Wikipedia refuses to delete photo as 'monkey owns it'

[meshaliuknits]

So all primates take selfies. Good to know.

[pixy0stix]

1. Team Wikipedia

2. Does this mean if we mess with the Nest wiki again that we could see exactly what the nest is claiming? Do records go back to cover the original? Who wants to do some research?

[cville]

I love this and it makes me laugh. But my husband and I are also watching Battlestar Galactica now (we're on the SIXTH episode of the FIRST season, so please don't destroy it), so the notion of any allegedly lower-level being self-actualizing in a human way is freaking me out.

[pretzel]

Team photographer. The photo would not exist without him and the equipment he paid for. He deserves to make royalties off it so he can enable more primates to take more selfies.

[noodleoo]

As much as I wish I could side with the monkey here, I have to side with the photographer. Without his work, his equipment, his editing and processing, there would be no image. It sucks for him.

[pixy0stix]

Aug 7, 2014 11:06:40 GMT -5 pretzel said:

Team photographer. The photo would not exist without him and the equipment he paid for. He deserves to make royalties off it so he can enable more primates to take more selfies.

Creative license lies with the artist, though. In this case the monkey.

[niemand88f]

Aug 7, 2014 10:52:34 GMT -5 pixy0stix said:

1. Team Wikipedia

2. Does this mean if we mess with the Nest wiki again that we could see exactly what the nest is claiming? Do records go back to cover the original? Who wants to do some research?

Yes, someone dug that up in that awesome ML migration history post, halfway down the 2nd page: The Migration

[cville]

Aug 7, 2014 11:06:40 GMT -5 pretzel said:

Team photographer. The photo would not exist without him and the equipment he paid for. He deserves to make royalties off it so he can enable more primates to take more selfies.

I see what you're saying.  But isn't the logical extent of this that, if you use a Nikon, without Nikon's patents and blah blah there would be no photograph so they should make royalties off of it too?

Here the photographer was a conduit for the photography equipment to reach the "artist."  I'm sympathetic to the photographer, but I'm not sure that I like his legal argument.

[wawa]

Aug 7, 2014 11:08:03 GMT -5 noodleoo said:

As much as I wish I could side with the monkey here, I have to side with the photographer. Without his work, his equipment, his editing and processing, there would be no image. It sucks for him.

But if you loan me your camera and I take photos with it and then fail to delete them from your storage before I return it...they're still mine aren't they? In terms of copyright type stuff.

I mean...all this seems irrelevant though since in what way can a monkey legally own anything? Or have the courts recognized the legal rights of monkeys?

[anastasia517]

Aug 7, 2014 11:27:44 GMT -5 wawa said:

Aug 7, 2014 11:08:03 GMT -5 noodleoo said:

As much as I wish I could side with the monkey here, I have to side with the photographer. Without his work, his equipment, his editing and processing, there would be no image. It sucks for him.

But if you loan me your camera and I take photos with it and then fail to delete them from your storage before I return it...they're still mine aren't they? In terms of copyright type stuff.

I mean...all this seems irrelevant though since in what way can a monkey legally own anything? Or have the courts recognized the legal rights of monkeys?

Monkeys, like corporations, are people too wawa.  Duh.

[meshaliuknits]

Aug 7, 2014 11:27:44 GMT -5 wawa said:

Aug 7, 2014 11:08:03 GMT -5 noodleoo said:

As much as I wish I could side with the monkey here, I have to side with the photographer. Without his work, his equipment, his editing and processing, there would be no image. It sucks for him.

But if you loan me your camera and I take photos with it and then fail to delete them from your storage before I return it...they're still mine aren't they? In terms of copyright type stuff.

I mean...all this seems irrelevant though since in what way can a monkey legally own anything? Or have the courts recognized the legal rights of monkeys?

That's what i was wondering. I assume the dog in Turner and Hooch didn't didn't get any of the monies for his artistic work in the movie. He didn't even get a credit on imdb.

[eponinepontmercy]

If a monkey has legal artistic rights, does this mean they can get married? Rick Santorum's nightmare has come true!

[PinkSquirrel]

Team photographer so long as the camera wasn't set to auto. This isn't just as simple has handing a point and shoot to a friend and letting them have at it. There are so many adjustments that can be made in a DSLR that the person making those adjustments 100% has a hand in how that photograph looks.

