Robert A. Baron
> It would be interesting to investigate the legality of such restrictions,
> for, on one hand, it would seem within the realm of rights of object owners
> to control access to and use of their objects, while on the other hand, the
> public trust in which many of these objects are placed would suggest that
> it is wrong to treat them wholly as private property.


It's my understanding that in France photography of objects in public
museums is allowed, which is the reason Nicholas Pioch gives for why he
was able to originally create the WebMuseum without interference from
the Louvre (except for the name change).

Interesting that the WebMuseum's Mona Lisa is a reproduction of the
image, like one you would find in a book and the way we usually picture
the painting, while the Louvre reproduces Mona as a framed object with
natural lighting on their site. While it's probably a way around the
whole use issue for them I find the Louvre's image much more interesting
and informative. Never hurts to remind people that paintings aren't
slides but physical objects that exist in space.

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