Request - Photos for an educational website

[the_athenaeum]

Hello there,
My name is Chris McCormick, and I am the webmaster for The Athenaeum, an interactive website for humanities study (http://www.the-athenaeum.org). Our nonprofit site provides many tools for studying the humanities, including more than 8,000 images of fine art. Users can store notes, discuss art, literature, and history, and more.

The reason I am posting here (please feel free to move this post if it should go in a different forum) is that we are looking for images of 3D artworks (i.e., sculpture) and architecture/archaeological sites. Unlike reproductions of 2-dimensional artworks, we cannot use such photos on our site without securing rights to them. As you know, licensing quality images is very expensive; as a non-profit venture, we cannot afford to buy rights on a large scale. Instead, we are seeking photographers, professional or amateur, who would be willing to *donate* photographs to either the public domain, or to our site specifically. We will use these photographs as an intergral part of our educational offerings about art, history, architecture, and archaeology. We hope we can find some photographers who will be inspired to use this as a way to "give back" to society, donating a service rather than money.

This is a new venture for us, and the rules are not set. Ideally, someone here will be interested enough to donate some photos, but perhaps equally as important is the value of your experience and opinions. It would be very helpful if some of you could answer the following questions, in as much detail as you like:

1. For this venture to work, we would need people to donate the rights to display the images *forever,* at least on our website. Is there *any* situation in which you would be comfortable doing that? If not, where would you draw the line (remember, these images would not be sold unless you specifically ceded that right)?

2. What sort of recognition would you require on our site? Your name under each image? A link to your website, if you have one? A "profile" page on The Athenaeum? Recognition on a donor page? Anything else?

3. We are investigating the process of becoming an official 501(c)3 nonprofit. At the moment, we are nonprofit in intent (ie, we don't sell anything and exist for educational purposes), but we do not have tax-exempt charity status. Does that make a difference to you personally?

4. This may not be the best place to ask these questions. Can you think of a better way for us to find photographers who might be willing to donate images?

Thanks very much for your time. If you visit our site, you will see that we are in earnest. Hopefully even if you are not interested in helping out, The Athenaeum might provide a moment's entertainment and enlightenment. We have a lot of ideas, and we want to make sure that we respect the rights of photographers as we grow. Thanks for listening.

Sincerely,
Chris McCormick