Monkey selfie copyright dispute

The monkey selfie copyright dispute is a series of disputes about the copyright status of selfies taken by Celebes crested macaques using equipment belonging to the British nature photographer David Slater. The disputes involve Wikimedia Commons and the blog Techdirt, which have hosted the images following their publication in newspapers in July 2011 over Slater's objections that he holds the copyright, and People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA), who have argued that the macaque should be assigned the copyright.

One of the monkey selfies at issue in the dispute

Slater has argued that he has a valid copyright claim, as he engineered the situation that resulted in the pictures by travelling to Indonesia, befriending a group of wild macaques, and setting up his camera equipment in such a way that a "selfie" picture might come about. The Wikimedia Foundation's 2014 refusal to remove the pictures from its Wikimedia Commons image library was based on the understanding that copyright is held by the creator, that a non-human creator (not being a legal person) cannot hold copyright, and that the images are thus in the public domain.

Slater stated in August 2014 that, as a result of the pictures being available on Wikipedia, he had lost at least GB£10,000 (equivalent to about £11,000 in 2019) in income and his business as a wildlife photographer was being harmed.[1] In December 2014, the United States Copyright Office stated that works created by a non-human, such as a photograph taken by a monkey, are not copyrightable. A number of legal experts in the US and UK have argued that Slater's role in the photographic process may have been sufficient to establish a valid copyright claim, though this decision would have to be made by a court.[2][3][4]

In a separate dispute, PETA tried to use the monkey selfies to establish a legal precedent that animals should be declared copyright holders. Slater had published a book containing the photographs through self-publishing company Blurb, Inc. In September 2015, PETA filed a lawsuit against Slater and Blurb, requesting that the monkey be assigned the copyright and that PETA be appointed to administer proceeds from the photos for the endangered species' benefit.[5] In dismissing PETA's case, the court ruled that a monkey cannot own copyright, under U.S. law.[6] PETA appealed, and in September 2017, both PETA and the photographer agreed to a settlement in which Slater would donate a portion of future revenues on the photographs to wildlife organizations. However, the court of appeals declined to dismiss the appeal and declined to vacate the lower court judgment.[7] In April 2018, the appeals court affirmed that animals cannot legally hold copyrights and expressed concern that PETA's motivations had been to promote their own interests rather than to protect the legal rights of animals.

Background
The other disputed image, a full-body "selfie"

Since 2008, British nature photographer David Slater had traveled to Indonesia to take photographs of the critically endangered Celebes crested macaques. In 2011 he licensed several images to the Caters News Agency who released them, along with a written promotional press release with quotes from Slater, for publication in the British media.[8][9] On 4 July 2011 several publications including The Telegraph, and The Guardian[10] picked up the story and published the pictures along with articles that quoted Slater as describing the photographs as self-portraits taken by the monkeys: "Monkey steals camera to snap himself" (The Telegraph),[11] "a camera on a tripod" triggered by the monkeys (The Guardian),[12] and a camera started by a monkey "Fascinated by her reflection in the lens". The articles also contained Slater quotes such as "He must have taken hundreds of pictures by the time I got my camera back." The following day, Amateur Photographer reported that Slater gave them further explanation as to how the photographs were created, downplaying the way newspaper articles had described them; Slater said reports that a monkey ran off with his camera and "began taking self-portraits" were incorrect and that the portrait was shot when his camera had been mounted on a tripod, with the primates playing around with a remote cable release as he fended off other monkeys.[13]

Slater gave further description on his website and in other media accounts, saying he and a guide followed the monkeys for three days, gaining their trust on the second day.[14] According to Slater, in his attempts to get photographs of the monkeys, he found that they were fascinated with the camera and the camera gear and kept playing with it, but they also kept trying to run off with the camera. Slater further stated in a 7 August 2014 Amateur Photographer follow-up article that "I wanted a close-up image but I couldn't do it. They were too nervous, so I had to get them [the monkeys] to come to the camera without me being there and get them to play with the release, which they did". He added: "They were looking at the reflection in the lens, which they found amusing".[15] In an attempt to get a portrait of the monkeys' faces, Slater said he set the camera on a tripod with a large wide-angle lens attached, and set the camera's settings to optimize the chances of getting a facial close up, using predictive autofocus, motor drive, and a flashgun. Slater further stated that he set the camera's remote shutter trigger next to the camera and, while he held onto the tripod, the monkeys spent 30 minutes looking into the lens and playing with the camera gear, triggering the remote multiple times and capturing many photographs. The session ended when the "dominant male at times became over excited and eventually gave me a whack with his hand as he bounced off my back".[14] Slater also said in a 28 July 2017 Vice magazine interview that some news outlets were misreporting how he obtained the selfie, but he went along with it because it was "a bit of fun and some good publicity for the conservation cause".[16]

