When should we report cases for potential infringement under new Alamy Focus.

[meanderingemu]

Now that Alamy has made infringement one of their explicit focus, and after seeing the fees recuperated from the one case i have had, I must say i have become more proactive in tracking potential cases.  Should we still delay reporting of suspicious cases?  For example if i see a case with Alamy watermark, does Alamy still want 3 months waiting period?  What about usage by a non regular client with no credits? Does delay affect Alamy's chance of recovery?   Obviously these are all for exclusive images where i am contractually obligated to check with Alamy first. 

 

 

Maybe it is time for the new Infringement team do give us clear guidelines, as well as a description of what they undertake on their side to identify potential cases.  

[sb photos]

17 hours ago, meanderingemu said:

Now that Alamy has made infringement one of their explicit focus, and after seeing the fees recuperated from the one case i have had, I must say i have become more proactive in tracking potential cases.  Should we still delay reporting of suspicious cases?  For example if i see a case with Alamy watermark, does Alamy still want 3 months waiting period?  What about usage by a non regular client with no credits? Does delay affect Alamy's chance of recovery?   Obviously these are all for exclusive images where i am contractually obligated to check with Alamy first. 

 

 

Maybe it is time for the new Infringement team do give us clear guidelines, as well as a description of what they undertake on their side to identify potential cases.  

 

Or does delaying reporting infringements increase the ultimate settlement?

[meanderingemu]

3 hours ago, sb photos said:

 

Or does delaying reporting infringements increase the ultimate settlement?

 

and if it does, does Alamy want us to manage it, or the infringement team.  All a contributor does is make them aware, the team should then be able to optimise the process. 

[geogphotos]

I emailed in about a recent online use and was told to come back in three months - because that's howlong reporting can often take. 

 

In the past I have been told (on occasions) whether or not the user has or hasn't downloaded the image, or if it is an Alamy client.

 

So, I agree it would be useful to have clear, consistent guidleines. I think that we also need a reference number assigned to each 'investigation'.

 

I seacrhing for DACS in Jan/Feb 2022 I found a use in a UK book published last autumn and was told that the query would be passed on to the client account manager ( or whatever).

 

I am still waiting. How long before I repeat the request? I don't want to be a nuisance but feel that I have been left hanging.

Edited March 28, 2022 by geogphotos

[meanderingemu]

9 minutes ago, geogphotos said:

I emailed in about a recent online use and was told to come back in three months - because that's howlong reporting can often take. 

 

In the past I have been told (on occasions) whether or not the user has or hasn't downloaded the image, or if it is an Alamy client.

 

So, I agree it would be useful to have clear, consistent guidleines. I think that we also need a reference number assigned to each 'investigation'.

 

 

 

whereas the one that finally resulted in a positive case, which had Alamy watermarks, they accepted in file immediately even if it had only been online for one month.  They then put it on back burner 3 months, with option for me to go directly- language was an issue so i declined, but i never had to resubmit, and in the end it was processed.

Latest which was 14 month old, i was told nah this is a great client they did download it,  we will just ask them to submit usage, likely at current rate and commission schedule, still not done 2 weeks later..... 

 

so @Alamy it seems i am not the only one who would like clarification on what we should be doing for optimal partnership process.  I now found one potential from a non regular source which i judge suspicious, but this is likely biased by personal views of usage, so i feel self-conscious reporting it out of turn, but am i harming process by sitting on it? 

[Tony ALS]

I have reported watermarked images as soon as I find them regardless of how long ago they were used as they are clear infringements and the team have accepted these without any delay.

[meanderingemu]

Just now, Tony ALS said:

I have reported watermarked images as soon as I find them regardless of how long ago they were used as they are clear infringements and the team have accepted these without any delay.

 

exactly, hence why we need guidelines. 

 

 

even the reporting form still has this statement

 

"By clicking submit I confirm the following, and agree to indemnify Alamy if either of the below statements turn out to be incorrect:

• This image has never been for sale or display on any other website and it’s not in the public domain / copyright free."

