I haven’t heard anything either.
hi
i too recieved a letter from B&M looking for £2,700 for se of corbis image. can anyone tell me how you got on with your letters as i dont know what to do?
Hi
i recently designed a website for a friend and used images which i thought were free. But today my friend recieved a letter from Corbis solictiors - B&M - demanding payment of £2,700 for use of 3 images from Corbis.
I have been looking at other forums here and wanted to know if anyone has resolved this matter?
I was completed unaware that the images were from corbis and feel the bill is a rip off, especially as the same images on their website only cost £600 if bought today.
If anybody has any comments it would be greatly appreciated
thanks
Hi Sitchey,
You really have to read through all of this thread and the Getty one and base your decision on what you see there. All I can tell you is that this has been going on for several months and despite the threats that are issued no one has reported being taken to court as yet so don’t rush into it.
I got my first letter at the beginning of December and I did not respond. The sent me a second letter giving me until 2 January to pay or else. Once again I did not respond. I am now almost six weeks past their “or else” date.
As I said above I got a law firm to send them a letter on my behalf on January 17th and this has been the only communication since then. The letter that was sent to them basically pointed out that under section 97 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988 there is no entitlement to damages where you do not know, and have no reason to believe that any copyright existed.
As far as I can see this puts the ball back into their court. They have made their case and I have contested it with what I think is a good defence. Were they to take this court I believe that I can prove that there was no “flagrancy”, which needs to be demonstrated to justify any claim for damages.
See, http://www.opsi.gov.uk/acts/acts1988/Ukpga_19880048_en_7.htm#mdiv97
The point to remember in all of this is that AFAIK no one has yet been taken to court. It could be that they are unwilling to risk a court case since if it is successfully defended it will be widely publicised and they will no longer be able to issue their extortionate demands. As things stand many people are paying without question and this will be pulling in massive amounts of money for them Worldwide.
Added: When I said that no one has been taken to court I meant no one like you or me. There have of course been many high profile copyright cases between larger businesses and Getty and Corbis.
Booler
many thanks for the reply!
I have had a look at the other posts on this site, but just didn’t know how people have got on once they got their letter.
I am adamant for me and my client not to pay this bill especially as when I priced the images on corbis the bill for the year comes to £545.
Was the law firm you used lineone? I seen this on other posts and have already sent them an email explaining my case.
Yes.
ok thanks. I have already sent them an email so waiting to here back.
is it vital that you are able to prove where u got the images from to resolve this matter, cos as its been a year I might have difficulty in finding them again
Once again this has not really been tested. I for one cannot remember where I got my offending image.
thanks booler your comments are a big help. I have found one of the images but cant find the other 2 and I was worried there that you might need the source of the images you used.
can i asked where you got your image from, i got mine from the internet, but the pages i used are no longer up and Im just worried that i might not have a case
Booler can you remember how much lineone charged you for the case?
I’ve come across this…
“Now Corbis is taking a web site to court for using one of its photos without paying, having detected its watermark. There’s nothing wrong with the picture technically, but it’s hard to imagine anybody actually using it if they knew they’d have to pay for the privilege. Corbis says the picture is worth over £1,000 and is now suing the site.”
The full article is in this link - http://www.itweek.co.uk/itweek/comme...tray-copyright
I wonder if the author means that they are actually taking them to court or if he just means that they have received a demand like ours?
No idea. I think I might drop a line to the author of the article and ask for the name of the site.
I’ve just been reviewing some of the information published by the EFF regarding the RIAA litigation cases against P2P users. In some cases, the copyright infringers have counter-sued for harassment and extorsion.
Surely that case is different to ours…
i mean like that website had the corbis watermark on the background of the images, so there is no way they could deny that they didnt get their images from corbis.
Is it my browser? or has the article vanished overnight?
It’s pretty simple…Stop stealing other peoples work. If you need a photography, pay for it or take your own.
If you didn’t know it was their photography when it was supplied to you, surely once you have been notified that it is in fact their image. Take it down.
we didnt know the images belonged to corbis so we didnt rip anyone off… and yes once we knew we took the images down, but that wasn’t enough for them the still want paid their extortionate fees!!
I doubt you would have a problem in court then. If you took the image down straight away after notification I doubt a court would make you pay the full fees. But of course I’m no lawyer. You may want to speak to one who knows something about copyright law.
B&M’s letter has reference with a number. Mine says 1024. Are they all the same? higher? lower?
Good idea Tristana. This could be interesting. The last part of the reference on mine says UK01016 and it was dated 4 December 2006. This suggests that this could have been claim number 1016 in the UK unless they started the number series at 1000?
Anyone else above or below this?
So the IT Week writer has rectified his article!
B&M’s letter has reference with a number. Mine says 1024. Are they all the same? higher? lower?