Commons:Deletion requests/Files in Category:Congressional Gold Medals

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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.

Congressional gold medals designed by AIP contractors[edit]

Each of the nominated medal designs was created by an Artistic Infusion Program contractor. For reasons explained at Commons:Determining if U.S. coins are free to use, coins (or medals) designed by Artistic Infusion Program contractors are not freely usable and are therefore ineligible to be hosted on Commons. Please see User:Mysterymanblue/U.S. Coins with known copyright statuses#Congressional medals for more information on how this determination was made.

 Mysterymanblue  04:58, 9 July 2021 (UTC)Reply[reply]

@Mysterymanblue: Thanks,  Mysteryman for your worry. Do you have a proof on your hands, I mean a copy of a contract, that retains the rights with the Artistic Infusion Program (AIP) not the United States Mint for medals in question? --Taterian (talk) 20:57, 9 July 2021 (UTC)Reply[reply]
@Taterian: Please see United States Mint: Call For Artists Terms and Conditions C.3: "All design submissions to the United States Mint shall be assigned to the United States Mint and will become its sole and exclusive property."  Mysterymanblue  23:20, 9 July 2021 (UTC)Reply[reply]
Thanx for the answer, and what's the problem then? --Taterian (talk) 17:39, 12 July 2021 (UTC)Reply[reply]
@Mysterymanblue: Thanx, I read the thread but still unconvinced that what your are proposing is the right thing to do. So, could you please kindly state briefly but definitely, you know, like, 1, 2, 3..., why all these files have to go. --Taterian (talk) 02:41, 25 July 2021 (UTC)Reply[reply]
  • Keep While I get and agree with why "coins designed as part of a competition" are not in the public domain, medals aren't coins. Per the USMint itself "Coins are “legal tender,” and medals are not." So the rule doesn't apply to medals by the UsMint's own standards of what a coin is. --Adamant1 (talk) 02:13, 18 August 2021 (UTC)Reply[reply]
    The contract linked above explicitly says it applies to both coins and medals, not just coins. So the same reasoning applies.  Mysterymanblue  05:49, 16 November 2021 (UTC)Reply[reply]
    Which "contract"? If you mean the Terms and Conditions even if I buy that the copyright rules applies to both coins and medals, you'd still have be more specific about what part of that "contract" applies to this and how for it to be a useful way to figure out what the rights are to these images, because from my multiple readings of it there's a bunch of random words, but nothing that is specifically relevant to this. Or if anything it just confirms that these images are in the public domain. Also, I'd like to know your answer to Taterian's question. I'm sure they would to. --Adamant1 (talk) 10:53, 16 November 2021 (UTC)Reply[reply]
    @Adamant1: Much discussion was had at the village pump discussion linked above (now archived) that essentially answered these specifics. Now, If you actually read the terms and conditions linked above, the designs submitted by AIP contractors clearly apply to both coins and medals:

The United States Mint established the Artistic Infusion Program (AIP) in 2003 to enrich and invigorate the Nation’s coin and medal designs through the development of a pool of outstanding artists who will be ready to create and submit new designs for United States coins and medals.

C.2 SCOPE The Contractor shall create and submit one or more original designs based on the information and narrative provided in each delivery order.

C.3 PERFORMANCE TERMS AND CONDITIONS

All design submissions to the United States Mint shall be assigned to the United States Mint and will become its sole and exclusive property.
— https://www.usmint.gov/learn/artists/call-for-artists/terms-and-conditions#sectionc3 (emphasis added)
The fact that the rights are being created by a third party and transferred to the mint is significant because of 17 U.S. Code § 105(a), which provides that "the United States Government is not precluded from receiving and holding copyrights transferred to it by assignment, bequest, or otherwise". That is, works created for the U.S. government by contractors and then assigned to it are not necessarily in the public domain.  Mysterymanblue  11:26, 16 November 2021 (UTC)Reply[reply]
I'm aware that works created for the U.S. government by contractors are not necessarily in the public domain. I don't find that a compelling argument though because prepared by U.S. government employees are. In the case of the US Mint in particular, they send the contractor the idea for a design. Then after they "finish" the design, there is a 7 step process (depending on who you ask) involved in actually making the coin or medal that the contactor has absolutely nothing to do with. So coins and medals aren't created "for" the government, they are made "by" the government with 1% of that process being farmed out to a contractor. What I think that would refer to is something like a statue or painting where a government employee has nothing to do with it outside of hanging the painting on the wall or putting the statue in front of a government building. --Adamant1 (talk) 07:40, 17 November 2021 (UTC)Reply[reply]
Ideas are not copyrightable; the expression of ideas are copyrightable. When the U.S. government asks artistic infusion program contractors to design coins, it only sends a general idea of what it expects the coin to look like. The actual artistic rendering - by far the most significant creative aspect of the coin - is almost entirely created by the contractor. How do I know this? Well, check out this webpage: CCAC Meeting Images for the 2018 American Innovation $1 Coin Program. All of the designs with the statue of liberty were produced to be the obverse of the American Innovation dollar coins. There is significant artistic variation within them, which shows that the U.S. mint is giving out vague enough prompts to receive a wide variety of different renderings. Yes, U.S. government employees also play a hand in creating the coins. However, with the exception of the coin sculptor, their work is not creative; it is simply work necessary to put the designer's design and the sculptor's sculpture into mass production. As the contributions of the non-federal designer are not de minimis, copyright was vested in their creative contributions, which were then transferred to the mint. This copyright cannot reasonably be ignored.  Mysterymanblue  08:20, 17 November 2021 (UTC)Reply[reply]

