What frequently happens on social media is that people take videos that aren't theirs and upload them to their accounts. Sometimes they're doing it in what some might say are 'innocent' motives. They're intoxicated by all of the likes, shares and comments that it brings them without being aware of the harm of what they are doing to the owner of that content - which is like a "reverse Robin Hood" act, taking the financial value of the video from the poor (photographer) and giving it to the rich (the platform). Others aren't so 'innocent': we know there are organized crime operations doing this, the same type of piracy outfits that sold bootleg VHS cassettes and DVDs 30 years ago. When an account is monetized on a platform, this means the platform shares some of the money they make with the uploader. Those pirates take advantage of that. Most accounts are not monetized, which means the platform takes all of the advertising revenue earned. Either way - whether it's an 'innocent' uploader or an organized piracy operation, they both have been responsible for the vast majority of the losses I've incurred and are still incurring right now as you read this.
When a photographer's video or photo is taken and posted on these platforms, it is usually one of their better ones. That means that it ends up going viral and as a result, pulling from that video's finite pool of available viewers and making the platform many thousands of dollars in each instance. Some of those uploaders are monetized piracy accounts, meaning that a large cut of that money goes to them. Again though, a non-monetized account still generates advertising revenue for the platform, so even if a non-monetized uploader doesn't earn money, the platform does.
It might surprise you to know that much of the viral content you see on social media is stolen. That page or subreddit you follow that constantly posts viral photos and videos from different sources? They're likely all stolen, and the cash conversion generated from the advertising is all going to the platform (with a cut going to the uploading account if they're monetized).
Our current copyright laws make it impossible to handle the infringement problem.
Our current copyright law governing online infringements, the DMCA, does two things: one, it places the burden of enforcement and takedowns on the owners of the content. That means that it's up to me to find all of the stolen copies of my videos and file legal notices to take them down. Second, it absolves the platform of any responsibility or liability for the infringing uploads as long as they take them down when a legal notice is received. That means that even if they earned tens of thousands of dollars on a video of mine that gets uploaded, they don't have to pay me any of it and can't be penalized at all as long as they take the video down when I discover it.
Under our current law, the only entity that can be held responsible for an infringing upload is the uploader. That means any lawsuit must be filed against the person who uploaded the video. This is often impossible because many are individuals who did not receive any of the money earned from the upload. Attorneys just won't take cases against those kind of defendants because there is no way to even cover the legal fees, much less recover damages. And the way the law works, there is no way to require or demand that the platform pay me the money they earned on the upload. Some of the worst offenders are overseas, where legal remedy is often also impossible or impractical. In all of those cases, that cash value extracted from my video is entirely and permanently lost - I will never see a dime of it.
Furthermore, the social media platforms have a financial incentive to make the takedown process as long and as cumbersome as possible. They often employ stalling tactics for the takedown notices, like requiring additional documents or evidence even when the case is very clear (like the link to my original Youtube copy). They often take their time - weeks or even months - processing a takedown before removing the offending video. Most of the time the takedown doesn't complete until after the video's viral cycle is over. By then, the stolen copy has already received the bulk of its views and made the platform their money on it.
An example of blatant stalling on actioning a DMCA takedown by Tiktok. My original takedown notice is below.
Original takedown notice sent to Tiktok that resulted in the above reply. They rejected it even after I provided the registration certificate and my video's original URL.
Losses from infringement are real, impactful and devastating to independent creators.
My total lost revenue from copyright infringement of my work in the past 10 years has exceeded the equivalent of at least four years of full-time income. Yes, you read that right: that's equivalent of a house or a significantly-funded retirement taken from me, and those funds are now in the hands of thieves and social media platforms. Again, that is the minimum figure based on the tens of thousands of infringement instances that I know about. That total includes license fees that I would have received from those uses of my photos and videos as well as advertising revenue for views of infringing copies of my videos on social media.
 On just Facebook alone, more people have viewed infringing copies of my videos than on my Youtube channel in its entire lifetime! On Tiktok, I'm beginning to see infringements at a rate that if not mitigated, might start approaching those numbers as well. And there are likely far more infringements that I've not discovered yet: finding all, or even a majority of, infringements with my daily manual searches is impossible. The social media platforms refuse to grant me access to the automated tools that are the only way to track down a larger number of reuploaded videos.
