Anyone ever use your images without permission?

[egbeachley]

I think Dean may have written it wrong. Placing an item on the internet does not mean the copyright becomes public domain.

But a non-copyrighted image can be used by others, or something of that effect.

[slidekellyslide]

I'm not even sure how they knew my name to attribute the images to in the first place because it's not on my Photobucket account. The only thing I can think of is they contacted the local minor league club (Lincoln Saltdogs) and asked for old images of Lincoln baseball...The Saltdogs contacted me last year through the American Association forum and I gave them the link to my photobucket...they may have passed that info on to the city??

And again, I would have let them use anything they wanted..it was just a bit of a shock to run across a website I didn't even know about where 90% of the images are mine.

[Bridwell]

I hesitate to post images on this forum, because of potential use on other sites. One issue is that a rare item seems more common if everybody has seen it a few times. You might think there are several out there when it is virtually one-of-a-kind. If you ever decide to sell, the item might sell for a lot less.

[bmarlowe1]

Originally Posted by Bridwell

I hesitate to post images on this forum, because of potential use on other sites. One issue is that a rare item seems more common if everybody has seen it a few times. You might think there are several out there when it is virtually one-of-a-kind. If you ever decide to sell, the item might sell for a lot less.

Ron -
What you are saying seems strange to me. Anyone interested in paying high $ for a rare card or photo ought to know if it's really rare or not. Countless re-productions of an image of the T206 Gretzky Wagner have not made anyone think it's less rare (though it is otherwise controversial).

If the item has been sold in an online auction or printed in a catalogue, you can do nothing to prevent it's reproduction, nor can you prevent a previous owner from posting a scan.

Would posting photos of an un-refinished Federal era card table or other valuable antique make people think it is not rare?

[FrankWakefield]

What this fellow here says seems about right...


http://www.templetons.com/brad/copymyths.html


Most folks get what knowledge they have muddled up with trademark and patent law notions. And the Berne Convention and the Digital Millennium Copyright Act have changed some of what folks have stuck in their heads.

I think reading the link above would get most folks on sound footing.

[frankb22]

Had image and entire auction description lifted and used
by someone who was flipping an item I sold them. It pissed
me off at the time and I blocked that person from bidding on
my items going forward. Guy is an active board member here
so he should know better.

[dani0100]

As a copyright and IP attorney, I am always fascinated when some issue arises, combining baseball cards and intellectual property. Here is my take on the legal issues involved with the use of sports card scans, community customs and courtesy notwithstanding.

As others have correctly pointed out, posting an image online does not in any way mean that such an image is in the public domain. It also does not somehow grant anyone a license to do anything in particular with the photo, other than perhaps view it in their web browser.

What is interesting to me is the question of whether someone who makes a scan of a baseball card has actually done anything that is protectable by copyright law. Most of the cards of interest to folks here are so old that the cards themselves are in the public domain. Anything first published in the U.S. before 1923 is now in the public domain, as are any works first published in the U.S. from 1923-1977 without a copyright notice.

So, assuming that a card itself is in the public domain, then is a mechanical scan of the card, which is intended to reproduce as faithful a reproduction as possible, actually protected by copyright? Copyright law requires that some "modicum of creativity" be evidenced in any protected work. Frankly, I am not at all sure that most card scans would meet this requirement. In a traditional camera photograph, there are lots of things like lighting, exposure, and composition, that can combine to create copyrightable elements in a photograph of even the most uncreative of subjects. With scanners, however, the card is pressed flat against the glass, and will almost certainly look exactly the same, no matter who does the scanning. Possibly if some post-scan retouching or optimization is done to the scan, then there would be a "thin" copyright interest in those aspects of the scan, to the extent that they are creative expressions of whomever made the scan. I'm not sure that much attention, however, goes into post-processing of card scans, if at all -- most will simply use an auto-exposure correction tool if they do any post-scan adjusments.

And so, I think it is safe to say that scans of baseball cards that are in the public domain are unlikely to yield their creator any valid copyright interest. If we're talking about scans of newer cards, for example Topps cards, which did feature copyright notices and likely are still protected by copyright, then I think the scan maker and the scan stealer are probably both better off concerning themselves with Topps' lawyers rather than each other.

Regards,
Miguel