Month: September 2007

Durova writes a nice piece for the marketers recruiting more free images. Nice one!

I’m wondering how to do this for entertainers. Bad live shots, snapshots and so forth under a free content licence always supersede something that isn’t free content. (Many have argued the toss on this, but as things stand that’s the way things are.) I’m wondering a useful way to reliably get entertainment industry promo photos to flock to us. I suspect our really crappy examples would be a start. e.g. “Top ten site, our rules. You don’t get to have a good photo under your control. You get a crappy photo that’s under a suitable license, or you give us a good photo under a suitable license. The latter is probably a lot more to your liking and that of your artists.”

The hardest part is publishing that somewhere it would actually get read by the target audience. Ideas?

By the way: if you have decent photos you’ve taken of someone who’s got a Wikipedia article but no good free content photo, we’d love ’em. CC by-sa and GFDL both require your name staying attached to the image details page.

Ayn Landers is a renowned author, philosopher and hero to millions thousands of nerdy overprivileged dweebs who’ve read too much Heinlein. She writes the famous syndicated advice column named after her. Send your letters to Ayn Landers, Objective Guidance, Uncyclopedia, Wikiality, Florida. Enclose a stamp, you lazy bum.

Dear Ayn Landers: My corporate masters have whipped up a page on our internal MediaWiki that they intend to publish on Wikipedia in the near future. It’s not terribly embarrassing, but I’m wondering what the attitude over there is regarding this sort of enterprise. — Stultified of Startupland

Dear Stultified: Depends what it is. Mostly it’s a really stupidly bad idea. Look at the reaction to people being caught with the WikiScanner writing about themselves. Whoever puts it up better be absolutely upfront about who they are and where they’re from. And be prepared for it to be zapped unceremoniously with somewhat brusque comments along the lines of “perhaps this will need an article when there’s citable evidence third parties care.” The all too frequent outcome of this sort of bug-on-windscreen impact with people who really don’t care about one’s corporate Kool-Aid is bitter ranting about those evil Wikipedia bastards, arrogant teenage nerds all of them; I’m sure you know the sort of thing. (The arrogant teenage nerds bit is accurate.)

I’ve also sent you three of my handy etiquette guides: COI, AUTO and the wisdom of Durova. We deal with a firehose of spam every day, and writing about yourself puts you at risk of being mistaken for part of it. But be good and all will be well.

When planning a cult, who pays for what? Who stands where? “The Ayn Landers Guide for Landroids” has all the answers. Send a self-addressed, long, business-size envelope and a check or money order for $3.75 (this includes postage and handling) to Collectives, Ayn Landers, Objective Guidance, Uncyclopedia, Wikiality, Florida. (In Canada, send $4.55.) And remember, A equals A!