The impact of that infringement on my life has been devastating and crippling. Instead of being able to do my photography and video full time, I have in recent years had to start relying on other part-time and sometimes full-time employment to keep my bills paid. it's not that my work isn't generating revenue any longer. Quite the contrary - it's generating more than it ever has in my career, but most of that money is not coming to me - it's going to the social media companies and the thieves who reupload stolen copies of my videos and photos. Ultimately, if my infringement mitigation actions fail to produce enough results in the coming years, I may have to shut my entire photography and video operation down. You see, I am not a mega-corporation like Disney or Warner Brothers that can absorb that kind of loss. Neither are many of my colleagues who also are going through the same thing.
To make matters worse for creators, infringers who find themselves on the inevitable end of a (well-deserved) copyright strike or lawsuit will play the victim to their fan bases. Infringers quickly and easily grow large, loyal followings because they are providing viewers with so much quality (stolen) content. They then weaponize their fan bases against the photographer by claiming the takedowns and/or lawsuits are "extortion" or "copyright trolling". After everything a photographer has suffered from infringements, they often find themselves painted as the bad guys in their battle against content theft, with the unknowing public hurling threats, insults and worse. I have received death threats after a copyright case involving a popular multi-millionare Youtuber.
It is from that place that I have launched an all-out war on copyright infringement in recent years, and I have recently ramped up that effort significantly. This is a task that I take no pleasure in and of which I would prefer to not have to take part, but it must be done to counter this existential threat to my life's work. I have signed on with rights management agencies and legal representation to attempt to both take down infringing copies of my work and recover some of that lost income. Those processes typically progress very slowly and involve significant costs of their own: attorneys, court costs, numerous copyright registrations and services from other professionals. Even after all of that, it is almost certain that I will never recover even a fraction of what has been taken from me.
One of my U.S. Copyright Office registration certificates.
Even with the help of the professionals I've enlisted, I spend at least one hour per day on infringement-related matters. For the most part, that is unpaid time.
Frequently Asked Questions and Objections
I've been involved in many debates with infringers, their supporters and anti-copyright activists for years. Many people in the general public also don't have an understanding of what photographers been going through and why I'm taking the actions I have. These are my answers to the most common questions and objections I've dealt with.
Why are you so concerned about copyright?
I'll get into these reasons in more detail, but here is a short summary:
Why didn't you contact me first? I would have taken down your photo/video if you'd asked.
It's always interesting that many infringers expect me to contact them first before issuing a DMCA takedown, when they couldn't be bothered to contact me for permission to use the video/photo in the first place! The answer to this question is very simple: contacting you takes too much time. That is time that your copy of my work sits there and gets indexed by search engines, and racks up views and shares on Youtube and social media in direct competition with my original copy. Consider that I deal with sometimes a dozen or more infringements of my work per day. I'm supposed to do tons of extra work to keep track of all of that, all the while an infringing video is making the thief thousands of dollars a day while it racks up millions of views?
Will you please retract your copyright claim so the strike on my channel will be removed? I'm really sorry!
No, I will not retract any copyright claims. A strike is not only fully reasonable, many times it is just the starting point of an infringement recovery operation. It's quite incredible that infringers that use some of my most valuable footage to make money for themselves illegally (while competing directly with me for views on my own videos) expect me to just retract a claim and call it a done deal. I have to spend at least an hour a day searching for these infringing uploads and manually sending the takedown notices. That is time lost from my life and work that I'm already having to spend, in addition to the lost income from the infringement itself.
Consider that a single copyright strike on most platforms like Youtube expires in 90 days. Channels only get terminated if they get three strikes within that timeframe. A first strike is a warning that gives a channel owner that made a legitimate mistake (a rare circumstance in my experience) a chance to correct their actions before getting another strike. For a channel owner that has truly learned their lesson, that first strike provides them with the opportunity to clean up their channel by removing and/or obtaining permission/license to use all infringing material. Afterward, the strike will expire after the 90 days, and their channel will go back into good standing.
But that's never what happens.
