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Court Rules Photo of Memorial Violates Copyright
WhatDoIKnow sends in a story about an appeals court ruling in a singular case that might have the effect of narrowing "fair use" rights for transformative uses of artworks. "The sculptor who designed the Korean War memorial [in Washington DC] brought suit against the Postal Service after a photograph of his work was used on a postage stamp. Though first ruled protected by 'fair use,' on appeal the court ruled in favor (PDF) of the sculptor, Frank Gaylord, now 85."
he's more obnoxious than a Reserved Gaylord.
Silly me... I thought the point of a memorial was for it to be placed in the trust of (or outright given to) the public... That being the case, how does this decision affect other images of public art?
Knock down his statue, break it into a million pieces, and send them all to his house using the infringing stamps.
http://cloudking.com/artists/heather-stanfield/works/korean-war-memorial_large.jpg
Is this one of those... monumental rulings?
It's a public monument. Get over it. Judge apparently hadn't taken his meds.
Yeah I don't get it, when somebody comissions an artwork, don't they therefore own the artwork? In this case that would be all of us.
The post office is making profit out of it by selling stamps. The incredulous part is how it paid a photographer $1,500 for the rights for a sculpture commissioned by the US govt. In essence, the govt. is suing itself which is weird but not uncommon.
It would be Fair Use if the photographer received no compensation ($1,500) and the stamps were "free"
Silly me... I thought the point of a memorial was for it to be placed in the trust of (or outright given to) the public... That being the case, how does this decision affect other images of public art?
Scary, or perhaps stupid, or even ridiculous. This was commissioned by Congress and occupies space in a public park. It belongs to the United States, so we should be able to use images of it just as we do with the other public buildings and monuments we own. It is a beautiful monument to those who risked and gave their lives for us. If some blowhard "artist" wants to retain all image rights to his work, then he should keep a piece for himself, not expect us to build a setting for it and maintain it. Plenty of artists could have created something as significant without being assholes about it.
This is a hacked account, for which the owner can not be held responsible.
BTW, I'm sure WE paid for it, too. It is massive and huge in scale, so I sincerely doubt the artist footed the cost out of pocket and just donated it all. So should I insist on retaining rights to all work I do, even when someone else pays me to do it and I do not negotiate such rights beforehand?
This is a hacked account, for which the owner can not be held responsible.
It's okay to take a photo of a sculpture but it's not okay to use that photo to market your service, such as the way the USPS was trying to do with this stamp. This is part of the reason they make sure people are dead for a good long time before they honor them with a postage stamp.
The guy made the sculptor as a work for higher of the American people, but obviously someone signed a bad contract along the way, or, to put it another way, the artist ripped off the American people. I guess I'll just have to add him to my piss on someone's grave tour, but in his case I should take a photo of it.
This is my sig.
FTA - noone actually ever paid the artist for the work, and I assume it wasn't stipulated in the rules of the competition (that the artist won) that the work, and any IP related to the work, would become public domain if he won.
Looks like a stupid oversight on behalf of the original organisers and the Postal Service for not enquiring about ownership.
Due diligence on the part of the Postal Service wouldn't have gone astray either.
I'm not sure where the outrage is coming from...
from TFA:
"she went over all of the available documents and found that they expressly kept those [IP] rights with Gaylord"
So no the idiots at the Army Corps of Engineers who signed the contract for this didn't in fact get ownership of anything other than the physical sculpture.
Fair use of a copyrighted work “for purposes such as criticism, comment, news reporting, teaching (including multiple copies for classroom use), scholarship, or research, is not an infringement of copyright.
17 U.S.C. 107
This is the law. This is not how the Postal Service used his copyrighted work. As an aside, this is also not what Tenenbaum et al. did when they downloaded music.
We shouldn't complain when judges use restraint and don't bastardize statutes.
Indeed, and furthermore, I believe it's the case that all works produced by the US Government are explicitly released into the public domain.
And it's not as if this is something he built himself. Why does the designer own the copyright, and not the people who constructed it? God knows what kind of contract they must have had...
It's nice to know all those people died, so that other people could have the "freedom" to grow old making money for doing nothing.
Depends on the contract. Look at wedding photographers - often if not they retain the copyrights.
The U.S. Court of Federal Claims is comprised of 16 judges nominated by the president and confirmed by the Senate.
Judge Thomas C Wheeler was nominated in June 05 and confirmed in October 05 for a 15 year term. His prior experience was 10 years as a lawyer for corporate law firm DLA Piper.
The government is not suing itself a private individual is suing the government for "stealing" his work (in the language the government likes to use for IP infringement).
The underlying problem is that copyrights were improperly assigned to Gaylord in the first place. Being under contract to the govt, those copyrights should have been assigned to the govt. In fact the contracting officer has been and still is demanding that those improperly assigned copyrights be turned over. The court wasn't allowed to challenge the validity of those copyrights and had to take them at face value.
I don't get it. A post is marked "Interesting" for asking a question that is already covered IN DETAIL in TFA!
The artist won a competition to design the memorial. At no stage was he paid, or contracts entered into...
They own the piece of art. They don't own the work. For example, if you buy one of two hundred prints of an artist's latest painting, you just own a print, but the artist retains ownership of the IP (the painting) and all copies (the print). You wouldn't be able to just photocopy (or, according to this court ruling, photograph) and distribute the copies freely. One of the best -- and most annoying -- examples is wedding photos, which the photographer usually retains rights to, even if he sells you prints.
The same is true even if you're sold original works, not copies (such as books, replica painting) or even a singular work (the only existing sculpture, like in this case). This is why copyrights are supposed to expire: eventually, all art should belong to mankind as a whole as part of our common culture. The founding fathers never intended for anyone to be able sit on his laurels and live off a single work for his entire life, much less for three generations of his estate to benefit after his death.
As has already been noted, the interpretation of a picture of a monument as a derivative work subject to protection under copy right is harsh narrowing of fair use rights. While non-profit "reproductions" (say, vacation photos in front of the memorial) would probably still be considered fair use, it gives IP owners with a litigious mindset a very big stick.
Call me crazy, but wasn't the sculpture created from a photo? Hmmmm...
Even worse a photo of a sculpture does not replicate the sculpture. That is the overwhelming fact when the photo is a reduced drawing on a stamp. Then the next issue is that the selling of an object should convey absolute rights to the new owner and disolve all rights of the seller. The moral and ethical issues of copyright are so twisted that copyright needs to be eliminated.
And shouldn't any photos of the memorial be under the copyright of whoever takes the picture? For example, although the design for, say an iPhone may be under copyright, I can still take a picture of it and Apple isn't going to claim copyright of it. Now, if I took a press shot of it, they might have a case, but an individual picture? No, they aren't going to do anything.
Taxation is legalized theft, no more, no less.
I think you don't know what "incredulous" means. And the post office doesn't make a profit by selling stamps - it loses a small amount of money on every one, because stamps are used to mail things, and mailing things generally costs more than you paid for the stamp.
17 million sales of $.37 stamps = 46 million or so stamps actually produced.
Statutory damages can run from $750-$30,000 per copy, assuming that it wasn't a willful infringement.
That's a minimum award of $34,500,000,000 (34.5 billion) and a maximum award of 1,380,000,000,000 (1.4 trillion). Plus attorney's fees, of course. Roughly last year's federal deficit not counting off-budget spending bills.
Would anyone here care to argue that statutory damages in the U.S. are not way out of proportion to the scope of the infringement?
This was an appeals court ruling. There was not one judge, but three. Two ruled in Gaylord's favor. US Federal judges are not elected. They are appointed by the President and approved by the Senate. They serve life terms. Federal judges can only be removed from office for misconduct (such as taking a bribe). That requires a trial in the Senate and super-majority votes in both houses of congress. Congress can not remove a judge simply because they disagree with a ruling and they are loathe to even try it.
The guy thinks too much of himself and his work, imo. I mean something like that should be seen as given to the public rather than having some guy controlling it like it's gold. In fact I think the latest developments in copyright are making everyone think their work is much more important than it is.
The government should give the memorial back to him and tell him to get bent.
The people who approved this contract ought to be drawn and quartered. Not only did the guy get paid royally for his work, he gets to keep the IP without actually contributing anything to its maintenance. I couldn't find anything about how much the upkeep is, but it seems to me that if the guy wants to keep control over his work, he ought to maintain it himself, along with the park in which it stands. If he doesn't want to do that, he clearly is not interested in keeping control of it.
Those who can, do. Those who can't, sue.
That should have started, "With $17 million in sales..."
I thought stuff done by the us govenment was defacto in the public domain - similar to the library of congress images and maps created by govenment.
The public display of art is not in question here, it is the commercial use of this art.
How could this situation have developed? Quite simply the artist may have offered his/her services at a discount if he/she could retain the commercial rights to the art. Congress gets their public memorial but leaves things like the manufacture and sale of miniatures to the artist. This could be a reasonable cost savings tradeoff.
Think of some software licenses, an application may be free for non-commercial purposes but require a paid license for commercial use. Like software developers, artists are free to negotiate whatever contract/license they can.
--
Perpenso Calc for iPhone and iPod touch, scientific and bill/tip calculator, fractions, complex numbers, RPN
Is this on public land? Did the artist get public dollars?
Politics is the art of looking for trouble, finding it everywhere, diagnosing it incorrectly and applying the wrong fix.
This is nothing more than a huge slap in the face to all American veterans, of any conflict.
My grandfather was in Korea, and he made what's perhaps the most ultimate sacrifice short of his life: his genitals. Thankfully, he had three kids by the time he was sent over, one of them being my mother. But it still apparently left him a very changed man, more so than most veterans.
I am glad that he is no longer around, to spare him from having to hear of this disgraceful ruling. Many of his friends' names were on that monument.
It's because the question is loaded with a popular Slashbot viewpoint. Most moderators are idiots, most Slashbots are pirates. They think they're entitled to full ownership of other people's work.
I don't get it. A post is marked "Interesting" for asking a question that is already covered IN DETAIL in TFA!
You must be new here.
My other first post is car post.
Setting precedents opens the door to business opportunities. Just put a sign or whatever near very public and photographed places, and sue any publication that from now on include photos of those places because they are sharing your sign too. Even a grafitti could eventually do the work.
No, it becomes a derivative work.
You can't take a photo of a photo to get around the photographer's copyright, for example.
There are exceptions to this, but sculpture isn't one.
Ya gotta start somewhere.
I think it's more about whether you're making profit from the picture, and what about the image - precisely - you are monetizing.
If you sold your photo to a magazine for an iPhone-related article, you're in the clear because you are illustrating an existing product, and the value of the image lies in the skilful portrayal of the object in question.
If you sold the photo to Chinese bootleg manufacturers so they can replicate the UI, or started making money off your revolutionary new idea, which you call the "CoolPhone", and sending that photo to people as the appearance of an "early prototype CoolPhone", then you are likely infringing because you bring nothing to the table yourself, but rather are making money off of Apple's copyrighted product design.
I guess you can scratch that life term. It seems congress has decided they should set up some courts separate from those spelled out in Article III of the constitution. As another poster indicated Judges in the Court of Federal Claims are appointed for 15 years. So much for an independent judiciary.
Scary, or perhaps stupid, or even ridiculous. This was commissioned by Congress and occupies space in a public park. It belongs to the United States, so we should be able to use images of it just as we do with the other public buildings and monuments we own.
And the Corps of Engineers should be able to take the damn thing to a safe place and blow it up. I'd rather see it destroyed than stand in mockery of the men it commemorates.
Dewey, what part of this looks like authorities should be involved?
If the Post Office were making 3D sculptures that duplicated the ones in the memorial and selling them, I could understand. But this is a PICTURE of the sculpture. The sculptures are not being duplicated.
If this ruling stands people won't even be able to take a picture of a building or a car without violating copyright.
Um no, if you tried to use a pic of the iPhone as a stamp, and made profit off of it, I could see you getting into trouble. The only issue here is who owns the IP, and if he does, then they can't really use it as their little logo thing...
The monument itself is based on a famous photo. The postal service should have bypassed the monument new artwork for the stamp based on the photo.
Did the sculpter pay royalties to Joe Rosenthal the photographer? Or to the AP, which employed him? If not, this is the height of hypocracy.
