- File:Coat of arms of Canada.svg (talk|edit|history|logs|links|watch) (article|XfD|restore)
Quadell closed this discussion by saying that it had resulted in the decision to change the way the image was used. Exactly one person took this position, while numerous people opposed. Yes, we're not a democracy, but when something like eight or nine people argue a good-faith position and one argues the opposite good-faith decision, it's not possible for the one person to be the community consensus and for the all-but-one to be in opposition to consensus — this goes far beyond the situation envisioned in WP:ROUGH CONSENSUS. Quadell's closing statement is quite obviously an argument why he thinks it doesn't belong, and not a summary of the discussion; the members of the community who participated all-but-one agreed that this image's uses were acceptable. If "consensus" means "one person's opinion trumps everyone else's", FFD becomes simply a place where we post un-defeatable requests for deletion. Let me close with a reminder that this kind of supervote close was the basis for SchuminWeb's arbitration case, because he was closing FFDs in favor of tiny minorities; I'm not suggesting that we take any other kind of dispute resolution (regardless of how this DRV goes), but simply reminding Quadell that pretending that all-but-one people can disagree with consensus has been deemed a thoroughly unacceptable decision in the very recent past. Nyttend (talk) 21:35, 31 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
- Comment (or endorse my own deletion). Earlier today I closed a contentious FFD discussion that was six days overdue. It engendered a lot of discussion, and it took a lot of reading and careful thought before I closed the discussion. It is true that my closing decision in its final form was suggested in its entirety by only one commenter, but I assert that it represents the consensus of relevant opinion regarding all aspects of the image's use. (It is often in the nature of compromise that neither side gets everything it wants, and it is often in the nature of debates about national symbols that few are willing to advocate a middle ground, making it necessarily a minority proposal.) Allow me to expound on my thinking.
- There were several people who argued that the proposed replacement image, File:Coat of Arms of Canada.svg, was inaccurate in subtle but important ways. That's true. Some claimed that no suitable free replacement currently exists, which is also true. (Many "oppose" comments said nothing besides these two points.) Others claimed that an accurate coat of arms could be created and freely licensed, which is true. Others pointed out that a new rendition of Canada's coat of arms would not be the same as the official rendition, which is important.
- Other comments were factually incorrect. Some comments appeared to conflate Canada's blazon (a text description in the public domain) with the official rendition of the coat of arms (a copyrighted image). Some claimed that it would be physically impossible to create an new, free, accurate coat of arms based on the blazon, and that's clearly not true. Some did not seem to understand NFCC#1. One comment conflated copyright with trademarks. There was a lot to sort out.
- Even when all the facts were taken into account by commenters, one general opinion (most clearly stated by Stefan2) felt that there was no legitimate use for a non-free official rendition of the COA, given the fact that a free rendition could be made. A different general opinion (most clearly stated by Wine_guy) held that any free, non-official rendition would be misleading in every case, and so the non-free image should be usable wherever Canada's COA is depicted. And a third opinion (most clearly stated by Psychonaut) held that a non-free, official rendition was necessary and irreplaceable in Arms of Canada, since there the official rendition itself is discussed; but that the image was replaceable in all other articles, where no mention is made (or would be appropriate) of any features of the coat of arms outside of what is in the public-domain blazon. This opinion took into account all of the different facts and opinions made by the differing sides of the debate and found a middle ground, and though no single decision could satisfy all parties, I felt that this position best represented all points of view regarding the image.
