deskthority

While adding a photo to the [wiki]buckling spring[/wiki] page, I found some more images taken from other websites with no attribution. I've managed to work out whose they are.

Images I find where I can ID the author, but no usage rights are stated (explicitly against the image, or under http://deskthority.net/wiki/Help:Contents ) are being added here, and the original page URL is added to the image description:

http://deskthority.net/wiki/Category:Im ... nfirmation

Permission may have been obtained to repost these images, but this has not knowingly been recorded anywhere.

Images that are not attributed and I don't even know where they came from, are being added here:

http://deskthority.net/wiki/Category:Im ... ttribution

Images in both categories must be either updated with a description stating the original author and copyright terms, or be deleted. Any image that has been sat in either category for too long needs to be deleted.

There are enough keyboard owners in this community that we should not have to rely on stolen images and references to eBay auctions.

It is good to see care being taken to protect intellectual property and provide proper attribution. It is sometimes difficult to know which materials are covered by "fair use"; nevertheless, even if something is not protected by copyright, it is good practice to document the source.

All of these images are certainly fair use in the US (I’m not familiar with how that shakes out in other places), and there’s essentially zero chance of a copyright holder coming after the deskthority wiki (but if it happens, it’s easy to resolve). With that said, if you have some other standard you want to impose, you’re the main keeper of the deskthority wiki, so impose away!

I am not a lawyer.

With that said, there is always a level of due diligence. I don't expect a Wikipedia-level of self-scourging, but if you're going to take someone else's work without permission, the least you should do is write the source of the image in the description: author, source URL (I use the URL of the enclosing page), and ideally a statement that you're using the image as fair use in good faith, so that anyone querying it in the future knows exactly where we stand.

That does not seem too much to ask. If the images were correctly identified, I would probably just ignore them. What upsets me so much is when the uploader was too lazy and too mean to even acknowledge their debt to the person who took the time to produce the work that they've just walked off with. Maybe if they spent hours and hours on photography of their own, they'd realise just how time-consuming it actually is.