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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."

4 of 163 comments (clear)

  1. Shame by mr100percent · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Shame on you Flickr, they're not even explicit.
    Hope someone has a mirror, and this time posted elsewhere on another site. Let's not reward them with more traffic.

    1. Re:Shame by grcumb · · Score: 5, Interesting

      Shame on you Flickr....

      Shame indeed. I live and work and write occasional newspaper columns in the tiny nation of Vanuatu, Last week, our Minister of Infrastructure and Public Utilities arrived in the offices of our national newspaper with a gang of 8 thugs and proceeded to beat the crap out of the publisher. His sin? Telling the truth about a litany of crooked dealings the Minister was involved in.

      This prompted people from all walks of life in the Pacific Islands region to stand up and make themselves heard. The staff of the Daily Post newspaper - and contributors like myself - were defiant in the face of overt coercion and threats.

      Why, I would like to know, is it easier for pipsqueaks like us to stand up to government coercion than for large corporations with a stable of capable lawyers on hand and not a fear in the world for their own safety?

      Of course, we already know the answer.

      --
      Crumb's Corollary: Never bring a knife to a bun fight.
  2. "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.

  3. 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.