User:Elvey/Open Letter

I wonder if Apple Inc., Paul Sakuma/Associated Press, Toru Yamanaka/Getty Images, and/or Jeff Zelevansky/Reuters could (team up and) successfully sue the US Government for copyright infringement for using their photos in the slides which can be found at https://www.eff.org/files/2013/11/15/20130909-spiegel-smartphones.pdf. ISTM that Fair use pretty obviously lets the EFF (and wikipedia) use the images within the slides in order to comment on and criticize the slides. But does Fair use let the NSA to use the images to illustrate what they did, when any picture of Steve Jobs with an iPhone would have been fine, and any photos of iDevice fans would have been fine? Well, if we're deleting the slides, and we are, because the use isn't sufficiently free use to meet our non-free content criteria, then I think the bar is at least close for the images. It seems the NSA plagiarized the works; it did not credit the photographers. It's not clear enough to me that I would bring a fair use claim in court, based upon my current understanding.

The purpose is (arguably) for neither of the purposes of leg 1, so that leg isn't super-weak. Leg 2 and 3 are pretty strong, but leg 4 - effect on the value of the work is (arguably) quite weak.

Legs:
 * 1) the purpose and character of the use, including whether such use is of a commercial nature or is for nonprofit educational purposes;
 * 2) the nature of the copyrighted work;
 * 3) the amount and substantiality of the portion used in relation to the copyrighted work as a whole; and
 * 4) the effect of the use upon the potential market for or value of the copyrighted work.

Note
Apropos https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=User_talk%3ATLSuda%2FArchive_6&diff=cur&oldid=prev : Wow. That's one way to get the last word. IMO, violates policy in spirit, though probably not in letter.

I was calmly bringing up an apparent pattern of bringing up irrelevant stuff and making over broad claims. TLSuda did more than just "assuming that the files were owned by Apple". TLSuda claimed that works were copyrighted by Apple when TLSuda had no evidence to support the claims made. Best to be careful - TLSuda doesn't see it as a mistake to claim consensus where there hasn't been consensus. Doesn't see it as a mistake to assert that Commons:COM:TOO#United_Kingdom, and Commons:COM:De_minimis#United_Kingdom need to be complied with in the way that TLSuda did. I think TLSuda misinterprets the applicability of NFCC (WP:NFCC and WP:NFCC) to the NSA and GCHQ documents.

TLSuda claimed, "The information about the United Kingdom was in response to the blanket statement that the last three files fail TOO in their country of origin." But I see no

"blanket statement that the last three files fail TOO in their country of origin". I spoke of what "we allow", and what we (through en.wikipedia.org policy) allow is NOT based on country of origin, so what I was asking about was certainly not specifically about "TOO in their country of origin". TLSuda's "pointing to the UK sections in particular" seems to be a result of imagining something in what I wrote that simply wasn't there. The explanation is that TLSuda thought (incorrectly) that I was talking about TOO in the country of origin. The result of a small and entirely forgivable mistake, but a mistake nonetheless, one that TLSuda apparently still doesn't think was made. Whatever, I think it's clear that TLSuda didn't need to delete the files, and has proffered multiple arguments to justify the deletions that have not held up. TLSuda could have replaced the logos and press photos with placeholders instead of deleting. TLSuda chose not to. TLSuda could undelete them and replace the logos with placeholders, with FURs for the government documents that contained press photos, or placeholders. Clearly TLSuda is not willing to, and to me that is evidence of censorship. I'm not going to continue to argue with TLSuda. I've shown that complete deletion was unnecessary. -- &#123;&#123;U&#124;Elvey&#125;&#125; (t • e • c) 21:47, 13 May 2014 (UTC)