Wikipedia talk:Elimination of Fair Use Rationale in Promotional Photos/Vote

message: I am a very strong beleiver that fair use images of living people should be permitted but the rationale altered to encourage a replaceable image to be restored immeditely if found. I have added fair use images of many living people where it is not always likely a free image will become available and it really is a very important part of the article to physically identify the subject particularly when it is an image for such media coverage anyway- but certain wikilawyers delete them even though a fair use rationale is give. Taking away the photo seriuosly affects the qulaity of the article and takes away a valuable info resource. While I do also agree with the concept of freeness, I do also take the quality of wikipedia as an encyclopedia very seriously and anything whiches compromises the qulaity of knowledge I disagree with. I suggest that the tagging is changed to this image must be deleted immeditely when a free image becomes available. THis way the article will always have the resource but will encourage a replaceable image to be found. As wikipedia grows I hope there will be a branch which specializes in the search for free images for use on wikipedia. In response to Big DT of course Wikipedia shoudln't be an archive of promotional photos. Images should be used to imrove the qulaity of an article only and identify the subject described certainly not for some archiveErnst Stavro Blofeld 20:35, 23 December 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Promotional images of living people should be regarded as temporary

message: Some users are contacting others in order to come here. If this continues, the poll should be closed as there is a clear side who is contacting users to support their cause. -- ReyBrujo 20:49, 23 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: There is no need at all to worry about that.  The poll is entirely bogus to start with, so people can vote as they please, it makes no difference.  We don't get to better policy by having extremists digging in their heels and voting.  We get to a better policy by discussion and compromise, looking for common ground, etc.  Since this proposal cuts clearly against the right thing to do and the ongoing trend toward noticing that we no longer NEED lame fair use excuses to get great content, it will go nowhere anyway.  The poll is simply a distraction from the serious hard work of figuring out how to get where we all want to be: free and high quality images in Wikipedia.--Jimbo Wales 02:05, 24 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Jimbo, has the wiki lawyers chimed in on what "fair use" promotional images mean to potential for wikipedia getting sued?  Or is this just a philosophical issue?  Don't think of this question as troll, I'm actually interested in why an issue so obviously heated and splitting wikipedians relating to a topic that IRL law and lawyers couldn't sort out.Hackajar 04:31, 24 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Brad chimed in when this same was discussed for Portals. And, as Jimbo, he opposed the amendment because of conviction. In short, Don't seek sanctuary in the law. Make the law irrelevant. Provide free content everywhere you can. -- ReyBrujo 04:44, 25 December 2006 (UTC)

text: Please feel free to contact other users and user groups regarding the poll. As with any poll, this poll needs attention in order to reach a conclusion. The issue of fair use a significant issue, the issue has been publicised outside Wikipedia , it would be ideal if all users could comment. Cedars 21:04, 23 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: It is not a matter of "I contact my side, you contact yours". The notification must be done in the correct boards (Village Pump, Fair Use, etc), not individuals. All those who have been notified are supporting this amendment, which implies votestacking. -- ReyBrujo 21:46, 23 December 2006 (UTC)

text: It seems to me that it would be appropriate to contact anyone who has expressed an opinion on this issue in the last few months, at least.  The idea that contacting people is "vote stacking" seems highly problematic to me.  Cedars contacted me, but I've been going on about this subject for months now.  Are you suggesting a better option would have been for me not to be aware of this?   The idea that votes should just be let be to let people randomly come across them seems problematic to me. john k 21:28, 23 December 2006 (UTC)

text: So far, only those who have supported this amendment have been contact, from what I see. -- ReyBrujo 21:46, 23 December 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Votestacking alarm 

message: A note - it provide a far better sample if items such as this could be on a page readily found by the general public that uses Wikipedia.  I'd love to see a one paragraph discussion of each side's viewpoints and rationales, and offer millions of people the opportunity to vote as such.  Doing so would provide a real viewpoint on the subject from a wider cross-section of actual users, as opposed to affected editors who happen to know about this page.  If that was done, I have every confidence a large majority of our readers would rather be able to see fair use images.  Tvccs 20:50, 23 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Oh, yes. Excellent point. Elitism in decision-making is the breeding ground for agendas not in the interest of the public good. CyberAnth 21:08, 23 December 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Summaries 

