I'm developing Faces, a game with the goal of helping new volunteers and employees know how their long-serving mates look like.
I'd like to know whether it is ok for the WMF to harvest file description pages at Commons in search of image notes, and feed them to players on the Web.
Some details are still quite unclear since the game is not finished yet.
Please note that:
- image notes on Commons can be viewed, added, edited and deleted by anyone at any time;
- it will be possible to play the game without identifying;
- information inferred from image notes may be incorrect, either because of errors in the image notes themselves, or because of errors in the parsing process;
- changes in image notes at Commons may not be immediately reflected in the game;
- everyone with a valid Wikimedia account will be able, at any time:
- to prevent image notes referring to their account from being used in the game ("opt out"), and
- to reverse the above action ("opt in");
- users who are prevented from logging in to Wikimedia sites may be unable to opt out;
- it will still be possible to play the game while opted out;
- images depicting users who have opted out may still be shown in the game, if also depicting users who have not opted out;
- any piece of information that will be stored permanently in the tool's database, including each authenticated player's score, and the list of who has opted out, will be considered public;
- the game's source code will be made publicly available under a free license;
- in a future version of the game, users might be allowed to erase their own data;
- if requested, the game might be changed to require explicit opt in by users who want to be publicly identified.