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sources?[edit]

Untitled[edit]

This article largely is a copy/paste of the linked PDF at the end of the notes section and while it gives backstory to the conservator of the peace idea, seems largely limited in scope to the state of Virginia and needs to be rewritten with correct citations and attributions which appear largely absent from this article. The "permission for general non-commercial reproduction" is not the equivalent of permitting the usage of its content, most specifically its citatoin list, in this article. Jessamyn (talk) 15:42, 26 December 2012 (UTC)[reply]

On a quick glance, I concur with Jessamyn. I wish to note that the questionable material was obviously added in good faith, the source is properly acknowledged and cited, and that, as the editor indicates, the source explicitly grants permission for non-commercial use. Unfortunately, the source does have a copyright notice, it does not have a free license--and the stated permission is incompatible with Wikipedia's license, because Wikipedia content is licensed for commercial re-use and the LeFande material is not.

Accordingly I've added "cv-unsure" and "non-free" templates.

I wasn't sure which copyvio template to use. I used cv-unsure because it is not a completely blatant cut-and-paste of an entire article. cv-unsure seems to be "for" material where the source is unknown. In this case, the source is known, the question is whether the "adaptation" constitutes a copyright violation. The source is acknowledged and property cited. The acknowledgement as it appears in the article is:

“

Some material in this article was adapted from Special Conservators of the Peace, by Matthew LeFande, with explicit permission of the author and permission for general non-commercial reproduction granted in the original document.

”

The article draws very heavily on this source, using long verbatim and near-verbatim extracts. A big problem for me is that the adaptation seems to have an element of glossing over the references to Virginia in the source, and thus making Virginia-specific content appear to be general in scope.

The intellectual property notice that appears in the source is

“

May be reproduced for non-commercial purposes or cited with appropriate attribution.

”

Although that is similar in spirit to cc-by-nc-sa, it does not actually state that it has that license, and cc-by-nc-sa is not compatible with Wikipedia.

I believe that this stretches fair use too far, that the material used does not have a Wikipedia-compatible license, and that, despite the good intentions of the editor who contributed it, the content "adapted" from the Matthew LeFande article ought to be removed. Dpbsmith (talk) 23:52, 26 December 2012 (UTC)[reply]

What would it take to salvage this article?[edit]

Since yesterday I've been thinking about what it would take to salvage the article in its present form. It seems to me that two things are necessary. The first, and I think it's non-negotiable, is that Matthew LeFande has to repost his paper, with the existing permission statement replaced with an explicit Creative Commons CC-BY-SA 3.0 License. Until this is done, I don't think it is permissible to post an adaptation of the paper as a Wikipedia article. Note that CC-BY-SA allows commercial use and further adaptation, but requires that the original be cited and that the adaptation be licensed under the same license. I'm going to try to email LeFande and ask him about this.

The second thing is much easier. Most of the existing content needs to be placed under a subhead like "in Virginia" and appropriately introduced. "An example of a modern-day conservator of the peace is provided by the state of Virginia. Here, the history is as follows" or something. Dpbsmith (talk) 11:06, 27 December 2012 (UTC)[reply]

I've sent Matthew LeFande this email and will await his reply. Given that the article has been up for years, I don't see any urgency about the situation, but if LeFande is not willing to license his paper under Creative Commons CC-BY-SA-3.0 I think the material based on his paper needs to be removed from the article. Dpbsmith (talk) 11:32, 27 December 2012 (UTC)[reply]

“

Are you willing to license your article under Creative Commons CC-BY-SA-3.0 so that it can be used in Wikipedia?

I think you are the author of an article, "Special Conservators of the Peace under Code of Virginia § 19.2-13" http://www.commonwealthprotection.org/scoppaper.pdf . As I think you know, a Wikipedia editor made an adaptation of this article, drawing on it extensively, and contributed it to Wikipedia. The Wikipedia article appears here:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conservator_of_the_peace

This is valuable material and it was obviously contributed to Wikipedia in good faith, and, the contributor says, with your permission. Unfortunately, I believe there are serious issues regarding its use and licensing. If they can't be resolved I think this material should be removed from Wikipedia. The biggest stumbling block is the copyright notice you've placed on your paper. It reads:

Broadly speaking, Wikipedia does not allow the inclusion of "used by permission" material; it must be available under a "free license." If this is not done, then its use in Wikipedia is considered a copyright violation that needs to be removed.

This can be fixed easily, and I am writing to ask you whether you would be willing to do this. Specifically, are you willing to post a revised version on the Commonwealth Protection website in which this notice is replaced with this one:

If you are willing to do this, I think this completely resolves the issue and allows free adaptation of your material in Wikipedia.

