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Designer Accused of Copying His Own Work By Stock Art Website
the_harlequin writes "A successful designer, who has a showcase of his own work available online, has had a stock image site accuse him of copyright infringement over his own illustrations, citing damages of $18,000. The story doesn't end there; the stock photo site hired lawyers, who have contacted the original designer's clients. The lawyers told them the designer is being investigated for copyright infringement and their logos might be copied, thus damaging his reputation. 'My theory is that someone copied my artwork, separated them from any typography and then posted them for sale on the stock site. Someone working for the site either saw my [LogoPond] showcase or was alerted to the similarities. They then prepared the bill and sent it to me. The good thing is that the bill gives me a record of every single image they took from me. That helps me gather dates, sketches, emails, etc. to help me prove my case. The bad thing is that despite my explanations and proof, they will not let this go.'"
They play hardball, hit them with a DMCA letter, pull all of the work down or else, and of course file for the maximum penalty per-hit on the stock images. They don't want to play nice, then don't play nice. "
Karma Whoring for Fun and Profit.
this laws are supposed to help this dude, or people like this dude, if this dude fail to protect itself, then our system has failed, and we don't need any protection. If the force of the strong is the one that prevail, theres no need for laws.
-Woof woof woof!
Sue them back for damages and that all their customers cease immidiately from using his work. That should get you a very concerned lawyer on the other side of the table who's probably ready to settle.
Live today, because you never know what tomorrow brings
If you have all of the original files of the art, file a DMCA notice to them to remove your art from their site and if they continue to be a problem, counter sue them for each image for maximum damages.
and begin selling stock images through the site he pwns as a result of the countersuit. A good lawyer should be able to get him some serious money (gratis) if he has adequate proof that the works are his.
This will be your chance to make some money off their commercial use of your art, a good chunk of money at that. All you have to be able to do is prove when you created the works and when they started using them.
Go get legal advice now, make sure they have actual experience in IP law.
Good luck with your new found source of revenue!
http://www.jonengle.com.nyud.net/2009/04/accused/
Coral Cache mirror of the page.
Forget world peace, bring on -1 pointless
so that the damages you get from them for harrassing you about YOUR own creations make them scream hard.
Read radical news here
Judging by your description, I'm guessing that you haven't registered the copyright of your images.
Big mistake. If you don't register a copyright within four months of publication, you cannot get statutory damages. You can only recover actual damages, and the burden will be on you to prove them.
1. Hire a lawyer
2. Register your copyrights (you still have to register before you can file suit)
3. File suit (not just for copyright infringement, you clearly have a claim for defamation as well)
4. Send DMCA notices to the site, the site's ISP, and any of the site's customers that are using the images (and the customer's ISPs).
The "bad" batman is on a crime spree, framing the "good" batman.
Following this plotline, the solution to the OP's problem is quite straightforward:
He needs to enlist help from the Joker, who is now facing some serious competition in the battle for Gotham.
I'm surprised this isn't more common. Sadly this will probably cost him in legal fees, and both he and the company are victims of a 3rd scam artist.
That they won't back down with presented with proof, ways against them. Do they think he is making it up or are they afraid of losing face?
Think Deeply.
If they had really taken the images from you, you would have known about this a long time ago. Instead, they made unauthorized copies of them.
Brought to you by the Please Don't Refer to Copyright Infringement as Theft department.
"... awfully expensive in lawyer fees." Apparently there are almost no lawyers in the U.S. who are true partners of their clients. Their clients are just a way to make as much money as possible. Getting involved with a lawyer is often just making something else bad happen to you. Most lawyers have no caring whatsoever if they handle the case poorly; there just is no quality control. Lawyers commonly lie about how much work they did.
It was on firehose 3 hours ago - when I looked about an hour ago he had 300+ posts and it was already doing the rounds on digg, stumble, reddit etc
Rightly so. This kind of crap needs stamping on hard.
Invaders must die
The problem is that some people get so excited about representation that they will sign anything handed to them. And then complain when they find out what it means... Just be careful what you sign in the future and try to settle this away. There is a difference if you grant them exclusive rights to something or just sign away all your rights to said work.
Exception Duck - may or may not contain chicken.
if i take a photo, put a CC license on it , but someother party take a screenshot of it and passes it off as owned by them, is there any effective way to prove i took the photo. Yes i could upload to say flickr and that would prove i had the photo at a particular date, but it doesnt really prove i took the photo. What in your opionion is the best way to protect your work. I give all my public photo's a CC license anyway but i would'nt want someone else passing them off as theres.
It wasn't Slashdotted. It was already hit by several other big sites. Slashdot's a day behind on knocking his site down. :)
There's a link for the cache in the comments here. A blog posting, and lots of comments most of which saying the same thing. Get a good lawyer.
They probably bought his images from a 3rd party, so they believe they own them. They'll hold onto that belief until it's gone through court. It'll probably turn out that it's almost impossible to track down the 3rd party, so all he'll eventually get is for the stock photo site to take down his work.
Serious? Seriousness is well above my pay grade.
I'm not one to normally swear on slashdot, hence posting as AC, but it has to be said that stockart.com are a bunch of fucking cunts.
I hope they get their collective asses kicked bigtime over this debacle.
Exactly. They are dishonest. See the comment above.
While you don't have to register copyrights to *have* a copyright, there is a mechanism to register copyrights with the US Copyright Office (well, if you're in another country, this option would probably not be available to you, though I'm not sure). When you register the copyright, you upload a copy of the work that you are registering.
While it is possible for a copyright registration to be overturned by a court, if presented with solid evidence (as in the SCO vs. Novell case where The SCO Group tried to fraudulently register copyrights), my understanding is that the registration puts the proceedings in your favor - if you hold a registration, the court assumes you own it until proven otherwise - you don't have to prove that you own the copyright, the other party has to prove you do NOT own the copyright). The registration also increases the amount of damages you can get in a court action (I think you can get triple damages plus attorney's fees).
It does cost money to register copyrights though - I think it's $35 for online registration, so if an artist has hundreds of small items they wish to copyright, it could get expensive to register them all individually. It might, however, be possible to collectively register them (that is, to have 100 or 200 photos as part of a single copyright registration), but I'm not sure about that.
Outside of copyright registration, I think the way courts decide copyright ownership is based upon someone providing the earliest proof of publication (though I'm not sure - I am not a layer, this isn't legal advice, etc, etc). If you can prove that you had published the image on flickr or some other site at an earlier date than the other party can show proof of their publication, that might do it for you.
I really think, though, that more open source and creative commons software/content producers should register their copyrights. It really does provide you a certain wall of protection against
Other than, I'm not sure what you can do. Registration of your copyrights is probably the best way to give you a strong case though.
Everybody email accounts@stockart.com and support@stockart.com to tell them how you feel. You can also call 1.800.297.7658.
I'd definitely turn around and sue them for selling your material, harassment, lose of business, etc.
They're trying to destroy him so he has to turn around and crush the scum bags.
Why should they only remove them?
Can I claim I believed everything I downloaded to be legal downloads since it's a crime to spread copyrighted work so it must have been ...
And then get away with it except for removal of my copies?
Sounds like an acceptable penalty but I doubt the copyright holders would agree in most cases.
Anyway, he'd already told them how it was and they kept pushing it.
