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Germany Says Taking Photos Of Food Infringes The Chef's Copyright
xPertCodert writes: According to this article in Der Welt (Google translate from German), in Germany if you take a picture of a dish in a restaurant without prior permission, you are violating chef's copyright for his creation and can be liable to pay a hefty fine. If this approach to foodporn will become universal, what will we put in our Instagrams? Techdirt reports: "Apparently, this situation goes back to a German court judgment from 2013, which widened copyright law to include the applied arts too. As a result, the threshold for copyrightability was lowered considerably, with the practical consequence that it was easier for chefs to sue those who posted photographs of their creations without permission. The Die Welt article notes that this ban can apply even to manifestly unartistic piles of food dumped unceremoniously on a plate if a restaurant owner puts up a notice refusing permission for photos to be taken of its food."
Why would they sue in the first place? and miss out on free publicity
Move the items on the plate around a bit, then it becomes your own work or a derrivative work.
--- To save space, would readers please insert their own witty comment -here-
So we can't take a picture in a restaurant if it shows the food because of the chef's copyright. There are already moves to say that you cannot take photographs in a street without the building's architect's permission. What next - photograps of people wearing clothes infringing the designer's permission? Soon we will only be able to take photographs of people in the nude in a wilderness (not farmland, the farmer's neatly trimmed hedgerows, fences, and dry-stone walls hold a copyright too).
Anything exposing the ridiculousness of copyright is welcome.
As a kid, I thought "that's my idea!" was childish playground talk. As a student, I learned that publishing and sharing was key to advancing science and culture. In the commercial world, I felt I was back in the playground.
Still, the new rule here will be that you know a restaurant is bad when nobody is allowed to photo the food.
I mean, everyone is fed up with the constant flood of instagrams and faceblogfucks of the burritos or squirrels you had for lunch today. German ingenuity just figured out the way to cull the flood. Copyright for the common cause !
http://validator.w3.org/check?uri=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.slashdot.org Errors found while checking this document as HTML5!
A: Officer, why am I being arrested? ...
O: For crapping in the street.
A: But I didn't!
O: I have a picture of it right here.
A: Sorry, but that's a piece of performance art, and you are in violation of my copyright; delete the picture now!
O: OK.
Probably not the way things would go, even in Germany.
Basically, no photos will be allowed in a German restaurant because food might be in the photos.
If I owned a restaurant in Germany, I would post a sign, "Photos Allowed."
...when I post a pic of my home-cooked dinner on Faceblog :)
No but a German chef could sue you if he cooked something that looked the same first.
This is insane! What's next? Being sued by an architect for a photo of a building? By a webdesigner for a screenshot? By a cars manufacturer for a photo of one of their cars? By parents for a photo of their child? By god for any photo you make?
It doesn't have to be like this. All we need to do is make sure we keep talking.
I have read TFA (and no, I am most certainly not new here) and it is full of hypothetical blah blah. Basically, some lawyer thinks that when the food has been artistically arranged, one has to ask the chef first before making photos, or one possibly might receive a cease-and-desist letter if the chef sees the photo and is in the mood for writing one. Never happened so far but maybe possibly might happen some day. Also can happen if the eating place owner generally doesn't allow taking photos.
"It's such a fine line between stupid and clever" -- David St. Hubbins, Spinal Tap
The food was cooked to order on behalf of the customer. There is an implied transfer of ownership and all rights from the restaurant (or chef) to the customer, hence the customer is allowed to destroy the chef's work without being sued.
If the chef wanted to retain artistic copyright of his work, then he should have got the customer to sign a contract.
After digging a bit (I read German) the basis for this foodscare is related to a "birthday train" lawsuit, in which the court found that the design elements could be copyrighted as a work of art despite its functional elements as a toy train, like a sculpture. Basically it gave "functional art" (angewandten Kunst) more of the same protections as "non-functional art" (zweckfreien Kunst). So while you won't get sued for making a hot dog, copying someone's fancy and unique cake design might land you in trouble.
None of this will have any effect on making food pictures on social media, any more than you'll get in trouble for making a photo of a copyrighted statue. It does open up quite a few cans of worms since anything reasonably unique you create might get a quasi-design patent lasting life+70, so it's a IPR minefield for everything from furniture designers to hair dressers, but the photographers don't have much to worry about. Nobody's actually been sued over food photos and it's unlikely anyone will.
Live today, because you never know what tomorrow brings
There is this old story about this guy who paid for the smell of kebab with sound of coins.
I'll give the chef a picture of my money.
Moderating "-1, Disagree" is simple censorship. Have the guts to post your opinion. -- Spazmania (174582)
This is why I mentioned the simplification. German law makes judgement about how good a creation is. Since we are Germans, we even have an own word for it: "SchÃpfungshÃhe" (in english; Threshold of originality).
If you don't reach a certain level, no copyright protection.
also infringes the copyright of my wallet. Problem solved.
Extending this logically - if someone takes a photograph of you smiling, your dentist can sue you for copyright infringement if you have any fillings that are visible in the picture. Well done, Germany. Only the English would have no fear.
Seven puppies were harmed during the making of this post.
I'm not familiar with German copyright law, but there are precedents in other countries that allow artists to use copyright on art that they've sold to prevent its destruction.
If Germany grants similar rights under copyright law, that would mean that the chef could not only prevent photos from being taken, but could refuse to let the diner eat the food or even move it around on the plate since it's now copyrighted.
So if the meal is IP owned by the chef, and not transferred to me when I purchase it, then I suppose the chef has to take it back when I'm done with it....
WTF. Did you really bring a camera into my restaurant? I'm calling the cops. BTW, how did you make it past security with that thing? The head waiter should have found it when he patted you down. Needless to say, no, you won't be putting this on youtube, because the waiter's uniform and my chef hat are copyrighted. You'll at least have to crop those out. Oh, and my barber says you need to blur out my moustache if you use this conversation in your video, too. (No, your video can't have my restaurant's tables and chairs in it; the supply company was very clear about their IP.) Don't let the door hit your ass on the way out, and obviously I don't need to tell you why you can't show the door, because even if the door itself weren't copyrighted, it also happens to have our business-hours sign on it...
As copyright owner of this comment, I authorize everyone to defeat any technological measure which limits access to it.
I think it *is* a work for hire. They fix the food...and serve it to you, then you are free to use it as you please...to eat it, to throw it on the floor, you can encase it in carbonite and hang it on the wall as a trophy.
I mean, I can't believe anyone would begin to think that they are licensing the food to you, and that you are not free to reproduce it at will in your own kitchen, or even make it yourself for sale. Hell, if you wanted, you could resell the original dish.
If it were otherwise, THEN I'd think there would have to be a more restrictive contract in place upon ordering.
Light travels faster than sound. This is why some people appear bright until you hear them speak.........
I do not live in Germany currently, used to live there.
Regarding difference between tax and insurance - as long as it is mandatory, enforced by government and percentage your income, it is a tax in my book, regardless of how government might want to call it. If it would be medical 'insurance' then it would be a lump sum depending on what service you are getting, not percentage of your salary.
As for the rest, please see here
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...
Please remember I'm talking about salary taxes as seen from the side of employer. Not showing them on employee payroll does not mean they do not exist. Otherwise you can just look at net salary and pretend taxes do not exist.
You are right about is possibility of getting out of church tax. Same way, in US you can probably move to state without a VAT/sales tax/whatever. I was comparing worst case scenario (this is why I took example of Lohnsteurklasse I instead of for example unemployed single mother of three).