Well, I'm never going to DC to see it, and since taking photos of it is a violation of his copyright I suppose I'll never see it. Gaylord (what an unfortunate name, BTW) is an idiot. Now, instead of millions seeing his creation only the handful of people who actually venture to DC then venture to the area where it is will get to see and enjoy it.
If this tool wants to restrict the viewing of his creation then so be it. It's his loss that so many people will miss out on it. Artists just don't seem to have the cognitive capacity to understand that. To be an artist is to desire others to see your work (usually), and in this case since he's put it on public display I'd say he wants that. To prevent people from seeing it one way or another is counter intuitive to that desire. Not only that, but he's moved the protection of intellectual property slightly further in favour of the greedy. This is counter to the very principles of copyright and art in general.
This is one more case of yet another greedy fool deciding that there's a quick buck to be made.
*grumbles* I agree with the sentiment of other posters though; this Gaylord was commissioned by the US to create an art for a US-owned memorial. He expects the US to maintain and display his creation for him. I presume that the government covered the material costs of construction. I'd demand that since it is a memorial to those fallen at wartime, commissioned by the government it should fall squarely into the public domain.
All that said, he didn't get paid (from what I understand) so I'd say it would have been fair for him to ask for a token sum of money from the sale of the stamps. But taking them to court with outrageous demands? That's just going too far.
I drink to make other people interesting!
While I would normally agree with you in this case I would say that if the person doesn't want to let people photograph his work, he probably shouldn't have created it in full public view. Instead, he could have created it in a darkened room and not allowed cameras to be brought in. When you create a public memorial for the public - you pretty much have said this is in the public domain. Anything else by the artist and they are just acting like a douchebag.
When a society ceases to produce real property, the value of intangible property virtually soars. Even our money is no longer tangible, as vastly larger sums flow through wires than through hands. Someday, free speech will not be, as the government will see it as the last bastion of tax revenues.
You can't make a copy in the same medium (photo of photo), but to say that a photo of a statue is a violation of copyright is plain stupid.
It's hardly the first time copyright law has been called stupid.
I read the decision as a straightforward and reasonable interpretation of fair use. It may clarify some points, but I don't see that it narrows fair use.
Warning: this article may contain humor, sarcasm, parody, and perhaps even irony. Read at your own risk.
What about Warhol and the Cambells soup cans?
Warhol was able to make a work of art out of the Campbells soup cans, and ostensibly a stamp could be made out of Warhols work without Campbells permission, right? However just taking a photo of Warhols painting and then making a stamp out of that without Warhols permission would not be transformative, even though Warhol's paintings were a somewhat straightforward representation of the soup can. Right? No?
This is just wrong.
It was commissioned by Congress. "Management of the memorial was turned over to the National Park Service, under its National Mall and Memorial Parks group. As with all National Park Service historic areas, the memorial was administratively listed on the National Register of Historic Places on the day of its dedication." (wikipedia)
I think, as the piece being commissioned by congress and the managing body by the US Park Service, the artist can go fuck himself. As an artist my self, Im possessive of my own works, but this is wrong. As a photographer, I am allowed to take someone else's work and duplicate the scene and photograph it. This is so long as I am not taking the image of their creation and claiming it to be my own. If I put the effort into it to duplicate it, and take the exact same photo, and can prove I did all that, Im in the clear. Taking a picture of a publicly commissioned art piece is my own work. Also, If I had art that was to be commissioned by congress, I wouldnt throw a hissy fit over what the government wanted to do. Theyre not even making money off it. What the hell is this guy's problem. He is known as the creator, that should be plenty enough.
Im a troll because I disagree with you.
The issue at hand is the use of the specific picture in a postage stamp. The postal service could have gotten around this issue by taking another picture at a similar/same angle using their own cameras in the snow. However, they did not seek proper usage for the underlying image on which the stamps are based.
Not all stuff done by the government is in the public domain - such as work by contractors, and other works where the government pays for services. In those cases, you have to especially careful to look into rights and ownership.
Public domain images may be public domain, but often times additional rights restrictions do exist based on their source. See, some NASA images.
Hardly the same thing, is it? They are retaining rights to the photos, surely.
Unless you mean photos of the cake?
*Still* negative function...
I say if the artist is going to be this way about a supposedly public sculpture, then perhaps it should be covered with a tarp and removed from public view until it can be removed from being in a public location. Then that would ensure that nobody infringes upon his copyright again.
Also in the future, any gov't sponsored public artworks should require a release of copyright to the gov't (and therefore public domain) to make sure this kind of stupidity doesn't happen again.
Look up something called Moral Rights.
Seriously, I really want you to write me a postcard and send over to my home.
I urge it asap.
PS: don't forget to send it with that stamp, I'm quite sure it will cost more than $1,000 each in less than a century... and I surely will need money...
They should return the sculpture to the sculptor!
> Silly me... I thought the point of a memorial was for it to be placed in the
> trust of (or outright given to) the public...
Perhaps you should have told the government that fifteen years ago so that they would have purchased the copyright (hint: they didn't).
> That being the case, how does this decision affect other images of public
> art?
I doubt that it has any relevance at all to most. Read the opinion.
Warning: this article may contain humor, sarcasm, parody, and perhaps even irony. Read at your own risk.
Same with the European Parliament and the London Eye.
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
..public can photo.
and put a note "re sculpted because original ass sued someone"
This is the US Post Office we're talking about here, so we don't have to worry about any profits being made...
-William Brendel
SCO's entire claim to having Unix copyrights is based on, "Well, they should have transferred."
But the copyrights in the SCO case didn't transfer because - just like this case - there was no written instrument that actually specified that the copyrights DO transfer.
Lordy, this case is almost an exact repeat of CCNV v. Reid, which I once had a lawyer describe to me as THE seminal case in US IP law. In that case, which went to the US Supreme Court, the artist retained copyright to a statue because the group that commissioned the statue did not specify that copyright would transfer.
Fair use is probably a legal defense especially when no money is involved. If you took a picture of an iPhone for a news story, that's fair use as it serves a legitimate purpose. If you used it to make a poster that you sell, that's not fair use. Ever wonder why movies have to get approval for products to be shown? Same reason. In fact if you look at the photo of the iPhone on wikipedia it tells you why it is covered under fair use.
Well, there's spam egg sausage and spam, that's not got much spam in it.
Interesting case. On the one hand it is his art and the USPO should have known better than to blatantly rip it off but on the other hand he was HIRED and paid for the art so the USGov should now hold the rights to the art and all images, representations, et cetera.
You would think, but there are other cases like this out there. Photos of the lighted Eiffel Tower at night, for example, actually require permission from France to publish.
I think this is the equivalent of that sculptor being sued by the industrial designer of the helmets or garments. It goes too far and should be appealed.
IANAL, but I can see where fair use would be an appealing technique here, but the public trust might actually be the right way to argue this one. The argument to make would be that whoever signed the contract, and perhaps even the Congress, does not have the power to grant the artist a copyright good against the public in a case where, as in a monument, the work is commissioned for display at the seat of the federal government and for the public good. The monument is something created for and held in the public trust and as such, control over its use cannot be restricted to a single individual or corporation.
The idea of the public trust overriding corporate ownership came up about a hundred years ago when a Railroad Company was arguing an older (1869, IIRC) act of the (corrupt) Illinois legislature had successfully given the railroad company title to a square mile of the lakebed of Lake Michigan. The court held that if the title had been valid, it certainly didn't survive a repeal of the original act, and in any event the State couldn't really give up control of its harbor to a private entity because that would violate the public trust.
The environmental law folks pulled the public trust doctrine out of a drawer about 40 years ago, now, and it might have been useful here.
-- IANAL, this isn't legal advice, and definitely isn't legal advice for you. Also, Squee!
If this was a privately owned piece of art and the image was used for commercial purposes. Since the artist does not own it, I think he's SOL. But if he did have a contract reserving his copyright, then the USPS is SOL. Yet, if there's any public money in the memorial, I'd say that the artist is SOL no matter what.
"I believe in Karma. That means I can do bad things to people all day long and I assume they deserve it." : Dogbert
That would only be a point if he actually protested people simply photographing the memorial. This is about the creation of derivative works for commercial purposes.
What you're saying is that if a rock band does a free concert in a public park, they have given away the rights to their work. That's Slashbot thinking: the philosophy of consumers who never produce anything worth more than a +5, "interesting".
The sculptor was a veteran. He made 19 larger than life size stainless steel statues over several years for $700K. Not exactly a fat contract. The architecture firm made $5M. The cost of the work was paid by a private group from fundraising. What are you talking about "the people who constructed it"? And why is it fair that the USPS (not the US government ya know) pocketed at least $5M in profit without a single royalty to the sculptor?
Yes Congress paid for it. But in their contract with Mr. Gaylord, they only paid for a copy. They did not pay for the IP rights. Someone screwed up when they drew up the contract. Just like when your local library buys a book, they only get the copy. They did not get copyrights. Can your local library start printing their own copies? No. As such, Mr. Gaylord still retains the IP rights. He might be a jerk, but he still has his rights.
Well, there's spam egg sausage and spam, that's not got much spam in it.
Get him to pay the rent or sue him for the misuse of public space, that will make him think twice.
> They own the piece of art. They don't own the work.
> For example, if you buy one of two hundred prints of an artist's latest painting, you just own
> a print, but the artist retains ownership of the IP (the painting) and all copies (the print).
I once spoke to an artist in a market fair. She was selling paintings and prints of paintings.
I was thinking of buying a painting from her. I asked if I would have the right to make prints of the painting I bought. She said I wouldn't - the rights remained with her.
I did not buy her painting.
Why this attitude from artists? It's not like there's a finite supply of artistry within an artist and it dries up in a decade - its lasts a lifetime.
What next? I take pictures of my new kitchen for 'Better Homes and Gardens' and the cabinet makers sue me?
> One of the best -- and most annoying -- examples is wedding photos, which the photographer usually retains rights to, even if he sells you prints.
One of the worst is the photographer who did my sister's wedding in 1999, where she and her fiance signed a photographer on who not only expressly stated the above (quite normal) but also stated that copyright of ALL photos taken at the wedding by others were to be assigned to him. Neither of them noticed either statements when taking him on, and he never did anything about the numerous relatives with cameras at the wedding, so I'm presuming clauses like that are provided to shut out any other professional wedding photographers.
Even so, it's insane.
And the Corps of Engineers should be able to take the damn thing to a safe place and blow it up. I'd rather see it destroyed than stand in mockery of the men it commemorates.
Or require the artist to pay an outlandish permit fee for displaying the work on public land.
How about all of the Korean vets sue Frank Gaylord for intruding on their IP. After all, they FOUGHT the war.
The army coup of engineers should have all of this Artists statues halled off and dumped in his front yard at his expense. He, after all, wanted to keep is art.
Communism == evil godlessness ergo capitalism == sainthood. Fuck the people who made my idea worth something. Now they are my slaves.
Right..
Nuke DC, LA and NYC.
Floyd R. Turbo,
American
Why are you reading this? I said NT!
He got paid $700K for 19 huge stainless steel statues. Keeping the copyright is about keeping control of cheap knockoffs like paperweights and refrigerator magnets. The photographer made some money and now pays 10% to Gaylord the sculptor. Yes, it took a suit and a settlement but it looks to be resolved one artist to another.
The USPS profited $5M. Why wouldn't the sculptor get a royalty?
In fact, probably a very low royalty could have been agreed on if they had even bothered to attribute the sculptor anywhere in their stamp collecting booklets!
Crazy ass shit going on here
That's a dumb argument to make. In the case of photos, a photo of a photo would be essentially a photocopy. However a painting of a painting would be a completely different matter as would a sculpture of a sculpture. In all those cases the copy would be a derivative work, however in the first there would be little meaningful difference between the two.
