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Getty Images Letter Forum / Re: settlement demand letter from Getty Image. What to do?

« on: August 17, 2010, 12:04:35 PM »

In the wake of Earl Jones, Conrad Black, BP, and those responsible for the sub-prime fiasco, I would believe that it is very likely, the reason why I think it is likely, as I stated earlier, is because they are specifically targeting the unsuspecting end user.  Greed has a way with people.  The difficulty here would be proving it in court, and they know that it's next to impossible, so it's a win-win for them.

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Getty Images Letter Forum / Re: settlement demand letter from Getty Image. What to do?

« on: August 17, 2010, 10:40:51 AM »

I have been a web designer/consultant for over 13 years in Canada.  I have always been very cautious of copyright.  In fact, I use Microsoft's royalty-free clipart site (or my own camera) because I know they have the lawyers and money to ensure the free use of the images there.

Anyway, to my point and thoughts about Getty.  One of my clients, where I took over the hosting of their website and conversion over to a content management system, wanted to maintain the same look and feel but I suggested to redesign the site.  Fool on me for not researching the images that the previous web designer used!  My client just contacted me and told me that they received THE letter from Getty demanding a large sum for 3 small images.  They did show that these images were rights-managed, citing the photographer and such.

My issue is, what's to stop Getty from dumping these rights-managed images on image database sites and other sources themselves, hoping that someone grabs it and uses it, like bait?  I would not be surprised if that is what they are doing.  In any case, they should be going after the places that the end user got the images in the first place to rule this out, instead of laying ALL the responsibility on the end user.

Just my two cents...