Photographer Still Insisting He Holds Copyright On Photo Taken By A Monkey...

[Mike]

Three years ago, we wrote about the bizarre case of a monkey who apparently grabbed a photographer's camera in a national park in Indonesia and snapped a selfie (that was back before "selfie" was so common a term -- and we just called it a "self-portrait"). There were a few different shots, but the one that clearly got the most attention is this one:

As we noted when we wrote about it, it seems fairly clear that the work is in the public domain. We were idly curious about how a news licensing agency (Caters New Agency) could claim the rights to the photograph. A few days later Caters itself demanded that we take down the photo, claiming that the copyright was held by the owner of the camera, David Slater. Slater himself insisted the copyright was his. However, as we explained in fairly great detail, looking at the laws of the US, the UK (where Slater is from) and Indonesia (where the picture was taken) the image is almost certainly in the public domain, no matter how you look at it.

Under all three laws, the rules say that the work needs to be done by a person, and a monkey doesn't count. Slater, however, claims that because the camera is his, it's still his copyright. While that's what many people think copyright law says, it's not actually what copyright law says at all.

The latest is that Slater is apparently still considering legal action against Wikimedia for refusing to take down the image from Wikimedia Commons.

The Gloucestershire-based photographer now claims that the decision is jeopardising his income as anyone can take the image and publish it for free, without having to pay him a royalty. He complained To Wikimedia that he owned the copyright of the image, but a recent transparency report from the group, which details all the removal requests it has received, reveals that editors decided that the monkey itself actually owned the copyright because it was the one that pressed the shutter button.

Mr Slater now faces an estimated £10,000 legal bill to take the matter to court.

First, I should note that if someone thinks the monkey holds the copyright, that's incorrect as well. While it's true that, in most cases, the person who takes the pictures gets the copyright, as noted above, the laws say it needs to be a person, so monkeys don't count. The image is public domain. The "monkey holds the copyright" claim appears to be a mistake by the author of the Telegraph piece. The guy who uploaded it has directly stated that he said there was no copyright (i.e., public domain) because there was no human author.

From here, Slater tries to flip the burden of proof, and claims that the copyright is his until proven otherwise in court:

“If the monkey took it, it owns copyright, not me, that’s their basic argument. What they don’t realise is that it needs a court to decide that,” he said.

While it's true that a court would decide the final result, the burden is actually on the copyright holder. To bring a copyright claim, you first have to prove that you hold the copyright. It's not the other way around. As Sherwin Siy of Public Knowledge notes, a system in which you needed a court to assert an affirmative defense would mean that no one could ever claim self-defense. That's just not how it works.

Slater also seems to believe in an odd "sweat of the brow" concept of copyright that simply isn't relevant:

“That trip cost me about £2,000 for that monkey shot. Not to mention the £5,000 of equipment I carried, the insurance, the computer stuff I used to process the images. Photography is an expensive profession that’s being encroached upon. They’re taking our livelihoods away,” he said.

The amount that the trip cost is meaningless on the copyright status of the photo. Photography is an expensive profession, but sometimes, apparently, it's so simple that... well... even a monkey can do it.

That said, the whole "jeopardizing his income" and "taking livelihoods away" lines are pretty extreme and ridiculous. This photo got Slater a tremendous amount of fame, and a chance to capitalize on that. If he wasn't so focused on a misguided legal fight against Wikimedia, why not use the photo as a calling card to get hired to do all sorts of other wildlife shots?

So why is this even an issue again at all? Well, that's partly Wikimedia's fault. It just released a transparency report, which discusses the whole monkey situation in a case study.

Originally Published: Wed, 06 Aug 2014 18:10:29 GMT
source

[stormium]

yeah, i had to read the title twice too... you just can't make this stuff up.

okay, so although slater has gotten a tremendous amount of publicity from this photo... i suppose the amount of shame from being one-uped by a monkey is too much to deal with.

[Tatsol]

yeah, i had to read the title twice too... you just can't make this stuff up.

okay, so although slater has gotten a tremendous amount of publicity from this photo... i suppose the amount of shame from being one-upped by a monkey is too much to deal with.

Does the monkey get the royalties, too?

[stormium]

Does the monkey get the royalties, too?

i'm not sure.

according to several laws, a monkey cannot claim ownership over a photograph.

the argument is that slater believes he should get paid for the use of the photo since it was taken using his equipment while the law says that it does not belong to him since the monkey took the photo and is considered to be public domain.

slater posted this self portrait taken by the monkey and people loved it... it went viral... and got him lots of publicity... but no money. so now, he wants money for it... but he already said that he didn't take the photo... the monkey did. on the other hand, the photo is only impressive because the monkey took it. if slater himself took the photo, no one would give a damn about it (except the imgurs who would call it a photogenic monkey and front page that bullshit in a heartbeat... then turn it into some diabetes inducing meme and front page it again).

let's assume that slater had a gun and the monkey took it and shot someone. i guarantee you that slater would not be saying that he is responsible for the monkey's actions since the monkey took his gun without his consent.