An Open Letter to All Grantmakers and Donors On Copyright And Patent Policy In a Post-Scarcity Society (by me):
http://www.pdfernhout.net/open-letter-to-grantmakers-and-donors-on-copyright-policy.html
"Foundations, other grantmaking agencies handling public tax-exempt dollars, and charitable donors need to consider the implications for their grantmaking or donation policies if they use a now obsolete charitable model of subsidizing proprietary publishing and proprietary research. In order to improve the effectiveness and collaborativeness of the non-profit sector overall, it is suggested these grantmaking organizations and donors move to requiring grantees to make any resulting copyrighted digital materials freely available on the internet, including free licenses granting the right for others to make and redistribute new derivative works without further permission. It is also suggested patents resulting from charitably subsidized research research also be made freely available for general use. The alternative of allowing charitable dollars to result in proprietary copyrights and proprietary patents is corrupting the non-profit sector as it results in a conflict of interest between a non-profit's primary mission of helping humanity through freely sharing knowledge (made possible at little cost by the internet) and a desire to maximize short term revenues through charging licensing fees for access to patents and copyrights. In essence, with the change of publishing and communication economics made possible by the wide spread use of the internet, tax-exempt non-profits have become, perhaps unwittingly, caught up in a new form of "self-dealing", and it is up to donors and grantmakers (and eventually lawmakers) to prevent this by requiring free licensing of results as a condition of their grants and donations. "
A 21st century issue: the irony of technologies of abundance in the hands of those still thinking in terms of scarcity.
The sculptor, Frank Gaylord, now 85, is an ass. Imagine having a work of art that you created commemorated on a US postage stamp. What an honor! What PR! What is this clown's reaction? Sue.
I really hope he loses this lawsuit.
The USPS is actually one of the few government agencies actually authorized by the US Consititution itself.
Of course! That way they can have their cake and eat it too.
Uhhh. I don't believe movies DO have to get approval for products to be shown. They simply generally CHOOSE to obscure product identifiers unless they've been payed off to show them, and to avoid any accusations of showing a product in a negative light...
And we should protect his precious rights by sending the damn thing back to him in pebble sized chunks.
He made 19 larger than life size stainless steel statues over several years for $700K. Not exactly a fat contract.
Not exactly fat?? Sounds pretty good to me.
And why is it fair that the USPS (not the US government ya know) pocketed at least $5M in profit without a single royalty to the sculptor?
Because their "profit" in this case really had little to do with the work of the sculptor. People buy postage stamps regardless of what's on them. Sure, a few collectors will mean a few extra sales, but nothing that significant.
Regardless, all of this just serves to underscore why the general public today just doesn't give a a rat's ass about copyright or any other IP rights. This fucktard was already paid over 700 grand for a few years of work, and he's still whining for more. I'd be willing to bet a pretty significant percentage of the adults in the US at the time did more actual work during those years than he did, for a whole lot less money.
What Ghostworks is trying to say is that IPs are crap.
Fuck systemd. Fuck Redhat. Fuck Soylent, too. Wait, scratch the last one.
USPS WAS operating in the green actually for most of the decade, up til 2007 when the increased gas prices really started to impact the bottom line. When you operate the largest vehicle fleet in the world, even a penny increase is going to be massively damaging..
http://www.usps.com/history/anrpt07/summary.htm
So yeah, it's fun to mock USPS, but it's not often warranted.
I was thinking of buying a painting from her. I asked if I would have the right to make prints of the painting I bought. She said I wouldn't - the rights remained with her.
Surely this was no surprise. The artist not only is protecting her copyright, she's also protecting her business (prints of her original artwork). What you want is to unlimited freedom to copy her art, and since you probably only need one copy for your house, the others may well be for sale or to be given as gifts.
You want freedom to copy the works of others. Why should you have such a right?
It wasn't done by the US government, it was done for the US government.
And for what it's worth, the government tries to claim copyrights on public legal documents and the like all the time, it's bull.
Security is mostly a superstition... Avoiding danger is no safer in the long run than outright exposure. - Helen Keller
It may very well be that a higher court will proffer a broader interpretation of "Fair Use" than what is given in United Sates Code. But as for the specifics at hand, with respect to the law, I'd say the right decision was made.
sig has been sent away for a few small repairs...
They retain the rights of the photos, however they cannot distribute those photos for profit without the permission of the people in the photos. I'm sure they usually get that permission in the contract, but it won't necessarily cover everybody, just those who signed.
Virgin got in a hell of a lot of trouble over this for buying the rights to photos from photographers on Flickr and not bothering to get the permission of the people who were actually in the photos. There was a major lawsuit about it some time ago.
I can kinda see the guy's point, but I'm not sure how I feel about it yet. :P
Security is mostly a superstition... Avoiding danger is no safer in the long run than outright exposure. - Helen Keller
Of course you don't have the rights to copy her work. Otherwise you could go into business competing against her, selling copies of work she created with no artistic contribution by you whatsoever. Why is this confusing?
Often companies will pay the studio to display their product in a movie.
I believe studios actually have people that contact companies to pursue these tie-ins.
I want to shoot the messenger!
When shopping for a couch, a salesman was very chatty. When he learned I do something with computers, he asked me some question about scanning or something. I queried for a general description of what he wanted to accomplish.
He gave me a 10-minute explanation of his business plan, how it would work, where he'd get his materials, and it would be simple to earn a lot of money. I said you might want to be careful who you tell that to, they might take your idea and steal your business.
His reply was essentially: Good for them. If they do the work, they should get paid. Doesn't matter if it's my idea, an idea is just sitting in my head. If someone actually does something with the idea, they did the work and can earn a profit. I asked him if by chance he is libertarian, and he said of course.
So that might have something to do with why people find this confusing. I assume gp was a bit of a troll, or at least sarcasm, but some people do believe that work earns money, and thought is just a way to get things done with less effort.
Yes, the Court of Federal Claims is an administrative court. There are lots of cases where an administrative (Article I) agency makes quasi-judicial decisions based on a consideration of evidence and law. The key is that these decisions are reviewable by an actual court of law as defined in Article III, and that's what makes it kosher. The Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit is the appellate court for reviewing many of these decisions, as happened here.
So if I bring the Mona Lisa to a public street and photograph it, I now own a copyright of a copy of the Mona Lisa? *And*... I can take that newly owned and copyrighted photo and sell it?? Uh, no. That's not how it works.
TPJ - Founder, The Amazon Basin
You can't make a copy in the same medium (photo of photo), but to say that a photo of a statue is a violation of copyright is plain stupid.
Wrong. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rogers_v._Koons "Transformative" is not the same thing as a change in media.
http://www.jurisnotes.com/IP/articles/trademarkblues.htm "Photographers, agents and publishers are up in arms over the latest legal trend that is growing like bacteria within their industry. New York's Chrysler Building, San Francisco's Transamerica Tower, Daytona Beach, and Cleveland's Rock and Roll Hall of Fame have all been the subject of trademark challenges brought by their owners against photographers and publishers who incorporated original images of each of these properties in posters or advertisements. Reliable sources say that the Dallas Chamber of Commerce has even claimed trademark rights in the Dallas skyline."
TPJ - Founder, The Amazon Basin
Wouldn't this mean then that I can copyright myself, and sue anyone that takes a picture of me?
If it won't boot, Fsck it!
Wow you think it's stupid for someone who hand crafts a complete 3d model to own the rights? Like if I sculpt the David sculpture you take photos then sell them you think you deserve that cash? Bullshit. Your photos would be nothing without the work of another artist who did ALL the work. You just show up with a camera, make sure there is light and press some goddamn buttons(maybe rotate a toggle or two or rest it on a tripod). You think that counts as work? In reality the photographer is making a fixed 2d view of MY work. A true public monument is different due to it's commissioning by the public. Also, if you can plainly see it from public property then you can sell the shot as a view of the street, but crop out the street and show only private property, then it gets dicey.
This is the US Post Office we're talking about here, so we don't have to worry about any profits being made...
actually, I think you'll find that the post office is the ONLY consistently profitable branch of the US government.
Then just tear it down. Rip it up, break it into tiny little pieces and deposit the remains on that scumbag-artist's front lawn. Build another from another artist who is more supportive of his country.
I never heard of the guy who designed the Lincoln Memorial asking for royalties from the back of every penny in circulation.
The founding fathers never intended for anyone to be able sit on his laurels and live off a single work for his entire life, much less for three generations of his estate to benefit after his death
That is one interpretation.
The other is that the Founders sought to drive ambition and talent towards the production of new works of art.
For generations of Americans, Japanese Import meant "dime store junk." Japan in its post-war reconstruction went all-out to erase that stereotype forever.
The geek's celebration of the copy, the knock-off - the trivially derivative work - is disheartening.
_____
The Founders were eighteenth century men of property.
Estate planning was as a natural to them as breathing. You didn't have a lot of time to make your mark, after all.
You came of age at 21 and died at 45.
The think the IRS would disagree with you ;-)
-William Brendel
"if I sculpt the David sculpture you take photos then sell them you think you deserve that cash?"
Of course yes. I did the work I'm selling, I get the cash. That's the only natural option.
You don't want your sculpture photgraphed? Don't let it in the open. Easy, isn't it?
"Your photos would be nothing without the work of another artist who did ALL the work."
That being said by the one that is copying Michellangelo's David. Anyway, you didn't all the work for that photo, did you? For this photo to be there you forgot making the damn photo itself. Ooops!
"In reality the photographer is making a fixed 2d view of MY work."
And that's exactly what he is selling. He is not selling YOUR work, but he is selling HIS work, no matter how diminishing you value it. People prefer buying his photo for peanuts instead of paying big bucks for you hard work? Though luck, that's the way capitalism works: it's not how much YOU value your work but how much OTHERS values it.
"What you're saying is that if a rock band does a free concert in a public park, they have given away the rights to their work."
Well, I don't know what the grandparent wanted to say, but I certainly think exactly that: once it gets to the public, it's public -and they already recovered their costs with the tickets.
Oh course the USPS can operate with a profit, they have no long term expenses. I could run a wildly profitable enterprise if only the federal government would pay for all of my initial start up costs and then never expect me to pay them back.
I would call him a douchebag, except for the fact that it would be an insult to douchebags.
Welcome to the Frank Gaylord Online Sculpture Studio‎ ‎
Contact Information
Frank C. Gaylord
2844 Rte. 14
Williamstown, VT 05679
For Business Inquiries Call John Triano or e-mail at trianoj@gmail.com
Unfortunately, it depends on the contract between the artist and the commissioner. It is becoming more and more common for the artist to retain the copyright. When an artist paints a picture and sells it, they often now explicitly put in the bill of sale that the copyright is not transferred, allowing them to sell prints of the painting even after they have sold the painting.
In another discussion group, we were discussing the incidents surrounding the Mackie dance sculptures on Broadway St. in Seattle. These are Dance Step diagrams in Bronze embedded in the sidewalk. Ten years ago a commercial photographer named Mike Hipple took a picture of someone dancing. A portion of one of the sculptures is visible in the photo. Mackie is suing for $60,000. Mackie has actually sued about photographs of these sculptures at least 30 times. As a result there have been some calls to reevaluate how public works of art are commissioned.
Unfortunately, transferring the copyright to the purchasing body (city, country, whatever) is not necessarily the answer. As shown by the Sept 11 incident with the I love new york logo. Milton Glasner created a modified version of the logo and was contacted by New Yorks legal department over infringement. The city backed down in the face of public opinion. Given that all cities/states/countries are feeling financial pressure, they will most likely want to grab licensing fees for any monuments that they own. The only solution may be an explicit grant to the public domain, but this may not be possible in practice, since everyone seem to want a cut of the action.
Atlas stands on the earth and carries the celestial sphere on his shoulders.
"One of the best -- and most annoying -- examples is wedding photos, which the photographer usually retains rights to, even if he sells you prints."
As long as you surrender your rights as a consumer it's no wonder others will abuse of that.
I married two years ago and I made damn clear I was contracting a service and that all byproducts and associated rights from that service were my own. There were two phographers that didn't see it that way... well, they didn't get neither the copyright nor the money for the service.
"Of course you don't have the rights to copy her work. Otherwise you could go into business competing against her"
Of course we all know how bad competition is... those bastard capitalists!
Who are you and why is your opinion modded 'Insightful?' While I am perfectly okay with you expressing your opinion it seems ludicrous that it is being modded as somehow being insightful when you bring nothing to the conversation.
How the hell does this make a mockery of the men in commemorates? This is what they were fighting FOR. The right of individuals to own property and do with it as they wish. The idea that we own our thoughts and work, and they do not belong to 'the people'.
"Even so, it's insane."
What it is insane is people *allowing* for that.
"One of the worst is the photographer who did my sister's wedding in 1999, where she and her fiance signed a photographer on who not only expressly stated the above (quite normal)"
That's the problem. The proper answer is laugh at his face, go out the door and find another photographer.
How is generalizing against an entire group [slashdot] with half-truths insightful? Moderation fail?
