Forum:Copyright Questions

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Genealogy - wills, census transcriptions, maps, etc

The following questions concerning copyright was posted on the Genealogy wiki Forum. These are the kinds of questions we can not really answer for ourselves, at least in a formal sense. Some of these questions are placed in a specific context, but obviously, its the generalized answer we need. Some feedback from Wikia on these questions would be particularly helpful, particularly if placed on the Genealogy Forum Genealogy:Forum:Copyright questions. Thanks input and insight much appreciated.

Genealogists are voracious consumers of information. We also have a need to pass that information on in the form of our genealogical findings, and a concommittant need to show where we got our information from. (That latter need is often ignored by many genealogists, often making it difficult to figure out how they figured something out.)

Sometimes we would like to include our information sources within our articles on the Genealogy Wiki. We may want to include transciptions of wills, marriage records, or portions of certain publications that relate to our ancestors. That raises questions of copyright. Here are some specific questions that I'd like to know the answers to

1. If someone prepares a compilation of wills for a particular county, and that information is posted on the net, can you extract a particular will from that electronic source, and place it in an article you have prepared about your great great grandfather?

2. If you want to show the lay of the land for the location where your great great grandfather lived,

Can you insert a map from GoogleMaps, or say Topozone?

Can you take one of their maps, modify it to meet your needs, and post it into an article?

Does modifying such a map make it independent of any copyright that Google (for example) might have?

In the case of USGS maps, since these are government property, does Google have any right to restrict your use of these maps, even if your immediate source is Google?

3. If Ancestry, or GoogleBooks, prepares an electronic copy of a work now out of copyright, can you copy portions of that electronic version of the work into an article? Is it copyright protected?

4. When the USGenWeb, or other genealogical sites post an item on one of its county pages, an uncopyrighted will for example, it includes a statement about how you may use the item, and what you have to do if you want to place it on another site. They often say something like "you have to secure permission from the person who transcribed this from the original".

Are you so required?

Does their "publication" of the will renew its copyright?

Was it ever in copyright in the first place?

Though the specific examples used in the questions above are of a genealogical nature I suspect that some of these questions have relevance for other Wikia. Bill 18:39, 16 April 2007 (UTC)

(That got a lengthy reply at the indicated forum fairly promptly. Robin Patterson 12:24, 5 May 2007 (UTC))

Copying from one Wikia to another

Have I missed a page on Central Wikia that specifies procedure for copying from one Wikia to another? I can't find anything relevant on Wikia copyrights, Policy discussions and proposals, or Terms of use.

I have no problem with copying whole pages from Starter Wikia, which are designed to be copied to all new Wikia and by implication to any older Wikia that can use them.

When copying (what someone else has written) from an ordinary Wikia to another, I usually make a reference in the edit summary; but it's not as precise as template:Wikipedia, and of course it does not appear on the actual page.

If there are no set policies on this yet, I think there should be. Possible policies could be along the lines of one or two of the following:

1. Open slather as it's all one "site"
2. Destination page must include the same acknowledgments (if any) of outside sources (eg Wikipedia) as the origin page has
3. Edit summary must say which Wikia it comes from

Robin Patterson 12:24, 5 May 2007 (UTC)

I think that, according to the GFDL, when copying from other page licensed too under the GFDL, in the edit summary must be a link to the original source, or at least indicate where comes it from. But there's no (legal) need to do more (although it would be appreciated) --Ciencia Al Poder (talk) ^-@WikiDex 12:49, 5 May 2007 (UTC)