It really does provide you a certain wall of protection against. . . claims of the sort discussed in this article, by someone else trying to claim your copyrights.
I had a PHP program on the internet for a while. Released it in 2003 with a certain name.
In 2006, someone came along and named their program with the same name. Normally I would have been okay, but it served exactly the same purpose.
I emailed the author and asked them politely to change the name. They responded back and admitted they saw my PHP program and it's name, but "figured they would use it anyway", and then had the gall to tell me to merge my project with his! I of course turned him down, not only because he was outright stealing the name but also because his program was an outright mess. He then spewed some bullshit that if he got more users and was 'bigger', he would then own the name. He then said that a movie studio can just suddenly own a student movie if they film it with the same script, characters, and actors, but just sell more copies.
Yeah, he was an idiot.
Unfortunately I was poor and didn't have the money to start court proceedings on him. The program I released was free; if he thought he really could take the name away by getting more people to download his, I could just play defense.
Karma was a bitch though, and about 6 months later his forum was just page after page of spambots.
Posting anon because I think he has a well-to-do mommy and daddy and he might try to sue me for libel or somesuch :(
In short, I understand how violated this guy must feel.
Something similar happened to me and I knew the lawyers realized they had no case but they wouldn't let it drop as long as their client was paying. My mother was a judge, so I knew how to aproach this. See the lawyers would never bring this to trial because the judge would repremand them when it was so clear they had no case. But that won't stop them from threatening me. So, first, because I wasn't a lawyer, I sent copious letters to the lawyers and their client repeatedly telling them they in as many ways that they had no case. Each letter sent to the lawyer cost the client money. Each letter sent to the client cost the client money when they turned the letter over to the lawyers as they must. Each reply from the lawyer, and they must reply to each letter, cost the client money. You can't wear lawyers down, but you can wear the client down.
Do not have a lawyer send the letters. It is considered unethical for a lawyer to send a letter to the another lawyer's cleint and it is really the client you want to get to.
If you have high resolution data or vector files this should be a technical proof that the work is your creation.
John Fogerty?
nail in the coffin of copyright...
comment first, facts later. http://chem.tufts.edu/AnswersInScience/RelativityofWrong.htm
Well, not to mention considerable damages for libel.
This one seems like a no brainer. Hire a LAWYER.
I'm no trying to be a smart-ass, but you obviously have a case and the proof. I think you will most likely be able to counter sue for lost profits, maybe damages and all that other fun stuff. They are not playing nice, so you need to protect yourself.
The real Sig captains the Northwestern. This one captains
what your counsel needs to do
1 begin a counter suit in a GO FOR BLOOD type mode
2 file an injunction with the court preventing them from "discussing details of the case(s) with parties not currently involved with the case" (why are they telling your customers that the status of their purchase may be in question??)
3 file a DCMA notice on the images in question
4 get lots of discovery, lots and lots of discovery
what you need to do
1 stop talking about the case! your last post should be that you did the DCMA notice and got your injunction
2 contact all of your clients and inform them of the situation and offer to send them proof of copyright (higher res version with predated meta stamps or whatever)
3 remember your actions should be clean and above the board (but hire a team that speaks MoFo grade law)
Any person using FTFY or editing my postings agrees to a US$50.00 charge
I'm not saying it's right, but it's the way it will probably work out.
Here's how I understand the case. If you step back a little, it will all be clear.
"A", the artist, created the work.
"B", the 3rd party thief, posed as an original artist, and submitted them to "C" for sale.
"C", the stock photo site.
"C" purchased the images from "B", probably under an exclusive license. "C" therefore has legitimate claim to the images. They found out that "A" has the same images on his site, so they filed the complaint. This is perfectly legitimate.
"A" countered the claim saying that he was the original artist.
"C" is still sitting on an invoice, a paid receipt, a signed (electronically, probably) contract saying that they own the photos.
Who do you believe? The person that you've done business with, or a third party?
This unfortunately happens all the time. I was talking to someone who showed me their "original web site, created by a local graphics art firm." I immediately recognized several images as stock photos, and the layout looked like a template. A few days later while doing unrelated work, I found the template on templatemonster.com. Ahhh, it was a template, that the local firm populated with their specific details (we do.. our number is.. email us at..). They confronted the local firm about it. They insisted that it was all original work, even though it was easy to see otherwise. The site owner chose to believe the local firm. Why? Because they had done business with them, and I was just a new guy in the picture.
I could copy down a handful of photos from a stock image place, upload them to somewhere that I had cooperation with, that would put whatever timestamps I wished on, and then say "Oh no, I made those last year". Does that make me right? Nope.
A good thief wouldn't turn around and say "oh ya, I stole it, sorry 'bout that." They would defend their story until it was proven completely wrong. I worked in a jail once (long long ago), and I was told on day 1, "every person in here will tell you how they're innocent." Either the legal system is really screwed, or liars and thieves are frequently one in the same. Heck, even in a traffic stop, people lie.
"Do you know how fast you were going?"
"ya, about 55."
"no you were doing 85. 30mph faster than the rest of the cars on the road."
Is "C" really liable for damages on property that they bought in good faith? No. They can be sued. They will probably agree to remove the copyrighted images and turn over the contact information "B". That won't necessarily get you very far though. What if the only contact information on "B" is a Hotmail address, and a PayPal account, which indicates the owner is in Russia? Good luck suing him.
Good faith goes a long way in court, especially where there is a paper trail.
The same applies to other things.
If you go online and buy say a new computer. It's 20% less than retail, so you assume you're dealing with a legitimate wholesaler. As it turns out, that person worked in a computer store, stole the computer, and sold it online. Do you believe you are criminally or civilly liable? Because it is stolen merchandise, you may have to forfeit the property, but you likely won't be criminally liable because you bought it in good faith. On the other hand, if you knew the person was a thief, you'd run into a long list of legal problems.
Another way to look at it is, go buy something at a pawn shop. How do you know that "B", the person who sold it to the pawn shop, was actually the owner of that property? You don't. You do hold onto the receipt, just in case. It proves your innocence (or at least helps to establish it).
Serious? Seriousness is well above my pay grade.
At least once upon a time stock photography had a decent argument. "I've got negatives, what do you have." Not that film is impossible to fake, it's just that it's a pain to do and very difficult to do well.
You need a competent lawyer. In the end, you should come out of this way ahead. You can countersue for libel, defamation of character, and copyright violations.
No, "C" thinks it has legitimate claim to the images. Not the same thing.
Whether or not "C" was tricked by "B", they still have no claim against "A" (the actual author). And by going after "A"s clients, they threw away any chance to settle their mistake amicably, so now "A" is perfectly justified in releasing the lawyers on "C".
I have an occasional problem with photo sites copying this image. It gets quite a few links, to which I don't object, but outright copies I have to bug people about. The worst case was a site which used it as a "smiley" in their forum system. It took them a while to untangle that. They were very unhappy about having to take it down, because removing it messed up old forum posts, but eventually they did. Right now, I'm getting Photobucket to take it down; someone uploaded a copy there.
(I used to have that animation of a man jumping off a building on my Downside.com site. But after September 11, 2001, when people really were jumping off the World Trade Center, I took it off the home page of Downside. It continues to pop up on the web, eight years later. It's a black and white animated GIF, made as a full 3D animation with Softimage|3D and the Animats physics engine, then processed into a simple silhouette and run through a GIF compressor. One had to do things like that back in the dialup era to put interesting motion on a web page.)
