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Tell them to bite you.
Tell them to bite you.
always a good idea if you want to have a default judgement issued against you.
I would definitely write back asking for something that can be viewed for accuracy. i’d mention that you will immediately remove any items found to be in violation, but that you see their 14 day time window unreasonable, given that their images lack to the detail you need to ID the pages to verify their claim.
I’ve not got one from them, but once register a series of car domains. MyNewPorsche caught the eye of Porsche’s lawyers, they demanded acknowledgement within 30 days, that i agreed to let the registration drop and/or transfer it to them.
always a good idea if you want to have a default judgement issued against you.
Thats only if they send a summons and you dont show. I highly doubt they will sue you for using their likeness if the banners which are on your website are being automatically rotated from various casinos / sportsbooks. They are sueing the wrong company. They need to go after the people who are infridging. For example, If I own a billboard company and someone leases the billboard. They send me the poster and its a copyright infridgement? Sueing the Billboard company is moot. They need to go after the company which designed and displayed the likeness. Not person who owns the mechanism for display. They have no bering on the graphic design.
I still get badgered by Western Union from time for anciet reviews on older sites I own.
I guess Getty is bored and have joined the fray of pestering smaller online operators.
If the images are embedded in banners then I would refer Getty to source, there isnt much else you can do.
@Professor 188391 wrote:
I guess Getty is bored and have joined the fray of pestering smaller online operators.
I think Getty also own iStockphoto these days. They’ve always been pretty on the ball when it comes to chasing up people illegally using their images. What often happens is people will take images from some website thinking it’s free to use, or in a template, but the original creator got the image from somewhere like iStock or Getty, and that’s when they get caught. If it’s an affiliate banner, then the company supplying the image should be their first port of call.
I received a call last year from a vendor for my retail site indicating that I was using copyrighted product images and to remove them.
I explained that I have permission to use the images and waited two months to get it.
The lady didn’t believe me until I forwarded her the 2004 email from a manager giving me specific permission. In the end I had to take my own photos but since I give them decent business they gave me a couple of months to get the task done. It was about 150 pictures in all.Getty is pretty vicious when it comes to protecting their copyright. I will make sure now that I won’t use any banners containing actual pictuers as opposed to graphics.
I second what Goldfinger is saying. Getty is brutal about this kind of stuff. You would be unwise to ignore this stuff….ask for clarification and for them to point out images that are in breach.
You’ll probably find that it is images used in your website template or something. Send them receipts for the template, the terms of use for the template and suggest they go sue someone else.
Don’t ignore them or tell them to go jump. I have clients that have fallen foul of Getty and they aren’t messing about.
@tryme1 188448 wrote:
I second what Goldfinger is saying. Getty is brutal about this kind of stuff. You would be unwise to ignore this stuff….ask for clarification and for them to point out images that are in breach.
You’ll probably find that it is images used in your website template or something. Send them receipts for the template, the terms of use for the template and suggest they go sue someone else.
Don’t ignore them or tell them to go jump. I have clients that have fallen foul of Getty and they aren’t messing about.
I mentioned in my original email that I had contacted them via email. I’ve received the “read receipt”, but no reply at this point. I had requested clear images from their screenshots so I could determine which banners were in question. They are definitely not images from a template etc. I am very careful about images of my own choosing.
Since the banners are from casino affiliate programs, they already know that these sites are located outside the US, and they have some work to do to go after them on foreign soil. Perhaps that’s why they targeted me, instead. For all I know, they’ve already been paid for the images. I have no way of knowing, and told them that.
I certainly would not ignore something like this. I went to their site, but haven’t had a chance to look up the images or photographers yet.
Thanks for the info on this.
I had a one million dollar suit filed against me once for using a keyword I got from wordtracker. I was served the papers. It was a trade mark, but I didn’t know. This was not gambling related.
I got in touch with them and after a lot of back and forth they dropped the suit and I discontinued the use of the keyword.
Definitley these things cannot be ignored.
Goldfinger;188443 wrote:I will make sure now that I won’t use any banners containing actual pictuers as opposed to graphics.Doesn’t necessarily resolve the issue. Getty and iStockPhoto both have graphic offerings which are just as protected by copyright law. This is just like cracked software; if you’re using it to make money, and they find out, they’re going to come down on you hard.
Not the smartest move for your merchant to not get the rights to the image. Would be even worse if they did pay, and Getty is getting all worked up for nothing (which sometimes happens).
Lluc.
Might be of use:
Thanks for that link…..it led me to a number of sites and forums for people who have received these letters, all the way back to 2005.
There was an article on WSJ with an interesting quote:
http://online.wsj.com/public/article/SB112897424251164666-HoCl03Chm2dx9Mi3hteQrriNSWg_20061014.html?mod=tff_main_tff_topGetty, for its part, has not filed a lawsuit against a photo thief in at least four years, according to John Lapham, the vice president responsible for legal affairs at Getty. Sometimes Getty sends warning letters to sites demanding that photos be removed.
Getty generally reserves its sales pitches for offenders that appear to be running legitimate businesses, rather than small blogs or other amateur sites, said spokeswoman Deb Trevino.
Although they wil ask for the payment, once I have removed the images, that should be enough to get them off my back.