No, these channels only beg for a strike to be retracted because they have no intention of removing infringing content or even to stop posting it in the future. No channel I've ever issued a takedown for has ever removed the rest of the stolen material they've posted. Me retracting the strike would just enable that channel to continue stealing from others. Other photographers in my niche who deal with this issue have learned that the "begging for a strike retraction" is oftentimes a stalling tactic employed by organized piracy operations to keep the channel (and its income) going. They fully expect the channel to ultimately be taken down with strikes, and their begging for retractions often works to buy them more time before that happens.
Even worse are the channel owners that employ the strategy of weaponizing their fan bases against photographers who issue takedowns. This is also something done by the organized piracy groups. After getting a strike, these oftentimes-millionaire channel owners post sob-story videos portraying themselves as the innocent victims, while the small-time photographer trying to pay for his or her rent and groceries is labeled the evil tyrant "copyright troll". I've been on the receiving end of many of these hate campaigns.
In any case, I am not going to retract a strike unless a legal settlement is reached that includes that as part of the final agreement. I'm giving you great publicity and exposure, right?
That statement is a myth at best, and a lie at worst. I get all the publicity I need from my web site, Youtube channel, social media pages and when my work is purchased legitimately for publication/broadcast. Publicity and exposure does not do a thing for me. I know from experience! I've had interviews on national and international television, credits in prominent TV shows, magazines, newspapers and books. I never get extra web traffic or sales from those! The only benefit I received was from the license fee I was paid for each use.
Think about this for a minute. How many times have you Googled the name of someone you saw in the credits of a show or in a photo credit line in a newspaper/magazine, then went to their web site and bought something? That's right, probably never. Guess what - you're not alone. No one does that. The 'great exposure' I get from infringing use is completely useless to me. I only make meaningful revenue from usage license fees, which is exactly the thing every infringer steals from me when my image is used without permission and payment. It's no different than a shoplifter taking something from a store.
If you're a media employee or personality, you of all people should know the true value of publicity and exposure for a photographer (that is, there is none). Some of you are on TV every day. Does that publicity pay your rent and buy groceries? No, then why do you think it would pay for mine? Would you stay at your job if your GM said "You know, since you're getting all this publicity from being on TV all the time, we aren't going to pay you any longer". Copy editors and writers, does that credit line pay your salary, or is it the company that employs you?
I only benefit I get from use of my work is when I'm paid a license fee. The 'you'll benefit from the exposure' line is, at best, a myth by those who really don't think about what they're saying, and at worst a lie by the unscrupulous trying to take advantage of someone they think doesn't know any better.
I gave you credit!
Credit lines are meaningless. They do absolutely nothing. And they're not this magic wand that make all copyright considerations go away. It's an unfortunate myth that a credit line entitles someone to just take whatever they want.
A credit line is a professional courtesy for paid, licensed use - it is not required nor do I care whether or not I'm credited when my work is licensed. I only care that I get paid. Credits don't fill my gas tank, pay my rent, buy my groceries and pay for my equipment and operating costs: money does. When was the last time you saw a credit somewhere and did anything as a result? By that I mean something like visiting that person's web site, buying something from them, or doing anything at all that would benefit them even slightly? Right. Never. And guess what? You're not alone. No one does that.
There was a recent thread on Twitter/X where a popular aggregator/compilation account (Massimo) was stealing the best photos from hundreds of photographers, then justifying it by saying "I gave them credit!". I asked his followers straight out if they followed the accounts of any of the photographers as a result of that credit. They all said "No, why would we? The aggregator account is where all of the great photos are. It's too much trouble to follow the photographers". They wouldn't even do as much as click "follow" for the photographers, much less anything more than that! And that's the reality of credit lines everywhere. They do nothing for the photographer.
Credits also never have, and never will, factor in as a defense when a photographer pursues the infringement in a legal case. My use of your work was 'fair use'.
It's most likely not. There have only been a handful of borderline actual Fair Use cases involving my work that I have elected to not pursue or file takedowns for (if I had to give a figure, it would probably be something like 1 in 10,000 cases I discover).