Why should he let them get away with just taking the images down? They were the ones that started playing dirty with the calls to his clients. I think he should first hire a lawyer, then subpoena the sales records for the images in question. After they get the records, then amend the claims to treat each sale as a separate infringement and seek the maximum penalty allowed ($250,000?). If the case is a strong as the blurb makes it out to be and the stock photo company is smart, they will attempt to settle out of court. If not, then Mr. Photographer may very well end up with a sizable amount of money as he bankrupts the company.
(Note: IANECTAL-this observation is made early in the morning while I wait for my coffee to brew so any advice should be treated as suspect)
Of all tyrannies, a tyranny sincerely exercised for the (supposed) good of its victims may be the most oppressive
if they were contacted by the original artist? Would they not believe the artist as being the original? Surely they have to realize that at some point an authentic, original artist will one day approach them or that it isn't out of the realm of possibility that they may accuse an authentic, original artist of stealing his own work so why aren't they realizing that yet? They must think they can sell art and never have to be in contact with any original artist. They must think those chances are astronomical enough for it to never cross their collective minds that they are currently suing someone who made it possible for them to make money. We may be at the point now where it is a matter of saving face. They may prefer to continue the lawsuit rather than say they made a mistake.
this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom. -- Lincoln, Gettysburg Address
I feel for this guy because I know how it is. I recently had copies of my videos stollen from me and posted on various websites and then I get a notice from YouTube that I am in violation of copyright for my own work that has ME IN IT and they are allowing me to use it but all ad reveinue goes to the other user. My videos were posted years before this company posted my clip. I can't afford a copyright lawyer and youtube refuses to accept the proof that I own my video. I sent a DMCA to them on the other video and got a reply that they have proof of ownership. It's insaine how a big company can screw the little guy and there is nothing we can do about it. Unless you want to shell out the money that honestly I don't have to spend with the economy the way it is now. Sorry for the rant.
Actually, wouldn't your pawn shop example count as a case of "Receiving Stolen Property"? Don't think a receipt and claims of "good faith" will help that much there.
> The bad thing is that despite my explanations and proof, they will not let this go.
Not so bad. If all you say is true in the end they will pay you quite a bit of money (including all your legal expenses).
Warning: this article may contain humor, sarcasm, parody, and perhaps even irony. Read at your own risk.
Do not have a lawyer send the letters. It is considered unethical for a lawyer to send a letter to the another lawyer's cleint and it is really the client you want to get to.
I have no idea where you're pulling that from, but it's gotta be a place where the sun ain't shining too often.
What you're saying sounds reasonable, but there's another angle to this specific case: it appears that the stock-art website is slandering the original artist, in addition to claiming copyright infringement. I'd definitely sue for loss of reputation.
What happens if someone has been plagiarized, their words, though? And there is no longer any proof, any timestamp, on the web, since it has long been removed. Would that person be out of luck? (Plagiarized as in the story was copied and pasted without citing the author.)
The law protects the ones that has the financial means to afford its protection. Those others that lack the financial means are just... road kills.
ELOI, ELOI, LAMA SABACHTHANI!?
Without actually looking at the evidence, nobody can tell who's right and who's wrong. It's plausible that someone stole this guy's art and uploaded it, it's plausible that the stock company ripped him off deliberately, and it's also plausible that he uploaded the images himself to sell them multiple times.
Let the courts work it out: that's what they are there for.
(As far as copyright is concerned, once you sell the rights to your works, you don't own them anymore.)
It's time for government-run digital timestamp services that will sign any hashcode-sized number and return it to you via email, and to require that any assertion of copyright over digital material include a timestamped signature for its hash.
Leave it, as a last resort, to the courts to decide whether an allegedly infringing copy is similar enough, but make the copyright precedence if they are so a simple matter of comparing timestamps.
As always, all IMO. Insert "I think" everywhere grammatically possible.
The lawyers will end up ruling the world. Its too bad people can't make an honest living anymore without fear of a "goliath" coming in and suing you. They have more money and resources, and fighting them just detracts you from using your true talents to produce artwork. Its sad really...
Play Free Games at FreeGameGallery.com. We have Flash Games for Everyone!
That still applies in photography with RAWs. They have the serial number of the camera that took them embedded in the data, and they can't be edited, only converted and saved in a different format and then edited. The original RAW is just a dump of the sensor's state immediately after the shutter closes. They're also huge proprietary formats, and I don't think any photographer uploads them to stock sites.
On top of that, they're held as a much higher form of evidence than say a JPEG in court as they are extremely difficult to tamper with. Since a RAW image is not even an image, but just a memory dump of a CMOS or CCD, you'd have to know the specifics of that exact chip in order to edit it, and the only people who know that usually are the manufacturers of said chip.
So, "I've got the RAWs, what do you have, JPEGs?"
Buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo!
pawn shops are generally regulated and covered by other statutes.
Do you even lift?
These aren't the 'roids you're looking for.
John Fogerty had been the lead singer of and primary songwriter for the band Creedence Clearwater Revival ("CCR"). The record label for CCR was Fantasy Records. When Fogerty started his solo career, Fantasy Records sued him, saying that his song "The Old Man Down the Road" was simply a rewrite of his CCR song "Run Through the Jungle."
As I recall Fogerty's argument at trial (which he won) was basically that he always wrote in the same basic style and there were bound to be similarities. There was a second lawsuit for a song on the album that seemed to reference the head of Fantasy Records, Saul Zaentz ("'Zanz Kant Dance'" but he'll steal your money.").
Anyway, the case went all the way to the US Supreme Court (Fogerty v. Fantasy, Inc., 510 U.S. 517 (1994)) on the issue of granting Fogerty attorney's fees. See http://www.law.cornell.edu/supct/html/92-1750.ZO.html .
I went to Penn State. According to a few professors I attended claimed the school had, while I was there, ~2003-2007, had a policy where the plagiarism rules applied to plagiarizing yourself.
by Anonymous Coward: I, for one, welcome the shift from car analogies to pizza analogies. um.. overlords?
Is "C" really liable for damages on property that they bought in good faith? No. They can be sued. They will probably agree to remove the copyrighted images and turn over the contact information "B".
And surrender any income they had from the property, right?
Violence is the last refuge of the incompetent. Polar Scope Align for iOS
Oh, that's a whole other story. :) Once he's proven innocent of the charges, he can then go after the company for lost work, blah, blah, blah. Hopefully he has a very sympathetic jury.
Just because you think someone is a thief, it's a bad idea to hunt down everyone he knows and tell them so, especially where there's an economic impact.
I can't believe their lawyers let them do that. It's usually a matter of STFU until court. I would guess they know they're on shaky ground, so they're trying to pressure him by hitting his clients, but that's really going to hurt them.
Serious? Seriousness is well above my pay grade.
What is more entertaining is when they use a subset of the picture, thinking it's the whole thing. "I have this." Well, I have the original photo, uncropped, plus the other 500+ pictures shot during that shoot. What do you have? :)
My other pictures have always been my proof. Of course, I thumbnail them if I ever want or need to show someone, so they get a little 320x240 picture, and I'm still sitting on the full resolution picture. :)
Serious? Seriousness is well above my pay grade.