On 9 July 2011, an editor on Wikimedia Commons, a site that only accepts media available under a free content license or in the public domain, uploaded the selfie photographs from The Daily Mail.[8] The uploader asserted that the photographs were in the public domain as "the work of a non-human animal”, adding that “it has no human author in whom copyright is vested".[17] Slater discovered this a few days later and requested that the Wikimedia Foundation remove the photos. Initially, an administrator at Commons removed the images, but they were later restored after a community discussion on their copyright nature. Slater continued to challenge the Foundation to remove the image.[8] The Foundation reviewed the situation, but made the determination that the images were in the public domain and denied Slater's request; in its transparency report for August 2014, the Foundation stated "copyright cannot vest in non-human authors" and "when a work's copyright cannot vest in a human, it falls into the public domain".[8][18][1][19]

Slater's conflict with the Wikimedia Foundation was covered by the blog Techdirt on 12 July 2011. Techdirt posted the photograph with a public domain license, arguing that the photograph was in the public domain because the monkey was not a legal person capable of holding a copyright, and Slater could not hold copyright to the photo because he was not involved in its creation.[20][21][22] Afterwards, Caters News Agency issued a request for the photo to be removed, citing a lack of permission; however, in response to a reply by the blog's author, Mike Masnick, the representative stated that Masnick had "blatantly 'lifted' these photographs from somewhere—I presume the Daily Mail online", and continued to request its removal. Masnick claimed that even if it were capable of being copyrighted, the photo's use on Techdirt would be considered fair use under United States copyright law. He believed that "regardless of the issue of who does and doesn't own the copyright—it is 100% clear that the copyright owner is not yourself."[20][22]

Slater counterargued in response to both the Wikimedia Foundation and Techdirt that he had made significant creative contributions to the monkey selfie photographs that would make the public domain argument moot.[8] Slater told the BBC "I became accepted as part of the troop, they touched me and groomed me ... so I thought they could take their own photograph. I set the camera up on a tripod, framed [the shot] up and got the exposure right ... and all you've got to do is give the monkey the button to press and lo and behold you got the picture."[1] In a story published on or before 14 August 2014 on his own website, Slater said that the monkeys stealing the camera was a separate incident that occurred before the "selfies" were taken.[14] Slater went on to say "I put my camera on a tripod with a very wide angle lens, settings configured such as predictive autofocus, motorwind, even a flashgun, to give me a chance of a facial close up if they were to approach again for a play ... I had one hand on the tripod when this was going on, but I was being prodded and poked by would be groomers and a few playful juveniles who nibbled at my arms."[14] In a November 2017 interview with the radio show This American Life, Slater said that he was holding the tripod with his fingers when the images were taken.[23]

Expert opinions

Expert opinion on whether Slater owns the copyright on the photographs is mixed.

On 21 August 2014 the United States Copyright Office published an opinion, later included in the Office's Compendium of U.S. Copyright Office Practices, Third Edition, released on 22 December 2014, to clarify that "only works created by a human can be copyrighted under United States law, which excludes photographs and artwork created by animals or by machines without human intervention" and that "Because copyright law is limited to 'original intellectual conceptions of the author,' the [copyright] office will refuse to register a claim if it determines that a human being did not create the work. The Office will not register works produced by nature, animals, or plants."[24][25] The compendium specifically highlights "a photograph taken by a monkey" as an example of something that cannot be copyrighted.[26]