- I don't believe I acted out of process, or that I failed to understand our non-free content policy. I don't believe I neglected any of the facts or opinions mentioned in the debate. – Quadell (talk) 22:56, 31 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
- OPPOSE Once again, I can not oppose the deletion of this image in any stronger terms then I already do. We need it. We need an accurate official representation of this image. There is no free alternative, there is no promise of a free alternative becoming available, there is only the possibility of it coming some day. Until that day comes, deleting it is nothing more then a vote to deprive this project of an image it needs, to deprive our readers of an image they need. The blazon of the Canadian coat of arms is Public Domain, but that doesn't give us the promise of a free alternative. It takes an incredibly skilled user to create one that would match in accuracy such that it would be a satisfactory replacement, and those users have been faced with requests to do so for ages. They refuse, not because they are lazy, but because they fear putting in all that effort only to see it deleted on Commons, which they see as a real risk. We should not make policy on "it's possible, somewhere, someday", we should make policy on what is at hand. What is at hand for us is that there's no current alternative and nobody is giving us one either. We have NO other choice but to keep this image. Deleting it would be a travesty. Fry1989 eh? 00:29, 1 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
- Endorse decision. Clear copyright violation. SVG recreation of a work created by Mrs. Cathy Bursey-Sabourin, Fraser Herald at the Canadian Heraldic Authority, Office of the Governor General of Canada in 1994. This well made SVG should never have been allowed as it is clearly a copyright violation. If the version is so needed as non free on Wikipedia, then it must be the original art of the artist. However, as I understand it, there is no official artistic version as an older, public domain COA exist that is similar without the ribbon motto behind the shield. The main difference is the artistic style itself and the use of maple leaves as the mantling or lambrequin, which in itself may not be original enough to disallow in an original version.--Amadscientist (talk) 02:10, 1 August 2013 (UTC) (This user is Mark Miller Just ask! WER TEA DR/N)[reply]
- What are you talking about?????????????? We have tonnes of copyrighted content on Wikipedia under NFCC rules, this is no different. Being copyrighted is not by itself a reason to delete this image. Fry1989 eh? 03:08, 1 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
- Yes, I am aware that there are some copyright works that were recreated in error, but it is trademarked works that can be recreated, not copyright works. Being copyrighted is exactly the reason to delete this image. It isn't the actual work being used under NFC but a derivative, faithful reproduction in svg of the original work....which can easily be recreated, perhaps even the style as I have even found a similar lion holding the staff in a much earlier rendering.--Amadscientist (talk) 03:22, 1 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
- I'm sorry, but I still don't understand your !vote at all. This SVG wasn't "created" by some user, it is in fact a creation by the Canadian Government of the CHA rendition. So how is it a violation of their work if they made it? As for it being copyrighted, yes the 1994 Canadian coat of arms is copyrighted until the 2040s, but being copyrighted still isn't an automatic qualifier for deletion. It's not just a few, we have a lot of copyrighted works on Wikipedia under non-free rationales. It has nothing to do with trademarks at all. Trademarks are not incompatible with Commons licensing and if this was solely a trademark issue this file would have been moved to Commons years ago. It's the fact it's copyrighted which is why it can not be on Commons and has been on Wikipedia under non-free content rules since 2007. It sounds to me like you're confused between trademarked works which can be on Commons, and copyrighted works which can be on Wikipedia. Fry1989 eh? 04:56, 1 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
- Endorse decision. It doesn't matter if the deletion discussion was eight to one or eight hundred to one; if the majority arguments cannot be supported by community policy then they carry no weight. This directly follows from Wikipedia:Consensus, which states that "consensus is determined by the quality of the arguments given on the various sides of an issue, as viewed through the lens of Wikipedia policy" and that "consensus among a limited group of editors, at one place and time, cannot override community consensus on a wider scale." It is by no means unheard of for an XfD closer to identify a minority opinion in the discussion as the consensus. (This is the usual result for discussions where one or more canvassers swamp the discussion with !votes of brand new or infrequently used single-purpose accounts, though it also happens on occasion with discussions among more established editors who nonetheless overlook or misinterpret policy.) —Psychonaut (talk) 05:41, 1 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
- It's almost as if you expect canvassing and !votes swamping to happen. Doesn't sound like good faith in the process to me. Fry1989 eh? 05:46, 1 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
- No, I just mentioned vote stacking as probably the most common scenario where the majority is wrong. I don't think canvassing or vote stacking occurred in this case. Here we had several established contributors who presented sincere and impassioned arguments for keeping the image which, unfortunately, were found to contradict the wider consensus at WP:NFCC. The decision to remove the image has understandably upset them, though a decision to keep would have been a slap in the face to the hundreds (or thousands?) of editors who have endorsed WP:NFCC, either through helping craft that policy or by invoking it in their own XfD contributions, and to the WMF which has officially adopted WP:NFCC as its Exemption Doctrine Policy.
- I was disappointed to read that User:Nyttend thinks that User:Quadell, the closing administrator, was advancing his own argument rather than identifying the existing consensus. In fact, in the closing statement Quadell went to great lengths to explain what the closer's role is, what WP:CONSENSUS says about simply counting the votes, and that he had carefully examined the entire discussion. The summary of the consensus itself consisted of facts and arguments given by two participants. He did not present any new arguments or evidence not already found in the discussion. —Psychonaut (talk) 07:01, 1 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
- Endorse decision. I have pointed out multiple times before that this copyrighted image should only be used rarely because a free image is almost always available and sufficient.[1][2][3][4][5][6]. DrKiernan (talk) 07:20, 1 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
- There currently is no free and accurate depiction of the coat of arms available. What you've linked to are diffs showing the insertion of either a long out of date version of the arms or just the escutcheon. --Ħ MIESIANIACAL 21:16, 1 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
- That's my point. The older version or the escutcheon suffices for those purposes. DrKiernan (talk) 21:23, 1 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
- For some purposes, perhaps. But not for Canada or Monarchy of Canada, among others, I'm sure. --Ħ MIESIANIACAL 22:02, 1 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
- That's actually a really good close and I'd applaud Quadell. He's extracted quite an intelligent conclusion from a mediocre debate. It's such a pity the consensus wasn't really behind it.
