Click Official ELI Links
Get Help With Your Extortion Letter | ELI Phone Support | ELI Legal Representation Program
Show your support of the ELI website & ELI Forums through a PayPal Contribution. Thank you for supporting the ongoing fight and reporting of Extortion Settlement Demand Letters.

Show Posts

This section allows you to view all posts made by this member. Note that you can only see posts made in areas you currently have access to.


Messages - Lettered

Pages: 1 ... 15 16 [17]
241
Getty Images Letter Forum / Re: Strict Liability
« on: December 17, 2008, 05:26:24 PM »
Incredibly silly isn't it?  It's like that, presumably to not let willfull infringers try to claim they didnt know it was copyrighted. It has created a nice little cash cow for companies like Getty who apparently dont mind seeing how much they can squeeze out of honest unknowing infringers.

I truly believe that the law the way it is may be encouraging people and companies to be purposefully sloppy (or even completely negligent) in protecting their copyrights, so that they can use newer technologies to scour the web finding infringers to harrass for money.

Click this link to see who's shaping the laws:

http://news.cnet.com/2100-1028_3-6184604.html

It's hard to be heard over a groups with that much cash.

242
Getty Images Letter Forum / Copyright Small Claims Court
« on: December 06, 2008, 07:36:45 AM »
Apparently photographers have been pushing for a small claims procedure to make it easier and less expensive for them to pursue infringers.  The copyright office has a statement on its website here:

http://www.copyright.gov/docs/regstat032906.html

Particularly striking to me is the following statement from the above link. It appears to me that the copyright office is sadly uniformed ....

"Some have also asserted that the existing system for adjudication of copyright infringement claims can in some cases be too burdensome for defendants who are accused of infringement. While it is not difficult to imagine that a wealthy plaintiff in a copyright infringement suit could make the litigation very costly for a defendant of modest means, the Office is not aware whether this has in fact been a significant problem."

243
Getty Images Letter Forum / Re: NCS called today
« on: December 02, 2008, 01:11:05 PM »
thats interesting ...

the tone and content of the conversation you describe reminds me a lot of another poster on this forum who made several posts awhile back.

what was the first date Getty contacted you dang99?

244
Getty Images Letter Forum / Re: damages
« on: November 30, 2008, 04:02:22 PM »
as I understand it robots.txt doesnt ever remove already archived material ... it just blocks public access.  For this reason, I find their exclusion policy misleading (the way it read to me, I originally thought robots.txt would cause all archived material for the site to be deleted ... which is apparently not so).

Can archive.org be compelled to remove archived material by the web site owner?  What would be the procedure ... letter from a lawyer?

245
Getty Images Letter Forum / Re: Can copyright law [likely] be changed?
« on: November 30, 2008, 11:30:16 AM »
thanks Oscar.  you are very much appreciated.

246
Getty Images Letter Forum / Can copyright law [likely] be changed?
« on: November 29, 2008, 08:51:25 PM »
Assuming Getty is right about the copyright in the demand they sent me (they provided no proof) I am at worst an innocent infringer (first offense) unknowing victim of a third party web designer for an unregistered image.  I took the images down as soon as I received their letter.

Honestly, from a moral perspective, I dont think I should owe Getty images a single thin dime.  That said, I understand the current US law and I do believe as a law abiding citizen, I owe (IF they provide proof of copyright) them something (though certainly not $1000 + per image!).  I would be willing (even though I disagree with the law) to pay them what the law allows ($49 low resolution web use license fee, or $200 statutory damages).

In the very least I think website owners should have zero liability where they can show they are unknowing victims of third party designers or image resellers ... especially on first offenses and especially when they imediately take the images down when challenged.

Is there any way we can capitalize on Mathew's and Oscar's hard work here on this site, and on the community outrage against this sort of behavior, to lobby (as a group) for a signifcant change in copyright law that makes sense?   Is there anything we can do as a community effort to be heard and have a chance of some change to the existing copyright law?

