BILD infringements?

[Radim]

Well, I think that Alamy won't solve anything (as always) because it doesn't risk anything. In the event of another dispute, he will again transfer the costs to his contributors. Allegedly, 6,000 images with the Bild logo were removed. However, Alamy still offers millions of logo images of various brands. It doesn't bother them at all, the contributor is responsible.
So why would they bother?

 

r.

[Lynchpics]

On 16/04/2024 at 17:24, Phil Robinson said:

Alamy's own submission guidelines.:

"If there’s recognisable property in your image you’ll need a property release in order to sell for commercial use.

Property is not just limited to buildings, it’s anything identifiable that’s copyrighted/trademarked e.g. logos and branded items. This release must be signed by the property or brand owner.
Remember what we said earlier; don’t worry if you don’t have a property release as all of these images can be sold editorially."

 

31 minutes ago, John Mitchell said:

 

Agreed, I don't have that many offenders, but it's definitely time for a logo purge. It would be helpful if Alamy could chime in and explain what their current policy is as it appears to have changed -- i.e. marking these types of images for editorial use only is no longer sufficient. 

 

Yes i have read that Alamy submission advice page before and Alamy even use a photograph with logo's from Pepsi and Coca-Cola to illustrate why you need property releases in order to sell for commercial use. As you pointed out further down that page Alamy then state 'Remember what we said earlier; don’t worry if you don’t have a property release as all of these images can be sold editorially.'

 

This case shows that that advice is now clearly very very wrong.

 

I have one image that was found in the wider sweep that Alamy did after the complaint was issued, it was an image uploaded via the live news portal so was it was 'editorial' and captioned and marked up as being editorial and accepted to be a legitimate news image by the Alamy news team.

 

I agree with John, can Alamy confirm that the advice on their submissions guidelines page is incorrect and a copyright / IP holder can claim against an Alamy contributor who uploads an editorial image that has been correctly captioned, labeled and checked as being for  'editorial use only' using the Alamy Image Manager or Live news upload portal.

 

 

[Steve F]

As someone that has quite a few logos in his portfolio, I'm wondering if the advice is similar to that when we we had various threads on artwork. i.e. logo shouldn't take up the full picture, but should be shown in context.

 

On removal of all images (most of which are legitimately editorial) and trying to recover costs, totally don't agree with this.

[Martin L]

23 minutes ago, Steve F said:

As someone that has quite a few logos in his portfolio, I'm wondering if the advice is similar to that when we we had various threads on artwork. i.e. logo shouldn't take up the full picture, but should be shown in context.

 

Not any more by looks of it e.g

 

On 16/04/2024 at 17:54, Jansos said:

All of the images in question were marked as editorial and were variations of this, taken from different angles. I really can't see where the infringement of IPR is.

 

 

[Phil Robinson]

Still waiting for a reply to my email.

[Nick Hatton]

What high street scene doesn't contain a logo? come on Alamy what can we submit?  

[KitJames]

Some of the photos I have got logos on them and are marked editorial as required.

 

Is it just Alamy, though for BILD? What about elsewhere about this? It's a bit strange if you ask me.

[Dave Richards]

What a sorry state of affairs. In the circumstances I will be working through my port to assemble a list of all suspect images which I will be asking Alamy to delete. Potential loss of revenue for me, but more so (60%) for Alamy. I doubt they will be bothered: given my piddling port it wouldn’t even register.

Edited April 17 by Dave Richards
added text

[John Mitchell]

I've already started deleting images where the logo takes up most of the frame. The question now is what exactly "in context" means? Fortunately, these types of images don't sell often anyway. I occasionally have one license for PU or Presentation use, but that's about it.

[Phil Robinson]

This is one of the images.

 

If that isn't "in context" I don't know what is.

I cannot believe that Bild would have complained about this as an infringement on the copyright of their logo.
If they didn't, the fact that Alamy deleted it, in their words "as a precaution" links me in no way whatsoever with the legal action and there is no legal basis for me being expected to contribute to the costs of the legal action.

Still waiting for a reply to my email.

[Steve F]

1 hour ago, Dave Richards said:

What a sorry state of affairs. In the circumstances I will be working through my port to assemble a list of all suspect images which I will be asking Alamy to delete. Potential loss of revenue for me, but more so (60%) for Alamy. I doubt they will be bothered: given my piddling port it wouldn’t even register.