Unless the camera is specifically made for it (e.g. cameras which digitally sign the RAW), faking a RAW isn't as hard as you make it out to be. Converting a JPEG back to a RAW and putting in a phony serial number is certainly within the realm of possibility for a dedicated fraudster. And not having the RAW doesn't mean you weren't the photographer either, obviously.
Well, "C" has an invoice and a receipt (or they should), so they have documented the purchase of the images. If I were in their shoes, I'd believe I was in the right too. Of course, I wouldn't go after clients. All it can do is hurt one or both parties.
You are right though, with the big picture in view, their legitimate claim is suddenly the belief of a legitimate claim.
Serious? Seriousness is well above my pay grade.
FYI there's a pattern to this sort of behavior from Gates; Years before, he lifted the "Tiny Basic" source code from a user's group magazine and sold it to Tandy (as in Radio Shack) for their computers.
I won't go into other details of their behavior like what happened with OS/2, Stac, DR-DOS, Netscape, but Microsoft has a pattern of stealing other people's work.
Well, IANAL, but I've never heard of anyone going to court for receiving/possession of stolen goods, when they believed they were purchased legitimately in good faith.
From what I've seen, if you go to the guy who's selling TV's out of the back of his van behind the mini-mart, then you have no reason to believe that he's legitimate.
The Internet is a huge gray market though. Even "professional" appearing sites can be straight con jobs. You may or may not get your product. You may or may not get stolen products. You may get your credit card charged all the way to its limit. etc, etc, etc.
I'd almost feel safer shopping at a flea market. :)
Serious? Seriousness is well above my pay grade.
If you shoot in RAW, you can have the same argument. The same is true if any of the images in question were otherwise processed in any way that destroyed information.
I still have my "negatives" in my Digital photography. the photos that leave me are NEVER in the original size and format. You as a customer get a re-sized image that will never be larger than 12 megapixels, has a digital stenography mark in it and All the EXIF data is wiped.
Oh, if you are my customer and asking for 20X30 prints, you gotta buy them from me, or buy the copyright to the RAW image. Otherwise you'll never get more than a 12megapixel image from me.
Honestly, nobody needs bigger than 8Megapixel Images anyways... even full color magazine spreads don't needs more than that.
Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
Well, a RAW is pretty much just a state dump from the sensor - it's not an image at all, an image is created from it using various interpolation techniques and it varies from sensor to sensor.
Creating a RAW isn't something as simple as saving an image as RAW. RAW is not an image format, it's just a term for what amounts to not much more than a state dump. If you don't have the sensor specifications, it will not be nearly as easy.
That aside, most photographers take more than one shot, and pick the best out of them. Just having the other three or four shots of the same subject and bringing all of them to court while the other person brings a crop of your original shot is more than enough.
Buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo!
It's a given that you cannot infringe your own copyright. If this designer still owns the copyright on his images then he should be suing for everything from malicious prosecution to SLAPP, and most any lawyer should be happy to take his case.
If this designer sold the entire copyright (foolish), or did it as Work for Hire (foolish) then he may be out of luck here.
If the designer does still own his own copyrights, and wants to cause trouble even through he has licensed them to this site, then he should be suing for Misuse of Copyright and getting their license to use his work revoked.
Disclaimer: IANAL, so hire someone who is.
"It's the height of ridiculousness to say for those 9 lines you get hundreds of millions."
"Information wants to be free".
"If your business model doesn't work, that's not my problem."
"Copyright is an artificial restriction. Nothing is lost when something is copied. It's like if you could copy someone else's car while they still have the original car - it doesn't hurt anything."
Whuh? Did slashdot get dns jacked and steered to some other forum? I'm confused.
It occurred to me, that a sensible course of action, might be to scan (in hi-res) any artwork that I'd drawn which I could then send to stockart with the following text:
"In response to the recent actions taken by StockArt towards a graphic designer (which I will make no remark on) has led me to believe that the only way to ensure, that, in future, a similar situation does not occur to me is to forward on hi-res versions of all of my artwork to you and your lawyers. I would be grateful if you could keep this email on file, so, that, in future, should someone upload an image you can compare it to this one - and all future images that I send. Needless to say, the attached image is (c)me.
Please find attached 512Mb PSD file. 6,230 images to follow.'
I dunno... just a thought...
I know it's popular to be all superiorly cynical here, and talk about how everything's a conspiracy against the little guy, and big corps/big gov are all necessarily evil, but come on guys - y'all are modding this high insightful? Anyone's who's paid any attention can see that the law in fact does protect those who can't "afford its protection", whatever that means. It doesn't protect them as well as it protects those who have the resources to vigorously protect their own rights, but frankly I don't think you want to live under a government where that's not the case. It's easy to say that the police are corrupt and such, and in some cases they are, but to make a system where the poor can go to court and sue people just as easily as the rich would mean either truly massive taxation, the nationalization of the legal profession, or placing artificial limits on how many rights you can protect that scale with your income. None of these sound particularly appealing to me.
Inequalities are a fact of life in a free society. It sucks, but it's better than the alternative.
Bobb9000 - raised by the wolves,
Oxford education as phrased by the wolves.
What do I have (and by I, I'm just meaning any photographer in general)? Well, for one I've got an original file of that same image. Perhaps it contains slightly more resolution than the photo you've got (maybe it was downsampled, cropped, or modified in some other way). Perhaps it's in raw format, and that raw file can be converted (using the right settings) to generate the supplied art. The metadata in that file (camera, lens, focal length, focal distance, shutter speed, aperture, iso, capture time, etc) can be used to verify several things, like is the angle of shadows consistant with the time of day, is the depth of field consistant with what you'd get from the indicated lens+settings, etc. Of course, all of that could theoretically be reverse engineered from the photo, but it would take quite a bit of effort and be prone to error.
I then also have a couple other photos of the same scene from slightly different angles. I've got dozens (if not hundreds) of other images from the same location or event. Evidence like that would be MANY orders of magnitude more difficult to fake. If you could fake that, you'd have no need to steal images because you could obviously just fabricate any photo you'd like.
Of course, if that's not the nail in the coffin, then there is also the fact that I (hopefully) registered the photo with the copyright office prior to your first documented usage of the image. And barring that, maybe I've sold the image to some other company before your first documented usage, and they can be called on to testify to that.
In short, even in the film days, an original negative was the least of the evidence a photographer had to prove his ownership, and in the age of digital photography, that same evidence is still every bit as useful.
The only effective way to stop all this silliness will be to abolish copyright completely. I'm sure I'll get plenty of indignant replies from copyright holders, but the indignation they feel about the prospect of losing this immoral legal 'right' is like that felt by slaveholders about the proposed abolition of slavery.
Those who would give up essential liberty to purchase a little temporary safety, deserve neither liberty nor safety.
Legitimate doesn't mean what parent thinks it does.
conforming to the law or to rules; able to be defended with logic or justification
Ok, a couple of things with the second part of your statement first, in that case, while at Common Law you would be liable for the possession of stolen goods (going back to British cases such as Cundy v. Lindsay), in most jurisdictions these days there are statutory rules protecting purchasers from sales of businesses (though, it usually only applies to sales from a business, not between individuals). The entire theory of "Good Faith" is nice; however, it's not necessarily a legal defence, if you're negligent, it doesn't matter what your intention was.
