Few people know this, but Bill Gates used to own the copyright to that famous image of a man standing in front of Chicom tanks in Beijing, as part of the great 1989 protest at Tienanmen Square that threatened to take down Communism in China, much as Communism fell apart at the time in eastern Europe.

Well, it’s about to get a lot harder to see that famous stand for freedom, since Gates just sold it out.

Pictured above is a different image from the protests because, well, I don’t have access to licensing from Visual China, the Communist-apporved media licensing firm that has achieved a near monopoly on image licensing in the People’s Republic. If you think they can do that without full cooperation and/or infiltration from the Communist Party of China, you have another thing coming.

So expect in the coming years lawsuits as that famous image is gradually pulled from the public eye. China’s leaders find it embarrassing when outsiders expose protests. They want a unified national front, and will stop at nothing to shut down dissent.

One wonders how well Bill Gates will sleep, with that blood money in his accounts.