Pilfered Magazine: Stealing Copyrights

Lets start with the definition of the word pilfer:

-make off with belongings of others

-In criminal law, theft (also known as stealing or filching) is the illegal taking of another person's property without that person's freely-given consent

-To steal in small quantities, or articles of small value; to practise petty theft

Pilfered Magazine is an online magazine who's sole purpose is to collect work from artists without their permission and without intent to compensate for usage & put it into magazine form to share with the world. The professional photographic community is disturbed and furious, calling the company a Napster for photography.

The first question I asked myself when I heard was, "How are they getting away with it?" After doing some research, I found that so far they have been able to get away with it by putting all liability on the general public. Common folk search on the web for their favorite images and submit them to the magazine. This, in theory, puts all liability on the person who initially found and submitted the work to the magazine. Unfortunately, common folk do not know or understand copyright law, especially with the newer Creative Commons Licenses making them think that all creative media on the web is free to take, share, and use for any purpose.

John Harrington wrote about this issue on his blog. It was a great read with some solid points. He points out that the magazine is extremely supportive of stealing copyrights from artists, but in turn doesn't want anyone to offer their own format or copyrights for people to use. Their privacy policy page states several "Prohibited Uses", including not using their site or services to transmit content which would cause distress on any other person, including unlawful material which would infringe on a copyright, or other lawful material. Sorry Pilfered, you cannot have it both ways. (Get more of the details at John Harrington's blog.)

For now, the online magazine is still up and running. If some of the larger photography pros have their way, it won't be up too much longer.

-Betsy

www.betsyhansen.com