Yet another "Stolen Image" thread!

pullandbang

This one with a slight twist.

I took the photo on this webpage some time back. http://www.discountpackaging.ie/tissue-paper/750-x-1000mm-unglazed-acid-free-tissue.html
I work here and manage the site as part of my daily grind. Now I didn't get paid, nor was I asked to take the photo so presumably I still own the copyright, rather than the company I work for.

Today I came across my photo being used on a rival company's website - they even put their own logo on it to make it look like their own. http://www.storageireland.ie/servlet/the-45/Tissue-paper%2C-wrapping-paper%2C/Detail

To make matters even more complicated, the storage company did actually buy some of that tissue from us to sell on. However that was last August and they haven't bought since. They never asked to use the photo, they presumably just downloaded it from our site.

So question is - should I contact them in my personal capacity as the copyright owner (assuming I still am the copyright owner) or should I contact them as my company representative and see what they have to say for themselves?

EyeBlinks

You definitely are the copyright holder unless you specifically sold it.

You definitely gave permission for the photo to be used by your company and thats not an issue.

They have abused your copyright, seems pretty clear. Would you normally expect to get paid for this?

If you would and there is no impact on the two companies commercial arrangements, it's your call!

artyeva

company representative first and foremost i'd say. after all, they didn't steal the image off ''denis'', they stole the image off ''discount packaging''.

i don't think whether they bought the product from your company to sell on is neither here nor there really. if they wanted the image they should have asked ''your company's webmaster first'' - who in turn should have asked ''you''. and because ''you'' own the copyright, and they're using it for commercial gain, they should have paid for the use of the image.

that ''you'' have decided not to ask for payment for the image from ''your company's webmaster'' isn't relevant.

i hope that makes sense?

DaireQuinlan

eh, it's not that simple here (Ireland) though, right ? If you create a work while in the course of your employment as part of that employment, isn't it your employer who owns the copyright on the work ? Pictures you've taken of products for illustration on the company website could well be the property of the company, not yourself.

That said, IANAL.

DaireQuinlan

Little more detail ...

http://www.mhc.ie/publications/item/182/commissioned-works-copyright/

Employees are Different

Generally, these issues do not arise with employees as the Copyright and Related Rights Act, 2000 provides that an employer will be the first owner of copyright generated by its employees during the course of employment, unless the employer and employee have specifically agreed different terms. While this does provide a great deal of certainty, to avoid any arguments at a later date it is good practice to have express clauses in contracts of employment dealing with ownership of copyright and other intellectual property rights.

Jonnykitedude

Is it the same gang that where hyper-linking your site?

pullandbang

Jonnykitedude wrote: »

Is it the same gang that where hyper-linking your site?

Nah, that was someone else. That was easy to deal with. Just replaced the Jiffy bag image with Jiffy condoms That put a stop to it!

EyeBlinks

DaireQuinlan wrote: »

eh, it's not that simple here (Ireland) though, right ? If you create a work while in the course of your employment as part of that employment, isn't it your employer who owns the copyright on the work ? Pictures you've taken of products for illustration on the company website could well be the property of the company, not yourself.

That said, IANAL.

Only if that's whats agreed and generally that would be in the performance of your duties (i.e. company photographer)

CabanSail

I think that the company would still own the copyright if Denis was being paid by them at the time he took the images, unless there was another agreement made. He was acting as an employee and these were taken as part of his duties, stated or not.

Tricky situation for the company to handle, though they are not a big customer you still don't want to lose trade buy cannot let them steal either. Probably a diplomatic word and them officially asking to use the image would be the best result.

MrPudding

CabanSail wrote: »

I think that the company would still own the copyright if Denis was being paid by them at the time he took the images, unless there was another agreement made. He was acting as an employee and these were taken as part of his duties, stated or not.

Tricky situation for the company to handle, though they are not a big customer you still don't want to lose trade buy cannot let them steal either. Probably a diplomatic word and them officially asking to use the image would be the best result.

Copyright and IP stuff is very tricky. Generally an employer will "own" any works of an employee, even if you works were created outside company time and using the employees own equipment. That is what it is like for something like writing a computer programme. It does not seem right that this could be the same for photographs, your employer should not own pics of your kids that you took at the weekend...

The fact that the pictures were taken for the company makes it slightly different. If you were a photographer and were asked to take the pictures for them, kind of on a freelance basis, then I think you would own them unless your contract with them stated otherwise.

Given that you are an employee and the photos were taken during the course of you work, though not specifically requested, I think they might own the images.