Fair Use is not based on this tunnel vision on commentary and editing that so many believe. Almost everything that has ever aired on television, media and in the movies has commentary and editing. Just think about this for a minute: news broadcasts do nothing but comment on footage from news cameras, and that has never been considered Fair Use. The reality according to the law is that four factors must be considered when evaluating a Fair Use claim - that includes instances that have commentary and editing. Fair Use is supposed to be fair, not a free-for-all against the owners of the content. You can read this from the source at the U.S. Copyright Office. Here are those four factors and how they apply in the case of works created by photographers like me:
- "Purpose and character of the use, including whether the use is of a commercial nature or is for nonprofit educational purposes": A Youtube video that is running ads and receiving AdSense revenue is commercial use! If your copy of my video is earning you money, it fails this part of the 'fair use' test right away. And no, just because it is news footage doesn't make it free. Do you believe TV cameramen don't get paid to do their jobs? Every TV news network pays me to use my video. A monetized Youtube channel or social media account is no different. No further explanation needed.
- Amount and substantiality of the portion used in relation to the copyrighted work as a whole: What this refers to is not only how much of the copyrighted work is used, but whether the heart of the work is used. This means that a video that only uses a few seconds of my footage, but used the heart of that video (for example, the most dramatic part of an icy road or tornado clip), would be infringing. Contrary to myth, there is no "time limit" in copyright law that makes it OK to use something if you only use a small part of it (for example, the common-but-false "5 seconds or less rule"), especially if that small part is the "heart" or best part of that clip. I see this frequently with infringers taking my lightning footage, thinking that since they only used a split-second of the video during a lightning strike (which happens to be the best part of that video) that it's all OK.
Most infringers, however, go far beyond that. Youtube and social media infringers always take my best and most popular scenes and play them in their entirety (for example, the entire icy road action sequence, tornado or lightning strike scene). I make my own compilations out of my best videos, and the thieves essentially take the same scenes from those and insert it into theirs.
- Effect of the use upon the potential market for or value of the copyrighted work: Copies of my videos, including videos incorporating large amounts of my footage, often completely replace my originals in search results and algorithmic slots (like recommendations or features). Even if they don't, they are directly competing for viewers with my channels using my own videos (see the water tank example in this article's introduction). Any way you slice it, every diverted viewer is a direct financial loss.
It matters where content gets viewed. Why do you think the movie studios and the NFL control so tightly where you can watch a movie or a football game? Because it matters! If everyone could watch new releases on Netflix, why would they go to a theater to watch a movie? Why are Super Bowl ads so expensive? It's because you can't watch the game anywhere else. Once a viewer has watched my video on another channel, they have already "seen" it and have no reason to watch it again. If they do re-watch, they will go back to the compilation and watch it again, they will never go searching for the original, even if the link is in the description (and most infringers never post the link to the original anyway).
As I said earlier, Facebook pirates have received more views on my videos than my Youtube channel has in its entire lifetime. And I never have seen a spike in traffic from those infringing uploads. Every one of those has been a devastating financial loss to me. This goes back to the "I gave you great exposure" myth I went through above. When you take views away from my channel, you are taking money and food right off of my table. I also sell license for the use of my videos. Not only is a second copy anywhere on the internet taking views away from me, its use to begin with is something I normally charge customers for! It's no different from shoplifting in a store.
A subset of this factor that is evaluated by courts is the effect on the market for the work if the type of use in question became widespread. If the type of use that many Youtube documentary producers try to assert was actually Fair Use, then it would essentially mean that no one would ever have to buy a license to use photographers' footage. This is because their usage cases are identical to virtually all of the television licenses that photographers sell in their careers for documentaries and news coverage (as in Discovery and National Geographic tornado shows to name a couple).
- "Nature of the copyrighted work": This refers to what category the copyrighted work in question falls under, meaning either video/photos of actual events or fictional/artistic works. This is the only one of the four factors that would weigh on the side of those using chaser/news photographer footage in things like documentaries, but courts give this factor much less weight than the first and third ones outlined above.
What I don't get about the insane interpretation of Fair Use that so many have is how impossibly unfair it is. This idea essentially says that photographers have to bear all of the costs and risks of capturing content, then multi-million dollar Youtube channels and media corporations can just take whatever they want and not compensate us at all just because they added a couple of minimal lines of commentary in there. All the while showcasing the heart of the video, which is in direct competition with our original copies on our channels.