message: As currently written, this proposal wouldn't even change anything.
Copyrighted promotional photographs of living people (including bands) may be used in articles about those people if no free alternative photograph is available and the photograph complies with all other fair use criteria. When a free image becomes available it should replace the copyrighted promotional photograph as explained by the first dot point.
This would still permit deletion any time a "free alternative photograph" is available, which is true in most cases. Many of the supporters of this proposal express a desire to use fair-use promo photos in cases where there is no free alternative photograph of similar quality. If that's really what we're debating here, then the proposed wording should reflect that. Perel 21:56, 23 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: The half-dozen editors who have done most of the deletion of the 40,000+ images over the past month or so have not interpreted the policy that way.  In fact, they state that if a "free" alternative photo COULD be created, that means the photo must be deleted.  And delete they have (more often than not without notification to the uploader, posting to the discussion page of the article on which the photo appears, etc.).  Badagnani 22:00, 23 December 2006 (UTC)

text: It is correct the proposal will not change anything. It is not actually intended to change anything it is intended to clarify the present situation. Badagnani has actually explained the situation much better than me. Cedars 22:02, 23 December 2006 (UTC)

text: I think that for a free use image of a living person to replace a fair use image, it should have to be of a certain minimal quality - in focus, not terrible resolution, showing the person's face at enough detail so that it's identifiable.  I don't really care about "comparable quality", just a certain minimum quality - if the free picture isn't good enough to be in wikipedia, then it shouldn't be an argument to delete a fair use image of the same subject. john k 22:48, 23 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I'd be fine with that phrasing. "comparable quality" may not be the right term, but the phrase should somehow get across that an out-of-focus super-low-resolution mis-exposed snapshot isn't a "free alternative photograph". Perel 02:10, 24 December 2006 (UTC)

text: Well, I agree with the former, and disagree with the latter.  If we don't know if any free images exist, but there are some copyrighted images that we can fairly use with no legal difficulties, why shouldn't we use them?  If we later find a free picture, we can replace it.  If we don't, then your plan is simply demanding that we not use one of the most powerful tools the law provides us with to create a good encyclopedia. john k 07:34, 24 December 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Phrasing of the proposal 

message: The two 'promotional' photographs examples that are provided -- Unwritten Law (image|article) and Tool (image|article) -- are not Wikipedia promotional photographs. Neither Wikipedia image page provide evidence that the photos are promotional photo.  There is no link on the Wikipedia image page to a page that says something like "this is a promotional photo."  There is no link on the Wikipedia image page to a page that says something like "this promotional photo is owned by company xyz." Also, there is no link on the Wikipedia image page to a page where the owner of the promotional photo provide rights to reuse the photos.  Further, there is no link on the Wikipedia image page to a page where the owner of the promotional photo provides rights to reuse the photos that would permit reuse on Wikipedia.  The two example photos do not meet the requirements to use any  promotional photo templates. Thus, the proposal is faulty.-- Jreferee 17:07, 24 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: *P.S. Tool (image|article) is a fair use photo because it uniquely conveys the band and who they are and illustrates a subject for which no free image could reasonably be found or created. -- Jreferee 17:44, 24 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: In promotional pictures, we don't need to reproduce the situation when the image was taken, just the individuals. In example, I would not care to contact Flickr users to see if they could release images like www.flickr.com/photos/musicfreak/163069875/, www.flickr.com/photos/lukaszr/202176909/, www.flickr.com/photos/lukaszr/202176909/ or http://www.flickr.com/photos/adamdi/227085004/ with a free license. Sure, they don't show all the members, or they are not as good as the promotional, but they would be free. Individual articles can have better images to show their faces (if that guitarist ever raises his head in concerts, that is :-P). -- ReyBrujo 18:18, 24 December 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: The proposal is faulty because the example images are not promotional photos

message: ===Get permission===
As noted above, Wikipedia is important enough to request and receive freely licensed promotional images and other images.  I routinely email out requests to use photos and usually get the permission because of Wikipedia's status as an encyclopedia leader.  It takes me about three minutes to compose and send out a request to use an image.  I added my form request letter here. -- Jreferee 18:13, 24 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: As I suggested above, maybe it is time to create a WikiProject Free Image to coordinate efforts when obtaining images (as in contacting an agency just once to request several images at the same time instead of sending them several mails with a single petition each, creating a single entry point to where these agencies, companies, etc, could contact us with questions (to free the Foundation from things we can do ourselves), maintaining indexes of images these companies offered to review their contributions, tracking down license changes or updates, image exchanges and reviewing that the images are being used in Wikipedia with conditions they have stated (in example, they could request us that every image should have a caption stating the image has been donated by them; the WikiProject would review every article where the image is being used to see this condition is being fulfilled). -- ReyBrujo 18:43, 24 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I think this might be a very good idea. Perhaps you could also suggest this at the village pump of commons? TeunSpaans 05:26, 26 December 2006 (UTC)

