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9th Circuit: Thumbnails Are Big Enough For Fair Use

Posted by timothy on from the visual-impairment dept.

An anonymous reader submits: "According to an article from law.com, yesterday's decision by the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals (U.S.) will have far-reaching effects on web publishing. From the article: '... The court found that reproducing photographs to create thumbnail images is a fair use of the material, but displaying full-sized images violates the copyright owner's exclusive right to publicly display his works....But the court found that displaying the full-sized images through linking and framing was not transformative and harmed the market for the original photographs.' One lawyer is quoted as saying, 'It's basically going to do away with linking or framing without permission.'"

8 of 388 comments (clear)

  1. Re:But what about enforcement? by oregon · · Score: 3, Funny

    What more do you want? Armed thumbnail police breaking down doors and demanding to search your html for

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    Oregon
  2. Better solution! by Serial+Troller · · Score: 2, Funny


    SetEnvIfNoCase Referer www\.yourdomain\.com good_referer
    Order Deny,Allow
    Deny from all
    Allow from env=good_referer
    ErrorDocument 403 http://goatse.cx/hello.jpg
    </FilesMatch>

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    STOP ME BEFORE I POST AGAIN!

  3. My girlfriend always used to tell me... by ozric99 · · Score: 2, Funny
    ... that size didn't matter.

    Thanks Slashdot. When I get back from work today I can shout to her "Hey! Size does matter after all."

    No wait.....

  4. Size by Glytch · · Score: 3, Funny

    What happens if someone has really big thumbs?

  5. You mean the "big images" exist?! by Nathdot · · Score: 4, Funny

    If you've ever "accidentally" been directed to a "leisure" site then, like me, you were probably convinced that only thumbnail images exist.

    This case is a landmark for me because it provides evidence that non-thumbnail pr0n is actually out there somewhere.

    :)

  6. Re:Penalities for Violations? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Funny

    removal of the offender's thumbnails..

  7. Re:In other words by thing12 · · Score: 3, Funny
    No, I can't agree... inlining content whether it be text or images is exactly the same thing. In the case I outlined above the content is still on the remote server - just inlined on mine. I wouldn't be copying it, just causing the users web browser to load it into what appears to be my page. No copying is taking place in either scenario.

    The same situation could apply to music or any other media. You can right now tell a browser to play a music clip when it loads a page, that clip can be on any server. So if a band puts up a web page with clips of their copyrighted music on it so people can listen to it, I can embed a link to those music files on my web page. When people come to my web page they hear them, and even if I offer a link to the bands site in attribution it's still not fair use... it's not copying either in the true sense of the word, but it's violating the spirit of the copyright laws -- What it comes down to is that you're not allowed to profit from other people's copyrighted work without permission.

    Tell me how inlining copyrighted images is different than inlining copyrighted text or music? And what makes one fair use and the others not?

  8. Lit Crit 101 by frank_adrian314159 · · Score: 3, Funny
    If I go and photocopy the latest John Grisham novel and put it in my library, you bet I'm risking trouble.

    Dude, if someone is dumb enough to go to the trouble of photocopying an entire John Grisham novel, they've already got trouble. Double that for anything by Tom Clancy. Do these guys get paid by the pound, or what?

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    That is all.