Oscar Michelen and I am more than willing to be a quoted sources on this subject.
I would focus on the following points:
Vincent K. Tylor does not work alone. He is in cahoots with Glen Carner of Hawaiian Art Network (HAN) and collection lawyers that work on a 50/50 or 60/40 split.
HAN and other stock photo companies brag about how their extortion letter program (they don't call it that of course) has helped their business tremendously. What they don't tell you is they don't simply recover and collect actual damages like most businesses do. They intentionally inflate it as high as their victims will bear up to $10,000 per image. We have proof of this in our HAN letter collection.
Also, why is it that Vincent Tylor's name keeps popping up repeatedly? Is it because his Hawaiian photos are so superior to everyone else? Or is it because he has allowed them to be disseminated to all these free wallpaper sites and discovered how profitable it is for people to take the images and then hit them later on a technicality.
Why is it that if this was such a crisis to Vincent Tylor, why has he not issued any public statement about it? How convenient of him to be silent about it.
Regarding his network of copyright lawyers, I venture to say that most are collection lawyers who happen to enjoy copyright infringement cases where they can enjoy a 50/50 or 60/40 split. This is why settlements have to go into the thousands of dollars to justify the payment splits.
These outrageous settlements are considered revenue and sales and it has been referred to as such by the various stock photo companies, not recovered costs. It is a profit center, not an entry to offset actual losses.
The stock photo companies are NOT thriving. Articles have discussed the troubles of the stock photo companies. Demand have dropped over the years and market values of images have dropped because it has become commoditized. There is simply a huge abundance of images available fighting for an audience resistant to paying a high cost for them. The photography industry is no longer as lucrative as it once was but almost no one wants to admit to this. They keep blaming piracy which is only one part of this. All the media companies are suffering because of the Internet: newspaper, radio, tv, cable, music, stock photos, images, etc.
There is extreme avoidance of discussions of innocent infringement because no one wants to acknowledge the $200/infringement provision. They keep wanting to publicize how if it goes to court, there could be award of $30,000/infringement and if willful $150,000/infringement. The reality is there are nearly no copyright infringement final judgments that support this. The couple that are out there by RIAA have been drastically reduced although it is still being fought.
The extortion letter scheme works because it takes advantage of people's inherent ignorance of the legal process and fear of the court system. There are ongoing lies, bluffs, and deception being told to lead victims to believe that lawsuits will occur when the fact is, it almost NEVER occurs. It is based on ambiguity and implied threats.
Also, the reporter should know ELI was under attack and threats by multiple HAN lawyers to have content removed from the ELI website. Nearly all of them coincidentally were dealing with VKT's images.
VKT claims he isn't involved. Well, he got involved when he signed his name to the recent lawsuits against 3 Hawaiian defendants.
There really are many talking points. The stock photo companies are not as honorable as they seem. And there are most certainly some dirty hands in the game. This is why ELI continues to fight so hard to report despite the HAN lawyers attempts to suppress and hide it.
Topic: Reporter to do story about HAN / Vincent K Tylor (link to emails from Vincent) (Read 9494 times)