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Copyright infringement by UK newspaper

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Have to agree with you Richard. You don't need "clients" that steal your property.

I will agree with Paul that suing for IP or Copyright Breach just isn't going to happen (unless you're very very rich). It would cost you £100 to sit down in an IP lawyers office.... However you are at liberty to take the thieving &%^%&s to court for non payment of an invoice issued for usage of your image without your permission.

That said I disagree with Paul on a softly-softly approach. I very much doubt if you are queued for a payment given that you seem to have no prior dealings with the paper. There's an outside chance if you have your full details in the IPTC fields..btw you should always do this. It proves theft quite easily for unauthorised web image use. I would not want to start grovelling for work/sales to someone like this either.

Your case does highlight the huge problem with having work on sites like Flickr and PBase et al. These images are no doubt being pilfered for other peoples profit every day. If you're lucky you find out. Would you own a shop and leave your goods with the store unattended?? You really need to put a semi transparent copyright symbol right across the middle of your images. A small one like you have now can be ignored (as is the case here) or cloned out or even cropped out.

You need to make it possible for the viewer to see the image but NOT to be able to use it. Make sure your details are fully embedded in the IPTC fields and finally put a huge dirty great warning on each page that holds the images with your contact details prominent.
 
JohnB said:
Have to agree with you Richard. You don't need "clients" that
steal your property.

I will agree with Paul that suing for IP or Copyright Breach just
isn't going to happen (unless you're very very rich). It would
cost you £100 to sit down in an IP lawyers office.... However you
are at liberty to take the thieving &%^%&s to court for non payment
of an invoice issued for usage of your image without your
permission.

That said I disagree with Paul on a softly-softly approach. I very
much doubt if you are queued for a payment given that you seem to
have no prior dealings with the paper. There's an outside chance
if you have your full details in the IPTC fields..btw you should
always do this. It proves theft quite easily for unauthorised web
image use. I would not want to start grovelling for work/sales to
someone like this either.

Your case does highlight the huge problem with having work on sites
like Flickr and PBase et al. These images are no doubt being
pilfered for other peoples profit every day. If you're lucky you
find out. Would you own a shop and leave your goods with the store
unattended?? You really need to put a semi transparent copyright
symbol right across the middle of your images. A small one like
you have now can be ignored (as is the case here) or cloned out or
even cropped out.

You need to make it possible for the viewer to see the image but
NOT to be able to use it. Make sure your details are fully embedded
in the IPTC fields and finally put a huge dirty great warning on
each page that holds the images with your contact details prominent.
Click to expand...
Thanks John. First, the image in question on my site does have my contact details in the IPTC fields, as do all the images on both my sites -- I never upload anything "empty". One of the first things I do when I PP is to apply one of two IPTC templates, depending on what it is I'm shooting and where it'll be used (e.g. railway or general). I then write in the description, and date, and the location as accurately as I can. All my contact details are in the IPTC fields as it's pretty much obligatory in the railway publishing world these days.

I'll look to watermarking my shots a bit more thoroughly, though I should be able to do that from the Fotopic side of things in theory. It's easy enough to change the footer on each page to carry my legalese plus a reference to how to contact me.
 
echelon2004 said:
and the standard rate that they pay.
Click to expand...
Which is pretty much what's just happened. Just had a phone call from them – the pic ed is saying that it was a genuine mistake as it was included with the original article, but that somebody in the office should have checked to make sure that it was kosher. It was all rather predictable really. The pic ed was very apologetic about it, but said that the normal fee for that pic would be £25, but he was willing to offer £50, and that was the most that he would be able to authorise. Anything more than that would have to be authorised by head office, delayed due to bureaucracy, yadda yadda yadda. Also said that if HQ were involved, they'd probably try to pin the blame on the article's author, but as I pointed out, it's the publisher who's liable, and irrespective of that, how the infringement occurred is not my problem, it's theirs!

Some blah about that he goes to pains to ensure these things don't generally happen, but he did notice my details in the IPTC fields (which begs the question why wasn't I contacted?!). Then he tried flattery, saying the pics on my site are rather good, and that he would like to use me for pics from this part of the world. He hoped we'd come to an amicable agreement.

What a load of guff. I didn't agree to anything until I've chewed it over.

R
 
As you didn't tell us about your "will be invoiced at £250" on the web site in your original post I took the line that you would be better off taking a softer approach, now I'm in possession of the full facts (?) then my advice changes.

If you indeed do have that rider about charging £250 for unauthorised use then send them an invoice for that amount - if they don't pay then off to the Small Claims Court. Simple as that.
--
Paul
 
Paul Boothroyd said:
As you didn't tell us about your "will be invoiced at £250" on the
web site in your original post I took the line that you would be
better off taking a softer approach, now I'm in possession of the
full facts (?) then my advice changes.
If you indeed do have that rider about charging £250 for
unauthorised use then send them an invoice for that amount - if
they don't pay then off to the Small Claims Court. Simple as that.
--
Paul
Click to expand...
Sorry about that, I should've quoted the legalese in my original post, but thought that the curious among you would have a look. It's at the top of the front page under my introduction, and is repeated in the footer. For the record, this is what it states:

"All photographic images* on this website are © 1990-2006 Richard W. Jones. This Web Site and any of its contents may not be copied, translated or distributed in any manner (electronic, web or printed) without the prior written consent of Richard W. Jones. I will actively seek out copyright violations in print and on the Internet and will use full legal force to deal with any Copyright infringements. Any unauthorised commercial use, which includes – but is not limited to – publication in magazines, leaflets or on other websites, will be invoiced at a rate of GBP 250 (two-hundred and fifty pounds sterling) for each photograph used.
(* Photographic images are defined as GIF & JPEG format image files.)

