One of the more challenging issues for writers, photographers, and other creatives is the fair use provision of the U.S. Copyright Law. Essentially, fair use allows you to use someone else’s copyrighted work without permission. But how much of the work and under what circumstances? That question can be hard to answer. Attorney Kathryn Goldman [...]
Plagiarize: to steal and pass off (the ideas or words of another) as one’s own; use (another’s production) without crediting the source (Merriam-Webster) Recently Vice-President-Elect Kamala Harris was accused of plagiarizing a story told by Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. President-Elect Joe Biden has been accused of plagiarism several times. Pulitzer Prize winner Alex Haley [...]
Over the years, I’ve worked with authors and clients whose interest in and understanding of copyrights range from oblivious to obsessed. In my opinion, extremes are only good when chocolate is involved. When it comes to copyrights, having a basic knowledge of the terms and related legal principles will help you protect your work, keep [...]
Free photo sites are not always free Camera manufacturers like to share images taken with their equipment, so it was understandably awkward when Canon Italy and Canon Spain shared a photo shot with a Fuji X-T1 on all their social media accounts. Then it got worse. Turns out Canon took the image from a website [...]
Do photographers really get a kick out of suing people? Of course not. But they deserve to be paid for their work. If you use their images without permission or compensation, you might get sued. Photographer John Aldred posted a great blog on diyphotography.net about an “internet entrepreneur” who seems to think that artists put [...]
Your customer mailing list is one of your most valuable assets. It’s the foundation of your ability to communicate with the people you’ve identified as customers or potential customers. Whether you market by email, direct (snail) mail or a combination, think about this: What would it mean to your marketing plan specifically and your company [...]
Do you use content that you did not create on your blog, website or elsewhere? By content, we mean articles and other copy; photographs and other types of images; audio; video and so on. If any of your content is not original, you need to be sure you have the right to use it. If you [...]
You’re getting ready to post a blog and you need an image. You’re in a hurry, so you do a Google search on “free images for blogs.” And you get 371 million results, but not all of those sources are for photos that are really free--and few meet your needs. So you try again, searching [...]
We uploaded a video to YouTube and were shocked when someone immediately lodged a copyright claim against us for the music we used. We have written before about how important it is to either own or acquire the rights to use the material on your website. The same applies to anything you post online, including [...]
When you “borrow” something without permission, it’s not borrowing — it’s stealing. And if you’re a developer of a mall, hotel and entertainment project estimated to cost between $300 and $400 million, there’s no excuse for using images on your website that you found online and posted without permission or compensation. Apparently Orlando Sentinel writers [...]
