This is still an issue. Can something be done? As I see nothing of use in Macros I suggest for the module to be disabled completely as a possible easy solution.

For avatars and logos of projects, those are fairy not important issues, iOS-app-v5.6.1-Goat-On-A-Plane also uses a logo which looks like using fair used plane.

If you think those images are inappropriate to you, just ask a lot of bans, even you can ask banning me.

In T128771#3667547, @Liuxinyu970226 wrote:

For avatars and logos of projects, those are fairy not important issues, iOS-app-v5.6.1-Goat-On-A-Plane also uses a logo which looks like using fair used plane.

If you think those images are inappropriate to you, just ask a lot of bans, even you can ask banning me.

Those are not macro/meme app relatated.

@Base:
I disagree that there is nothing of use. The macros serve the very important purpose of increasing enjoyment.

The macros I have created are all licensed creative commons and composed of my original work and/or other free content. Others could easily be argued to be fair use.

@mmodell, could you read the task description please? There is a policy when fair use could be used on Wikimedia projects and there is no complience with it on Phabricator at the moment.

@Base: I did read the description. My argument is simply that at least some of the content in macros is original work properly and freely licensed by myself. Disabling macros would remove access to this free content so that is not an acceptable solution. If we need to write an EDP for phabricator content, so be it. And if there is inappropriate use of copyrighted work then we should remove it, however, memes and image macros seem to me to be fairly clear examples of fair use.

Files can be deleted in phab. So if they are illegal content or is not abiding by the license of the image it can be deleted.

+1 to keeping macros.

2017 by Mukunda Modell, CC-BY-SA 3.0

😁

Another thing, I am not sure that phabricator counts as a wikimedia project in the same way as, say, wikinews does. It's an internal use tool for the wikimedia developer community and not really intended as a very general educational resource.

For example testwiki is not a very general educational resourse either, but it is still a wikimedia project. I do not see phab using another cms changing much. It could be arguable if phab were only accessible for logged in people (at least that was kind of an argument I heard on otrs wiki where people disregarded licensing policy as well), but it is not.

In T128771#3667926, @mmodell wrote:

Another thing, I am not sure that phabricator counts as a wikimedia project in the same way as, say, wikinews does. It's an internal use tool for the wikimedia developer community and not really intended as a very general educational resource.

I haven't checked with the board or legal, but I'm pretty sure when it comes to legal compliance, I bet project can be pretty safely interpreted to mean anything the foundation hosts on their servers.

Although @ZhouZ did assign this in the legal project over a and year and half ago with no response from anyone within the legal team…

It is a bit of a stretch to argue that it isn't a Wikimedia project, indeed.

Anyway the only position I feel strongly about is that properly licensed free content should not be removed. It would appear to me that the way forward is:

1. Come up with an Exemption Doctrine Policy and exempt the stuff which is fair use.
2. Remove improperly licensed content that does not warrant an exemption (and this can happen concurrently with 1.)

I am definitely not a lawyer and this opinion doesn't represent an official opinion of the foundation. I have no idea what WMF-Legal would/will have to say about this, however, after re-reading Wikilegal Primer on U.S. Fair Use I do believe that most memes are fairly strong candidates for fair use protection, at least in the US, This is especially due to the following:

• Transformative Purpose - Clearly memes serve a different purpose from the original - usually the primary purpose is simple amusement.
• Size and Quality of Reproduction - usually reduced size and quality compared to original
• Non-commercial use - they are not in any way commercial.
• Portion used - Memes might remix art or photographs but often that is only a small part of the overall image.
• Market effect - Unlikely to affect the original market for the original content in any way.

In T128771#3667998, @mmodell wrote:

• Non-commercial use - they are not in any way commercial.

(My consideration does not change anything. Anyway: this comment is untrue because a CC BY-SA authorizes whatever purpose, so also commercial purposes. Anyway let's wait for legals.)

The licensing policy actually doesn't say anything about Wikimedia sites. It talks about "projects", which it defines as "A specific Wikimedia Foundation project in a certain language or a multilingual project, such as English Wikipedia, French Wikisource, or Meta." If you follow the link trail (which is not necessarily authoritative), you end up with https://wikimediafoundation.org/our-work/wikimedia-projects/ which is a list of wikis. Alternatively, if you follow common sense, it's clear the intent behind thee licensing policy is to facilitate content reuse ("Whereas the mission of the Wikimedia Foundation is to "empower and engage people around the world to collect and develop educational content under a free content license"). Phabricatory content is not meant for external reuse, so that concern doesn't apply. (Just like it doesn't apply to any number of other things, e.g. lists.wikimedia.org content.)

So IMO if someone feels Phabricator should count as a "project" for the purpose of the licensing policy, the onus is on them to seek clarification from the Board and demonstrate it. Until/unless that happens, I'd decline this task.

BTW the spirit of macros is to have memes, for addition, not in high quality. Simple graphics and memes in most countries do not fall under copyright and so this does not require any kind of attribution, so, no problem.

To highlight this, we could just adopt the Creative Commons Public Domain Mark 1.0. Please read its statement that is quite simple and solving.

In short, I've added this comment below a couple of macros I've created:

This macro has a very low threshold of originality and so it reasonably does not fall under copyright. So it's considered in the public domain.
https://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/mark/1.0/
Public domain go brrrrrr!

For what its worth, the Phabricator terms of use (linked in the footer) incorporate by reference the general Terms of Use. This includes §7. Licensing of Content, which states

d. Non-text media: Non-text media on the Projects are available under a variety of different licenses that support the general goal of allowing unrestricted re-use and re-distribution. When you contribute non-text media, you agree to comply with the requirements for such licenses as described in our Licensing Policy, and also comply with the requirements of the specific Project edition or feature to which you are contributing.

While "Project" is still not defined, it is used throughout the Terms. If it were interpreted strictly to mean "just the wikis", then most of the rest of the Terms wouldn't apply to Phabricator either, and I doubt that was the intention.

The statement that Simple graphics and memes in most countries do not fall under copyright is without basis in any country's copyright law, and certainly not US law.

list of macros I created:

bikeshed - By Wester, CC BY-SA 2.0 BE, via Wikimedia Commons
flowchart - unknown
hasharrabbit - By @hashar
hulk - fair use in US I would say, but I just disabled it, but that does not mean it is deleted completely
cathug - has "gifak.net" water mark, I like it, do I need to disable it? - disabled
progress - too trivial for copyright? pretty sure I took it from commons
ostrich what ?
seal of approval ?
tech barnstar - import from commons afair
vote cat - own work, collage, if I can PD my own work even if I used elements from elsewhere, I hereby did it.
wikilove - I don't really remember. Wanna send images through reverse image search?

cathug deleted by replacing it with https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Key_delete.jpg (Public Domain!:)

https://phabricator.wikimedia.org/macro/view/44/