Instagram Has The Right To Sell Your Photos

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Instagram says it has the right to sell your photos without your permission and without compensating you in any way. Don't like it? Tough. You have until January 16th to delete your account.

Instagram said today that it has the perpetual right to sell users' photographs without payment or notification, a dramatic policy shift that quickly sparked a public outcry. Unless Instagram users delete their accounts before the January deadline, they cannot opt out.
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I thought this was SoP for most of these "free" web/picture hosting sites, the minute you upload you sign away your rights to said data.
 
Instagram seemed stupid to me from the start but I suspect more people will feel this way when news of this gets around.
 
Let's hope this means we see a mass abandoning of the faux-artistic use of sepia tone filters and retro colorways!
 
Sounds inline with Facebook, since they own instagram. Don't use either and will continue that course.
 
Easy solution.
Walk away.

Never used Instagram, never used Facebook.

Carry on.
 
Does that mean all the racy pics of my cat I posted on Instagram are no longer mine to sell?
 
Instagram isn't saying "without your permission" they're saying "if you use the service, you agree to this". Legally speaking there is a big difference. If you want a service that won't do something like this then you generally have to pay for it.

As we're all aware ... TANSTAAFL.
 
colinstu said:
YEP. You're exactly right and I cannot stand how this is "news"
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Not really...

article said:
Facebook's new rights to sell Instagram users' photos come from two additions to its terms of use policy. One section deletes the current phrase "limited license" and, by inserting the words "transferable" and "sub-licensable," allows Facebook to license users' photos to any other organization.

A second section allows Facebook to charge money. It says that "a business or other entity may pay us to display your... photos... in connection with paid or sponsored content or promotions, without any compensation to you." That language does not exist in the current terms of use.

Google's policy, by contrast, is far narrower and does not permit the company to sell photographs uploaded through Picasa or Google+. Its policy generally tracks the soon-to-be-replaced Instagram policy by saying: "The rights you grant in this license are for the limited purpose of operating, promoting, and improving our services." Yahoo's policies service for Flickr are similar, saying the company can use the images "solely for the purpose for which such content was submitted or made available."
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So its NOT the same.

BB
 
colinstu said:
YEP. You're exactly right and I cannot stand how this is "news"
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Well then, sit down. We will try our best to tailor our news posts for simply the ones that are important to you and no one else.
 
Any outcry about such a policy expressed in this particular forum is sensationally ironic. I'll leave it at that.
 
I don't use instagram all that much but fuck that if I let someone potentially sell my pics without me getting anything for it.. using their service doesn't count to me.. deleting my account.
 
wonderfield said:
Any outcry about such a policy expressed in this particular forum is sensationally ironic. I'll leave it at that.
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Wait, I don't get it. :confused: [H] doesn't do photo hosting does it? I thought there were just Ratpadz or something, but I must have missed that part somewhere.
 
colinstu said:
YEP. You're exactly right and I cannot stand how this is "news"
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I love it when the "how is this news" people always end up reading / posting in these threads.

Anyhow, what made Instagram "different" is that, until yesterday, the company was one of the ones that didn't claim the right to sell your photos. Being that they are by far the largest service of this type, used by millions, it is news.

wonderfield said:
Any outcry about such a policy expressed in this particular forum is sensationally ironic. I'll leave it at that.
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What I find ironic is people that get repeatedly banned but keep coming back to forums they "hate" under different names. :rolleyes:
 
SkribbelKat said:
Wait, I don't get it. :confused: [H] doesn't do photo hosting does it? I thought there were just Ratpadz or something, but I must have missed that part somewhere.
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WTF? Steve and Kyle have the right to sell both my Ratpadz? Over my dead body!
 
Azhar said:
WTF? Steve and Kyle have the right to sell both my Ratpadz? Over my dead body!
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I was sort of hoping they do. Since Microsoft has still not yet mailed a Microsoft branded mouse pad to me, I need to look for a good alternative and one of your Ratpadz that is taken and refurbished seems like it could be a good thing. Then again, I could just go buy a new one...*ponders*
 
I thought Sepia, black and white and embossing were artistic.... when I was like 6 years old playing with mspaint and ACDSee. Goes to show that posting personal anything online is a bad idea.

