IP Rights Vs Social Media

[Jay Beckman]

Interesting MSNBC Article on the use of phones, etc Vs Social Media Vs Fair Use and compensation.

Maybe the Twitter / Facebook crowd might wake up and smell the licensing...

[BillOz]

A very complicated situation sure to get more so, as more and more people Tweet and post pictures.  Personally I don't see the Twitter/Facebook crowd smell the licensing issue, as there are hundreds of millions of photos and videos posted to these sites, of which maybe a few dozen to few hundred could be licensed for any real monetary value, and in most cases it wouldn't be worth the effort.  People just want to get it out there to their friends.

The question I expect which this will all lead to is, "Does posting your photo on Twitter or other similar sites mean you have put it into the public domain"?  Since this and similar sites all network your posts, is there anyway for you to maintain control, and if not, have you inadvertantly given it away?
You may still own the Copyright, but is there anyway you can control how it is used?
As the article indicates, they put their photos out there for the world to see, it's now kinda hard to say, "Hey pay me for that", now that they see it going all over the world and into many media outlets.

I'd say it will come down to, If you put it into public networks, like Twitter, Twitpic, Facebook, etc., you should not expect you can control how or where it will be used.  If you keep it off these networking sites, and try to promote it to established media, like MSNBC, TIME, Newsweek, etc., then you should be able to make claims against someone for using it without your permission.  Problem as noted in the article, you basically can only get damages for a multiple of what their use may have cost you in lost revenue from them, and unless the user was a major publication, advertiser, or company, your losses are not going to amount to anything worth suing for.

Basically once you put a picture out into the publc network, you have lost control.  You may still be able to make money from established organizations, but the public will do what they want with it. 

The Fair Use claim argument has some interesting aspects.

I'd say if you don't want your truly once in a million lifetimes photo showing up on every imaginable website, email, Tweet, Facebook, then don't post it on the net, get to a reputable publication, like "The National Enquirer" who pays big money for some celebrity doing incomprehensible immoral acts and make your payday.   Thanks to all the un-professionals out there, (like me) and most of you, which makes for a camera everywhere all the time, there is less and less need for professional photogs, like it or not, right or wrong.

Like it or not, having the Copyright only gives you rights to help protect your creation, not a vault to secure them.
It's only going to get worse for those trying to keep their creations (photos) out of public access.

[Jay Beckman]

That's pretty much what the article points out.  The policing is backwards where the artist has to pursue the offender to prove infringement when it should be the other way around.  As the plaintiff, I shouldn't need to arm myself with a battery of lawyers as though I were the defendant.  Make it easier for plaintiffs to file and recover and you'll see a lot of this crap come to an end.

One of the best ways to help yourself is to make sure you use the metadata properly and to not "save for web and devices" through Photoshop as this strips the EXIF information.

Pretty sure the courts have ruled that "self publishing" via a website is not considered published as it pertains to copyright violations.  Not sure though about social media.

[Joe Copalman]

Wonder how long she's going to prison for having her cell phone on during a commercial flight.