Thank you for your kind words, they are much appreciated.
You are also welcome for "being open" too. I did that for a couple of reasons. The first of which was to show Getty that I am not the typical
extortion demand letter recipient and I chose to reveal my real identity here on the forum and bring my fight out in the open. I see benefits in doing it this way, a corporate bully may be a little more conservative in their approach to you if they know everything they say and do is going to be placed on the World Wide Web for everyone to see, the other reason was to show everyone else that you can fight back against an unethical $4.5 billion company whose business model is legalized extortion by being open, upfront and honest.
As far as the wording of my first letter goes, yes I probably would have worded it differently. While not a lawyer I do understand and respect copyright law and I do understand infringement is a statutory offense. I do believe that artists should be paid for their work as well. While I felt that Getty's approach to the matter was reprehensible and unethical, designed to instill fear and panic people into paying many times more than an image is worth out of fear of an eminent lawsuit I did in good faith try to negotiate with them. I still would have shown where the image was being claimed by Getty and another party, I still would have requested proof of Getty's claim prior to negotiation and if Getty would have simply provided me the proof requested (which I offered to sign a confidentiality agreement if needed to receive the proof requested) we could have settled the matter amicably. Getty's response to me trying to negotiate with them was to ignore my requests and threatened me with their legal department in legal action.
So to answer your question more directly I think I would have worded it differently but the content would have still been pretty much the same. Just like the complaint letters I currently have and keep updated should I ever hear from Getty, NCS, Mr. Timothy McCormack or anyone associated with Getty look different from the letters you read that I had already sent out in the past. You evolve with age and knowledge and so do my letters.
If you choose to confront Getty make sure you mean what you say. If you tell them you will file a complaint(s) if they do not provide you proof or whatever you request make sure you follow through and do it. If you do not they will not believe you mean what you say and will keep pestering you until you either pay or your 3 years runs out. I told Getty exactly what I would do and I did it. After I receiving their "escalation" letter I made good my promise and file the complaints you read, while Getty did have to answer these complaints to date I have never been contacted by them again. I only have a little over a year to go before my SOL expires.
I hope this answers your question and helped you out and don't hesitate to ask if you have other questions.
Greg, I just finished reading all of your back and forth with Getty, all your complaint letters, and your 17 page forum thread about your experiment. First of all, thank you for being so open and sharing all of that. Now to my question. Most people here say to offer as little information as possible. It seems to me that in your initial letter to Getty, you offered a lot of information, including some background information on how you came to use the image that alerted them to you. In retrospect, do you feel that you gave up too much? Would you change that initial response after all the time you have spent here at ELI?
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