I like to ask this question to someone who is so liberal in their interpretation of Fair Use: What, to you, would *not* be Fair Use? Can you give an example of what you think would be copyright infringement? The answers to this are usually very revealing.
Finally, the interpretation of Fair Use held by most "amateur copyright experts" doesn't exist in the professional world. Everything you see on television and in the movies has been licensed or has written permission obtained: *none* of it was taken and used under Fair Use. And those are multi-billion dollar corporations with the most powerful legal teams on the planet. If they could take things under Fair Use in the way most amateurs believe, they absolutely would, and they have more than enough legal firepower to defend themselves from copyright challenges. Why do you think a Youtuber can do what the entire media and entertainment industry doesn't do? If you're a Youtuber wanting to use third-party content, take that free legal hint from lawyers you and I could never afford: properly clear everything you use.
Think about what the world of media and entertainment would be like if Fair Use was so permissive. There would be no professional photographers, writers or artists. The only video content that would be available for the big Youtubers and media corporations to use would be amateur America's Funniest Home Videos-style cell phone clips. You're supposed to share on social media!
Right. That's why there is a 'share' button for every social media platform out there. Sharing of most anything online is a simple one-click deal. Quick. Easy. Painless.
But the thieves don't do that. No, they go through the extra steps to download the image or video and repost a separate copy of it to their account! Answer this very simple question: why would someone do that instead if just clicking 'share' or 'retweet'? Why would they go through all of that extra trouble? It's because they know they're going to get all of the viral benefit instead of the photographer by doing that! I invite anyone to try and defend that - you can't. That's not sharing, that is stealing.
"Sharing" is good, and all of the platforms have made it easy to do it. Stealing an image is never accidental - it requires additional, deliberate steps (right click, download, re-upload). As opposed to the simple one click of a legitimate share. Stealing diverts all of the viral traffic, likes, shares, retweets and links to the thief's account instead of mine, causing their following to grow instead of mine. And again, the little credit line or mention I'm sometimes given in such cases doesn't do anything for me in reality. People will not click over to my account and/or search for me from the infringing post (I know and have the site traffic data to prove it!). They're just going to re-share or RT the thief's post without ever giving me a second thought. If they can see the photo on Twitter, why would they click over to my web site to see the same image again?
This is especially true of mobile users (on phones or tablets). They'll see an image or video on their feed, and they are just going to engage (comment/like/share) THAT copy, then keep on scrolling. No one on a mobile device is going to click away from Facebook, Twitter or whatever app to try and find my original or go to my web site. It just doesn't happen! I wish people would just stop and think about this for five seconds before giving me the "you're getting great exposure" spiel.
If that doesn't explain it enough, here's a more detailed post and infographic I put together on it. What's the big deal? It's just a Twitter/Facebook/Reddit/Imgur image or blog post!
Half of the time, an infringing photo ends up ranking higher in search engines than my original copy. This is especially true of TV station sites and media blogs. Sites like Twitter, Facebook and Reddit all have very high rankings in search engines, which means a copy of my photo on those sites will almost always outrank my copy here on this site. That means when someone searches for the image in Google/Bing/Yahoo/whatever, the infringing copy sometimes shows up first - then that link gets re-shared, boosting the infringing copy even more.
Furthermore, a competing copy on social media takes engagement (likes, shares, comments, favorites, retweets, new followers) away from my account and diverts it to the thief's. Their copy could go viral in the future, and leave me with nothing. Again, people are generally not inclined to go searching for the original copy of an image, they'll just do what is easiest and re-share the first one they see. I already covered that above. Copying something doesn't cost anything, so you lost nothing when I copied your photo.
Really? I mean come on now. You don't need to look much farther than this argument to see that anti-copyright activists don't think about what they're saying. I don't know if you've noticed, but the word copy is the first part of the word copyright. The word literally means "the right to copy", copy is half of the word. Copying is the reason the law, and the word itself, exists. Copyright was conceived of in the early 1700s to address the harm done by unauthorized copying of books in the era of the first printing presses.
