Mops
June 15, 2007, 3:32pm
#1
Given that public image immediately translates into market value, i.e. money , for actors and (to a lesser degree) for other media figures such as authors, I wonder why they (or their publicists) often don’t seem to take the opportunity to submit a photograph to Wikipedia
Examples for no photographhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kenneth_Branagh http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/P._D._James
Example for publicly contributed ‘candid’-type photographs where the subject would have fared much better with a normal, professionally made publicity-type photograph:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dan_Aykroyd http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Shatner
In contrast: one actor whose publicist has been up to the taskhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marina_Sirtis
So, is there any particular reason for people for whose personal promotion a lot of money is spent otherwise to not submit a good photograph to Wikipedia? Or is just an oversight?
xizor
June 15, 2007, 5:28pm
#2
If you are a rising star (eg Hilary Duff ) or trying to increase your recognizability (Sirtis), then your photo goes everywhere.
Submitting your own photo for publicity purposes may be a violation of Wikipedia policy:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Conflict_of_interest
There may also be certain copyright restrictions, since it’s the photographer that holds copyright by default not the person whose image is on the photograph.
See also this essay on how PR people can interact with Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Jmabel/PR
Let’s start with something uncontroversial: there is one large, uncontroversial way that public relations people can help both Wikipedia (and other “copyleft” projects) and help their clients: explicitly give all of your promotional photos and other graphics some copyleft license, such as the GFDL or an appropriate Creative Commons license. It’s also nice if you do the same with press releases: after all, this is how you really mean your press release to be used, anyway.
A free license lets us use your materials at will, without worrying that we might be violating your copyright. In particular, this also lets us host copies of your images on Wikimedia Commons, which is great for you and great for us.
Note that Marina Sirtis’s photograph was copied by a Wikipedian from Memory Alpha and is only presumed to be fair use:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Marina_Sirtis.jpg
Please note that our policy usually considers fair use images of living people that merely show what they look like to be replaceable by free-licensed images and unsuitable for the project. If this is not the case for this image, a rationale should be provided proving that the image provides information beyond simple identification or showing that this image is difficult to replace by a free-licensed equivalent. Commercial third-party reusers of this image should consider whether their use is in violation of the subject’s publicity rights.
Uh-oh… When I created the entry (well, stub) for The Kevin and Trudie Show , I swiped the photo from their website.
They’re friends of mine, though, so I don’t think they’ll complain.