Copyright Infringement Help!!!

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vernychops

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Name
Vern
Edit My Images
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I have just found one of my images being used on a major multinational clothing company website, they have not contacted me or even credited the image to me.
I created the image in July 2012 and is definitely my picture. It’s a stitch together image of the world record jump of a BMXer at the festival of speed.
Can anyone help me as to the way to approach the company. What I can claim if any etc.
It’s on the Hungarian version of their global network of websites so there could be a bit of a language barrier.

Many thanks, Vern
 
Welcome to TP :wave:

A search on here and the business forum will find you loads of threads regarding this with oodles of advice on how (and how not) to proceed.
 
to be honest if its out of the uk you are knackered in terms of enforcing it anyway , so all you can do is send them a polite request for either cease and desist or payment to use. If they ignore you its not really going to be worth trying to take action in a hungarian court.

that said DC shoes are a multinational , and their british website is here http://www.dcshoes-uk.co.uk/Call-Us/customer-service-call-us,en_GB,pg.html so you could try contacting them (allthough i pretty much predict that they will say the actions of the hungarian subsidary are not their concern)

edit: all the DC shoes domains appear to be registered to Emerald Coast at 162 rue Belharra 64500 Saint Jean de Luz France , and the english language sites say that the operable law for site content is french law. - although to be honest I wouldnt fancy trying to take an action in a french court either
 
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firstly take a screen grab to prove it with the date/time window in the same shot

then there's a internet time machine thingy that should tell you when they put it online

use that thread as guidance above and make a quote accordingly, then send invoice with letter etc

drew
 
vernychops said:
I cant find any contact details.
Click to expand...

:thinking:

kontakt_dc.jpg


As this reflects on DC Shoes, you might want to CC them into any correspondence with their Hungarian distributor.
 
big soft moose said:
to be honest if its out of the uk you are knackered in terms of enforcing it anyway , so all you can do is send them a polite request for either cease and desist or payment to use. If they ignore you its not really going to be worth trying to take action in a hungarian court.

that said DC shoes are a multinational , and their british website is here http://www.dcshoes-uk.co.uk/Call-Us/customer-service-call-us,en_GB,pg.html so you could try contacting them (allthough i pretty much predict that they will say the actions of the hungarian subsidary are not their concern)

edit: all the DC shoes domains appear to be registered to Emerald Coast at 162 rue Belharra 64500 Saint Jean de Luz France , and the english language sites say that the operable law for site content is french law. - although to be honest I wouldnt fancy trying to take an action in a french court either
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Subsidiary or not the company will want to limit any damage to its brand. They will pass on the request.
 
you'd think wouldnt you

in my experience companies like this will diagnose that they can take the pee because they are huge and the photographer is tiny - and the larger they are the less likely they are to pay up, and since in this case their website isnt even governed by english law they'll (correctly) think that the op isnt going to have the resources to pursue this in a foreign court
 
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vernychops said:
Hi Steve, thanks for the reply. I have looked through a few threads and there is some good advise but I'm kinda stumped at the first hurdle as I said its a Hungarian website and I cant find any contact details. Even translated most of the links are images so don't get translated.

if anyones interested take a look here.

http://dcshoes.hu/hirek/750_kye_forte_megdontotte_a_8220high_air8221_vilagrekordjat#
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Sorry Vern, I mis-read part of your original post and thought you'd said it was also on their Hungarian site (as in not just on their Hungarian site). Apologies for that but you've had as good suggestions already as I would have given :)
 
Here's an idea use the image to your advantage, screen grab there page, stick it on your website and tell the world your image is used on the site, part of quicksilver, dc shoes, etc.
 
