geni wrote:
On 2/3/07, Ray Saintonge saintonge@telus.net wrote:
As the one victim said, she checked out what the rates would be for what she used and it came out to £440 for five years, but he was being asked for £1,300 for one month. Attorney's fees? One could always go to the court for a motion to have the costs taxed according to the schedule prescribed by the courts for such action. How long does it take for a lawyer to write a letter which he probably already has set up as a template in which he can substitute the relevant details?
Companies like Corbis, Getty, et.al. know that the average little guy is scared shitless at the idea of going to court about anything. They can use that to charge whatever they feel the guy will pay.
As long as the offending picture is removed from the site ASAP how far will they be really be willing to go if you stonewall them?
likely as far as they legally can. If word got out that they don't follow these things up the tactic would lose it's effectiveness. On the other hand if you take people to court and make the payment stick word will also get out and people will fold in future rather than risk taking them on.
Absolutely, and this is as much why I support the principle that it should not be WMF that pursues these matters but individuals. WMF needs to play it by the book in a way that will safeguard the rights of both the copyright owner and the apparent infringer. This is not solely a matter of self-preservation, but the application of distributed liability as a tactic.
Sooner or later someone will call the companies' bluff. I'm sure there are enough stubborn people out there to do that, and willing to take the risk that the payment would stick. Who has the biggest risk? The individual with one offending picture has his risk limited to the £2,000 or so demanded in the action; this effectively spreads the potentially much broader liability. The downside for the companies if they lose is not restricted to that single case, but in the loss of credibility in all cases; they may even pay the offender to accept a secret out-of-court settlement. 8-) A single army ant or a single piranha rarely poses a serious danger.
The "Guardian" article notes that these databases are not sustainable, that, except in a small high-end market segment, they will eventually be squeezed out of the market by free alternatives. I wonder how much these massive resources will be worth in a bankruptcy sale. ;-)
Ec