7 Responses

1. alex taylor

   One thing i would like to add about music doawnloads is that the record companies short change the fans by adding more content on every release
   a good example is the next round of pink floyds back catalog it must be release number six i think for dark side of the moon, not to mention the star wars endless rerelease
   i not saying its right to down load in any way but i think companies do milk things too many times for most fans also when things are free who cares about quality?
   i am not sure what this means for photograghy but i do wonder if some of the big names in the uk keep many of there best images private because of downloads??

   On September 24, 2011 at 3:16 pm • Reply
2. Joe Rainbow

   I think software downloads is in a similar category. Companies do such ridiculous things (take Photoshop for instance) like making buy new versions if you are just two versions out of date. It really doesn’t help their credibility I think.
   I also agree about image size on the web. If someone in China wants my images at a 1000px longest edge and 100dpi, and can print thousands of images for profit, I take that as a compliment, even if it is theft. It is nearly always a sense of justice that upsets people more than business being dragged down. It still amazes me that there is no way of ensuring an image can not be copied these days. There must be a way of encrypting? After watching QI last night, I want to add ?! together in one character

   On September 25, 2011 at 10:08 am • Reply
3. thingy

   In the BJP, Jonathan Worth has argued in favour of making one’s photographic work available online but use the Creative Commons license as a means both of giving wider & legitimate access to your work and as a means to encourage potential customers to make purchases. We use the Creative Commons license process at my workplace as we get thousands of requests to reproduce our images but are no position to print copies out and it works well. If you want to read Worth’s article is is available (free) at the link below.
   http://www.bjp-online.com/british-journal-of-photography/profile/2108237/freetard-visionary

   On September 25, 2011 at 2:03 pm • Reply
4. Maciej Markiewicz

   Interesting lecture and a topic that is coming back in different places and forums regularly. That shows that emotions are strong and we naturally react to the fact of seeing our work stolen. I am not a professional – I mean I do not live from photography – and I rarely if ever sell my photos. A few times in the past I found my photos stolen from the web and used on private blogs. All I asked and was always given were credits and a link to my site. However my feelings are different when we talk about business websites. There are two possibilities. Ask the company running the website to take the image down or make a legal action asking the responsible for paying – legalizing – the use of the photo. Still the huge differences in approach in national laws – even at the EU level – make this so difficult that I often abandon. There are situations that in fact make me laugh. One of my images made in Chamonix in French Alps is used not only (illegally) on different French and British websites promoting the paragliding activities in Alps but it also used in a totally different place. I found that the same image is used on a websites for hikers/tourists/trekkers for the promotion of paragliding in …. Nepal. If I ever take a legal action it will be rather against websites based in France and UK.
   I do not work for Google (so this is not to be seen as a publicity) but thanks to the new mechanism of images search I found it amazingly quick to look for the places over the web where my images are used. This is even giving some very surprising results as the one described above.

   On September 26, 2011 at 4:17 pm • Reply
5. Tricky

   Sorry I’m late to the discussion, thought I’d add a little point unfortunately based on personal experience – people can effectively make money off your work without direct expense to themselves if they’re particularly douchy- about 6 months ago i was trying out the new Google image search functionality that lets you search for copies of an image…

   I found 2 of mine on photographers direct (‘improved’ with some particularly nasty over saturation and burning too). Raised the issue with them, who explained they came from one of their partners, a canadian stock library run by a supposedly professional photographer.

   To cut to the chase he first tried to blame it on an intern, and then unbelieveably told me it was my own fault for uploading it at too high a resolution! (normally i limit to 1280 pixels but somehow uploaded at full res in this case).

   It’s unfortunate that given another country its very difficult to do anything other than call them an @rsehole :-/
   Can’t say I was that impressed with photographers direct over the matter either – apparently they just asked him to ensure he had the copyright of images he uploads in future :-/

   (so in summary, if you upload hires just keep an eye on stock libraries)

   On November 25, 2011 at 11:07 pm • Reply
6. Custard

   “What is being revealed is that we are not machines trying to find everything at the cheapest price. We want to reward the creators of things we love. We want to support an industry we care about”

   Tim, my “day job” is in the DVD and BD division of a Hollywood studio, where I run the emerging markets, Brazil, Russia, India, and China. I very much wish that I could agree with you, but my experience is that the great majority of people will routinely steal intellectual property whenever it’s simple to do so and there’s little risk of being caught. A creative industry that relies on “honesty boxes” is unfortunately an industry destined for penury.

   On January 5, 2012 at 9:38 pm • Reply
   • Tim Parkin

     Heh – no I can understand that. Do you think the people that steal movies would pay for them if they couldn’t steal them though? Maybe some, perhaps not. Radiohead managed a good ‘honesty box’ example and if anything that proves that if the audience are engage with the originator in the way that music fans do then honesty can work.

     It’s not black and white and is definitely market specific but I think the fine art market is one where this philosophy is possibly more apt than most.

     On January 5, 2012 at 9:45 pm • Reply