[WikiEN-l] overzealous image deletion?

[geni]

On 12/5/06, Steve Bennett <stevagewp at gmail.com> wrote:
> I've been assuming that the policy about not applying "fair use" for
> these photographs was entirely of Wikipedia's design, and is not
> really related to copyright law. You're suggesting that we're actually
> breaking copyright law if we do use "fair use" for promotional
> photographs instead of going out and taking a new photo. Does anyone
> know either way?
>

It depends.

Questions of what the law says can only really be answered on a case
by case basis and generealy need to be quite carefuly defined (for
example a trivial answer to you question is that it would be illegal
but that is because you failed to specify the legal system you were
tlaking about).

> Can you steal a promotional image which some B grade hollywood star
> desperately wants everyone to use at any opportunity?

Certainly the most obvious case would be one in which the hollywood
star did not own the copyright to the photo.

> I certainly
> agree with you about people filling gaps - I've taken quite a few
> "gap-filler" photos myself - but taking good photos of celebrities is
> pretty hard. Here's an example:
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Jerry_Seinfeld_%281997%29.jpg
>
> We're not even sure that this *is* a free image, and this is at the
> better end of the scale of the free celebrity photos we have. And do
> you think Seinfeld, his publicist, us, or anyone is really happy that
> we have a crappy photo of him rather than a professionally executed
> publicity shot?

The publicist is free to release a photo under a lisence we can use.


-- 
geni