I will do a bit of digging and see what I can come up with.

MrP

DaireQuinlan

EyeBlinks wrote: »

Only if that's whats agreed and generally that would be in the performance of your duties (i.e. company photographer)

that's the point where you'd have to lawyer up. My (completely un-legal) opinion is that if denis manages the site as part of his everyday work then taking product pictures for inclusion on the webpage would very probably be considered as part and parcel of these duties ...

MrPudding

EyeBlinks wrote: »

Only if that's whats agreed and generally that would be in the performance of your duties (i.e. company photographer)

Ironically no. It is more likely that the employee might hold the copyright if he was a company photographer, simply because he might try to negotiate copyright ownership. Someone who is not a company photograhper, but merely took pictures on an ad hoc or informal basis would be unlikely, like the OP for example, to negotiate this kind of clause.

The law is actually pretty clear on this:

Copyright and Related Acts, 2000 wrote:

23.—(1) The author of a work shall be the first owner of the copyright unless—
(a) the work is made by an employee in the course of employment, in which case the employer is the first owner of any copyright in the work, subject to any agreement to the contrary,
(b) the work is the subject of Government or Oireachtas copyright,
(c) the work is the subject of the copyright of a prescribed international organisation, or
(d) the copyright in the work is conferred on some other person by an enactment.
(2) Where a work, other than a computer program, is made by an author in the course of employment by the proprietor of a newspaper or periodical, the author may use the work for any purpose, other than for the purposes of making available that work to newspapers or periodicals, without infringing the copyright in the work.

Section 23(1)(a) is the relevent bit.

MrP

kfish2oo2

In this case, your employer owns the copyright, and it is their prerogative to pursue the issue further. Certainly inform your superiors of it, but don't make any contact with said rival unless your employer wants to take the issue any further.

pixbyjohn

" Now I didn't get paid, nor was I asked to take the photo so presumably I still own the copyright, rather than the company I work for."
Did any of you actually read all of the post that Denis posted

DaireQuinlan

pixbyjohn wrote: »

" Now I didn't get paid, nor was I asked to take the photo so presumably I still own the copyright, rather than the company I work for."
Did any of you actually read all of the post that Denis posted

Yes ? And ? The fact that he wasn't asked would if anything imply that it's a completely routine part of his day job, for which I presume he gets paid.

MrPudding

pixbyjohn wrote: »

" Now I didn't get paid, nor was I asked to take the photo so presumably I still own the copyright, rather than the company I work for."
Did any of you actually read all of the post that Denis posted

Yes. But I'm afraid you have lost me. What point are you tring to make?

MrP

stcstc

isnt the company yours?

secondly the company would own the copyright only if its written into the contract of employment, otherwise its still yours

if the company is yours, and your customer is using your image, maybe a friendly discussion, and nothing more is needed

otherwise, do you want to loose the customer? suppliers supply images of their products all the time for their customers to use in marketing. i get a rake of them from my suppliers, and using them is NEVER and issue, in fact its encouraged!!!


i dont think its in your personal interest or the companies interest to persue any more than a, "hey can you ask us next time you wanna use images" type conversation

MrPudding

stcstc wrote: »

isnt the company yours?

secondly the company would own the copyright only if its written into the contract of employment, otherwise its still yours

I'm afraid you have it the wrong way round. The default is the employer owns it, see my post above with the actual law.

MrP

pullandbang

stcstc wrote: »

isnt the company yours?

I wish

Seems the thing to do is a quiet conversation without losing the run of myself and keep the customer on board.
Definitely won't be getting any legal people involved because at the end of the day, they are the only ones who ever make money at these things.

KarmaGarda

I disagree that the employer is by default the owner of the work. But it depends on when and under what context the photo was taken. Even this can prove that it's actually the "employee" who owns the copyright.:

23.—(1) The author of a work shall be the first owner of the copyright unless—
(a) the work is made by an employee in the course of employment, in which case the employer is the first owner of any copyright in the work

The important part being "in the course of employment". If I have a job that consists of me looking after a website and I take a photo at 8 O'Clock in the evening outside of work hours and it had nothing to do with work at the time I took the photo then I own the copyright. If I then, at a later stage, use that photo as part of my employment I would consider it permission of use, it doesn't suddenly become propery of my employer.

The real question is when and why was the photo taken? If it was under company hours and it was related to the task at hand (i.e. for you employer) then that's a different kettle of fish, and your employer would probably be in favour. On the other hand, if it was in your own time, but was used at a later date for the purpose of your job/employer then I would hedge a bet you still own full copyright.