With regards to comments on the first part, and the situation in question here, yeah, while people were debating back and forth who owned the images in question, it was a relatively gray area (though even that would depend on what "proof" the gentleman provided the stock image firm), which the courts would sort out in time. Based on the statements though, it appears that the Stock Image group or their lawyer crossed some big black lines in calling clients and claiming that the gentleman had stolen images. There are all sorts of charges that can come from this, depending on the nature of the statements, etc. though defamation may be a fairly east case if you can show they made factual statements which are not true (especially in the US). As mentioned elsewehre, if it's found that sufficient proof was provided to establish that he did own the images prior to the legal battle, more charges (dependant on the locale) may be possible, and it would definetely affect the damages awarded.
Hence, it's more important than ever for digital artists to register their work with the copyright office. They become the arbitor of who created the art first.
Oh ya, if he can get a lawyer to work on contingency, they'll make some decent money.
I can't believe their lawyers let them do that. It was a stupid mistake only done by kids and newbie business people.
Serious? Seriousness is well above my pay grade.
Well, IANAL, so consult a lawyer for proper advice in your jurisdiction, but...
They have proof it was published.
You don't have proof it was published.
Unless you can provide proof, you're probably out of luck.
Serious? Seriousness is well above my pay grade.
Assuming this guy is telling the truth... If this company is claiming $18,000 in damages, they company must believe they own the registered copyright. It's possible the thief actually DID register these works. (AFAIK, the US Copyright Office doesn't check one registrations against all others when filed, the way the Patent Office does.)
However if the original creator registered his own copyright on these images, then it will simply be a matter of comparing his registered copyright to the company's, and comparing the respective dates.
Then you go after C for being idiots and buying something from someone who was acting shifty from the start.
Legally it doesn't matter how YOU got the stolen goods, you are still breaking the law by selling them, knowingly or not, doesn't matter.
As a general rule innocent people in the middle get a get of jail card by prosecutors as they try to uphold the spirit of the law rather than the letter.
Persistent Volume manager for Kubernetes - https://github.com/dwimsey/openshift-pvmanager
Can't be edited? Are you kiddin? Whats next, you're going to tell us PDFs can't be editted in any app other than Acrobat?
If RAW is so hard to deal with, how come there are so many apps that let you manipulate RAW files?
If you can read it, you can write it. If someone can read the RAW data, then they can also manipulate the RAW data. Even if you slap a digital signature on the image, it can just be removed and another one put on it instead that will look JUST as valid. The only possibility for hope is a trusted third party to timestamp the signature. Since I'm not aware of that many cameras that have an internet connection all the time, then I find it unlikely that the original RAWs, regardless of who made them, have any third party verification.
In short, the conversation would go something like this:
"I've got RAWs, what do you have, JPEGs?"
"No, I've got RAWs too."
Persistent Volume manager for Kubernetes - https://github.com/dwimsey/openshift-pvmanager
Uhm, its not really that hard to duplicate negatives, hasn't been ... ever.
Well okay, the first ones ever made might have been since there were still learning the process, but anytime in the last 100 years, probably over 150 its been rather trivial.
Persistent Volume manager for Kubernetes - https://github.com/dwimsey/openshift-pvmanager
----------
"C" is still sitting on an invoice, a paid receipt, a signed (electronically, probably) contract saying that they own the photos.
Who do you believe? The person that you've done business with, or a third party?
----------
There's no excuse for possession of stolen goods. Which is what they have, stolen goods.
Steve's Computer Service, Hobbs, NM
This is slander, and interference with a contractual business relationship. I'd expect them to get slapped down very hard over that one.
"It's the height of ridiculousness to say for those 9 lines you get hundreds of millions."
Well, since I've seen software that can read and manipulate RAW files from various cameras, as a developer that lets me know that you can certainly create RAW files that look like they came from the camera. If you have the math to go one way, you have the math to go the other way. The app knows the entire process of reading and making an image out of a RAW, it can certainly produce a RAW that will give you the same image. It might not be the same RAW as the original, but that really doesn't matter since either side could have the fake and you have no clue which one.
If the camera digitally signed the RAW with something like an RSA or DSA sig then you would think you've made it secure, but you've only made it a little harder. All you need to sign the document is the private key used to sign it. The camera HAS to have that key or it can't sign it itself. Its just a matter of getting it out of the camera so you can use it. This is not always so easy, as the XBox360 hacking guys will tell you. But as anyone who knows anything about encryption will tell you that given the time and willpower, someone will break it, its just a matter of when and how. Add to it that all the cameras of a given model, probably a given manufacture are going to share the same key and it means its just a matter of someone breaking it via brute force.
My point to all this is simply that the idea that RAWs can't be faked is silly at best.
I think that any court which saw one guy with one image of a scene, and the other guy with 7 images from slightly different moments within the same scene is probably going to go with the guy who has the 7, since faking those would be a lot more difficult than faking a RAW.
Or he could just produce a higher resolution or uncropped version of the one photo and I'm likely to believe him over the guy who can't produce it. Doesn't mean the uncropped version was actually taken by him, but he has better proof than 'I bought it from a russian via hotmail' me thinks. Of course, he could have just hax0red the russians PC and stolen all the images from him in the first place, in order to pull this off! Okay okay, taking my tin foil hat of now.
Persistent Volume manager for Kubernetes - https://github.com/dwimsey/openshift-pvmanager
I thought he meant a lawyer shouldn't write to another lawyer directly, but apparently he mean a lawyer shouldn't write ...
Well actually I'm not sure anymore what he meant:
a letter to the another lawyer's cleint and it is really the client you want to get to
You can think you are right all day long, but you will still be wrong, both legally and morally.
You got ripped off, sorry. Doesn't give you the right to rip off the actual owner. Legally (in America anyway) you are still responsible for the fact that you are/were selling stolen goods.
You probably wouldn't be prosecuted as most courts tend to be rather nice to people who were caught in the middle, but that doesn't change the fact that its illegal and you commited a crime.
Not knowing that rape or murder is illegal in America doesn't mean that you get by with it because you came from another country. Ignorance is not an excuse as far as the law is concerned.
Persistent Volume manager for Kubernetes - https://github.com/dwimsey/openshift-pvmanager
They can't be edited? How comes any strings of bits can't be edited? Is there some kind of well documented crypto involved, a secret key in every camera and a certificate to sign the raw data? Why isn't that done with jpegs as well, one could add a small file with proof (signed MD5 of jpeg) to the picture itself.
I was talking to someone who showed me their "original web site, created by a local graphics art firm." I immediately recognized several images as stock photos, and the layout looked like a template. A few days later while doing unrelated work, I found the template on templatemonster.com. Ahhh, it was a template, that the local firm populated with their specific details (we do.. our number is.. email us at..).
Just on this point. It was "an original web site", perhaps it used a template but you said yourself that they'd altered stuff in it. Cheap web firms buy (or acquire for free) templates and use them on clients sites. There's probably some minor deception but no more than is common in business advertising.
Now if they claimed they create the individual graphic elements and didn't use a template .. possibly they're still telling the truth, some firms make templates too.
