has to register an agent with the Library of Congress to receive copyright complaints. As long as quick action is taken to remove offending works the provider is generally not liable.

The following article from Nolo.com helps explain the DMCA and how it applies to ISPs. I am fairly certain it similarly applies to Wikipedia.

When Is an ISP Liable for the Acts of Its Subscribers?

I wonder what the rest of you think? — The preceding unsigned comment was added by Oherra~metawiki (talk) 23:11, 24 August 2006 (UTC)

This is a mess!

Can this page be archived or something? It currently stretches from back when signatures didn't have datestamps (!) to the present. Or is my idea of an essay (Wikipedia essay like) non what meta's are like? 68.39.174.238 01:53, 13 February 2007 (UTC)

I agree. I'm not even sure if this answers my question of what should I do instead? I have a picture from a website I want to put on an article, but I don't know what copyright to upload it under, or if it'll stay up after I upload it. Anyway, the answer might be somewhere in this page, but it's too jumbled and messed up to be of any use. Instead, it reads more like a forum or talk page itself. Kvn8907 23:02, 21 May 2007 (UTC)

This is a metadiscussion. You'd want to ask that on whatever subwiki you're trying to upload the image to. Ask on, say c:COM:VP. 68.39.174.238 20:43, 2 December 2007 (UTC)

odd spacing

Some odd spacing was (apparently accidentally) introduced with the http://meta.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?title=Avoid_Copyright_Paranoia&diff=next&oldid=16546 edit. --68.0.120.35 04:45, 8 April 2007 (UTC)

Avoid accusations of copyright paranoia

I know that the term "copyright paranoia" and this essay both have a long history on Wikimedia projects, and I don't expect to change that. However, for the reasons stated below, I dislike the term and the way in which some participants refer to this essay. I am considering making this an essay of its own. Suggestions are welcome.

Paranoia, as Wiktionary notes, is derived from a Greek word meaning "madness" and primarily denotes a psychotic disorder characterized by delusions of persecution. Wikipedia explains that in psychiatry, the term is used to describe delusions associated with various mental disorders.

Thus, to say that another participant's actions are motivated by copyright paranoia is effectively to pathologize their behavior and to call them "mad" and "delusional."

No personal attacks is a Wikipedia policy, and all Wikimedia projects have similar policies or apply principles influenced by that policy. According to the policy, epithets (such as against people with disabilities) directed at another contributor are never acceptable. In any reasonable interpretation of the policy, unfounded statements about a fellow contributor's mental state are also unacceptable.

As with the use of other types of epithets, calling another contributor paranoid is not only inappropriate in relation to that participant, but unfounded use of the names of medical conditions in a negative manner is also disrespectful of those to whom the term might be applied in a medically correct way. For this reason, the term is in poor taste even if used in a supposedly non-literal sense.

In addition to establishing a disrespectful and even hostile tone in discussions, the term is also utterly unhelpful in bringing them forward. Policies like No personal attacks and Civility exist not primarily to make the Wikimedia projects nice and friendly online communities, but because factual and relevant arguments are more constructive than subjective assessments about other users.

For example, stating that the initiation of an image deletion discussion is motivated by "copyright paranoia" only tells us that the person raising the accusation believes the image should not be deleted with reference to copyright concerns and that they question the judgment of the person starting the discussion. A constructive argument would explain why the concerns are supposedly unreasonable, rather than focusing on the mental state of fellow participants or other things that have no bearing on the actual copyright status of the image in question.

This is not to say that all discussions about copyright issues are inherently well-founded. Participants have varying knowledge of legal issues and often interpret legal principles differently. The discussions are, however, typically well-intended and raised with the safety and integrity of the Wikimedia projects and its participants in mind. Furthermore, the validity of copyright discussions is not determined by their frequency. As such, unwarranted concerns are best opposed through respectful and factual reasoning addressing relevant specifics, rather than name-calling and observations of real or imagined Wikimedia trends.

