Copyright issues

I have a few questions:

1. Can we find out who is buying our clips?
2. When someone is using one of our clips, do they have to credit Pond5 or the copyright holder?
3. How do we know if the copyright is being respected?

1: Nope. But sometimes the buyers tell us.
2: Nope, but sometimes they do.
3: Faith, trust, hope. And the heavy penalties applied in US civil courts if someone gets caught.

So then are we actually keeping the copyright to our work?

Yes we have copyright to the work in terms of it being used as stock, but once it gets incorporated into another video it becomes a new arrangement, where the owner can resell it. So its illegal to resell it as stock, but if you make a video, documentary, film or whatever you can resell the DVD .

I have seen producers 'give' each other royalty free songs etc...it is illegal but no one ever seems to get caught. How am I supposed to report it anyway, I don't know who the artist is... Thats the problem, since we don't know who the buyer is, we have no way of enforcing our own material. If you see your clip on TV you have to assume someone bought it, but maybe they didn't, maybe it was given by a friend of a friend. Not to mention many businesses can protect themselves from lawsuits (to some degree) through many different legal entities.

Thats just collateral loss I guess.

I swear if I ever see anyone posting something I made on another site under a different name or something, I think I will sue the "artist". Some idiot on SS was doing that to a bunch of artists.

The Royalty-Free License Agreement which all buyers MUST agree to, and do so whenever they buy a clip from Pond5, very clearly cover these cases.

See Royalty-Free License for the specifics.

Basically, when an artist sells a clip, he or she grants the buyer (or Licensee) the right to incorporate it in whatever film, video, art piece, website or any other derivative work they want for ever.

They may not give, transfer, or resell that right. Period full-stop. If they do, you may sue them and extract compensatory and punitive damages, including legal costs.

If they use your clip in a movie, and then sell all their rights to that movie to a third party, that third-party may not sell or re-use your clip outside of that movie, because the original buyer cannot transfer that right to the third party. The original buyer never owns the right to resell your footage as stock.

For example, a buyer buys a timelapse-clouds clip and edits into their film. They may sell their film anywhere they like. But whoever buys the film can't extract the clip of timelapse-clouds and use it in something else. Also, the buyer can't 'give' the clip to a friend of their's. That's a violation of the License Agreement, and you can sue them for that even if they don't sell it.

Unfortunately there is no easy way to enforce your rights, and requires the services of a lawyer. However, if you see your clip in 10 different uses but you only sold it 5 times, you can probably sue one of those 5 buyers. All you have to do is ask the 10 different users where they got it from. Of course, its possible that one of your buyers used your clip in 6 different pieces. That's okay, they're allowed to do that.

With music its a little easier, since its been around longer. http://www.bmi.com/ and http://www.ascap.com/ monitor film, television, and radio for abuse. As far as I know there's nothing equivalent for motion pictures. Perhaps MPAA and RIAA, but I"m not sure.

Of course, I'm not a lawyer, so these remarks should not be considered legal advice. Please refer to a qualified professional for serious inquiries.

Unfortunately, I don't think they can monitor all of the educational videos, training videos or foreign movies. :(
I wondered that about the third party thing, so I guess if an indy film maker gets a distribution deal, he doesn't have to pay anything extra ... does he?

Why was it, when dreamworks purchased from here they paid extra for the license to use the clips? I guess they were buying an extended license... Im not entirely sure what that means.

DreamWorks didn't want to b ea cheap buyer but more important they did not use the P5 license agreement, they required sellers to sign their own agreement and therefore they paid extra to P5 and the seller for the additional work.
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With BMI and ASCAP they make a fortune charging restaurants, bars, etc for the right to play music over their speaker system. When I owned restaurants I had to pay an annual fee to them just to have a radio playing inside or my property. It wasn't cheap, several hundred dollars a year.

Klipper did a great job at explaining. With RF you just have to trust everyone.
Don

ah, I see... I remember a while ago Jake said something to the effect of: "...they pay a little extra for that kind of a license.." and I was under the impression they had modified, or somehow expanded the license agreement.

Thanks Don!
and thank you Klipper, you always have insightful information! lol you should write a blog.

Mark, that's what you get for listening to me.
Sorry, I misunderstood why the extra money for the clips.
Thanks for clearing it up for me Don.
Jake

Heck I dunno, I just pocket the cash and go buy more camera gear. I figured it was due to having to use their release and the extra work on our part. I think P5 and Dreamworks release was very similar. I kinda like the paragraph that said they can use the clip forever and throughout the universe. I sure hope to see them release a movie with our clips used on Mars or even the North Star ;) That would truly be a universal release to use.