 

 

does this apply to something with Watermarks?  Obviously they took it from Alamy, so if i posted it also on Twitter or even at another agency should i not report it?

[meanderingemu]

one more thing @Alamy

 

This is section 16.7 of the agreement

 

Quote

1. Each party will promptly inform the other party of any actual or suspected third party infringement of copyright or any other intellectual property right or third party right, loss of Content, breach of moral rights or any other matter giving rise to threat of proceedings, claims or demands in respect of any of the Content. Alamy, in its sole discretion, may either take action itself against the third party or may notify you that it will not be taking action and you may then do so at your option.

 

 

This states i need to do it "Promptly", and for "Any of the Content".

 

So how does it relate to the fact we are then told to wait up to 4 months, and fact i need to certify it wasn't available elsewhere even on a clear potential infringement from Alamy's version of the image for example when they give credit to Alamy. 

 

These seems to be contradictory

 

 

[meanderingemu]

@Alamy when you have time to look into these, would you mind also addressing how i can certify  the reporting form statement

 

"By clicking submit I confirm the following, and agree to indemnify Alamy if either of the below statements turn out to be incorrect:

• This image has never been for sale or display on any other website and it’s not in the public domain / copyright free."

 

 

when they are obviously being offered on other website through Alamy's distribution arrangements.  

[spacecadet]

40 minutes ago, meanderingemu said:

@Alamy when you have time to look into these, would you mind also addressing how i can certify  the reporting form statement

 

"By clicking submit I confirm the following, and agree to indemnify Alamy if either of the below statements turn out to be incorrect:

• This image has never been for sale or display on any other website and it’s not in the public domain / copyright free."

 

 

when they are obviously being offered on other website through Alamy's distribution arrangements.  

I agree it's poorly worded, but obviously inclusion in a distributor's collection wouldn't be a breach of contract.

[meanderingemu]

13 minutes ago, spacecadet said:

I agree it's poorly worded, but obviously inclusion in a distributor's collection wouldn't be a breach of contract.

 

 

still a concern with the wording and the holding us potentially liable for wrongful claims in the contract, especially when i see these "downloaded xx times" through a distributor where Alamy has no record of the actual download.  

Edited March 30, 2022 by meanderingemu

[Alamy]

Hi all,

Just jumping in to hopefully provide some clarity - our Infringements Team focus on two areas of revenue for the images that are marked as exclusive to Alamy:

The first strand is to proactively look for infringements using one of the multiple copyright protection agencies that Alamy has now partnered with.  Our partners use their proprietary software to crawl allocated territories to find infringements which is bringing in increasing revenue month on month and we see this becoming a major source of revenue for exclusive images.

The second strand is the reactive infringements, these are the unauthorised uses of your images that you find, and then report to us to investigate.  This process is now being managed by the Infringements Team, and we will soon be sharing more information with you on the new process, including having a dedicated email address to report infringements to.

Thanks
Alamy

[meanderingemu]

6 minutes ago, Alamy said:

Hi all,

Just jumping in to hopefully provide some clarity - our Infringements Team focus on two areas of revenue for the images that are marked as exclusive to Alamy:

The first strand is to proactively look for infringements using one of the multiple copyright protection agencies that Alamy has now partnered with.  Our partners use their proprietary software to crawl allocated territories to find infringements which is bringing in increasing revenue month on month and we see this becoming a major source of revenue for exclusive images.

The second strand is the reactive infringements, these are the unauthorised uses of your images that you find, and then report to us to investigate.  This process is now being managed by the Infringements Team, and we will soon be sharing more information with you on the new process, including having a dedicated email address to report infringements to.

Thanks
Alamy

 

Thank you appreciated. Looking forward to the extra information.

 

 

Can you clarify one thing, the first strand seems to happen without informing Contributors as required under 16.7, what are the liability of contributor if the said process lead to legal dispute? 

