As an artist and art historian I am firm in the belief that the artist ought to be acknowledged  Copyright protects the ownership of living artists and the more recently deceased Decency ought to respect the ownership of earlier artists and those who are still living but have permitted use of their work   I dont have any difficult about using without acknowledgment the very average pointandclick snapshots that get uploaded without being cropped or straightened  But when Wikipedia has photos uploaded that are carefully composed and are artworks in their own right then the author needs acknowledgment  It is probably wrong of me to make a distinction here but there appears to be a difference between the camera holder functioning simply as a recorder and functioning as a thinking planning creative artist Strangely enough it is often the takers of badly lit lopsided holidays snaps that want to be acknowledged  It is I suppose a value judgement that I may not be entitled to make  However some of the worlds top photographers have chosen to upload their works to Wikipedia I would no more use a portrait by Allen Warren without stating the author than I would use a portrait by Van Dyck or Gainsborough  Tell me we know when copyright drops out but at what point do you think the right of acknowledgment of creative effort and real talent should cease