text: I heartily encourage all the deletionists to join the Wikipedia free papparazzi. Tvccs 12:48, 25 December 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Alternatives to fair use

message: As noted above, Wikipedia is important enough to request and receive freely licensed promotional images and other images.  I routinely email out requests to use photos and usually get the permission because of Wikipedia's status as an encyclopedia leader.  It takes me about three minutes to compose and send out a request to use an image.  I added my form request letter here. -- Jreferee 18:13, 24 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: As I suggested above, maybe it is time to create a WikiProject Free Image to coordinate efforts when obtaining images (as in contacting an agency just once to request several images at the same time instead of sending them several mails with a single petition each, creating a single entry point to where these agencies, companies, etc, could contact us with questions (to free the Foundation from things we can do ourselves), maintaining indexes of images these companies offered to review their contributions, tracking down license changes or updates, image exchanges and reviewing that the images are being used in Wikipedia with conditions they have stated (in example, they could request us that every image should have a caption stating the image has been donated by them; the WikiProject would review every article where the image is being used to see this condition is being fulfilled). -- ReyBrujo 18:43, 24 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I think this might be a very good idea. Perhaps you could also suggest this at the village pump of commons? TeunSpaans 05:26, 26 December 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Get permission

message: Maybe you personally cannot take the photo, but there are Wikipedians all over the world and at least one may be able to get the photo for you.  GabrielF's  Wikipedia Photo Matching Service gives you the ability to access these Wikipedians (or become one).-- Jreferee 18:13, 24 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I heartily encourage all the deletionists to join the Wikipedia free papparazzi. Tvccs 12:48, 25 December 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Photo Matching Service

message: The issue here is (i) where a company's posted promotional license does not meet all the terms of a GNU Free Documentation License (GFDL) and (ii) largely because of the company's posted promotional license, Wikipedia's use of the image meets all four Copyright fair use factors, (iii) should the image still be deleted under Wikipedia's first fair use criterion if a free equivalent is available or could be created that would adequately give the same information? -- Jreferee 19:10, 24 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I don't think this is particularly the issue.  The main issue, I think, is what "could be created" means, and whether it's reasonable to  say that images of living people are reasonably replaceable.  I think everyone would agree that if a free equivalent is available which conveys the same information, we should delete the promo image. (There is also some dispute, perhaps, about what "adequately conveying the same information" means, exactly, and how broadly this should be interpreted). john k 20:13, 24 December 2006 (UTC)

text: The issue here is that fair use images in this instance do not harm the project in any way, and losing the images makes the articles worse.  As there's no harm, and the photos improve the articles, they should be allowed until a free equivalent is available to replace it with.  That's the entire issue. --badlydrawnjeff talk 20:34, 24 December 2006 (UTC)

text: Perhaps there are nuances here I haven't seen.  In my experience, most images tagged with  don't have a "posted promotional license" at all.  They are either explicitly copyrighted, or simply released without any statement whatever (and therefore presumably copyrighted).  Can you give an example of a posted promotional license, please? -- Visviva 02:21, 25 December 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: What really is the issue here

message: So to condense and bullet "the heart of the matter": 
An apparent majority of Wikipedia editors are thinking it may be best if <I>no one</I> gets paid, i.e., they reject the clause in the GFDL allowing commercial use, now that they see that the price of allowing said *commercial use* means no to nil *fair use* in Wikipedia content they care enough about to author.
Thoughts?
CyberAnth 04:50, 25 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Hmm... majority? You are the only one who is clearly wanting to go against the GFDL to allow commercial reuse. Badagnani did speak, but I took him as a curious question and not a full rejection of GFDL like you. -- ReyBrujo 05:38, 25 December 2006 (UTC)

