The reasons put forward on why images must be allowed to be profited from can be summarized thus:
(1) "Maybe you should explain WHY you have the policy of not allowing people to "get rich" off your work first. There's nothing wrong with commerce. In fact, in today's society commerce is pretty much required for survival."
In answer to that; I can only say that this seems to be the very antithesis of what I thought Wikipedia to be; people providing free material, for a free resource. How does Wikipedia justify its policy on not getting rich quick? I am not proposing a shutdown of western society (although given how the planet is going as a result, dredging sandworms for fuel, clearcutting the amazon for profit, one could go that way); I'm arguing that there should be a space for those who wish to contribute out of the good of their hearts, for a better, freer, society. I thought Wikipedia stood for this; apparently I was wrong, as also evidenced by reason (2):
(2) "On the other hand, have you considered getting rich off ours?... I hear that running Google ads on well-formatted copies of Wikipedia can be quite lucrative." and "commercial re-use of Wikipedia isn't limited to certain people, you can take part too."
My purchase price, I'm afraid, is a little higher than that. ----------------------
Having dismissed the most objectionable objections, we come to more reasonable ones.
(3) "The goal of Wikipedia is "to create and provide a freely licensed and high quality encyclopedia to every single person on the planet in his or her own language....In order to achieve that goal...This necessarily includes... for-profit ... uses"
I realize this has other implications, in terms of funding, but I'll deal with that later. First, I wish to disabuse the notion that "freedom" cant be gained unless and until everyone has made a buck from something freely given. Is love only truly free when someone pays for it? There is a perfectly acceptable, CC-nc designation, which means that everyone - including Bill Gates - can use the material as they wish. They are just prevented, for now, for all time, from buying out Wikipedia and copyrighting it. I'll come back to that.
(4) "However, allowing for-profit uses can make the information even more widely available; for example, it encourages people to make derivative works that build on it, or to make and sell hard copies to other people."
This becomes even more reasonable. However, at what price does accessibility come? A quick look around the web shows whats happening; commercial sites like About.com are encouraged to derivatize Wikipedia by loading the page with ads, as suggested by one of our commercially-minded contributers above. Does it REALLY help people to have a copy available on Ebay for $5? How about someone selling links to the site to gullible buyers at $1 a pop? I'm not convinced that any for-profit body has materially benefitted Wikipedia by having been derivatized, or sold as hard copies.
(5) "if there are parts that have more restrictive licences (for example, no commercial use), a commercial redistributor would have to go through the entire encyclopedia checking the licence of every single illustration. "
Looking at the wonderful system that is Wikipedia, and all the coding that went into it; it strikes me as strange that no filter can be written, such that a user cannot simply tick a checkbox, yielding a version of Wikipedia for his/her perusal consistent with any of the copyright classifications available. If a user ticks "not nc", for example, he would be able to see/download/pilfer everything which is "not nc" in wikipedia. It doesnt seem insurmountable.
Which brings us to our last, most reasonable proposition
(6) "And our commercial mirrors bring in new business, make donations and have helped pay wages for Wikipedia employees." "put on DVD, and sold for ten euros(?). A large swathe of this went back to the Foundation"
I have no objection to any use of the images, for non-profit use. That is, if Wikipedia makes money from selling disks to people, I'm fine by that, provided that the money is used to fund wikipedia. I *do* have a problem if someone -say a newspaper - lifts one of my images from Wikipedia, and uses it instead of paying for their own photography, and makes a profit therefrom. Now I'm not the legal expert here that most are, and I suppose "non-profit" use may not cover the generation of money by non-profit organizations. In which case, I dare say, the same people could find a way to write this and include it in the Wiki License. The sole remaining objection to me appears to be that people like me arent ponying up to donate cash to provide whats required to run Wikipedia. And that is, I guess, true. So we need to turn to Satan, and prostitute ourselves, so that some people will have access to free material. And in response to those who ask me to consider the profit enterprises as only american-as-apple-pie patriots, Let me just respond that there are already many for-profit encyclopedias in existence. If Wikipedia becomes just another way for a corporation to make money, it will not improve over the already excellent content provided by these worthy capitalists.
Let's be clear about the danger of consorting with the enemy (because like it or hate it, those who would fence in the commons are always at odds with those who would free resources to all); that Danger is seen in how Bill Gates has bought the rights to the digitial reproduction of huge amounts of Art that is (or should be) public domain. Bill Gates has seen to it that Java has become a little part of Windows. Private enterprises now own the right to use turmeric as a medicine; and are patenting life forms. Yes, it is unfortunately true that anywhere one CAN make a buck, someone WILL be trying to capture it. "I hear that running Google ads on well-formatted copies of Wikipedia can be quite lucrative." What happens when Bill Gates, or Larry Ellison, or someone else builds a new and better gizmo, which makes the Internet obsolete? Or whatever; just say that the experience of Wikipedia becomes a thousand times better on it, than as it is at present. But the new format is proprietary. Sure the CONTENT is free - but the licensing of the new technology is not. And say that this fictitious company adds new material, such that wikipedia-old becomes obsolete? Who will use the free version anymore? What if Google generates a superpedia; in which it uses Wikipedia as a base, but adds on vast new access to its own-sourced info? Who will use Wikipedia then? Embrace and Extend has killed off more than one open-source before. One of the most significant protections against this is the prohibition against for-profit use.
I would encourage people to consider other possibilities, other than engaging in or with the for-profiteers. One suggestion would be to sell and widely distribute DVDs, by some of the wikipedia wage-earners, all profits going back to pay for the system. Make it $20 for all I care. I dont even mind policies whereby other non-profits can use the free material.
But embracing embrace and extend, is a dangerous gamble.
postscript. I may contribute some images, I'll have to consider the matter more deeply now. Perhaps some images that no commercial company would want to use; or perhaps a resolution unsuited to commercial useage. I'll continue to contribute information; but the idea that someday some Mogul might squeeze Wikipedia out of existence, and incorporate its assets, just as surely as Netscape was lost to AOL-Time-Warner, will probably have an affect on my desire to help create something new. A world asset which was never saleable to the highest bidder.