Cognitive apprenticeship(history · last edit · rewrite) from https://digitalcommons.usu.edu/etd/6246/. As noted at the bottom of Cognitive apprenticeship § Overview (permanent link) and on the talk page (permanent link), at least some of the article is excerpted from the doctoral dissertation linked above. Specifically, page 22 for the first paragraph and pages 20–21 for the second and third paragraphs of that section. I notice that the verbatim text has also since been modified slightly, probably due to copy editing from various editors passing through.My concern here is about compliance. The article is not compliant with the Manual of Style and that excerpt note in the prose is exemplary of that. That can be cleaned up. Is it legally compliant, though? Or will some major revision deletion be required here?The text is sourced from an open access dissertation released into the Digital Commons via Utah State University's institutional repository and the excerpt note specifies both the dissertation title and the author's name (that is how I found the source). The exact copyright license being used here is unclear to me, but if it is anything like CC BY-SA (some Digital Commons repositories require CC BY-SA 4.0 licensing), then the attribution, distribution, and modification conditions may technically be satisfied. The closest information I can find for this article is here, however, in which case someone may need to email them. I am willing to do so if necessary, but I am checking here first. Any input on how to proceed here is appreciated. —Nøkkenbuer (talk • contribs) 17:59, 18 September 2018 (UTC); slightly edited at 19:18, 18 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]
As an addendum, it appears that this copyrighted content was added when the page was created at 00:02, 9 June 2005 (UTC) by 63.239.116.50(talk·contribs·WHOIS)without attribution. However, this may be because the text precedes the May 2006 publication date of the dissertation, in which case that IP user is very likely the author being "generous" enough to prepublish their work here on Wikipedia—or that text in their dissertation was lifted from an IP user's published original research here. Does this mean this is a case of Wikipedia having it first, thanks to that IP user, in which case copyright concerns do not apply? If so, then how should that be best documented? If it is still somehow a copyright violation, then we might as well delete and recreate the page because otherwise, we may be deleting every single revision in the page history thus far. Were it not for the fact that I cannot find any contact information for the author, I would consider contacting them. —Nøkkenbuer (talk • contribs) 18:13, 18 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Furthermore, the first addition of this excerpt note was on 27 August 2016, around three months after publication of the dissertation, by Rsedmo (talk·contribs). Four days later, on 31 August 2016, IP user 129.123.38.3(talk·contribs·WHOIS)—located at Utah State University—clarified the excerpt note by adding the dissertation title. Given the contribution histories of all three users, I suspect they are all the same (or at least the latter IP and Rsedmo) and that Rsedmo is the dissertation author. In fact, Rsedmo confirms as much by stating their identity on their talk page (permanent link). As a note, Tagishsimon's signature in the prior diff was reused by Rsedmo, likely due to their newbieness, though they corrected that two minutes later. Also, the unsigned signature of Tagishsimon at the talk page was mistakenly added by 24fan24; the original unsigned post was added, deleted, and readded by Rsedmo.With all this information, I strongly suspect this is a case of the author prepublishing on Wikipedia to promote their original research rather than a copyright violation, though the connection between Rsedmo and 63.239.116.50 is weak and only behavioral (all three edited the Telepresence article, which was topically part of the dissertation's title and content). Given the decade that has passed since then, however, it appears that "cognitive apprenticeship" is a marginally notable concept now, in which case the article may be worth keeping. But how to document this? Again, further input here would be appreciated.Since they were tangentially involved by initially noticing something was up over a decade ago, I am pinging Tagishsimon and JamesR. Enjoy the blast from the past. —Nøkkenbuer (talk • contribs) 18:42, 18 September 2018 (UTC); last edited at 18:58, 18 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Thank you, Nøkkenbuer, for your very thorough investigation here. :) I have placed {{backwardscopy}} on the talk page of the article. Pending any evidence of prior publication or other reason that the material when placed on Wikipedia in 2005 violated our Terms of Use and licensing policy, this should not constitute a copyright concern. I would myself feel comfortable investing time in the article at this stage, although sometimes fate may surprise us! --Moonriddengirl(talk)15:18, 6 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Article cleaned by investigator or others. No remaining infringement. — Diannaa 🍁 (talk) 18:31, 24 September 2018 (UTC)