MySpace’s Terms & Conditions page states that “MySpace does not claim any ownership rights” over the photos users post on the site. It says MySpace has the right to display user content within MySpace, but “This limited license does not grant MySpace the right to sell or otherwise distribute your Content outside of the MySpace Services.” The photos remained on Youmans’s MySpace profile Thursday morning, but had been taken down by Thursday afternoon.

That strikes me as incredibly silly, though, and as a relic of the pre-Internet world. Like it or not, Dupree is a public figure now and the images are indeed newsworthy.

It seems to me that when a copyright holder puts images in a public forum, that should render them public domain for the purposes of news reporting and commentary. It shouldn’t confer the right to sell said images directly but their use to illustrate a story should be “fair use” under the law.