Adventure & Outdoor Photography by Mark A. Johnson

Hi Folks,

This week I’m going to discuss the importance of copyright protection to artists and photographers. Quickly, I’ll explain copyright-an artist, musician, or photographer automatically secures copyright in their work when it is created. As soon as I press that shutter button, my photograph is protected by U.S. and International copyright laws. For additional legal protection, I can register that intellectual property with the U.S. Copyright Office, which is something that I do take advantage of. However, even without that extra legal protection, my images are mine and mine alone to do what I want with; I can license them, distribute them to sub-agents, assign them to someone else, or even sell them outright along with the copyright (something I never do, but could if I chose to). I alone decide what to do with my creative works. I use the value of the copyright I own in my photographs to create and maintain an income stream, both through licensing royalties, and print sales.

Now the world wide web, and social media in particular, allows photographers like me to get their work seen like never before by thousands and possibly even millions of new viewers. For instance, someone may see that their friend “Liked” my travel images on Facebook, my wave photographs may be mentioned in a Tweet, or one of my nature photographs could be “pinned” on a Pinterest board. That’s the really great thing about the Internet; my work can spread “virally” around the world without me having to do a thing! The not-so-good-news is that my work can be easily copied from my web page and placed onto other web pages without a link back to my own web page, or even a credit line, therefore depriving me of income from that photograph. Believe me, I’m thrilled that people like my work so much they want to share it with their friends and family, and the majority of people don’t realize that this sharing can lead to unauthorized use and loss of income for artists and photographers. It’s been a problem for creative professionals for years, but it’s recently gotten a lot of new publicity with the huge rise in popularity of Pinterest (the fastest growing social media site yet), where people can grab something from the net and “pin” it onto their “board”. Apparently, most Pinterest users do give credit or a link back to the creator’s web page, but not always, either intentionally or accidently. However, the really big problem with someone pinning a photographer’s work on Pinterest without the photographer’s permission is that Pinterest’s terms of use state that if you upload content to Pinterest, even if it’s not yours, then you’re giving Pinterest permission to distribute, sublicense, and sell that content!

Finally, respecting an artist’s copyright also protects you, the consumer. If a photograph is taken without permission and then pasted all over the web, it then loses most of its intrinsic value. Therefore, value is lost to the creator of the work, as they lose control over, and income from, their own work. And value is lost to the consumer, because what should be unique, is now commonplace. So I protect both of us by registering my photos with the U.S. Copyright Office, and  by only posting smaller photos on my web page. That way, when someone buys or licenses a photo from me, I can guarantee the photograph is a real Mark Johnson image and not a counterfeit!

I’ll finish by referring to a blog post by Greek Geek that I thought raised some really good points about Pinterest, and copyright in general.

Until next time, Aloha!

Mark