[Picklock]

this is twisted!
that monkeys should hire Cochran!

[RobertX]

Monkeys are related to humans. Because of that, they deserve human rights.

[Mike]

As we wrote yesterday, the infamous monkey selfie has returned to the news, thanks mostly to Wikimedia's new transparency report, which discusses the supposed copyright claim over the following monkey selfie:

Unfortunately, as we noted, the original story in The Telegraph claimed that Wikipedia "editors decided that the monkey itself actually owned the copyright." As we explained in great detail three years ago, this was false. The monkey doesn't hold the copyright: no one does. It's in the public domain. In fact, if the reporter had been careful, he would have noted that even Wikipedia properly notes that the image is in the public domain. It did not claim that the monkey owns the copyright.

However, since a major newspaper (falsely) wrote that Wikipedia had decided the monkey holds the copyright, the whole thing went viral all over again. All over Twitter I saw people claiming that the monkey held the copyright. Unfortunately, this is somewhat pernicious, starting with the Telegraph reporter, Matthew Sparkes, who made the false claim. As Sherwin Siy notes in a very good post, it's very troubling that people now come to automatically believe that someone has to hold the copyright on a photograph. That's just not true:

The claim isn’t that monkeys have IP rights — it’s that no one owns the copyright in the photo. A lot of people seem to take issue with this, insisting that, if the monkey doesn’t own the copyright, the photographer must — that someone has to own a copyright in the photo.

But that just isn’t true.

This is the definition of the public domain — things that are not protected by copyright. We’re used to thinking of the public domain as consisting of things that were in copyright and then aged out of it after a length of time, but that’s just a part of it. There’s also works created by the federal government, and things that simply can’t be protected — like ideas, methods of operation, or discoveries.

I think a big part of the problem here is that we've been trained incorrectly to believe that everything new must be covered by copyright. This is part of the most pernicious aspects of copyright maximalism today -- the idea that everything is covered by copyright. Only a few decades ago, nearly all created works were not covered by copyright and were public domain, free to be shared. It was only with the 1976 Copyright Act that the US switched from an "opt-in" policy to a "nearly everything is covered" policy, leading many people to (wrongly) believe that with any photo someone must hold the copyright.

That's a dangerous assumption for culture, highlighted by the fact that so many people default to insisting that someone must hold the copyright over this photo.

Meanwhile, for an even more amusing take on all of this, don't miss Sarah Jeong's defense of monkey copyrights satirical post:

It’s hard enough to eke out a living as an artist without the Copyright Office butting in and claiming it is literally impossible for you to own copyrights, just because you’re a monkey. What on earth is this “Copyright Office”, anyways? What right do they have to say whether a monkey’s work is worthy of copyright or not?

According to Slater’s own account, the Indonesian macaques were “already posing for the camera” when one of them started taking photos. Not all of them were good – as it turns out, some monkeys are much better photographers than other monkeys. The “monkey selfie” in question is a diamond in the mud: a truly remarkable portrait, perfectly focused and strategically positioned to capture a mischievous yet vulnerable smile. If that macaque had an Instagram account she’d have, like, a million followers.

But she doesn’t, and the sorry state of our copyright law – as interpreted by the Copyright Office and exploited by Wikipedia – is to blame. Due to the backwards treatment of animal creators everywhere, monkey art (and monkey photography in particular) continues to languish. How is an aspiring monkey photographer supposed to make it if she can’t stop the rampant internet piracy of monkey works?

That's only a snippet. The whole thing is well worth a read.


Source

[Picklock]

I'm willing to pay with banana's for the monkey if he demand the royalties
David Slater can suck my "banana's" if not I put it on his ass

[stormium]

and the monkey copyright story is back... again... and guess what? peta is involved now.

so, peta sued the photographer and his publishing company over the rights to the photo which it says should belong to the monkey and that they should be allowed to spend that money on monkey's well being (including the other monkeys in the monkey reserve)... seriously.

so, a judge has finally ruled that the monkey cannot own rights to the selfie unless the us congress or president intervene... which is unlikely.

so there.

source: http://www.foxnews.com/science/2016/01/0...right.html

[RobertX]

You know, back in high school, my theology teacher, who is a Roman Catholic, told us that we, as humans, have dominion over animals.

What an unfair world.