(Private communication isn't enough; the license notice needs to be part of the published material on the website).

You can and should read more about the license here:

http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/

I am most definitely not a lawyer or copyright expert, just a moderately experienced Wikipedian, so can't speak to details, but the main thing you need to know is that Wikipedia DOES allow commercial use of its content. Any content used in Wikipedia must be compatible with the Wikipedia licenses, and the easiest way is to use the same license. CC-BY-SA allows commercial use and adaptation. It is what Wikipedians know as "a free license." However, it requires that the commercial adaptation acknowledge and cite the original, and reproduce all original copyright notices intact; and it requires that the adaptation itself must be made available under the same license. That is, a commercial user cannot hide the source and slap a new copyright notice on it and capture ownership of the adapted material.

”

LeFande's further reply: I wrote the majority of this article. I have already given express permission to use what was in the paper linked in the footnotes. The paper itself permits non-commercial use of the contents. There is a strong argument to be made that anything I have put in this article is already in the public domain and I have waived any further right to it. There is no copyright issue herein, and if anyone were to have an issue, it would be me.

dphsmith needs to leave the lawyering to lawyers.

Comment to Mr. LeFande[edit]

Mr. LeFande, if you're reading this, I encourage you to read Wikipedia:Donating copyrighted materials. I'll quote the most important section here:

When you contribute material to Wikipedia, you are not giving us exclusive use of it. You still retain any rights you previously held, but you are giving non-exclusive license under Creative Commons Attribution-Sharealike 3.0 Unported License (CC-BY-SA) and the GNU Free Documentation License (GFDL) (unversioned, with no invariant sections, front-cover texts, or back-cover texts). Note that there is no way to say "you can use this in Wikipedia, but not anywhere else or in derivative works." Also, because some derivative works may be commercial, we cannot accept materials that are licensed only for educational use or even for general non-commercial use.
— Wikipedia:Donating copyrighted materials

We're not trying to "lawyer" here, we're trying to abide by the established licensing policy here at Wikipedia, guided by legal advice from the Wikimedia Foundation. We cannot use your material either word-for-word or closely paraphrased unless you explicitly grant us permission to use it according to the licenses above -- which will require you to eliminate your "non-commercial" restriction, because all material published on Wikipedia is automatically licensed under those two licenses. —Darkwind (talk) 03:21, 4 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]

LeFande's reply[edit]

I've received a one-sentence reply, "I put that material in the wiki article. This issue has been previously discussed in the notes." I don't see where it's been previously discussed. I've asked him for clarification, and specifically whether he's willing to republish the material with a CC-BY-SA-3.0 or other Wikipedia-compatible license. If he declines to license the material, or generally declines to discuss the issue, I think I need to revert the article to this old and very sketchy version. I hate to lose the content, but I don't see how copyrighted material licensed only for non-commercial use can be properly included in Wikipedia. Dpbsmith (talk) 13:30, 27 December 2012 (UTC)[reply]

In response to my request for clarification, he says "It already says the content is included with my express permission." It seems to me that there is a disagreement, since he thinks copyrighted content with permission for noncommercial use can be included in Wikipedia, and I don't think it can be. I've invited him to discuss here.Dpbsmith (talk) 13:36, 27 December 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Request for comment[edit]

An editor has added extensive, lightly-adapted content from a document containing the notice "May be reproduced for non-commercial purposes or cited with appropriate attribution." The author of the document says he is the editor who inserted the material. Is the material compatible with the Wikipedia license, which allows commercial use, or does the original source need to be revised to explicitly include a Wikipedia-compatible free license? Dpbsmith (talk) 13:45, 27 December 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Speaking as a CP clerk, non-commercial restrictions make the license incompatible with Wikipedia. This is noted here and here, as well as being interpretable from the terms of the actual CC-BY-SA license. Because his permission statement includes a non-commercial restriction, the material cannot be copied or closely paraphrased anywhere on Wikipedia. However, the paper can still be used as a source, if the material is substantially rewritten. —Darkwind (talk) 05:44, 29 December 2012 (UTC)[reply]

I'm afraid I have to agree with Darkwind. Maybe somebody might make another attempt to persuade the author to change the license? Isn't changing the license easy to do? Or does it require bureaucratic procedures with the agency which Mr. LeFande is unwilling to engage in?

As for rewriting, much of the text is quotes, and they appear to be in the public domain. --Jonund (talk) 16:44, 9 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]