As an example, I was just on a group trip to Tanzania and Rwanda. We had a few tweens along with us. One of them was really excited about photographing all of the animals. At one point we were in front of the lion, I got my dlsr all set up for him, made artistic choices about things etc and handed the camera over. I had left the focus point slightly to the right, which lead him to take a picture virtually identical to one I had taken a minute earlier. Why was it identical even though a kid with no knowledge of shooting a DSLR in manual mode took one picture and I, with at decent amount of knowledge took the other? Because I had set everything up for that shot, hell my choices even guided his composition. Now, he's a cool kid and I'll give him credit and praise all day long for taking a great picture, but I know that ultimately 98% of the reason the picture looks like it does is because of me. So, yeah, that photographer likely contributed significantly to that picture. I have no idea what the pictures were shot with, but if he had chosen a different lens, different aperture, different shutter speed etc there may very well be no pictures.

ETA - My comments aren't really on the legal end because I'm not a copyright lawyer, but even if Wiki CAN do this, I think it's in extremely poor taste to pretend the photographer holds no rights to the photo.

[pamela]

So if it belongs to the monkey, why do they think they can just put it up for free? Did the monkey agree to that?

[stealthmom]

Aug 7, 2014 11:08:33 GMT -5 pixy0stix said:

Aug 7, 2014 11:06:40 GMT -5 pretzel said:

Team photographer. The photo would not exist without him and the equipment he paid for. He deserves to make royalties off it so he can enable more primates to take more selfies.

Creative license lies with the artist, though. In this case the monkey.

if the monkey had set up the shot I might agree with you.

There is nothing artistic about only pressing a button.

[Deleted]

I'm not sure I agree the photo is ownerless merely because the monkey took it. But I think it's a huge stretch to say the owner of the camera was some kind of artist who set up a shot in anticipation of the settings required for a monkey to take a selfie.

The difference between this monkey and borrowing your friend's camera is that the friend has given you permission. In effect, the monkey stole the camera so the question, if you get past the fact that monkeys don't exactly have legal rights, is whether you get to keep pictures taken with a stolen camera.

I'm not sure you do.

[pixy0stix]

Except that the photographer didn't set up the shot. The monkeys took the camera and went gallivanting off with it.

[josieposy]

Unless they're paying the monkey, they're skating on a technicality and that's not cool.

[Cicero]

Does wiki have enough ties to the UK to be hauled into court there? Because the guy is a Brit. It sounds like he'd sue there, making US copyright law kind of irrelevant.

[PinkSquirrel]

Aug 7, 2014 18:30:37 GMT -5 pixy0stix said:

Except that the photographer didn't set up the shot. The monkeys took the camera and went gallivanting off with it.

Stealing the camera has little to do with it, he had already set the camera's exposure/aperture/iso, he had set the metering mode, focus mode, selected the lens etc to be appropriate for the general situation.  He also is the one who edited the photos, which is his own artwork.   You could argue all day about the significance of his contribution, but he did contribute on some level and if the monkey can't get the rights he should. I do wish the monkey could just get the rights and they could be used to raise money for conservation efforts because they made a significant contribution to the photos.

[pixy0stix]

Aug 7, 2014 21:33:12 GMT -5 PinkSquirrel said:

Aug 7, 2014 18:30:37 GMT -5 pixy0stix said:

Except that the photographer didn't set up the shot. The monkeys took the camera and went gallivanting off with it.

Stealing the camera has little to do with it, he had already set the camera's exposure/aperture/iso, he had set the metering mode, focus mode, selected the lens etc to be appropriate for the general situation.  He also is the one who edited the photos, which is his own artwork.   You could argue all day about the significance of his contribution, but he did contribute on some level and if the monkey can't get the rights he should. I do wish the monkey could just get the rights and they could be used to raise money for conservation efforts because they made the most significant contribution to the photos.

The camera was off and they turned it on. Then stole it and pressed buttons. There was very little composition and blah blah blah going on (trust, I know what it takes to get a good picture). You should know that by editing a picture, you don't get to claim any rights to those pictures. In this case, since the monkey took the picture, the picture belongs to no one. (At least here in the states. I have no idea about over the pond.)

[wawa]

Aug 7, 2014 21:43:12 GMT -5 asdfjkl said:

Aug 7, 2014 12:41:56 GMT -5 nuggetbrain said:

GUYS. IT'S A MONKEY. MONKEYS CANNOT LEGALLY OWN THINGS. BECAUSE THEY'RE MONKEYS.

Right?!?! There is a one sentence answer to this question: only people have ownership rights of ANYTHING.

