
Twitpic makes deal with news agency to sell users' uploaded photos - brown9-2
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/05/23/technology/23terms.html?_r=1
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huntero
Apparently the news agency is primarily interested in the photos that
Twitpic's celebrity users are posting. That's going to be a severe red-flag to
celebrities and word will spread quickly among them/their social media folks
to switch to another service.

As these popular trend-setting celebrities switch services, so will their
followers. This is nothing but bad for the future of Twitpic.

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daimyoyo
When the story of twitpic's TOS broke, I immediately deleted all the pictures
I'd uploaded and changed to Mobypicture. It's not as good, but their TOS says
in no uncertain terms "All rights of uploaded content by our users remain the
property of our users and those rights can in no means be sold or used in a
commercial way by Mobypicture or affiliated third party partners without
consent from the user." I like that. No ambiguity at all.

~~~
potatolicious
This is why I use Flickr - they are similarly unambiguous about their terms of
use. They even issued a statement reiterating their position when the Twitpic
brouhaha broke initially.

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joshwa
There is related lawsuit pending between a professional photographer and
Agence France Presse, who stole the photographer's photos of the Haiti
earthquake from TwitPic without permission, and sold them to newspapers around
the world via an agreement with Getty Images.

They claim that the TwitPic TOS allowed them to use (and profit) from the
images, and even further, their initial filing even went so far as to say
something along the lines of "well, you posted it on the internet, so that
means it's in the public domain".

[http://copymarkblog.com/2011/05/11/twitpic-photographs-
and-c...](http://copymarkblog.com/2011/05/11/twitpic-photographs-and-
copyright-law/)

[http://paidcontent.org/article/419-in-lawsuit-wire-
service-a...](http://paidcontent.org/article/419-in-lawsuit-wire-service-afp-
says-twitter-pictures-are-free-for-taking/)

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gojomo
Gentleman, fire up your photoshops. Who can get the most outrageously fake
photos onto wenn.com via twitpic?

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jcasman
I'm trying to imagine a scenario where I post a pic, they sell it in one of
their publications, then sue when someone else also uses it. I think it sounds
ridiculous, but isn't this one of those legal scenarios were it's possible but
not probable? No, I'm still not happy about the principal of it.

~~~
jambo
Also, users don't assign copyright, they merely (if the users have actually
agreed to these terms) grant TwitPic a non-exclusive license. All someone has
to do to get around it is tweet @ you and get your permission to use the image
instead of getting TwitPic's (or their affiliate's) permission.

~~~
marshray
Right. That suggests that the value of WENN is mainly going to be as a
convenience clearinghouse for quick and easy licensing of the images.

Don't post it on TwitPic unless you want it to be used by others. WENN/TwitPic
may get paid but, probably no one's going to get much out of any individual
image either.

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callmeed
I think there is need for a Twitter image service designed for artists and
journalists. Something they can brand (logo and colors) and display clear
usage terms/licensing. Possibly watermarking and licensing/payment as well.

~~~
Mazy
That seems to be the goal of <http://whosay.com/>

ex:

<http://www.whosay.com/rihanna/> <http://www.whosay.com/50cent>

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jambo
I don't think I ever agreed to a TOS. I upload using an API client.

~~~
gojomo
Websites also offer 'terms' that you might never be forced to read (or
actually read), but would still have some presumptive legitimacy in the
absence of other customs: giving the site the right to curtail your use, or
limiting your claims against the site. A court could reason, "What, did you
think the service was free, with terms totally in your favor, in the absence
of any other guidance?"

You might be able to argue ignorance/non-assent and then have them cease some
objectionable reuse; you probably couldn't ding them for big damages because
you thought you retained all rights.

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antihero
From their TOS:

"All content uploaded to Twitpic is copyright the respective owners. The
owners retain full rights to distribute their own work without prior consent
from Twitpic. It is not acceptable to copy or save another user's content from
Twitpic and upload to other sites for redistribution and dissemination.

By uploading content to Twitpic you give Twitpic permission to use or
distribute your content on Twitpic.com or affiliated sites. "

So your images are safe(ish) for now, I think.

~~~
phaylon
It also says

 _However, […], you hereby grant Twitpic a worldwide, non-exclusive, royalty-
free, sublicenseable and transferable license to use, reproduce, distribute,
prepare derivative works of, display, and perform the Content in connection
with the Service and Twitpic's (and its successors' and affiliates') business,
[…]_

I think the "sublicensable and transferable" part is relevant here. What I
found most odd was the claim to go after unauthorized uses. I would've
expected that this has to be done by the copyright owner in many countries.

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skbohra123
What's stopping twitter itself from doing something for photo sharing ? Seems
like it's a tested market, users will always prefer twitter image sharing
service and there is no risk in trying this.

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pyrmont
I don't see the problem with this. They host your photos for free and they
want to try to make some money out of it. Sounds like a fair deal to me.

~~~
itswindy
It's all fun and games until a picture makes big bucks. Then, you'll see
lawsuits; I didn't read the user agreement well, didn't understand it, it's
unfair, it violates [insert law of any US state]...and so on.

Have you seen that CNN and the likes make it absolutely clear the intention
when they seek pictures or video for live events (earthquakes of example)? Not
hide it on what would page 83 of an agreement.

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Painbird
They're going to be selling a lot of photos of food and cats.

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rudiger
Does Twitter do photo/video hosting yet? Why not?

~~~
kmfrk
They've only got so much VC money to burn, I guess.

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ignifero
Without the user's consent (and their share of the royalties)? Regardless of
their TOS, how would that stand in a court of law?

~~~
MichaelGG
The user agreed to assign all rights to the image when uploading the image.
Any user suing to the contrary would have to say they didn't really agree.
More interesting is when some user uploads a photo they found elsewhere, to
which they don't have the copyright.

~~~
itswindy
I am not a lawyer but I know that a contract has to be fair and obey other
laws to be valid.

~~~
pavel_lishin
How do you objectively evaluate "fair"? $0.30 cents per text isn't fair.

~~~
itswindy
You pay a lawyer $600 an hour to figure that out :)