As long as the firm didn't use the template in an infringing way then your friend probably shouldn't care less if they got a cheap website - the guys they thought were the designers aren't but does that matter to them (again providing the template wasn't released with an attribution license).
Sure this wasn't just sour grapes?
They insisted that it was all original work, even though it was easy to see otherwise.
All works are original at some point, lol.
you missed the part where C contacted D to defame A.
Since a RAW image is not even an image, but just a memory dump of a CMOS or CCD, you'd have to know the specifics of that exact chip in order to edit it, and the only people who know that usually are the manufacturers of said chip.
So, "I've got the RAWs, what do you have, JPEGs?"
There are many programs to convert RAW images to standard formats, RAW formats are not secrets and are not specific to the exact chip but may be specific to a range of sensors.
Heck, even in a traffic stop, people lie.
"Do you know how fast you were going?"
"ya, about 55."
"no you were doing 85. 30mph faster than the rest of the cars on the road."
Just a peeve, but it can't be called a lie when the question was not asked to request the truth.
You have two options, in one of two situations. In basically all of them, you are forced into answering exactly that way.
If you were not speeding, and you answer with the speed limit, you are in fact not only 'not lying' but telling the truth. Good!
If you were not speeding, and you answer above the limit, you just admitted to a crime which you will now get convicted for. Bad.
If you were speeding, and you answer with above the limit, while you might be telling the truth, you just admitted to a crime that despite any (or lack of) proof, you gave up any slim chance of not being punished, as your admission is all that's needed. Bad.
If you were speeding, and you answer with the speed limit, then the officer has to prove it (assuming you go to court), and you still have a slim (at least it's non-zero) chance of not getting charged. Not great but could be worse..
So not answering with the speed limit is a guaranteed punishment, even if you were not speeding, and on the chance the case goes in your favor.
At least answering with the speed limit is not 100% bad with 0% left for good.
No matter how small 'non-zero chance' is at the time, anyone would take that over 'zero percent chance'.
Oh, and answering with "I don't know" are the only three words needed to add a reckless operations charge with guaranteed guilty court outcome, if the officer wishes to.
While legally the best answer is nothing beyond 'name, rank, serial'. Unfortunately in todays world, doing that is generally unhealthy for you.
It really only leaves one option left. Always say you were doing equal to or below the posted speed limit. This is the trained response the officers wanted, so one should not be surprised they get it.
When it comes to lawyers, and you have a case that works against them, don't spare them. They won't spare you even if it means your financial situation is wiped out. No 'morals' or 'right' here, just a blind interpretation of the legalese.
If you can't afford legal fees, find a bulldog lawyer who is willing to take them on with the DMCA for 25% of the take, no other fee required. If you still need money, solicit donations at your website.
Write letters to each of your clients explaining the situation and detailing the options, one of which should be the reasons why they need to join you in the fight. Hopefully some of the designs you did for them will have become valuable brands that they cannot afford to lose.
Go as far as demanding both compensation and restitution (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Restitution) for frivolous lawsuits, explaining how the incompetent research of the lawyers has cost both the legal system and you. The judge will be as pissed off as you are.
This is going to take time and lots of your energy at a time when you need it most. Just do it.
As posted above, always (slightly) cropping your images could be good proof too. You are the only one who has the true original, that still includes the cropped border.
Legally (in America anyway) you are still responsible for the fact that you are/were selling stolen goods.
At least in Hawaii (I expect most other states to be the same.) you are not responsible. There is a stipulation in the theft section (remember... copyright infringement != theft.) that absolves people of guilt if they did not know if was stolen.
Not knowing that rape or murder is illegal in America doesn't mean that you get by with it because you came from another country. Ignorance is not an excuse as far as the law is concerned.
True, it is expected that one knows the laws. But there are many cases in the law where ignorance of certain facts is an affirmative defense.
This is regards to criminal matters, civilly they would be open to being sued.
How in the world did we ever form civilization?
With much effort from Sid Meier.
Next you're going to blame him for the large number of copyright-infringing Pirates!, aren't you?
If you have the math to go one way, you have the math to go the other way.
The thing is, RAW has more data than the JPG, and therefore the JPG is a *reduction* of the RAW. You can't go back the same way.
Also, it would be pretty surprising to have JPG compression artefacts on a file that's supposed to be uncompressed raw data from the camera.
Still, your point of having several shots of the same scene still stands.
It's not the stupid fucks that mess things up long-term.
and how does Google know that?
Now, there are modules for cameras - Canon makes a forensic module - that guarantees that the image you saw is untouched from what the camera sensor saw, but that is neither here nor there.
The point is that having a RAW image with your camera's serial number embedded into it will likely go a long way to substantiating your case. This is a civil matter. "Balance of probabilities", not "beyond a reasonable doubt". Of course, if this guy has images that are uncropped, then to me, that'd do a great deal to seal his case (remember in the remake of The Thomas Crown Affair, and 'the margins' of a painting being used to determine issues of forgery (since the margins are hidden by the frame, a forgery that has the margins painted correctly must have seen the original at some point. If you can show that the work on the site is but a cropped version of an image you have, then that helps.
Actually for stolen goods I think you might be wrong. Some, and perhaps most or all States have laws against buying or selling goods which you know or have reason to believe have been stolen.
This is made more complicated by the fact that this isn't stolen property or theft in the ordinary sense - the original author hasn't been deprived of his creation. This is an IP argument - who owns the rights to the images.
I'm not saying it's right, but it's the way it will probably work out.
Here's how I understand the case. If you step back a little, it will all be clear.
"A", the artist, created the work.
"B", the 3rd party thief, posed as an original artist, and submitted them to "C" for sale.
"C", the stock photo site.
"C" purchased the images from "B", probably under an exclusive license. "C" therefore has legitimate claim to the images. They found out that "A" has the same images on his site, so they filed the complaint. This is perfectly legitimate.
NO ... it is NOT legitimate. The problem is "C" doesn't have the information to figure out that it is not legitimate. So (for now) it APPEARS to be legitimate to "C".
Since "B" did not ever have the legitimate rights, "B" could not have transferred them to "C". Since "B" committed fraud, it is a crime done by "B". "C" is a victim, as is "A" in a different way. That doesn't make "C"'s actions legitimate. But it does give "C" a defense against criminal charges. As to any civil damages, it depends on how prudent "C" behaved. Given the way stock art sites operate, there is probably not much, if any, liability for "C", provided they handle this appropriately. Once notified that there is a conflict of ownership, they do need to handle this very carefully. Also, one remote possibility is that both "A" and "B" created extremely similar art work. It has happened before. It can easily happen with photography of public scenery, for example. "C" needs to investigate appropriately. "A" needs to do the DMCA takedown thing to get "B"'s alleged artwork down, for now.
"A" countered the claim saying that he was the original artist.
"C" is still sitting on an invoice, a paid receipt, a signed (electronically, probably) contract saying that they own the photos.
That, if the given scenario is true, is not a legitimate invoice. Whether the scenario is true, or not, might well be up to a court to determine.
Who do you believe? The person that you've done business with, or a third party?
If I have not done business with them PERSONALLY, and only did so as an unseen party submitting things online, I would not know which to believe.
