It never was, for any of them. They claim fair use under “research”, but the very next step after determining the category is to consider the commerciality. Their research is not an academic pursuit in the public interest and they don’t publish their research data (because that would be incriminating); the entire activity is commercial product development. Such a venture is very clearly and obviously not fair use.
It never was, for any of them. They claim fair use under “research”, but the very next step after determining the category is to consider the commerciality. Their research is not an academic pursuit in the public interest and they don’t publish their research data (because that would be incriminating); the entire activity is commercial product development. Such a venture is very clearly and obviously not fair use.