Breach of Copyright - The Independent

Since I jumped onto the Twitter bandwagon, I haven't looked back! Twitter continues to be a fountain of relative information I find both entertaining and educational. A recent tweet I read was titled "Breach of Copyright - The Independent" and led me to photographer Peter Zabulis.

Peter Zabulis, also known as PeteZab on Flickr, claims the "Independent", a national and commercial newspaper in the UK used the Flickr API to search for and display images of snow scenes, which included one of his images marked as “all rights reserved" on his Flckr site. He also includes his dialogue with the Editorial Director for Digital at The Independent. For a fascinating and lively read of this discussion as it is was unfolding, with currently over 21,000 views and 184 comments, check Peter's Flickr site at http://www.flickr.com/photos/petezab/

I mentioned in his comment section how images of mine from Flickr have been used commercially without my consent or knowledge at the time. Personally, I upload only low resolution images but do grant permission to the 'search feature' on the Flickr API. I do not upload images I have sold to clients or any other work I wouldn't want to be reproduced.

I'm not a lawyer and don't claim to know much about copyright law, but in the very least I would like to be asked if one of my images could be used and credit given to me as the photographer, which I have obliged to before. Kudos to Peter Zabulis for engaging what must be one of the most interesting and debated discussions I have read on Flickr!

A special thanks to Jim Goldstein at JMG Galleries for his recent inclusion of my image "Respect" in their "Best Photos of 2009" list! There are some very good images to be viewed here and I am happy to be included!


Update link posted by Peter Zabulis via Twitter