race photos (Read 1793 times)

Trent


Good Bad & The Monkey

    In the days of Napster, it was easy to steal.  Really, it was easier to steal than it was to pay to get digital music.

     

    Then came iTunes.  With iTunes, the pricing model matched people's sensibilities, it became super easy to get digital music, and you didn't have to steal.  Napster lost, iTunes won.

     

    With digital images, we don't have the distribution and payment model figured out, and so we still live in a world where people find it easier to steal (or go without) than to pay.


    Why is it sideways?

      I actually thought Perry's post was pretty good on this.

       

      What makes a digital picture easier to take (beyond the fact that there is no interest powerful enough to make sure that people are punished if they are caught) is the idea of its infinite and effortless reproduce-ability. Led's point is important--a file is not like property because you can take it, and the original is still there. You are copying, not stealing. It is more like plagiarism than theft.

       

      But of course the act of taking a picture is different as well from plagiarism because no one is passing this work off as their own or attempting to profit from it, either in financial terms or in prestige.

       

      In fact, taking a photo is very close to a victimless crime, and it would be actually victimless if there wasn't an assumption that race photographers ought to be getting paid for this work, which brings us to the question: should they be getting paid for this sort of labor? And how should this pay occur?

       

      I think photographers should be paid because it adds to the race experience to be able to remember the race, share it on FB, and also see pictures of your friends that ran it. The race photo is really the new race t-shirt. We don't wear t-shirts around, we post a gnarly shot of ourselves on our FB walls. The way of monetizing it should reflect that pictures are a part of the total experience, and I think that it should be included in the race cost.

       

      For these reasons, it makes more sense to me to pay either a salaried photographer through a local race organization or to pay a freelance photographer a flat fee, rather than pay by the picture. I think it would be better for the photographers and better for the runners. The only ones who lose out on this are folks like Brightroom, who want to take $45 extra dollars from folks for whom this is their only marathon and will pay a premium for documentation of the crossed off item on their bucket list.

      MrH


        I like the idea of races bundling the cost in as part of the total event fee, versus pay per photo. With 100% participation, the additional cost would be small.

         

        I'm an amateur with an OK camera, who likes taking race pics. I upload them to the web and share them with anyone who is interested at no cost. And while I've even had some of my pics published in running magazines in preference to the official meet photographer, I can't be relied on to be there for everyone and to get the best pictures in less than optimum conditions. If professionals don't get rewarded for their work, we lose a service we might want.

        The process is the goal.

        Men heap together the mistakes of their lives, and create a monster they call Destiny.

        AmoresPerros


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          Oh, give me a break....... If said web page implicitly has a copyright all over it, that means it is not available for download.  You can view it, but not download it.  Period. 

           

          To "view" it without downloading it, I think, can't really be done on a any regular computer or internet-enabled phone.

           

          That was really the essence of my point, that I think some people may not realize that "viewing" actually means "downloading".

           

          From the tone of your response, I suspect I did not communicate that successfully.

           

          Or else you are thinking of "view without downloading" in some way that I don't understand.

          It's a 5k. It hurt like hell...then I tried to pick it up. The end.

            But of course the act of taking a picture is different as well from plagiarism because no one is passing this work off as their own or attempting to profit from it, either in financial terms or in prestige.

             

            In fact, taking a photo is very close to a victimless crime, and it would be actually victimless if there wasn't an assumption that race photographers ought to be getting paid for this work, ...

            I don't think my opinion about whether photographers "ought to be getting paid for this work" has a bearing on whether or not I'm entitled to take an exemplar of what's being offered to me for sale.  The exemplar does not belong to me, is not being given to me, nor is it even being shown to me for any other purpose save to graphically describe what's being offered to me for purchase.  I've not been able to get from there to "it's OK to take it".

            "I want you to pray as if everything depends on it, but I want you to prepare yourself as if everything depends on you."

            -- Dick LeBeau

            AmoresPerros


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              ... The exemplar does not belong to me, is not being given to me, ... I've not been able to get from there to "it's OK to take it".

               

              I know that I'm belaboring the technically obvious, but there is a problem of analogy here. With a physical photo, the photographer may well hand it to you to hold up in your hands, to view with your eyes, with the implied understanding that it is a loan, and that you are expected to hand it back.

