Jimmy-
I agree with this assessment. I would add to this a
general concern
that our use of images under "fair use" prevents the rise of a
stronger demand for really free sources of images.
I believe this argument is fallacious, since most of our instances of fair
use are in cases where it isn't realistically possible to get a "really
free" source. We're not going to put up an image of a famous building as
fair use, because we can get a Wikipedian to make a photograph. But we
can't make free photographs of deceased celebrities in any appealing
state.
Of course, we can try to get permissions (and we can, and should, try to
do so with all of our fair use images), but our main problem with doing so
is that we effectively require the copyright holders to relicense their
works under the FDL or to put them in the public domain. Most people
aren't going to do either.
Regards,
Erik