I think this whole discussion, like many similar ones, is based on a bizarre inconsistency in Wikipedia's rules, which is our mysterious insistence on treating crown copyright the same as commercial copyright. While we continue to do that, we're going to get decisions and issues like this one. In reality, the Canadian government clearly has every intention of allowing the image to be used in this way. I think we need to close this DRV without result and ask for a brief comment from the WMF's legal counsel about this as a prelude to a community RFC on crown copyright.—S Marshall T/C 08:01, 1 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
- "[T]he Canadian government clearly has every intention of allowing the image to be used in this way". Really?[7] Seems they still require permission for commercial use. That is non free.--Mark Miller Just ask! WER TEA DR/N 09:52, 1 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
- Absolutely right, crown copyright isn't free for commercial use. However, this is unrelated to what I said. What I said was that it's bizarre that we treat crown copyright the same as commercial copyright, and that the Canadian government clearly has every intention of allowing the image to be used in the way that Wikipedia is using it. I did not say (but I expected readers to understand by implication) that Crown Copyright needs its own NFCC criterion.—S Marshall T/C 11:00, 1 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
- I would really need to look a lot further into Canadian Crown Copyright to know the specifics of whether we need a NFCC criteria speaking directly to Crown Copy right, but the issue that is most important in this case is that a Wikipedia (a very talented one I might add) created this work and uploaded it. It was created using an SVG program which is an open source program that allows the original file to be reproduced in extraordinary clarity and resolution. As a creation of a Wikipedian it is a derivative work based on the Copyright of the artist, not the Canadian Government. The COA as a logo is trademarked by the government, not copyrighted, however the original artist retains the copyright for their original design aspects. If you look close and research you can see that the current COA is based on, not just the 1921 proclamation, but also on a 1921 illustration of the COA. The lions are very similar, but not exactly the same. It is possible to use the same elements lifted from that Public Domain image to create an original depiction of the Canadian Coat of Arms. The mantle and ribbon are not original it turns out as the mantle of the original, more complicated Canadian COA uses the Maple leaf mantle. Slightly different, but a maple leaf mantle is not original to the 1994 design, nor is the added ribbon which is used in other COA. The actual work of the 1994 illustration, which the Canadian government uses for official purposes could be recreated in a free version closely matching the spirit of the original without breaking the copyright of the artist. You can't copyright an idea, but you can copyright the precise design and artwork.--Mark Miller Just ask! WER TEA DR/N 19:12, 1 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
- Are you seriously contending that the copyright in Her Majesty's arms is owned by Cathy Bursey-Sabourin, who is one of Her Majesty's subjects? If not then I have grievously misunderstood you, but if so, then I would beg to differ. :)—S Marshall T/C 19:39, 1 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
- Contending that, yes, the artist does indeed own the copyright of that artwork and design. Not "Her Majesty's arms" (whatever that is supposed to mean). The elements within the arms are common and cannot be copy protected, but...individual artistic works are. If this shocks you, perhaps you simply do not know that as an artist, her copyright was established upon the creation of the work.--Mark Miller Just ask! WER TEA DR/N 21:35, 1 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
- I am afraid you have misunderstood how Crown Copyright works. See, for example, page 3 of the National Archives on Crown Copyright: "Works made by officers and servants of the Crown in the course of their duties qualify for Crown Copyright protection". Mrs Bursey-Sabourin was Fraser Herald at the Canadian Heraldic Authority, which is an office of the Governor General of Canada, at the time she made the image (I have no idea whether she still is). Therefore the copyright status as declared on the file description page is accurate: the file is Crown Copyright and free for Wikipedia's use.—S Marshall T/C 22:10, 1 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
- Endorse - very clever close and I wish that the availability of a free alternative was so nuancedly considered in other cases.. As regards S Marshall's point, I do think in the context of non-free files (they would not necessarily be free) crown copyright should get a (considered) note. We have a note about commercial photo agencies, and it bears to reason that the impact on commercial use is affected by the type of provider. Grandiose (me, talk, contribs) 12:26, 1 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
- Would you agree with that, S Marshall? Grandiose (me, talk, contribs) 20:50, 1 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
- My position has always been that any image that is (a) lawfully available for us to use, and (b) enhances the encyclopaedia, should be used to enhance the encyclopaedia. This is not an uncontroversial position on Wikipedia but I stand by it. Crown Copyright would in almost all cases be lawfully available for us to use.—S Marshall T/C 22:17, 1 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
