Wikipedia:WikiProject Images and Media/Free/Contacts/Napalm Records/Petition 001

Greetings,

My name is Roberto X, a 24 year old editor and administrator of Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. As you may have heard, Wikipedia is an international online collaboration aimed at building a high quality and free repository of knowledge, available to anyone, anywhere in the world. The site itself is regularly situated between the ten most visited in internet according to Alexa (you can confirm the claim at http://www.alexa.com/data/details/?url=wikipedia.org ), the traffic measurement service offered by Amazon.

To reach such goal, it is common for Wikipedia editors to contact companies or individuals that may help us improve articles. In my case, I am contacting Napalm Records to check the possibility of obtaining free images compatible with Wikipedia aim.

In Wikipedia, images can be classified as "free" or "non-free" ones. Images considered "free" are done so in the "freedom" sense of the word; in other words, the copyright holder agrees to either release the image under the public domain, or agrees to license it under a so-called "copyleft" license, a license that allows the following:

1. Freedom to use the image, both commercially and non-commercially. 2. Freedom to modify the image 3. Freedom to publish a modified version of the image, both commercially and non-commercially.

These images are usually contributed by Wikipedia editors themselves (in example, by taking a picture of a metal band during a concert) or by copyright owners themselves (professional photographers, bands and agencies agreeing to release a few selected promotional images under a free license). Images released as promotional material (usually for the press to advertise new launches, or use for "personal purposes") are considered "non free", because they fail to provide the previously mentioned freedoms. In example, http://www.napalmrecords.com/promotion.shtml indicates "Reproduction in whole or in part in any form or medium is permitted for promotional use only." which clearly contradicts with Wikipedia concept of "free".

Unfortunately, a number of articles about bands signed with Napalm Records currently do not have such free images. A few of them are:


 * Trail of Tears: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trail_of_Tears_%28band%29
 * Visions of Atlantis: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Visions_of_Atlantis
 * Midnattsol: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Midnattsol
 * Leaves' Eyes: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leaves%27_Eyes
 * Lacrimas Profundere: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lacrimas_Profundere
 * Elis: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elis_%28band%29

Please note that Wikipedia is a multilingual project, therefore for every article in English I linked, there are several in other idioms as well, in example, Leaves' Eyes is currently found in 14 other languages, including Spanish ( http://es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leaves%27_Eyes ) and Japanese ( http://ja.wikipedia.org/wiki/%E3%83%AA%E3%83%BC%E3%83%B4%E3%82%BA%E3%83%BB%E3%82%A2%E3%82%A4%E3%82%BA ).

While, eventually, editors will be able to supply free images obtained during the band's promotional events and concerts, the quality of free images created by the community do not match the quality of promotional images released by record companies, as they usually lack focus, lightning and, sometimes, even band members.

Therefore, I am contacting Napalm Records to suggest the possibility of providing Wikipedia free images for the bands currently work with you, including (but not limited to) the mentioned ones. Free images would not only help increasing the quality of Wikipedia articles about your bands, but also offer free publicity to them. It will also put Napalm Records in high consideration within the Wikipedia community, especially those contributing with articles about metal bands, as agreeing to relicense properties is seen as a true form of collaboration with this project.

Also, of note is that Wikipedia is always between the first results returned by Google and Yahoo search engines. A search for "Leaves' Eyes" at Yahoo returns the official website of the band in the first place, and the Wikipedia article in the second (as seen here, http://search.yahoo.com/search?p=%22Leaves%27+Eyes%22 ), while a similar search at Google returns the Wikipedia article in third place (as seen in http://www.google.com/search?q=%22Leaves%27+Eyes%22 the first two hits are from the official page itself). A good and informative article about the bands can also drive more visitors to the their official sites, as every article includes links to Napalm Records and the official band website.

Images do not require to be of high definition, or even new ones. It is our belief that "free" is more important than "large" or "updated". We have obtained images of varying resolution, from less than a megapixel to several ones. While we would really appreciate high resolution, updated images, we will welcome any version you may provide.

In order to consider an image "free", it must be licensed under a license that accepts the freedoms mentioned above. Following is a short list of licenses, from less restrictive to most restrictive you may be interested in:

1. Public Domain ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Public_domain ). The copyright owner renounces to all his rights over the work, worldwide, in a timeless manner (that is, forever). If in some location it is not possible to declare such renouncement, the copyright owner agrees to license the work, for any purpose, in a timeless manner, to anyone.

2. GNU Free Documentation License ( http://www.gnu.org/licenses/fdl.html ). The copyright owner agrees to license the work under the GNU Free Documentation License (GFDL) with no Invariant Sections, no Front-Cover Texts, and no Back-Cover Texts. The image must be accompanied with a copy of the GFDL license. Any modified version of the image must be licensed under the same license.

3. Creative Commons Attribution ( http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.5/ ). The copyright owner agrees to license the work under the Creative Commons Attribution license (CC-BY). The copyright owner must indicate the way in which the material is attributed to him, but allows commercial and non-commercial usage of the material, modifications over the original, and commercial and non-commercial usage of the modified versions.

4. Creative Commons Share Alike ( http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.5/ ). The copyright owner agrees to license the work under the Creative Commons Share Alike license (CC-BY-SA). The copyright owner must indicate the way in which the material is attributed to him, but allows commercial and non-commercial usage of the material, modifications over the original and commercial and non-commercial usage of the modified versions. However, any modified version must be also licensed under this same license (CC-BY-SA) or a compatible one.

Images with free licenses are updated at Wikimedia Commons ( http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Main_Page ), the repository of free media for the Wikimedia projects, from where they will be used in the different articles in different languages.

It is my hope that I have explained myself clearly and demonstrated that collaborating with us help not only our project, but also the bands, especially new ones, giving them more visibility through Internet.

I await your response, willing to ansewr any question you may have regarding this mail.

Very Best, Roberto X, Wikipedia editor and administrator http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:ReyBrujo