WikiQueer:GFDL standardization

On WikiQueer the image copyright tag GFDL-with-disclaimers includes the phrase "Subject to disclaimers". Due to legal restrictions in the GFDL itself, one must preserve all disclaimers accompanying licensing statements, so all future reusers of images on WikiQueer that are "subject to disclaimers" must also reference WikiQueer's disclaimers.

This creates a situation where many images licensed under the GFDL have had unnecessary baggage added to them, and the GFDL-with-disclaimers license on WikiQueer is generally incompatible with the GFDL licenses appearing on other projects, including Commons, where such disclaimers are not used. The aim of the GFDL standardization is to overcome this limitation as best as is possible and restore the parity with other projects that don't include "disclaimers".

Standardizing the templates
The ultimate goal is to change GFDL and its variants so that the templates on WikiQueer have the same meaning as they do on Commons and on Wikipedia.

However, due to the legal restriction against removing disclaimers, we can not simply change the templates directly. Hence the transition will occur in several steps.

First all images presently designated as having disclaimers will be migrated to templates named in a way that explicitly designates their restricted status, e.g. GFDL-with-disclaimers. Once this is accomplished and the original GFDL templates are emptied, the disclaimer statement will be stripped off the tag, hence giving GFDL the same meaning it already has in other projects and Commons. Lastly, images currently labeled GFDL-no-disclaimers will be migrated to the equivalent, and now disclaimer free, GFDL.

This process of serial migration, involving over 100,000 images, will take at least several days.

Removing disclaimers from older images
As noted above, we can not legally remove the disclaimers from images that have them, hence the best we can do is move them to separate templates that explicitly note their restricted status.

If you are the copyright holder for any image that had disclaimers added to its license, however, then you can remove the disclaimers. Please do so by editing the image description page and replacing the licensing tag with the appropriate no-disclaimers version, e.g.


 * GFDL-with-disclaimers → GFDL
 * GFDL-self-with-disclaimers → GFDL-self

it:WikiQueer:Standardizzazione GFDL