American and British intellectual property lawyers Mary M. Luria and Charles Swan said that because the creator of the photograph is an animal and not a person, there is no copyright on the photograph, regardless of who owns the equipment with which the photograph was created.[27] According to University of Michigan law professor, Jessica Litman, "No human author has rights to a photograph taken by a monkey," ... "The original monkey selfie is in the public domain". She said that the US Copyright Office was clarifying existing practice, and not creating a new policy.[24] However, American art lawyer Nicholas O'Donnell of Sullivan & Worcester LLP commented that "even if 'a photograph taken by a monkey' cannot be copyrighted by the monkey, it is not clear why that would categorically rule out any copyright for a human author in a work in which cameras are intentionally left in a place where some natural force or animal will cause them to snap a photo".[4]

On 22 August 2014, the day after the United States Copyright Office published their opinion, spokeswoman Bianca D’Orsi for the UK Intellectual Property Office was quoted as saying that, while animals cannot own copyright under UK law, "the question as to whether the photographer owns copyright is more complex. It depends on whether the photographer has made a creative contribution to the work and this is a decision which must be made by the courts."[26]

British media lawyer Christina Michalos said that on the basis of British law on computer-generated art, it is arguable that Slater may own copyrights on the photograph, because he owned and presumably had set up the camera.[18] Similarly, Serena Tierney, of London lawyers BDB, stated, "If he checked the angle of the shot, set up the equipment to produce a picture with specific light and shade effects, set the exposure or used filters or other special settings, light and that everything required is in the shot, and all the monkey contributed was to press the button, then he would seem to have a passable claim that copyright subsists in the photo in the UK and that he is the author and so first owner."[3] Furthermore, Andres Guadamuz, a lecturer in IP law at Sussex University, has written that existing European case law, particularly Infopaq International A/S v Danske Dagblades Forening, makes it clear that the selection of photographs would be enough to warrant originality if the process reflects the personality of the photographer.[2] Lawyer Iain Connor, a partner in Pinsent Masons, similarly said that the photographer could claim they had "put the camera in the hands of the monkey so [they had] taken some creative steps and therefore own the copyright," and that "if it’s an animal that presses the button, it should be the owner of the camera that owns the copyright to that photo."[26]

Wikimania 2014

The "Monkey-selfie selfie" became a theme at Wikimania 2014 at the Barbican Centre in London.[28] Conference attendees, including Wikipedia co-founder and Wikimedia Foundation board member Jimmy Wales,[29] posed for selfies with printed copies of the macaque photograph. Reaction to these selfies and to pre-printed monkey posters was mixed. According to Wikipedia contributor Andreas Kolbe, writing in Wikipediocracy, Wales' action was criticized by some users on Twitter and Wikipedia "for what appeared like tactless gloating".[3]

Naruto et al v. David Slater

The macaque photographs appeared in a book titled "Wildlife Personalities" that Slater had published via San Francisco-based self-publishing company Blurb, Inc. On 22 September 2015, People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) filed a lawsuit against Slater and Blurb in the United States District Court for the Northern District of California to request that the monkey, whom they named Naruto, be assigned copyright[30] and that PETA be appointed to administer proceeds from the photos for the benefit of Naruto and other crested macaques in the reserve on Sulawesi.[31][32] PETA did so by using the next friend principle, which allows persons to sue in the name of another person who is unable to do so. In November, Angela Dunning, the attorney for Blurb, noted that PETA may have been suing on behalf of the wrong monkey.[33]

During a hearing in January 2016, US District Judge William Orrick III said that the copyright law does not extend its protection to animals.[6][31] Orrick dismissed the case on 28 January, ruling that "if Congress and the president intended to take the extraordinary step of authorizing animals as well as people and legal entities to sue, they could, and should, have said so plainly."[34][35] On 20 March 2016, PETA filed a notice of appeal to the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals.[36] On 12 July 2017 the court held an oral argument on the matter in San Francisco.[37] On 4 August 2017, lawyers for all parties to the case informed the court that they expected to arrive at an out-of-court settlement in the near future, asking the court not to issue a ruling.[38] The court on 11 August stayed the appeal to 8 September.[39] An agreement between Slater, Blurb, and PETA was reached on 11 September 2017, in which Slater will donate 25% of any future revenues from the monkey selfies to charities that protect the wildlife of monkeys like Naruto, but the court has not accepted this agreement as being a valid settlement.[40] As part of their joint motion to dismiss the appeal and vacate the judgment, the parties have asked for vacatur, which would nullify the record in the lower court. The Competitive Enterprise Institute filed an amicus brief on 13 September 2017, urging the court to deny vacatur. The brief argues, that since Naruto is not a party to the settlement, PETA does not have standing to move for vacatur.[41]

