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It has been suggested that this page be renamed to Help:Copyright.
Reason: Much of this reads somewhat like a help page, so maybe this page should be in help namespace?
The talk page may have more information.
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This page is a project page. It pertains to the running of Dungeon Keeper Wiki, and is not part of the encyclopaedia.
Writing
This is an essay, not an official policy or guideline. However, it may be based on one or more policies or guidelines, and may offer suggestions or advice on how to interpret them.

Content on the Dungeon Keeper Wiki is in no way official or endorsed by Electronic Arts, who are the owners of the copyrights and trademarks to the series. Dungeon Keeper, Dungeon Keeper 2, and their assets were created by Bullfrog Productions, Dungeon Keeper Online by NetDragon Websoft, and Dungeon Keeper Mobile by Mythic Entertainment. All screenshots, assets, etc from the Dungeon Keeper series are believed to be the intellectual property of Electronic Arts, and this wiki makes no claim of ownership of them.

Dungeon Keeper Wiki content[ | ]

Text[ | ]

Walnut
This section in a nutshell: text on Dungeon Keeper Wiki is meant to be freely distributable. Therefore, it must be legally compatible with that purpose; anything that isn't is not permitted here. This applies everywhere (including this page), not just to articles.
CC-BY-SA

The text of this site is freely licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License (CC-BY-SA). Reusers of the content must retain it under the same licence, ensuring it remains free.

"You are free to:
  • Share — copy and redistribute the material in any medium or format
  • Adapt — remix, transform, and build upon the material
  • for any purpose, even commercially.

The licensor cannot revoke these freedoms as long as you follow the license terms.

Under the following terms:

  • Attribution — You must give appropriate credit, provide a link to the license, and indicate if changes were made. You may do so in any reasonable manner, but not in any way that suggests the licensor endorses you or your use.
  • ShareAlike — If you remix, transform, or build upon the material, you must distribute your contributions under the same license as the original."
— Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License
No U-turns sign

Once something is licensed, it cannot be unlicensed, so be sure before submitting it.

The CC-BY-SA licence is a copyleft licence for free content. This means that the content can be copied, modified, and redistributed so long as the new version grants the same freedoms to others and acknowledges the authors. Dungeon Keeper Wiki content will, therefore, will remain free forever and can be used by anybody subject to certain restrictions, most of which serve to ensure that freedom. If you do not want others to reuse or remix your content, do not post it on the Dungeon Keeper Wiki, or elsewhere on Fandom.

Wikipedia, one of the web's most popular reference works, uses the CC-BY-SA licence. Using the same licence as that site makes it easy for Fandom users to reuse the content from Wikipedia. You must adhere to the licence when using Wikipedia content. This can be done using {{Wikipedia attribution}}. It is also possible to reuse text from most (but not all, for some use a more restrictive licence) other Fandom wikis; the {{Fandom attribution}} template can be used to provide attribution.

Text that infringes copyright will be deleted on sight, no exceptions. Not only may the copyright holder not be happy that their content is being used without permission, but in some jurisdictions, copyright infringement on a commercial scale (the CC-BY-SA licence permits commercial reuse of content) is a criminal offence,[1] so unsuspecting users could end up inadvertently breaking the law and risking prosecution. This is more than reason enough to ensure this wiki is kept as copyright violation-free as possible. Do not post content here if you do not have the right to license it under the CC-BY-SA licence. Outside content can only be posted here if it has been released on terms that are compatible with the CC-BY-SA 3.0 licence (there is no such thing as Dungeon Keeper Wiki-only or Fandom-only permission; either it's released under CC-BY-SA 3.0-compatible terms, or it doesn't get posted here). As Wikipedia has the same licensing as Fandom, you may want to view their documentation on licence compatibility (note: the table is not exhaustive).

Image guidelines[ | ]

Walnut
This section in a nutshell: files should have proper copyright and licensing information.
Further information: Image Licensing

Unlike text, images are not automatically licensed under a free licence. Therefore, different rules apply to images; licences that are incompatible for text are not necessarily incompatible for files, and there is such a thing as Fandom-only permission. A file's use here does not have any effect on its copyright status.

