Matt Brown wrote:
There is a strong argument that those concerned with freedom should aggressively use the provisions of Fair Use - explicitly to never allow the fiction that copyright owners have absolute control to establish itself. Fair Use is equivalent to a public right of way, in a sense - and should not be a right allowed to lapse through unuse.
I have great sympathy for this argument, of course. But I also have great sympathy for the argument that relying too easily on fair use (no matter how justified it may be in a given situation) is discouraging to people who are trying to provide free alternatives.
Terry Foote (who works in the office with me) loves baseball. He goes to a lot of baseball games and takes pictures of players. He then puts those photos into Wikipedia. A great hobby, a great thing to do.
It's always a little disappointing to him, though, when he goes to put in a photo and sees a "fair use" photo already there. He'd like for his work to be making Wikipedia a lot better, and of course it *does*.
There are many cases like this, in my opinion, where we are currently relying on (perfectly valid) fair use claims, but in which those photos are discouraging people from developing alternatives.
This is a balancing act.
--Jimbo