Basics of Publishing Images/Photos.. Are you allowed?

I've noticed a lot of upset articles lately regarding Photos and Images being flagged for Copyright. While frustrating and annoying, really this is not only for Gathers own sake and the copyright owners, but could be good for you too!

What? That makes no freakin' sense! Good for me? How?

Regarding photography there are so many rules regarding the rights of the Photographer. It can be difficult to chew through and understand, hence the reason that colleges offer classes just to learn the law behind Photography rights!

But to break it down simply to you, if you did not take the photo, you have no rights to reproduce said photo without explicit permission of the Photographer.

What does this mean?

Say you hire a Photographer to do your family portrait and you order 5 copies. Later on down the road you decide you want to give the photo to some friends. You scan the photo, go online to Walmart, upload the photo and pay for 5 more copies. Guess what, you've just violated the copyright of this photo.

But, you paid for it correct, and it is a portrait of your family! Yep, that's correct, but you didn't get a signed release from the photographer stating that you had permission to reproduce this photo.

Say you see a fantastic photo somewhere online. You see it all over the place. It's on many websites. Shouldn't be a problem publishing it here on Gather right?

Wrong! Just because "everyone else is doing it" doesn't make it safe for you from being liable for copyright infringement! Just because those "other people" have yet to be caught does not mean that will not be, nor does it mean you will not be.

I have been good friends with people who took a Disney Coloring Book,  colored some pages, scanned the pages and published them online to share... and Disney later contacted the people and threatened them with a lawsuit if said images were not removed!

So my dear Gather friends, while it is confusing, my best advice to you would be, if it does not belong to you, if you have not had permission from the original photographer of a photo or the artist of an image, for your own sake do not reproduce them. It is better to be safe than sorry!