Messages

166

Getty Images Letter Forum / Re: Copyright Troll Randy G Taylor from Copyright Defense League on video

« on: September 28, 2012, 10:25:40 PM »

Buddhapi makes a very important point.
Let's not lose sight of what kind of fight this really is.
It's all trolling/extortion.  These trolls lose on the basic of legal standing.

Additionally, before transferring any rights, one must actually own the image, and register the image as copyrighted.
Wonder if anyone is doing that?  Probably not.

S.G.

167

Getty Images Letter Forum / Re: Copyright Troll Randy G Taylor from Copyright Defense League on video

« on: September 28, 2012, 04:59:33 PM »

Territorial rights are the only option, in fact.
One may own exclusive rights in the USA for example.
But, registrations with the US copyright office aren't valid in Canada...
So, one would have to make registrations for the Canadian territory, etc...
There's no "world copyright office".

Of course the 'states attempts to get extradition orders to bring alleged infringers to their shores to face trial.
...to face their laws... but, I guess that's a bit off topic.


S.G.

168

Getty Images Letter Forum / Re: Copyright Troll Randy G Taylor from Copyright Defense League on video

« on: September 27, 2012, 02:21:28 PM »

Obviously, it's fairly straightforward when all of the Section 106 exclusive rights are transferred as a group to another entity.
The Section 106 rights are indeed "exclusive", so if all rights are transferred to a company or person, none of those rights can be held by other entities simultaneously.

I think that giving exclusive right(s) to more than one entity at a time could cause big problems if there were to be a legal dispute.
There's no guarantee that a court would find that the last person to sign a contract would be found to be the actual rights holder.
Perhaps, nobody on the list would have legal standing.

To complicate matters, the list of exclusive rights can be broken up, and then each right can be granted to different entities individually.
Regulars here know that I'm no lawyer, but it's my opinion that each rights holder would have good standing to sue in the event of a dispute if his/her exclusive right(s) is/are violated.

Furthermore, disparate entities may own the same exclusive rights simultaneously, if they are in different territories.

Obviously, rights holders may draft any contract that they desire, so long as the laws do not preclude the stipulations in the contract.
Trouble starts if the rights holder drafts a contract that is unenforceable under law in the event of a dispute... by then, it's often too late.

S.G.

169

Getty Images Letter Forum / Re: Copyright Troll Randy G Taylor from Copyright Defense League on video

« on: September 26, 2012, 01:07:18 PM »

Agreed!!

But, if his business has legal difficulties (and I think that it will), it may be short lived.

S.G.

170

Getty Images Letter Forum / Re: Copyright Troll Randy G Taylor from Copyright Defense League on video

« on: September 26, 2012, 11:32:19 AM »

My personal opinion is as follows:

An owner of a piece of content such as an image may give any number of people/companies non-exclusive rights for certain uses. 
Such as when you license a royalty-free image for your web site... you can use it, but you can't sue third parties for infringements.
This would not diminish in any way the exclusive rights given to a company such as Getty images.  They could sue over infringements in such a case.

The legal concept of "exclusivity" in terms of copyright doesn't follow the common dictionary meaning of "exclusive".
Legally, an exclusive rights holder can do certain things, while a non-exclusive rights holder can do more limited things.

S.G.

171

Getty Images Letter Forum / Re: Copyright Troll Randy G Taylor from Copyright Defense League on video

« on: September 26, 2012, 11:05:37 AM »

A person or company holding only "non-exclusive rights" wouldn't have enough legal standing to "win" a copyright infringement infringement case in court.

I think that Taylor's scheme is not intended as a system that would allow HIM to sue.
It's intended to give provide copyright trolls/extortionists a tool that gives the impression that they have legal proof of infringement(s).

Taylor asserts that "It’s critically important to note that creators are merely granting ACCESS to their works with C-Registry, NOT USE of their works."  I think that this statement is very misleading.
From Buddhapi's posting, Taylor states: "A nonexclusive, royalty-free, perpetual, irrevocable, and fully sublicensable right to access, view, host, cache, route, transmit, store, perform and/or display CONTENT, and.."
We all know by now that access, viewing, and routing through linking only is probably ok.
However any other use including "hosting", "performing" and especially "storing" are clearly infringements under law.
I say "infringements under law", because Taylor's present system doesn't provide the use signed contracts or recorded verbal agreements.

Something else that should be of concern is that he mentions a "royalty-free... right".
Many images on the web are still rights-managed.  But, he's attempting to create a system that overrides the rights-managed system.
Therefore, he's attempting to take images having much greater value, and placing them into a category of much lesser value.

I have never seen such an ill thought conceived business.



S.G.

172

Getty Images Letter Forum / Re: Copyright Troll Randy G Taylor from Copyright Defense League on video

« on: September 25, 2012, 11:15:54 PM »

Great to see Oscar's input!!

I doubt that any stock image agencies could use his system, either.
Most of these businesses don't hold ownership the images that they sell.
Therefore, I don't think that they could legally "sublicense" their catalog to a system such as this.

