Hi all,
I came across n interesting piece of text in a German mainstream newspaper that ran an article on Freedom of Panorama. [1] or [2]
According to the text, there has been court action against pictures of the Hunderwasserhaus located in Vienna. [3]
Theoretically, both countries enjoy full FoP. [4] The German law, however, has one restriction: pictures need to be taken from a public ground. With other words, not only the building must be located on a public street or square, but also the photographer (effectively making pictures made with a drone in Germany a noFOP). According to the Austrian law, there is no such restriction.
What happened is, that somebody took a picture from the building across the street. The image is perfectly legal in Ausstria, but the rightsholders of the Hunderwasserhaus in Vienna managed to get German courts to order a stop of distribution in Germanny.
Questions arising are:
- Are there other countries where a "on the ground" specification exists? - Can I request the take down of a picture of the Millenium Bridge in London in France? - How can we best coin this knew piece of information to best suit our advocacy efforts?
Cheers, Dimi
[1] http://www.berliner-zeitung.de/recht/urheberrecht-warum-fotos-vom-eiffelturm... [2] http://www.rundschau-online.de/recht/urheberrecht-warum-fotos-vom-eiffelturm... [3]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hundertwasserhaus [4]https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Commons:Freedom_of_panorama#Malta
My belief on (2) is yes
(Can I request the take down of a picture of the Millenium Bridge in London in France?)
That is essentially what happened to WP over the Claes Oldenburg images -- pictures (some of them) taken in the UK, removed in the U.S.
-- James.
On 02/02/2015 14:42, Dimitar Parvanov Dimitrov wrote:
Hi all,
I came across n interesting piece of text in a German mainstream newspaper that ran an article on Freedom of Panorama. [1] or [2]
According to the text, there has been court action against pictures of the Hunderwasserhaus located in Vienna. [3]
Theoretically, both countries enjoy full FoP. [4] The German law, however, has one restriction: pictures need to be taken from a public ground. With other words, not only the building must be located on a public street or square, but also the photographer (effectively making pictures made with a drone in Germany a noFOP). According to the Austrian law, there is no such restriction.
What happened is, that somebody took a picture from the building across the street. The image is perfectly legal in Ausstria, but the rightsholders of the Hunderwasserhaus in Vienna managed to get German courts to order a stop of distribution in Germanny.
Questions arising are:
- Are there other countries where a "on the ground" specification exists? - Can I request the take down of a picture of the Millenium Bridge in London in France? - How can we best coin this knew piece of information to best suit our advocacy efforts?Cheers, Dimi
[1] http://www.berliner-zeitung.de/recht/urheberrecht-warum-fotos-vom-eiffelturm... [2] http://www.rundschau-online.de/recht/urheberrecht-warum-fotos-vom-eiffelturm... [3]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hundertwasserhaus [4]https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Commons:Freedom_of_panorama#Malta
Advocacy_Advisors mailing list Advocacy_Advisors@lists.wikimedia.org https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/advocacy_advisors
you could call it "earch-bound panorama rule" (avoiding the word "freedom" here on purpose), sounds wonderfully heavy ...
Am 02.02.2015 um 15:42 schrieb Dimitar Parvanov Dimitrov:
Hi all,
I came across n interesting piece of text in a German mainstream newspaper that ran an article on Freedom of Panorama. [1] or [2]
According to the text, there has been court action against pictures of the Hunderwasserhaus located in Vienna. [3]
Theoretically, both countries enjoy full FoP. [4] The German law, however, has one restriction: pictures need to be taken from a public ground. With other words, not only the building must be located on a public street or square, but also the photographer (effectively making pictures made with a drone in Germany a noFOP). According to the Austrian law, there is no such restriction.
What happened is, that somebody took a picture from the building across the street. The image is perfectly legal in Ausstria, but the rightsholders of the Hunderwasserhaus in Vienna managed to get German courts to order a stop of distribution in Germanny.
Questions arising are:
- Are there other countries where a "on the ground" specification exists?
- Can I request the take down of a picture of the Millenium Bridge in London in France?
- How can we best coin this knew piece of information to best suit our advocacy efforts?
Cheers, Dimi
[1]http://www.berliner-zeitung.de/recht/urheberrecht-warum-fotos-vom-eiffelturm... [2]http://www.rundschau-online.de/recht/urheberrecht-warum-fotos-vom-eiffelturm... [3]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hundertwasserhaus [4]https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Commons:Freedom_of_panorama#Malta
Hi all,
Thanks for sharing Dimi. I have no info on questions 1 and 2, but as for question 3, in terms of EU advocacy the story is good for two reasons:
(1) Because part of the problem stems from the fact that there is no single EU regime on FoP. As you know many MEPs and most COM people hate legal inconsistency. They would very much prefer to have one rule applicable throughout the Union.
