Photo Stealing / Ripping - Need Lawyer

[KmH]

You don't own copyright until the work is recorded in a tangible medium, like a memory card.

US Copyright lasts for the life of the author + 70 years, IF the copyright owner does not transfer copyright ownership to some other entity.

 

[smoke665]

work is recorded in a tangible medium

Forgotten a lot of it. The only reason I have any knowledge of it was because in the early 80's I worked a few years as VP of a privately owned corporation that filed suit against another company for blatant patent violations, copyright violations, and trademark violations. We finally won after a long and protracted legal battle, but I'm not sure that the win was worth the effort.

 

[Dave442]

Every time I have used a lawyer I have found that they are very good at doing the discovery work and then presenting the options to the other party in order to settle the action. In more than a few cases I have been the one to pull them in a bit on how much they want to go after the other party.

As Buckster had so well laid out and the OP has also noted, collecting on copyright violation is best done employing a party that also has an interest in the monetary gain.

Generally I try and have a lawyer recommend a lawyer, so for the OP my recommendation would be to see if his lawyer has any recommendations for one that is current on U.S. law.

 

[chrigah]

they will do their best to wear you down financially and mentally.

...but only if you don´t have a lawyer that plays by the same game. i never allowed the other party to wear me down because of my bloodhound lawyer. so i think it strongly depends on your lawyer if you´re successful or not.

thank you dave442 for your message. do YOU have a recommendation for me?

 

[table1349]

The US has a "fair use" doctrine built into the copyright law and it's a defense to copyright infringement if certain elements are met. The defense is decided on a case-by-case basis. "The distinction between what is fair use and what is infringement in a particular case will not always be clear or easily defined. Recently a big name case in the news was Google and their posting of "samples" of books. They won by the way.

fair use
noun

1. (in US copyright law) the doctrine that brief excerpts of copyright material may, under certain circumstances, be quoted verbatim for purposes such as criticism, news reporting, teaching, and research, without the need for permission from or payment to the copyright holder.

 

[fmw]

Don't want to hijack the OP's thread but this sort of ties in. To be enforceable in court doesn't your image have to be registered with a copyright office? And though some countries don't , I was under the impression that the US recognized the copyright status of other countries. It was my understanding that just putting your name on a print didn't make it copyrighted.

Copyrights do not require registration. If it ends up in a legal action the proof of ownership is the original image. For example if the shot was copied from the internet, the raw file owner will be the winner.

In my area, we always worked by the hour and expenses. The commercial customer was the owner of the images. The concept was always to get paid for the work, not hope for future revenue from images which likely didn't have much universal appeal. If you want future revenue from images there are plenty of stock agencies that can distribute your work. Commercial shooting is a different animal in my view. If I were the OP I would consider the architect to be the one harmed, not the photographer. The architect would likely be happy to see an image of their work on he internet.

If you aim your lawyer at a U.S. company, they are likely to remove your image from their web site and ignore the lawyer. They know you aren't going to litigate and they aren't likely to pay you anything. After all, they are thieves. You may be able to handle that without paying a lawyer.

The internet has changed the professional photography world a bunch. Be sure you get paid properly for your work so you don't have to worry about the images themselves. If you want to earn over time from your images, the stock agency is the answer.

 

[KmH]

Yes.
Some photographers have dramatically reduced the value of high quality photographs by giving away their valuable copyrights and treating photographs like a commodity.
That's a major reason doing photography as a way to make a living is rapidly moving towards extinction.
Yes, the Internet has played a part and there are other factors involved - like the consolidation of the stock photography industry.

Until a couple of years ago Canada copyright law granted copyright to whoever commissioned photographs to be made. Business savvy Canadian photographers had a clause in their contracts that was a copyright transfer from the commissioning entity to the photographer so the photographer would own their intellectual property (work product).
Canada copyright law is now very similar to US copyright law and the photographer owns copyright from the time the photograph is recorded in a tangible medium.

While here in the US we own copyright as soon as our work is recorded in a tangible medium, registering our copyrights with the US Copyright Office gets us a broader range of legal remedies than if we don't register our copyrights.

Copyright law (US Title 17) is federal law, so copyright infringement cases are heard in federal court, not in lower courts.
Copyright law (§411 · Registration and civil infringement actions) require a work be registered, or be in the process of being registered, before the court will accept an infringement action - with limited exceptions noted in US Title 17 §106a · Rights of certain authors to attribution and integrity.

Sans registration we really have no way to enforce our copyrights.

Back in the day I made a substantial portion of my income from a plethora of stock images I made over the years. Today, with the consolidation of the stock photography agency business, and because photographs are now treated by so many photographers as a commodity.
Today, income from stock images is very low.

 

[KmH]

fair use
noun

1. (in US copyright law) the doctrine that brief excerpts of copyright material may, under certain circumstances, be quoted verbatim for purposes such as criticism, news reporting, teaching, and research, without the need for permission from or payment to the copyright holder.

That's only a small part of the legal definition of Fair Use.
Lots of people only quote that part of the Fair Use doctrine - often as a means to justify their infringement of someones copyright.

Here is what US Copyright law says about Fair Use:

§ 107 . Limitations on exclusive rights: Fair use

Notwithstanding the provisions of sections 106 and 106A, the fair use of a copyrighted work, including such use by reproduction in copies or phono records or by any other means specified by that section, for purposes such as criticism, comment, news reporting, teaching (including multiple copies for classroom use), scholarship, or research, is not an infringement of copyright. In determining whether the use made of a work in any particular case is a fair use the factors to be considered shall include—

(1) the purpose and character of the use, including whether such use is of a commercial nature or is for nonprofit educational purposes;

(2) the nature of the copyrighted work;

(3) the amount and substantiality of the portion used in relation to the copyrighted work as a whole; and

(4) the effect of the use upon the potential market for or value of the copyrighted work.

The fact that a work is unpublished shall not itself bar a finding of fair use if such finding is made upon consideration of all the above factors.

Additionally, on the US Copyright web site it also says:

In addition to the above, other factors may also be considered by a court in weighing a fair use question, depending upon the circumstances. Courts evaluate fair use claims on a case-by-case basis, and the outcome of any given case depends on a fact-specific inquiry. This means that there is no formula to ensure that a predetermined percentage or amount of a work—or specific number of words, lines, pages, copies—may be used without permission.

 

[table1349]

True, however in the context of the OP's post and situation, criticism, news reporting, teaching, and research do not apply.

 

[smoke665]

That's only a small part of the legal definition of Fair Use

May be wrong but I think he was addressing the part that pertained to my previous comment about the Google lawsuit.

...but only if you don´t have a lawyer that plays by the same game.

From your previous posts you've indicated you had some success in collection, however as I've said and others have said, the success may have been just as good on your own. Having been on both sides of the table in some high dollar "games", I can tell you that any claim for damage was first investigated as to the legitimacy of the claim, unless it was a rock solid claim, it was automatically denied. If it continued, regardless of fault, the value of the claim was compared to the cost of litigation, and the decision was made to settle or fight the claim. With billing rates of $750-$2500/hr for specialized attorney's you're going to find it difficult to find a good attorney that will be willing to take your small claim on a percentage.