S.G.

173

Getty Images Letter Forum / Re: Copyright Troll Randy G Taylor from Copyright Defense League on video

« on: September 25, 2012, 03:19:07 PM »

Agreed.  It would actually be pretty east to troll Randy Taylor with this.
I could register some my right-managed photos with the copyright office, for example.  50 of them is a good number.
Next, make up a fake name at some BS address.  "Claim" the images under the fake name with Taylor's "C-Register"/"Stock PhotoFinder".
Now, I can come out of the wood-work using my real name, and send demand letters to Taylor at 10k apiece.
That's... 5 million dollars.  lol.

As far as actual proof of ownership, registration with the Copyright Office is the only option... everything else is literally junk.

S.G.

174

Getty Images Letter Forum / Re: Copyright Troll Randy G Taylor from Copyright Defense League on video

« on: September 25, 2012, 11:45:09 AM »

The problem with Randy Taylor's venture, as I see it, is that any random person can sign up for his service.
Then, that random person can "claim" an image on the Internet, and then give Taylor "a nonexclusive, royalty-free, perpetual, irrevocable, and fully sublicensable right to cache, use, reproduce, copy, resize, crop and/or publish" those pictures.
I assume that the plan is that the random person can "troll" or "extort" money from people, based on Randy Taylor's lame registration system as "proof" of ownership.

This is counter to the concept of registration with the actual copyright office.  The copyright office can give one prima facie proof of ownership.
Official papers are signed before the image is actually published, or very shortly thereafter. You can make a registration before anyone else has copies of the work; a very important point.

My understanding that non-exclusive rights can be conveyed on another entity verbally.  You wouldn't have much proof in any dispute, however.
But, Taylor's system offers neither verbal (spoken) agreements, nor are any contracts signed.

If he uses/modifies images that are "claimed" under false pretences, he'll be trolled and possibly sued many times over.
Apparently, he's been working on this for years... we're finding major faults in the system in five minutes.
I wouldn't be too surprised if it's used only for trolling, and fails eventually.

Maybe I should post my comments on his youtube channel?

S.G.

175

Legal Controversies Forum / Warner Bros, Hotfile and EFF Fight Over Bogus DMCA notices

« on: September 25, 2012, 01:01:33 AM »

Warner Bros, Hotfile and EFF Fight Over Bogus DMCA notices

"Hotfile alleged that after giving Warner access to its systems, the studio wrongfully took down files including games demos and Open Source software without holding the copyrights to them.
Wrongful takedowns continued even after the movie studio was repeatedly notified about the false claims."
 
"In a response, Warner Bros. admitted the accusations. However, the movie studio argued that they are not to blame because the mistakes were not made in bad faith.
As a result, the false takedown requests were not “deliberate lies.” "

http://torrentfreak.com/warner-bros-defends-bogus-automated-takedown-requests-120920/



S.G.

176

Getty Images Letter Forum / Re: Free Web Template Case and "Remix" Copyright Law?

« on: September 24, 2012, 11:46:41 PM »

I disagree that a site in a state of test/construction meets the test of innocent infringement in terms of an image placed on it.
The state of completion of a website should not cause the publisher to determine that any given image is not covered by copyright.
I think that "innocent infringment" is being confused with "de minimis damages".
The alleged copyright holder couldn't prove much value in damages because the site didn't make sales.

S.G.

177

Getty Images Letter Forum / Re: Copyright Troll Randy G Taylor from Copyright Defense League on video

« on: September 24, 2012, 11:34:46 PM »

Great information as usual, Buddhapi!!  My Jaw is hanging open, aghast...
These terms of use sound a lot like they were lifted from Facebook's old terms of use regarding photos.

I don't think that he can do what he intends to do without actual written contracts.
The terms "perpetual" and "irrevocable" raise my eyebrows.
Additionally, no mention is made of what "content" is, or what "information" constitutes.  Either one can be text and/or images.
No stock image agency will sign with his venture with wording like that.  Is this guy some kind of scam-artist? 

Sorry if this has come up before, but can a (non-attorney) send DMCA notices on behalf of a third party?

S.G.

178

Getty Images Letter Forum / Re: an inside peek at picscout

« on: September 24, 2012, 08:53:11 PM »

I mentioned in another thread I feel that Randy Taylor's "C-Register" seems to be based on Picscout's "ImageExchange" model.

http://www.extortionletterinfo.com/forum/getty-images-letter-forum/copyright-troll-randy-g-taylor-from-copyright-defense-league-on-video/

I also mentioned that if he's storing the actual images in a database for his profit, then he's a huge infringer.

S.G.

179

Getty Images Letter Forum / Re: an inside peek at picscout

« on: September 24, 2012, 03:34:23 PM »

You're right... interestingly, it was uploaded to YouTube about two weeks before the purchase was announced.

S.G.

180

Getty Images Letter Forum / Re: Copyright Troll Randy G Taylor from Copyright Defense League on video

« on: September 24, 2012, 03:12:38 PM »

this is relevant to my interests...

S.G.