Free content (which is generally defined as freely-licensed or public domain) content strongly preferred on Fandom. Copyright-violating images are subject to deletion. Copyright information must be added to the image description page of every uploaded image. Images and other uploaded files may be available under an alternative free licence, or used under fair use guidelines.

For fair use files, it is recommended to state why the file's use qualifies as fair. The {{Fair use rationale}} template can be used to assist with this; by default, it describes the file's use as being for illustrative purposes, as that is by far the most common fair use on this wiki.

Screenshots (whether of a Dungeon Keeper game or of something else) should be tagged with {{fairuse|screenshot}}; they fall under the copyright of the game they were taken from. Do not tag screenshots with {{Self}} if you took the screenshot yourself. This is a common misunderstanding of what one's 'own work' means; it means the content was created by you. When you take a screenshot of a Dungeon Keeper game, you did not create its content; Bullfrog Productions did. You merely captured their content. Capturing it does not make it yours.

Do not tag a file with {{PD}} unless you can prove that it's in the public domain. The vast majority of content on the world wide web and beyond is not there for the taking. The lack of a copyright symbol or notice does not mean the work is in the public domain, nor does it mean the rightsholder won't enforce their copyright. Copyright is assumed unless proven otherwise. Complicating matters is the fact that a work can be in the public domain in one jurisdiction, but be under copyright elsewhere. Per the tag, it should only be used for files that are in the public domain worldwide.

Fair use and fair dealing[ | ]

Walnut
This section in a nutshell: unlicensed copyrighted content should generally only be used if necessary, and only in articles if it aids the reader's understanding of the topic.
Disclaimer: this section is not legal advice.

Fair use is a provision in United States copyright law that allows limited use of non-free copyrighted material for certain purposes:

"the fair use of a copyrighted work, including such use by reproduction in copies or phonorecords or by any other means specified by that section, for purposes such as criticism, comment, news reporting, teaching (including multiple copies for classroom use), scholarship, or research, is not an infringement of copyright. In determining whether the use made of a work in any particular case is a fair use the factors to be considered shall include—

(1) the purpose and character of the use, including whether such use is of a commercial nature or is for nonprofit educational purposes;

(2) the nature of the copyrighted work;

(3) the amount and substantiality of the portion used in relation to the copyrighted work as a whole; and

(4) the effect of the use upon the potential market for or value of the copyrighted work."

17 U.S. Code § 107 - Limitations on exclusive rights: Fair use, Legal Information Institute


This applies to all material posted on Fandom, because Fandom and its servers are based in the United States. However, editors are also bound by the copyright laws of their own jurisdiction if outside the US.[Notes 1] Many other countries have a similar concept, called fair dealing; however, this is more specific than the US's fair use, which is very general, and the rules vary by jurisdiction. The general definition of fair dealing, according to the Government of the United Kingdom is:

"‘Fair dealing’ is a legal term used to establish whether a use of copyright material is lawful or whether it infringes copyright. There is no statutory definition of fair dealing - it will always be a matter of fact, degree and impression in each case. The question to be asked is: how would a fair-minded and honest person have dealt with the work?

Factors that have been identified by the courts as relevant in determining whether a particular dealing with a work is fair include:

  • does using the work affect the market for the original work? If a use of a work acts as a substitute for it, causing the owner to lose revenue, then it is not likely to be fair
  • is the amount of the work taken reasonable and appropriate? Was it necessary to use the amount that was taken? Usually only part of a work may be used"
Exceptions to copyright, GOV.UK


For non-free copyrighted content to be legally used on Fandom, it must be fair in both the United States and your own jurisdiction. Any fair use is acceptable, but illustrative/educational use is the most common by far, especially for files. As mentioned above, there is no hard and fast rule for determining how much of a work used is fair and how much constitutes infringement, but, as a general rule, the less used, the better, especially with regard to the proportion of the work as a whole.

