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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."
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.
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.
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.
You guys have a habit of pushing your court decisions on the rest of the world so of course we're interested in your courts decisions and how they work.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inverted_totalitarianism
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.