[WikiEN-l] Non-free images, there has to be a better way

Fri Jul 8 09:31:33 UTC 2005

Stan Shebs (shebs at apple.com) [050708 13:34]:

> So as to cull out the unnecessary fair use images, I think we should be 
> making
> passes over those, and not be shy about deleting ones that offer nothing 
> over
> free versions. Ideally, every fair use image's description page will have a
> special justification for its existence, something that we can defend to any
> skeptics.

Shooting all fair-use images is not a good idea, I agree. Look at [[Xenu]]:
that article uses three fair-use images (the handwriting sample, the cover
of 'Dianetics', the Sea Org logo) in a manner that's blatantly academic
fair use. And even the proudly litigous Church of Scientology has not
uttered *one peep* about the article. Not a dot.

I think a lot of the difficulty is that it's the *use* of the image that's
fair or not, not the image itself or its inclusion in Wikipedia as a whole.
So yeah, a fair-use cat that makes damn sure the justification for each use
is right there on the image page.

There are people who seem to think that fair use is fair game, and if an
image is fair use in one article, it's open slather to use it anywhere.
This is not necessarily the case may be a source of problems.

OTOH, throwing out all fair use images would be throwing the baby out with
the bathwater.

- d.