The related issues have been discussed on Commons, Enwiki, and Meta, at various times and places in the past.
There is a legitimate concern that the inclusion of non-free logos is bad for reusers. On sites like Commons, which are expected to be exclusively free content, it also creates confusion to have thousands of non-free logos and derivatives. Personally, I also feel that it sets a bad example for a free content company like WMF not to have any formal policy on the third party use of their logos. Even within Wikimedia there is no agreement about what is allowed and what isn't, except that Mike and others have generally said they don't object to most uses by the community, even while reserving full copyright control and the right to object in the future. It has been three or four years since I first asked members of the WMF to draft a policy on logo use that would be clear about what is allowed both in the community and for reusers. One option is to release the logos under copyleft, but that has historically been flatly rejected by the WMF on the grounds that copyright is necessary for brand protection. I don't think copyleft is incompatible with brand protection, but even if one assumes it is, that isn't the only option. One could still write a policy that made it clear internally and externally that logos can included and reused alongside Wikimedia content, and when derivatives can be created, without going all the way to copyleft. Given that we don't have clear policies regarding logo use, I think the Swedish Wikipedia decision is entirely defensible. I don't think it is a good outcome, however. A good outcome would be one that explicitly establishes the allowed uses of the logos and their compatibility with our larger free content mission. Most of the time when this issue comes up, people just shrug and look the other way, but I don't really think that is a good approach for people that want to be respectful of copyrights. I would also note that the Meta community moved to a public domain logo some time ago in part because of the desire to avoid a copyrighted logo. -Robert Rohde _______________________________________________ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l