rights
Copyright…Protection?
Copyright by Uncommon Depth
I’ve been thinking today about how us photographers can protect our ideas and our work. The internet although a great place to share and promote our work is not hugely secure. Any image posted to the internet can be stolen without your knowledge and used by someone else as there own. There are some techniques out there that try to stop this happening but most of them aren’t that effective and can easily be by-passed. The only effective ways to protect your images online include using not very subtle watermarks in a prominent place or only posting very low resolution versions of your images.
There are laws in place to protect us but how effective are they? Have your images ever been stolen or used without permission? If so, what course of action did you take?
I’ve included a couple of links below for some factual reading on the subject regarding copyright law but obviously this is mostly UK specific I believe the laws do vary slightly depending on what international borders are crossed!! The whole subject is a bit of minefield but an interesting one for discussion…Do you have any useful links to add to this list?
UK Copyright Service P-16 – Photography and Copyright
UK Copyright Service P-05- Copyright Infringement: What to do?
Digital Photography School: How to protect your digital images online
Camera Phone Predators!!
I read the following article yesterday over at network world news and it made me chuckle a bit and then it made me a bit annoyed. I thought I’d share it here and see what you all thought.
No, we’re not joking. The Camera Phone Predator Alert Act (H.R. 414) is the real deal. Fresh off the legislative desk of New York Representative Peter King (R), the bill–currently cosponsored by goose egg–would require an audible tone to accompany all cellular phones with an installed camera that are created in the U.S. This tone, likely a clicking noise of some sort, would sound, “within a reasonable radius of the phone whenever a photograph is taken with the camera in such phone.” And don’t think that evildoers would be able to conceal their predatory ways by flicking an iPhone-style audio toggle switch. Any mobile phones built after the bill becomes a law would be prohibited from including any way to eliminate or reduce the volume of said noise.
And the reasoning for this legislation? But a single sentence: “Congress finds that children and adolescents have been exploited by photographs taken in dressing rooms and public places with the use of a camera phone.”
While this bill might very well age into irrelevance within the House Committee on Energy and Commerce, it’s not as far-fetched as it might sound. Camera phones in Japan already have features like this enabled by law: A rude awakening to new phone owners that would like a way to turn off–or turn down–shutter noises that have had their volumes jacked up for this reason specifically.
It seems to me us photographers get a raw deal these days (worldwide) and this is just another example of proposed legislation that supports the idea that anybody with a camera is up to no good. I constantly get to hear of stories of photographers getting moved on or treated with suspicion by members of law enforcement. › Continue reading
Photography in Public Places: Know Your Rights?
Watching You Watching Them (photo courtesy of Beth Wilson)
Let me just state a fact to kick off this post: In a public place, in the United Kingdom, you are free to photograph or film whatever you wish to photograph. It’s the truth, Brothers and Sisters, the law is on your side! It’s amazing that so simple a rule can be misunderstood. But examples of misunderstanding, confusion and persecution seem to be increasing on a weekly basis (especially in these times of heightened security). › Continue reading
