Microsoft's Iconic Britain copyright violations?
OffTopic
Registered Users Posts: 521 Major grins
Anyone else paying attention to the fiasco about Microsoft's Iconic Britain contest? Seems contestants are being urged to use Microsoft Live Search to search images apparently hosted on 'someone's" server and submit them to win a camera. Problem is, those are OUR images, they are not linked and the IPTC data has been removed, possibly creating potential orphans. I found images of mine from my SmugMug pages, my PhotoShelter Collection account, and even one that a client posted on his webpage. I found 17 of mine in just a few minutes of searching.
Nikon was a sponsor and judge for the contest, but after a multitude of photographers started sending takedown notices and invoices the Nikon judge removed himself from the judging panel, and now word is that Nikon may have pulled their sponsorship.
There's been some talk of concern about possible licensing violations on the Rights Managed stock images (there are images there from all the big stock houses) and it was even recommended on one site that anyone who finds one of their RM images should review any current licenses and contact anyone who has licensed the image to inform them.
Pro-Imaging, a fantastic resource for photographers' rights in photo contests, has a lot to say about the problem. They contacted Microsoft and have published MS's official statement on their website (scroll down).
I'm certainly no expert in this and I'm not sure how this it's going to play out, but it seems that everyone is recommending at least doing a search for your images and making screen prints as proof. The main page has images linked properly, but if you go the "submit" page of the contest, that is where our images are hosted on a different server with absolutely no originating/identifying information.
:huh
Nikon was a sponsor and judge for the contest, but after a multitude of photographers started sending takedown notices and invoices the Nikon judge removed himself from the judging panel, and now word is that Nikon may have pulled their sponsorship.
There's been some talk of concern about possible licensing violations on the Rights Managed stock images (there are images there from all the big stock houses) and it was even recommended on one site that anyone who finds one of their RM images should review any current licenses and contact anyone who has licensed the image to inform them.
Pro-Imaging, a fantastic resource for photographers' rights in photo contests, has a lot to say about the problem. They contacted Microsoft and have published MS's official statement on their website (scroll down).
I'm certainly no expert in this and I'm not sure how this it's going to play out, but it seems that everyone is recommending at least doing a search for your images and making screen prints as proof. The main page has images linked properly, but if you go the "submit" page of the contest, that is where our images are hosted on a different server with absolutely no originating/identifying information.
:huh
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