Sued by Getty images

<i> suing bloggers for exorbitant amounts is a reasonable business plan</i><P>

It's not a business plan. Getting sued is a consequence of using copyrighted material without permission or license. The person getting sued is not an innocent victim; the copyright holder (or his or her agency) is not a villain.

This thread is unfortunately reinforcing all of the negative perceptions held by the general public about the inflated self-

importance and intractability of photographers. No wonder the consumer side of the photography business is in a free fall.

 

We're talking about bloggers with personal websites. There was no sale to be made in the first place. So you don't want

someone who doesn't know any better to use your picture, ask them to take it down. I'm not talking about a major retail

outlet taking a design from a Flickr user and making curtains and window displays without licensing and compensation.

 

Give me a break people. I'm a photographer too, but just because the law allows you to sue a blogger for any arbitrary

sum because they used a picture doesn't make it right. It's good for lawyer's fees and a greedy agency. The law is on the

copyright holder's side. But really? There was no sale here, no loss, ... it's pure greed and bad PR.

So it's better PR if there's no disincentive to use other people's work without permission? It's better if people think that professional work is essentially valueless--you should use whatever you want because the worst that will happen is that you have to take it down if you get caught?

 

"I wouldn't have used it if I had to pay for it" isn't really a legitimate defense for using copyrighted work without permission.

<p>I don't know where the original poster is located but unless they are geographically sort of close by, how much time and effort is Getty going to expend pursuing this now that the image is down? $850? That's not enough money for most people to do any more than send a few threatening letters or have someone make a few nasty phone calls to scare the person into paying. They've made their point. No you shouldn't have used the photo and you took it down immediately. Lesson learned.</p>

<p>Rick H.</p>

<p>"Illegal" ? Really....I think that's something for a court to interpret. Not a website member. </p>

<p>Its a hard way to learn a lesson, but you can't just grab other people's work without either permission or a license if you are going to use it to promote yourself. Again see the million discussions on "fair use". I would just apologize, explain you didn't realize there was an issue (though you should) and ask if they can't see their way clear to lower the demand and move on. It seems hiring an attorney would just be throwing good money after bad in a losing cause.</p>

 

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<p>Illegal" ? Really....I think that's something for a court to interpret</p>

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So is someone breaks into my house and smashes my cameras, it's not illegal until a court says so?</p>

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<p><em>"So is someone breaks into my house and smashes my cameras, it's not illegal until a court says so?"</em></p>

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<p>Jeff, I think civil litigation and criminal prosecution is where the difference lie, and there is the presumption of innocence in both cases.<br>

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It might seem cut and dry to a plaintiff in a civil case, but a court indeed needs to decide the guilt or innocence in cases where a defendant is accused of tortious conduct based on the evidence and the law, often with surprising or unexpected outcomes. <br>

</p>

<p>I don't think it's different at all. If the issue is that a court has to decide, it's the same in both cases. The court has to decide.</p>

<p>I think just as one should know that stealing cameras is a crime, one should also know that stealing the use of images is also a crime even if its civil not criminal.</p>

<p><em>he uses photos and illustrations from various free-use sources.... Though she keeps records for most pictures she uses, my wife can't document where she got the Getty image.</em></p>

<p>Use Google image search, upload the image at issue, and use that to try to figure out from where she got it. If it's from a site that explicitly declares the image to be free for all uses, then point Getty and the site's owner at each other and declare your wife an innocent victim, one way or the other (because then she was duped by either the site's owner or Getty).</p>

<p>And if that's not the way it happened--if the website did not explicitly declare the image free for all uses, giving some sort of general license or something--then your wife wrongly took it. Just because it wasn't marked 'Property of Getty' makes no difference. It wasn't hers, and she knew that. If I leave my bicycle on the sidewalk, I don't need to post a sign on it saying, 'Dave's property, no you can't borrow it,' to make it unlawful for you to borrow it. So unless she was told she could use it, free, then she's in the wrong. $850 may seem steep, but it has to be steep enough to deter people in the first place. As lessons learned for doing something professionally-oriented that's unlawful go, $850 doesn't strike me as too expensive.</p>

<p>As a semi-aside, if I had a dime for every claim of "fair use" I'd heard that was in fact theft or piracy, I could buy myself a nice dinner at any restaurant in town. That's not to say there's never fair use, just that it seems to be claimed ten times for every one legitimate instance of it.</p>

<p>OP - several people have mentioned how unreasonable the proposed amount is but their comments are based on ignorance. You need to arm yourself with some facts - most importantly, how much do Getty charge to license this image. Until you know that you can't even begin to calculate what would be a reasonable penalty for infringement. To calculate that you need to know....<br>

1. What it would have cost if your wife had licensed it,<br>

2. then factor in a penalty on top of that - An innocent infringement carries a smaller penalty than a wilful infringement but you still don't get to use an image without permission and not suffer some penalty.<br>

3. The copyright holders costs in tracking down the infringement and taking action. As previously mentioned IP lawyers aren't cheap and that applies to them just as much as it does to you.<br>

4. Other factors - was the image previously licensed? If not then your wife's use of the image can prevent the copyright holder from licensing the image on an exclusive basis (which generates a higher fee than a non-exclusive) license, so they have lost that potential revenue. By placing the image on her site she exposes it to further infringing use by third parties etc etc.</p>

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<p>This thread is unfortunately reinforcing all of the negative perceptions held by the general public about the inflated self- importance and intractability of photographers. No wonder the consumer side of the photography business is in a free fall.<br>

We're talking about bloggers with personal websites. There was no sale to be made in the first place. So you don't want someone who doesn't know any better to use your picture, ask them to take it down. I'm not talking about a major retail outlet taking a design from a Flickr user and making curtains and window displays without licensing and compensation</p>

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<p>So based on this, big corporations should pay however bloggers should be able to go to their local Walmart and take home whatever they want without paying for it. After it, it is only for a blogger who is not making money. </p>

<p>Sorry but this thinking is absurd. Stealing is stealing. Period.</p>

If this is stealing, then what is a site like Tumblr? It is a curated agglomeration of other people' work. Why isn't basically

every one of the millions of Tumblr users being sued for copyright infringement? Has anyone here noticed what has

happened with the internet and digital technology and the market value of licensing in the last 10 years?

