When Getty
Images, the world's largest photo agency, effectively opens its picture vaults
to make them library free to use, you have to stand back and realise that
access to use restricted stuff is radically changing.
Getty combating
piracy not by locking up the images with restrictive watermarks or DRM but
making 35 million
images, including iconic images of Marilyn Monroe and famous ones of John F Kennedy
and Barack Obama available without cost to blogs and social media sites. However Getty Images is not the most user friendly site and searching and establishing what is allowed is still often a mare.
The photos will be tagged through an
embedding tool with a code that links back to Getty's website but they
effectively have decided to combat abuse by bringing the offenders inside and
encouraging the use of the images by all. Images cannot be resized and they
will all incorporate a Getty Images logo, as well as a credit for the
photographer.
There has been some backlash from
photographers who are opposed to their images being given away but the reality is
that they are all over the Internet anyway and currently there is no
attribution or provenance. Trying to ascertain whether a picture is in the
public domain or restricted and who owns its rights is like trying to chase
down the rights to orphan work books – difficult.
Commercial users of Getty's library,
which include TV, newspapers, publishers and advertisers will continue to be
charged. Exactly how the Getty economic model now works remains unanswered
today but this move is a significant one not just for images but for all media.
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