In recent weeks, it has increasingly come to my attention that photographers are working themselves into a frenzy about the rights controversy concerned with uploading material to Facebook. Some refuse to upload images; others have turned away from Facebook altogether. I suppose this is responsible enough, as we shall see. What encouraged me to look into the matter, however, was hearing of an extreme case of a photographer emailing a client, threatening legal action if they uploaded an image to Facebook that the client had actually purchased. Let’s have a look and see how justified that actually is.
The issue with Facebook is – and do pause for a quick yawn here, I did - clause 2.1 in their Terms & Conditions:
‘For content that is covered by intellectual property rights… photos and videos ("IP content"), you… grant us a non-exclusive, transferable, sub-licensable, royalty-free, worldwide license to use any IP content that you post on or in connection with Facebook. This IP License ends when you delete your IP content or your account…’
The howling turds, you cry. A sub-licensable, royalty-free, worldwide license to use photographs? Pshaw! Well, I mean, fair’s fair, but that’s just silly…
No, it isn’t a fair agreement. Yes, there is a strong case for crying foul and being protective of one’s intellectual property. It would be ridiculous to so much as attempt to defend such a one-sided clause, even if I were an employee of Facebook, but especially as a photographer myself.
The thing that makes me wonder, though, is that I am not actually aware of a single case of Facebook using a photograph under this clause. I could have missed something, but from here it does look like a bit of a storm in a teacup. Mark Zuckerberg has explained that Facebook ‘need certain licenses in order to facilitate the sharing of content through our service’ – and in the absence of any evidence to suggest that the clause is any more nefarious than that, I for one am prepared to believe him. Photographers seem to be spending more time than can possibly be healthy, worrying about the clause. It turns up in conversations and blogs and has even featured on the radio recently. It’s good that attention is being brought to the issue, but surely there is no need to go overboard.
Which brings us back to our litigious photographer, my inspiration for this piece, whose failure to understand this matter appears to have cost him a client. Whatever may happen in the future with this clause, he appears to be more of a threat to his own business than Facebook is.
For what it’s worth, my message to any photographer would be as follows: Don’t avoid Facebook because of its rights policy. Avoid it because it reduces your images to a poor quality, pixellated mush.
Wednesday 14 July 2010
Thursday 8 July 2010
Ho-hum...
I was in an imponderably baffling situation a couple of weeks ago. It was a situation I didn’t think too much about at the time, although the actual extent of the farce became clearer after a few days passed. Names will not be named. This post is being written with nothing more in mind than the hope that someone can explain the, erm, what shall we say – the opaque thinking of the person I spoke with.
I suppose this has happened to most photographers, and more than once as well, but here goes. An eminent figure within the hospitality industry offered me a photographic job, providing fresh images for their brochure. In exchange for the images, I would have been paid… well, let’s simply say I would have been credited in the brochure and given the opportunity to cover future events held at the venue. The unpaid opportunity, might I add. The benefit of this, you ask? I would be allowed to keep any money I generated, selling images from these events to the guests in attendance.
I know, I know…
I enquired as to why the venue in question, given its reputable standing throughout East Anglia, would fail to set aside even the faintest whiff of a budget for such an important task as renewing their brochure. My thoughts on the logic of being paid in further unpaid work, which might or might not eventually be remunerated by people with no connection to the venue whatsoever, remained private.
‘We do have an in-house team of creatives who would normally do it’, was the reply, ‘but they’re busy at the moment, and we’d like the photography done soon. Furthermore, there are a lot of photographers who are interested in doing it, so we don’t see the need to set aside money.’
Right. So. Apparently it’s perfectly acceptable for a company not just to drive down the cost of a professional photographer, on the grounds of the job having many possible candidates, but to completely eliminate it - and then attempt to save face by stating that other people might make the job worthwhile if the photographer continues working for them. Come on. Photographers aren’t that thick. It is the equivalent of buying a new television, and saying ‘well, I shan’t pay for this, but I will recommend you to a friend, and they might buy one.’
I have my own thoughts on the principle of this. If you implicitly attempt to choke an industry by refusing to pay a penny for a photographic project like that – not even peanuts – then you will without doubt end up with the quality you deserve.
I await the results of the venue’s blinkered thinking with quite some degree of anticipation. Unless can anyone elaborate on why people make such strange offers as these…?
I suppose this has happened to most photographers, and more than once as well, but here goes. An eminent figure within the hospitality industry offered me a photographic job, providing fresh images for their brochure. In exchange for the images, I would have been paid… well, let’s simply say I would have been credited in the brochure and given the opportunity to cover future events held at the venue. The unpaid opportunity, might I add. The benefit of this, you ask? I would be allowed to keep any money I generated, selling images from these events to the guests in attendance.
I know, I know…
I enquired as to why the venue in question, given its reputable standing throughout East Anglia, would fail to set aside even the faintest whiff of a budget for such an important task as renewing their brochure. My thoughts on the logic of being paid in further unpaid work, which might or might not eventually be remunerated by people with no connection to the venue whatsoever, remained private.
‘We do have an in-house team of creatives who would normally do it’, was the reply, ‘but they’re busy at the moment, and we’d like the photography done soon. Furthermore, there are a lot of photographers who are interested in doing it, so we don’t see the need to set aside money.’
Right. So. Apparently it’s perfectly acceptable for a company not just to drive down the cost of a professional photographer, on the grounds of the job having many possible candidates, but to completely eliminate it - and then attempt to save face by stating that other people might make the job worthwhile if the photographer continues working for them. Come on. Photographers aren’t that thick. It is the equivalent of buying a new television, and saying ‘well, I shan’t pay for this, but I will recommend you to a friend, and they might buy one.’
I have my own thoughts on the principle of this. If you implicitly attempt to choke an industry by refusing to pay a penny for a photographic project like that – not even peanuts – then you will without doubt end up with the quality you deserve.
I await the results of the venue’s blinkered thinking with quite some degree of anticipation. Unless can anyone elaborate on why people make such strange offers as these…?
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