Wal-Mart Jumps Into The Copyright Question Concerning Photo Reprinting
from the orphan-works,-indeed dept
Earlier this year, there was a lot of talk following a few news stories about various photo processing locations that were refusing to make prints of photos that "looked too good" for fear that they could be violating copyright. It was a silly situation, where people couldn't get new prints made of their own photos if they happened to have actually taken a decent shot. Well, now, it appears that Wal-Mart is trying to do something about that (if ever so slightly). They're taking part in a discussion about how "orphan works" should be dealt with. These are works where the owner of the copyright is unknown or unreachable. Wal-Mart is saying that this could apply to certain photographs as well -- and if the law is changed, it could allow them to more easily print such photos without fear of breaking copyright law.
Thank you for reading this Techdirt post. With so many things competing for everyone’s attention these days, we really appreciate you giving us your time. We work hard every day to put quality content out there for our community.
Techdirt is one of the few remaining truly independent media outlets. We do not have a giant corporation behind us, and we rely heavily on our community to support us, in an age when advertisers are increasingly uninterested in sponsoring small, independent sites — especially a site like ours that is unwilling to pull punches in its reporting and analysis.
While other websites have resorted to paywalls, registration requirements, and increasingly annoying/intrusive advertising, we have always kept Techdirt open and available to anyone. But in order to continue doing so, we need your support. We offer a variety of ways for our readers to support us, from direct donations to special subscriptions and cool merchandise — and every little bit helps. Thank you.
–The Techdirt Team
Reader Comments
Subscribe: RSS
View by: Time | Thread
Mad Skillz
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Ask for a release form
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Ask for a release form
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
more of blaming the tool and not who wields it.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]