Hey, let's post our address and what we look like and where we go to work and school and our favourite places we like to hang out and all of our friends and all of our family and marry our best friends. That should repell stalkers right?
 
The masses have repeatedly proven that they will give up rights and privacy to avoid paying a dime. I doubt this will have much of an effect on the volume of users.
 
What if you have the (c) on it, etc.. Could they be held responsible if it were to be used without permission? Or do you give up the (c) material if uploaded? Curious to what would superceed which....
 
Ur_Mom said:
What if you have the (c) on it, etc.. Could they be held responsible if it were to be used without permission? Or do you give up the (c) material if uploaded? Curious to what would superceed which....
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Don't know the particulars of Instagram, but I would guess that somewhere in their terms is a section dealing with the prohibition of uploading copyrighted material.
The fact that you happen to hold that copyright would not alter the terms.
If so, then they could not be held responsible, since the terms were violated.
 
gathagan said:
Don't know the particulars of Instagram, but I would guess that somewhere in their terms is a section dealing with the prohibition of uploading copyrighted material.
The fact that you happen to hold that copyright would not alter the terms.
If so, then they could not be held responsible, since the terms were violated.
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I think most places specify something about having the permission of the copyright holder, not just whether or not it's copyrighted.
 
Instagram's co-founder has taken to the company blog to let you know this is all just a big misunderstanding and that legal documents are easy to misinterpret.

Advertising on Instagram From the start, Instagram was created to become a business. Advertising is one of many ways that Instagram can become a self-sustaining business, but not the only one. Our intention in updating the terms was to communicate that we’d like to experiment with innovative advertising that feels appropriate on Instagram. Instead it was interpreted by many that we were going to sell your photos to others without any compensation. This is not true and it is our mistake that this language is confusing. To be clear: it is not our intention to sell your photos. We are working on updated language in the terms to make sure this is clear.
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Just to settle everyone's minds.... They aren't actually going to sell anything. They can't. Lets say you hand me your camera. I take a picture of you and your friend. You take the camera back and upload it to Instagram. Instagram sells the rights to use the photo in an add campaign to Depends Undergarments. You and your friend sue for obvious reasons.

Because I was the photographer I hold the copyright. Since I never gave you the right to sell the photo for commercial use (personal use is implied though) you were unable to assign that right to Instagram and so Instagram was unable to assign the rights to Depends. In addition, your friend never signed a model release, so you, Instagram, and Depends don't have the right to use their likeness either.

Whether you win or lose such a suit is irrelevant because there would be so many similar suits that Instagram would be forced to settle most of them and would lose millions more than they could ever make from that kind of use of photos.

So because Instagram can not know whether the person uploading has the right to do so for any photo they can't afford to use any photos for commercial reasons at all. In addition, nobody will pay Instagram to use them because they will also not want to be involved in a needless lawsuit.

So basically this is some stupid contract lawyering that has no upside and a big negative publicity downside for Instagram.
 
Aluisious said:
I hope this means no more sepia photos of someone's lunch.
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Yay
723z85.jpg
 
Steve said:
I love it when the "how is this news" people always end up reading / posting in these threads.

Anyhow, what made Instagram "different" is that, until yesterday, the company was one of the ones that didn't claim the right to sell your photos. Being that they are by far the largest service of this type, used by millions, it is news.



What I find ironic is people that get repeatedly banned but keep coming back to forums they "hate" under different names. :rolleyes:
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Some people just want to be emo and think it's cool to sound sassy.

Steve said:
Instagram's co-founder has taken to the company blog to let you know this is all just a big misunderstanding and that legal documents are easy to misinterpret.
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That smells like they had this as their plan 'B' in case there was a backlash.
 
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