Well a die design, just like code, is definitely some form of intellectual property and covered by copyright law. So I think a more fair comparison would be a photo of an entire book.
> is definitely some form of intellectual property and covered by copyright law
I'm not sure if you meant to suggest that "some form of intellectual property" implies "covered by copyright law", but this is untrue in general, and untrue in this specific case.
Copyright does not cover mask works; see [1] for discussion, from which quote: "Copyright law ONLY protects an original work of authorship IF the work is non-functional. But the etching designs on computer chips ARE functional."
Chip dies are covered by a special mask copyright law - you can actually see the M with a circle round it in this die photo (rather than the more traditional C with a circle)
The die design tells what parts are there, not their values or characteristics; cloning a chip just by looking at the die would require a lot more research.
It might be a problem if the photo was reverse engineered into a schematic, which would also imply much more detail, but in this case it's just a photo of something cool.
