2009/3/30 Gerard Meijssen gerard.meijssen@gmail.com:
Hoi, <grin> you indeed can do better </grin> Often the person who did the photography is known, but it is not possible to contact him.
If the permission is cleared properly, there is no need to contact him.
Often the material does not have a known photographer but the material was donated by the organisation that commissioned the work.
If the permission is cleared properly, there should be documentation and it should be possible to provide a complete chain of transfer of rights of usage.
When you talk about "liberating", it is the wish of museums and archives to do exactly that.
I am not disputing that our interest overlap.
Mathias