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Flickr Censors Egypt Police Photos

Posted by Soulskill on from the state-of-de-nile dept.

An anonymous reader writes "Yesterday Flickr removed a photoset of Egyptian Secret Police photos which had been posted to an Egyptian journalist's Flickrstream. The photos were obtained when the journalist acquired them from what he called 'one of Mubarak's largest torture facilities.' Flickr cited the fact that the photos 'were not the user's own work' as justification for the censorship, even though Flickr staffers themselves frequently upload work that is not 'their own' to their personal photostreams."

11 of 163 comments (clear)

  1. Re:Shame by Intrepid+imaginaut · · Score: 3, Insightful

    I grow tired of the evil enabled by fools. Let us together remove it, and breathe once again the fresh, honest air.

  2. How many services are this misguided lately? by Jane+Q.+Public · · Score: 3, Insightful

    I grow weary of this. PayPal, Amazon, card companies, and others over their BS decisions regarding WikiLeaks. Flickr protecting despots in Egypt. Where will it end? How many services am I going to have to boycott before they get a damned clue?

    1. Re:How many services are this misguided lately? by MoonBuggy · · Score: 3, Insightful

      How many services am I going to have to boycott before they get a damned clue?

      Unfortunately, unless you're particularly rich and/or politically influential, you're going to end up living in a cave and they still won't notice.

  3. Not censorship, clear TOS violation by SuperKendall · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Flickr is very clear that you are sharing your OWN WORK. These are images taken by someone else.

    Regardless of how you feel about breaking into government files and sharing things you find there, a place like Flickr with a very clear TOS about not publishing other people's work has every right, and should be expected to take these things down. Flickr is not Wikileaks. Find somewhere else to put the images.

    --
    "There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
    1. Re:Not censorship, clear TOS violation by penguinchris · · Score: 5, Insightful

      You're being disingenuous. They would never take down a photo in a situation as you described. They don't normally take down people's stuff that isn't their own anyway, because no one complains about it. They only look into these situations if they get complaints (typically), and usually those complaints are from the copyright holder. Presumably, your wife wouldn't complain to flickr if you posted her photo to your account.

      Seriously, flickr is not the place to host the photos you found on a CD you stole from the secret service headquarters. Flickr is not Wikileaks and doesn't want to get involved in that sort of thing. Flickr regularly takes down photos that are "stolen" in the sense of being blatant copyright infringement. In this case it's both copyright infringement and legitimate theft.

      Flickr *does not* remove politically charged, graphic (sex and/or violence), etc. images, either - they're neutral on such issues. You can find tons of stuff like that on flickr, including photos from protests around the world showing government officials committing crimes and violent acts against unarmed citizens (as an example). But typically you should have taken those photos yourself, or gotten permission, before posting them to flickr.

      As for the examples in the second FA of a flickr staff member posting things that aren't his own work - they're a huge stretch. It's FUD.

    2. Re:Not censorship, clear TOS violation by uofitorn · · Score: 2, Insightful

      Right. Remember when wikileaks was supposed to be an actual wiki? They used to host leaked information from many sources regarding other nations. Go to their site now and none of that is to be found. Their agenda has changed and it is clear to those who've been online since 2007...

      --
      "What kind of music do pirates listen to?" -Paul Maud'dib
      "Yeeeaaarrrrr n' Bee!!" -Stilgar, Leader of Sietch Tabr
    3. Re:Not censorship, clear TOS violation by SuperKendall · · Score: 1, Insightful

      You idiot, I'm not saying they shouldn't be seen, just that Flickr is the wrong place to put these. It's not Flickr's job to share random photos from other people, there are plenty of other places you can go for that.

      Flickr is not CENSORING them, if you can get that through your thick head (doubtful).

      --
      "There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
  4. "Ripped off", he says by Chaonici · · Score: 5, Insightful

    This is what happens when you love rule of law so much that you follow laws, rules, policies, terms of service, and end user license agreements over basic ethics.

    Whether or not Flickr is justified in removing the images at all, the manner in which they did it is unacceptable. It would be very easy to accuse them of using their TOS (their rule of law) to hide behind the fact that they just don't like the content of the photos themselves.

    As TFA points out, this is selective enforcement.

  5. Re:Oh, I see by Draek · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Flickr isn't part of any government, and I see nothing that suggests they took the photos down under the orders of one. So, dick move? yeah, reprehensible? sure, but censorship? not really.

    --
    No problem is insoluble in all conceivable circumstances.
  6. Re:Oh, I see by tsm_sf · · Score: 4, Insightful

    I don't understand why censorship is always seen as something only a government can do. If you alter or remove something based on it's content (i.e. not because you need the disk space or similar) you are literally a censor. That's the definition of censorship.

    --
    Literalism isn't a form of humor, it's you being irritating.
  7. Re:lol libertard by Bobakitoo · · Score: 4, Insightful

    What happened here is censorship. What you describe is merely legal censorship. Because it is legal, it dont mean it is the right thing to do.

    There is no recourse against legal corportate censorship. But peoples are free to complain and presure them anyway they see fit. Bloging, writing articles, posting comments are all acceptable way for the public to communicate its disagrement. It is up to them to see if, considering the shitstorm, that unpopular move was worth it.

    No one sued Flickr over some "VIOLATE MY FREE SPEECH AMENDMENTS! OMG!" claim, WTF is your problem?