Strange third letter from Getty, community input requested.

[wdkobie55]

After responding to Getty in a comparable manner as dnsg, I too received a similar letter. The following is Getty's response, verbatim:

"We can understand your concern over proof that Getty Images has the authority to represent the photographer’s copyright and that our claim is legitimate.  However, I can assure you that this proof would typically be furnished when compelled by the court through the course of discovery should this matter go to legal proceedings. In settlement discussions, the burden of proof lies solely with the party we have a claim against.  While we may be able to simply claim and demonstrate by encouraging the opposing party to visit our website to see that we exclusively represent the rights managed images in question, if the opposing side cannot show any license for the usage in question, our claims and these settlement discussions are raised in an effort to quickly settle an unauthorized use case to avoid prolonged back and forth and most importantly additional cost.  We are the leader in our industry, with a reputation to uphold and a high standard of excellence. We do not bring frivolous or meritless claims to companies with respect to unauthorized use of our represented images."

I'm not sure how to respond to this letter. Can anyone offer advice? Any words of wisdom would be greatly appreciated.

[SoylentGreen]

You have no legal or moral obligation to respond.
In any case, a response would simply be seen as the beginning of a 'negotiation'.
If they owned the image(s), they would surely send the proof to you in order to get the money.
This is just Getty scamming again.

S.G.

[Jerry Witt (mcfilms)]

 While we may be able to simply claim and demonstrate by encouraging the opposing party to visit our website to see that we exclusively represent the rights managed images in question, if the opposing side cannot show any license for the usage in question, our claims and these settlement discussions are raised in an effort to quickly settle an unauthorized use case to avoid prolonged back and forth and most importantly additional cost.  We are the leader in our industry, with a reputation to uphold and a high standard of excellence. We do not bring frivolous or meritless claims to companies with respect to unauthorized use of our represented images.

So in essence, they are claiming you must have a license for any image from somewhere. This is simply not the case. It doesn't take into account public domain images, nor images that you shot yourself. I love the way they spin it to sound like they can simply post these images on their site, claim they are exclusively rights managed and you have to pay up.

[Oscar Michelen]

Very fishy-  but in court Getty would have to prove why this image was worth so much more than all the others.