—LX (talk, contribs) 22:32, 17 July 2009 (UTC)

Characterising the phrase as a personal attack is unreasonable. Going back to the derivation of the word is a nice academic exercise but usage of the term 'paranoia' in everyday language would be more appropriate. I think the en:wp definition "is a thought process characterized by excessive anxiety or fear" is what is meant. People can quite rightly express their impression that we are exhibiting what appears to them to be "excessive anxiety or fear" about copyright details, especially when extreme standards of proof about copyright claims are demanded. For instance we allow claims from anonymous people, who we don't demand so much as a verified email address from, let alone have any evidence of who they are, to assert copyright. We assume good faith. But as soon as anyone challenges a claim, things get turned on their head and sometimes "copyright paranoia" is an apt description for the following inquisition. --Tony Wills 23:28, 17 July 2009 (UTC)

Many words are used in a non-literal sense in "everyday language" with a meaning different from its original meaning (such as "that's gay" or "that's retarded" being used to mean "that's silly"). That doesn't wash away older meanings of those words or make their use any more civil, though, and the section Avoid copyright paranoia#How to diagnos copyright paranoia [sic] demonstrates that the connection to the medical meaning is still quite strong. As I also mentioned, if one believes that excessive standards of proof are being expected, it's more constructive to explain why one believes the expectations are excessive than it is to label those expectations or those who hold them. —LX (talk, contribs) 01:09, 18 July 2009 (UTC)

To be honest I agree with this, not so much on the basis that the term is being misused (medical terms often acquire informal, inoffensive secondary usages) but because it's vague and you can't refute it. Frankly, most deletions on Commons would be considered "paranoid" by the standards of a website like YouTube that has no downstream users or print edition and can respond to takedown requests as they happen. Many (indeed most) works that are not found on Commons are orphaned works that their copyright holder has no interest in enforcing. It's far better to describe in detail what the standard of scrutiny you're applying is, and why you believe that standard is a good choice, based on the images it would include and/or exclude. Dcoetzee 09:22, 18 July 2009 (UTC)

Would you or LX object to "Avoid Copyright Panic"?... AnonMoos 17:28, 22 July 2009 (UTC)

That would be a less problematic term in the sense that it doesn't pathologize fellow contributors and misuse a medical terms as an invective. But I'm afraid it still has the problem of not bringing discussions forward. —LX (talk, contribs) 19:21, 26 July 2009 (UTC)

This is now an essay at Avoid accusing others of copyright paranoia. —LX (talk, contribs) 17:51, 5 September 2009 (UTC)

This is an essay.

What? It looks more like a talk page to me. :-) Rocket000 02:37, 11 August 2009 (UTC)

No kidding. Someone needs to do a massive refactor and archive that mess. — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 01:45, 5 January 2012 (UTC)

I agree Mo8inc (talk) 11:30, 20 December 2019 (UTC)

Author users have been deleted

If in blog,author users have been deleted,but the article also stay in the Web page.Is the copyright has been canceled?Amysze123 (talk) 03:59, 18 May 2013 (UTC)

No, the thing remains copyrighted for the duration of the normal copyright law in its country of origin (and the United States of America if it's from another country), though it would be harder to trace the fact that their copyright has been violated. --Donald Trung (Talk 🤳🏻) 10:55, 5 February 2018 (UTC)

Cleanup, possible deletion

I've removed the essay tag because this is certainly not an essay, rather very old talk page ramblings. I do agree that copyright paranoia needs to be avoided, but this page is a total mess and has been for more than a decade- see previous posts. I might nom it for deletion and then rewrite it because of how bad it is. Money emoji (talk) 02:03, 12 January 2020 (UTC)

Have you done so though? DestinyPegasus (talk) DestinyPegasus (talk) 22:37, 28 July 2023 (UTC)

When to close? Or is this a suitable discussion page?

Both this talk page and associated main page look like public forums or RFCs rather than useful information pages, or at least eassyes. Should the main page be re-written to not have several signatures, or move to RFC and then govern by their closure policy? Liuxinyu970226 (talk) 14:42, 6 October 2023 (UTC)