So, you want to make a work set in/based off of the Wanderers' Library? That's awesome! Whether it's a piece of artwork, short story, film, or anything else, we always welcome people who want to contribute to the Library's universe.
The Wanderers' Library uses a specific Creative Commons license - CC BY-SA 3.0. If you want to make a work based in the Wanderers' Library universe, this means you need to follow the rules of this license. CC BY-SA 3.0 has two key components: attribution and share-alike. Let's talk about attribution first.
Attribution
The first requirement under Creative Commons is "attribution." Any derivative works (A derivative being something that is based on another source, so in this case, stuff you create that is based on the Wanderers' Library or specific content within the Library) must attribute back to the original source, the Wanderers' Library wiki. If you use a specific WL gallery or tale, you must attribute the individual article as well as the wiki. If you are using a general Wanderers' Library idea (like a character, Group of Interest, or the concept of the Library as a whole) you only need to attribute the wiki in general.
Two Loaves in Love is based on "A Loaf Story" by "Rumetzen": https://wanderers-library.wikidot.com/a-loaf-story
In this case, if you wanted to do a work based entirely or partially on A Loaf Story, then you would need to add this somewhere accompanying the work.
You do not need to follow this exact format, but according to CC any attribution you provide must include:
1. The name of the work referenced.
2. The author's name, or whatever they wish to be known as. Online screen names work for attribution as long as they are in quotes, but if the author contacts you and wants you to use their real name or some other alias, you need to oblige.
3. A link back to the source material, or other forms of citation if you're somehow referencing offline WL materials.
You will then also need to include a CC release statement. See the Share-Alike section below for an example of that.
If you are posting to the Wanderers' Library website itself and you reference another story, it's general practice to include a link to that story, or to mention it in your author post, as well as the author who wrote it. You do not need to fully attribute the individual article and/or the wiki, since you are posting to the wiki itself. If you are referencing another art piece posted onto the wiki, follow the steps mentioned in the following tab, images and supplementary material.
Share-Alike
Any content based on the Wanderers' Library is itself going to be under Creative Commons. So anything you make, you agree to share as well under these same rules. While there are other versions of the Creative Commons license, you MUST release your work under CC-BY-SA 3.0. You simply can't change the license to something else.
This also means that anyone making stuff derived from your work has to attribute you as one of the creators, and that any work made from your stuff is under the same license as well. You can't stop people from doing derivatives, but you can ask them to attribute you in the way you see fit, such as linking back to your web page or project page.
In short, this means that your derived work must be released under the CC-BY-SA 3.0, so that other people can use the same license, so you will need to state as such. It is not enough to simply attribute the Wanderers' Library.
An example of a release statement is below, replace what is in the brackets with the kind of work you are posting:
"Content relating to the Wanderers' Library, is licensed under Creative Commons Sharealike 3.0 and all concepts originate from https://wanderers-library.wikidot.com/ and its authors. This [video/artwork/music/ect], being derived from this content, is hereby also released under Creative Commons Sharealike 3.0."
Again, if posting to the site itself, this is not needed, as the release statement is included on the site itself.
What can I do under this license?
So if you agree to these two things, what can you do?
- Share: You can share or repost anything from this site. You can copy-paste entire stories and articles in their entirety and repost them to your website. You can include them in any sort of compilations of fantasy worldbuilding or stories.
- Remix: You can make derivative works. You can make fanfiction, fanart, fan movies, fan mods, anything that fans can do. You could write up a TV show or movie. You can make posters or T-shirts. You can even…
- Sell: You can sell the remixes you make based on the Wanderers' Library. However, keep in mind that you probably will not get rich off of them, because under Share-Alike, anyone can freely copy, use, or download your stuff, and you will have no legal recourse provided they also follow the terms of the license.
As stated above, all work posted to the site will be under CC BY-SA 3.0. This includes written works, images, audio embeds - if it's posted and being used in your story, it falls under Creative Commons.
If you created the art, audio, or other supplementary material to your written content, please state so in the discussion page of your article. Make a forum comment there (commonly referred to as an "author post") stating that you made the images and release them under the site's license. The reason you can do this is because when you take a photo, you automatically own the copyright to said photo. This means that, as you own this photo, you can do whatever you want with it - even use it in a WL article.
As you may have noticed, however, we don’t allow the usage of copyrighted images on the wiki. The reason why YOU, the image owner, can do so, is because you own the rights to that specific image, and can choose to release that image under a license compatible with CC BY-SA 3.0.
If you are getting the art, audio, or other supplementary material from somewhere else, it must be compatible with the CC BY-SA 3.0 license. Compatible licenses include the following:
- Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) 4.0
- Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) 2.0 and 3.0.
