Wikimanqala:Copyrights
From Wikimanqala
This page describes one of wikimanQala's policies and guidelines
The license wikimanQala uses grants free access to our content in the same sense as free software is licensed freely. This principle is known as copyleft. This means that wikimanQala's content can be copied, modified, and redistributed as long as the new version grants the same freedoms to anyone and acknowledges the authors of the wikimanQala article used (a direct link back to the article satisfies our author credit requirement). wikimanQala articles therefore will remain free forever and can be used by anybody subject to certain restrictions, most of which serve to ensure that freedom.
To fulfill the above goals, the text contained in wikimanQala is licensed to the public under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 2.5. license. The full text of this license is at Creative Commons website.
See also: Why wikimanqala doesn't use the GFDL
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Contributors' rights and obligations
If you contribute material to wikimanQala, you thereby license it to the public under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 2.5 License. In order to contribute, you therefore must be in a position to grant this license, which means that either you own the copyright to the material, for instance because you produced it yourself, or you acquired the material from a source that allows the licensing under a Creative Commons or similar license, for instance because the material is in the public domain or is itself published under the same Creative Commons License.
In the first case, you retain copyright to your materials. You can later republish and relicense them in any way you like. In the second case, if you incorporate external Creative Commons License materials, as a requirement of the license, you need to acknowledge the authorship and provide a link back to the network location of the original copy.
Using copyrighted work from others
If you use part of a copyrighted work under "fair use," or if you obtain special permission to use a copyrighted work from the copyright holder under the terms of our license, you must make a note of that fact (along with names and dates). It is our goal to be able to freely redistribute as much of wikimanQala's material as possible (within the limits of copyright law), so original images and sound files licensed under the Creative Commons License Attribution-ShareAlike 2.5 or in the public domain are greatly preferred to copyrighted media files used under fair use.
Never use materials that infringe the copyrights of others. This could create legal liabilities and seriously hurt the project. If in doubt, write it yourself.
Note that copyright law governs the creative expression of ideas, not the ideas or information themselves. Therefore, it is perfectly legal to read an academic article or other work, reformulate it in your own words, and submit it to wikimanQala.
If you find a copyright infringement
It is not the job of rank-and-file members of wikimanQala to police every article for possible copyright infringement, but if you suspect one, you should at the very least bring up the issue in that page's comments section. Others can then examine the situation and take action if needed. The most helpful piece of information you can provide is a URL or other reference to what you believe may be the source of the text.
Some cases will be false alarms. For example, if the contributor was in fact the author of the text that is published elsewhere under different terms, that does not affect their right to post it here under the Creative Commons License Attribution-ShareAlike 2.5. Also, sometimes you will find text elsewhere on the Internet that was copied from wikimanQala. In both of these cases, it is a good idea to make a note in the talk page to discourage such false alarms in the future.
If some of the content of a page really is an infringement, then the infringing content should be removed, and a note to that effect should be made on the comments page, along with the original source. If the author's permission is obtained later, the text can be restored.
In extreme cases of contributors continuing to post copyrighted material after appropriate warnings, such users may be blocked from editing to protect the project.
Belief of copyright infringement
wikimanQala requests that in the case that the owner or owners of a copyrighted work feel that their work is being illegally infringed upon, they provide a full list of all items which they believe are infringing, along with the reasoning behind the belief that those items are infringing to wikimanQala's designated agent. In addition, please provide the name of a person, along with their mailing address and e-mail address if possible, for a reply or follow-up letters.
Things for users to know
Copyleft means that every single author, editor, illustrator, mapmaker, factchecker and photographer who puts their work into wikimanQala gives you the right to read, copy, print, save, download, read aloud, project, modify, email, distribute, sell, photocopy and correct their work however you want to.
The only restrictions are that if you distribute it, you must give attribution to the creators, and if you derive new work from it, you must give the same rights to users of that work. In any case you must state the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 2.5 license.
In other words, we give you practically every freedom within the boundaries of the law to use the information in wikimanQala, except the freedom to take that freedom away from others.
Things for contributors to know
Copyleft means that every single yahoo, nutcase, screwjob, charlatan, shyster, weirdo, freakazoid, mouthbreather, goofball, lamer, cheater and jerk will have the right to read, copy, print, save, download, read aloud, project, modify, email, distribute, sell, photocopy and correct your work however they want to.
In particular, your work can be ruthlessly modified, edited, or cut from wikimanqala altogether by other wikimanqala editors. It can be photocopied thousands of times and passed around as flyers by games sellers. It can be put in books or magazines. It can be used for commercial ventures, advertisements, or other purposes without your direct control.
In return for your incredible generosity, you will have the knowledge that you are helping gamers all over the world. And, of course, you get to use all the other work in wikimanqala the same way; but you don't need to contribute to do that.
You'll also get the pleasure of collaborating with other editors just like yourself. You'll get free spellcheck service from nit-picky folks you've never met. You'll work together with people you don't know to make better pictures, text, and maps than you've ever dreamed of. You still retain the copyright over your own work, and you can use it any other way you want (even if it's not compatible with our license!). By writing on wikimanqala, or uploading photos, you're using a license under which all our work is available -- making it simpler for everyone.
Now, the hard part: because of the Attribution-ShareAlike 2.5 license, you are legally responsible not to put other people's copyrighted work into wikimanqala without permission.
Frequently asked questions
Can GFDL content be used on wikimanQala?
No! See Why wikimanqala doesn't use the GFDL. This means that most content from Wikipedia and Wikimedia Commons cannot be directly copied to wikimanqala.
Can content from other sites be used on wikimanQala?
Maybe. Content from other sites can be used only when it has been explicitly licensed under the Attribution Share-Alike 2.5 license, a compatible license, or released into the public domain. When copying content from another site be sure to provide proper attribution, as required by the CC-SA license. This means citing the license, author and source of images on the image page, and noting the license, author and source of text content on the article talk page.
How can I license my own images for use on wikimanQala?
All images you upload that are your own original work must be licensed under the CC-BY-SA 2.5 or a more free license, and you must add a comment to the image page indicating the author, license, and source of the image. Some acceptable comments might be:
- Image copyright 2006 by [[User:wikimanqala]], licensed under the CC-BY-SA 2.5 (or later). Taken by myself.
- Image copyright 2006 by [[User:wikimanqala]], dual-licensed under the CC-SA 2.5 (or later) and the GFDL.
- Image copyright 2006 by [[User:wikimanqala]]. I renounce to any rights and release it as Public Domain.
- Image copyright 2006 by [[User:wikimanqala]], dual-licensed under the CC-SA 2.5 (or later) and the GFDL. Taken by [[User:wikimanqala]].
There are some additional restrictions in specific cases (such as when photographing people) so please also read the image use policy.
If content is available free-of-charge, can it be used here?
Probably not. Just because a map, brochure, or other item is given away for free does not mean that it has been freely licensed. For content to be usable on wikimanqala the content copyright owner must agree to license it under the CC-SA 2.5 or a compatible license.