It's similar what others have, including some pros. The pic ed has now tried to palm me off with £50, despite knowing about that rider. By implication, any unauthorised use is acceptance of my terms, so I've been led to believe. I wrote an update a couple of hours or so earlier. As Anders predicted, he tried to palm me off with a derisory offer and offers of freelancing.
 
In part defence of the picture editor, it appears that the infringing photograph doesn't contain any contact information in the IPTC fields. So the editor, as you say, saw your details but had no way to contact you direct.

The Welsh Daily Post is part of the Trinity Mirror Group, so they will have procedures for dealing with this.
 
tuppersson said:
In part defence of the picture editor, it appears that the
infringing photograph doesn't contain any contact information in
the IPTC fields. So the editor, as you say, saw your details but
had no way to contact you direct.
Click to expand...
Looking at my copy you're right. Now, this is strange as the DNG raw file and TIFF both have the info but the JPG produced from the TIFF doesn't have it, but has all the other data. (Scratches head.) That puts a slightly different gloss on things, but still doesn't explain why they didn't make absolutely certain that they had my consent before running it. If they were in doubt, or had no means of contacting me, then it shouldn't have been used. Thanks for bringing it to my attention though.
 
Yes, oddly the embedded copyright URL is http://www.the-gog.org which has a cartoon for The War Against Terror (T.W.A.T). If I was the picture edior, I wouldn't have gone further.

You said in an earlier post that someone else submitted the picure to the Daily Post in support of thier own article. Could they have changed it?
 
tuppersson said:
Yes, oddly the embedded copyright URL is http://www.the-gog.org which has
a cartoon for The War Against Terror (T.W.A.T). If I was the
picture edior, I wouldn't have gone further.

You said in an earlier post that someone else submitted the picure
to the Daily Post in support of thier own article. Could they have
changed it?
Click to expand...
At the time I didn't have the demeseo.com domain set up for both my Fotopic websites, and I used a standard Fotopic subdomain for the gallery, hence I used the URL from my other domain, the-gog.org, in the IPTC field. When I uploaded it that photo, along with all the others, it was only for the enjoyment of friends and family, and not for any picture editor to look at. Indeed, I still only upload photos for private use, and not specifically for a picture editor to worry about what I have on the web.

It's possible that whomever submitted the article could have modified the IPTC data, but I think it's highly unlikely.

Oh yes, I've had a lot of positive feedback about that cartoon as well. It seems it's gone down rather well here in the UK.
 
I'll be interested to find out how you resolve this. I seem to remember a similar problem on this discussion board with the same newspaper group a few months ago.

Good luck.
 
KAllen is right, jsut send an invoice according to your terms and give them 7 day's to pay, after 7 day's send a further invoice recorded delivery, and giving a further 7 day's to pay or a Smalls Claims Court case will be started. If I was you, I'd be spitting feathers, BUT any image put "online" risks this occuring, I note your image was only 600x400, I'm surprised they used it. There is only one way to stop this occuring - do not upload any images that can be used in print!

You say you upload for family and friends, if you don't want to put a © across the picture your only option is a password protected page - then email your F&F the password so they can view. This can be done very simply with a small program and using your own webspace, forget the online galleries if you don't want to see your pictures stolen, a search on this forum will pop up hundreds of posts over the past year or so with very few reaching a successful outcome.

If you're proud of your pictures and you want people to see them, you "assume" no one will nick them just because you put a © and a disclaimer - but would you leave your car keys in the ignition and put a note on the windscreen asking people not to nick your car or else you'll send them an invoice for the petrol....?

If you must post pictures, find a secure way to display them, I have no pictures of reasonable print quality anywhere that can be stolen, any pictures I have with agencies are displayed with a large watermark or Digital Object Identifiers which the agency can "audit trail" or so they tell me!

You might want to consider joining an organisation like the BFP who can fight something like this on your behalf, they have a lot more "clout" than you do. Good luck, please post the outcome.
 
Ignore the pesimistic, you wont get anything nonsense.

I sued someone on ebay for over grand myself for selling a cd containing a word document I had written.

You dont need a copyright statement you have legal ownership by default.

You can do it all yourself and go through the small claims court.

I will happily help you for free....

Let me know....
 
You dont have to accept what they offer.

They have broken the CRIMINAL law.

Its no different to someone selling fake disney DVD's.
 
It's happened to me.

I emailed the paper, suggesting it was an "oversight" on their part, and I would accept payment at their usual rates. NO aggro, NO threats, just polite reasoning. Thet paid me with an apology. They've bought & paid for a good number of shots since.

If you've been offered £50 ( and their £25 sounds fair for the image siize printed), accept it graciously and move on.

You're not gonna get rich from this.
--
KenC
 
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