- Creative Commons Attribution Share-Alike (CC BY-SA) 2.0 and 3.0.
- Public Domain
- Creative Commons Zero (CC0) 1.0
The material has to directly state one of those licenses. "Free use" or "no copyright" are not valid licenses. Additionally, you cannot use copyrighted images, images you would have to pay to use (such as stock photos), images that you cannot find the license of, images licensed under NC (non commercial) or ND (non derivative) Creative Commons licenses (as they count as additional restrictions), or any other Creative Commons licenses that place other restrictions on the media. Remember, always read the fine print!
Supplementary materials are not required for the success of an article, but if you would like to include them, a whitelist of approved sites that list image licenses can be found in the collapsible below. Not all of the content on these sites falls under Creative Commons, so please check your content before using it on-site.
- CC Search
- Wikimedia Commons
- Library of Congress
- Snappygoat
- Wikipedia General Resources
- Public Domain Review
- Public Domain Vectors
- Torange
- Pixabay (Anything uploaded before January 2019 is CC0 Public Domain. Anything after that date is not usable.)
- Pexels (Anything uploaded before July 2018 is CC0 Public Domain. Anything after that date is not usable.)
- Unsplash (Anything uploaded before 5 June 2017 is CC0 Public Domain. Anything after that date is not usable.)
- Flickr
- DeviantArt
- NPS Historic Photo Collection, NASA images, National Archives Collection, and other US government sites. Note: logos of these government sites are usually not in Public Domain, so be careful.
- publicdomainpictures.net
- OpenClipArt
- svgrepo.com
- Openverse
- Rawpixel
- commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Commons:Free_media_resources/Photography
- Nara and Dvids Public Domain Archive
- Picryl
- Game-icons.net
- Pixahive
- European Southern Observatory (Please read the terms listed on this page first: eso.org/public/outreach/copyright/)
- pxhere
- SketchFab
- Project Gutenberg
- metmuseum.org
- Pixnio
AI generated content is not permitted on WL for licensing concerns, and for the fact we respect our human creators here.
If posting offsite, you need to do two things:
1. Attribute the works that you're using to the Library and to the specific author, if possible. For example:
Two Loaves in Love is based on "A Loaf Story" by "Rumetzen": https://wanderers-library.wikidot.com/a-loaf-story
2. Add the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 license (or CC-BY-SA for short) to the derived work. Doing this will release it under the CC-BY-SA 3.0 license. An example of a release statement is below, replace what is in the brackets with the kind of work you are posting:
"Content relating to the Wanderers' Library, is licensed under Creative Commons Sharealike 3.0 and all concepts originate from https://wanderers-library.wikidot.com/ and its authors. This [video/artwork/music/ect], being derived from this content, is hereby also released under Creative Commons Sharealike 3.0."
Releasing it under the CC-BY-SA 3.0 license means that people will be able to copy your work wholesale, and even sell it, provided that they properly attribute you and release their work under the same license. See a "Deeper Dive on the License" tab for more information. For information regarding specific kinds of content - games vs videos vs fanart - see the next tab.
Note: The below release statements are designed for general usage and projects featuring content based on a large number of WL stories. When creating a derivative work based on one particular article, please identify the author of the work in your statement. You can do this by:
- Clicking the "More by this Author" module and seeing who is listed
- Checking the forum discussion page and looking for an author post
- Going into the page history and seeing who posted the page (will be revision number 0)
- Using Discord bot CROM to look up the piece
As a note, collaborative stories (written by 2+ people), will not always have all the authors listed on the "More by this Author" module, or in the page history, so it's best to double check using the forum discussion post or CROM bot.
Additionally, though not legally required, it is considered good form to link to the author's Author Page if they have one.
Game Developers: You are free to create and share videogames based on WL, but you must comply with all aspects of the license as it relates to software. Rather than directly releasing your games under CC BY-SA 3.0, we recommend releasing under one of the Permissive Software Licenses. They are mostly compatible with CC BY-SA 3.0. Under CC BY-SA 3.0, most forms of copyleft/GPL-style licensing are not allowed, although this is in a case-by-case basis. Each Permissive License has it's own stipulations, so please do your research on which one works best for your game, and our license. The most common Permissive Licenses, which we would recommend starting with when looking at what to release your game under, are BSD-3 Clause and MIT Licenses.
When licensing a WL inspired game, there are three areas to consider - the source code, with all of its libraries, the art assets (music, photos, etc.), and the program.
- The source code can be kept proprietary. Most permissive licenses focus on the redistribution of the final product, not the release of the source code itself.
- The program must be released under either a CC-BY-SA 3.0 license (which we do not recommend) or a permissive software license (which we do recommend).