An image being listed as exclusive is only a punctual label, and doesn't prevent image being available elsewhere, just not for sale at "another licencing service outside your personal slite".

[Sally]

5 hours ago, Alamy said:

Hi all,

Just jumping in to hopefully provide some clarity - our Infringements Team focus on two areas of revenue for the images that are marked as exclusive to Alamy:

The first strand is to proactively look for infringements using one of the multiple copyright protection agencies that Alamy has now partnered with.  Our partners use their proprietary software to crawl allocated territories to find infringements which is bringing in increasing revenue month on month and we see this becoming a major source of revenue for exclusive images.

The second strand is the reactive infringements, these are the unauthorised uses of your images that you find, and then report to us to investigate.  This process is now being managed by the Infringements Team, and we will soon be sharing more information with you on the new process, including having a dedicated email address to report infringements to.

Thanks
Alamy

This will be very helpful. The process so far has been pretty confusing. Someone suggested that an ID number is assigned to each case and that would also be very helpful. One thing I wondered about, having received an email today telling me that payment had been made for an infringement but it wouldn’t be reported until the last day of the month. Why do we have to wait as long as a month for such licenses to be reported?

[Cryptoprocta]

On 28/03/2022 at 11:16, meanderingemu said:

Latest which was 14 month old, i was told nah this is a great client they did download it,  we will just ask them to submit usage, likely at current rate and commission schedule, still not done 2 weeks later.....

Let's hope at the very least that it's two strikes and they're, if not 'out' at least charged the rack rate plus a 'fine' to discourage recividism, as per the Muddle.

[Betty LaRue]

I’m happy to have Alamy and partner find my infringements. I have other things to do. Thank you, Alamy, since I had a nice payout, worth more than my last 10 sales put together for an infringement.

I do think these recoveries should be posted straightaways like sales are.

[Michael Ventura]

7 hours ago, Alamy said:

Hi all,

Just jumping in to hopefully provide some clarity - our Infringements Team focus on two areas of revenue for the images that are marked as exclusive to Alamy:

The first strand is to proactively look for infringements using one of the multiple copyright protection agencies that Alamy has now partnered with.  Our partners use their proprietary software to crawl allocated territories to find infringements which is bringing in increasing revenue month on month and we see this becoming a major source of revenue for exclusive images.

The second strand is the reactive infringements, these are the unauthorised uses of your images that you find, and then report to us to investigate.  This process is now being managed by the Infringements Team, and we will soon be sharing more information with you on the new process, including having a dedicated email address to report infringements to.

Thanks
Alamy

 

Aggressively chasing infringements is wonderful and past due, I was very happy to have one listed on my revenue page yesterday.  I do wish I would be contacted first, before pursuing a possible infringement, since many of my stock images have come from assignment work, I would hate to have a client badgered about a misidentified infringement.   As for stock, all my images are exclusive to Alamy.

[meanderingemu]

3 hours ago, Betty LaRue said:

 

I do think these recoveries should be posted straightaways like sales are.

 

 

as long as they get by month end they get paid on same date,

 

I am more concern that @Alamy considers these to be inferior revenue and that they are not included in meeting Level Threshold. 

[meanderingemu]

On 01/04/2022 at 11:33, Alamy said:

Hi all,

Just jumping in to hopefully provide some clarity - our Infringements Team focus on two areas of revenue for the images that are marked as exclusive to Alamy:

The first strand is to proactively look for infringements using one of the multiple copyright protection agencies that Alamy has now partnered with.  Our partners use their proprietary software to crawl allocated territories to find infringements which is bringing in increasing revenue month on month and we see this becoming a major source of revenue for exclusive images.

The second strand is the reactive infringements, these are the unauthorised uses of your images that you find, and then report to us to investigate.  This process is now being managed by the Infringements Team, and we will soon be sharing more information with you on the new process, including having a dedicated email address to report infringements to.

