I think you are all underestimating the possibilities for gross
stupidity in the American Legal Process. There's nothing in contract law
that says a contract has to be fair to both parties to be legal.
I'll tell you where I've seen this language before. It's boiler plate
for a lot of photo "contests". They offer some prize, sometimes even a
pretty good one, but one of the terms is all entries become the property
of the contest promoter. They get to use your photos for whatever
purpose they choose and you get squat.
Last time I saw this was a Major League Baseball photo contest. Prize
was a new Nikon w/kit lens (D70 at the time IIRC) and a trip to the All
Star game.
THEY got the rights to all the photos you took at the game along with
the rights to all the photos submitted for the contest.
Think you could prevail against MLB in court over this?
You're setting yourself up to get screwed if you can't abide by the
terms of their agreement. There's other places you can photograph dance
without having to put your right to your own work at risk.
Unless, of course, you got someone with big money and high power legal
staff already standing behind you just salivating at the chance to pound
this guy in court PRO BONO.
From: Joseph McAllister
I was most impressed by the claim of ownership over any photographs
"every taken" at their events. Implies they have had this wordy piece
of crap since their event #1, and that anyone with a camera has read
and signed it.
I suspect an amateur organizer who was too cheap to pay a lawyer. The
statement is bogus, and should be ignored as it deserves.
On Aug 19, 2009, at 11:26 , Bob W wrote:
> It's their event, they can make the rules. If it was something I was
> interested in then I would either not take photos or, if I did take
> photos
> and they wanted to exercise their so-called rights I would see how
> far they
> were prepared to go before I decided whether or not to cave in. For
> example,
> if they requested copies I would simply not give them any and see
> what they
> were going to do about it. If it seriously looked as if it was going
> to go
> to court, then I might give them a high quality 20x30-pixel copy,
> with no
> watermark of course. Then we can argue about the meaning of the term
> 'high
> quality'.
>
> I suspect this sort of thing would never get to court - I don't
> think it's
> been drafted by a competent lawyer, and it would be laughed at. For
> example,
> the statement "EBC retains the right" presupposes that they have the
> right
> in the first place, which they don't. Ditto "EBC retains ownership"
> - they
> aren't the owners of your photographs in the first place, so they
> can't
> retain ownership. They might claim it, but unless you expressly give
> ownership away they can go swivel on my pinky.
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