Copyright Infringement [WIN!]

mehfesto

Two weeks ago a friend notified me a national newspaper published a picture of mine. Great I though, a few bob after Christmas. However, after seeing the image in question, I soon realized I had never signed over copyright to this image, nor had I given anyone permission (bar my best friend, who works at RTE 2xm) the right to use this image.

I did a quick google image reverse search and soon enough I found that the image existed only on my flickr account, blog and the 2xm website. I came to the conclusion that the image was taken from my flickr account (where the only large copy existes). So I checked the status on Flickr - all rights reserved.

Thinking that someone was just being very lazy, I googled the bands name in question and added 'promo' to it, to see what existed. Two of my pictures from that shoot came up in the first line - both on the google.ie search and the .com one too. I know the band have since had some excellent images taken from an NME photographer and my (let's be honest here) awful images of them from 2 years ago were not doing much for their image.

So I fired off an e-mail, charging for image usage and copyright infringement. I outlined that the image was clearly stolen from my site and that I was charging double their top end amount for their mistake.

Today comes and I get a very courteous phonecall from their image department. He had no issue with paying my image fee, but argued that they would never pay the 'infringement' part. I argued that nobody had contacted me regarding usage, that the file info on every image I've ever put out clearly stated it was mine. He stated his was marked 'free usage', (or something similar) on his copy that he received from the record label. Given that I worked with this band prior to them signing a label, never handed over any copyright nor have ever spoken to anyone at that label, I seriously doubted that.

He argued they had a great record of paying photographers, I didn't dispute that. I just calmly stated that this was clearly breach of copyright and I'd have no issue contacting my brother for legal advice on this.

He agreed to pay and hung up angrily.

Truth be told, I may have burned a bridge there. But given they'd bullied me out of payment before, I honestly don't care. I have a normal job and don't rely on them for a living. However when my work is used, I will chase down for payment.

I do feel awfully sorry for those that rely on things like this to make a living though.

melekalikimaka

made my sh1tty monday alot better reading that

magicbastarder

you don't want to say what paper it was?

sebphoto

well done!

mehfesto

magicbastarder wrote: »

you don't want to say what paper it was?

It was The Sun. But I am impressed by how quickly they got in contact and how they chose to resolve things.

That said, I've posted this to keep people up to date on how it's going; You'll find the picture in question there, too. I've heard from people on Twitter, who this had happened to before and they said it might be a good idea to catalogue it all for others to read about.

Thanks for the support everyone!

Reoil

It sounds like a mistake on the band's part to be honest. They've passed the image on in ignorance of copyright knowledge and just said that the record label could use it as they wish.

KevinGossRoss

Good to see the occasional win for photographers. Well done.