From WeRelate
How to choose an appropriate license for your image
- Disclaimer: This quick summary of image copyright and licensing is not written by lawyers. It is meant only to help the uploader choose a proper license.
In order to post an image on WeRelate or any other public website, one of the following must be true:
- the image is not under copyright,
- you have permission from the copyright holder, or
- your posting of the image constitutes "fair use".
1. The image is not under copyright if one of the following is true. See this article on copyright for more information.
- The image is an original work of the US Federal Government.
- The image was published in the US before 1923. An image is considered published when the author makes it available to the public on an unrestricted basis. For example, sharing a picture with family members does not constitute publication; putting it in the newspaper does.
- The image was published in the US between 1923 and 1977 without a copyright notice.
- The image was published in the US between 1923 and 1963 with a copyright notice but the copyright was not renewed.
- The image is a faithful reproduction of an old painting that is out of copyright due to its age.
- The image was never published and the author died more than 70 years ago.
- The image was created more than 120 years ago, was never published, and the death date of the author is unknown or the work was made for hire (corporate authorship).
- The copyright owner has released the image into the public domain.
2. If you know the copyright owner (or if you are the copyright owner), you can ask the copyright owner to grant a "license" so that you and others can use the image. We recommend a dual-license (the first option below), but any of the following licenses can be granted for images appearing on WeRelate:
- Dual-license with GNU Free Documentation License (GFDL) and Creative Commons Attribution Required Share-Alike (CC-BY-SA). In a nutshell, either of these licenses allow others to use the images for commercial or non-commercial use so long as proper attribution is given to the copyright holder and any derivative works created from the images (e.g., a collage) are made available under the same license.
- GFDL only.
- Creative Commons CC-BY-SA only.
- Creative Commons Attribution Required (CC-BY).
- Attribution required (no other restrictions).
- Ancestry.com allows people to upload images that are part of a unique family history. Their limited use license states in part: "Online or other republication of Content is prohibited except as unique data elements that are part of a unique family history or genealogy."
3. If the image is still under copyright and you are unable to ask the copyright owner for a license, then if you publish the image it must be under "fair use" conditions. Most family photos where the photo taker died less than 70 year ago fall into this case. Fair use allows copyrighted works to be used in certain situations. The factors that determine whether a use is "fair"
are:
- the purpose and character of the use, including whether such use is of a commercial nature or is for nonprofit educational purposes;
- the nature of the copyrighted work;
- the amount and substantiality of the portion used in relation to the copyrighted work as a whole; and
- the effect of the use upon the potential market for or value of the copyrighted work.
See this article on fair use for more detail. Image postings that qualify as fair use on WeRelate might not qualify on other websites (e.g., possibly not commercial websites). WeRelate has defined two categories for "fair use". It is believed that images falling into one of these two categories contitute a "fair" use of a copyrighted image at WeRelate.
- A small snippet of a unique historical photograph or document.
- A lower-resolution copy of a unique historical photograph or document.
See the image tutorial for instructions on cropping and reducing image resolution.