text: As explained below, Personality rights issues dictate that a GFDL'ed photo is no more usable in a commercial setting than a fair use image.  In fact, in a commercial situation, the latter is much less likely to get you in trouble than the former because the person in question has full control of the content of the photo and doesn't have concerns of being shown without the right makeup and hair.  You can't use commercial applications as an argument for GFDL as opposed to fair use...at least not in the 28 US states. Quebec and other places where personality rights laws have been enacted. SteveBaker 14:30, 25 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: So what about the 160+ countries that have no "fair use" clause in theyr copyrihgt laws then? Even iff personality rights somehow mean that absolutely no commercial use of any image of any person is allowed (wich seems unlikely, as far as I can tell it just limits "expolitation", so I would think commercial re-distribution of article content would still be fine). On the other hand a GFDL licensed image would at the very least allow the ~250 non-English Wikipedia projects that generaly don't allow fair use to use the image. So either way a free licensed image would allow a great deal more use and value to the projects than any promotional photo ever would. --Sherool (talk) 17:43, 25 December 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: To condense "the heart of the matter"

message: This exchange between an interviewer and Jimmy Wales may shed light on the reasons behind the much-touted "absolutely free" German Wikipeida.  In all the discussion of German Wikipedia that has come up in reference to its deletion of all fair use content, I have not once heard this marketing arrangement mentioned.  And I would very much like to know more about Wikipedia's profit-sharing arrangment with Answers.com for their use of our content.  I cannot find anything about that at Answers.com, although I believe it is significant enough to merit discussion there.
Excerpt from http://writingshow.com/?page_id=91:
:WS: Are you going to be doing any revenue sharing from any of these other projects like the German version being sold on CD and DVD by the German publisher, or any other you know….?
:JW [Jimmy Wales]: Yeah, absolutely. The main thing that we really want to try to avoid is to have any advertising on the Web site, but there are other revenue opportunities in terms of licensing our trademark for sales of DVDs, for example, in Germany that’s being experimented with. And for example, Answers.com has a software tool. They put out a Wikipedia edition of their software tool, and when people use that tool and visit the Answers.com site, then they split the ad revenue with us. So that’s a way that they are trying to give back to the community and benefit us.  Badagnani 08:38, 25 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Anyone can use our content, that's what the GFDL is all about. Answers.com just interacts a bit more closely with the foundation, and are kind enough to donate some of the profits back to Wikimedia and sponsor some events and stuff. See things like Wikipedia:Tools/1-Click Answers, foundation:Benefactors, meta:Wikimedia partners and hosts and . --Sherool (talk) 12:16, 25 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: That's pretty much it. Wikimedia is not rolling in the dough from this; no one at Wikimedia is becoming personally wealthy from doing this. We're taking in some money from making it easier for others to use this free content, but not even enough alone to keep the site afloat, which is why we hold fundraisers. Our financial statements are available here Kat Walsh (spill your mind?) 20:28, 25 December 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: "Profit-sharing" with Answers.com and related matters

message: Several people have mentioned Personality rights as a reason why a publicity photo used under 'fair use' might actually be more legal than a 'free' photograph - which might potentially get us into legal trouble because of Personality rights in some parts of the world - where a photo that was explicitly offered for publicity purposes ought to be free from legal entanglements, even though there is still an active copyright on it.
Whilst I'm in favor of the ability to use 'fair use' in this circumstance, I have to say that the evidence is that the Personality Rights laws only seem to apply if you use the image of some celebrity commercially.   So I don't think we ever have to actively prefer 'fair use' - a free use image should be just as legal.
However, those on the extreme of the 'anti-fair-use' camp need to be aware that even images licensed under GFDL cannot be considered utterly free of legal entanglements.  If you use a GFDL image of a celebrity to advertise your brand of soap powder - you're still in trouble.  Hence we cannot reasonably say that Wikipedia's content is going to be completely and utterly free.  We could be in trouble if we wished to sell a paper copy of Wikipedia (for example) since that would be a commercial use - and under some juristictions gets us into trouble.
SteveBaker 02:35, 25 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Being free content doesn't preclude having or obtaining a publicity rights release. It should be noted that when we use a unlicensed image we aren't gaining the benefit of whatever publicity rights releases were made to the actual copyright holders of the image we are using. It's really an orthogonal issue. You can have a free or non-free image with or without a release. As far as our own use and peril goes, in the US at least editorial use trumps publicity rights every single time. --Gmaxwell 10:51, 25 December 2006 (UTC)

