The Ending to it??

[thehat]

Hi all "Gettied" persons,
I am being "Gettied" at the moment and will be reaching the Atradius Collections stage soon, I have no doubt...as I refuse to pay the extortionate demand (dispute the bill)...but have made offers...without prejudice....and I'll not bore you with the usual details.
I have spent, as many of my fellow sufferers, large amounts of time reading and researching all this.
I just wondered...I read loads of "I got a letter" starts....but I haven't seen any "endings"...i.e. what happened at the end of the process??
Do Getty / Atradius Collections just stop, if you ignore them?
How long do they go on for?
Have people just paid them off...and do they come back for more...like extortionist do (allegedly)?
Any one out there have any happy / unhappy endings to share??
As I'm not the first to suffer this, it would be helpful to know (from people with the experience) where this story is going to end up??
The End??

[Robert Krausankas (BuddhaPi)]

I'm not sure about UK law, but in the states, the statute of limitations is 3 yrs.. They can no longer harass you after that, and at that point it is perfectly within your rights to tell them to shag off..then again I suppose you could tell them that at any time..

[DavidVGoliath]

There's no statute of limitations in the UK for claims of copyright infringement claims; this is established case law that was taken all the way up to the High Court in 2006, when keyboard player Matthew Fisher won the right to be recognised as one of three authors of the song "A Whiter Shade of Pale", which was originally released in 1967. The judge also granted Fisher a 40% right to future royalties.

So, that's a case that spans almost forty years from the creation of the work to the judgement in favour of Fisher. For as long as the work is covered by copyright (life of author + 70 years for photographs), a claim can be brought at any time.

[thehat]

So do they just give up if you hold tight and move on to the next victim that might just pay up easily?
This would be good to know for future victims, as well as myself.

[lucia]

DavidVGoliath,
The 3 year statute of limitations issue in the US is particular to a specific individual infringement. The copyright holder must sue within 3 years of discovering that specific violation.  This is important with the Getty letters since individuals know that if a copyright holder contacts them but then doesn't sue, the statute of limitations for that specific claim discussed in the letter has lapsed. But no other potential claims have lapsed.

A claim to be recognized as one of the authors and so gain copyright protection is different. I think that would have no statute of limitations here either.

There's no statute of limitations in the UK for claims of copyright infringement claims; this is established case law that was taken all the way up to the High Court in 2006, when keyboard player Matthew Fisher won the right to be recognised as one of three authors of the song "A Whiter Shade of Pale", which was originally released in 1967. The judge also granted Fisher a 40% right to future royalties.

So, that's a case that spans almost forty years from the creation of the work to the judgement in favour of Fisher. For as long as the work is covered by copyright (life of author + 70 years for photographs), a claim can be brought at any time.

[DavidVGoliath]

I had to dig around to get the information, but it turns out that the statement citing there was no limits on the time that could elapse before bringing a copyright claim in the UK courts was made in the House of Lords back in 2009

Although Fisher won his case in 2006 and was granted 40% of all future royalties of the song, the defendants - singer Gary Brooker and songwriter Keith Reid- were given leave to appeal. In 2008, Booker and Reid took their case to the Court of Appeal, where it was ruled that Fisher had waited too long to bring his case, and the copyrights / royalties reverted to Booker and Reid alone.

That's not where it ended, though, as Fisher was then given leave to appeal the case to the House of Lords.

During the appeal in the Lords, it was Lord Hope that specifically said there there were no time limits under English law in copyright claims, and he and the four other Law Lords on the panel reversed the appeal, granting Fisher both his authorship and 40% cut of future royalties. As the song was published in 1967, Fisher will continue to receive royalties until 2047.

The defendants were left with no higher court to appeal to, thus rendering the Law Lords ruling as final.

[thehat]

I see. So forever then. No end, until they get sick of it, in the UK. I'm learning a lot from ELI members.
I might be changing the point of this thread here but...
So would your opinions with experience be not to communicate with any of them? I have just read "My proposed Getty letter response and settlement offer" from timtime 2012 which seems to suggest a couple of careful reply letters and then no more...."send proof that you manage the image and that I am infringing and I'll consider making a reasonable offer." and Matthew Chan says..."after covering yourself doing the the requisite due diligence, of course"... " Debating back and forth with collection clerks endlessly is a waste of time here.  People keep forgetting they are dealing with persons who really have no real authority."

[DavidVGoliath]

I see. So forever then. No end, until they get sick of it, in the UK.

From a statutory standpoint, that's correct - so long as the entity has permission from the author to pursue a claim on their behalf. (FYI, such a clause is written into Getty's contracts)

So would your opinions with experience be not to communicate with any of them?

Here's an opinion of how you can effect a positive outcome; it's possible that you might be able to track down the individual photographer who created the work and offer to pay them directly for the past use.

Believe it or not, the majority of photographers aren't an adversarial bunch. We like to create, we like it when our work is licensed - and we hate dealing with the hassle of infringements. It's time-consuming, frustrating and overall a "negative" aspect of our business interests. If someone came to me and said "Hey, I used one of your pictures and would like to pay for it" then that opens up a wholly different dialogue and attendant possibilities.

Of course, there's also that chance that the shot was created by a staff photographer, or that tracking the actual author of the shot is difficult, in which case dealing with Getty (or similar) may well be your only option.

[thehat]

Interesting! I've sent you a PM on the matter...I know certain eyes are watching...