Such great news today for anyone producing images, whether professional photographers or not. The ‘orphan works’ part of the proposed digital economy bill has been dropped by the government.
What is ‘orphan works’?
Basically, any image could potentially be (ab)used without the permission or even knowledge of the person owning that image. This doesn’t just apply to professional photographers that rely on copyright for their income but to ALL individuals who at any time have released ANY image in any form. Imagine posting a photograph of your child on Facebook and seeing that image used in a commercial poster campaign without your permission.. that is what ‘Clause 43′ could have led to.
For detailed information on this visit the stop43.org.uk site.
Quite amusingly, the current government had provided the best argument against clause 43 by using an image owned by the BBC without their consent and altering it for use in an anti Conservative poster. But even more significant was the fact that the BBC themselves are one of the supporters of this ‘money grabbing’ clause. They couldn’t see the wood for the trees, so how could this possibly benefit the public?
There are other parts of the digital economy bill that are being debated, including clause 18 that would permit the disconnection of internet customers found to be downloading files but as a photographer that relies 100% on the right for me to own my images with clients that rely 100% on their right to data protection, I am just glad that clause 43 has been sunk.