               

              With a digital photo, to show it to you, the photographer likely puts a link to it onto a website, and sends you an email, requesting that you download it to your computer where you can see it -- they don't say "download", but that is a more or less necessary step for you to view it.

               

              So they want you to make a copy of it -- in fact, several copies may need to be made, if you go through a proxy. So this downloading and copying is implicitly requested by the photographer.

               

              But we miss the analogous step of "handing it back", because that step isn't present in the digital world -- at least, not in our present simple handling of files.

               

              This is a simple step, but missing it opens up this can of worms, because we lost this nice gateway differentiating "keeping it" from "borrowing it".

               

              Then there are the parts of technology that don't work so well in analogy. When your local backup program automatically makes a copy of it late at night, simply because it makes copies of everything on your computer (including your browser cache), in case your computer hard drive crashes -- then there is another copy, and one perhaps never considered by the photographer. This isn't so perfectly analogous to you making a copy of the photo that the photographer handed you, because this software backup is automatic, and there was no specific intent to copy this photo.

              It's a 5k. It hurt like hell...then I tried to pick it up. The end.

                Perry, I get that point.  But the digital copies transiently made on a computer aren't deemed to be a copyright infringement.  (I'm not sure, but I believe they are expressly exempted from the legal ambit of US copyright infringement.)  They are made, and exist, for the purpose of displaying to you the exemplar (for the purposes and with the limitations I listed previously) via the Internet.  In any event, those transient files are authorized by the image's author when the exemplar is put on the Internet for viewing.

                "I want you to pray as if everything depends on it, but I want you to prepare yourself as if everything depends on you."

                -- Dick LeBeau

                AmoresPerros


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                  "Transient" is going to wind up being rather weasely (? not sure what word I want) in that context, I suspect. Especially once you consider proxies. Anyway, pretty much all digital files are transient; that's a major factor distinguishing them from real objects.

                   

                  In any case, you're omitting the backup copies -- I'd say if we set up our system to make people liable (civilly or criminally) for backing up their own computers, we've set up a very bad system.

                   

                  It seems to me that there are a lot of snakey issues involved, that are really there even when people wave their arms and treat it as all a very simple topic.

                  It's a 5k. It hurt like hell...then I tried to pick it up. The end.

                    It seems to me that there are a lot of snakey issues involved, that are really there even when people wave their arms and treat it as all a very simple topic.

                    I'm willing to wave my arms and call it a simple(r) topic because I think the law recognizes that (a) only the most computer-astute are even going to know they have those "long-term transient" files stored on their machines and backups, let alone be able to access them in the labyrinth of hidden Temp folders and whatnot; and (b) practically speaking, no one is going to sue anyone for a backup drive housing a copy of an image that's only there because it was still in cache or something when the disc was backed up.

                    "I want you to pray as if everything depends on it, but I want you to prepare yourself as if everything depends on you."

                    -- Dick LeBeau

                    xor


                      Can someone summarize where we are on this issue?

                       


                      Prince of Fatness

                        Can someone summarize where we are on this issue?

                         

                        Probably not.  I know I can't.

                        Not at it at all. 


                        an amazing likeness

                          Can someone summarize where we are on this issue?

                           

                          Well, Nuke's scared because his eyelids are jammed and his old man's here. We need a live... is it a live rooster?

                          We need a live rooster to take the curse off Jose's glove and nobody seems to know what to get Millie or Jimmy for their wedding present.

                          Is that about right?

                          We're dealing with a lot of shit.

                          Okay, well, uh... candlesticks always make a nice gift, and uh, maybe you could find out where she's registered and maybe a place-setting or maybe a silverware pattern.

                           

                          Okay, let's get two! Go get 'em.

                          Acceptable at a dance, invaluable in a shipwreck.

                          AmoresPerros


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                            Candlesticks? Is that what you kids are calling it these days? Damn kids.

                            It's a 5k. It hurt like hell...then I tried to pick it up. The end.

                              Candlesticks? Is that what you kids are calling it these days? Damn kids.

                               modified to reflect delayed but improving impulse control

                               

                               

                               

                              Tramps


                                Can someone summarize where we are on this issue?

                                 

                                1. Using photo proofs: not cool

                                2. Photo business model: outdated

                                3. Photographers: underpaid

                                4. Treating photos as T-shirt: promising possibility

                                Be safe. Be kind.