[WikiEN-l] Crediting images inside the article text

[Iain Huxley]

 >Shouldn't photo credits be allowed *only* in the image description page?

 >I don't see why images would have a special status when compared to text
 >contributions, the credits for which are found also a click away, in the
 >edit history.

This could have the effect of greatly reducing the images available 
for use, particularly those of high quality and/or limited availability.

I recently have been up against such an issue when trying to find 
some good photographs of whale images for the sperm whale and blue 
whale pages (the blue whale page has resorted to using a postage 
stamp as its main image).

It turns out any underwater photos of these creatures - let alone 
good ones - are in very short supply.  After a while of searching I 
found the stock agency http://seapics.com which has many fantastic 
pictures you'd have trouble finding elsewhere (while not a fair 
comparison, to get an idea try searching for sperm whale or blue 
whale at seapics.com and then try the same at images.google.com).

I'm now writing a letter to seapics (snail-mail still has an extra 
value sometimes :) to try to obtain explicit permission for use on 
wikipedia.  These folk sell images for tens or even hundreds of 
thousands of dollars depending on use (some info at 
http://seapics.com/information/clients/pricing.html).

Due to the high exposure, allowing just one of their images to be 
used in wikipedia would be a significant donation to wikipedial; to 
be honest I don't think I have a particularly good chance of success here.

**But** if I couldn't guarantee credits where used, I could be pretty 
sure my chances would be nil.

My understanding is that we currently accept images with credit 
required when used, so changing this policy would also mean a massive 
amount of work.

I'm strongly in favor of allowing credits inside the article, but 
discouraging it - favoring images where the copyright holder has no 
such requirements.

--Iain
[newbie]