[cc-community] Creative Commons and privacy rights
Evan Prodromou
evan at wikitravel.org
Sat Sep 18 17:46:39 EDT 2004
James Grimmelmann wrote:
>> I'd assume that licensors are still accountable for the privacy rights of
>> works' subjects, and shouldn't release images of people for which they
>> don't
>> have model releases.
>>
>> What about redistributors or makers of derivative works? As far as I can
>> tell, there's really no way for them to be sure that a work doesn't
>> violate
>> someone's privacy, unless they have some kind of documentation from the
>> original author.
>
> And so on and so on. There are tons of ways you can open yourself up to
> a lawsuit whenever you open your mouth or make a creative work. Across
> the board, the 2.0 licenses say that this is strictly a matter between
> you and the person who might sue you: there is no warranty from the
> licensor that the work is "safe" from any of these torts. Privacy is
> just another example of the general pattern.
I find this all kind of interesting, but from a practical level it really sucks.
I mean, when I find a CC-licensed photo of a human being on Common Content (for
example), do I have to trace down the identity of that person, get some kind of
contact information, and make an additional agreement with them to publish the
picture?
I don't know really a whole bunch about the business of photography, but for
some reason I find that kind of hard to believe. It seems like a lot of
photographers sell and re-sell portraits and other photos to magazines, books,
or whatever. Does each publisher have to contact the model and make a separate
agreement? Or does the permission granted by the model to the photographer
transfer at all to the publisher?
If it does, could that same framework be applicable to a Creative
Commons-licensed work? If the model gives the photographer permission to sell a
photo of them to anyone for any reason, could they also give them permission to
give the photo away to anyone?
~Evan
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