While this is true, they are in the green simply because they are now the worlds biggest spammers. 90% is unsolicited junk these days, plus the the fact that they strong-armed their way into a monopoly, doesn't encourage positive views of them.
Yes, this was a stupid decision, but before everyone jumps all over the artist, consider that the man is 85 years old and is a US citizen, which means that he's likely to have serious health problems but not to have adequate health insurance. He might very well be a greedy prima donna, but he might also just be sick and desperate.
As far as the fair use issue goes, it is my personal opinion that one ought to be able to photograph everything that is in public view and to profit therefrom. Unfortunately, that is just my personal opinion, and the laws and their interpretation can and probably do differ. Of course, if I got to make the laws, most of the crap that arouses outrage on Slashdot wouldn't be an issue, but there would probably be endless bitching about the difficulty of the math, logic, and statistics sections of the voter qualification test...
Proud member of the Weirdo-American community.
The court's opinion also points out that the USPS did make a substantial (millions of dollars) profit in selling the stamp, from collectors purchasing it and never using it to send a letter.
This man served his country when he fought in WWII. He does not deserve to be called names.
And I guess $36K per statue is about what you could expect if you went to the statue store.
The nothing significant was found to be $5M. The merchandise included framed pictures, brochures, all sorts of stamp collecting stuff. If the USPS had done its homework and listed the sculptors name, and contacted him and negotiated the same nominal amount they paid the photographer, probably the whole thing could have been avoided. But the original sculptor is not listed on the merchandise. Not a footnote of attribution.
Sometimes rectifying an issue of artistic authorship results in a lawsuit. It isn't always money or greed, but that is the unit in which our courts operate.
I hope that people read the court's opinion. It's not all that dry and its basic background of fair use is not at all a bad explanation of what your comment is getting at.
I've sometimes wondered, with wedding photos, why they're not considered a work for hire under copyright law, granting the copying in the party hiring the photographer. Is there some photographer exception to the work-for-hire rule, or do they just act like it?
"free concert" = profiTTT from tickets
Where this analogy breaks down is that ideas are not copyrightable. A work must be fixed in a tangible medium of expression. And then it's just the expression that gets a copyright. So even if the business plan were written down, the writing is the only thing copyrighted - not the idea.
Why don't we comission a new Korean War Memorial sculpture, smash Mr. Gaylord's sculpture to bits and then mail him the pieces?
Except you cannot assign somebody else's rights. Period.
Not true at all. If we are talking about a photo of the original artwork itself then you are completely and utterly wrong. The sale price is irrelevant as the work may not even be for sale. If you read you would know I m not talking about a public monument and that's why I use Michelangelo's David as an example, maybe bad example because the original artist is dead. If the photograph contained a sufficient amount of creativity, it would be a derivative work; if not, it would simply be a copy. You need permission unless you can show your use is fair use. So its even simpler for you, you can't buy a Transformer action figure that you bought and own outright and sell pictures of it. Why do you think that is then? You can draw the model and sell the drawings but then you can't name it transformers. You would have to do what all the cheese ball knock offers do, alter the name, make a crappy copy, THEN you get your cheap losers buying that stuff. See Gobots. Sorry to say but your weak replies are so sad! in I covered the parts you tried to rebut but completely failed at due to not reading. That doesn't not surprise me considering your quality of writing; "no matter how diminishing you value it..." and "Though luck, that's the way capitalism works"...? Learn how sentence structure works and how to proof read, then try a complex machine like capitalism! "I get the cash. That's the only natural option." I love the way you argue whats that called, the natural way? Also not trolling but, you caps like a jerk trying to raise his/her voice in an argument! By the way I sculpt and do photography. Photographing a sculpture is not work at all. Making a fat bride look good is work but showing up with a camera to take a picture of a static object is not. You could make it hard by trying lots of stuff but really you would not be even standing there without the work of the sculptor.
The idea that we own our thoughts and work, and they do not belong to 'the people'.
...right up to the point that we sell them to the freakin' government, which is, by definition, "the people". This greedy geezer wants to sell his work and keep profiting from it. I'm glad my plumber doesn't want a royalty every time I flush my toilet.
Dewey, what part of this looks like authorities should be involved?
That's not at all in question here; nobody claims that the holder of the copyright over the memorial has also copyright over the photos of it, and nobody disputes that the photographer has the copyright over the photos. However, the photos depict a copyrighted work, and there is a legal question as to whether specific uses of the photos require permission from both the sculptor and the photographer.
Why do we have this system? Well, imagine you're a painter, and you show paintings and sell them for money. Then some dude comes to your show with a camera, takes a photo of each of your paintings, and starts selling prints of your paintings. That ain't good, right?
That is, of course, a clear example of abuse of photos that depict a copyrighted work. There are also benign cases: for example, somebody might come to your gallery show and meet a long-lost friend, and have a picture taken of them together, which just happened to include your painting in the background, clearly visible. Or, two famous rock stars might have come to your show, and a journalist was there and took a photo of them, which also captures your painting.
The law is supposed to judge situations like these in a case-by-case basis and develop a set of rules that balance the painter's copyright over his work against other people's First Amendment right to take photos and reproduce them. In some cases, the purpose of the photo is very clearly to profit from the fact that the photo depicts another artist's work, and in those cases, you should need permission from the painter. In other cases the purpose will be to depict the artist's work, but not to profit from it; e.g., tourist's photos of themselves at a famous public sculpture. And in yet other cases, nobody really gives a damn about the paintings or sculptures which are just accidentally there in the photo, but it's an impromptu photo of two rock stars that has journalistic value for that reason (ugh). The legal treatment of these may be different--and there's more shades of gray.
In the case of the postage stamp, well, it's not just that it's a photo of the memorial, it is that it's a stamp that's being sold commercially, and whose whole point is that it depicts the memorial, and that therefore, the copyright holder deserves to be compensated for such an use. The counterargument could well be that the government should have a right to depict its own memorials in postage stamps, and that the sculptor, by agreeing to make a memorial for the government, should just accept that he's making a sculpture for the people, subject to different rules than commercial transactions.
Are you adequate?
Lawyers make obscenities like this possible--commonplace, it seems. If it is his goddamned piece of "art" he needs to fetch the crap up and get it off the public land--or to start paying rent on the public property where his "sacred IP" is being displayed now for free. If he can't come get it or pay the rent, then it should be destroyed at his expense. The greedy bastard should also be forced to disgorge the fee he was paid with interest . Fuck all these wannabe "artistes" who want to be worshiped forever for one third-rate "work." Fuck the laywers, too. Is it time to stop funding law schools?
If you want your life to be different, live it differently.
Actually, it's not about making a profit, but about whether or not the creative work is used in a commercial, vs. artistic endeavor. And no, to be a commercial act, the act does not have to generate profit, or even money.
In fact, you can generate money from the fair use of a creative work derived from someone else's creative work. Case in point: if you are an artist, a photographer let's say, and take a photo of another work of art, then turn around and manipulate it into some creative interpretation, print it, hang it in a gallery, and sell that print to a buyer, you are still within your rights of fair use. However, if you go through the same process but use your creative work (which again is a derivative of another's creative work) to advertise and promote your photography business, implying that the maker of the original creative work somehow supports or condones your business activities, you have engaged in a commercial endeavor, even though you may not have yet gained any profit from it (perhaps everyone thinks your work is crap, and nobody shows up to pay you for your photography), and violated copyright.
You know the thing about model releases? A photographer who just wants to take a photo to hang in a gallery doesn't need to get one. The photographer doesn't even need to get one if the photo is sold to a company that plans (note the specific logic of this statement) to use the photo on a website to promote the company. That company, however, needs that model release in order to actually go through with using the photo on the website, which is why the photographer will usually get one from the start, so that it can be presented/transferred to the buyer of the stock photography.
So if am the author of The Da Vinci Code ...
you get to make the movie and keep all the profits?
They didn't get permission before they used the image? What idiocy!
How many other stamps are in the same boat? How many times did they make this mistake?
If I recall correctly, this has been applied to other things, and the decisions have gone both ways.
Not to drag a cars into this, but... :) If I recall correctly, the "Black Mustang Club" (BMC) wanted to publish a calendar of their members vehicles. Ford objected, and stopped the printings, through legal muscle. It made the press, and Ford softened their stance to be "You can't use the Ford logo".
If there's a buck to be made, someone will try to make it.
A judgment like this is extremely dangerous. Pretty much it leaves us at the point of anything that has been produced cannot be used in any reproduction which can make money.
If I take a photo of say the city lights of New York, and I have it printed as a calendar, poster, or postcard, I would then be liable to the City of New York, the owners of every building included, the manufacturers of the lights used, and countless others. It may seem silly, but that's the case here. I know buildings, to some degree, are exempt from this, but I believe there was a story a few years ago of someone photographing the Sears Tower, and they were forbidden from doing it because they didn't have permission of the building owners for reproduction rights.
I have some very interesting photos of places I've been. Maybe someday after I kick the bucket, one of my descendants will arrange them into a nice book, "Life In The Eyes Of JWSmythe". With a decision like this, owners of anything I've taken pictures of could come back looking for their cut. Luckily, I'll be rolling over in my grave at that point. :)
Serious? Seriousness is well above my pay grade.
Here's a company that does exactly that, AIM Productions. AIM stands for "Advertising In Movies"...
http://www.aimproductionsinc.com/
You seem to stand under massive influence of content mafia bullshit. (Sorry for that.)
There is nothing else to own than that what is physical. Tell me, how can you own an idea? How can you own information? You can have it in your head. You can take a note of it. But unless you tell someone else about it, you can’t even prove it exists. And if you tell someone (as in this case, where the whole world knows it), everybody has the information, and hence nobody owns it. Because how can you own something, that can’t even be taken away from you, and that you also can’t control?
The value of information is inversely proportional to the number of people knowing it. So what’s the point anyway.
Back then, the “idiots” did’t even remotely imagine of how fucked up this (including some “laws”) could become in the future. They went for the natural. The obvious.
Gaylord already gave out the information. In form of a large memorial for the whole world to see. So now it’s waayy too late to bitch about it. If he wanted more, he should have asked back when he passed it over. That was the only point in time to do this.
And you: I know it’s hard to stay in reality with today’s media bullshit power. But please stop getting all you know form others. Especially the current sources. And start to find out things for yourself. Strengthen your own sense of reality. :)
A good way to measure how close you are to reality, is to trace it back to basic physics.
I did that. And the above is a the tip of the iceberg of the result of it.
Any sufficiently advanced intelligence is indistinguishable from stupidity.
A lot of people miss the entire point of the ruling. A lot more are outraged at an artist who is merely enforcing his rights.
Mr. Gaylord was paid for the statues. However he was paid for the physical objects of the statues. He was not paid for the rights. When you buy a CD, you are not paying for the rights; you are paying for the copy. This is no different.
It does not matter that the statue is public. It does not matter it was paid for public money. It does not matter the subject of the statues nor whether any of us personally had a relative that served in the Korean war. All that matters is that he never sold the rights.
As such, he does not want the statues back. As the owner of copyrights, Mr. Gaylord controls how he wishes to license his copyrights. He never gave the US Postal Service rights to profit from his artwork. This is no different than a rapper "sampling" from another artist without paying them for the work.
This is not a limitation of fair use. Fair use normally applies to noncommercial, private use. The US Postal service is not using as such. Their use is both commercial and public. So anyone who wants to take a picture of the statues is not violating rights. Selling the pictures for profit is violating rights.
Well, there's spam egg sausage and spam, that's not got much spam in it.
I think you're confusing product placement with copyright and approved uses.
You see very obvious brand names in movies and TV because they are sponsoring the movie. It's advantageous for them to have their products shown.
Don't think every couch, lamp, and article of clothing had a royalty paid for it's use. You could extend that idea to "character A walks through a door. He hangs his jacket on a hook." Consider every element in that shot. The clothes, the door, the carpet he was standing on, the hook. None of those manufacturers made any money except for the retail cost of their product.
If you see an iPhone in a movie, it's because Apple paid for it to be there. Otherwise, it would be a nondescript phone, probably held to the actors off-camera ear, or not even shown in an obvious manner other than the fact you knew the actor was talking on a cell phone.
But, sure as hell, some lawyer will grab onto a case, and make some money at it (one way or another). That's part of the American dream though. Sue someone with money, and win a fortune. I'm just happy I'm not one of them.
Serious? Seriousness is well above my pay grade.
