Wikipedia:Fair use/Historical logos in galleries

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

This is a request for comment (RFC) on the use of historical logos in galleries, in articles about subjects which the logos represent. This RFC aims to gather community opinion on the use of galleries of historical logos claimed to be fair use, and to generate a consensus about whether what has been long-standing usage is acceptable or not, under the current fair use criteria, specifically FUC #3 and FUC #8.

This is not a request or proposal to change existing policy; it is merely an attempt to clarify current policy as it relates to the specific issue of historical logo galleries, and to determine a consensus on such clarification.

There is currently an ongoing dispute at Wikipedia:WikiProject Television Stations about the use of fair use images, specifically historical logos, to illustrate television station articles. User:A Man In Black, an administrator, has been deleting galleries of logos from various television station articles over the last couple of months, and consistently and quickly reverts anyone who restores them, claiming they violate fair use policy. Discussion has been ongoing without resolution on WP:TVS, including here, here, and here.

The issue has broader significance for similar galleries which may appear in any articles about companies or organizations which have used a variety of different branding identities thoughout their lifetimes. As such, it is appropriate that the issue be discussed here. Note that while much of the discussion so far relates to the use of galleries of logos in television station articles, feel free to discuss issues which relate to fair use images in galleries more generally.

[edit] Examples of current usage

Below are some examples of articles which use fair use images in the fashion that is presently disputed (static versions are linked to; notice that many of the galleries may be missing images due to the removal of such galleries from article pages and the policy of deleting orphaned images after 7 days):

• KTLA
• KCOP-TV
• WNYW
• WNBC
• WCBS-TV
• KNTV

[edit] Arguments for and against

This is a very brief summary of the major arguments for and against the use of fair use historical logo images in galleries. Note that this is only intended to be an extremely brief summary, and all substantive development of arguments should be directed to this page's discussion page.

For: Historical logo images contribute significantly to the quality of articles, that they provide relevant and encyclopedic information about the history and evolution of branding in a way that cannot be adequately conveyed by text alone. Logos are widely distributed by the copyright holder for the purpose of identifying a station, company, or product. Most if not all images comply with the current fair use criteria, and most are tagged with relevant templates (such as {{tv-logo}}) and provide a rationale on their description page. No free alternative can be made to a copyrighted logo. FUC#3 is not violated because as generally as few images are used as possible to convey the information of how the subject has been historically identified. FUC#8 is not violated because the logos identify the subject of the article at different points during the subject's existence. The logos are only being used in the articles whose subject the logo represents, and not to illustrate other tagentially related articles, such as affiliate lists. The image captions in the galleries identify the logos as historical and occasionally contain more relevant information about specific logos.

Against: Logo galleries are merely being used for decoration, and not for a valid fair use purpose (such as critical commentary). Logo galleries violate FUC#8 because do not illustrate specific points in the text. (Whether they contribute significantly is not at issue.) These galleries violate FUC#3 because only one logo is normally needed to identify a subject, and for the rare exception a gallery of logos is still not necessary. Galleries contain very little (if any) text and thus provide far less opportunity to properly establish fair use of the image. Such images are often posted without source, and no fair-use rationale has been, or indeed can be, written for the vast majority of them. There are far too many fair use images in Wikipedia, and encouraging the use of fair use image galleries hinders the goal of making Wikipedia a free-content encyclopedia.

[edit] Discussion

All discussion should be directed to this page's discussion page. Discussion should not be added below.