Sharealike Explained

All Fortepan images are ShareAlike to ensure that the images themselves always stay free, even if they are modified and adapted by others. The ShareAlike license has several intended effects:

The original Fortepan image always remains freely available to use and remix. Anyone who has access to the photograph may use it, even if they encounter the work in a modified form.
Adaptations of a Fortepan image are always freely available to use and remix. Anything made from the original photograph is just as free as the original image was, and you may use a Fortepan Iowa image remix as a starting point for your own work, just as easily as starting from the original Fortepan Iowa image. For example, this looping video of this fun winter scene was adapted by Gabriella Cummings from “"FI0003973” by Susie Meyer/Fortepan Iowa, CC-BY-SA 4.0. Anyone is free to download and build upon this animated adaptation:
The ShareAlike licenses are designed to result in the creation of new works for the Commons through their copyleft mechanism. Because new contributions to adaptations (when distributed) must be licensed under the same or a compatible license, people who wish to remix SA works also contribute back to the commons as a condition of using the SA work.

Key Points About the Sharealike License

The ShareAlike condition applies for any Fortepan Iowa photo, whether or not it’s an adaptation. If the image is published as part of a book or collection or “aggregation” (for example an online gallery, commercial textbook or published calendar), list the original CC-BY-SA license following the work, and if possible, provide a link or URL to the original work. If the work is considered an adaptation under copyright law (for example, a Fortepan Iowa photo is inserted into a photomontage or an animated component in a video, the adaptation of that image--not the entire work itself--requires a CC-BY-SA license:

Original Fortepan Iowa image, "fortepan_25246," by Fortepan, CC-BY-SA 3.0.

A slightly edited version of a group of people posing for a photo — Here is a slightly modified version of the same “fortepan 25246” image – a frame and a blue duotone have been added, and there is a little tear on the left side--do you see it? The modification is so marginable, though, that it does not count as an adaptation. You could publish this image in a fully copyrighted textbook (no SA license) as long as you properly attribute and provide the URL: Original fortepan image, “fortepan_25246,” donated by Fortepan, CC-BY-SA 3.0.

This digital photomontage, “Fan,” is altered so considerably that we can definitely call it an “adaptation” (or remix) of the original, wouldn’t you agree?

The same image drastically modified with blotches of orange and the group of men removed from the background

A license for this work should link back to the original photograph, and explain how that photograph was modified. The attribution should look like this:

“Fan” by Bettina Fabos. Based on the original image, “fortepan_25246” by Fortepan, CC-BY-SA 3.0, Removed background and applied colored layers. “Fan” is licensed under CC-BY-SA 4.0.

Accordingly, if you remix and share a Fortepan Iowa image, you must apply the CC-BY-SA 4.0 license (or a later license version), or a BY-SA Compatible License. That way we can always find a way back to the original work, so it always stays free. Once again, If this adapted image appears in a series of images, and published as a book, then as long as this image and adaptation is listed CC-BY-SA, the entire book does not have to carry the BY-SA license.

The ShareAlike term applies to licensed uses of Fortepan images only, not other uses by the rightsholder of the original photograph. Licensors that make their photographs available under an SA license in Fortepan are always free to share their works under other terms if they wish.

Any Fortepan image used for the purposes of criticism or parody does not require a ShareAlike license.

Any link to a Fortepan image does not require a ShareAlike designation.

A ShareAlike license on an adapted Fortepan image cannot be modified through any additional explanations.

Unless other restrictions are present, the work may be used for any purpose (even commercially), without the need to make distinctions about allowable types of uses.

The ShareAlike condition only applies to a Fortepan image when it is publicly shared. You are not obligated to share things you make from Fortepan photos--you may create remixes and adaptations that you do not publish. If you are using Fortepan images privately and not sharing them with others, you do not have to comply with the license conditions. For example, if you download, print, and hang a Fortepan photo in your living room, you do not have to license your printed image under an SA or compatible license unless you plan to share it with others.

Anyone who builds on the original photo should provide a URL or a link back to the original.

Possible Uses of Fortepan Photos

Use a Fortepan photo, unmodified, in a larger work (e.g., a curated collection of photographs, organized in a series; a calendar). Unless the larger work would be considered an adaptation of of the original image, using a ShareAlike photo as a separate element within it does not require original materials in the larger work to be ShareAlike or compatible. The larger work may be licensed under any terms.
Publish a Fortepan photo in a book, newspaper article, or Facebook post.

This photo, appearing on Facebook requires a ShareAlike license.
Wheat-paste a Fortepan Iowa photo on the side of a building.
Fortepan photo(s) in a digital project. If the Fortepan image, or images, are altered, as in this photomontage, then the parts of the project derived from the Fortepan photos require a Share Alike license.
In this example, two separate licenses are assigned to this section of the digital project, Proud and Torn, a Visual Memoir of Hungarian History:
1. “Shoes,” by Dana Potter. Based on the original image, “fortepan_103911,” Budapest Főváros Levéltára / Fortepan, CC-BY-SA 3.0. Selected shoes from background, applied a brown duotone. Proud and Torn, a Visual Memoir of Hungarian History, “1956.” CC-BY-SA 4.0.
2. “Long lines,” by Dana Potter. Based on two original images, “fortepan_31273” by Lechner Nonprofit Kft. Dokumentációs Központ/Fortepan, CC-BY-SA 3.0, and “fortepan_17956” by Magyar Rendőr/Fortepan, CC-BY-SA 3.0. Applied photomontage and alternating brown and blue duotones. Located: Proud and Torn, a Visual Memoir of Hungarian History, “1956.” CC-BY-SA 4.0.

Choose SA for your Content

Before opting to use an SA license for your material, consider the following:

SA may be incompatible with other material you want to use in your remix. SA does not mix well with CC-licensed images “NC” (non-commercial), or “ND” (no derivatives). For more information about compatibility, see the CC license compatibility chart, here. Because the ShareAlike licenses require that adapted material of a ShareAlike work be licensed under a ShareAlike or a compatible license, you should be aware of the licenses covering the other materials that you want to use in your remix.
BY-SA allows your work to be used commercially. While the BY-SA license requires that commercial entities using the work comply with the terms of the license, they may sell or otherwise use your work or their adaptation of your work for commercial purposes.

This information in this section, “Using Fortepan Photos” was adapted from “ShareAlike Interpretation,” by Creative Commons, CC-BY 4.0.