[WikiEN-l] The principle of fair use

[james duffy]

>But I can't understand why this
>http://www.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image%3A843-870_Europe.jpg
>is fair use. The map has been created for an encyclopedia
>or an history textbook. If this is fair use, is there any
>picture we may not use?

It depends on its source. Many maps designed as teaching aids aren't 
copyrighted, for the very good reason that they are copied by teachers 
throughout an educational system. Others are issued with the instruction 
"for educational use only". If the former, without copyright there would be 
no problem in usage. If the latter, one could argue that as wikipedia is 
clearly for educational and not commercial usage, it could claim usage.

Looking at the image, I would say it probably predates the 1950s though 
whether it predates the 1923 copyright limit is hard to say. The nature of 
the colouring and font usage I have seen in 19th century documents and 
history books but also in the 1950s. It certainly was not designed on a 
computer, unless someone was trying to construct a 'retro' look. So unless 
we know the source we cannot say whether it is copyright-free, 
copyright-expired or designed exclusively for educational use. The trouble 
is this seems first to have appeared on wiki under the dreaded DW. Maybe, as 
Camembert and others suspected the obnoxious Jacques was really DW in a 
French accent, we should ask Jacques before he goes where he got it. Or on 
second thoughts, maybe not. We don't want to give him an excuse to stay!!!

JT

_________________________________________________________________
The new MSN 8: smart spam protection and 2 months FREE*  
http://join.msn.com/?page=features/junkmail