Just recieved a Getty Letter today

[gmcnary]

The image they are claiming infringement on is actually a banner ad link from an affiliate program. The image is not even hosted on my site. Can I till be liable for this? What is the best way to fight this. They are asking for $965.00, which I have no intention of paying. Also, what should I do about the banner? Is it best to remove it immediately, or leave it up? Any ideas would be appreciated.

Greg

[Robert Krausankas (BuddhaPi)]

Remove the banner, but keep the code snippet, so you have some kind of record, that is was being generated elsewhere. I would then contact the company who is serving the banner, to see what they say, you can try explaining to Getty the situation, but they will most likely give you the standard answer.." doesn't matter where it comes from, or who put it there, it's on your site, please pay us...etc...".. If the company serving the banner has any scruples they will take responsibility, but don't hold your breath.

[SoylentGreen]

Readers here may recall that I posted a link to info regarding images that are linked to on a site, but actually reside elsewhere (on a different server/site).
In the 'states, this isn't considered a copyright infringement.

Does this sound like your situation?

S.G.

[gmcnary]

SG,
Thanks for your response. The image did appear on my site, but was not stored on my server. It was stored on the company hosting the affiliate program. I went ahead and removed the image, but saved the source code. It clearly shows the image comes from another domain.

Greg

[SoylentGreen]

ok... here's the info and link as I posted previously:

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Here's quite an interesting tidbit from US law (as explained on Wikipedia):

Definition of "copy"
 
Several important rights exist under the United States copyright law only for “copies” of works — material objects in which the work is embodied.[13] Section 106(1) prohibits the reproduction only of copies of works, and section 106(3) prohibits the distribution only of copies of works.[14] Thus, as the Ninth Circuit held in Perfect 10, Inc. v. Amazon.com, Inc., a link (even a deep link or inline link) to an image does not involve reproduction of a copy of the image by the person on whose web page the link appears.[15] An instruction to a browser to jump to an URL is not a reproduction or distribution of a copy of what is at the referenced URL.[16]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Copyright_law_of_the_United_States

I think that this means that actual copying and distribution of content are infringements.  But, content that is only linked to on the Web is not considered an actual copy, nor is it a form of distribution.

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This sounds like good news for you!

S.G.

[gmcnary]

SG,
Thanks for the info. I'll look into it further when I prepare my response to Getty. From everything I've read here and elsewhere, they are still likely to demand some sort of payment. I'm curious, has anyone here kept stats on settlements, amounts, etc? I'm only being extorted for 1 image, so I wonder how aggressive they may get as well. Once I send them my response and get theirs, I'll post the results.

Greg