Commons:Deletion requests/Atlantis docking with Mir

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This deletion discussion is now closed. Please do not make any edits to this archive. You can read the deletion policy or ask a question at the Village pump. If the circumstances surrounding this file have changed in a notable manner, you may re-nominate this file or ask for it to be undeleted.

Atlantis docking with Mir

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Original source: http://grin.hq.nasa.gov/ABSTRACTS/GPN-2000-001315.html

As stated by NASA on the source page, this photo was taken and copyrighted to the "Mir- Crew" (specifically cosmonauts Anatoliy Y. Solovyev and Nikolai M. Budarin), not NASA (as claimed on Commons) or its employees. There is also no evidence that the Soviets cosmonauts were acting on NASA's orders to take pictures. Conversely, as stated at http://spaceflight.nasa.gov/history/shuttle-mir/multimedia/sts-71-photos/71p-015.htm, "RUSSIA SPACE AGENCY PHOTO COURTESY OF NASA": this Russian Space Agency photo is shown to the public through NASA's generosity.[1] As stated in our own warning on {{PD-USGov-NASA}}, "The NASA website hosts a large number of images from the Soviet/Russian space agency, and other non-American space agencies. These are not necessarily in the public domain."

In short,

  • not taken by NASA
  • Russian Space Agency property shown to the public through NASA's courtesy

Where NASA employees took the photos, even at Soviet locations, they clearly state themselves as the creators.[2][3][4] NASA publications use material from Russian Space Agency.[5] Note that this photo does not appear in NASA's images of STS-71 (the mission in which this request's photo was taken). Jappalang (talk) 02:23, 8 October 2009 (UTC)[reply]

 Oppose Oy vey, please don't delete those space masterpieces :( — Preceding unsigned comment added by Horst-schlaemma (talk • contribs) 16:14, 19 October 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  • If an image is hosted on a nasa.gov gallery (and certainly this one), it is not copyrighted unless explicitly stated otherwise (see gallery terms), be it because NASA employees created them, or otherwise. The news items of the website, and many other elements outside the NASA galleries are indeed much more uncertain. However just because a NASA employee did not create the image does not mean it cannot be PD, or that NASA does not own all rights to the image. There are SOOOO many contracts that deal with image and other types of goods and legal transfers between NASA and friends, we cannot be expected to call NASA for the contract of each of those. Example:
    Many of the images taken aboard ISS are taken by russians. Sometimes in the russian section, sometimes in the USA/EU section. Mostly with USA camera's, but not always. The legal footing is that the russian section is russian "soil", USA section is US soil, Harmony is EU soil etc... No one is claiming any rights on any of those images however. It would be an impossible task to verify the exact "legal" status of any image taken by a russian from the Zvezda module, and no one bothers to dive into that, with good reason. When Wikipedia receives a complaint (as we recently had with a photo of a lightning strike on the Shuttle launchpad, because NASA messed up the copyright), we should respond, but where NASA messes up, that is their responsibility.
To get back to this case. "The primary objectives of this flight are to rendezvous and perform the 1st Shuttle docking between the Space Shuttle and the Russian Space Station MIR."[6] This was a media thing (They also had IMAX camera's on board). And you can bet on it that NASA wanted to exploit this moment in the media. As such they made sure they could. I'm fairly certain that it was NASA that arranged for the fly around of the Soyuz (not part of the original missionplan as far as I can determine) and it was probably NASA that footed the bill for it (NASA paid a lot of the en:w:Shuttle-Mir_Program because Russia was dead broke). I think we can be fairly certain that NASA made sure they could use those images in any way they wanted. It was what the whole mission was about. Getting pictures to prove that Americans and Russians could work together post Cold war. And it's tough luck, but without a whole lot of effort, we are never going to find out what those exact terms of usage are. As a matter of fact, I doubt anyone at NASA knows. It's their responsibility. Courtesy can mean any number of things. It can mean they paid to get all the rights, or that it's just an unwritten thanks or whatever. No one cares but us, and no one will bother digging trough the archives of NASA contracts to find out.
  • Gallery pointed to by Jappalang. These are not all the mission photo's of course. These are only the Kennedy Space Center photos (only launch and landing images).
  • The GRIN id points to mission photo: STS071-S-072, which means that it is catalogued by the Johnson Space Center and part of the official mission image collection.

I'm all for being diligent about the legal status of our images, but we shouldn't go overboard where it isn't necessary. NASA has used this image many times, if there is a problem, it is their problem. So perhaps not PD-USGov-NASA but certainly PD in my opinion. TheDJ (talk) 14:00, 23 October 2009 (UTC)[reply]

The circumstances of the photo taking might be true, but we would need evidence to verify it. On another note, NASA's many uses of the image does not factor into what is its license; they have the permission of the Russian Space Agency to do so. NASA also specifically stated the photo belongs to the Russian Space Agency. Jappalang (talk) 11:17, 28 October 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Keep It Clearly if NASA is passing it around freely then they are the party responsible copyright issues and until they pull it for copyright related reasons then it should stay here credited as is. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Cygnusloop99 (talk • contribs) 19:37, 20 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Strong Keep I'd argue that given the photo was taken during a joint RKA-NASA programme, we're OK copyright-wise. No complaints have been received, and the image is used extensively in various NASA publications. Unless someone writes to the Russian government to ask and they say to remove it, lets keep it. This is verging on image Wikilawyering (see en:Wikipedia talk:Canadian Wikipedians' notice board#Copyright status of Canadian flag (for ISS) for another, similar issue brought up by Jappalang). Colds7ream (talk) 14:38, 28 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Strong Keep If the Russian government didn't want this being spread they would never have released it, or told NASA to make sure that it does not get used publicly. I think it should be kept because of its historical relevance and it is in the public domain.Navy blue84 (talk) 15:12, 28 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]
 Delete This image was not created by a US Federal Government employee during the discharge of his duty. Therefore an explicit release to the public domain by the copyright holder (the photographer or the Russian Government depending on the exact circumstances) is required in order to keep it. Sv1xv (talk) 08:47, 3 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]
 Delete I'll have to agree with Sv1xv on this one. Hekerui (talk) 09:14, 3 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Deleted. There is no reason to believe that the Russians have released this to the Public Domain. I agree with TheDJ that NASA certainly has the right to use this image in any way they like, but that doesn't mean they became the copyright holders or can distribute it to others under the licence they want. Historical relevance and the quality of the photos are not copyright arguments and so are irrelevant to this discussion. The Russian space agency probably doesn't mind that these photos are being displayed online, but again, this does not mean that they have released under a free licence. As far as I can see, there is only one way these images could be in the Public Domain, and that is if they had been PD-US-gov-NASA; this is clearly not the case. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Pruneau (talk • contribs) 08:21, 4 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]

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