text: In my personal and completely un-lawyer like opinion we should still prefeer a free licensed image over a promotional one. The personality rights still apply to the promotional image in addition to the copyright, while the free licensed image at least does not have any copyright related entanglements. There are a lot of situations where local laws may forbid the use of our content even if it's freely licensed, but in those cases it rely is the responsibility of the re-use to take local laws into acount. For example :Image:Nazi Swastika.svg is public domain, but if you use it for decoration in a number of European countries you may still get arrested or fined, this is covered by Wikipedia:General disclaimer#Jurisdiction and legality of content. I don't see personality rights as beeing fundamentaly different, some uses in some areas are forbidden, but for everyting else a free licensed images is still vastly more free than any promotional photo ever will be, it might warrant en extra disclaimer on the image page, but that's about it IMHO. --Sherool (talk) 13:03, 25 December 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Personality rights/Right of Publicity 

message: There are degrees of replaceability.  For example, a screenshot from a movie to illustrate the movie, a corporate logo, or an event poster, are all 100% irreplaceable.  Even if we had all of the time/resources/talent in the world, we could never produce a free version of those things because anything we could produce would only be a derivative of a non-free work.  Make a drawing of the Enterprise - you still have a derivative of something copyrighted by Paramount.  Make a painting of the Rose Bowl logo?  You still have a derivative of something copyrighted.  That's what irreplaceable is - we're talking about items where there is no such thing as a free version.  But when we're talking about photos and not movie screenshots ... that's a whole different ballgame.  Even if the person is dead ... there is potentially such a thing as a "free" version of a photo of Reggie White, for instance.  We may not have one ... but we could potentially convince someone who photographed him to release their photo under the GFDL.  With Star Trek, that's patently impossible.  Paramount could never release a drawing, photo, screenshot, whatever, of the Enterprise under the GFDL or they would lose their ability to exclusively market it.  With a movie screenshot, corporate logo, etc, there is no such thing as a free version, there never can be, and never will be.  Those are 100% irreplaceable.  But for anything else, we need to be moving away from questionably claiming fair use on any random thing we find on the internet and move towards trying to acquire free versions. BigDT 06:06, 27 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Thank you. Although a minor aside: Paramount could in theory release a single frame (for example).. although they wouldn't be able to stop further derived works, it probably wouldn't harm them since most of the derived works will happen anyways and they can't stop them without bad PR (fanart and the like). That said, I favor an interpretation of policy which would regard such things as irreplaceable. The easiest way to express the form of fair use that you are talking about would be something like "You may use an excerpt of a copyrighted work in an article which is providing analysis or critical commentary on that work." This notion is one of the core concepts underlying the existence of fair use in US law, that the exclusive rights of a copyright holder should not squash normal public discourse, criticism, or academic research. It is this material and this material alone why I do not support a policy which would completely prohibit non-free materials in Wikipedia.--Gmaxwell 06:19, 27 December 2006 (UTC)

text: Nope. This is a philosophy built on what-ifs and logical extremes. It's not the kind of ground to build a philosophy on. It's wobbly. The trick is to moderate and find the steady ground that benefits all, not one philosophical pole. - Stick Fig 06:32, 27 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: This "anything we find on the Internet" supposed atttiude as a basis for "policy" is ludicrous - we are talking about legitimate press and promo photos, some obtained directly from the artists themselves.  I have no problem with not using non-legitimate photos, as well as substituting quality free images when they are actually available.  I radically disagree with the idea that the only images placeable on Wikipedia of living persons, or dead, should somehow be free and unable to use press or promophotos, unlike every other publication on the planet. The vast majority or artists I deal with are not readily available to be photographed by the Wikipedia papparazzi, do not and will not have GFDL images available, and/or choose not to release their own material under a GFDL license.  Tvccs 11:07, 27 December 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  We really need a more restrictive policy, not a less restrictive one 

message: In rereading the project page, or what's left of it, I noticed the comment from Jimbo that we should have a proper poll after a proper debate.  Care to provide guidance/ideas as to what a "proper debate" and a "proper poll" mean in this context?  Tvccs 03:24, 29 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Note, in example, how the French Wikipedia handled the banning of Fair use. A month of discussion, followed by a month of voting. However, I go back to what I said somewhere else (at WT:FU or here, can't remember): It is clear that these polls can be made to tighten the free concept (in example, removing fair use cases), but not to lessen the concept (in example, adding new types of fair use). -- ReyBrujo 04:30, 29 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Then your above two comments predispose an inevitable outcome, as opposed to anything else.  Tvccs 06:01, 29 December 2006 (UTC)

text: That's ridiculous.  What this means is that if some terrible decision is made, we can never take it back.  What basis do you have for believing this to be "clear"? john k 17:57, 29 December 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  A Proper Poll? 