I'm sure they could do it in situ for added lols; safety would be a secondary objective.
If opportunity came disguised as temptation, one knock would be enough.
3^2 * 67^1 * 977^1
The US Govt should decide that he can have it back; and mail it to him.
The US Govt should decide that he can have it back; and mail it to him.
Reply paid, with postage costing whatever this tool is asking the courts for.
I drink to make other people interesting!
Pfff, any excuse will do. USPS is expensive, inefficient and unreliable compared to UPS, Fed Ex and DHL. USPS is civil service which means pay based on time, not productivity. USPS bulk mail is push spam which is increasingly inefficient so increasingly less attractive for business use. USPS never could handle overnight efficiently which is why it is jobbed out to UPS and FedEx.
Hmmm...high cost, low return...yeah, it must have been gas prices...which have returned to previous levels and USPS still loses money.
Could it be...USPS does not operate a proper business model and they are having the same "retirement" expense explosion as other operations?
But what if you took a picture and sold them for 40 cents each. (Or however much stamps cost these days.)
> They own the piece of art. They don't own the work. > For example, if you buy one of two hundred prints of an artist's latest painting, you just own > a print, but the artist retains ownership of the IP (the painting) and all copies (the print).
I once spoke to an artist in a market fair. She was selling paintings and prints of paintings.
I was thinking of buying a painting from her. I asked if I would have the right to make prints of the painting I bought. She said I wouldn't - the rights remained with her.
I did not buy her painting.
Why this attitude from artists? It's not like there's a finite supply of artistry within an artist and it dries up in a decade - its lasts a lifetime.
?quote> Probably because you didn't want to pay for the right to make prints in addition to buying the original. The creator of a piece of work gets to decide how it may be used; that is a fundamental concept that enable ssuch things as the GPL.
What next? I take pictures of my new kitchen for 'Better Homes and Gardens' and the cabinet makers sue me?
I doubt it - the cabinets would be a part of a greater work, just like a picture of a building that includes a sculpture in front of the building would not violate the artists copyright.
I'm a consultant - I convert gibberish into cash-flow.
Well if you find that interesting here is the reverse application of the whole principal, boiled down to a judgment in the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit. Rogers vs Koons. Guy makes a sculpture from a photo of puppies. They are a big success and sell for 300k combined. The sculpture was a close copy of the photo and an average person could tell it was from the same source. The court rejected the parody argument, and said Koons could have made his sculpture of that general type of art without copying Rogers' specific work. So copying that work did not fall under fair use.
Actually, unlike your rock concert which is covered by copyright, this is a very gray legal area.
Aside from work for hire issues as to whether he has the right to the copyright or not(which the judge seems to have argued he does). Public landmarks are more than a little bit fuzzy when it comes to copyright. How much of the value of the memorial is in the sculpture itself and how much of it is in what it represents to people. How much of the stamp is about the actual sculpture and how much of it is about what the sculpture represents.
I would argue that that sculpture represents the lives of thousands of American soldiers in Korea and perhaps more broadly the millions of soldiers who have fought died on all sides in conflicts throughout history. It is important and famous not because of what this guy did with a chisel, but because of what a lot of men and women did either because of what they believed in, or because they had no choice.
That postage stamp, like the memorial, is to commemorate those people, and Mr Gaylord, no matter how great an artist he may or may not be, owns nothing of that.
I think it's more about whether you're making profit from the picture,
Not exactly.
Copyright infringement is not about whether you are making money off of an existing product, but rather whether or not you have the right to distribute it. After all, if I draw a picture (lets call it artwork for the sake of the point), I own the copyright to that artwork. If I refuse to sell it, you do not have the right to reproduce and sell your reproductions. If I contract with you and allow you to pay me royalties for the right to distribute, or simply tell you that you can take pictures of it and sell (or give away, or otherwise use) those reproductions, then you have the right to distribute. I can tell you how many times, or for what period of time, or for what purpose I am allowing you to do so, and if you break any of those issues, you are committing copyright infringement. If I tell you that you can take a picture of my artwork, you do not, simply by that allowance, have any right to sell your picture. To take it one step further, if I am a professional [public figure who plays a sport] and you ask for an autograph, and I give you an autograph, you do not have the right to sell that autograph.
If, on the other hand, I directly tell you that I created this artwork and I do not want anyone to use it for any purpose, you cannot reproduce it. You cannot distiribute reproductions. The civil penalties that you could be held to are there explicitly because the amount of money you might have been making off of such infringement is not relevant; the cause of action is the existence of the infringement. You could be giving away copies of your reproduced photo for free, but you would still be subject to those monetary penalites. In fact, I don't have to tell you that I don't want you to use it, I simply have to do nothing (except create the artwork), and then you do not have the right to reproduce it.
When you sell photos to chinese bootleg manufacturers, you are infringing not because you are trying to make money, but because you don't have the right to distribute that photo.
That should have started, "With $17 million in sales..."
And even more interesting was the estimate of 5.4 million sold to collectors. I don't understand the point of collecting a stamp when there are 46 million others just like it? It's the same notion of collecting all the state quarters I suppose.
Good point. Other works of IP "owned" by the government are by definition public domain (frex, NASA's space photos); why should art be any different?? I'd think it would be akin to a work-for-hire in the private sector -- you get paid for your work, and that's the end of your lawful interest in it.
~REZ~ #43301. Who'd fake being me anyway?
If it is an original work of art, clearly the original artist can have a copyright on that work of art.
In this particular case, I am supportive of the sculptor and think that he should be compensated in this particular case.
I'd be curious how many contracts for "3-D public art" have a sale of copyright that goes with that artwork when it is purchased. If that is something which comes from this particular case where such copyright sales must be explicit, I'm all supportive of such an arrangement.
On the other hand, if a work of art is commissioned by a public organization such as the federal government in this case, it certainly could implied that such a copyright transfer was done to the government as a "work for hire". That would simply put the sculpture in the public domain due to the nature of all works of art done by public employees. There are some amazing photos made by Ansel Adams for the U.S. Department of the Interior during the 1930's and 1940's that are thankfully in the public domain for this very reason, even though there are other photos which are clearly still under copyright by this very talented photographer.
This case would be much more cut and dried if it was a sculpture that was placed on private property such as a business and both the business and the artist was seeking enforcement of copyright status. The public work for hire and/or possible "donation to the public" certainly is a fly in the ointment here.
What kills me is those museums and art galleries who assert copyright on works of art that were clearly made more than 100 years ago.... hence the copyright claim ought to be considered expired. I understand the desire for a museum to try and make a little bit of money on the side, but charging patrons for taking photographs and demanding royalties on photos of such works of art is a bit over the top. That, to me, is where it goes over the line.
This man served his country when he fought in WWII.
So did lots of other people, none of which has anything to do with the topic at hand.
He does not deserve to be called names.
He's being a greedy asshole. Sure he does. Serving your country in a war doesn't give anyone a free pass to pull the shit he is.
The nothing significant was found to be $5M.
Whoopdefriggindo, a federal agency made a little money off a picture of some guy's sculpture. Stop the presses.
The merchandise included framed pictures, brochures, all sorts of stamp collecting stuff. If the USPS had done its homework and listed the sculptors name, and contacted him and negotiated the same nominal amount they paid the photographer, probably the whole thing could have been avoided. But the original sculptor is not listed on the merchandise. Not a footnote of attribution.
He won a contest, and was given the privilege of working on a national monument. AND he got paid a handsome wage for it to boot. But oh noes, the postal service forgot to put in some kind of tribute on a fucking postage stamp to recognize his work. I'm trying to care, but it's just not happening.
Sometimes rectifying an issue of artistic authorship results in a lawsuit. It isn't always money or greed, but that is the unit in which our courts operate.
Right, because since the USPS didn't properly attribute authorship, no one knows that HE did the "work" on the statues. I'm sure you're right, money has nothing to do with this. Nothing at all.
BTW, can you send me some of what you're smoking? It has to be pretty damn good.
[eyeing chart] Looks to me like the big problems were more due to declining revenue across the decade, and a sudden jump in "Retiree health benefits". "Total operating expenses" (which presumably includes fuel) increased, sure, but had been increasing all along. There's even a footnote about the retiree benefits being an excess cost in 2007.
~REZ~ #43301. Who'd fake being me anyway?
It wasn't the U.S. federal government who paid the start-up expenses for the USPS in this case.... it was the British government instead, when Benjamin Franklin became the first American postmaster-general in North America.
Otherwise, it has been a make a little lose a little proposition for the past nearly 300 years, and one of the early forms of revenue for the American Republic after the revolution of the 18th Century.
I'd say that those start-up costs have been amortized quite some time ago. How many 18th Century organizations are you familiar with that are still operational today?
Apparently you don't understand the word "apparently"
Yes, that word is sometimes abused and accompanied with a tone of sarcasm (implying anything but "apparent"). That still doesn't make his sentence wrong. It just makes you ignorant.
Pfff, any excuse will do. USPS is expensive, inefficient and unreliable compared to UPS, Fed Ex and DHL.
An interesting little side note here: DHL is actually a subsidiary of the German post office. That is correct, DHL employees actually work for the German government, even if it is operated as a for-profit business.
As for comparing the efficiency of the American government vs. the German government.... that is certainly something that could be a bit of an interesting discussion in its own right.
I love, love, LOVE this argument.
You know why?
FedEx has been going up and down as well, and DHL stopped much of their US operation. (Guess who took over for DHL? Come on, guess! Give up? USPS.)
This argument simply proves that you don't actually look up the business performance of the companies you quote, you just assume that "oh, these non-government companies MUST be doing better" when the truth is more nebulous.
One of the most glaring problems with copyright law is the current copyright ownership by state and local governments.
IMHO, all government organizations, at least in the USA, should have works of art owned by a government entity as being in the public domain. State's rights issues don't even apply here as it is the federal government that has exclusive constitutional authority in terms of copyright granting authority in the first place.... 1st article of the constitution no less.
Some states like California have also formalized this sentiment and have made all works of art owned by that particular state government to be in the public domain just as the federal government has through legislation. As for why more states don't do that is something that doesn't make too much sense to me.
USPS is in a Catch-22 position here, now.
They are, actually, well aware of their operating costs. Unfortunatly, closures of low performing USPS branches are met with heavy public outrage. They're doing what they can, but when you have to fight tooth and nail to remove even a blue dropbox, well, you have to pick your battles.
Furthermore, there's been talk from USPS about going to a 5-day delivery schedule (likely dropping Tuesday or Wednesday) for years now but approval for something like that has to come from Congress.
USPS, in a lot of ways, is like the penny. It costs nearly 2 cents to stamp a coin with a 1c face value, but try to remove it and there's a sudden emotional public outcry.
The government commissioned the work of art, in this case the sculpture itself, and then had another branch of that same government take a picture of that work of art for use in its own operations.
It isn't quite so cut and dried as it would seem. The question is if that sculptor was acting as an "employee" of the government via the contract to requisition the public monument in the first place. If he was an employee, that would be a "work for hire" and there would be no copyright as it would simply be in the public domain like all other works of art by government employees. Photographs taken by NASA astronauts, for example, are in the public domain because of this principle. ESA photographs, on the other hand, aren't covered by this same principle because the EU doesn't automatically grant public domain status to such photographs.
BTW, it is a mistaken notion that fair-use doesn't apply to commercial publishers either. You can make money as a for-profit commercial publisher (aka like the USPS selling stamps, or somebody making a coffee table picture book to give another example) with fair-use photographs. It must fit the fair-use criteria, which isn't trivial, but it can be done. The profit or lack thereof from the organization is only one of several factors that goes into determining the fair-use status of a copyrighted work and how it is used.
It wasn't done by the US government, it was done for the US government.
And for what it's worth, the government tries to claim copyrights on public legal documents and the like all the time, it's bull.
No, the "government" doesn't try to claim copyright on public legal documents. There have been some situations such as the National Electrical Code, which is published by a private organization, which has in turn been codified in the form of law that has had copyright asserted.... but that is a different situation entirely. State governments also assert copyright on some documents and works of art... but that is the state government and not the federal government.
As for the distinction of a work of art done by or for the government.... that is about as weak of an argument as you can make. About the only difference I can see is if you are salaried or not... aka are you on the payroll of the government or do you receive the money in a lump sum? The distinction between an employee and a contractor is rather fuzzy, and to use this excuse as being a contractor instead of an employee as an end-run around the U.S. copyright laws on the public domain status of works of art by government employees is something the courts should rule as essentially the same thing.
