When does fair use of a photo become copyright infringement?
photo credit: bloomsberries
Good question.
I saw a statistic somewhere on the number of blogs that are created each week and it’s mind boggling. The number that make it to any sort of maturity is only a small proportion but its still, on a global scale, quite a few! Now imagine those blogs had no images on at all. Just words. That would be really boring wouldn’t it?
As photographers we are finding ourselves in a world where images are more in demand than ever before. The online use of our work is eventually going to outstrip print use. I almost guarantee it. The web is still in relative infancy and I reckon we ai’nt seen nothing yet when it comes to web use. Yet we charge pissy little amounts fro web use don’t we? Look at stock. RF for web use is micromicropeanuts even at a non microstock agency….but the RF usage could well be forever and ever……..
Charging for electronic advertising use is another post altogether and one that we’re going to have to address for it makes no sense to get $50 for online with 500x the exposure of the dearer print use…!
Still……back to the point of this post - use by blogs. These bloggers need images like humans need oxygen. They may well like your images. So if you find your part of your portfolio on someone’s blog you’re going to be angry right? Or are you? When does added exposure and promotion equal usage fees? What if the blogger (who never asked your permission first) claims that good old defence of “Fair Use”.
Rob Haggard’s (A Photo Editor) blog has some thoughts and a neat discussion….
“I’ve been asked a few times by readers “What’s fair use and what’s illegal when using photography that’s not yours on a blog?” I can’t actually answer that question, because I’m not a lawyer, but I would like to help bloggers understand the best practices for using photography that doesn’t belong to them…”
I suggest you go and join in the discussion right here as its something that isn’t going to go away anytime soon…
PP
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I think the easiest way to deal with this is just as you did, use CC licensed images only unless you can easily justify it as a fair use. I’m glad I’m not the only one using the PhotoDropper plugin.