As I've described in detail already, my primary income from photography and video comes from selling copies of my work to be used by third parties. Most of a musician's income comes from selling copies of a song or album. A copy does have value, it is the cornerstone of how artists, photographers and content creators make a living. Society has understood this for the past 300 years - why don't you? If you can't make money from your work because people steal it, then find another job.
This is like telling a store owner that if he can't make money because of shoplifters, then he should find another career instead of doing loss prevention and prosecuting the thieves. It's interesting that those who say this are acknowledging that the work is desirable enough to steal and use for their benefit and profit, but somehow not worth paying me for so I can make a living. It's a double standard.
If you don't want people stealing your work, don't post it online.
And you think that is a viable business strategy - why, exactly? Take my primary business product off of the very medium that generates my income? Sure, great idea. To borrow from the previous entry, that's like telling the store owner that has a problem with shoplifters to just stop advertising and just keep his doors locked. If no one knows about his store and no one can get in, he won't have any shoplifters, right? Yes, but he also won't have any customers either.
Sometimes I don't know if these type of objections are real or just the work of a provocateur. They're so self-evidently absurd that just a few seconds of critical thinking should keep them from being levied. A true artist doesn't worry about money, only that his work is appreciated by others.
The person making this statement is really saying that there should be no such thing as a professional artist, photographer, writer or any type of content creator. When they say 'no, I'm not saying that', my next question then is how does the professional content creator make a living? The answer is usually along the lines of 'he should freely give and let the money situation work itself out'.
"Be passionate about your work, and the money will follow" is a utopian fantasy that does not work in the real world. I know it because like many photographers, I did just that back when I was starting out. It would be nice if I could freely give everything away, then have all of my needs just magically taken care of as a result. I always ask someone who says that if they could suggest a scenario or plan on where all this magical money is going to come from. So far, I've never received an answer. Copyright should expire earlier/not exist because free creative works would enrich society.
I'm sure society would benefit if Wal-Mart gave away all of their products for free, carpenters and plumbers gave their services away for free, and Dairy Queen gave away free ice cream cones. That sure would enrich a lot of people's lives! That is, until all of those companies and people went out of business because they weren't bringing in revenue. Then there would be nobody making free stuff to give away.
If you believe that free creative works are so essential, so vital to an enriched society - then why don't you do something to help out the content creators that are producing them? Why is that burden on us 100 percent? We have to pay full price for all of our costs of producing content - cameras, travel, etc. And you can't see fit to pay us anything? You call us 'evil' for expecting to get paid and protecting our copyright? This absolutely boggles my mind that so many people think this way, and I have yet to hear a rational basis for it. I gave you lots of compliments!
I genuinely appreciate that, but it doesn't make stealing my work OK.
I'm non-profit/not making any money from your images or video.
Even if you don't make any money on the video or photo, the platform that you're posting it to does in the form of advertising revenue. I covered that in my introduction at the top of this page. You are also causing me to lose viewers on my own web site or Youtube channel, which does cost me, even if you're not making any money. I also have to spend time sending DMCA takedowns and searching for infringing copies like yours.
Content on the internet should be free!
If that's true, then so should my cameras, fuel, hotels, groceries, health care, rent, internet access, utilities, insurance, you name it. Figure out a way for me to drive thousands of miles a year, take weeks of unpaid time off of work, buy and maintain professional gear, keep gas in my car and take care of my living expenses for free while I capture my images and video, and I'll give a free license to use my work. Deal?
Content theft is just the way it is on the internet today. You can't do anything about it. You just need to accept it and get over it.
I can assure you it's not the way it is, unless you are reading a different copyright law than what is currently in force. And photographers absolutely can do something about it: the many infringers who have found themselves on the receiving end of (very deserved) strikes, terminated channels/accounts and lawsuits would also disagree with your statement.
As I've already explained multiple times, this is an issue of pragmatics that determines the very existence of my operation. "Just getting over it" would be the end of my career. It's really that simple. You're just worried about money.
I don't understand what is meant by that. Of course I'm concerned about money, because I have groceries, health care, rent, internet access, utilities, insurance, car payments to pay every month just like you do, on top of the costs of producing my content!
