Usage concealment

This page totally conceals one obvious and clear usage of multi-licensing: combining barely free licenses (such as {{GFDL 1.2}}) and unfree ones, as a mean to bypass Wikimedia Commons rules and effectively proposing contents under a non-commercial clause… Jean-Fred (talk) 19:12, 30 June 2012 (UTC)

Sorry, what? Rd232 (talk) 21:05, 30 June 2012 (UTC)

One recent example of this sort of combination is {{GFDL 1.2 or cc-by-nc 3.0}}. This page's unqualified assertions that multi-licensing gives users more freedom presumably would not sit well with people who see {{GFDL 1.2}} as a "barely free" license, so such statements could be phrased a bit less dogmatically. On the other hand, the "barely free" view of GFDL-1.2 is not universal, and such license combinations aren't very common. Maybe a footnote acknowledging these complexities would be enough. --Avenue (talk) 09:01, 6 October 2012 (UTC)

Given that GFDL used to be the Commons primary license, and remains good enough for use on Wikimedia projects, I have no problem with the combination you mention, if the alternative is not having the content available for use on Wikimedia. Rd232 (talk) 09:24, 6 October 2012 (UTC)

strange recommendation

Commons:Multi-licensing "recommends" multilicensing with CC-BY-xx plus CC-BY-NC-xx. However, when a user puts an additional NC-template on the image page, a speedy-deletion warning is automatically produced. --Túrelio (talk) 16:59, 12 October 2012 (UTC)

Yes, NC is currently only possible via {{Cc-by-nc-sa-2.0-dual}}, AFAIK. I had suggested making an NC template that required a COM:L-compatible license as a parameter, as a more flexible forced-dual-licensing for people applying NC. Rd232 (talk) 22:38, 12 October 2012 (UTC)

Thanks. My rant was related to a recent case, see User talk:Torf. As there was no other option visible, the user removed the NC-template. --Túrelio (talk) 07:44, 13 October 2012 (UTC)

How to use multi licensing with an NC tag with CC4.0?

I tried {{self|cc-by-sa-4.0|cc-by-nc-sa-4.0}}, and got the stupid Speedy-box, big and red and completely rubbish. I tried the mentioned {{Multi-license}}{{self|cc-by-sa-4.0|cc-by-nc-sa-4.0}}, nothing changed. I tried {{Multi-license}} {{self|cc-by-sa-4.0}} {{self|cc-by-nc-sa-4.0}}, still no change. How can I get a cc-by-nc-sa-4.0 to my pictures without this nasty and utterly wrong speedy box? Grüße vom Sänger ♫ ^(talk) 17:09, 23 August 2018 (UTC) P.S.: {{self|Cc-by-nc-sa-4.0-dual}} was not even there as a template.

Public domain and CC BY 2.o

For this scenario, would the only permissible license be CC BY 2.0, because the latter requires attribution? ProfessorM2112 (talk) 22:53, 22 October 2022 (UTC)

Different reasons for why files have multiple licenses set – what to do?

Many files have multiple licenses set. Sometimes this is because the file is made available under multiple licenses where the user of the file can choose which to pick (example), sometimes it's files like this, sometimes it's because different parts or components are differently licensed – for example text & UI here or the text spoken & voice (e.g. one word of the audio or that voice component) here.

Now this is a confusing mix where it's often not clear which of these apply for a given file and at least the meta categories on the file could for example suggest CCBY files are public domain when they actually aren't. This means files could show up in incategory/deepcategory searches or petscan scans that try to view files of a/some specific license(s) and also external search engines like https://openverse.org/ could display the wrong license for files. (Again, for example also CCBYSA files when just public domain files was selected.)

What could or should be done about this? Is it possible for example to specify which license ultimately applies which for many files would be the more restrictive license? Maybe the license categories set on files should automatically be so that just one license category is set on the file (the most restrictive license). Prototyperspective (talk) 23:14, 22 September 2025 (UTC)