[Foundation-l] [Wikipedia-l] contents under education/information licenses - related question

[luke brandt]

Rama Rama wrote:
> Gregory, I fear that there might be some sort of misunderstanding here.
> 
> I think that we all share the same ideal of information sharing.
> However, practically, there are constraints with which we have to
> accomodate.
> 
> In this case, we might wish that the CNES put their photographs in the
> Public Domain, but our wishes are irrelevant because this is
> impossible. (Furthermore, I feel that you are quite unfair to the
> CNES, because it is not their choice anyway).
> 
> Since we are already using non-free images under "fair use"
> conditions, I fail to understand how the "if it's not Free it sucks"
> type of discourse is relevant.
> 
> The question is that, *practically*, there are Wikipedia which for
> different reasons do not have Fair Use provision ; that there is a
> legitimate need for some photographs ; and that we have people quite
> willing to share their photographs as much as they possibly can.
> 
> In this respect, it is legitimate to wonder whether Wikipedia which to
> not have Fair Use might allow themselves to use these images. Lyrical
> discourses relying on the Judgement of History contribute little to
> the discussion.
> 
>   -- Rama

I think this ties in and relates closely with this discourse. Does the
Foundation have an official policy on the ongoing Fair use / Free
content discussion? To explain briefly, it seems to have been accepted
until now that US 'fair use' isn't inconsistent with the GFDL, but does
the Foundation have an up-to-date view on whether fair use should be
kept to a bare minimum, or whether it should be ultimately disallowed
on, for example, the EN Wikipedia and all Wikipedias? Or is there some
other official standpoint on fair use in Wikipedias? Luke