Pete,

We did discuss the issues of 2257 record-keeping and so forth for several months last year. But even the watered-down version of the proposed Sexual content policy was roundly rejected in the "big poll":

http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Commons_talk:Sexual_content/Archive_6#Seco...

This was the proposed policy that was put to the vote last December:

http://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?title=Commons:Sexual_content&ol...

Our methods of establishing subject consent for sexual images have always struck me as extremely dicey. By e-mail??? I have seriously considered whether we should ask porn companies to donate sexual imags. (From GLAM to GLAMP.) At least the record-keeping requirements would be fulfilled. Or ask university sexologists. But "girlfriend" pictures are a liability. (And why is there not a single image of a black penis in Commons? Perhaps we need to form another outreach list ...)

A small success I have achieved is that the Shankbone topless vacuum cleaner images are no longer housed in the category "People using vacuum cleaners" (where they were the only images present until a couple of weeks ago).

Another issue that came up recently was what to do about freely licensed, self-published defamatory material. This is probably not the best venue for this, but on the other hand, Charlotte being a lawyer, I would be interested in her view. The related discussion is here:

http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Commons:Village_pump/Archive/2011/06#Using... click the encyclopediadramatica.ch link! It's just shock images.)

Andreas

Pete wrote:Charlotte, you present a well-researched and compelling point. There havebeen efforts to inject some rationality into the curation of images on Commons; I'm hoping that some of those who've been involved with that will comment here. It seems that your research could pretty easily be compiled into a policy or set of guidelines, and be put to use without a great deal of effort.

Fred, while that's an interesting debate, I'm not sure how it relates to Charlotte's point? Charlotte's point turns on "sexually explicit conduct" as defined in a specific piece of the U.S. code. I don't think the images you reference could possibly be covered by that definition. Is there some connection I'm missing?

Can anybody speak to how this part of the law is reflected in policies on Commons, and whether there have been recent efforts to reconcile the two? My sense is that Charlotte is probably right, and that posting the argument she makes on the appropriate page in Commons could support the images' removal without a whole lot of room for argument. I know these things can be contentious, but I don't see much wiggle room on this one.

-Pete