Compensation was given to this sculptor for making this work of art, and was paid by the government. As to if that artist was paid sufficient money for that sculpture, that is something which can be debated. It is this issue that is the sticking point, and it sounds to me that this artist is complaining that he didn't get enough money for what he made in this case.
And the Corps of Engineers should be able to take the damn thing to a safe place and blow it up. I'd rather see it destroyed than stand in mockery of the men it commemorates.
Then they can send him the bill for their time and explosive.
"One of the best -- and most annoying -- examples is wedding photos, which the photographer usually retains rights to, even if he sells you prints."
As long as you surrender your rights as a consumer it's no wonder others will abuse of that.
I married two years ago and I made damn clear I was contracting a service and that all byproducts and associated rights from that service were my own. There were two phographers that didn't see it that way... well, they didn't get neither the copyright nor the money for the service.
your... RIGHTS as a consumer? What about the rights of the person who created the ART of your event? Sure, you can go find a shutter-monkey who will grant you the copyright, and they'll even be cheaper. They're also going to have a piss-poor eye, and will likely be late and unprofessional when it comes to delivering the images.
If you treat an artist like they're a tradesman, perhaps you don't really understand the scope of the service, and maybe you should shut your fucking mouth before you prove yourself to be a bigger douchebag than you already seem to be.
Do you mean in the black?
If I take a photo of say the city lights of New York, and I have it printed as a calendar, poster, or postcard, I would then be liable to the City of New York, the owners of every building included, the manufacturers of the lights used, and countless others. It may seem silly, but that's the case here. I know buildings, to some degree, are exempt from this, but I believe there was a story a few years ago of someone photographing the Sears Tower, and they were forbidden from doing it because they didn't have permission of the building owners for reproduction rights.
One thing that does protect you on cityscapes is that most mass-produced items are not considered "works of art" and you are free to take photographs of them. Buildings themselves are interesting, as it can be considered a 3-D sculpture and as such a sort of work of art... explicitly covered in the U.S. copyright code and explained in detail.
Automotive design is certainly something interesting in terms of its copyright status.
To me, the #1 problem with all of this is the lack of copyright registration. In the past, an author or artist had to take explicit steps to copyright their works and register that copyright with the government for protection.... sort of how a patent works now. Registration still can happen and is a good idea if you want to enforce copyright, but it is not longer necessary to enforce copyright.
In all of the cases above, I wonder if either the Sears Tower (now Willis Tower.... don't get me started there), the Ford vehicles, or this particular sculpture would ever have had their copyright registered. All it would take to register that copyright is to take a few photographs and file them with the library of congress, so it isn't really an undue burden, but it does take some extra effort. I don't think that until the groups involved had photographs taken and used on a wide basis would they have even bothered in the first place.
Almost all of these posts are way off track and the wing tip.
UPS. FedEx, and the USPS have applied the eighty-eight so many times that they had to get the restriction off of all consumer mail. This is one man and his art piece.
People that look at monuments are not really getting why the monument is there. The monument is for the hate - not just who hates the war and perhaps the monument. In other words, the bronze is there to get the hate of war to a more manageable and acceptable level. This is the reason why the monument exists - 50 yards from the Vietnam wall.
I'm not people here are really getting the implications of this, and why it's so wrong.
Essentially, what this decision means is that any photo/video/painting/rendition of any kind of anything designed by a human can be considered copyright infringement, if that "derivative work" is being used to make a profit. Any building design recent enough to be under copyright is just as applicable as this war memorial. (In reality, literally *everything* would be applicable, because the creator of a work gets copyright by default unless he gives it away. This could include even things as far-fetched as landscape design, or the way some average joe mowed his lawn. Or some fence a farmer built, or even a highway. But, to keep it simple, we'll stick with buildings.) There's millions of buildings throughout the world, for which I'm 100% certain if you checked, you'd find copyrights on the design not just by default, but in every sense of the term. That means that literally every movie, every photo, every drawing, every painting, every rendition whatsoever of any of these buildings that is used to make a profit without first getting permission or paying royalties for every single building contained in them is infringing every bit as much as the USPS is here. Think about it. That's insane.
Care to take a guess how many infringements there are in this item alone?
http://www.amazon.com/dp/B000RA3ZBY?tag=freefocom05-20&camp=211493&creative=379997&linkCode=op1&creativeASIN=B000RA3ZBY&adid=15664KQ5AMV47KCTWZ7H&
This decision can't hold. The can of worms it would open is literally too massive to really comprehend.
There is no -1 Disagree mod. Slashdot.org/faq defines mod options. USE IT.
"Not true at all."
I know the law, thanks. That were not the point. I was challeging law itself, not your explanation of it.
"Also not trolling but, you caps like a jerk trying to raise his/her voice in an argument!"
Not trolling, uh? That's why you go from arguments to argument 'ad hominem'.
"What about the rights of the person who created the ART of your event?"
They were properly covered by the money I got him in exchange for his services.
"They're also going to have a piss-poor eye, and will likely be late and unprofessional when it comes to delivering the images."
You are using the future tense. I remember you this was two years ago, the one I contracted had a good eye, was professional and came in time. I of course took my references.
"If you treat an artist like they're a tradesman, perhaps you don't really understand the scope of the service"
I fully understand the scope of the *service* and, yes, a wedding photographer is a tradesman no less than a lawyer or a milkman, I hired him for a service and as long as he is under contract the result of his work is my own. Maybe the photographer I hired is more professional than what you think since he had no problem understanding what I was hiring him for, professionally reaching a deal and professionally binding by it.
Don't think every couch, lamp, and article of clothing had a royalty paid for it's use. You could extend that idea to "character A walks through a door. He hangs his jacket on a hook." Consider every element in that shot. The clothes, the door, the carpet he was standing on, the hook. None of those manufacturers made any money except for the retail cost of their product.
If this decision holds, that's about to change. And considering the amount of movies that have already been made, there's gonna be a shitstorm of lawsuits going on.
There is no -1 Disagree mod. Slashdot.org/faq defines mod options. USE IT.
"Statutory damages are per work, not per copy." So please explain how Jammie gets a penalty of 2.4mil?
If you treat an artist like they're a tradesman,perhaps you don't really understand the scope of the service
You're right, we're treating them entirely too well. They do about a tenth the actual work of a tradesman, they should also be making about a tenth the actual pay.
Seriously though, your attitude is precisely the attitude that has made IP as fucked up as it is today. The wedding photographer, if he does good work, will make damn good money photographing the wedding. Everything they do is a la carte. Want another photo touched up? That's another hundred bucks. Why the FUCK do they deserve to have a "right" that entitles them to keep making money off the "work" they already got paid for, any more than any other type of worker? They spent a whopping half a day (maybe less) taking the photos, and maybe another day or two editing them, developing them, etc. They probably got paid anywhere from $3,000 to $20,000 for less than a week's worth of work. And yet, they should have a right to make more off the same work? Bullshit.
There is no -1 Disagree mod. Slashdot.org/faq defines mod options. USE IT.
I doubt it - the cabinets would be a part of a greater work, just like a picture of a building that includes a sculpture in front of the building would not violate the artists copyright.
So in other words, just like the photo of the war memorial includes the ground the statues are standing on, as well as who knows what all else?
There is no -1 Disagree mod. Slashdot.org/faq defines mod options. USE IT.
A sculpture, even in a public place, has long been protected from being photographed. IANALBIKLBTY. The artist quite rightly took a crack at retaining his rights, and he's completely within his rights in this case. The torrent-sucking copyright-is-evil gallery ought to try to make a living from IP once or twice before going off sounding like pitchfork-waving mindless rabble.
"you get to make the movie and keep all the profits?"
Disregarding current laws, why exactly not?
"If it is an original work of art, clearly the original artist can have a copyright on that work of art."
Apart from rupestric paintings, what's an original work of art is quite a questionable issue.
Architecture is artwork owned by the architect. So wouldn't this ruling limiting fair use possibly apply to images of copyrighted architectural creations, aka buildings? And if so, wouldn't all photographs that include buildings like skyline shots and google streetviews have the same problems since that imagery makes money? Could be an interesting can of worms. Or perhaps the ruling is more narrow.
They spent a whopping half a day (maybe less) taking the photos, and maybe another day or two editing them, developing them, etc.
Clearly you have *no* idea what is involved being a photographer of an event (wedding or not). Any decent photographer for events at a known location would've spent time scouting said location for the correct shot, angle, etc. Their work would've started a long time before the wedding date.
On the day of the wedding they would shoot as much as the client requested (sometimes this can be everything from the bride getting into her dress down to the point where the bride & groom leave for their honeymoon). This will be more than half a day.
Now, lets assume our photographer took ~3000 photos, which is not unreasonable in any capacity. First he'd have to review each photo, choosing about 500 or so for further review. Assuming you work at the rate of 1 image reviewed in 15s (which is almost too fast in most cases), the reviewing alone takes 12 hours and 30 mins.
Now, with those 500 photos they'll edit each. From experience, after any noise reduction, white balance corrections, exposure corrections, curves adjustments, vibrancy edits, sharpening and final output (proofed if printing at a reputable place) you're looking at about 15 mins an image. That's 5 days worth of editing right there, assuming our photographer doesn't sleep (for giggles, lets assume he doesn't, I don't want to factor in ~8 hours of sleep in every 16 hours awake)
So, lets keep score. Scouting the location: 1 - 2 days. Taking the actual pictures: 1 day. Editing the pictures: 6 days. Total time: 8 - 9 days. "less than a week" my ass.
DHL was begun to send packages from San Francisco to Hawaii in 1969, it was purchased in 1999 years by Deutsche Post a private company largely owned by the German government (30% of share held by a state bank). DHL employees are no more "government employees" than GM ones, and for what it's worth DHL has had to pull out of the US because package service here was hemorrhaging money under its new ultra-efficient overlords.
Yes, he was paid for his work. That proves my point.
The sculptor was a veteran.
And?
And why is it fair that the USPS (not the US government ya know) pocketed at least $5M in profit without a single royalty to the sculptor?
Because they provided a service? Again, why is it fair that he gets paid for other people's work, when he was already paid for the work he did? If he didn't think that $700,000 was enough money (!), he could have not taken the job. I don't see how it being funded by the people makes it any different.
Do you have a source for any of your claims?
Oh, and if you quote my post in reply, I demand royalties.
PS - disagreeing with a post doesn't make it a "troll". Learn to mod.
If this decision holds, that's about to change.
Nonsense. Sculptures are works of art, and thus uncontroversially subject to copyright. Clothes, doors, and carpets are functional objects, and thus not, in general, subject to copyright. If this story were about the designer of a chair asserting copyright over photos of that chair, that might represent a significant increase in the restrictions imposed by copyright law; but that's not the case here.
This man served his country when he fought in WWII.
If you're going to pay that card, then what about all the people who died in the war, that he's now making money off of?
He does not deserve to be called names.
Oh, but it's okay to call people trolls to their face if they have an opinion that someone disagrees with.
I can not put a picture of my car on my website? Or is it designed for human occupancy, therefore I can?
I would be interested to see where you get all of your facts from, please let me know when you have worked as a photographer and please let me know what your expenses were while covering a wedding. I really am looking forward to hearing these imperial figures your implying you know. I would love to reduce the time spent on each wedding and looking to reduce overheads even more, it sounds like you have some great tips on being a photographer.
Just to clarify things, Gaylord designed the statues but Louis Nelson designed the black granite wall portion of the memorial.
If it's such easy work with such high pay why don't you do some courses on photography and become a wedding photographer?
If you're in the U.S., you can't make photographers transfer copyright this way. What you're essentially doing is setting up a work for hire situation. Unfortunately, due to the one-shot nature of the work and the fact that the photos comprise the entirety of the visual record, it fails to qualify as work for hire. For copyright to be assigned to you as work for hire, you either have to be their employer for multiple projects, or the material has to fall into one of nine categories (quoting from Wikipedia): "(1) a contribution to a collective work, (2) a part of a motion picture or other audiovisual work, (3) a translation, (4) a supplementary work, (5) a compilation, (6) an instructional text, (7) a test, (8) answer material for a test, (9) an atlas;"
So whatever agreement you came to with the photographer you hired to let you have copyright would probably be tossed out in court. The law is set up to prevent someone from coercing the actual creative authors from giving up their copyrights in the way you did. The music studios fall under (2) since multiple people (artist,s producer, sound engineers, etc) are involved in creating the final product. Most wedding photographers OTOH take the photos and process them by themselves.
