Youâre very welcome Matthew; I sincerely hope that I have helped others much as you and Oscar have.
Iâm not a lawyer, and I have not âtestedâ the following theories, however consider the following a âthought experimentâ. I have been speculating whether the likes of Masterfile and Getty are actually willing to take their complaints to court in Canada. While they have sometimes registered their complaints with the court for around 50 dollars in recent times, there has always been a discontinuance filed and nobody went to court. As mentioned above, Masterfile hasnât actually gone to court over copyright issues since 2000/2001 â almost an entire decade. Getty has never actually gone to court in Canada.
What Iâm saying is that Masterfile and Getty have never gone to court in Canada and won anything. Surely, some of the âaccusedâ have agreed to an out-of-court settlement that both parties agreed to. However, I do wonder if any of the accused simply said something to the effect of, âok, see you in courtâ. Did Masterfile or Getty back off anyway? *Everybody* paid them off without going to court? Itâs hard to believe.
I have taken note that Masterfile hasnât really registered much in Canada as âcopyrightedâ. Checking at the Canadian Intellectual Property Office, âCopyrights Databaseâ, I can only find three documents copyrighted by Masterfile at this time. That is, three âBest of Masterfileâ image catalogs; Volumes 19, 20 and 21. Search for âMasterfileâ here:
http://www.ic.gc.ca/app/opic-cipo/cpyrghts/dsplySrch.do?lang=eng
What does this mean? Firstly, Masterfile hasnât copyrighted much of its content in Canada. Chances are, if one is told that theyâve infringed on a Masterfile copyright, it may not be copyrighted in Canada at all. Secondly, since Masterfile has copyrighted several images in only three bulk catalogs (and not individually), this may reduce the number of alleged infringements made by the accused. For example, three copyrighted images that are infringed upon, but copyrighted in bulk in one place are often taken as one copyright infringement. While Masterfile has copyrighted more of its content in the USA, Iâm not sure how much it would mean to a Canadian court that images were copyrighted in some other country, especially when it appears that the accuser seems to have been lazy in their home country. If they want as little as $2500 or even $50,000 from you, they have to *prove* their case; it must be quite compelling. I believe that there is also a big issue for Masterfile (and maybe others) in that, while they have copyrighted three of their catalogs, there is no info given as to whom the author is for each image that the catalogs contain. That is to say, while the books are copyrighted, there's not enough copyright information *registered* for each individual image. Oscar recently posted an article showing that there's a similar issue in the USA as well; while many images have been "copyrighted", the original author was never listed in many cases.
Iâd like to wrap this up by saying that a Getty court loss or worse yet, another Masterfile loss in Canada would be devastating to both of them and many other similar companies. All of their future efforts to extort money from people here in Canada would be worthless. Anyone who performs the most simple of research would know that these companies canât do anything to collect money. Even their âCopyright Enforcement Teamsâ would be out on the street, out of a job. Iâm not so sure if they can risk it at this time.
S.
Iâm not a lawyer, and I have not âtestedâ the following theories, however consider the following a âthought experimentâ. I have been speculating whether the likes of Masterfile and Getty are actually willing to take their complaints to court in Canada. While they have sometimes registered their complaints with the court for around 50 dollars in recent times, there has always been a discontinuance filed and nobody went to court. As mentioned above, Masterfile hasnât actually gone to court over copyright issues since 2000/2001 â almost an entire decade. Getty has never actually gone to court in Canada.
What Iâm saying is that Masterfile and Getty have never gone to court in Canada and won anything. Surely, some of the âaccusedâ have agreed to an out-of-court settlement that both parties agreed to. However, I do wonder if any of the accused simply said something to the effect of, âok, see you in courtâ. Did Masterfile or Getty back off anyway? *Everybody* paid them off without going to court? Itâs hard to believe.
I have taken note that Masterfile hasnât really registered much in Canada as âcopyrightedâ. Checking at the Canadian Intellectual Property Office, âCopyrights Databaseâ, I can only find three documents copyrighted by Masterfile at this time. That is, three âBest of Masterfileâ image catalogs; Volumes 19, 20 and 21. Search for âMasterfileâ here:
http://www.ic.gc.ca/app/opic-cipo/cpyrghts/dsplySrch.do?lang=eng
What does this mean? Firstly, Masterfile hasnât copyrighted much of its content in Canada. Chances are, if one is told that theyâve infringed on a Masterfile copyright, it may not be copyrighted in Canada at all. Secondly, since Masterfile has copyrighted several images in only three bulk catalogs (and not individually), this may reduce the number of alleged infringements made by the accused. For example, three copyrighted images that are infringed upon, but copyrighted in bulk in one place are often taken as one copyright infringement. While Masterfile has copyrighted more of its content in the USA, Iâm not sure how much it would mean to a Canadian court that images were copyrighted in some other country, especially when it appears that the accuser seems to have been lazy in their home country. If they want as little as $2500 or even $50,000 from you, they have to *prove* their case; it must be quite compelling. I believe that there is also a big issue for Masterfile (and maybe others) in that, while they have copyrighted three of their catalogs, there is no info given as to whom the author is for each image that the catalogs contain. That is to say, while the books are copyrighted, there's not enough copyright information *registered* for each individual image. Oscar recently posted an article showing that there's a similar issue in the USA as well; while many images have been "copyrighted", the original author was never listed in many cases.
Iâd like to wrap this up by saying that a Getty court loss or worse yet, another Masterfile loss in Canada would be devastating to both of them and many other similar companies. All of their future efforts to extort money from people here in Canada would be worthless. Anyone who performs the most simple of research would know that these companies canât do anything to collect money. Even their âCopyright Enforcement Teamsâ would be out on the street, out of a job. Iâm not so sure if they can risk it at this time.
S.