Disturbing industry trend

JerryPH

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I was reading in a flickr forum about how there are many new photography forums popping up, and that most of them have competitions. This part is ok, but the part that is not, is that to participate, one has to submit all one's rights to them.

In other words your pictures become THEIR property and if they make money off of them (which is their intention, trust me), they owe you nothing.

Well, I used to enjoy posting in several of them and went to check out one place that was not very big, nor very prominent as a photo forum, but they had a competition. I was curious about the rules and there it was. I was shocked not only that they would be doing this, but that they are OPENLY TELLING you that you are giving them all rights.

Here is a portion of the text... tell me what you think:

"Entrants agree, by virtue of their entry, to provide the (name removed of the site for now) with an unrestricted license to copy, display and otherwise use the image(s) for promotion. Entrants must have model releases, if appropriate, on file for all their images (model releases can be obtained from XYZ.) Entrants agree to submit a copy of the model release on request."

So you don't even need to agree to it. By the mere fact of participating, you stipulate that you agree to give them FULL rights to YOUR property. Heck they even HELP you to give it to them by providing model releases to you for the models to sign so THEY are covered!

Suffice to say, that I will not be participating in any competitions where rights to my property are taken away from me in this rather underhanded manner.
 
Wow, makes me think of the Suicide Girls contract!

I agree with you, I would not participate in any of these.
 
I do not see any thing wrong with what they are saying or the competition. I am glad that they are making their intentions known. The problem is when people do not read the fine print and see their photo plastered on a billboard in L.A and then cry murder.

Moral of the story is always, always be very clear on your rights and the clients rights. It is up to the photographer to prevent copyright from becoming a "grey" area. This especially applies to the folks on flickr.

LUV & BASS
 
Well...Truth be told They have to inform you that this is their intention, If they don't their asses can be put into a sling, but any who.

This makes me hesitent none the less, being on the otherside of the fence so to speak.
 
stamp a huge watermark on it, then let them have it :lol:
 
Send a VGA sized entry, saved as a PNG file. They can't do anything with that!
 
Always read the fine print, it you don't know one to blame but yourself. And if your not sure don't get involved.
 
But it does seem to be a growing trend. All the fine print for facebook for example says exactly the same thing about pictures uploaded to the site, they can do whatever they want with it.

I'm just very carefull with these things, I don't want to see my work ending up earning someone else money...
 
Those agreements in general are becoming scary lately. While it is within the user's responsibility to read through those agreements I have no doubt that they make them 15 pages and insert "... by accepting I agree to give you my soul" fully knowing that few people read those. In fact I'm not sure how well a ULA can hold up in court because it's common knowledge that no one reads them and companies bury dirt in there.

If you really want to get fired up about something check out this badboy:

http://www.wired.com/science/discoveries/news/2006/01/70126

The article doesn't specify but I believe AT&T's statement was that within their User License Agreement it is stated that anything passing through their networks is owned by AT&T. Riiiiiight.
 
I really think you are making too much of this. You enter a contest with the expectation of having your images displayed on that particular site if you don't want your images displayed don't enter. I cant figure out how the site is going to run a contest if everyone who enters is going to put some kind of watermark on their image or want some kind of royalty every time it is displayed. If you think your work is too valuable to let someone display it as a contest entry then you need to be selling it rather than entering it into contests. I don't think this kind of release is made for some kind of nefarious purpose it is merely you participating in the forum as a memberand. Again if you think your pictures are too good to enter into a contest without charging the people who hold the contest for your images then you should just keep all your images hidden till you can sell them.
 
If you think your work is too valuable to let someone display it as a contest entry then you need to be selling it rather than entering it into contests.

... and that is a valid arguement, but ONLY if you KNOW the true value of your picture or not.

A great example is a recent happening on flickr who's friend's picture she took while standing at a bus stop. The picture taken was "stolen" and used in an advertisement. Currently the situation is under litigation.

My point is, we don't know how our pictures are abused, and we don't know how good or bad we are. Also, what we may see as an everyday nice "pic" could easily turn into a million dollar photograph in someone else's hands.

The whole thing is ... no one knows what the companies that poach are looking for. It could be something incredible, or it could be a pic of your buddy standing at a bus stop.

The point is, is that it *IS* happening and a lot more than they would want us to know. If it was you, how would that make you feel? It just angers me that not just pros are at risk, but now amateurs with desires to improve and learn are being taken advantage of.

It is at it's most base... just wrong, and not acknowledging it or closing our eyes to it won't make it go away. However, knowing about it, talking about it and NOT participating in those sites that abuse of it, and legally persuing places that DO abuse of it, all help slow it down.

Ideally, I wish it would stop. But then again I also wish that child abuse and rape would also stop, and I doubt it ever will. Just sad that the human animal persues goals that are to the detriment of others for their own personal base end.

I bet you at least 50% or more people here never even realized this. Well, now, I hope that they do and that's the best that I could hope for and this was the point of my post, nothing more. :)
 
ummm..This vivdly reminds me about a sort of science paper presentation a college used to hold, all entrants had to submit a soft and hard copy to them. The Catch was that the college used those idea for projects.
As they we out of ideas they usurped fresh idea's.
I wouldn't have a problem giving a copy, after i add a water mark on the four corners of the picture!
 
Honestly it is called participation people!!!. It is voluntary to participate in a forum as it is voluntary to participate in a contest. Noone is forcing you to submit your images If you don't want to do it don't. Some people see entering contests as a learning experience or a chance to get there inages out there for others to see.
 
Honestly it is called participation people!!!. It is voluntary to participate in a forum as it is voluntary to participate in a contest. Noone is forcing you to submit your images If you don't want to do it don't. Some people see entering contests as a learning experience or a chance to get there inages out there for others to see.

Thats fine, and I agree, but its still messed up. Just because someone wants the recognition of a contest shouldn't give the website the right to do whatever they want with your photo.
 

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