message: I found THIS on the French Wikipedia, in English, but have not found it on the English version. CyberAnth 07:51, 29 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: That is an obsolete two year old essay :-) -- ReyBrujo 12:31, 29 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Okay, thanks. :-) CyberAnth 04:27, 1 January 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  What's with this? 

message: User:Chowbok has a boilerplate at User:Chowbok/Photo request boilerplate for requesting "free" images from famous people. Here is the letter copied from the source: 
Dear [whoever],
I am one of the many volunteer editors of the English Wikipedia
(en.wikipedia.org), the free encyclopedia. Wikipedia is among the
most-visited sites on the Internet, ranking near the top ten according
to the estimates of Alexa Internet (alexa.com).
Unfortunately, our article about you at
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/[Whoever]) currently lacks an image.
I am aware that there are publicity images of you available, but since
Wikipedia aims to be reproduceable even for profit and even in nations
where generous United States "fair use" provisions in copyright law are
inapplicable, we cannot use an image that is not released under a
so-called "free license". Essentially, the copyright holder of any image
that we use must irrevocably permit anyone else to use it, modify it, or
sell it, with the only permissible requirements being that the author be
named and that any modifications be released under an identical license.
Example licenses that would permit us to use an image would be: the GNU
Free Documentation License (http://www.gnu.org/copyleft/fdl.html), the
Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 2.5 license
(http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.5/legalcode), or a simple
"no rights reserved".
Given Wikipedia's great popularity, I was hoping that you could provide
us an image under such conditions. Please do consider this, and feel
free to contact me if you have any questions.
Thank you for your time.
Sincerely,
Kim Scarborough
I find the sample letter he offered very interesting but unclear. 
I thought I would therefore suggest a much more clear wording of the letter. This version avoids euphemisms and jargon. It also responsibly lets the celebrity know of some important implications of their decision to release a "free" photo of themselves.
Since our Jennifer Love Hewitt article currently lacks an image, I thought I'd just go ahead and address this letter to her, to make it more realistic.
Here is the sample letter:
<B>
Dear Jennifer Love Hewitt,
<P>
I am one of the many volunteer editors of the English Wikipedia
(en.wikipedia.org), the encyclopedia that anyone can edit and use for any for-profit or non-profit purpose. 
<P>
Unfortunately, our article about you at
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki//Jennifer_Love_Hewitt lacks an image.
<P>
I am aware that you have already made copyrighted publicity photos of yourself available for fair use, and that these depict you as you yourself wish to be depicted in media such as Wikipedia. However, fair use images are not actually allowable within Wikipedia. This is because we must maintain the encyclopedia's entire contents, including all images, as reproducible and alterable for for-profit purposes by anyone anywhere.
<P>
We are therefore requesting you to legally and irrevocably release to the world an image of yourself, an image that 
*Anyone anywhere may use for profit, and; 
*<B>Anyone anywhere may modify as they see fit.
<P>
<B>However, we can require that attribution is always made to the producer of the image.
<P>
After you have released in perpetuity a photo of yourself under this type of for-profit-allowable and derivative-allowable licensing, we at Wikipedia along with anyone anywhere can then use the photo.
<P>
We hope you agree, and thank you for your time and consideration.
<P>
Joe Gotdagall
<P></B>
CyberAnth 03:56, 1 January 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: the line "yourself available for fair use" makes no sense. Fair use doesn't work like that.Geni 00:42, 2 January 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: This approach to getting free photos works well for some subjects - when I want a photo of a rare car, I find the owner's club web site - which always has a gallery section - then I email the owner of the site and ask if they would be prepared to donate one or two photos into the public domain or under GFDL and about 80% of the time I get the photo I need.  But it's different with big businesses (and big name personalities are definitely big businesses). These organisations find it easier to refuse your request (or more often, simply ignore it) than to go through the cost/effort to get in contact with  their corporate lawyers - have them read the license agreement - then to go through all of the internal the red-tape required to say "Yes".  It's simply cheaper and easier to ignore your request.  In the half dozen cases I've tried to do this, I've never once gotten a reply - let alone a positive reply.  (Although admittedly these were requests to release promotional photos of cars, computers, etc...not people.) SteveBaker 15:22, 4 January 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Photo request boilerplate