Re: "When the U.S. government asks artistic infusion program contractors to design coins, it only sends a general idea of what it expects the coin to look like. The actual artistic rendering - by far the most significant creative aspect of the coin - is almost entirely created by the contractor." According to the US Mint website "After the artists submit their design ideas, the Mint reviews them. A legal review looks at whether the designs meet requirements in the law, follow copyright laws, and use correct symbols. The Mint’s chief engraver provides feedback for artistic improvements. A coinability check looks for anything that wouldn’t strike well, such as letters that are too small or too close together. All of this feedback goes back to the artists so they can revise their designs. Once the designs go through a couple rounds of internal revisions, the stakeholders review and provide feedback. They look for accuracy and appropriateness of the designs. The artists incorporate the feedback and come back with additional revisions until both the stakeholders and the Mint consider the design portfolio ready for committees to review." According to that, employees of the US Mint are involved in and have more say about the design process then the designer does. Also, the committee makes the final decision about the design. In no way does that process equate to the coin being "almost entirely created by the contractor." Also, the design isn't the final product. The minted coin is. According to the US Mint a coin is produced through a six step process 1. Blanking 2. Annealing 3. Washing & Drying 4. Upsetting 5. Striking 6. Bagging & Packaging. The coins design doesn't come into it until the 5th step and as far as I know the designer isn't involved in the striking process. --Adamant1 (talk) 10:31, 17 November 2021 (UTC)Reply[reply]

@Adamant1: Yes, the sculpture is the final product. But it is a derivative work of the design, which is protected by copyright. Derivative works are protected both by their own copyright and by the copyright of their underlying work. This informs the Commons guideline at COM:DW: In either case, unless the underlying work is in the public domain or there is evidence that the underlying work has been freely licensed for reuse (for example, under an appropriate Creative Commons license), the original creator of the work must explicitly authorize the copy/ derivative work before it can be uploaded to Commons.
Yes, much work at the mint goes into making the coins/medals. You describe the process as "1. Blanking 2. Annealing 3. Washing & Drying 4. Upsetting 5. Striking 6. Bagging & Packaging". However, you seem to miss that these are the steps to an industrial process, not a creative one. Only the areas where creativity involved (i.e. the engraving on the coin presses) are actually under the guise of copyright.
You also correctly mention that the mint is not absent from the creative process - not in the slightest. But the vast majority of the final visual appearance is still attributable to the coin designer. See, for example, the obverse of the American Innovation $1 coin, whose initial design and whose final proof look almost identical. The designer's contribution is absolutely the most significant part of the final coin's appearance.
And even if the coin's design was truly a shared endeavor between the mint and the designer, the design would be the joint work of mint employees and the designer. In order for a work to be in the public domain, each author's contributions must be in the public domain. So while the mint's contributions would be PD, the designer's contributions would not be, and we'd end up in the same situation.  Mysterymanblue  10:56, 17 November 2021 (UTC)Reply[reply]
"Yes, the sculpture is the final product. But it is a derivative work of the design, which is protected by copyright." No one has shown evidence of that. What has been shown is that the designer doesn't hold the original copyright. That's it. Nothing from what I've seen says what happens to the copyright after that or if there even is one once it's relinquished by the designer.
"you seem to miss that these are the steps to an industrial process, not a creative one." Not really. "Copyright protection under this title is not available for any work of the United States Government." The copyright rules for "works" is defined as "Copyright is a type of intellectual property that protects original works of authorship as soon as an author fixes the work in a tangible form of expression." The tangible form of expression here is the coin. Not the design. We aren't hosting images of the designers draft drawings and they aren't the tangible form of expression. The overall coin is. Maybe you could argue that minting a coin is the industrial process, but there would be no tangible coin without it. So it's ridiculous to say that's not part of turning the coin into a work.
"each author's contributions must be in the public domain. So while the mint's contributions would be PD, the designer's contributions would not be, and we'd end up in the same situation." No we wouldn't be in the same situation because the designer doesn't hold any copyright to the work and never has. So there's nothing on their side to be public domain or not. "All design submissions shall be accompanied by a completed and signed rights transfer document" makes it clear that the designer has no rights, public domain or otherwise. --Adamant1 (talk) 11:32, 17 November 2021 (UTC)Reply[reply]

Deleted: Per nomination including the essay Commons:Determining if U.S. coins are free to use. The terms of use on the website of the US Mint state ‘’Coin and medal designs may be based on sources that are copyrighted and licensed to the United States Mint or otherwise used with permission. In some cases, such designs may themselves be covered by third-party copyrights assigned to the United States Mint. Numismatic designs may also contain third parties’ other proprietary material, trademarks, or logos licensed or provided to the United States Mint for limited purposes. Reuse of such designs may require permission of the rights owner.’’ There is a possibility these coins are copyrighted. Consequently, the uploader – or any other Commons user - has to show per COM:EVID that the image can be used with an acceptable licence. This has imho not been done in this case. So therefore these images must be deleted. --Ellywa (talk) 09:13, 13 February 2022 (UTC)Reply[reply]

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