I had an image of mine stolen from a posting I had put on 500px and then re-posted for sale on a company web site on Facebook. I reported it to Facebook and within 3 hours they had closed the offending company's page. Now in this day and age you have to say that's impressive!
James
 
Thanks everyone for your input and effort I’ve taken this all on board.
Well I’ve had a look on Getty and a similar file is £39 - 413 px, 3-month use for Web & Mobile, so £78 for 6 months, not a lot but it would pay for my day out.
I don’t think they would keep the image there once I contact them as the guy in the shot broke his own high jump record not 3 weeks later so as an editorial piece the image and article is way past its sell by date.
Craig, I like what you’re saying but two wrongs don’t make a right,(what if there was a Getty image in there..hmm.,.tin and worms come to mind). But if I hit a dead end from them I could say , that I’m prepared to waive the fees in this instance if they grant permission for me to use the screen grab for my own promotional purposes as a photographer, Quid pro quo as they say. Anyway it’s time for action I’m gonna fire off a few emails and see what happens.
 
jbw said:
I had an image of mine stolen from a posting I had put on 500px and then re-posted for sale on a company web site on Facebook. I reported it to Facebook and within 3 hours they had closed the offending company's page. Now in this day and age you have to say that's impressive!
James
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The cheek!! Good to see that FB are standing by us togs. but then again our pics are theirs on FB:rules:
 
vernychops said:
Craig, I like what you’re saying but two wrongs don’t make a right,(what if there was a Getty image in there..hmm.,.tin and worms come to mind). But if I hit a dead end from them I could say , that I’m prepared to waive the fees in this instance if they grant permission for me to use the screen grab for my own promotional purposes as a photographer, Quid pro quo as they say
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Let's be clear on this, unless you have explicitly waived your right to be credited for your image (which, obviously, you haven't), you're entitled to take the credit that should have been given to you in the first instance. It isn't a 2nd wrong, it's a redress of their wrong. Unless you agree with them differently, you're entitled to a negotiated fee AND credit for your image.

Just saying.
 
I sent emails outlining the infringement together with an invoice on Sunday night, it’s now Monday morning and they have removed /replaced my image and changed the article. So they were on to that pretty sharpish then!! Not quite got the time to reply to me tho as No reply from the Hungarian distributor and just an automated response from DC Europe. I gave a 30 day payment time so I’ll just sit and wait, I’m not holding my breath.
Is it worth posting a hard copy to Hungary?
Simon, you are right I am entitled within the legal framework of society to remuneration but these big corps think they are above or beyond that, we’re just little people, ants under their feet. It would be different story if I went into their store and took a pair of shoes and claimed redress of a wrong. Ha that would be a good publicity stunt if I had the balls. I will be using this as much to my advantage as possible, a press pass to this year’s festival of speed would be a good start.
I usually deal with people in a jolly and relaxed atmosphere but that’s weddings and portraits, so this is a whole new ball game for me, I appreciate all your words it’s a good learning experience.:thankyou:
Just for reference it was my flickr page the offending image was liberated from. So if you don’t want this to happen it might be worth watermarking your pics on there, or if you do .., there are success stories, this being one we’ll have to wait and see how it pans out, any predictions any one..
 
Seems they changed the picture again. I don’t know if they are trying to make out it’s a daily rolling news page or what so I tried the internet time machine to find historic entries but that held no results but a simple Google search of the URL yielded an historic result of 2 Aug 2012. So proof it’s been live for at least five months.

I just found this on their US site about copyright. Note the bit about “respect and honor the intellectual property of others”

5. NOTICE OF COPYRIGHT INFRINGEMENT
We respect and honor the intellectual property of others. If you believe that your work has been copied and is accessible on the Website in a way that constitutes copyright infringement, please provide our copyright agent with the following information:
(1) Identification of the copyrighted work claimed to have been infringed;
(2) Identification of the allegedly infringing material on the Website that is requested to be removed;
(3) Your name, address, and daytime telephone number, and an e-mail address if available, so that we may contact you if necessary;
(4) A statement that you have a good faith belief that the use of the copyrighted work is not authorized by the copyright owner, its agent, or the law;
(5) A statement that the information in the notification is accurate and, under penalty of perjury, that the signatory is authorized to act on behalf of the owner of an exclusive copyright right that is allegedly infringed; and
(6) An electronic or physical signature of the copyright owner or someone authorized on the owner's behalf to assert infringement of copyright and to submit the statement.
Our copyright agent for notice of claims of copyright infringement on the Website is DC's General Counsel, who can be reached as follows:
General Counsel, Americas
15202 Graham Street
Huntington Beach, CA 92649

I don't have a copyright agent (who does ..any one) but i'm gonna send the infringement notice and invoice there and see what happens.
 