Thanks
Alamy

 

Again thanks for this @Alamy

Reviewing the post, I am curious why there is no proactive search based on images downloaded from Alamy.  I had an image downloaded 14 months ago that had never been licenced, wouldn't that be another easy picking fruit of potential Infringing party using an image without an appropriate licence,  since you have data on the download and the lack of payment.  

 

 

Edited April 4, 2022 by meanderingemu

[Allan Bell]

On 01/04/2022 at 15:33, Alamy said:

The first strand is to proactively look for infringements using one of the multiple copyright protection agencies that Alamy has now partnered with.  Our partners use their proprietary software to crawl allocated territories to find infringements which is bringing in increasing revenue month on month and we see this becoming a major source of revenue for exclusive images.

 

Does this statement mean that Alamy's search partners are ONLY looking for exclusive images. If so then they are missing income from those images fraudulently used which are not exclusive to Alamy. Not all contributors have the time to carry out extensive searches for infringements whereas it is the full time job of Alamy's partners.

 

Allan

 

[meanderingemu]

54 minutes ago, Allan Bell said:

 

Does this statement mean that Alamy's search partners are ONLY looking for exclusive images. If so then they are missing income from those images fraudulently used which are not exclusive to Alamy. Not all contributors have the time to carry out extensive searches for infringements whereas it is the full time job of Alamy's partners.

 

Allan

 

 

I understand that it adds one more validation step, but it seems weird as some are clearly identifiable as Alamy infringement.  My one positive infringement claim, which i submitted,  was not marked exclusive mainly because i forgot so they would not have have processed it without me finding it, However the infringer gave Credit to Alamy and Me (why i found it), and still had Alamy watermark, so this was clearly Alamy Infringement. 

[meanderingemu]

On 01/04/2022 at 17:47, Cryptoprocta said:

Let's hope at the very least that it's two strikes and they're, if not 'out' at least charged the rack rate plus a 'fine' to discourage recividism, as per the Muddle.

 

highly doubtful.  All that happened was the client putting an entry in system like any other usage.  Contributor service could not validate that it actually matched the usage- in fact technically it does not but i am waiting for the promised direct access to Infringement team to report that since contributor service sides with customers.  

(might actually start a discussion on this in the ask Q forum)

Edited April 9, 2022 by meanderingemu

[meanderingemu]

On 01/04/2022 at 11:33, Alamy said:

Hi all,

Just jumping in to hopefully provide some clarity - our Infringements Team focus on two areas of revenue for the images that are marked as exclusive to Alamy:

The first strand is to proactively look for infringements using one of the multiple copyright protection agencies that Alamy has now partnered with.  Our partners use their proprietary software to crawl allocated territories to find infringements which is bringing in increasing revenue month on month and we see this becoming a major source of revenue for exclusive images.

The second strand is the reactive infringements, these are the unauthorised uses of your images that you find, and then report to us to investigate.  This process is now being managed by the Infringements Team, and we will soon be sharing more information with you on the new process, including having a dedicated email address to report infringements to.

Thanks
Alamy

 

Hi @Alamy

 

While we wait for a finalised process could you clarify one thing, let's say I found a usage that seems suspicious to me but is recent 2 weeks, non regular client, no credit, what am i supposed to do to respect section 16.7 of the contract?  

[Alamy]

36 minutes ago, meanderingemu said:

 

Hi @Alamy

 

While we wait for a finalised process could you clarify one thing, let's say I found a usage that seems suspicious to me but is recent 2 weeks, non regular client, no credit, what am i supposed to do to respect section 16.7 of the contract?  

Hi meanderingemu,

 

In this case, we would suggest to email the contributor relations team so they can do their checks on the system and advise you of the next steps.

 

Thanks,

Alamy 

 

 

 

 

[geogphotos]

I found one in early March and don't think that it is a usual Alamy client and no credit.

 

I was told to wait three months. This seems to be different advice to that just given in the post above.

 

What i had hoped was that i would have been told if there had been a download and if the client was known to Alamy.