The list continues with part 2.
11. Do not wait to enforce the terms of your licenses, invoices or copyright. There are time limitation imposed by law which set specific time periods within which you must act to protect your rights and/or sue. You snooze, you lose – literally. A mere letter by you or your lawyer does not extend these time periods. If you are owned money, waiting to get paid gives the deadbeat more time to play with your money or fold up shop.
12. Do not assume that if your client threatens or actually files for protection under the Bankruptcy Act that you are “SOL”. This is typically not the case if your paperwork and copyright registrations are in order. In such situations if your lawyer tells you that you have no recourse, make sure you see a bankruptcy and/or intellectual property specialist. Many well-intentioned attorneys actually do not know the law in this regard.
13. If you are not in business to turn a profit, close your business and work for a charity of your choice. “Not for profit” is a tax status, not a business philosophy.
14. If you are told by anyone that something is “standard” in any deal remember that it (whatever “it” is) is not. This is a tactic to get you to shut up. A tactic perceived is no tactic at all.There is no “standard” contract. Jack recently got that from a client. EVERYTHING is negotiable and nothing is “standard”.
15. People lie. Advertising is built on lying. Your closest family members, spouses, loved ones have lied to you somewhere along the line. It should come as no surprise therefore, that your clients, reps, stock agents and so on will lie to you whilst looking right into your eyes. Remember there are people in the world who can slap you back with one hand and pick your pocket with the other.
16. Trust, but verify. If your rep or agent does the invoicing, make sure you get a photocopy of the check from the client. May sound simple, but Jack suggested this to a friend who was a well-known photographer. Photographer soon separated from his agent after he asked for the photocopies. What a surprise. It also works both ways. Jack does his own invoices, but sends his rep a photocopy of the check.
17. Pay little attention to those of your comrades or competitors who seem to have an endless amount of time to spend on chat rooms and blogs pontificating about all things photographic. Our clients who are either actually working or actively looking for work, have no time for such activities.
18. Do not trust something just because you read it on the Internet. Present company excluded, of course!
19. If they say “You’ll never work in this town again” over an invoice, infringement, or any other issue, don’t panic. It’ll never happen. A lawyer once actually said that to Ed when he was negotiating a payment to a client. “You client will never get a job again”. Ed’s reply was a simple “Say what? Can you please repeat that?” which resulted in a big case of lawyer tap dancing and back tracking. Ed would love to quote that in front of a judge.
20. Last but not least – Register your work. Always. Oh, did we say that already? It’s worth repeating over and over and over.
#1 by Maria Brophy on May 4, 2010 - 2:17 pm
I’ve been filing copyright applications with collections of artwork. Example: 8 paintings created at the same time. I put them all on one $45 application. They were created in the same year.
An artist just told me that their attorney said that if you “gang” up a number of images on one application, it may not hold up in court should you sue for infringement.
Is this true? Will I now have to fill out an application for every painting created (there’s about 50 or more a year)?
#2 by admin on May 4, 2010 - 3:48 pm
Not true. I sued someone on an application that had 4 or 5 thousand images and “settled to my satisfaction”.
Ed might tell you that if it’s a unique or important image, like a photo of a historic event it would be better to register that image or small group of images on one application. Like if you had images of the “Miracle on the Hudson” plane landing. You wouldn’t register those images with a mish mash of other images.
The issue in court is that a lawyer can argue that many images on a single application “devalues” each individual image. But that’s an argument the judge/jury has to buy that argument and then it only affects the amount of the judgement, but not always. In my case it never came up.
But it will never “void” or disqualify a registration. When you hear second hand from a lawyer, you get second hand info. And you also have to talk with a real IP lawyer. Using any lawyer is like using “any” mechanic to fix an airplane engine. A car mechanic may be the best car mechanic, but that don’t mean much with an airplane’s jet engine. You do want to have some order or a collection that makes sense. We do reccommend to keep work done in one year together and not combine years if possible. Even though it’s allowed.
Hope that clarifies.
Jack
#3 by admin on May 4, 2010 - 4:51 pm
Ideally every lawyer would like one registration per image. It makes life easier for the lawyer and under some circumstances allows for a bigger recovery. That desire is however, utterly unrealistic and unnecessary in 98% of all cases. Jack (comments above) is totally correct – words he never hears from his wife.
Would you accept second hand medical advice from your neighbor who once had something on his knee that sorta looks like what you have on your knee? How about some second hand tax advice from someone who knows a guy who does tax returns during tax season behind home plate at the Little League field near the hardware store? Sound absurd?
Remember playing “telephone” in elementary school and seeing how the simplest sentence becomes totally distorted and convoluted after being re-told and relayed just a few times? The difference between how children and adults distort the simplest of facts is, (drum roll please) NONE.
Have any lingering doubts? Go to the “source” and see for yourself – http://www.copyright.gov . That is the official US site. Take a look. You will see many references to “single” filings of multiple works/images? Your livlihood is at stake. If you rely on “second hand information” don’t count on staying in business very long.
Ed
#4 by The Fishguy on March 25, 2011 - 11:17 pm
Could use help and a lawyer, what do I ask to make sure I get a good one?
#5 by The Fishguy on March 25, 2011 - 11:22 pm
Hi, I was referred to your site from a photoshop artist, and it looks like you all know what you are talking about.
I have been making art for over 33 years and discovered that a company has taken my art to china after altering it… because they told me they did… I could use some help from start to finish on keeping what’s my creative art mine,and getting paid for the work that was copied. Where do I fine a good lawyer,and what questions do I ask so I know who ever this person is they know what they are doing?
#6 by Gregory Young on October 6, 2011 - 7:21 pm
Hi I watched the Kelby Training video on registering your photos and it was mention that you can batch register your images at the same cost as registering one image. This I would think would appeal to a lot of photographers to cut on costs. It was also mentioned that you could or should do this every month, quarter yearly or as frequently as possible.
My Question is. What if before you register the next batch of images someone steals one of the images and publishes it in a magazine, without licensing permission from you. Are they breathing copyright and could there be a case against them?
#7 by Jack and Ed on October 7, 2011 - 11:08 am
Yes and yes. If this has happened to you consult with an attorney and get your images registered.
Ed
#8 by MariaL on December 10, 2011 - 10:30 pm
Thanks for your post on “one registration per image … make life easier.” I recently had an IP attorney tell me that I would only be allowed statutory damages per registration, not per image. I had several images infringed and the images had all been registered as unpublished with the Copyright Office prior to the infringement. So I think you have to really look hard and find the right attorney.