This unfortunately happens all the time. I was talking to someone who showed me their "original web site, created by a local graphics art firm." I immediately recognized several images as stock photos, and the layout looked like a template. A few days later while doing unrelated work, I found the template on templatemonster.com. Ahhh, it was a template, that the local firm populated with their specific details (we do.. our number is.. email us at..). They confronted the local firm about it. They insisted that it was all original work, even though it was easy to see otherwise. The site owner chose to believe the local firm. Why? Because they had done business with them, and I was just a new guy in the picture.
They might start believing otherwise when the sheriff or marshals come in to collect property to satisfy a default judgment ruling that resulted from them ignoring a court summons for copyright infringement damages. Of course, a DMCA takedown would get the point across long before then.
I could copy down a handful of photos from a stock image place, upload them to somewhere that I had cooperation with, that would put whatever timestamps I wished on, and then say "Oh no, I made those last year". Does that make me right? Nope.
Right. You would be committing a crime by doing that. But it doesn't make it right for others to work with you on that, either, even though you do a very good job of lying to them about the crime.
A good thief wouldn't turn around and say "oh ya, I stole it, sorry 'bout that." They would defend their story until it
now we need to go OSS in diesel cars
Actually, you don't have to answer anything. It's fair enough to answer, like you said, name, rank, serial number. When they look at your drivers license and say "Mr. Smythe", I can answer "yes". Well, and other tidbits, like "is this your car?" "yes". "do you have insurance?" "yes"
Outside of that, it is strongly suggested that you don't answer anything.
I REALLY upset a police officer once. I answered simply and honestly. I did not elaborate, to avoid making mistakes that could be used against me. I swear to god, this was the conversation.
"Do you know how fast you were going!?"
"Yes sir. To the best of my knowledge, I was doing the speed limit, the same as all the other vehicles around me?"
"NO! How fast were you going a few miles back when I saw you?!"
"I don't know where you saw me sir, but to the best of my knowledge I've been doing the speed limit, except when driving slower."
"NO! I saw you doing at least 85! You were flying past the other cars like they were standing still!"
"Sir, I don't know what you are referencing."
"You're really starting to piss me off. I'm going to walk away for a second, and then come back up here. When I come back, I want you to tell me the truth!"
"Yes sir."
[takes my license, walks to his car, walks back]
"Ok, how fast were you going?!"
"Sir, to the best of my knowledge, I was doing the speed limit, the same as the other cars around me."
He then proceeded to tell me to get out of the car, walked me to the back of my car, had me spread, patted me down, and told me "You're going to jail!" It was all a tactic to get me to confess.
He continued for a few more minutes, all the while I'm thinking "This sucks, I'm late to work now."
He had nothing on me. No evidence I was speeding. My testimony that I was doing the speed limit. Even if I was wrong, it was "to the best of my knowledge". Not a lie, just a misperception. Maybe my speedometer was wrong. Maybe the other cars were going faster than the speed limit. Maybe I didn't really care. The truth was, for the last two or three miles, I had been doing just under the speed limit. Traffic had slowed to well under the speed limit, and then back up to about 5mph under the speed limit. I was following traffic. He was bored, and wanted an easy ticket. I was in a convertible with the top down. Maybe I was busy listening to the radio, and hadn't paid any attention to my speed.
After he realized I wasn't going to confess to anything, he calmed down a lot, and we had a nice chat. Of course, his lights were on, on the side of a busy road, so other drivers saw this and slowed down. Having a car pulled over does more for traffic control than writing hundreds of tickets.
There's a good video from a defense attorney, who says never say anything. You'll screw up. If I were to tell him this story, I'm sure he'd say I was just lucky. Watch the video, and you'll understand. Name, rank, serial. That's all that you say. Otherwise, use your 5th amendment rights, regardless if you're innocent or not.
Serious? Seriousness is well above my pay grade.
But do you have timely copyright registrations?
What would encourage a lawyer to take on an action against the stock photo website on a contingency basis? The possibility of statutory damages of $150k per infringement. If the photographs are a business, the photographer should consider copyright registration as a necessary cost of doing business.
I also think most open source projects should file for copyright registrations on a defensive basis, but very few do. It's a shame!
The real "Libtards" are the Libertarians!
A nice house in the Bahamas, a Porsche in the garage and a nice retirement pension to me.
When I take a photo, I don't just take one.
Different composition, different depth of field, etc. For any one pic I put up on the web, there are likely 5 or 6 brother/sister photos shot at the same time as well as the published photo in uncropped/uncompressed form.
If you took *any* of my photos of the web and tried to convince a judge they were yours, you'd just come off as a thief, because I have parts of the puzzle you don't.
JPEGs are a lossy format. End of story. You cannot get away from the fact that once an image is saved as a JPEG, it loses picture quality.
You may be able to create a RAW from a JPEG, but so what, if you have the time and skill to digitally paint the minute details that have been lost by the conversion to and from JPEG back into the resulting RAW, you might as well have spent the effort designing something of your own!!
The difference between an original image saved as a RAW or a bitmap and one saved as a JPEG is visible to the naked eye... A really good JPEG might look pretty convincing, but not after you exaggerate the effects by further compressing both images in a back-to-back comparison...
This kind of litigation is actually pretty common. Look at the older somewhat similar case of Harmony Gold VS FASA. The wiki article (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BattleTech#Miscellaneous) doesn't have a great amount of detail but in essence FASA purchased a bunch of Mecha designs for their game Battletech from a japanese artist. These same designs were also used in Macross, the artist believing since Macross was a Japanese Anime and FASA was an American company neither side would really bump into each other. For the most part he was right until Harmony Gold came along and purchased the rights to Macross and put it into the American market as Robotech. Several years later and two cartoon series later (Battletech and some crazy ass Robotech tie in with Exo Squad), and both Harmony Gold and FASA are at each others throats each one holding what they believe to be valid exlusive rights to the designs for about 12 different mecha. The legal rangling got pretty bad between both sides. Long story short the case was eventually settled out of court due to gross legal incompetance on Harmony Gold's part, and a lack of funds on FASA, but legal battles over who owns the rights over images like this can get pretty brutal. Just because you THINK you own the rights to something doesn't mean you in fact do.
Its sad that Stock Art is made out as the 'evil party'. Its entirely possible that a another person claimed Jons art as theirs and sold it to Stock Art, and Stock Art think they are in the right.
Possibly the lawyers of stock art giving misleading advice (maliciously or mistakenly) to Stock Art, and the lawyers themselves are the only vultures in the case.
The consequences of being slashdotted? Ruin Stock Arts name. No consequences for the lawyers.
If you have proof that the images are yours, send a take down notice immediately. Not just to the stock image site but to any other sites out there are now using your images having bought them from the stock image site.
Doing so will stop the stock image company from being able to make any more money from your images.
I can't believe their lawyers let them do that. It was a stupid mistake only done by kids and newbie business people.
It's worse than that; the lawyers are the guys sending these emails. Which opens 'em up to a bar complaint at least, if not actual liability. (In DC, rule 4.4 prohibits "means that have no substantial purpose other than to embarrass, delay, or burden a third person".)
Well of course everything is derivative. YOU are derivative. You have copied what your education system has foisted onto us all so you can graduate and become yet another derivative cog in the system.
If you were given a chance to see something truly original... you would go insane from trying to comprehend it.
http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/TrueArtIsIncomprehensible indeed.
