Poking around I found the following related discussions listed below (all in German) dealing with the current issue and a similar 2013 complaint. In the second link Harald responds a couple times to the 2013 complaint. The Google translate versions of the linked discussions are somewhat hard to follow so I'll leave it to someone with a native understanding to summarize. As far as I can tell no one has raised the current issue on his talk page (either at DE or Commons).
It is also worth noting that Harald has about 800 photos on Commons, mostly of athletes or minor celebrities. Spot checking a couple dozen suggests that the majority of his photos are unused, but at least a small fraction are widely used across many Wikipedias. Current German Wikipedia Discussion: https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Caf%C3%A9#In_eigener_Sache_.E2.80.94_Fast_900_Euro_Verlust:_Die_Freiheitsliebe_wurde_abgemahnt.21 2013 German Wikipedia Discussion about Harald's behavior: https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Administratoren/Notizen/Archiv/2013/08#WP:URF.23Fotos_werden_Hochgeladen_-_gesucht_und_dann_gezielt_abgemahnt_.3F 2013 Commons Discussion about same: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Commons:Forum/Archiv/2013/August#de:WP:URF.23Fotos_werden_Hochgeladen_-_gesucht_und_dann_gezielt_abgemahnt_.3F -Robert Rohde On Mon, Jul 20, 2015 at 7:56 PM, Newyorkbrad <newyorkb...@gmail.com> wrote: > I would have a serious problem with someone litigating, or threatening to > litigate, over an instance of technical non-compliance with the license > terms; much less so if the (alleged) infringer persisted in republishing > without requested attribution information after warnings. > > Has anyone directly contacted Mr. Bischoff and asked him what he is doing > and why? > > Regards, > Newyorkbrad > > > On Monday, July 20, 2015, Robert Rohde <raro...@gmail.com> wrote: > > On Mon, Jul 20, 2015 at 5:46 PM, Brad Jorsch (Anomie) < > bjor...@wikimedia.org > >> wrote: > > <snip> > > > >> Since when has that ever been a thing? With respect to licenses such as > CC, > >> we follow the same rules as anyone else. > >> > > > > Not really. Commons actually recommends that an explicit credit line > > accompany CC BY images, which is something that Wikipedia doesn't do in > > articles. See below. > > > > > >> If the description here is accurate, it sounds to me like this harald > >> bischoff should be blocked and possibly have his files deleted as > >> incorrectly licensed (since he apparently doesn't accept the usual > >> interpretation of CC BY), unless he publicly renounces the behavior of > >> suing reusers. But I'll leave that to Commons and dewiki to work out. > >> > > > > Commons' own guidance to reusers [1][2][3] recommends including an > explicit > > credit line alongside CC BY images, e.g. > > > > "You must attribute the work to the author(s), and when re-using the work > > or distributing it, you must mention the license terms or a link to > > them..." > > "[R]eusers must attribute the work by providing a credit line" > > > > And recommends credit lines of the form: "John Doe / CC-BY-SA-3.0", with > > an included link to the license. > > > > As I understand it, Harald sent a demand letter to a reuser who failed to > > mention his name and the license. In other words, he demanded > compensation > > from a reuser who failed to do precisely the things that Commons actually > > says that CC BY image reusers are supposed to do. While I agree that > > Harald's actions are not friendly, it is also hard for me to get behind > the > > notion of punishing someone for demanding that reusers due the things > that > > Commons actually recommends that they do. His behavior is either A) a > > mean-spirited attempt to extract money from unexpecting people by > fighting > > against the spirit of the license, or B) a vigorous defense of his rights > > under the license. And I'm not really sure which. Suppose, > > hypothetically, that Harald actually sued someone (as opposed to just > > sending demand letters) and the courts actually agreed that the 3.0 > license > > requires that reusers provide a credit line (not an impossible outcome). > > Would that change how we viewed his behavior? > > > > CC BY 4.0 explicitly says that a link to a page with attribution and > > license terms is sufficient, but prior to 4.0 it isn't clear whether such > a > > link actually compiles with the license. There has been enough recurring > > doubt over the issue that CC decided to explicitly address the linking > > issue in the 4.0 version. Wikipedia behaves as if merely linking to an > > attribution page is always okay, but Commons' advice to reusers seems to > be > > written with the perspective that it might not be. (I don't know the > > history of the Commons pages, so I'm not really sure of the community's > > thinking here.) > > > > I do think there is something of a problem that Wikipedia models a > behavior > > (i.e. linking) that is different from what Commons recommends (i.e. > credit > > lines). > > > > -Robert Rohde > > > > [1] > > > > https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Commons:Reusing_content_outside_Wikimedia > > [2] > > > > https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Commons:Reusing_content_outside_Wikimedia/licenses > > [3] https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Commons:Credit_line > > _______________________________________________ > > Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: > https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines > > Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org > > Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, > <mailto:wikimedia-l-requ...@lists.wikimedia.org?subject=unsubscribe> > _______________________________________________ > Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: > https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines > Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org > Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, > <mailto:wikimedia-l-requ...@lists.wikimedia.org?subject=unsubscribe> > _______________________________________________ Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, <mailto:wikimedia-l-requ...@lists.wikimedia.org?subject=unsubscribe>