In April 2018, the Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit denied the motions to vacate the case.[42] On 23 April, the court issued its ruling in favor of Slater, finding that animals have no legal authority to hold copyright claims.[43] The court also expressed concern with PETA's motivations and actions during the case that were aligned to promote their own interests rather than to protect Naruto, as they found PETA's actions – i.e. attempting to vacate the case when the group learned of the potential for landmark case law to be set – to be troubling. The judges noted that their decision had to be considered in light of Cetacean Community v. Bush, a 2004 case heard by the Ninth Circuit that found, under some circumstances, animals could have some standing to seek legal action, and encourages that the Ninth Circuit should hold an en banc hearing to review their decision in Cetacean in light of the monkey selfie case.[44][45] On May 25, a Ninth Circuit judge made a call for the case to be heard en banc, potentially to overrule the Cetaceans Community precedent. The court requested the parties to provide briefs within 21 days on whether the en banc hearing should be granted[46][47] and on August 31, 2018 declined to review the case.[48]

Impact on Slater

Slater told BBC News that he had suffered financial loss as a result of the pictures being available on Wikimedia Commons, "I made £2,000 [for that picture] in the first year after it was taken. After it went on Wikipedia all interest in buying it went. It's hard to put a figure on it but I reckon I've lost £10,000 or more in income. It's killing my business."[1] Slater was quoted by The Daily Telegraph as saying, "What they don't realise is that it needs a court to decide [the copyright]."[49] In January 2016, Slater stated his intention to sue Wikipedia for copyright infringement of his works.[50]

By July 2017, Slater was reported to be broke and unable to pay his attorney.[51][52][53] While he had originally made a few thousand pounds from the images, enough to recoup his travel costs to Indonesia, this income reduced to about "£100 every few months" when the Wikimedia Foundation refused to stop making the images available without his permission.[1][52]

Slater was unable to travel to the July 2017 court hearing in the United States for lack of funds and said he was considering alternative careers as a dog walker or tennis coach.[52] "This would be a new venture for me. It would pay peanuts, but at least it would be more than photography. I am just not motivated to go out and take photos any more. I've had outlays of several thousand pounds for lawyers, it is losing me income and getting me so depressed. When I think about the whole situation I really don't think it's worth it."[52] Slater added, "Everything I did to try and highlight the plight of the monkeys has backfired on my private life. I've had my life ruined."[52]

However, Slater still said he felt "absolutely delighted" with the impact of the photo shoot itself: "It has taken six years for my original intention to come true which was to highlight the plight of the monkeys and bring it to the world. No one had heard of these monkeys six years ago, they were down to the last thousands. ... The locals used to roast them, but now they love them, they call it the 'selfie monkey'. Tourists are now visiting and people see there is a longer-term benefit to the community than just shooting a monkey."[52]

In May 2018, Condé Nast Entertainment acquired the rights from Slater to make a documentary-style film related to the monkey selfie dispute. The project is being overseen by Dawn Ostroff and Jeremy Steckler.[54]