<p>What's the actual damage ? Should MEGA corporations be able to extort more money because they have the financial ability to do so, as compared to joe photographer who is a one man mom and pop operation, who may not have the financial ability to threaten to suee someone, have the means to "search" to see if someone is using their images ? <br>

I've always had a huge distaste for LARGE corporations using their power to screw the small guy, regardless of the issue. And that's what is happening here. A simple "take down" letter is all that was needed. Not some ridiculous " fill my fat pockets" threatening demand. </p>

<p>How many of YOU out there have the means to do what Getty can do ? </p>

<p>Not knowing the size and quality of the file used without permission or exactly how it was used, it's hard to estimate damage; however, I know that Getty sells my images for several hundred dollars each, but the range is from around $50 to $500. Assume $250, plus attorney's fees and it's not hard to get to $850.</p>

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<p>How does it help photographers' reputation when agencies and individuals go after bloggers with obscure websites for $8000 for an image in a blog post that a few people have read?</p>

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<p>It doesn't affect photographer's reputation much at all. Its usually a stock house involved as is the case here. An ordinary photographer doesn't have the resources to pursue complicated infringement claims in federal court anyway. But I know of situation where these claims have induced people to stop lifting images in general and that goes beyond the stock houses. That's how it helps.</p>

 

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<p>That' shy so many consumers who previously had to deal with photographers are running away.</p>

 

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<p>Hardly any infringers, in these instances, are dealing with photographers but they do wind up getting content in legitimate ways which tends to help photographers. You would have us believe these same people were somehow helpful to photographers when they lifted content. So many get real uppity if you merely request a take down of the use. The disrespect is already there.</p>

 

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<p>Can you imagine paying for a wedding photographer, and then having said photographer hold on to the images until you pay again for printing, etc., because the copyright belongs to the photographer?</p>

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<p>That typically is how it was done. With rampant internet/digital copying ability that model has dried up quite a bit and still done to some extent. So, yes, I can imagine that.</p>

 

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<p>National magazines pay as little as $200 for a cover image, how in any conceivable way, even with punitive or sanction intentions, can you justify this sort of legal extortion? Just because it's possible?</p>

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<p>Its called consequences. Hardly any infringer pays the amounts you are complaining about. Paying a few hundred under a statutory framework designed to protect against and deter infringing is hardly the horrible result you make it out to be in any event.</p>

 

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<p>This thread is unfortunately reinforcing all of the negative perceptions held by the general public about the inflated self- importance and intractability of photographers. No wonder the consumer side of the photography business is in a free fall.</p>

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<p>Sure, because unfettered lifting of free content is the proper perception and has been sooo helpful to the industry.</p>

 

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<p>We're talking about bloggers with personal websites. There was no sale</p>

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<p><br /><br />Reproduction of images reduces any actual value it has and chronic infringement by all these innocent bloggers ect.l has tanked the value of photography.</p>

<p>Cry me a river.</p>

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<p>"Has anyone here noticed what has happened with the internet and digital technology and the market value of licensing in the last 10 years?"</p>

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<p><br /><br />Because of people who, like you who believe that people should just be free to take other's intellectual property for their own use without consequence. One of the very reason copyright law exists. A hedge against people who think like you.</p>

<p>John, when's the last time you downloaded something from Youtube without paying a licensing fee ? </p>

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<p>"Has anyone here noticed what has happened with the internet and digital technology and the market value of licensing in the last 10 years?"</p>

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<p><br /><br />Because of people like you who believe that people should just be free to take other's intellectual property for their own use without consequence. One of the very reason copyright law exists. A hedge against people who think like you.</p>

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<p>John, when's the last time you downloaded something from Youtube without paying a licensing fee ?</p>

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<p> <br>

I realize this was addressed to John but stealing is stealing. It does not matter is you are stealing it from a large mega-corporation or your local store. If you want to rationalize it so that you feel better, that is your choice. But it is stealing. If you tried to walk into your local store and take something without walking out, anyone would call that stealing. Why is this any different.</p>

 

 

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<p>John, when's the last time you downloaded something from Youtube without paying a licensing fee ?</p>

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What John does or doesn't do is completely irrelevant to the fact that the image creator is owed something. Getty will also get something as the image creator's agent.

<p>It's irrelevant when people start romping around on their high white horse like their St. Michael acting like they're sin free.</p>

<p>Yes stealing is stealing, whether it's a Getty image or some file from Youtube downloaded illegally that people copy for their own enjoyment. Be it music or movie. Don't throw out high and mighty accusations if you are guilty of the same thing in some other venue. </p>

<p>Remember, Getty is an agent for people like us. The photographer that they're selling for doesn't often have the resources to protect their copyrights. Getty has gotten my images in places where I'd never had access, including Wall Street Journal and International advertising agencies, willing to pay good money. Getty is protecting its own interest, but also mine.</p>