Let’s consider MySpace as a comparison. MySpace is owned by News Corporation (Rupert Murdock). If MySpace had such rights grabbing language in their user agreement, News Corporation would be able to use photographs posted on MySpace in all of their publications around the world without paying a cent and without telling us.

Now consider if Microsoft purchased FaceBook. Microsoft would have all the rights to the images we posted on FaceBook. They could use them as a wallpaper or screensaver or on product packaging for the next release of Windows without notifying a sole or paying a dime.

Is it fair for multi-billion dollar international companies to make such a rights grab? I am not saying any of these things will happen. I am saying all of these things are legally permitted with their user agreement. Why should we subject ourselves to that?

Many people make a living by licensing rights to photographs and other intellectual property. I personally refuse to give such broad rights to anyone for free. Others will make their own choice.

Cheers!

It is not my intent to use paranoid language. It is my intent to make the people aware that this matter affects the average citizen as much as it affects the creative professional. It won’t necessarily take away their livelihood, but it will grossly limit the protections afforded them today against copyright infringement. This legislation affects every person who takes a photograph, paints a picture, creates a video, makes a sound recording, writes prose on blogs, etc. Personal blogs that get lifted and passed around on the internet can be used with impunity if it matches someone’s needs. The same with video clips, photographs, sound recordings, etc.

The Orphan Works legislation erodes our copyright protections by removing the statutory and punitive deterrents that protect us today. And it shifts the responsibility for discovering infringement from the infringing party to the author. Commercial use of any copyrighted work simply has no place in Orphan Works.

The spirit of Orphan Works is preservation of history and public display for the public good. I wholly support those causes. Commercial parties want to make the most money at the least expense. They have no concern for either of these causes. Even the low cost of microstock would be traded for free use if it increases the bottom line. The Orphan Works legislation being considered today is not the ideal solution to the spirit for which it is intended. Modifying the exemptions under the “Fair Use” statutes of existing Copyright Law is a much more appropriate solution to the spirit of Orphan Works.

The idea that companies would want to steal your private vacation photos of your children and use them to endorse things that you don’t agree with is pure paranoia. This contradicts all concepts of fair use and current legislation and would certainly be fought in courts if anyone tried it, regardless of any loops that someone thought this bill allowed. This bill does not negate slander and libel laws, so such suggestions are purely made to generate an irrational emotional response, and are biased propaganda.

The spirit of this bill is quite clear and will allow many works that have been unclaimed for years to be shared. This fosters creativity and ingenuity and is a good thing. The real thing you want to look into is how to make sure you aren’t separated from your works, so you want to make sure if someone is using your photos or writings that you are being credited. You should also look into how to use metadata and other embedding techniques to keep your attributes in your works. Also this bill will fund some very useful technology to allow image search and recognition so that if someone steals one of your pictures and slightly modifies it so that they remove your attributes then you can still find it and stop them from using it without your permission.

I’ve discussed these issues without the propaganda at my blog - http://knowtocompete.blogspot.com/2008/05/orphaned-works-act-and-you.html