(2) This is in my view exacerbated by the lack of logic in the German law. I think some people could understand if German FoP excluded pictures taken from the (private) ground of the protected monument itself, because it would protect those views on the monument which are potentially private (for instance if a building was explicitly built behind a wall or covering trees). But excluding a photograph taken from my own living room (if it happens to be on the opposite side of the street) doesn't seem to make much sense.
So I think the story line is nice: Inconsistent laws across the EU which make actions illegal that no normal person would have expected to be illegal -- this can't be in the interest of the EU. :)
Best, Jan
On Mon, 2015-02-02 at 15:42 +0100, Dimitar Parvanov Dimitrov wrote:
Hi all,
I came across n interesting piece of text in a German mainstream newspaper that ran an article on Freedom of Panorama. [1] or [2]
According to the text, there has been court action against pictures of the Hunderwasserhaus located in Vienna. [3]
Theoretically, both countries enjoy full FoP. [4] The German law, however, has one restriction: pictures need to be taken from a public ground. With other words, not only the building must be located on a public street or square, but also the photographer (effectively making pictures made with a drone in Germany a noFOP). According to the Austrian law, there is no such restriction.
What happened is, that somebody took a picture from the building across the street. The image is perfectly legal in Ausstria, but the rightsholders of the Hunderwasserhaus in Vienna managed to get German courts to order a stop of distribution in Germanny.
Questions arising are:
* Are there other countries where a "on the ground" specification exists? * Can I request the take down of a picture of the Millenium Bridge in London in France? * How can we best coin this knew piece of information to best suit our advocacy efforts?Cheers,
Dimi
[1]http://www.berliner-zeitung.de/recht/urheberrecht-warum-fotos-vom-eiffelturm... [2]http://www.rundschau-online.de/recht/urheberrecht-warum-fotos-vom-eiffelturm... [3]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hundertwasserhaus [4]https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Commons:Freedom_of_panorama#Malta
Advocacy_Advisors mailing list Advocacy_Advisors@lists.wikimedia.org https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/advocacy_advisors
Am 03.02.2015 um 23:45 schrieb Jan Weisensee:
(2) This is in my view exacerbated by the lack of logic in the German law. I think some people could understand if German FoP excluded pictures taken from the (private) ground of the protected monument itself, because it would protect those views on the monument which are potentially private (for instance if a building was explicitly built behind a wall or covering trees). But excluding a photograph taken from my own living room (if it happens to be on the opposite side of the street) doesn't seem to make much sense.
well, it turns on the notion of publication. The only outer appearance of works of architecture and monuments that is "published" is the one the public sees. Public means anybody. Ground level is in most situations the only area actually open to the public. Your living room is just as private as the private ground of the monument itself.
So there is some logic to it, and even aerial photography using drones doesn't change that, even if there are no restrictions on where to fly. The logic says, published means what the public can see, and what that means see with their own eyes, not through technical means. So the quite old case law on FoP in Germany already deals with ladders and stuff that photographers used on public ground to peek over walls and such. What is behind the wall is not published in that sense and so - according to the idea - FoP cannot apply.
Greetz John
Thanks John for the clarification. From this angle it makes much more sense then.
Even though I still find it a bit weird that "public space" is so narrowly defined in Germany. What about someone building a sky scraper next to a protected monument, including a rooftop café? What about pictures taken from a regular airplane? To decide which views exactly would be protected seems very hard and it might still be well possible to tell decisionmakers that such a law works like a trap for citizens who just want to take photographs. :)
Best, Jan
Am 04.02.2015 00:38 schrieb John Weitzmann:
Am 03.02.2015 um 23:45 schrieb Jan Weisensee:
(2) This is in my view exacerbated by the lack of logic in the German law. I think some people could understand if German FoP excluded pictures taken from the (private) ground of the protected monument itself, because it would protect those views on the monument which are potentially private (for instance if a building was explicitly built behind a wall or covering trees). But excluding a photograph taken from my own living room (if it happens to be on the opposite side of the street) doesn't seem to make much sense.
well, it turns on the notion of publication. The only outer appearance of works of architecture and monuments that is "published" is the one the public sees. Public means anybody. Ground level is in most situations the only area actually open to the public. Your living room is just as private as the private ground of the monument itself.