But...so obviously the monkey doesn't own it.  But so does the photog own it or is it up for grabs by any other person who wants to snag it?

[PinkSquirrel]

Aug 7, 2014 21:36:32 GMT -5 pixy0stix said:

Aug 7, 2014 21:33:12 GMT -5 PinkSquirrel said:

Stealing the camera has little to do with it, he had already set the camera's exposure/aperture/iso, he had set the metering mode, focus mode, selected the lens etc to be appropriate for the general situation.  He also is the one who edited the photos, which is his own artwork.   You could argue all day about the significance of his contribution, but he did contribute on some level and if the monkey can't get the rights he should. I do wish the monkey could just get the rights and they could be used to raise money for conservation efforts because they made the most significant contribution to the photos.

The camera was off and they turned it on. Then stole it and pressed buttons. There was very little composition and blah blah blah going on (trust, I know what it takes to get a good picture). You should know that by editing a picture, you don't get to claim any rights to those pictures. In this case, since the monkey took the picture, the picture belongs to no one. (At least here in the states. I have no idea about over the pond.)

Where did it mention that it was turned off?   I just went through old articles and I'm not able to find any mention that the camera was turned off.   From what I've read he already had it set up on a tripod and the monkeys knocked it over setting off the shutter, which made noise and caused the monkey to become more interested.    If it was already on the tripod and and he had been hanging out with these same monkeys for three days, yeah the camera was likely at least somewhat set up to take pictures of monkeys in close quarters due to the artistic choices either made that morning or on the previous two days with the same group of monkeys.

[Alyssa]

My cousin posted an article on this on FB and there's a huge debate going on right now with him and some of his friends over this.


One guy said:

The photos would never have reached the public if the photographer hasn't released them. Regardless of who took the photos, they were taken with his equipment, and control of the photos was his. He didn't take the photos, but he had control of the circumstances in which the monkeys were able to take them.

If it wasn't for him, being there, at that time, with his equipment, the photos never would have been taken. I tend to agree on the side of public domain more often then not, because in most cases it's the bigger guy trying to control something and take power away from the little guy. (i.e. The Happy Birthday song)

However, in this case, a larger entity (wikipedia) is trying to take something away from the little guy. (This photographer.) Photographers often have had their photos taken without them being paid, or even given credit. I've seen this happen a lot.

Wiki is in the wrong here, and it's a dick move on their part.


Cousin responded:

Wikimedia is not a big company, David. They're a non-profit, they've got a few people who work full-time... they're pretty small, really. In this case, yes, a small non-profit is larger than a single individual -- but that doesn't change the facts of the case, and I still strongly believe that these pictures are public domain.

He didn't do the set-up, as he's arguing. The monkey did the setup. The only set-up he did was bring a camera to the monkey.



I chimed in:

Somewhere in Indonesia there is a monkey chewing on a fruit unaware of the intense debate that it sparked.

[MixedBerryJam]

Aug 7, 2014 11:06:40 GMT -5 pretzel said:

Team photographer. The photo would not exist without him and the equipment he paid for. He deserves to make royalties off it so he can enable more primates to take more selfies.

Agree. If anything, I can see the macaque having acted as the photographer's agent (or assistant) but even in that case, wouldn't the photographer own the intellectual/creative property?

[ChillyMcFreeze]

Aug 8, 2014 14:09:03 GMT -5 MixedBerryJam said:

Aug 7, 2014 11:06:40 GMT -5 pretzel said:

Team photographer. The photo would not exist without him and the equipment he paid for. He deserves to make royalties off it so he can enable more primates to take more selfies.

Agree. If anything, I can see the macaque having acted as the photographer's agent (or assistant) but even in that case, wouldn't the photographer own the intellectual/creative property?

Sort of? But a photog's assistant will have signed a work-made-for-hire agreement reverting all rights to the photog or studio owner. The monkey didn't sign any such agreement.

BUT MONKEYS CAN'T OWN THINGS!!!

[orangello]

I just keep coming in here to laugh at that cheese-ass grin. Team monkey, if it means that the pic stays out in the public sphere for me to giggle at.

(really - I'm team photographer here, but...it's so funny!)

[ESF]

Team Wikimedia.

I'd feel differently if this guy had trained the monkeys to take selfies. But this is just dumb luck. He didn't do anything creative, he just disseminated his luck.

I don't think people whose toasters imprint Jesus on their rye are creative geniuses either.