wwp@yahoogroups.com:
Special note: WWP panoramas used by third party without consent
Markus Altendorff 2008-Jun-02 20:48:00
This announcement is sent out as a special notice, to reach those WWP group members
that do not receive regular messages.
A german cultural institute, the ZKM (roughly translateable as the "Center for Arts and
Media Technology") has obviously used the panoramas contributed to the WWP as example
data in an installation of their own design (a circular large-scale projection, controlled by
laser pointer, for high-res visualization) without seeking permission from each
photographer (remember that all rights remain with the individual photographers, not the
WWP).
Don Bain has a summary of the events here:
http://tech.groups.yahoo.com/group/wwp/message/9520
The ZKM has also sent a message, which I've forwarded to the group here:
http://tech.groups.yahoo.com/group/wwp/message/9774
Several pano-photographers have, in the mean time, sent letters of disagreement or
revocation/denial of permission to the ZKM, to which the ZKM has apparently complied
and is no longer using these images.
Yuval Levy, and others, have decided to join their actions in regard to the violation of their
copyrights, to reach an agreement and a to-be-decided-on compensation from the ZKM:
http://tech.groups.yahoo.com/group/wwp/message/9713
They are currently in talks with the ZKM to settle this out of court, and the ZKM's lawyer
has acknowledged to the misconduct, according to:
http://tech.groups.yahoo.com/group/wwp/message/9816
To give an idea what the ZKM presentation looks like, Willy Kaemena has visited the
installation and recorded a video:
http://tech.groups.yahoo.com/group/wwp/message/9598
Copyright troubles are a sore subject, but please keep the discussion calm and civilized.
-Markus