Copyright scroll

Copyright laws are complex and vary by jurisdiction

Files[ | ]

Non-free copyrighted files (e.g. screenshots) are most often used for illustrative purposes. This is permitted under the fair use policy of United States copyright law. In the United Kingdom, this is permitted under the educational use exception, under the following conditions:

  1. the work must be used solely to illustrate a point;[2]
  2. the use of the work must not be for commercial purposes;[2]
  3. the use must be fair dealing; and[2]
  4. it must be accompanied by a sufficient acknowledgement[2]

This is only an example; you should check the laws of your jurisdiction. Even if not required by law, it is still good practice to provide an acknowledgement of the source.

Text[ | ]

Text can also be used under fair use, usually for quotation purposes. However, this does not mean that quotations automatically qualify as fair use; as a general rule, they must not affect the market for the original work, and they certainly should be no longer than necessary. It should generally be okay to excerpt for quotation purposes from the games, manuals, and even the strategy guides as long as the source is clear, and what has been taken really are excerpts, not huge quantities of text. In the United Kingdom (again, this is only an example, but these are good guidelines to follow in general), quotations of non-free copyrighted material are permitted only if all five of the following criteria are met:

  1. The purpose is really for quotation, criticism or review[3]
  2. The material used is available to the public[3] (if you're quoting from a Dungeon Keeper game, manual, or strategy guide, it is, so you needn't worry about this)
  3. The use of the material is fair.[3] See above for more info on fairness, but it would not be considered fair dealing if the proposed use of a copyright work would conflict with the copyright owner’s normal exploitation of their work[4]
  4. Where practical, the use is accompanied by a sufficient acknowledgement,[3] which generally means the title and the author’s name (this does mean the author, not the copyright holder[3]) should be indicated[4]
  5. Your use of the quotation must extend no further than is required to achieve your purpose (unless the purpose of the quotation is criticism or review)[3]

You cannot just reproduce the material without accompanying it with genuine critique or putting it into context. For example, using a long extract from a manual or guide book (or even the game itself) without referencing or alluding to the quotation in any way would probably not be okay.[3]

Quotations of non-free material should, of course, be used to supplement something in the article, and not be used in lieu of free content.

Further information[ | ]

Notes[ | ]

  1. Fandom's Terms Of Use state that you may not break laws of your jurisdiction, including copyright laws.

References[ | ]

  1. Intellectual Property Office. (2014). Exceptions to copyright: Education and Teaching. p. 1. Retrieved on 9 December 2022.
  2. 2.0 2.1 2.2 2.3 Intellectual Property Office. (2014). Exceptions to copyright: Education and Teaching. p. 3. Retrieved on 9 December 2022.
  3. 3.0 3.1 3.2 3.3 3.4 3.5 3.6 Hayleigh Bosher. Quotation, Criticism & Review. CopyrightUser.org. Retrieved on 7 January 2023.
  4. 4.0 4.1 Intellectual Property Office. (2014). Exceptions to copyright: Guidance for creators and copyright owners. p. 7. Retrieved on 7 January 2023.

Attribution[ | ]

Open Government Licence logo whiteOpen Government Licence logo black
This page contains public sector information licensed under the Open Government Licence v3.0: Intellectual Property Office (2014). Exceptions to copyright: Education and Teaching. Retrieved on 9 December 2022.
Open Government Licence logo whiteOpen Government Licence logo black
This page contains public sector information licensed under the Open Government Licence v3.0: Intellectual Property Office (4 January 2021). Exceptions to copyright. Retrieved on 9 December 2022.
CC-BY
This page uses text licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 licence: Hayleigh Bosher. Quotation, Criticism & Review. CopyrightUser.org. Retrieved on 7 January 2023.
Open Government Licence logo whiteOpen Government Licence logo black
This page contains public sector information licensed under the Open Government Licence v3.0: Intellectual Property Office (2014). Exceptions to copyright: Guidance for creators and copyright owners. Retrieved on 7 January 2023.
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