This is probably the worst day of the week to publish this question, since no one reads weblogs on weekends, but I can’t get it out from under my skin so I need to turn to the internet. Hello, Internet.
Let’s say I’m a photographer. And I photographed military personnel and military equiptment, and also coffins returning from Iraq. These photographs are then OWNED by the United States Armed Forces. Let’s say that an independent journalist online then demanded to see those photographs, under the Freedom of Information Act, and the USAF released to him a CD of those images. And then let’s say the independent journalist then released those images on the internet to any and all media that wanted high resolution images. And different magazines requested high resolution images, and then printed them uncredited.
My gut instinct, and the instinct of any photo agency worth its salt if that had happened to one of THEIR photographers, would be to cry foul. After all, someone owns that image, and the person who is distributing them on the internet is not the person who has the legal ownership and distribution rights.
However, the images were obtained under the Freedom of Information Act. A national body owns those images, not a photographer per se. When a document is released under FOIA, I don’t need permission to reprint it. Why is a photograph any different?
Except… and here’s what bugs me … I couldn’t very well pass off the document as my own, could I. I’d have to credit it, wouldn’t I? So why aren’t these photographs being properly credited by the media outlets that are reprinting them? If they’re owned by the USAF, even if they’re public domain to use, shouldn’t they be credited to the USAF? Or even better, to the actual struggling photographer that took them?
This might very well be the most boring question in the entire world to anyone who isn’t interested in digital image rights or photographers’ rights, like I am. But perhaps some of you out there, especially you photobloggers, might have an answer, or be able to point me to someplace that does. I don’t want to release the names or links to these images because I’m not trying to start an internet brawl. I’m just curious.
This Ethicist is now open for discussion.
freedom of information?
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I’m probably wrong because of the tons of red tape. But I would think the images should belong to the eye that focused on the image and shot it. Although that person probably can’t seek compensation, he should get the credit for being able to capture and share the image.
Huh. That’s actually something I’d never considered, and you’ve raised an interesting point. Unfortunately, I don’t have a good answer for you. Sorry.
I do a lot of work finding images to go with website content for organizations.
The rules are clear when purchasing stock images from photo agencies, photographers and private corporations.
When the images are procured from a government agency or entity, they’re free to use. I usually credit the agency that housed the image. So if I use a photo of an ship that I got from NOAA, the credit usually reads “image courtesy of NOAA.”
I’ve never credited to the photographer, always to the organization.
I don’t know if that’s a hard and fast rule, but I (and my clients) would never consider posting or running a photo without the proper credit.
Most contracts (and implied contracts) state that whoever paid for the image gets the copyright. So if I work for an agency and shoot an image while on official duty, the agency gets copyright of the image.
When the military is involved, the military owns the image, and the photog gets screwed over. End of story.
The military being a government agency, the rights to the image belong to “we the people”. The military may choose not to release the images to WTP for various reasons, but when it does, once again, rights rest with WTP, specifically, any citizen of the United States. It’s sort of public domain for US citizens (this is why reprinting is so easy). Foreigners will probably have to pay royalty to the military, although I doubt anyone really cares. (The Beeb asserts similar rights over its archives. Brits can use it for free, non-Brits can’t.)
I would probably give credit the way Mala says.
Definitely it seems like in this context not providing the photographer with credit sucks. In a macro-copyright context, though, one good thing about most government works being in the public domain is that it makes re-use of art more accessible to the general public – you don’t have to pay anyone to reprint. I love the National Archives – you can download amazing photographs from the WPA, etc., for free.
Just about everything that I was going to say here has already been said. I will toss in a little bit that I’ve learned through art school and freelancing: When you sign away Right of Ownership, you lose all connection to your work. Its like you never existed. It wouldn’t surprise me if all government is contracted under such terms.
Then, once the Air Force releases the images, it’s up to them whether to require an agreement giving them credit. If they choose not to require that credit, then anyone can print it freely. Looks like that’s what’s happening here.
i’m in the business of defending intellectual property rights of words, not images, so my perspective is different.
jason’s point stands out the most to me. if [for whatever reason] you took those photos as work for hire, or sold (or were forced to submit under the patriot act or other legal rendition) the rights to those photos to the military, the military has no obligation to you — other than whatever protection you can build into the contract.
if a photo agency had sold those rights to a newspaper or other source, i would hope that they would have built that credit line into the use agreement. i would think that they would attempt to do the same for the military — but my guess is that a government agency would never accept that as part of the package, for reasons of inefficiency (can you see a monster buerocracy going to the bother of attaching credit? for artists?!?) almost as much as the complete posession they’d insist on, as a policy.
one hopes that my fierce defense makes me more effective, but too often it’s just beating my head against the wall.
This issue is actually something I wonder about all the time, since I work for an artist (a painter) and one part of the job is providing reproduction permissions. We can ask for proper credit until we’re blue in the face and have the image borrower sign a contract saying that they will use the exact credit line we require but 8 out of 10 times the line is wrong or incomplete. Apparently most publishers consider this issue unimportant, inconvenient, or otherwise dispensable.