MrPudding

KarmaGarda wrote: »

I disagree that the employer is by default the owner of the work. But it depends on when and under what context the photo was taken. Even this can prove that it's actually the "employee" who owns the copyright.:

This is actually where it gets kind of interesting. Caveat: I know more about UK law, though it is very similar to Irish, and I know more about software than photos, though they are both considered to be works.

KarmaGarda wrote: »

IThe important part being "in the course of employment". If I have a job that consists of me looking after a website and I take a photo at 8 O'Clock in the evening outside of work hours and it had nothing to do with work at the time I took the photo then I own the copyright. If I then, at a later stage, use that photo as part of my employment I would consider it permission of use, it doesn't suddenly become propery of my employer.

This is where the law is sometimes misconstrued, there are a couple of rules of law that are forever being misunderstood. One is people thinking that if something in a shop is mis-priced they can demand to pay that price and another is that just because you do something out of your normal hours it belongs to you.

Granted, some of this will depend on the contract you have, but case law tell us that even when an employee writes a piece of software at home, using his own equipment his employer can be considered to be the owner. Clearly this is for software, but it is conceivable that photos would not be treated much differently.

KarmaGarda wrote: »

IThe real question is when and why was the photo taken? If it was under company hours and it was related to the task at hand (i.e. for you employer) then that's a different kettle of fish, and your employer would probably be in favour. On the other hand, if it was in your own time, but was used at a later date for the purpose of your job/employer then I would hedge a bet you still own full copyright.

I don't actually think any of the above is relevant to this particular case. From the OP it seems to me that the photo was taken as part of the ongoing management of the website for the company, so really we probably don't need to get into the really interesting aspects of IP.

P&B administers the website for the company he works for. In order to make a fairly boring stock line more interesting he take a nice picture and uses it on the company website. There is no indication he took it out of work hours as part of his hobby; (which would not necessarily help anyway) it simply seems like he took it because he is a conscientious worker and thought it would work better. The default position in a case like this would be the company owns the copyright.

P&B would be perfectly within his rights to speak to his company and negotiate the rights to pictures he might take in the course of his work, but in the absence of such an agreement pictures taken in the circumstances he describes are owned by his employers.

Were he to take the pictures at the weekend and then subsequently use them does raise an interesting question, though there is no reason to suspect this is what happened in this case. If this was the case I think that P&B would really need to speak to his employers before using such images. If not it might still be considered that they were taken in the course of his work. If he is claiming copyright then I would expect he would need to inform the employers he intended to use material for which they did not own the copyright on the company website.

MrP

pullandbang

MrPudding wrote: »

it simply seems like he took it because he is a conscientious worker and thought it would work better.

Just highlighting this bit in case the boss reads it

I did take the photo on company time and in the premises with the view to using it on the website - although I wasn't specifically asked to take it. The previous pics we had were crap (came from our supplier ) so it looks like the company owns the copyright.

Thanks for all the input folks, much appreciated. The debate on copyright is always an interesting one - just saw an article about the Red London bus shot against the Houses of Parliament which are in B&W. Apparently you can longer take your own photo from a similar position without infringing copyright of the original shot!

Linky - http://www.petapixel.com/2012/01/25/create-a-similarly-composed-photo-in-the-uk-risk-copyright-infringement/

pullandbang

Just thought I'd update this for anyone interested.

Sent a polite e-mail and got response back straight away with an apology and the image was removed. Good enough for me.

jcf

a lot of these threads around, it's worrying to be honest, I have some photos up on stock sites - have never seen one being improperly used then again i dont look - didn't someone once mention there was some crawler that could search the web for photos that are in your flickr photostream ??

would be handy if someone could post the link.

AnCatDubh

jcf wrote: »

a lot of these threads around, it's worrying to be honest, I have some photos up on stock sites - have never seen one being improperly used then again i dont look - didn't someone once mention there was some crawler that could search the web for photos that are in your flickr photostream ??

would be handy if someone could post the link.

tineye, and google image search come to mind.

I think Hugh_C had a cool add on for firefox which fired off a search against half a donzen or so image search tools.

*eadaoin

There's a great app for Mozilla called Who Stole My Pictures.

It will allow you to right click on an image and search on several image search websites (Tineye & Google Image Search included) for other places your image can be found on the web. Very handy!

CabanSail

Good result.

Politeness Man would be proud.