[thelist] Ethical issues concerning re-use (and heavy modification) of images

[Simon Willison]

At 15:14 09/05/02 +0100, you wrote:
>It seems to me that the obvious and decent thing to do is simply seek the
>copyright holders permission. This rarely involves any money changing hands,
>and usually the originator is flattered by the attention. Unless they're Van
>Gough estate in which case I wouldn't bother with their images in the first
>place.

Seems perfectly fair to me, however for some works it can be hard (if not
impossible) to figure out who the original copyright holder is. In these
cases would you say it was acceptable to use the image as inspiration / a
basis for a derived work anyway?

Thanks,

Simon