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Author Topic: Do not store your images on any UK based site or you could lose rights to them  (Read 4134 times)

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grafix04

« on: July 13, 2012, 23:54 »
0
I hope this new law doesn't pass through and if it does, I hope it never goes beyond UK borders.

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2012/07/02/govt_copyright_white_paper/


« Reply #1 on: July 14, 2012, 00:59 »
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This government is notorious for doing U-turns.  Here's a list of 33 of them.  Hopefully this will appear on it soon.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/politics/9296682/Coalition-climbdowns-u-turns-and-row-backs.html

grafix04

« Reply #2 on: July 14, 2012, 01:12 »
0
This government is notorious for doing U-turns.  Here's a list of 33 of them.  Hopefully this will appear on it soon.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/politics/9296682/Coalition-climbdowns-u-turns-and-row-backs.html


Pasty tax  ;D

ShadySue

  • There is a crack in everything
« Reply #3 on: July 14, 2012, 04:13 »
0
This law has been postited for ages and there was a big petition against it. It seems like just a stupid diversionary legislation, with no value other than presumably to hide stuff they're doing that a wider public might be concerned about.
The last time this came up on here (a week or two back) I asked why some/most/all? the agencies strip out our copyright line from the EXIF data: thus rendering them orphan works as soon as they're out there on a legal buyer's website, without any thief even having to know how to do it.
No answer was the loud reply.
We should start by making it clear to the agencies that this is not on. Not that they'd bother.  >:(

For those in the US, I do understand that registering copyright of images in the US is cheap and easy, and you do it with a batch. In the UK, it's expensive and every photo has to be registered separately:
"The current charges for online registration are 39.00 for 5 years or 64.00 for 10 years per work. Uploads over 10MB are also subject to a fee of 3p per additional MB, but there is no limit to the amount of data you may upload within the registration."
And yes, 'per work' means per image, not per 'body of work'. So that would only be an option for the very top-selling UK togs.

« Reply #4 on: July 14, 2012, 14:13 »
+1
The last time this came up on here (a week or two back) I asked why some/most/all? the agencies strip out our copyright line from the EXIF data: thus rendering them orphan works as soon as they're out there on a legal buyer's website, without any thief even having to know how to do it.
No answer was the loud reply.


I discuss that quite in-depth here: http://picworkflow.com/blog/research/do-microstock-agencies-violate-photographers-dmca-copyright

ShadySue

  • There is a crack in everything
« Reply #5 on: July 14, 2012, 14:30 »
0
The last time this came up on here (a week or two back) I asked why some/most/all? the agencies strip out our copyright line from the EXIF data: thus rendering them orphan works as soon as they're out there on a legal buyer's website, without any thief even having to know how to do it.
No answer was the loud reply.


I discuss that quite in-depth here: http://picworkflow.com/blog/research/do-microstock-agencies-violate-photographers-dmca-copyright


I have't even looked at several stock agency sites, but from the small sample that I have seen, your speculative reason must logically be false:
"The second reason (though purely speculative) is simple business. If your customers can cut you out the middle and go direct to your photographers, then what is the agency there for? This simple reasoning may have meant that for new/growing agencies it was initially risky to share copyright/ownership with clients who might go direct to the source."
Since all the sites I've seen, except Thinkstock, put the contributor/copyright holder's name on the same page as the image, it's even easier for someone wanting to cut out the middleman to copy/paste/Google the name straight from the image page than looking up the copyright note in the metadata. The name must be somewhere on TS too, as I think one can find one's files by searching on one's name.

I hoped you were going to supply authoritative reasons for the deletion, directly from the agencies.

« Reply #6 on: July 14, 2012, 14:44 »
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I'm all for protecting copyright, but I think it is an unnecessary burden on agencies to maintain all the metadata that a contributor stuffs into an image. That data gets stripped out in normal saving processes (multiple sizes, thumbnails, etc.). Even if it was included, most buyers will never look at it or see it anyway. Also, where do you draw the line? Should buyers be required to keep it too? Should Photoshop or other image editors be forced not to remove it either when files are saved?

ShadySue

  • There is a crack in everything
« Reply #7 on: July 14, 2012, 14:55 »
0
The copyright line should be unchangeable by the agencies and by legitimate software (maybe a short time window, of about five minutes, in case you made a mistake entering the info).
Obviously, someone would come out with stripping software, but just as copyright notices,disabling right clicking and putting a watermark on an image will deter a proportion of 'thoughtless' image lifters, so having an embedded and unremovable-by-normal-programs copyright line would prevent a reasonable proportion of images bought from becoming orphaned.

