On 2/24/07, Nick Wilkins nlwilkins@gmail.com wrote:
One of the common concerns that image owners bring up is the potential for commercial re-use of their images. Would it be proper to make it explicit that uploading the image (and placing it under a free license) means that they would have to allow that? In a perfect world, they would read and understand the text of the license; of course, it's not a perfect world. Regardless that they *should* know, it would probably be good if we did our best to avoid the situation where uploaders get mad at us when they find out the "hard way" that their images can be used commercially by others.
People with those concerns should be pointed to this essay written by Eloquence and now hosted at the Definition of Free Cultural Works site:
http://freedomdefined.org/Licenses/NC
Or give them the extremely quick summary: the viral nature of copyleft licences (the "share-alike" provisions) prevents commercial exploitation while allowing commercial innovation.
Whether it's appropriate stuff to mention on the upload form, I don't know.