Camera-wiki.org:Community discussions/Archive03

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Older discussions are archived here and here. Below is a summary of the archived discussions.

Archive summary

Here is the content of the archived discussions, briefly summarized, in the order in which it appears:

• Archive no.1

1. A link to an image on Flickr must be within its Camerapedia area and requires an accompanying link to the Flickr page.
2. Categories and templates both have their uses.
3. It may be a good idea to have "a list with sources of camera reviews".
4. See Camerapedia.org:Standards (cameras) for how to write a page about a camera, and use Template:Camera where useful.
5. Eventually, each camera should get its own article. However, redirects can be used from the individual names to articles on more than one camera.
6. The name of the maker of the camera should appear in the article title if the camera is usually so named (so "Pentax LX", not "LX"), but not otherwise (so "Pearl", not "Konishiroku Pearl").
7. Articles may be provided to describe technical processes that are now primarily, or only, of historical interest (e.g. wet collodion")
8. There's a list of templates.
9. Templates may need more work.
10. Camerapedia is not affiliated with Wikipedia and there is no plan to change this.
11. See Help:Editing for help in editing.
12. Although it would be convenient if one could search for the intersection of two or more categories (for example Category:Japan AND Category:6x6 AND Category:folding), Wikimedia software does not allow this. Thus we have for example Category:Japanese 6x6 folding.
13. Although admin powers are needed for the best way to make complex alterations of redirects, non-admins can often achieve the same ends by rather messier means. If you are not an admin, have a good reason to do something like this and are willing to explain what you've done on the relevant talk pages, go ahead and do it without asking for an admin to help you.
14. Good ways to find good pages are to look in Special:Longpages and to explore Camerapedia.org:List of templates.
15. On one purpose of a favicon.
16. Cameras and other products, even very old ones that are now unusable or unknown, are better described in the present tense. But what companies and people did to or with them in the past is better related in the past tense.
17. Other than by footnotes, precise specification of which assertion came from which source is hard to do. We now have a footnote facility, however.
18. Frame format is described as "[smaller] × [larger]", e.g. "24×36", "4.5×6".

• Archive no.2

1. A sub-category for fix-focused cameras might be created as a sub-category of Category:Viewfinder.
2. The word "classic" is not an objective way to classify cameras.
3. There is a CSS class called "noprint" to prevent parts of a page from appearing in the printable version. Nobody knows how to use the global CSS stylesheets provided by Mediawiki.
4. A Cleanup template may be applied to pages which need cleanup.
5. It would be good to have the ParserFunctions Mediawiki extension.
6. Affective words describing a particular feeling about a camera, such as "cute", are best avoided.
7. The dimensions and weights must be given in metric units, and a conversion into feet, inches and ounces may be provided.
8. There are cases where the nationality of a camera is difficult to define.
9. The Category:Digital should be split in a number of sub-categories.
10. An automatic index of companies might be created.
11. How to remove a redirect.
12. Various questions from a new contributor, drifting to a discussion about image hosting and copyrights.
13. New version of the main page.
14. Use of old advertising material which is still under copyright is not allowed.
15. On edit conflicts, when two users are working on a page at the same time.
16. Some disagreement about the posting of copyrighted advertising material.
17. New main page applied.
18. Camerapedia pages copied verbatim into Wikipedia, without source crediting, which is against the GFDL.
19. Working on the copyrights page.
20. Some plagiarism found and eradicated.
21. Proposal to emphasize the good external links, and objections to this proposal.
22. Proposal of French and other language versions.
23. Copyrighted images found and eradicated.
24. Link to another wiki.
25. A set of templates is available to tag the published pictures with their respective licensing status. It can be found in the Category:Image rights.
26. Visit from a Wikibook member.
27. One contributor briefly leaves the project, then comes back.
28. It is impolite to replace a good image by another equally good image without giving a reason and warning the contributor of the first image. It is discouraged to link an image from a site other than Flickr.
29. Disagreement about the usefulness of the Category: Famous photographers.
30. How to photograph cameras.
31. How far beyond "camera" should this wiki go?
32. How to classify the pages about film and emulsions.
33. Visit from someone who confuses this page with a photo newsgroup.
34. Manual confirmation of user creation is needed to avoid spam and destructive bots.
35. Visit from someone who confuses this page with a photo newsgroup.
36. Commercial links are prohibited, but links to private pages offering cameras for sale on a limited basis are tolerated. There is some disagreement about the links to auction houses such as Westlicht. The current practice is to allow the links to terminated auctions and to forbid the links to future auctions. Of course the links to the online auction sites such as eBay are forbidden.
37. Visitor offering to contribute images.
38. Questions from a beginning contributor.
39. Minor question about the search engine.
40. Visitor asking for information about very old lenses.