See also

References
  1. "Photographer 'lost £10,000' in Wikipedia monkey 'selfie' row". BBC News. 7 August 2014. Retrieved 4 November 2017.
  2. Guadamuz, Andres (2016). "The monkey selfie: copyright lessons for originality in photographs and internet jurisdiction". Internet Policy Review. 5 (1). doi:10.14763/2016.1.398.
  3. Orlowski, Andrew (24 August 2014). "Cracking copyright law: How a simian selfie stunt could make a monkey out of Wikipedia". The Register.
  4. Nicholas O'Donnell (28 July 2017). "Is the 'monkey selfie' case making a monkey out of the law?". Apollo Magazine. Retrieved 29 July 2017.
  5. "NARUTO, a Crested Macaque, by and through his Next Friends, PEOPLE FOR THE ETHICAL TREATMENT OF ANIMALS, INC., and ANTJE ENGELHARDT, Ph.D. Plaintiff, vs. DAVID JOHN SLATER, an individual, BLURB, INC., a Delaware corporation, and WILDLIFE PERSONALITIES, LTD., a United Kingdom private limited company, Defendants" (PDF). People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals. 21 September 2015.
  6. Kravets, David (6 January 2016). "Judge says monkey cannot own copyright to famous selfies". Ars Technica. Retrieved 7 January 2016.
  7. Wittenhorst, Tilman. "Streit über Affen-Selfie geht weiter: Vergleich hinfällig, Urteil angekündigt". Heise online (in German).
  8. Stewart, Louise (21 August 2014). "Wikimedia says when a monkey take a selfie, no one owns it". Newsweek. Retrieved 15 November 2017.
  9. Guadamuz, Andrés (21 March 2016). "The monkey selfie: copyright lessons for originality in photographs and internet jurisdiction". Internet Policy Review. 5. doi:10.14763/2016.1.398.
  10. "Taking a photo is monkey business".
  11. "Monkey steals camera to snap himself". The Telegraph. 4 July 2011. Retrieved 4 November 2017.
  12. Steven Morris, Shutter-happy monkey turns photographer, theguardian.com Monday 4 July 2011 14.34 EDT
  13. Cheesman, Chris (5 July 2011). "Ape-rture priority photographer plays down monkey reports". Amateur Photographer. Retrieved 4 November 2017.
  14. Slater, David J. "Sulawesi macaques..." DJS Photography. Archived from the original on 16 August 2014. Retrieved 4 November 2017.
  15. Cheesman, Chris (7 August 2014). "Photographer goes ape over monkey selfie: Who owns the copyright?". Amateur Photographer.
  16. "I'm a Human Man Being Sued By a Monkey". 29 July 2017.
  17. "Macaca nigra self-portrait". Wikimedia Commons. 9 July 2017. Retrieved 4 November 2017.
  18. "Monkey 'selfie' picture sparks Wikipedia copyright row". ITV News. ITV plc. 6 August 2014. Archived from the original on 13 August 2014. Retrieved 14 August 2014.
  19. "Wikipedia reveals Google 'forgotten' search links". BBC News. 6 August 2014. Retrieved 8 August 2014.
  20. Masnick, Mike (12 July 2011). "Monkeys Don't Do Fair Use; News Agency Tells Techdirt To Remove Photos". Techdirt. Retrieved 24 June 2014.
  21. "Can monkey who took grinning self-portrait claim copyright?". Metro. Retrieved 24 June 2014.
  22. Masnick, Mike. "Can We Subpoena The Monkey? Why The Monkey Self-Portraits Are Likely In The Public Domain". Techdirt. Retrieved 24 June 2014.
  23. Chivvis, Dana (10 November 2017). "The Monkey Stays in the Picture". This American Life. Episode 631. Chicago Public Media. Public Radio Exchange. WBEZ. So a Monkey and a Horse Walk Into a Bar Transcript. Retrieved 13 November 2017.
  24. Axelrad, Jacob (22 August 2014). "US government: Monkey selfies ineligible for copyright". Christian Science Monitor. Retrieved 23 August 2014.
  25. "Compendium of U.S. Copyright Office Practices, § 313.2" (PDF). United States Copyright Office. 22 December 2014. p. 22. Retrieved 27 April 2015. To qualify as a work of 'authorship' a work must be created by a human being.... Works that do not satisfy this requirement are not copyrightable. The Office will not register works produced by nature, animals, or plants.
  26. Samuel Gibbs (22 August 2014). "Monkey business: macaque selfie can't be copyrighted, say US and UK". The Guardian. Retrieved 16 July 2017.
  27. Laurent, Olivier (6 August 2014). "Monkey Selfie Lands Photographer in Legal Quagmire". Time. Time Inc. Archived from the original on 14 August 2014. Retrieved 14 August 2014.