Keep at it - they may employ silence or delay tactics to make you go away.
In the meantime, as pointed out above, start making headway with having your image used by them.
Get as much "airtime" as you can to help promote yourself.
And you're still able to file a small court claim against them in the UK - your place of residence is all that matters, not which international website made use of the image.
 
PJ S said:
And you're still able to file a small court claim against them in the UK
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Small but important distinction: patents county court, small claims track.

We've covered this recently in other threads and determined that the small claims court is essentially incompetent in these matters. It's not worth going there.
 
SimonH said:
Small but important distinction: patents county court, small claims track.

We've covered this recently in other threads and determined that the small claims court is essentially incompetent in these matters. It's not worth going there.
Click to expand...

Thanks for that Simon, appreciated.
I've had a response from the UK and Ireland country manager he is investigating the matter and will get back to me. So things are progressing.
 
I work for a national company, our marketing dept once accidentally used a photo we didn't have permission for. It was taken down sharpish once the mistake was spotted.

Not saying its right but sometimes it's just monkey human error. Not all businesses are rights stealing monsters :)
 
neil_g said:
I work for a national company, our marketing dept once accidentally used a photo we didn't have permission for. It was taken down sharpish once the mistake was spotted.

Not saying its right but sometimes it's just monkey human error. Not all businesses are rights stealing monsters :)
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I can understand the human error argument but procedures need to be followed, it's someone's wages being docked. Did you pay for the usage you had or did it not come to that?
 
vernychops said:
I can understand the human error argument but procedures need to be followed, it's someone's wages being docked. Did you pay for the usage you had or did it not come to that?
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Not saying procedures don't need to be followed and steps taken. Just saying it could be a genuine mistake and going in guns blazing with threatening courts etc may increase friction.

In our instance I believe the IP owner was satisfied it was a genuine mistake and sufficient remedial steps were taken with procedure. I also believe the IP owner got some work out of it. So try and turn it to your advantage :)
 
LoL - I remember one place i worked , a few employers ago, our webmaster sent a memo round the whole staff saying that all jpgs found on the net were copyright free :eek: (He'd confused himself by reading about the status of .jpeg as a format i think) - I was on holiday at the time.

This led to nearly all the staff merrily lifting jpegs off the net and using them willy and indeed nilly on the new webpages :bang:

It was only when i returned from holiday and raised the question with the big boss that the brown stuff hit the fan - i then got the wonderfuly exciting job (:bonk:) of spending about 2 weeks off and on going through our web pages deleting stuff we didnt have copyright for and replacing it with our own photos or paid for stock.
 
Update: I’ve ad a reply from the Uk & Ireland country manager he said he will investigate the matter and get back to me asap, and a reply from the Head of marketing of Europe He said this “and I received a mail from Drew about a Kye Forte pic you did and used by one of our distributor.
I understand your surprise, so I'm … So we will check how it happened as it's a Distributor and hard to control. I will investigate and come back to you
Sorry for that,”
They haven’t mentioned where I need to go to lodge the invoice of whether it’s their responsibility, surely head of marketing for Europe is the man. Hungary is Europe isn't it?
 
vernychops said:
Update: I’ve ad a reply from the Uk & Ireland country manager he said he will investigate the matter and get back to me asap, and a reply from the Head of marketing of Europe He said this “and I received a mail from Drew about a Kye Forte pic you did and used by one of our distributor.
I understand your surprise, so I'm … So we will check how it happened as it's a Distributor and hard to control. I will investigate and come back to you
Sorry for that,”
They haven’t mentioned where I need to go to lodge the invoice of whether it’s their responsibility, surely head of marketing for Europe is the man. Hungary is Europe isn't it?
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they said it is one of there distributor's that mean they supply stock to them
so not dc shoes fault
so you would have to send invoice to the distributor not the show dc shoe's them selfs

instead of pushing the invoice why not ask for some free back stage passes to the next event the help run they dont cost them a penny half the time , and see if you can get talking to dc direct you might even get some work of it dont push to hard a good thing may come of this if your lucky
 
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Yeh that’s an option, if getting paid for the image use proves difficult, then forsaking the short term profit against long term opportunities would be passable even preferable looking at the big picture.
 