message: Instead of all of us stating and restating our opinions, and arguing back and forth endlessly, when it is clear that we are never going to agree, or having pronouncements made from on high again, why don't we ask someone who knows the ins and outs of copyright law for an opinion.  As the servers are all hosted in the States, American copyright law would seem to be the most applicable.
I'm sure that the foundation has its own lawyers?  Otherwise, out of the thousands of lowly editors like the rest of us, there has to, I'm sure, be at least one lawyer competent in this area.  Admittedly, we'd only have their word that they were a lawyer, but wouldn't it be useful to have a simple legal opinion: 
are we or are we not allowed under fair use provisions, to use promotional / publicity photos for the purposes of compiling a free encyclopedia? Rmkf1982 |  Talk 13:08, 3 January 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: We have had our lawyer opinion here. According to him, Don't seek sanctuary in the law. Make the law irrelevant. Provide free content everywhere you can. -- ReyBrujo 13:11, 3 January 2007 (UTC)
replies: text:  Thanks ReyBrujo - I had seen that comment already though - he says that he opposes, but not for legal reasons, which to me means he isn't expressing his opinion of the legal niceties, but rather his own opinion.  What I meant was can we get someone to give us a legal opinion of whether or not it is permissable. Rmkf1982 |  Talk 13:31, 3 January 2007 (UTC)
replies: text:  Wikipedia isn't legally obliged to be a free content encyclopedia; rather, its founders decided that was the kind of encyclopedia they wanted to build. Wikipedia's policies are a reflection of that vision; they're not intended to allow everything that doesn't actually break the law. —Angr 13:52, 3 January 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: However, the issue of what the law allows ought to be important in determining what the best way to promote free content on wikipedia is.  Being a "free content encyclopedia" is not something that has an unambiguous meaning.  Clearly, the founders believe that having some fair use content does not violate this goal. The issue of what exactly our fair use policies should be ought to bear at least some relationship with the law, if only so that we know the outer bounds of what is allowed.  It is quite possible that current policies, while far more restrictive than the law in some ways, might also allow for some content in violation of the law.  Even if it does not, knowing what the law is, and how it applies to an enterprise like wikipedia, can only be helpful to this debate. john k 17:54, 3 January 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: So far I haven't seen anyone complaining that Wikipedia's fair use policy allows things that are prohibited under U.S. fair use law. If it does, clearly the policy needs to be brought in line with the law. (Someone did mention once that Wikipedia's fair-use policy allows things that aren't allowed under the UK's fair-use law, but they didn't elaborate.) Usually though, it's the other way around, with people saying "Why can't I do XYZ under Wikipedia's fair use policy? It's allowed under U.S. law, isn't it?" To which the answer is, yes, it probably is, but it's Wikipedia policy to keep fair use images to an absolute minimum. Jimbo once said we could have hard-core pornography on the main page and not violate any laws, but it's an editorial decision not to. Similarly, there's no law saying we have to write from the neutral point of view or that all our encyclopedic content has to be verifiable, but we do it anyway. —Angr 09:42, 4 January 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: There is a big distinction between the WP:NPOV and WP:V policies and the issue of fair use policy.  Enforcing NPOV and V make for a better encyclopedia - denying fair use makes it worse (Compare Andy Warhol in English and German Wikipedias to see clearly what happens when you deny fair use).  You have to justify denying legal fair use on purely idealistic grounds - which is a much harder sell.  The word "free" in "free content encyclopedia" has many meanings - it's vague. Does this mean that the encyclopedia can be purchased for $0?  Does it mean that you can read it for $0? Does it mean that it's OK to mirror it?  Is it OK to copy it without giving credit to Wikipedia?   Is it free of all legal entanglements?  Is is mostly free of intellectual property entanglements?  Is it entirely free of such issues?  In all countries of the world?   In all English-speaking countries of the world?  Just in the countries where the servers are housed?  Any and all of these interpretations of the word "free" are possible - and depending on precisely where on this spectrum you stick the stake in the ground, you get different answers to what should be done about fair use images. Since that precise spot on the spectrum has never been determined, we are doomed to continue to have this kind of debate over fair use. SteveBaker 15:09, 4 January 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Ask a lawyer 