  28. "Wikimania Gets Social". Barbican Centre. 11 August 2014. Archived from the original on 18 August 2017. Retrieved 11 November 2015.
  29. @WikimaniaLondon (7 August 2014). "So this just happened... @jimmy_wales selfie with a #monkeyselfie #wikimania2014" (Tweet) – via Twitter.
  30. "PETA files suit on behalf of grinning 'selfie monkey'". 22 September 2015. Retrieved 22 September 2015.
  31. A macaque monkey who took now-famous selfie photographs cannot be declared the copyright owner of the photos, Associated Press, 7 January 2016.
  32. "Monkey selfie: warring parties reach settlement over court case". The Guardian. 12 September 2017. Retrieved 4 November 2017.
  33. Will the real monkey who snapped those famous selfies please stand up?, by David Kravets, at Ars Technica; published 10 November 2015; retrieved 2 August 2016
  34. Iovino, Nicholas (29 January 2016). "Judge Dismisses PETA's 'Monkey Selfie' Lawsuit". Courthouse Naws Service. Archived from the original on 31 January 2016. Retrieved 30 January 2016.
  35. Naruto, et al. v. Slater, et al., no. 15-CV-04324 (N.D. Cal. 28 January 2016)(Order Granting Motions To Dismiss). Retrieved 30 January 2016.
  36. Papenfuss, Mary (21 March 2016). "Captivating monkey Naruto who snapped viral selfies filing appeal for right to photos". International Business Times. Retrieved 21 March 2016.
  37. "Oral Argument Notice - James R. Browning U.S. Courthouse, San Francisco - 2017-07-12". www.ca9.uscourts.gov. Retrieved 22 May 2017.
  38. "Monkey selfie animal rights brouhaha devolves into a settlement".
  39. Naruto v. Slater, no. 16-15469, 9th Cir., Order (11 August 2017), retrieved from PACER, 4 September 2017
  40. Fingas, Jon (11 September 2017). "Monkey selfie copyright battle ends with a settlement". Engadget. Retrieved 11 September 2017.
  41. Sophie Duffy; Dori Ann Hanswirth (20 September 2017). "Monkey See, Monkey Do… Monkey Own? The Curious Case of Naruto v. Slater". lexology.com. Retrieved 22 September 2017.
  42. Jeong, Sarah (13 April 2018). "The monkey selfie lawsuit lives". The Verge. Retrieved 13 April 2018.
  43. Zhang, Michael. "24 April 2018". PetaPixel. Retrieved 11 August 2018.
  44. Randazzo, Sara (23 April 2018). "Copyright Protection for Monkey Selfie Rejected by U.S. Appeals Court". The Wall Street Journal. Retrieved 23 April 2018.
  45. United States Court of Appeal for the Ninth Circuit, April 23, 2018. Full text of ruling. Retrieved April 24, 2018
  46. Graham, Scott (29 May 2018). "Monkey Selfie Case Swings Back Into Action at Ninth Circuit". The Recorder. Retrieved 29 May 2018.
  47. Naruto v. Slater, no. 16-15469 (9th Cir. May 25, 2018), order.
  48. "End-of-summer Monkey Selfie Status Update". Techdirt. Retrieved 9 September 2018.
  49. Sparkes, Matthew (6 August 2014). "Wikipedia refuses to delete photo as 'monkey owns it'". The Daily Telegraph. London: Telegraph Media Group. Retrieved 6 August 2014.
  50. "The Gwent photographer who won a legal battle over a 'monkey selfie' is to sue Wikipedia". South Wales Argus. 8 January 2016. Retrieved 8 January 2016.
  51. Julia Carrie Wong (13 July 2017). "Monkey selfie photographer says he's broke: 'I'm thinking of dog walking'". The Guardian. Retrieved 16 July 2017.
  52. "Photographer in bizarre selfie court battle reveals that being sued by a monkey has left him broke". The Telegraph. 13 July 2017. Retrieved 16 July 2017.
  53. "Photographer Being Sued By A Monkey Over Its "Selfie" Is Now Broke". IFLScience. 13 July 2017. Retrieved 16 July 2017.
  54. Siegel, Tatiana (7 May 2018). "'Monkey Selfie' Film in the Works at Conde Nast". The Hollywood Reporter. Retrieved 8 May 2018.
  • Naruto, et al. v. Slater, et al., no. 16-15469 (9th Cir. July 12, 2017). Oral argument. (audio;video)
  • Naruto, et al. v. Slater, et al., no. 16-15469 (9th Cir. April 23, 2018). (opinion of the court).
  • Jiang, Jialei (August 2019). "What Monkeys Teach Us About Authorship: Toward a Distributed Agency in Digital Composing Practices." Kairos. Retrieved 5 March 2020. (Commentary).
This article is issued from Wikipedia. The text is licensed under Creative Commons - Attribution - Sharealike. Additional terms may apply for the media files.