- The art assets, since they are derived from the WL, must be under CC-BY-SA 3.0.
Youtubers: You are free to create and share videos based on WL, but you must license your videos under CC if the particular featured content does not fall under fair use. Most WL Youtube content, being either audio readings or original animations based on a WL article, do not fall under fair use because they either reproduce the content of a work in its entirety or are entirely based on the WL universe. An example of something that would not require a CC statement due to being clear cut fair use would be a video reviewing a WL article, while only including small selections of the text itself (or none at all). A statement that you can copy paste into your video descriptions can be found below, and you can feel free to err on the side of caution if you're not sure whether your video needs it. You are also encouraged to choose to use Youtube's own CC licensing feature in addition to making the statement, though we do not strictly require it. You can learn how to mark your Youtube videos as CC here.
To be clear, we're all in favor of readings/animations/short films/etc and have never copyright striked any such videos - and would never do so except in exceptionally negative and exploitative circumstances. The licensing warning in this section primarily exists for the protection of our Youtube content creators, several of which have previously been demonetized by Youtube for "content reuse" prior to licensing staff and the Youtubers in question intervening with Google. It is our hope that by including this language you are less likely to be targeted by Youtube's monetization woes, in addition to the obvious legal and ethical benefits of fully complying with the license. Should you ever receive a copyright strike against one of your WL videos on the basis of the WL content, please inform us so we may take action against the party filing false strikes under our name.
Sample release statement: "Content relating to the Wanderers' Library is licensed under Creative Commons Sharealike 3.0 and all concepts originate from https://wanderers-library.wikidot.com/ and its authors. This video, being derived from this content, is hereby also released under Creative Commons Sharealike 3.0."
Artists: If you create a piece of art based on a WL article and share it publicly, ie via deviantart, it needs to be licensed under CC. This is particularly important if the artwork is being sold for profit, ie as a merchandise image on a website like Redbubble. Attempting to restrict use of WL artwork to all rights reserved or noncommercial use only is not compliant with the license, and does not fall under fair use.
Sample release statement: "Content relating to the Wanderers' Library is licensed under Creative Commons Sharealike 3.0 and all concepts originate from https://wanderers-library.wikidot.com/ and its authors. This artwork, being derived from this content, is hereby also released under Creative Commons Sharealike 3.0."
Can I post WL content elsewhere, such as in magazines or off-site contests? Or does the entire magazine/contest have to be under Creative Commons for that to be allowed?
The CC licenses affects the work only, so yes you can publish the story elsewhere, and no, the entire magazine or contest or whatever you're entering the work in does not all need to be under CC. The magazine/contest is just a medium for the work itself. You would; however, need to confirm with the publisher that they are okay publishing something licensed under CC BY-SA 3.0. Generally, most publishers will not be, since it's counterintuitive to their business to allow competitors access to their published works, but always be sure to ask.
If I want to make something inspired by WL, but want to retain full control over my work and not have to release under CC, what do I do?
In short, that idea or thing you make cannot be posted here. You can't reference WL by name, or specific named concepts or ideas. A brief mention of WL in passing is fine - see the Youtuber section under Posting Offsite Long Version - but you'll need to be starting from scratch. Remember that there have been hundreds of stories about infinite Libraries all across literature, WL doesn't own that concept and mentioning a Library like that is totally fine. It's just when it gets too specific to WL and takes content directly from the site that you'd need to release under CC. Think about how games like Control or Lobotomy Corporation are inspired by SCP, but have their own world and rules and don't take anything directly. That's how they're able to maintain copyright over their concepts, without having to release under CC.
What do I do if I see something that isn't licensed correctly?
The easiest thing to do is to let staff know, and generally we want you to tell us rather than to act upon it yourself. See the Rights Agent Notice after this - we can act on your behalf if you see a Youtube video or social media post for example that doesn't properly follow the CC licensing requirements. If the content not properly attributed is your own, we can walk you through the next steps of what to do and if action is required. In short, don't hesitate to reach out to us. Active staff, as well as their preferred contact methods, can be found here under the Meet the Staff tab.
Use of this website constitutes legal authorization for Wanderers' Library staff to act as your rights agents in cases where the copyright(s) of a work published on this site is infringed by a third party. This authorization is limited to the removal of infringing content via section 512 of the DMCA, regional equivalents, or legal action. This authorization is via Informal Contract agreement, and is an extension of the formal agency authorization provided to staff by the creators and copyright holders of the Wanderers' Library concept, and the Wanderers' Library logo.
In simpler terms, this gives WL staff the power to pursue DMCA action against copyright infringement of works. Normally, it falls upon the writer to handle it themself, and we as staff don't have the authority to act on their behalf. This notice allows us to step in on behalf of users if we find infringing items.
