On Thu, May 31, 2012 at 1:12 PM, Nathan <nawrich@gmail.com> wrote:
I'm not convinced that sexual images is a gender gap issue. But my non-expert opinion is that there is, or ought to be, a degree of feminist interest in the problems of model releases and age verification. I've always thought it strange that Andreas, and privatemusings before him, focused primarily on the very low probability that someone might accidentally stumble onto sexual images... to the near exclusion of the far more important problem, to me, of hosting potentially thousands of images where the subject is unknown, unaware of the publication of the image and did not (and would not have) given permission for such publication. For most images on Commons of a sexual nature there is no model release and no age verification, but despite the Board resolution and the lip-service paid to personality rights on Commons, there have been only minimal efforts to rectify this problem.
Nathan, I agree with you that the consent issue is a huge problem. Wikimedia is allowing people to upload revenge porn (= sexual images of ex-partners) anonymously, without models' knowledge or consent, and editors then use this kind of material to illustrate articles.
Editors are pinching hundreds of private sexual images off Flickr and upload them to Wikimedia sites without asking Flickr account owners for consent, in violation of the board resolution.
The March/April thread on personality rights I started on the Commons list was exactly about that:
Even after that post it took over a month to get these images deleted, after a total of six or seven deletion nominations: even though Commons knew all along that the models did not want these images on Wikimedia.
Commons has images here
from an uploader who has written on Commons,
First of all, I am the photographer of this photo [dianaoftripoli]. I'm not even sure WHY this photo is on Wikimedia. the photo was posted on my Flickr account. This is in violation of how I want the photo to be used, so I do want it to be taken DOWN. For the record, no one involved in that project was underage. This conversation is completely idiotic. It was a college final project and of course it was taken with a high quality camera and of course it doesn't match my normal life because it is ART. You're all crazy. REMOVE this photo from this site and all others that I have taken. If you need to contact me, contact me directly via Flickr. Do NOT publish any more of my photos on another site WITHOUT my consent. PERIOD. FURTHERMORE, your posting of my photography AND COMMENTARY are in VIOLATION of my PRIVATE life and those who are in the photographs. You all should be ASHAMED. Bunch of speculative meddlers. Find something better to do and respect other people's privacy.
and Commons is STILL refusing to delete her images. I did my best to get them deleted, bringing them to the attention of the Wikimedia UK chair, who nominated them for deletion. To no avail (well, one of the images was deleted; it was a simulated image of a naked woman having her throat cut in a bathtub). Any help on consent issues is very much appreciated, Nathan.
I am sorry – this thread may now actually be in danger of derailing the discussion. If people want to debate this further, but consensus is that the discussion should take place elsewhere, we could perhaps create a page on Meta.
Andreas