Yes, but how easy is it to duplicate them with good resolution? I assume there's some loss of detail even from a slide copier, and especially from a film recorder. At least that's what I always heard. Plus, if you bracket that's even more proof as you may have adjacent images that record more shadow or highlight data and if you've managed to recreate the scene you arguably haven't broken copyright in the first place.
Works for me. Better yet. "I've got raw's bracketed +- 2 stops." Even with a fully hacked raw format (not out of the question given the existence of 3rd-party raw converters) there's no way to get information that never made it into the exposure of the "keeper".
if a person is found with stolen merchandise though a pawn shop, the pawn shop has criminal liability and the buyer has to return the stolen merchandise. would that not be the same here?
That's why you build the cameras with individual key pairs. I think that's how the old evidence camera kits worked. Epson had one for an 800z or whatever it was way back, and Canon has sold one in the past for dSLRs. Totally useless for this app, but it was very good for showing an image came out of a given camera unmolested by Photoshop. Pointless for that too as if I recall the rules actually rested the might of the evidence on the photographer testifying they took that picture, not on the camera.
This is slander, and interference with a contractual business relationship. I'd expect them to get slapped down very hard over that one.
It's also a clear violation of the Bar rules of ethics (4.4) in Washington DC, where these lawyers are. They could get admonished, suspended, or even disbarred, and I hope they do. I encourage Jon to file a Bar complaint in addition to litigation.
This is going to be messy, isn't it? :)
I hope it comes to the courts attention, rather than just all us geeks on Slashdot.
Serious? Seriousness is well above my pay grade.
I would hope so.
In my warm fuzzy utopian world (it's all in my head, don't worry, I know it doesn't exist). The buyers would be paid back, with the option to license from the real owner or stop using the images. The pimp ... err ... stock photo folks, would be held liable. The thief would be liable. And the asshole lawyers, well, they would get what we all hope of lawyers.
(bringing on the lawyer jokes)
What do you do if you see a lawyer drowning?
Throw him a brick.
How do you get a lawyer down from a tree?
Cut the rope
What do you call one lawyer thrown off a bridge into a river?
Pollution.
What do you call all the lawyers thrown off a bridge?
Solution.
What do you have when 100 lawyers are buried up to their neck in sand?
Not enough sand.
How can you tell when a lawyer is lying?
His lips are moving.
And finally, a story.....
An lawyer dies, and goes to heaven ... oh, who am I kidding.
Serious? Seriousness is well above my pay grade.
A google search on "stockart.com" gives their site and then a page of links about this issue. Not all publicity is good.
And then there's this list of previous federal cases.
Google notes that more than half (57%) of the takedown notices it has received under the US Digital Millennium Copyright Act 1998, were sent by business targeting competitors and over one third (37%) of notices were not valid copyright claims.
There are a lot of things that the folks at Google are capable of doing, and I believe "counting" is one of them. :-D
CAn'T CompreHend SARcaSm?
It would be difficult to present the existence of RAW files as evidence to support your claim. First of all you would need to explain what it means to the judge, which would essentially require independent experts to testify, and be refuted by the oppositions "experts".
Secondly, to present the evidence in court you have to submit it to the opposition in advance, thus you have given them what you claim they don't have. They could then just claim they always had these files as well, so that you have them proves nothing.
Hit that stockart.com site with everything you got, from DMCA takedown notices to accusations of pedophilia, beastiality and warez. If that doesn't deter them, go for the DDoS and blackmail option. If they are going to take you out of business, take them with you and don't stop at just the company - go for the CEO and owners personally as well; nothing like accusations of pedophilia and maybe a bit of terrorism to really fuck up their lives. That'll teach them NOT to mess with people just for the fun (and profit) of it.
That way you have proof that you made it.
We went a round with Getty Images a couple of years ago: we had licensed several images years before, they found them online and claimed we had stolen them. It turns out that our account records had somehow been lost: the account was active, but all records of the transaction in question were gone. We had (stupidly) not kept a copy of a printed receipt, all we had were credit card statements saying that we had paid several hundred dollars for something. That, of course, was totally unsatisfactory to the collection agency.
Lots of unnecessary stress, and this a few days before Christmas. In the end we (perhaps stupidly) settled with them.
Since then, we have not licensed a single image from them or any similar agency. If you need an expensive image, hire a photographer directly! If you need a cheap image, look for a royalty-free or creative-commons image (although that also not totally safe). We advise all of our clients (and anyone else who will listen) to avoid the stock art agencies at any cost. This article gives yet another good reason to do so...
Not a believer in the existence of a decent cryptographic hash function, are we?
You just have to load it on a computer and say "zoom ... enhance". Don't you watch CSI?
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
It's analog, so there'll always be a quality loss, plus when you copy it tends to push the contrast up. What's more to produce a negative from a negative you'd have to use positive, i.e. slide film. It's easy to spot slide film just by looking; the unexposed parts are black. Then there's the amber background tint on negative film that you'd have to allow for.
It would be difficult in the extreme to produce a copy negative of sufficient quality to survive a side by side comparison.
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
Can we throw in tortuitous interference, for good measure?
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
What's next? Me accusing me of harassing myself?
"I said NO, but I knew that I wanted" ;-)
In the future, the US economy will be completely based on litigation.
How much wood would a woodchopper chop if a woodchopper would chop wood?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Todd_Goldman One of the most obvious plagiaristic companies/individuals ever.
I would give everything i own for a little bit more.
The only solution, as far as I can tell, is out and out revolt where we rise up as a mob, line these people up against the wall, and put a bullet in their head.
Over-the-top Response Guy! Giving "Over-the-Top Responses" since 1970.
This is an IP argument - who owns the rights to the images.
While I agree with you, we need to make sure we phrase the arguments correctly. IP is a misnomer. It's not property. It is a copyright issue.
This would definitely put a crimp in the income that people could earn from things that are easily copied.
Big name authors would have to have a day job to make up for the fact that their works could be distributed for 'free' by the first person that makes a copy of their work.
Small time musicians, those that publish their own work, could have their works 'lifted' by groups with bigger audiences. The other groups, making most of their money by concerts and direct sales, would benefit by having new material that they got for 'free'.
Artists and photographers might have things a little easier IF they sell the services of creating art and photographs as opposed to the end products. They could argue that lack of copyrights means they have to get full value front end.
Sounds like you've never edited a RAW file. All of your edits are stored sequentially in a sidecar XMP file and applied to what you see every time you load it, or saved as a preview JPEG also in the sidecar XMP file or some other metadata depending on the software you're using. The RAW file remains untouched.
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Yes, what I meant was to a specific range of sensors. All of the 1D mark II sensors will produce the same format, but a 1D mark IIN will produce a different format, for example.
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C doesn't have a claim against A. But A has a claim against B and C. A can sue C for lawyer fee's and all the money they've made using the images. Because the images aren't registered with the copyright office they are limited on damages but the disbursement of revenue will be painfull along with the automatic payment of lawyer fee's for A. Copyright law puts EVERYTHING in the hands of the copyright holders. Assuming the original author can substantiate ownership. A should immediately submit all the images for copyright (and they should be images that include more data than the ones in the complaint) so that any ongoing use by B and C falls under statutory damages.
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