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I see this photo as somewhere in the uncomfortable gray area between Macauley Culkin and child pornography. That's why I don't believe the same rules should app

I see this photo as somewhere in the uncomfortable gray area between Macauley Culkin and child pornography. That's why I don't believe the same rules should apply.

burnished 5y ago
What? In what way is this possibly pornographic? It is really uncomfortable to me that you're just going to casually throw that out there as an axis for this to be measured on.
- spoonjim 5y ago
  It is a naked picture of a baby clearly used to provoke and advertise. I'm OK with naked baby photos being taken and kept by parents but I don't think it's OK to use a child's naked photo as one of the iconic commercial photos of a generation. I do not think it is child pornography but I think that it is a misuse of a baby's naked photo in a way that a parent should not be able to consent to on behalf of the child.
  - burnished 5y ago
    I feel like part of the problem is that your position is changing based on outcome, right, like it became a problem after the fact when it became a commercial hit.
    - spoonjim 5y ago
      I don’t think naked baby photos should be commercially licensable at all.
      - sokoloff 5y ago
        Not even for biology/medical textbooks or forensics training content or other educational purposes from commercial publishers? I don’t see naked as equaling sexualized and I don’t see the Nirvana cover as the latter either, but I definitely can’t see a total ban on pictures in commercially-sold material being workable.
      - nate_meurer 5y ago
        What is your personal threshold for "naked"? Completely naked? Diapers? Nipples showing?
      - burnished 5y ago
        If your position is something along the lines of, babies cant consent, young children cant consent, why dont we just live in a world where we dont include them in media so we dont have people growing up having to figure out how they feel about how they were presented to the world... sure, that would be a pretty consistent world view. If its just that you think a naked baby is pornographic then I guess its an entirely different conversation. Its not really clear what motivates your statement here though.
vmception 5y ago
You had good arguments, this is the weakest one of them. The child pornography aspect of this civil suit is just to settle it faster, in order to add gravity to the situation, but it would be counterproductive in actuality. Although likeness is regulated only at the state level, and is the only aspect of this lawsuit, copyright is regulated at the federal level and is the basis for the commercial licenses to exist at all - if this actually was child pornography which requires a category of something considered obscenity, it would be ineligible for copyright which would mean the existing licensors would have no reason to pay for the license at all, and there would be no value to give for the likeness settlement. The rest is your feelings and that is not relevant here.

I see this photo as somewhere in the uncomfortable gray area between Macauley Culkin and child pornography. That's why I don't believe the same rules should apply.

burnished 5y ago

What? In what way is this possibly pornographic? It is really uncomfortable to me that you're just going to casually throw that out there as an axis for this to be measured on.

spoonjim 5y ago
It is a naked picture of a baby clearly used to provoke and advertise. I'm OK with naked baby photos being taken and kept by parents but I don't think it's OK to use a child's naked photo as one of the iconic commercial photos of a generation. I do not think it is child pornography but I think that it is a misuse of a baby's naked photo in a way that a parent should not be able to consent to on behalf of the child.
- burnished 5y ago
  I feel like part of the problem is that your position is changing based on outcome, right, like it became a problem after the fact when it became a commercial hit.
  - spoonjim 5y ago
    I don’t think naked baby photos should be commercially licensable at all.
    - sokoloff 5y ago
      Not even for biology/medical textbooks or forensics training content or other educational purposes from commercial publishers? I don’t see naked as equaling sexualized and I don’t see the Nirvana cover as the latter either, but I definitely can’t see a total ban on pictures in commercially-sold material being workable.
    - nate_meurer 5y ago
      What is your personal threshold for "naked"? Completely naked? Diapers? Nipples showing?
    - burnished 5y ago
      If your position is something along the lines of, babies cant consent, young children cant consent, why dont we just live in a world where we dont include them in media so we dont have people growing up having to figure out how they feel about how they were presented to the world... sure, that would be a pretty consistent world view. If its just that you think a naked baby is pornographic then I guess its an entirely different conversation. Its not really clear what motivates your statement here though.

vmception 5y ago

You had good arguments, this is the weakest one of them. The child pornography aspect of this civil suit is just to settle it faster, in order to add gravity to the situation, but it would be counterproductive in actuality. Although likeness is regulated only at the state level, and is the only aspect of this lawsuit, copyright is regulated at the federal level and is the basis for the commercial licenses to exist at all - if this actually was child pornography which requires a category of something considered obscenity, it would be ineligible for copyright which would mean the existing licensors would have no reason to pay for the license at all, and there would be no value to give for the likeness settlement. The rest is your feelings and that is not relevant here.