Just take a quick browse around my site and Youtube channel. News flash: it takes money to produce all of that. Not exposure, not credit lines, not likes on social media. More than 90 percent of what I've captured would not have been possible without license fees and ad revenue I earn from my content. And think about how much more I'd have been able to produce if it weren't for the huge amount of funds siphoned away from me by copyright infringers, preventing me from doing this full-time! You're an evil capitalist for wanting to earn money from your video/enforce your copyright.
So the small-time photographer that bears all of the costs, risks & workload to capture the core content is evil for wanting to be paid to cover his rent and groceries, but the multi-million dollar Youtuber or corporation getting rich from *using* the content without paying is perfectly virtuous. Way to stand up for the worker there, comrade.
You sure do complain about this a lot.
As would you if up to half of your paycheck (after taxes!) was stolen every year.
You are a copyright troll.
So, given everything I've just finished describing in great detail, exactly what do you think I should do in response? Please email me and explain what you feel I should do. I'm serious. I would like to hear your proposed solution to this problem.
Every time I've posed that question to someone who thinks I'm doing anything wrong, I get no answer. So maybe if you're one who holds that opinion, you can make history by giving me another workable pathway to fixing this problem that you think would be better. My inbox is always open.
I think I know the reason why I never get an answer to that question. It's because in every person's mind who uses the "copyright troll" pejorative, they think a photographer should do nothing about theft of his or her work. They're just afraid or unwilling to because of how absurd it would sound to actually say that out loud. The reality is, if any of these people (or their companies, friends or relatives) suffered even a fraction of the losses I have, they'd be on the phone with an attorney in five seconds, and everyone would be supportive of them. It's absolutely mind-boggling that these people place me in some other category that makes me the bad guy if I do anything to fight back.
Every action I take is completely justified and in accordance with the law. And I haven't made, nor do I ever expect to make back all or even a majority of the losses I've suffered. I've always found this accusation like something you'd hear from a cartel. It's like a small mom and pop business being told "you're going to let us take as much of your inventory as we want, and you're going to be happy about it. And if you complain or fight back, we'll ruin your reputation". Infringers and their defenders say and do the exact same thing to me. You're being too stingy with DMCAs. You're not being very nice about this.
Notwithstanding the fact that it certainly wasn't very nice to steal my image/video - if a DMCA seems harsh, consider that I have the right and the option to send the case to the attorney's office. If the infringer is a major TV personality or business, that's likely happening anyway - in addition to the DMCA.
Please understand that this is nothing personal. I take no pleasure in having to do any of this. I would prefer that all of my work is shared properly and/or a valid license purchased, and I didn't have to spend one minute searching for infringements and issuing takedowns. If I didn't actively patrol for infringement, it would get out of control very fast. Even despite all of my current copyright enforcement efforts, I've lost years of income to infringement! How can I help?
I know I have many viewers and supporters who understand what I've been going through. I am very thankful for all of you. I'm often asked what kind of help I could use in this battle. These are the most effective things you can do not only for me, but any creator you follow and want to support:
- Let me know if you see an infringing copy of my videos or photos anywhere other than on my official Youtube channel, official social media account or this web site. You can email me here on my site or you can message me or post at me on Twitter/X @stormhighwaycom.
- Don't follow or share content from accounts that appear to be stealing content. A social media account that constantly posts lots of viral videos and photos is almost never doing it with permission or a license from the owners. Again, If you see mine or any other creators' work on these accounts, the best thing to do is let the owner of the video or photo know so they can file a DMCA takedown. It usually only takes three DMCA takedowns to get the account shut down.
Creator testimonies of the impact of infringement
Links
If any of what I said above is news to you, I implore you to read up on the basics of copyright. It might save yourself or your company significant trouble in the future. Here are some helpful links:
For photographers and creators: dealing with copyright infringement
If you are a photographer, writer, artist or any other type of content creator experiencing what I've described in this article, I wanted to pass along advice that has helped me in the fight against infringement:
- Register your work with the US Copyright Office: This is a vital first step that puts you in the best and most powerful position possible to battle infringements. Our current copyright law requires that a work be registered in order for a lawsuit to be filed in an infringement case. More importantly, the work must have been registered before the infringement took place to be eligible for court costs, attorney's fees and statutory damages. If a work wasn't registered before an infringement, the most you can hope to recover in the legal system is the actual value of the license fee or other income you would have earned. Oftentimes, that amount will not cover the significant costs of hiring an attorney and paying for court costs and other fees, and contingency fee attorneys (more on that below) will be less likely to accept your case.
