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Craig Brittain (Revenge Porn King) Sues For Use of Image
retroworks writes "Washington Post reporter Caitlin Dewey leads with, "Revenge-porn impresario Craig Brittain is learning the hard way that karma is a real witch." The report states that the Federal Trade Commission has settled a complaint against Brittain, whose defunct site, "Is Anybody Down" was accused of unfair business practices. From the article: "The site paid its bills by soliciting women's nude photos on Craigslist and/or from their exes, publishing the photos without the women's permission (and often with their names and phone numbers attached), and then charging fees of $200 to $500 to take the photos down." Brittain agreed to destroy the image and never operate a revenge porn site again. However, On Feb. 9, "Brittain filed a takedown request to Google, demanding that the search engine stop linking to nearly two dozen URLs — including a number of news articles, and files on the case from the FTC — because they used photos of him and information about him without his permission." Ars Technica explains. "In this instance, fair use and general First Amendment principles are on Google's and the media's side."
Are you not concerned about the anti-sexual religious morality police that create such an aura of shame and disgust around sex?
While I have no doubt that what he was doing was unethical, I have more of a problem with the fact that society chooses to stigmatise sexuality. A picture of your dick or your pussy should be no more of a problem than a picture of your face. In a healthy community, this would be little more than a personal data protection matter.
This is the real world, like it or not it is a problem for the victims. Come back in another century. Progress marches on.
Progress is marching backwards. When I was a kid, you could find Playboy at the local grocery magazine rack. When I watch the morning news there is inevitably a half dozen "sex crime" stories. In the seventies, streaking was common and now it gets you put on a sex offender list. A friend of mine was arrested for taking a leak behind a bush walking home one night and was charged with sex assault because it was witnessed by a mother from her window who had her daughter with her. He ended up killing himself before he went to trial.
The people in charge are the sixties generation. WTF?????
Not completely true. There's a reason if you do a photo shoot with a model you ask them for a model release (right to use their image). Not every image is copyright to the photographer. And I have quite a few citations.
Of course, whether or not you need a release is a complex issue, but if you don't want lawyers sorting it out the best is to err on the side of caution.