I would imagine that any DC franchise will have obligations regarding corporate integrity, reputation etc. possibly including fines by DC for transgressions. My understanding is that Burger King, for example, has its own inspectorate, mystery shoppers etc, and penalises franchise holders for their sins.

I should imagine that DC will handle your complaint directly with you, and will deal with (recover the cost, issue a fine or whichever) their franchise holder internally.
 
SimonH said:
I would imagine that any DC franchise will have obligations regarding corporate integrity, reputation etc. possibly including fines by DC for transgressions. My understanding is that Burger King, for example, has its own inspectorate, mystery shoppers etc, and penalises franchise holders for their sins.

I should imagine that DC will handle your complaint directly with you, and will deal with (recover the cost, issue a fine or whichever) their franchise holder internally.
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I wouldn't count on any of that to be honest.
 
yep - many big companies really don't give a good **** about the rights of the small guy, because in all honesty how much damage can this do their reputation - the OP isnt likely to be able to pursue a hungarian company in a Uk court (and even if he does how is the court going to make them pay ? ) and the main corporation can just deny responsibility and blame the hungarian distributor.

and as per publicity , this isnt likely to make national press for the same reason (except maybe the photoprss who DC probably don't care about) , and even if it does make something like the Daily heil in a small way , is it likely the average reader will even understand the issue, let alone be influenced not to buy their product.

Its not like say finding horsemeat in a beefburger
 
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I can see all sides here, but having been down this road so many times I invariably discover a) that is was premeditated & in defiance of known copyright (with all the usual excuses/defences firmly in place just in case they're caught out), b) the culprit always wins if you do nothing & adds to the pile of difficulties with which we're already faced, & c) if you persist in the face of adversity (because right is on your side) they will eventually settle - if only because it's cheaper than the damage to their reputation.

So hang in there, & make them do the proper, decent thing. I've tried all the other options & only a policy of zero tolerance actually pays dividends.
 
I've sent a couple of follow up emails to them asking how the case is progressing , if they heard back from the Hungarians or if there is a problem with the payment method or anything but seems I'm getting the silent treatment know. or is it they just cant hear me , what to do to get their attention?
 
vernychops said:
I've sent a couple of follow up emails to them asking how the case is progressing , if they heard back from the Hungarians or if there is a problem with the payment method or anything but seems I'm getting the silent treatment know. or is it they just cant hear me , what to do to get their attention?
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They don't care. You need to hit them where it (might) hurt - Facebook, Twitter, Google, the press. A company with a carefully-contrived hipster image won't want to be exposed as a faceless corporate behemoth.

And whilst you're at it, write to the Hungarian ambassador in the UK, and the UK ambassador in Hungary. Will make a change for them from dealing with lost passports...
 
vernychops said:
Well I’ve had a look on Getty and a similar file is £39 - 413 px, 3-month use for Web & Mobile, so £78 for 6 months, not a lot but it would pay for my day out.
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As it was a 'day out' I presume you therefore do not have the right to exploit your images commercially from that event?

I'm not meaning to sound harsh as clearly the Hungarian distributor is in the wrong here, but as somebody who has had a lot of interest from large companies regarding usage of FoS images in the past I quickly realised what could have been an incredibly well paying day is anything but for someone without relevant permission.
 
Quick update , I had an email from the Legal Councel of Quicksilver. So things are moving on. see below.

Dear Sir,

I wanted to inform you that your letter in relation with the photo of Kie Forte has just been fowarded to my attention.

We'll revert to you shortly on this matter that we take seriously.

Thank you
 
It could be they are being true to their word.....

Well we will see!

Ste
 
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