[WikiEN-l] Attributing "attribution required" free images

[Zoney]

On 29/10/2007, Steve Bennett <stevagewp at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> It's about time we had this debate again. Morally, ethically, legally:
> what
> are we required to do to meet the "attribution required" aspect of certain
> free images we acquire from Flickr or other sources, including our own
> contributors?
>
> Viewpoint #1: Provided the information is available on the image
> information
> page, which can be reached by clicking the image, then attribution
> information is available to anyone who wants it.
> Viewpoint #2: The attribution should be more visible, such as beneath the
> image in articles. This is the standard used by newspapers, for instance.
> People who licence their work under "attribution required" licences are
> expecting a bit more than a begruding source tag hidden behind a mouse
> click.
>
>
> Personally I am of viewpoint #2, and feel that we are short-changing
> photographers who generously release
> their work for virtually no recompense. I feel that if we are not
> willing to attribute the photo properly, by putting the owner's name
> at the same level
> as the photo, then we should bar the use of these kinds of images.
>
>
I absolutely agree with viewpoint no. 2. Furthermore, beyond images, I do
think we should have attribution on article pages. It isn't hard for the
vast majority of articles. Merely from a copyright point of view, you only
need to put authors responsible for substantial original content in the
article (i.e. tweakers, sentence/section/structure reworkers, grammer, etc.
do not require attribution).

The Wikipedia approach to attribution is morally lax, and even stretching
things under the GFDL, despite the content being "free" (the copyright
should be displayed even for freely licenced content in any case, it's only
PD etc. that don't require a "(c) AuthorX, AuthorY, AuthorZ" notice).

Zoney
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