Beg, don't "borrow", or steal. Who owns the content on the web?
One
of the marvelous aspects of the Internet is the staggering amount of content
that is readily available to users on every topic under the sun. But who owns the content that is placed on the
internet and can it be used freely by the millions of users that may come
across it?
However, they try to protect the artistic rights of the creators of content and prevent people from being able to use that content without acknowledging the source or paying for its use.
The creator or author of the work retains the right to use that work exclusively and others cannot piggy back off their hard labour. Copyright automatically comes into being on the physical creation of original work.
Copyright is held by the author or artist responsible for its creation. If another person wishes to use the work they should pay the copyright holder a royalty for its use. Using images from the internet without acknowledgment amounts to a breach of copyright and is unlawful. You should rather ask the creator of the content if you can use it and pay them for that use.
If you have used content from the internet where you have not asked permission from the creator or acknowledged the source and you are sent a scary lawyer's letter by the copyright owner, rather say sorry and remove the content from wherever you have used it.
Unless of course that person did not hold the copyright themselves in the first place… then you may stand your ground. But perhaps get some legal advice first!
Verlie Oosthuizen
Shepstone & Wylie Social Media Law Department
We were caught in a situation where
posted pictures of a Hollywood celeb's house that were circulating on the
internet. Being huge fans of the celebrity we decided to talk about the
"alleged" purchase. Our content reaches people all over the world,
and we were surprised to recieve a letter that reads as follows:
“Your Article includes a number of photographs of our client’s home in Los Angeles, California. Our client owns the exclusive copyright and all other rights in the Photographs. You do not have a license to publish or otherwise use the photographs and our client does not consent to your publication and/or use of them.
As such your publication of the Photographs is an unlawful infringement of our client’s copyright.”
The celebrity's lawyers came across our piece of content online and sent us a letter due to sharing private images. Luckily they were generous enough to see that we shared the circulating content because we are big fans of the celebrity.