What you could do is after the wedding is over and the photos processed, negotiate to buy all rights to the photos from the photographer. But if you do this the rights reverts to the original creator in 35 years. Aside from the above exceptions, the law makes it really hard to separate copyright from the actual creative authors.
Actually, the Corps of Engineers included clauses in the contract that gave "GOVERNMENT RIGHTS (UNLIMITED)" and "DRAWINGS AND OTHER DATA TO BECOME PROPERTY OF GOVERNMENT". The dissenting opinion of Judge Newman makes this clear. The rest of the court chose to ignore this because, apparently, the Government's lawyer (inexplicably) did not include it in the brief to the appellate court. Read the dissenting opinion.
> Now, if I took a press shot of it, they might have a case, but an individual picture?
It's a stamp. A commercial product sold by the US postal services in order to pay them for performing a service for you, i.e. delivering a letter. In order to sell more of this product, they decide to include a copyrighted work.So technically, the court is correct. Still, it's pretty dumb to have a public-owned work of art under copyright.
Clearly you have *no* idea what is involved being a photographer of an event (wedding or not).
I don't even remotely understand your complaint.
The original poster found a photographer who was willing to perform the service being requested in exchange for the amount of money being offered. Nobody's work was stolen. Nobody's copyright was violated. Nobody was forced to work against his or her will. The poster didn't ask the photographer to perform 9 days of work in exchange for 2 days of pay, as you seem to imply. There was nothing illegal about the transaction. A basic requirement of a free market system is that such transactions between two willing parties must be allowed to proceed.
Why, exactly, are you upset by the notion of a willing customer and a willing vendor entering into a mutually agreeable business transaction?
I can only imagine one reason why you would be upset, and it reflects poorly on you. The only reason why you would oppose other photographers who freely offer these kinds of services would be if they are depriving you of business. However, since they are winning against you by fair competition rather than stealing or breaking the law, I would suggest you either adjust your business model or find another line of work. Whining about competitors because they offer a better service at a lower price, or even (as you argue) a worse service at a lower price, is pretty much the last thing that will gain you any sympathy around here.
The whole essence of free market capitalism is that suppliers must be free to offer varying levels and combinations of goods and services at varying levels of prices, and consumers must be free to choose among the suppliers.
I did the same. Only difference is i went to maybe 10-12 photographers before i got a deal. But dam, if I pay a few thousand dollars, i get the negatives and copyrights. Just like the company i work for gets the copyrights of the code i write.
The Grey Goo disaster happened 3 billion years ago. This rock is covered in self replicating machines!
The stamp was intended to be a satire on patriotism. Small is funny to some people, although I think fat is funnier.
I smell BS.
The photographer can sign over copyright to who ever the want to. Its often the deal with selling a *single* photo to a newspaper or journal. They are free to put it into the contract...or not... and you are free to agree to the terms of the contract... or not.
The Grey Goo disaster happened 3 billion years ago. This rock is covered in self replicating machines!
An artist is concerned with the process of creating. A craftsman is concerned with the product of his/her work. I believe you were being hustled by a craftsman who was pretending to be an artist. Not buying her product was the right call. I guess she disagreed with William Blake's insight that, "He who binds himself to joy / does the winged life destroy / but he who kisses the joy as it flies / lives in eternities sunrise".
like that before, have you?
Why US Mail/USPS didn't claim the war memorial was public domain is beyond me. I assume it was built on public land at public expence (either financed directly by govt using tax money or by public subscription), & the designer was paid for the commision.
When creators/designers/artists are paid directly by their employer or a 3rd party who commissioned the work, then it's not unuseal for the 3rd party to end up with the IP rights to the work (in this cas the govt/public I assume).
Gay Fawker?!
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Same thing happened here a long time ago:
The Erasmus bridge in Rotterdam cannot be used for commercial means without permission of the city -- or the architect, whoever won that fight -- but neither were willing to give away their 'rights' to the city's landscape!
"We can confirm that Debian does *not* ship the version with the trojan horse. Our version predates it." [CA-2002-28]
I wouldn't call it emotional. I don't know anyone who's attached to the penny; I know a lot of stores that would gleefully raise prices by that one cent and hope no one noticed, and that sort of thing adds up, especially if you're poor.
Dropping delivery on a weekday is a really bad idea. Timebound stuff like bills and legal documents are never obligated for weekend time, but they ARE obligated for every weekday (that 10 days you get to pay or respond is counted in business days only). If they have to drop a day, Saturday makes more sense.
As to dropping low-performing branch offices, sometimes those are the only one convenient to a neighbourhood. I know if mine were closed, I'd have to drive considerably out of my way in much worse traffic, AND still drive to the old location because that's where the bank etc. are located. Hardly an emotional thing; it would cost me time and money regularly, a great deal more than would a few more cents more in postage.
I do have to wonder how much the partnership with Fedex actually costs, ie. whether it actually saves USPS anything or if it just dilutes revenues, since after all the same parcel delivery rate now has to be split between them. I also am reminded that a sharp decline in USPS speed and reliability happened about 2007ish, and wonder if that's related to their revenue drop. Much as folks like to rag on USPS, they'd always been THE fastest and most reliable, with the least parcel damage enroute, and every independent test I've seen confirmed that. For contrast, send a few things via Canada Post... it's much better/faster than it used to be, but still often gnaws the merchandise.
~REZ~ #43301. Who'd fake being me anyway?
Deutsche Post is the German post office. Germany may be playing fiscal games with it such as how the U.S. government plays around with the Federal Reserve, Fredie Mac, and other quasi-government agencies, but it is essentially an organ of the German government. Yes, I realize it has been "privatized" as some government functions have been in Europe, but it is the same organization that functions and has functioned like the USPS in the USA.
As for General Motors and Goldman-Sachs as agencies of the U.S. federal government.... I'd argue that they are, in fact, enjoying such status too. It has been suggested that the current ruckus over the Toyota recalls is in part due to economic competition and strategy to take out a competitor. I also don't think that the government should be owning businesses of this nature either and it was a bad move to get them under government control.
As for if the USPS could become privatized like Deutsche Post is currently being operated.... that is something that certainly can be debated. Under the current presidential administration, that doesn't seem to be even a remote glimmer of a possibility, however.
Like if I sculpt the David sculpture you take photos then sell them you think you deserve that cash?
You just show up with a hammer and chisel, make sure there is light and knock some goddamn pieces of of stone off (maybe make a measurement or two). you think you deserve that cash? Bullshit.
There's more to photography than showing up with a camera, making sure there is light and pressing some goddamn buttons, just as there's more to painting than smearing pigment on a surface. With your midset there's no way you could be effective in any artistic endeavor, especially sculpture (which is probably the most demanding of all artistic endeavors).
When I was in art school I took some photos of sculptures in Laumier Park in St Louis as part of a sculpture class. The instructor said the photos were more beautiful than the actual sculptures -- I chose the right time of day, added more light, and carefully composed the photos. There was a meaningful graphitti on the wall of a painting class I once took that sums it up: "Even shit can be beautiful if the light hits it right." All visual art is nothing but the practice of making photons bounce the way you want them to, whether photocraphy, painting, or sculpture.
Art is like science and engineering, in that everything comes from what has come before, whether as an improvement or a rebellion.
Free Martian Whores!
I doubt it - the cabinets would be a part of a greater work, just like a picture of a building that includes a sculpture in front of the building would not violate the artists copyright.
So in other words, just like the photo of the war memorial includes the ground the statues are standing on, as well as who knows what all else?
No, since the statue is the primary focus of the stamp - unlike a photo where it would be merely one element - such as a shot of the mall.
I'm a consultant - I convert gibberish into cash-flow.
I wouldn't call it emotional. I don't know anyone who's attached to the penny
You may not, but there's a lot out there.
Dropping delivery on a weekday is a really bad idea. Timebound stuff like bills and legal documents are never obligated for weekend time, but they ARE obligated for every weekday (that 10 days you get to pay or respond is counted in business days only). If they have to drop a day, Saturday makes more sense.
Saturday is one of, if not the, heaviest load days for mail. Middle of the week is actually the slowest. And they were just talking about home delivery, not closing branches at the same time.
Catholicism? Though that was a bit before the 18th century.
Is it just me, or do you hate it when people say "Is it just me..."?
from TFA:
"she went over all of the available documents and found that they expressly kept those [IP] rights with Gaylord"
So no the idiots at the Army Corps of Engineers who signed the contract for this didn't in fact get ownership of anything other than the physical sculpture.
So? Just bulldoze it and build another. Then make sure they own all the rights to the new one.
If someone is passing you on the right, you are an asshole for driving in the wrong lane.
And would you say catholicism has been operating at a profit? I sure would.
Copyright law is what it is. A court gave a ruling making a judgment on how it applies to this case. Until it is overturned on appeal, this is how copyright works.
You are the one who seems to be under some influence, since the facts are pretty clear.
Now, I think this is a bad thing but that doesn't mean I can't see that that is what the law says.
OK then. The idiot Government lawyers fucked up.
That sits better with by preconceptions than the Army Corps of Engineers screwing it up (though of course it would be their lawyers doing the screwing up so maybe not).
Would that make the stamps featuring it more valuable? And make the damages award higher :)
Obviously not since it doesn't change the initial profits or reasonable royalties - but I've never let facts get in the way before so why start now.
Or could it be that the country is in a huge recession and lots of businesses with huge fixed costs and tiny marginal costs aren't doing well?
Yes the USPS is an inefficient behemoth, but it's one of the few large government organizations that is actually constitutional. Why not pick on the ones that aren't first (the department of education springs to mind, social security anyone?)
The whole point of my post is that copyrighted work must be granted use in other copyrighted works. In some cases, the original holder pays for it so that they get advertising. This is called product placement. In other cases, the original holder gets money for use. What matters most is not who gets the money but rather that permission is granted.
Well, there's spam egg sausage and spam, that's not got much spam in it.
The guy is 86 or something. I'd love to see the government say, "Ok, sure, here, why don't you watch us take a wrecking ball to your life's legacy and replace it with a new Korean War monument that is fully owned by the American people. We'll even send you a piece of rubble to cry over until you die."
So no the idiots at the Army Corps of Engineers who signed the contract for this didn't in fact get ownership of anything other than the physical sculpture.
The government should try to acquire the rights to the sculpture for a reasonable sum. Failing that they should remove the sculpture, sell it to a third party, and commission a new one that they actually own.
Why anyone in their right mind would acquire (let alone fund) an original work of art without the accompanying copyright boggles the mind.
Saturday may have the highest volume, but it doesn't have the legal issue of being a business day, on which bills fall due. And that's the big problem I see.
Another is that a lot of branch post offices are closed entirely *including the box lobby* when no employees are present. This will impose a hardship on business that needs to pick up and/or send mail every business day. Effectively, it puts anyone dependent on mail OUT of business for that day, and that can be enough to kill marginal outfits.
~REZ~ #43301. Who'd fake being me anyway?
10 day is 80 working hours, that equates to $37.50 per hour on the low end. I don't think you are describing a $3000 photographer, so let's pick the middle range.
10 days of work, 80 hours, at a $10,000 fee equates to $125 / hour. That's a pretty decent wage. If this guys keeps busy he will gross about $260k. Not shabby, I don't think he needs to steal my copyright.
Cheap storage VM.
Dropping pennies is really simple, see Australia.
I've never understood Saturday mail delivery, but again that's because I grew up in Oz where there is no such thing.
I would think they want to drop a day other than Saturday because Saturday isn't the least busy day. Plus if you drop Saturday there's now two days in a row with no mail which some might consider worse than two one day gaps.
And that you would rather pay a few cents more in postage than have your low-performing branch office removed is the entire problem. The other 300 million of us would rather your branch be removed than pay a few extra cents on our postage.
actually, if you have two turds on the bottom of the bowl, parallel to each other, there is a trademark fee you have to pay to Disney. They call that one the disney-eisner.
Cheap storage VM.
What you're saying is that if a rock band does a free concert in a public park, they have given away the rights to their work.