message: Images can be divided between free and non-free ones. Recently, there has been a push to eliminate the non-free ones that, apparently, can be recreated. However, until now I have seen many places with suggestions about how to request free images, but not a project to coordinate efforts. Because of this I am giving the first push to WikiProject Free Images, aimed at centralizing discussion about free images. Currently, it is situated at my userspace, User:ReyBrujo/WikiProject Free Images, but with enough positive feedback and help, it will be moved into the Wikipedia namespace.
The WikiProject aim is broad: first and foremost, educate users about the benefits of free images, but also to teach the differences between free licenses when applied to images. Aside this, the WikiProject  will focus in replacing the current fair use images with free ones of good quality, by contacting the media, agencies, publishers or other copyright holders as necessary. It would keep a list of requested images to different organizations, with the different steps that had been taken and the different replies. It will also have an index of all the images that had been donated by these organizations, so that they are able to review their contributions. Also, the members of the WikiProject would review the usage of these images in Wikipedia, verifying that attributions are applied at all times when requested by the copyright holder.
This WikiProject was given as a thought during the Wikipedia:Elimination of Fair Use Rationale in Promotional Photos discussion, and since apparently there has not been a similar one, I decided to try it out. With some luck and effort, it should be possible to replace many of the current fair use images with free ones of similar quality.
Please drop by and give some thoughts in there. Thanks. -- ReyBrujo 18:12, 4 January 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: WikiProject Free Images

message: Fair use is a wonderful legal concept and we should be taking advantage of it, not hiding our heads in the sand.  Promotional publicity photos are specifically taken by the subject in anticipation of distribtuion and re-use.  Usually, these photos are of much higher quality than any that are likely to be taken by amateur photographers.  Legally appropriate use of such images makes this encyclopedia better and should be embraced with open arms. Johntex\talk 04:01, 6 January 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: This is a great proposal

message: As I understand the position of those who are "anti-fairuse-promophotos", with regard to publicity photos, is, that while publicity rights do limit use of free images, such limits are vastly less than those typically imposed on copyrighted promophotos.  For instance you can't use this PD photo of Britney Spears on a perfume bottle, to falsely imply she endorsed it.  So, perhaps what we should do is draft a free license that explicity accepts certain limits that are already in place in major U.S. states (e.g. California), due to publicity rights, or other laws.  IANL, but here's an example of my pseudo-legal wording for a tag (which needs to be added to, and improved):
:This image is copyrighted, but anybody is allowed to use this image for any purpose, including commercial useage, provided there is attribution, and the image is not used to imply an endorsement by the subject of the photo.  Derived works are permitted, provided they do not mispresent the subject..
This would help stop stuff like slapping on a famous celebs head onto a nude model's body, to sell naked photos of the celeb (who never posed nude).  I have a serious problem asking a person to use their photo for any purpose (if taken to the literal extreme).  Since we already accept photos which can't be used for certain purposes (as free), we aught to be able to have a license text which acknowledges that certain re-uses aren't allowable.  --Rob 18:01, 6 January 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: The point is that copyright and personality right are two entirely separate jurisdictions.  Images or text that are free to use on copyright grounds are still subject to certain basic legal restrictions that apply to all speech; you can't use them for false advertising or libel or certain other purposes.  So when we ask someone for a libre image, we aren't asking them to waive their right to be protected from libel or infringement of their personality rights; those remain protected. It would be somewhat clumsy to attempt to reduplicate this protection in the copyright law (not to mention that writing a good license is a major task for which we would need a lot of help from experienced lawyers). --RobthTalk 18:29, 6 January 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Yeah, we can't possebly cover all possible non-copyright related laws that may affect re-users of our content in every part of the world. We aim to give acurate copyright declarations for our stuff, and make sure Wikipedia itself does not break any laws to wich it is subject. For everyting else there is Wikipedia:General disclaimer and Wikipedia:Legal disclaimer. --Sherool (talk) 19:09, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

text: IANL and most people aren't lawyers.  So, while you say we're not asking people to waive personality rights, how we word license tags and suggested wording for requests for permission, certainly sounds like we're asking for exactly that.  I'm mainly concerned with the specific unique situation, where the subject of the photo (or their rep) owns the copyright of the image (which I assume is common with promo photos).  They may (we hope) be willing to grant permission for pretty much any use, but aren't willing to accept *literally* any use.  I really can't understand why we can't give people some small written assurance, that they're not releasing more rights than is reasonable.  As for being "clumsy", that's hopefully fixeable, and definately unimportant.  We really have to look at things from the perspective of a *non-lawyer*, who's the subject of an article, considering the release of their own image to Wikipedia.  Also, Sherool, I think you're not addressing my suggestion.  I never said we have to cover all non-copyright related restrictions.  Simply put, we shouldn't ask to use images for *any* purpose, without a qualifier, unless we literally mean that.  If we don't literally mean "any", than say "any except".  Let's just speak clearly. --Rob 01:11, 7 January 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Small naive compromise suggestion