« Reply #8 on: July 14, 2012, 15:13 »
0
The copyright line should be unchangeable by the agencies and by legitimate software (maybe a short time window, of about five minutes, in case you made a mistake entering the info).
Obviously, someone would come out with stripping software, but just as copyright notices,disabling right clicking and putting a watermark on an image will deter a proportion of 'thoughtless' image lifters, so having an embedded and unremovable-by-normal-programs copyright line would prevent a reasonable proportion of images bought from becoming orphaned.

Sounds expensive. You can pay for my share.  ;)

ShadySue

  • There is a crack in everything
« Reply #9 on: July 14, 2012, 15:30 »
0
The copyright line should be unchangeable by the agencies and by legitimate software (maybe a short time window, of about five minutes, in case you made a mistake entering the info).
Obviously, someone would come out with stripping software, but just as copyright notices,disabling right clicking and putting a watermark on an image will deter a proportion of 'thoughtless' image lifters, so having an embedded and unremovable-by-normal-programs copyright line would prevent a reasonable proportion of images bought from becoming orphaned.

Sounds expensive. You can pay for my share.  ;)

That's the real reason that micro is unsustainable. Clearly factoring in preventing/chasing abuses wasn't something the sainted Bruce thought about in any depth.
And why it's easier for them to declare pinterest as an affiliate than pay a staff member to chase up abuses.
So I just had to spend over half an hour filling in the pinterest form (at least they have them, and deal with them timeously: what iStock issue would get dealt with within an hour on a Saturday evening?) on more pins of the same images from the same popular, presumably legitimate buyer's site.
Then I found another with seven pins, all from two sites, which may be legitimate buyers  - one of which has a pin badge on it. Mind you, there are several times more 'regular' (non-pin) sites using that image than I've had sales for, all with the same crop and sizing - and no real way of knowing which was the original, legitimate buyer. Of course, several magazine sites could be employing the same designer, who bought the image and can't think of a different crop and always uses the same size ...  ::) Worse, as the image is one of my few isolateds, istock's watermark falls in a very easily removable place and these same-size, same-crops are all small enough to have come from the iStock thum.
I think I'm going to have a Nice Cup of Tea.

« Reply #10 on: July 15, 2012, 02:42 »
0
For those in the US, I do understand that registering copyright of images in the US is cheap and easy, and you do it with a batch. In the UK, it's expensive and every photo has to be registered separately:
"The current charges for online registration are 39.00 for 5 years or 64.00 for 10 years per work. Uploads over 10MB are also subject to a fee of 3p per additional MB, but there is no limit to the amount of data you may upload within the registration."
And yes, 'per work' means per image, not per 'body of work'. So that would only be an option for the very top-selling UK togs.


"Can foreigners register their works in the United States?
Any work that is protected by U.S. copyright law can be registered. This includes many works of foreign origin. All works that are unpublished, regardless of the nationality of the author, are protected in the United States. Works that are first published in the United States or in a country with which we have a copyright treaty or that are created by a citizen or domiciliary of a country with which we have a copyright treaty are also protected and may therefore be registered with the U.S. Copyright Office. See Circular 38a, International Copyright Relations of the United States, for the status of specific countries."

http://www.copyright.gov/help/faq/

« Reply #11 on: July 15, 2012, 11:06 »
0
First, ALL intellectual property MUST be protected for free and without any tricks. My work is my work and that is. No god * govt or agency or company has right to steal it under any circumstances. Orphan work is just a legal excuse for stealing someones work. As it is I consider this law as absolutely unethical.

Second, all agencies MUST keep original copyright line untouched. All about saving space and blahblah are just excuses. As was said, they willingly render our images "orphan work" and so directly make the stealing much easier or even legal. This is absolutely inacceptable as agency should try to make the best profit from photographers images (including theft pevention) and not try to screw photographers in every possible way and throwing off photographers images out like orphan work. By the way in many countries is absolutely illegal to write something like "(c) Agency ltd./photographer" - agency did not move a finger to create that image so they have no copyright to it. They just charge commision for selling it but that doesn mean they also got copyright to that image.   

Intellectual work is still work and authors do not live from sunshine. As up to 80% of citizens of western Europe or USA work in "services" which are mostly intellectual work and not manufacuring, all governments should protect intellectual property and not shoot themselves in the foot.


 

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