You cannot copyright a performance; you can only copyright a recording of it. Merely performing work that is already copyrighted does negate the copyright. If you take a tape recorder to that public park and record that concert, YOU own the copyright to that particular recording, the songwriter retains copyright to the song, and the band retains any copyrights they hold. You couldn't sell your recording, since it contains copyrighted material someone else holds copyright on, but you still own copyright on that work.
If the copyright on the song is twenty years old, your copyright will be good as soon as the original copyrights expire, and will last twenty years.
Free Martian Whores!
But that question is totally irrelevant. This work is an accepted work of art.
Or to go with your argument. If I mold some elephant dung into the shape of an ear and call it art; it is covered by copyright whether you think it is art or a pile of crap. And should you or anyone else decide to take and sell pictures of my crappy art (pun intended) I get to go after them for infringing on my copyrights. And your claims that it is just a pile of crap have no bearing on the issue.
I'm too lazy to compose a creative sig.
How many 18th Century organizations are you familiar with that are still operational today?
Bank of the Manhattan Company (JPMorgan Chase) - OK, maybe not the best example to start with...
Moet et Chandon
Wilkinson Sword
Thwaites & Reed
Royal Bank of Scotland Group
Johnston Press
Hall & Woodhouse
Drummonds Bank
Cookson Group
Browns of Chester
Blancpain
Shoyeido
Whitbread Group
And more.
And this doesn't even take into account business that had already been established PRIOR to the 18th Century.
[UID-HeinzIntel]
Maybe the photographer I hired is more professional than what you think since he had no problem understanding what I was hiring him for, professionally reaching a deal and professionally binding by it.
Indeed; bad artists are like bad PhDs in that you can always tell an idiot with a doctorate because they always put that "PhD" after their name and insist that everyone call them "doctor". The good ones are like Dave and Charlie, some very intelligent and very good previous bosses I had who I'd worked for for years before I found out their level of education, the morons are like "Doc" who was so stupid I could have had him fired if I'd wanted to.
Someone who is a prima donna about his art is probably sub-par. Note that Michelangelo and Da Vinci were thought of as tradesmen by their contemporaries.
Free Martian Whores!
For example, if you buy one of two hundred prints of an artist's latest painting, you just own a print, but the artist retains ownership of the IP (the painting) and all copies (the print).
Wrong. They do NOT own the art, they only hold a limited time monopoly on its publication.
The rest of your post is accurate.
Free Martian Whores!
Wrong.
What about the rights of the person who created the ART of your event?
What about all of the code that I've created for my employers over the years? My programs are creative works and much of it is aesthetically beautiful. Where are my artists rights for that? Do I have rights over what my employers do with my CODE ART?
Works for hire are works for hire whether they're photos, poems, code, or plumping.
I'm not generally a big fan of eminent domain but I would like to see it used in this case to strip away whatever ownership this self important asshole is claiming.
"Liechtenstein is the world's largest producer of sausage casings, potassium storage units, and false teeth."
"And your claims that it is just a pile of crap have no bearing on the issue."
Which in turn can be applied to any other work no matter how crappy is looks to you. I.e.: my photograph of your sculpture. It might seem that making just "click" doesn't merit the name but, hey, it was you not me the one going through that slippery slope (yes: I know what law says but laws might be wrong or even purpouselly evil).
Depends on your agreement with the photographer. Some photographers give you the rights and turn over all materials (digital source, negatives, etc.) while others retain the originals and reserve the right to sell you additional prints.
Most of the cut-rate wedding "service" photographers that do videos, provide disposible cameras for the guests, etc. will turn over everything to you and wash their hands of the whole thing. You have them for a day (or most of) and that is it. Other photographers consider their photo shoot to be a lot more of an artistic expression and retain the rights. Sometimes the rights are purchasable, sometimes not.
Basically, you can get whatever you want - you just have to get the right agreement in advance. Hiring a professional and bitching about them not doing things the way you want after the fact doesn't get you anywhere.
1. This was done clearly as a work-for-hire. Therefore the ownership and rights should belong to the U.S. government, and by extension "We the People"
2. We shove his arse on the top of the statue.
3. We lock him in a room with 500 Korean war vets.
Depends, did you pay the FSM for the derivative work of the human form you made?
He created the sculpture. I'm pretty sure that it's fair to him to have rights over how images of the sculpture are used. Putting it on a stamp doesn't seem like an adaptation of the work but a direct use for commercial means. Where's the "fair use" issue here?
http://dilbert.com/2010-12-13
No, if the contract he signed says he keeps the copyright, then he keeps the copyright, no matter who owns the work or where it is displayed.
Commemorating people by stealing artwork is not a free pass around the law.
If they want to use pictures of his statue in their commemoration, they will have to (a) get his permission and (b) probably pay him for usage rights for the images.
How does protecting this guy's rights mock their sacrifice?
Your inability to allow the man to own what he owns is what mocks their sacrifice.
He and the government signed a contract, and that contract is binding. If you don't like the terms the government got, you know where to vote.
Aye. When rent is due, I have the courier take the remittance over to the landlord's estate. Due to the horse having his day off on Tuesday, the rent is sometimes a day late.
-l
/Fer cryin' out loud, who the heck relies on residential DELIVERY for bill payments?
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One of the amplifiers of value in collections is completeness.
So once you start down the road of being a collector, and the greed factor kicks in, you have to have the completeness points or you're not winning the game.
The magnitude of it, though...5.4 million?
Well, this is just going to require (a) people not waiting to the last minute, (b) federal law saying 'Day X+1' = 'Day X' for the purposes of bill collection (c) counting Saturday as a business day for certain circumstances or (d) some combination of the above.
If USPS is to stay buoyant, something is going to have to give.
There's obviously not going to be a quick, easy and flawless solution, but there is going to have to be one at some point.
I've sometimes wondered, with wedding photos, why they're not considered a work for hire under copyright law, granting the copying in the party hiring the photographer. Is there some photographer exception to the work-for-hire rule, or do they just act like it?
Say you are a programmer [A]. You write software for a company [B]. That company [B] writes custom software for another company [C].
Who owns the copyright on the code?
Is it common practice for [C] to require that all the source code and copyrights get turned over by [B]? Is it common practice for [B] to allow [A] to retain copyrights for all the code they write while they are employed for [B]?
As far as wedding photos go, you are [C]. If you want copyrights for all the images, you will have to pay [A] as a work for hire directly, which can be done very easily if you put an ad on craigslist saying, "I will pay you an hourly rate for shooting my wedding, turn over the CF cards to me at the end of the night and get lost." There are lots of photographers, with great portfolios on their flickr accounts that would respond to this ad, and you will easily find someone that will take the job.
However, if you are going to go with a reputable company, you are likely to find that even if it is one person's name as the photography company, they fit in the class of [B] because they are hiring assistants [A], second shooters [A], post-processors [A], and handling other incidental details that never occur to people until things go wrong. (Shooting with cameras that have dual card slots, redundant back-ups of images, redundant camera systems, etc).
It is all about risk management, and how valuable your time is. If you have a bulletproof way of capturing and storing images without running into data-loss, and you are a master of photoshop, and you can find a person that will pull the trigger for you, there is nothing wrong with hiring a work-for-hire photographer. However, when you get down to brass tacks, most people don't know the difference between a SD card and a CF card, don't know how to use photoshop, and are better off having someone else take care of all the little details for them so that they can enjoy their honeymoon.
Well, it wasn't a work for hire. The artists still owns all the rights. If the US government wanted it differently, they should have written the contract with the artist to reflect that. The US taxpayers may own the memorial, but not the rights to reproduce the image for other purposes. The government screwed up on this one, but the artist is being a douche, too.
I ran into a related problem recently. My mom just died of pancreatic cancer, and we needed some photos blown up for the memorial. The best ones we had were from Olan Mills. I took them to Walgreens, they took one look at the Olan Mills logo in the bottom corner and said, "No dice. Olan Mills owns the rights to those photos, nobody can reproduce them without permission." So I tried Kinkos, with the same results. My mom is dead, but some damn portrait studio will own the rights to her image until 2065 because she got her picture taken there and didn't read the contract.
According to the helpful folks at Kinos, nearly all large portrait studios will try to do this to you, not just Olan Mills. They must have a large legal outreach team, too, to make sure every minimum wage copyshop and photohut employee in the world knows not to copy these photos.
- None can love freedom heartily, but good men; the rest love not freedom, but license. -- John Milton
USPS WAS operating in the green actually for most of the decade,
So, the USPS was using alternative fuel vehicles? I think the phrase you're looking for is "operating in the black" if you intended to say that they were making a profit.
Fine, call the fellow and tell him to get his private property off of public property
Or maybe charge him a storage fee.
When someone is being an asshole, you just have to agree, then show him you can be an asshole too.
As a person who used to make a living doing wedding photos, anyone who insisted on holding the copyrights was either charged more, or I just told them that maybe a family member would be better suited to do the photos.
Didn't matter to me, because I'd just book a different wedding. If you're a good photographer, you turn down as many or more jobs than you take on, and are still busy every weekend and week.
Works of art, no. Copyrighted? Very possibly. There's a reason Vendor X doesn't make an identical hook to Vendor Y. They've likely patented, copyrighted, and otherwise protected their IP, even if it's a hook. As manufacturer Y of said hook, it's advantageous for me to not want anyone else to make a hook that is like mine, or even confusingly similar.
Serious? Seriousness is well above my pay grade.
Note that Michelangelo and Da Vinci were thought of as tradesmen by their contemporaries.
And they were also quite poor. But back then everybody was.
The Grey Goo disaster happened 3 billion years ago. This rock is covered in self replicating machines!
The thing is, even the law doesn't say that. National icons are and always have been a gray area in the law. They are more than just physical objects, and in large part they belong to everyone both as an idea and as a representation.
Now don't get me wrong, the government were stupid. They shouldn't have ever signed a contract allowing him to keep the rights(presuming that's what they did), but the thing of it is is that it's a war memorial. The rules are never going to be the same as when you make some piece of commercial work.
National icons that actually belong to the public are a gray area. Can the government prevent the public (corporations) from using images of public property? That'd be a question.
Can the owner of a copyright of an object whose corpus is public property and displayed in public enforce his copyright? That isn't gray in the slightest. Protecting individuals from government theft is one of the reasons for all law. He owns the copyright, and the government and the public can't just steal it from him. There's zero justification for a claim of eminent domain, here, as there's no compelling public need for the property. He wins. No question at all.
Incidentally, AP just released this article:
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20100302/ap_on_bi_ge/us_postal_future
I hadn't even thought of this possibility:
"While suggestions to close local post offices always draw complaints, Potter said the current system could be improved by opening more postal facilities in places like convenience stores and supermarkets. A few Office Depot stores are already doing this, he said."
Banks did it a long time ago (tho a lot of those went away when one of the grocery chains died). It was convenient and worked well enough for any purpose that only needed a teller's services. I don't see why a postal outlet couldn't do the same thing. Even if it were just a postage machine (the kind with a scale) and PO Boxes, and maybe the returns clerk being also empowered to handle stuff like certified mail -- I'm sure any store with the room would welcome a small share of the box rent (at a cost of a bit of foyer space and nothing out of pocket), and better still, the fact that it would guarantee bringing the boxholders into the store on a regular basis. Only snag I can think of is building lease agreements that might view this as an unpermitted sublease, or (as is the case with some SoCal store leases) would demand a share of the gross (yes, they take part of your gross, not net).
~REZ~ #43301. Who'd fake being me anyway?
I have several relatives (one being my sister) who are professional photographers, and I've also done work for photographers.
Of course, if you don't personally know people who are professional photographers you may need other sources. Here's one page to get you started:
http://www.costhelper.com/cost/wedding/wedding-phographer.html
You'll see there, that even the dirt-cheap "professional" photographers charge a minimum of $1,000-$1,500. The decent ones start around $3,000. There's even a photographer who posted on that page detailing his pricing, and he pays his assistant $250 per day - and he's one of the cheap ones starting at $1,500! Still think they don't make damn good money?
Also note, I never claimed nor implied that photographers (wedding or otherwise) are overpaid in general. I think they make good money for the amount of time invested. My point is that they get paid well enough up front, there's no reason whatsoever that they should retain copyrights for the work they do. It's not unlike a plumber signing you to some kind of contract forbidding you to do any kind of work or make any modifications to the plumbing in your house without his permission. Or replace "plumbing" with whatever type of work or service you'd pay someone to do for you.
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