WWI Photographs & Copyright

[Guest]

Having spoken further with " m' learned friends" here is the latest UK Law... seems pretty clear UK - Duration of Copyright. In layman's terms:

1. If the author is unknown, copyright expires 70 years after the end of the year in which the image was made. Example: where the author of a 1918 photograph is unknown, the copyright expired in 1988. There are 2 caveats:

a. If the author is subsequently identified, this has to happen within the 70 years from the creation of the original photo. In this case the copyright extends to 70 years after the author's death.

b. If the photo is published, copyright extends to 70 years from first publication.

What this means to me is that any archive with WWI era photos where the author is unknown can't claim Copyright unless it was first published after 1941 (2011 less 70 years). From a practical standpoint for WWI researches as long as one can demonstrate an unpublished photo is of the era, copyright would have expired. ...which takes us back to this useful Flow diagram..

In my example, I don't think Archive A, B or C can claim any Copyright unless they had identified an author before 1985 (1915 plus 70 years). Archive D can as the author was identified in the 1960s and died in 1973, so only Archive D has copyright, which lasts until 2043. Archives A, B and C would have to prove archive D waived copyright for their copies......Your honour.

Regards MG

[Tom W.]

Another thought: If my thinking is right and I publish a digital book (with high resolution digital images) using an 70 year expired copyright image (which I paid for), anyone buying the book could copy the image and distribute it...i.e. it become a free object with no claim on it. Hurrah.

Not just a digital book. I recently bought a book by a German author and discovered that he had scanned several images from my 2007 hardback book. You can tell by the individual blemishes and creases in the photos.

I'm not going to do anything about it. The guy obviously knows what he did was wrong, so he'll just laugh at any letter I wrote. Also, since the images are WWI-era postcards, they're in the public domain. Trying to sue him would cost more than any damages awarded.

The extra layer of contempt he has for standards of behavior is the fact that he credits the images to himself. He also took massive amounts of information from my book without footnoting it or crediting me.

(It's a terrible book, by the way. He just regurgitates what several other authors have written. Even with that extremely lazy approach, he still got many of the basics wrong.)

[Guest]

An interesting development.

Archive B acknowledges the existence of the same photos in Archive D but still claims Copyright as it says it is virtually impossible to positively prove authorship of something 100 years ago. It does not appear to understand that authorship needs to be proved by the Copyright claimant, rather than disproved by someone wanting to use the photo. This is a key point. The Archive is assuming provenance without proof, arguably creating a false claim of ownership of copyright to the detriment of the public. Note: it can own a copy, but not the copyright. It would be akin to finding a photo on the floor and claiming copyright.

It is an interesting stance......especially when the photo in question was used in 1930 in the The Regimental History (published in 1930) and attributed to Archive D's collection. The photo is embedded in a continuous, homogeneous set of over 150 photos in chronological order. Strong contextural evidence, recognised by the Regiment as the original source. The Copyright on the photo, having been published in 1930 would have expired in 2000 under UK Copyright Law (70 year rule) if the author is unknown.... but still Archive B claims Copyright. I am waiting a response.....

MG

[Terry_Reeves]

This may help, it also has a section on photographs:

http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/documents/copyright-related-rights.pdf

TR

[David_Blanchard]

Interesting thread, but very confusing.

David

[Moonraker]

Just a postscript to the above: I recently won on eBay the postcard shown in

this other thread

 

Googling for information about the QMAAC at Rollestone, I was led to

 

this page

 

From the damaged top-left corner, you'll see that it's the card I've just won (at a cost of £10.40).

 

I appreciate that Alamy is not seeking a copyright fee, but one relating to the use of an image (or, pedantically, its copy of an original image).

 

Moonraker

[martin_sole]

It's a bit cheeky, but it's still legit.

You could, of course, sell the license for the image that you have as well

[depaor01]

2 hours ago, martin_sole said:

It's a bit cheeky, but it's still legit.

You could, of course, sell the license for the image that you have as well

 

Careful... only if he scans it himself.

 

Crazy really. It would be exactly the same as the Alamy image but Moonraker has made the digital image therefore that collection of pixels is owned by him because he owns the original and he has digitally published it..

 

Dave