----- Original Message ----- From: "Tom C" Subject: Re: DMCA Takedown (was Stolen Photos)
> > I'm not suggesting that a lab owner or worker should not be aware of the > issue or somewhat concerned. I'm more or less suggesting (if I know what > I'm trying to say) that *strict and rigid* adherence to the letter of the > law would likely make the lab and it's employees unproductive as well as > less likeable. Unfortunately, rigid adherence is all we can do as lab operators. You either obey the law or you disobey the law, there really isn't a gray area here. And yes, it does make the lab less productive and the employees less likable, but the alternative, if a photographer decides to go fishing for a violation and catches one is a lab that is a heck of a lot poorer because of the fine, and more than likely an out of work employee. > > It's a crime to steal personal property, but Costco and other mass market > photo finishers set a customer's copyrighted material out in an > unmonitored > bin after processing it, for the convenience of both the store and the > customer, allowing anyone to walk by and pickup someone else's photos. > > 1. Most "photographers" wouldn't take serious work there to begin with. > 2. However, if the lab had the responsibiliy to protect copyrighted > material > from being copied, what about protecting the original copyrighted work > itself from being pilfered or misapproriated? The customer also has a responsibility to look at a Costco method of treating customer property the same as it treats a loaf of bread and deciding if the risk of theft is worth the cost benefit of leaving work at that lab. > > I'm saying that common sense factors in here somewhere. Traffic police > who > ARE law enforcement don't look for and don't stop each and every violator. > They deliberately ignore some and forgive others. It may be that they are > on their way to jelly donuts and coffee, or that they are not robots but > simply humans, as I suspect most lab employees are (simply human). > Common sense stopped factoring in when the people who wrote the copyright act didn't put in a clause forcing the copyright owner to mark his work as such. For lab employees, the copyright law is a driftnet that you swim into at your own peril. You might swim out, or you might not. William Robb -- PDML Pentax-Discuss Mail List [email protected] http://pdml.net/mailman/listinfo/pdml_pdml.net