Flickr Group

Camerapedia Flickr Group

Display of old advertisements

The image policy currently held at Camerapedia is to allow three types of images:

• documents used with permission
• documents used per Creative Commons
• documents in public domain

Publication of images under fair use is discouraged, and strict rules apply.

It is tempting to illustrate the articles with older advertisements. I'm fairly sure that the copyrights of an advertisement are held by the company which inserts it, not by the magazine publisher or by the advertisement's anonymous author. They fall in public domain after a fixed number of years following their publication:

• 50 years if published in Japan (per Japanese copyright law)
• 70 years if published in most European countries, plus a few more years for World War II in France and maybe some other countries

I don't fully understand the situation for advertisements published in US magazines: does the absence of the © sign mean that they are unprotected from the start?

Some good contributors recently added advertisements of the 1950s or 1960s, which are certainly still under copyright. I removed some of them but they keep coming. I understand that the copyright delay might seem too long for these documents. It seems obvious that Voigtländer or Zeiss ads of the 1960s can be published under fair use without harming anyone's rights, but a clear rule is needed to avoid people posting advertisements for the Nikon D300 and putting us into trouble.

In my opinion, we should distinguish between:

1. the companies which merely disappeared, and whose rights are not traceable, for which fair use is allowed
2. the companies which still exist or which were absorbed by another company, and whose rights are traceable, for which we need to contact the owner of the rights to ask permission.

It is absolutely necessary to keep concerted when contacting a company: a hastily written e-mail might induce a refusal. We can decide that when a company does not answer, it means that it does not care, and publish the images under fair use after that.

Another possible rule would be to trace our own "fair use" expiry date: for example any advertisement published more than 30 or 20 years ago is allowed, the more recent are not. I would like to hear the opinion of the others, so that we agree on a policy.

--Rebollo fr 09:13, 21 October 2007 (EDT)

Hi Rebollo,

You're right, the case of US magazine articles is a difficult one. Of course I'm not an expert, but from http://www.dml.indiana.edu/pdf/dml-copyright-duration-report.pdf, and from your earlier text on the subject, I understand that pre-1978 publications published without explicit copyright notice, could be considered public domain.

In case it's not in the public domain, I guess using old ads could be considered fair use, since our site is non-commercial and we're doing some sort of research for which these ads are part of the sources.

Good practice would demand to (1) allways mention the name of our source and to (2) retract the ad when, contrary to our expectations, a copyright holder presents himself. (3) limit ourselves to pre-1978 uncopyrighted ads.

As I understand in ads published after 1978, copyright expires after 28 years or has to be renewed to be prolongated. Let's not go into shady territory and allow only pre-1978 ads that mention the source and have a clear relation to the text in the camerapedia article.

--driesvandenelzen 11:34, 21 October 2007 (EDT)

Dries,

I absolutely agree with your approach., and I will make a set of clearer "public domain" pages.

--Rebollo fr 07:30, 26 October 2007 (EDT)

American ads published until 1922 should be no problem, European ads maybe useable when published in Europe until 1926 because Spanish Copyright preserves rights for 80 years. U. Kulick 16:47, 29 October 2007 (EDT)

The Spanish copyright laws should be a problem for Spanish documents only. Most European countries protect the anonymous works for 70 years. France adds a few more years for World War II, other countries might do the same. --Rebollo fr 03:06, 15 November 2007 (EST)

"Image rights" tags and picture crediting

There is a set of "image rights" tag, used to tell the visitors the license status of the images published in the site. They are found in the Category:Image rights. I will manually add these tags to the pictures which are already present. I would like all the future image contributions to include these image tags from the start.