247
Getty Images Letter Forum / Re: Masterfile Corporation
« on: November 29, 2008, 08:18:19 PM »
There seems to be some fairly common misconceptions among us laypeople about the protections afforded to Online Service Providers in the Digital Millennium Copyright Act ... requirements for takedown notices, safe harbor provisions and the like.  The key is, I think, that these DMCA protections apply to Online Service Providers to limit their liability for what thier users post on their website.  I dont think there is anything in the DMCA to limit liability of website owners for website content directly under their control.  Someone please correct me if I am wrong about any of that.

248
Getty Images Letter Forum / Re: damages
« on: November 27, 2008, 01:19:20 PM »
There was a link in my post to a letter Getty supposedly wrote in response to photographers complaining about the $49 web use license fee.  No new information, really, just Getty saying in so many words that the market wont support anything higher than $49 ... which conflicts, of course with the $1300 demand.  Might be a handy reference when trying to establish fair market value of the alleged infringing use ... if thats even needed ...

search the linked to page for the text appropriate price point.

249
Getty Images Letter Forum / Re: damages
« on: November 27, 2008, 07:28:09 AM »
This might be of interest to those pondering what actual damages should be.  It is apparently Getty making the argument of why web use images are only worth $49.

http://www.abouttheimage.com/2858/getty_answers_critics_of_the_49_web_use_product/author3/

250
Getty Images Letter Forum / Did Getty sue and lose in Germany?
« on: November 18, 2008, 01:35:48 AM »
In German, but I think it describes a case Getty lost?  Is anyone's German good enough to summarize in English?

http://www.spiegel.de/netzwelt/web/0,1518,547234,00.html

Also came across this German Forum ... similar to eli forum perhaps?:

http://www.abmahnwelle.info/

251
Getty Images Letter Forum / Re: damages
« on: November 17, 2008, 09:44:06 AM »
I've been researching how far media bullies go with these sorts of things and have found cases where KIDS (under 14) are being sued.  One interesting thing I came across was this article:

http://cyberlaw.stanford.edu/node/5524

that talks about a warning clip supposedly aired before children's programming. creepy behavior if you ask me. The striking thing about the clip to me is the singing of "Happy Birthday" as part of it .... I have to wonder if this "get tough on copyright" group is violating the copyright of the song "Happy Birthday" ... lol

http://www.snopes.com/music/songs/birthday.asp

252
Getty Images Letter Forum / damages
« on: November 17, 2008, 01:02:35 AM »
Hi all.  Im trying to figure out what happens if one of these goes to court.  For most of us I think innocent infringment would be easy enough to prove.  Also, I'm guessing that for most of us the copyright wasnt registered.  That leaves actual damages, the way I understand it, as the maximum Getty would be able to get.

I did some searching and found a case talked about here:
http://www.photosource.com/channel/psn/2004/10_27.txt
where it appears to me that the court rejected the notion of multipliers and penalties added to actual damages.  The following quotes from the article got my attention:

 " "in litigated cases, infringement does not make a copyright more valuable.""

Im trying to figure out how much I might have injured or damaged the market value of Getty's copyright.  I never would have paid anywhere near the 4 figures they are asking for the little photo (nor would I have stolen it, btw).  I simply would have instructed our [third party] web page developer to find something for $5 or less or to just not use any photos at all.  So how could Getty have been "damaged" by my innocent infringement?  I say the damage related to lost license fees is closer to $5 ... would a judge agree?

Also, isnt Getty saying they are also trying to recover costs of finding the infringement?  I wouldnt think that could be considered a damage caused by the infringement, as this cost would have been incurred whether or not they had found the infringement.

So, the way  I see it, from my layman's point of view, the most I feel I would owe Getty would be a few bucks for the time it took the intern to write me the letter to ask me to take the photo down and whatever a similar photo ($5?) would have cost at places where people like me would shop for photos.

any thoughts??  what would a judge be likely to award Getty for the innocent infringement of a single photo?

Pages: 1 ... 15 16 [17]
Official ELI Help Options
Get Help With Your Extortion Letter | ELI Phone Support Call | ELI Defense Letter Program
Show your support of the ELI website & ELI Forums through a PayPal Contribution. Thank you for supporting the ongoing fight and reporting of Extortion Settlement Demand Letters.