 

53 minutes ago, John Mitchell said:

I've already started deleting images where the logo takes up most of the frame. The question now is what exactly "in context" means? Fortunately, these types of images don't sell often anyway. I occasionally have one license for PU or Presentation use, but that's about it.

 

Is it not worth waiting for the outcome?

[Brian Yarvin]

Quick question - could this be a trademark issue rather than one of copyright? Might this be Bild protecting their mark?

[John Mitchell]

6 hours ago, Steve F said:

 

 

Is it not worth waiting for the outcome?

 

I'd rather be proactive and get rid of the few "full frame" logo (and logo-ish) images that I have. They just tend to gather dust anyway. I'm not deleting the "in context" ones yet -- i.e. I'll wait for the outcome, which hopefully will eventually come.

 

Edited April 18 by John Mitchell

[John Mitchell]

5 hours ago, Brian Yarvin said:

Quick question - could this be a trademark issue rather than one of copyright? Might this be Bild protecting their mark?

 

I don't know anything about this kind of thing, but I'd guess it's a trademark issue. Copyright is meant to protect the original creator. No?

[Brian Yarvin]

John, exactly what I thought. 

 

Thinking as a photographer instead of a lawyer, I'd say that the Bild logo is part of the reason the photo is marketable - that's their trademark. At some point, for the case to be actionable, it will have to be explained in terms we photographers can understand. In theory at least, we should all know the difference between trademarks and copyrights. Right?

[John Mitchell]

17 minutes ago, Brian Yarvin said:

John, exactly what I thought. 

 

Thinking as a photographer instead of a lawyer, I'd say that the Bild logo is part of the reason the photo is marketable - that's their trademark. At some point, for the case to be actionable, it will have to be explained in terms we photographers can understand. In theory at least, we should all know the difference between trademarks and copyrights. Right?

 

I would think that a "trademark infringement" involves someone illegally using a company's trademark on their products, which is not the case here. But I'm not a lawyer...

 

Useful summary of differences between trademark and copyright here.

[Dave Richards]

10 hours ago, Steve F said:

 

 

Is it not worth waiting for the outcome?

Not really. I’m taking down all full frame images of logos, there aren’t many. I don’t think we are going to get any clarification from Alamy on the issue. I haven’t sold any (yet) so at this stage, better safe than sorry.

[spacecadet]

4 hours ago, Dave Richards said:

I don’t think we are going to get any clarification from Alamy on the issue.

If we don't, this looks less like a contract and more like an ambush.

If Alamy can follow the forums closely enough to take down a years-old much liked thread, it can answer to this.

Edited April 18 by spacecadet

[Dave Richards]

2 hours ago, spacecadet said:

If we don't, this looks less like a contract and more like an ambush.

If Alamy can follow the forums closely enough to take down a years-old much liked thread, it can answer to this.

+1

I could be wrong but time will tell.

[John Mitchell]

4 hours ago, spacecadet said:

If we don't, this looks less like a contract and more like an ambush.

If Alamy can follow the forums closely enough to take down a years-old much liked thread, it can answer to this.

 

Yes, it sounds as if Alamy has been ambushed and decided to just pass the ambush along to some of its contributors. Very disconcerting indeed.

[Jeffrey Isaac Greenberg]

2 thoughts:

 

a. this may be BILD thing now, but if they are successful, others may follow...

 

b. offering a trademark-logo is not yet infringement of a trademark-logo AFAIK

[Harry Harrison]

It's before my time but wasn't there was an issue with a certain air freshener company on here that became rather toxic.

[Michael Ventura]

When watching U.S. TV news, I see logos all the time, used when a company is making news, either in good or bad context and I doubt they are going to each corporate office to get the logo straight from the source.  Sometimes they are just the logo or a photo of the logo out in the "wild", in context with some sort of structure. 

[John Mitchell]

44 minutes ago, Michael Ventura said:

When watching U.S. TV news, I see logos all the time, used when a company is making news, either in good or bad context and I doubt they are going to each corporate office to get the logo straight from the source.  Sometimes they are just the logo or a photo of the logo out in the "wild", in context with some sort of structure. 

 

There are zillions of logos available at certain other stock agencies. This whole thing strikes me as nonsense. 🙄

[Nick Hatton]

1 hour ago, Harry Harrison said:

It's before my time but wasn't there was an issue with a certain air freshener company on here that became rather toxic.

You don't want a toxic air freshener 🤣