Moreover, I noticed a number of images licensed under Creative Commons but with no indication of their author. The Creative Commons license allows the reproduction of an image provided that the image is credited to its author. I am aware that the visitors can see the name of the author by clicking on the image and visiting its Flickr page, but I think that crediting the image directly in the page is better.

--Rebollo fr 12:08, 26 October 2007 (EDT)

Polaroid Spectra System

I have a camera that I do not see listed. How do I go about listing it? ... asks User:Irvdk

First, check that it's really not here, by typing different possibilities in the search box. (Is it the "F300", "f300", "F 300", "F-300", etc.?) If you still can't find it, choose the name that seems most accurate, and decide whether or not to add the maker's name in accordance with practice here. ("F" makes little sense by itself, so "Nikon F"; "Autocord" does make sense, so "Autocord" rather than "Minolta Autocord".) You'll be told apologetically that there is no such article, and asked if you'd like to create one. Opt to create one. You'll get the hang of this by examining existing articles: If it's a Polaroid, then by examining other articles on other Polaroids. Once the article is done, you link to it from other articles (such as Polaroid itself) to taste. Happy editing! -- Hoary 19:13, 28 October 2007 (EDT)

Photobloggers using the blah blah

Here's an entirely normal set of contributions by a new user. If this were Wikipedia, I'd be told to "assume good faith"; but it isn't, and I tend to think of simple self-promotion.

I do see a good reason to link to sites and pages of people who are actually using unusual cameras to good effect, doing something with cameras that seems remarkable to people other than themselves and their chums, or doing stuff that's otherwise truly noteworthy. Otherwise, I'd tend to scrap the lot. Am I merely a grouch? -- Hoary 06:20, 21 November 2007 (EST)

I agree, I have been tempted to axe the "photobloggers etc." links for ages. Those links should be scrapped unless: (i) they contain info about the camera other than pictures taken with it, or (ii) the fact to have taken pictures with the camera is an achievement in itself. Condition (ii) does not concern regular post-1960 cameras which most people know how to use; pictures taken with a really weird or impractical camera, such as a big plate SLR or press camera, are allowed; we will decide for the in-between cameras on a case-by-case basis. --Rebollo fr 10:01, 21 November 2007 (EST)

Indeed. I can see how people might see those sections as spam-like. Bottom line is that the sections should disappear if they don't add real value to the Camerapedia. I like Rebollo's suggestions, because they try to ensure that the links point out to valuable pages. Hoary's suggestion below talks about the notability of the photographers themselves, but I think it's possible for an "un-notable" photographer to still be a valuable resource. Whatever we decide on doing, I think we should document the guidelines so that new users will understand them clearly. --Lbstone 12:20, 3 December 2007 (EST)

I'll concede that some photobloggers whose photography is notable just from photoblogging and other website appearances (their own sites, Flickr, etc). But they're very few indeed. How about this set of criteria for notability? Of course we can allow links to the works of other photographers too if those photographers write informatively about the particular cameras from whose articles there are links. -- Hoary 20:44, 21 November 2007 (EST)

Antique cameras (pre WWI)

Hello Rebollo_fr

The timeline categories from 1839 to 1914 are already populated with more than 40 cameras. I hope that attracts experts for museum and antique cameras to write some further articles about historical cameras here. But there's only one entry of an early Japanese camera type: Pearl (6×9 and larger). We have to thank you for this entry, but after we also have to thank you for more than 150 entries in the "Japanese camera makers" category I'm supposing that you may know another very old Japanese camera type worth to mention? If you have no time to write the article yourself please set its title into the community to-do-list under the "Missing articles about cameras" headline.

Best regards, U. Kulick 10:30, 2 December 2007 (EST)

Hello

First I would say I'm not responsible for the article about the Pearl (6×9 and larger), whose history shows that it was mainly written by Hoary. For the moment, I know very few about the pre-1914 Japanese cameras. It is my feeling that they were largely made on an artisanal rather than industrial basis, except for the products of Rokuoh-sha (early Konica). I intend to make articles about the Japanese plate cameras of the '20s and early '30s at some time. In fact, to look for the names of the companies and products would imply to start the research in itself, and it would not make sense to do this without writing articles at the same time.

Best regards, --Rebollo fr 15:45, 2 December 2007 (EST)