In this photo, the normally bustling NYSE trading floor looks as if it were a miniature diorama. One could only imagine what the NYSE would say if someone actually did create such a thing. (Photo: Todd Holmes/Flickr) Even the grinches on Wall Street acknowledge the holiday time -- as you can see with the giant snowflakes hanging over the trading floor in December 2010. (Photo: Ian Lamont) After the 9/11 attacks on the nearby World Trade Center, the NYSE wrapped itself in the flag, as evidenced by this photo from 2007. Luckily for the NYSE, the flag is not trademarked. (Photo: Peter Kreder/Flickr) Reid Hoffman (center), the founder of LinkedIn, watches the listing of the company on the New York Stock Exchange on May 19. (Photo: Mark Lennihan/AP) Traders work on the New York Stock Exchange on May 19. (Photo: Mark Lennihan/AP)

The New York Stock Exchange wants its trading floor to be the place where slices of the nation's biggest public companies are bought and sold, but the syndicate isn't too keen on the idea of public.

The NYSE sent a legal nastygram Thursday to the news site Talking Points Memo, demanding that it take down a picture of the trading floor the site used in a news article, claiming that the exchange has trademarked the floor.

"NYSE owns Federal Trademark rights in one depiction of the Trading Floor and common law rights in the Trading Floor viewed from virtually any angle," the letter from the NYSE's general counsel Kendra P. Goldenberg claims. "Accordingly, NYSE has the right to prohibit unauthorized use of its Trademarks and reference to the NYSE by others.... Your unauthorized use of the images of the Trading Floor tarnishes NYSE's Trademarks."

In fact the letter goes so far as to demand that TPM "immediately cease and desist from any use of its Trademarks and service marks." Which is another way of saying that TPM can't, according to the legal theory being pursued, even reference the NYSE without permission (as we just did).

The NYSE's main objection seems to center on the fact that the November story, which includes a rather generic picture of the NYSE, is about an Oregon trader involved in an FBI probe of financial misdeeds by giant hedge funds – not the NYSE.

But instead of suggesting that the photo was libelous, the NYSE is advancing a theory of trademark law that would let them control all images of the trading floor. (And the libel case would be weak since the NYSE is all but synonymous with financial trading generally.)

The theory is a joke. And that's how TPM is treating it, publishing the letter in full on its site, along with a photo of the trading floor.

The NYSE might have a slim legal pillar to rely on if it were pursuing, say, a rapacious brokerage firm like Goldman Sachs from using an image of the trading floor in their brochure. But TPM is a news publication.

While the almighty dollar might rule on Wall Street, thankfully there's something known as the First Amendment that almost always trumps things like trademark. If a publication wants to use a photo of the trading floor, mention a trademarked company, or use the trademarked logo of a company to illustrate a news story, there's nothing the trademark holder can or should say.

And if the NYSE wants to do something to prevent "tarnishing" of its image, it can start by explaining why there has been not a single prosecution of anyone involved in the machinations which brought on the Great Recession of 2008, or why after receiving bailouts and other government protections, bonuses are back at pre-meltdown levels, or why hedge fund managers are still taxed at a lower rate than the minimum-wage delivery people who bring them their croissants.

Because you're unlikely to see that, enjoy the gallery of pictures of the NYSE's trading floor, which we bring to you here without any permission from the NYSE – because neither Wired.com nor TPM (nor any other news site) needs it.