You can register your works using the Copyright Offices's portal at copyright.gov. Be aware of the rules for registering certain types of content. Each video usually can only be registered separately. Photos, however can be bulk registered (up to 750 photos) together on one application as long as they were all shot in the same calendar year. Also pay attention to the rules for published versus unpublished works. You might also consider paying for an agency or attorney to do all of this for you. The biggest obstacle to registration is that there is a fee for each one. If you can't afford to register all of your work, start with your most popular or most commonly infringed works.
- Sign on with a rights management agency and/or contingency fee law firm or attorney. A rights management agency is the best way for an individual creator to fight infringements. They can assist you with locating infringements that would be difficult for you to find on your own. They can help you file takedowns, deal with fraudulent counter-notifications and do all of the proper documentation for an attorney to take on the case. Look for an agency that can ingest your work into the automated content scanning tools on Facebook/Instagram (Rights Manager), Youtube (Content ID), Tiktok and others.
Many rights management agencies also have relationships with law firms. Some even have attorneys on staff. If not, you can hire a contingency fee law firm or attorney. Contingency fee attorneys do not charge you money up front to take on a case. They will take their fees and any other costs out of the final settlement or judgment if and when it is reached. This is where registration of your work is important. A non-timely-registered work means that an attorney can't include their fees and court costs in the total damages sought, making the case non-viable to pursue.
- Don't contact infringers and try to deal with them yourself, send the cases to your attorneys or agents. Contacting infringers first is the wrong move in most cases. In my past experience, most just ignore you. Other times, you are literally dealing with organized, experienced criminal enterprises that know how to manipulate the situation into one where you end up out of options. For those reasons, many attorneys will not take on cases where you have communicated with infringers. Just send the cases to your attorney and let them handle it.
- Do regular manual searches for infringements. Thanks to how rampant copyright infringement is in our world, many incidents can slip through the cracks even with a good rights management agency helping you. If you don't catch an infringement early, it can result in significant losses to you (like a reupload of your video that goes viral and replaces your originals in search results and algorithms). It's an unfortunate (and unjust) reality that the responsibility lies on the creator to find these. Search for your photos using keywords and keyphrases relating to the subject of your photo or video. Use a translator to do searches for those same keyphrases in other languages (as in Russian, Chinese or Arabic).
Unfortunately, the way the world is right now means that as a creator, you will have to fight these battles to maintain your income if you are producing anything of value. It might seem overwhelming, but the law is on your side.
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Licensing has always been the reality in publishing, advertising and media production. It's not just something only I do, it's the way it is across the entire media and publication realm. Nothing is ever taken and used "under Fair Use" because Fair Use doesn't apply in these situations. I'll go into the Fair Use issue in more detail later on this article. What is happening now is big Youtube channels and social media accounts are just taking my footage and using it in their own productions without paying me a license fee. Many do this because they are misinformed about what Fair Use is, mostly via the myth that editing and commentary makes *anything* Fair Use. A Youtube video is no different from a television production. An online-published video can easily get more viewers than a documentary on a television network! The end result in those infringement cases is that my footage helps the channel owner make a large amount of money, but I get left completely out of that successful venture: many times to the tune of thousands or even tens of thousands of dollars. Many businesses take and use my photos on their web sites, product packaging or even billboards without paying me the license fee that I would have normally earned. None of those losses are "throwaway" amounts of money: each one is a loss of anywhere from hundreds to tens of thousands of dollars (or even more).
It's also important to realize that viewers for any given piece of content are finite. A movie will only sell a certain number of tickets, for instance. Most people will watch a viral video online once. If that view was on a stolen copy, that viewer is lost to the original creator forever. That viewer is not going to seek out the original copy to watch it again, even if they are provided with a direct link to it later (which rarely happens to begin with). This is why TV networks are so protective of what channels broadcast their best content and why the NFL controls so tightly where you can watch the Super Bowl. It's fundamentally critical where something gets viewed, not just that it gets viewed.