So there is some logic to it, and even aerial photography using drones doesn't change that, even if there are no restrictions on where to fly. The logic says, published means what the public can see, and what that means see with their own eyes, not through technical means. So the quite old case law on FoP in Germany already deals with ladders and stuff that photographers used on public ground to peek over walls and such. What is behind the wall is not published in that sense and so - according to the idea - FoP cannot apply.
Greetz John
Am 04.02.2015 um 17:49 schrieb Jan Weisensee:
Thanks John for the clarification. From this angle it makes much more sense then.
Even though I still find it a bit weird that "public space" is so narrowly defined in Germany. What about someone building a sky scraper next to a protected monument, including a rooftop café? What about pictures taken from a regular airplane?
yeah, I know, it is sort of anachronistic in many ways. I just wanted to highlight that there nevertheless is some (weird) logic to it.
To decide which views exactly would be protected seems very hard
the courts took the easy way out: What a person can view from open air public ground without additional equipment is panorama, everything else is not. Additional problems were created recently with the decisions in favour of "Preussische Schlösser und Gärten" in which it was held that even public parks can be excluded from panorama freedom under certain wacky circumstances :(
and it might still be well possible to tell decisionmakers that such a law works like a trap for citizens who just want to take photographs. :)
true
Best John
you could call it "earch-bound panorama rule" (avoiding the word "freedom" here on purpose), sounds wonderfully heavy ...
Am 02.02.2015 um 15:42 schrieb Dimitar Parvanov Dimitrov:
Hi all,
I came across n interesting piece of text in a German mainstream newspaper that ran an article on Freedom of Panorama. [1] or [2]
According to the text, there has been court action against pictures of the Hunderwasserhaus located in Vienna. [3]
Theoretically, both countries enjoy full FoP. [4] The German law, however, has one restriction: pictures need to be taken from a public ground. With other words, not only the building must be located on a public street or square, but also the photographer (effectively making pictures made with a drone in Germany a noFOP). According to the Austrian law, there is no such restriction.
What happened is, that somebody took a picture from the building across the street. The image is perfectly legal in Ausstria, but the rightsholders of the Hunderwasserhaus in Vienna managed to get German courts to order a stop of distribution in Germanny.
Questions arising are:
- Are there other countries where a "on the ground" specification exists?
- Can I request the take down of a picture of the Millenium Bridge in London in France?
- How can we best coin this knew piece of information to best suit our advocacy efforts?
Cheers, Dimi
[1]http://www.berliner-zeitung.de/recht/urheberrecht-warum-fotos-vom-eiffelturm... [2]http://www.rundschau-online.de/recht/urheberrecht-warum-fotos-vom-eiffelturm... [3]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hundertwasserhaus [4]https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Commons:Freedom_of_panorama#Malta
Hi all, Dimi - thanks for pointing this. I also think (as Jan pointed above) -that the major part of the problem stems from the different national regimes in copyrights (and in FoP in particular). Thus, many conflicting decisions could apply on the same issue in different EU countries. And yes, an action that is legal in UK could be illegal in France (in copyright terms) regarding the same copyrighted work: another chance (provided by a FoP issue) to point the inconsistent copyright laws in Europe, Plamena
2015-02-02 16:42 GMT+02:00 Dimitar Parvanov Dimitrov < dimitar.parvanov.dimitrov@gmail.com>:
Hi all,
I came across n interesting piece of text in a German mainstream newspaper that ran an article on Freedom of Panorama. [1] or [2]
According to the text, there has been court action against pictures of the Hunderwasserhaus located in Vienna. [3]
Theoretically, both countries enjoy full FoP. [4] The German law, however, has one restriction: pictures need to be taken from a public ground. With other words, not only the building must be located on a public street or square, but also the photographer (effectively making pictures made with a drone in Germany a noFOP). According to the Austrian law, there is no such restriction.
What happened is, that somebody took a picture from the building across the street. The image is perfectly legal in Ausstria, but the rightsholders of the Hunderwasserhaus in Vienna managed to get German courts to order a stop of distribution in Germanny.
Questions arising are:
- Are there other countries where a "on the ground" specification
exists?
- Can I request the take down of a picture of the Millenium Bridge in
London in France?
- How can we best coin this knew piece of information to best suit our
advocacy efforts?
Cheers, Dimi
[1] http://www.berliner-zeitung.de/recht/urheberrecht-warum-fotos-vom-eiffelturm... [2] http://www.rundschau-online.de/recht/urheberrecht-warum-fotos-vom-eiffelturm... [3]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hundertwasserhaus [4]https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Commons:Freedom_of_panorama#Malta
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