As a published photographer who strongly believes in the right to protect one's copyright I was a little surprised to be on the wrong end of a Getty letter.
I know enough about copyright law to not knowingly infringe, even accidentally.
So, the first I heard about Getty's complaint was from Atradius. It seems all the letters Getty sent went to an old address - personally I would only send this kind of letter signed for...
Anyway, it turns out the image in question is from a hotel booking website I worked with. They supply details and images off the hotels which are advertised on my (now defunct) website. There are thousands of hotels and many more images so obviously I didn't check them. However, I realise that this still possibly constitutes a technical copyright infringement.
BUT, my objection is the images were never actually on my server, they were just linked from the hotel company using inline <img> tags. Now according to a recent EU court case (BestWater International GmbH v Michael Mebes and Stefan Potsch) "framing" an image in such a manner does not constitute an infringement.
So, I want to call Getty out. Tell them if they think they have a case, sue me. Otherwise take a running jump. I'd also like to know where I stand in terms of harassment if they do not desist.
Any help, greatly appreciated. Thanks
I know enough about copyright law to not knowingly infringe, even accidentally.
So, the first I heard about Getty's complaint was from Atradius. It seems all the letters Getty sent went to an old address - personally I would only send this kind of letter signed for...
Anyway, it turns out the image in question is from a hotel booking website I worked with. They supply details and images off the hotels which are advertised on my (now defunct) website. There are thousands of hotels and many more images so obviously I didn't check them. However, I realise that this still possibly constitutes a technical copyright infringement.
BUT, my objection is the images were never actually on my server, they were just linked from the hotel company using inline <img> tags. Now according to a recent EU court case (BestWater International GmbH v Michael Mebes and Stefan Potsch) "framing" an image in such a manner does not constitute an infringement.
So, I want to call Getty out. Tell them if they think they have a case, sue me. Otherwise take a running jump. I'd also like to know where I stand in terms of harassment if they do not desist.
Any help, greatly appreciated. Thanks