Photographers in Manchester are voicing their opposition to new government law which allows the use of photographs if the copyright owner cannot be contacted.
The Enterprise and Regulatory Reform Act, which became law last month, licenses ‘orphan’ works for use by anyone as long as they have performed a ‘diligent search’ for the copyright holder.
‘Orphan’ works are photographs or other similar creative art which have an unknown copyright owner.
An e-petition opposing the legislation and labelling it ‘legalised theft’ has attracted nearly 20,000 signatures.
The usage of ‘orphan’ works have increased in recent years, especially due to the rise in use of social media sites such as Facebook and Twitter.
Terry McNamara, a freelance photographer based in Manchester, said: “I’m not happy about it at all.
“Any time you upload images to sites like Facebook it strips off all the excess data which contains all the copyright information.
He said the issues surrounding photos being taken from the internet was a big problem.
“It’s not a new problem – I just think this new act will make it even more of a problem,” he added.
However, the government stressed the powers in the act would make copyright licensing more efficient.
An Intellectual Property Office spokesperson from the Department of Business, Innovations and Skills (BIS) said: “They are intended to help remove unnecessary barriers to the legitimate use of works while preserving the interests of rights holders.
“The powers do not remove copyright for photographs or any other works subject to copyright – nor do they allow anyone to use a copyright work without permission and free of charge,” they said.
“If a work is licensed following the verification of the diligent search, there will be a licence fee payable up-front for its use. The fee will be set at the going rate.”
Although Mr McNamara’s work is largely commercial, he admits his vintage modelling material would be ‘very very desirable’ to those looking to reproduce his images.
He said: “It’s very easy to watermark images before you publish them online but people do copy and paste and borrow images from Facebook and re-upload them.
“Watermarking does help but it also spoils the look of your image. I watermark my images in a corner and it’s very easy to remove that.”
Although professional bloggers could stand to benefit from the change in law, there is still concern among some who feel it is morally questionable.
Kate Feld, a Manchester-based blogger, said: “I’m actually appalled by this. I may be a blogger who sources images to illustrate my site, but I’m also a writer, so copyright is really important to me.
“The idea that someone could grab original content of any kind – and license it for commercial work especially – seems wrong.
“There will always be irresponsible people who want to cut corners when publishing online, but bloggers need to be responsible for sourcing images they have permission to use and crediting the photographer responsible.”
Picture courtesy of Dominic’s pics, via Flickr, with thanks.
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