[WikiEN-l] "Fair use" images of living people

Sat Nov 25 03:42:31 UTC 2006

On 11/24/06, Ray Saintonge <saintonge at telus.net> wrote:
> There is nothing obvious about a copyvio when you can't identify its
> source.  You may have very strong suspicions about the matter, but that
> does not establish the fact.  I don't know what the standards are for
> drawings in ship construction, but I'm sure that there are bound to be
> some aspects that will be constant.  Are these even copyrightable?

I can not agree with your position.

We are only able to discover the source of so many violations because
the people who have submitted them have put so little work into
finding the material themselves. This does not imply that all or even
most of our violating images can be identified this way.

If we want our contributors behave with responsibility we need to
treat them like people who have responsibility and allow them to
execute professional judgement.

When people put in effort to clean up violations they do it because
they care about making an improvement. No one is paying them to spend
their time making sure our Free Encyclopedia is actually free. So they
actually care if something they know to be bad is kept... their work
is not just hours on a timeclock.

Our users know that uploaders make mistakes, they know that some are
confused, they know that some lie... so if you ask them to take an
unsupported  and unbelievable claim at face value you are demeaning
them, disrespecting them, and worst of all: discouraging them.

Of course, it is equally critical that we respect the involved
uploader. But part of that respect is treating the uploader like an
adult. If we behave rationally and fairly, they should understand.  At
least we can completely undo our deletion if we later find it to be
mistaken... which is a lot better than most situations in life.

When there is an obviously problem, such as an which has an obvious
halftone pattern yet the uploader comment claims that the 'made the
image himself',  it's possible that the uploaders claim is correct,
that there is some complicated explanation which didn't fit into the
edit summary....   But it is unlikely.

So we ask the uploader, .. to the extent we can... and we delete the
image in due course because our experience and careful consideration
allow us to reach a conclusion, free of unreasonable biases, that it
is most likely the case that the image is not acceptable.

The material, if it's worth while, will be recreated in time...
perhaps sooner if we'd quit obsessing about the 1.5 millionth article
and focus on quality... perhaps sooner if we could delete all the
copyright violations.... to make room for real contributors who want
to sit down with the community and produce the new and free works that
we need, completely with the right justification that would ensure the
material stays free.

Requirements mean nothing if we cant enforce them... and a commitment
to free content is worth nothing if it is all words and show without
substance.