- Endorse close. Firstly, nonfree image decisions are not made by consensus, but by compliance with NFCC. Consensus may not make exceptions to that policy. Quadell's close considered the facts and not the fans, and was an excellent and fine-grained decision that clearly involved a lot of consideration. Good work. Seraphimblade Talk to me 15:55, 1 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
- endorse A reasonable compromise under the present interpretation of NFCC. Crafting such a decision is not a supervote, but a valid use of IAR. (However I may disagree with Seraphimblade that consensus cannot overrule NFCC--if the meaning is that we must have a restrictive NFCC policy, it's true we cannot overrule it because it's a foundation decision; but just what the policy should be is our own decision, adopted here by consensus. As for any other policy we make,we can make whatever exceptions have sufficient consensus.) DGG ( talk ) 17:51, 1 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
- Endorse closure, eh? NFCC has the status of a policy that overrides any local consensus. Stifle (talk) 17:07, 3 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
- Endorse Deletion - whatever that may be... NFCC makes it clear that when there is a reasonable expectation a free image exists or could be created we must use a free image, unless the quality of such free image is so low to constitute a mockery of the subject being described. This is a case where that expectation exists. If people put their time into creating a free version instead of this AN and DRV thread, we'd have one for Canada and probably 5 other countries by now... ~Charmlet -talk- 19:59, 3 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
- Oppose closure. NFCC#1 is satisfied here, IMO, because an independently recreated substitution of the official coat of arms would not be of "a quality sufficient to serve the encyclopedic purpose" of the non-free image; an independent rendering based on the blazon alone is not going to have "the same effect" as the real thing; and the blazon alone is not a sufficiently comprehensible text description to allow the subject to be "adequately conveyed" to our general readership without using an image.
- As for the suggestion that even a massive consensus on an issue is not entitled to any consideration at all if it urges a decision contrary to policy — this may certainly be true in some cases, but we must also carefully consider that if an overwhelming consensus is going in a direction that seems to contradict policy, this may indicate that the policy itself is being misinterpreted, misapplied, or is significantly out of step with the sense of the community.
- Now, if our NFCC policy had come directly from the WMF, then we would be fully entitled (nay, obligated) to say — per WP:CONEXCEPT — that even a unanimous contrary consensus simply does not matter and must be flatly ignored. But as I read the NFCC and the WMF licensing policy resolution, our NFCC policy was adopted by consensus of our community and is subject to community feedback.
- To be sure, our NFCC policy is recognized as satisfying a requirement of the WMF to have a policy dealing with "copyrighted materials that can be legally used in the context of the project, regardless of their licensing status". However, the WMF policy does not (as best I can tell) mandate the specific implementation of NFCC that we are currently using. The WMF policy does require that a project's "Exemption Doctrine Policy" (such as our project's NFCC) "must be minimal", but as best I can tell, the WMF is not thereby mandating that a piece of non-free content which is otherwise acceptable for use must be used only to the absolute minimum possible extent (e.g., only in one or two articles maximum).
- If a sizable consensus is urging a different interpretation here, this should be seriously considered and not automatically be given short shrift per "consensus cannot override policy". And if people feel our current NFCC does in fact demand this particular interpretation and are not comfortable with reversing the current Canadian COA decision per the policy as it currently stands, then I would strongly recommend a community review of the NFCC policy to determine if it may in fact be in the best interests of Wikipedia to clarify or change the policy. — Richwales (no relation to Jimbo) 05:27, 5 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
- Overturn The admin tried mightily but ultimately invented a consensus by going well beyond the purpose of the deletion discussion. 1) the consensus was that there is no other official rendering of the AOC; 2) It was well found by the Admin that NFCC compliant consensus supported the use of the official rendering in Wikipedia somewhere; 3) But, the consensus (or, at the least the well supported position) was also that whenever the Pedia represents the AOC pictorially, it should use the official rendering, so as not to misinform or mislead readers; 4) So, whether the official rendering is used in any particular manner in any particular article is not well suited for the broad imposed consensus, here by the Admin, as there was no adequate discussion and consensus of each use on that point (or the use of notes and text and the like to obviate concerns). Therefore the close should be overturned, or amended by the admin. After he/she found that the official image would not be deleted from the Pedia, they should have left the particular use issues to other processes RfC and the like, or to further discussion to see if a consensus would form on other uses and manners of use (eg notes. text etc). Alanscottwalker (talk) 12:00, 6 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
- Endorse decision - Good, well written and explained closure. Garion96 (talk) 12:20, 6 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]
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