Copyright Issues

[schnee]

I thought I’d try to move the copyright questions out of “This Week’s Contest” and over to the Pub and Grill.

The FArQ has this to say:

Fark.com is the legal owner of all copyright interests of Fark.com content. Each and every submission to Fark.com carries with it an implied assignment of the entire copyright interest in the submission. In exchange for the content and publication of that submission on Fark.com, Fark.com grants back to the submitter a non-exclusive, non-transferable and royalty-free license to republish that submission in any and all forms.

IANAL, but this seems to me that when we submit any entry (text, image, link, headline) to Fark, we give the copyright over to Fark. Fark in turn gives back to the submitter a license to do whatever with the submission that they want, but Fark still holds the copyright. How do you all interpret this? I hope that the intent is for Fark to just hold the copyright on content that Fark maintains – since images are linked in, Fark doesn’t in fact hold the copyright on the image itself; just on the HTML that Fark stores. But again, IANAL.

If Fark does indeed hold the copyright on the image, I imagine this could have a chilling effect on Farktography.

Is there a lawyer in the house?

[staplermofo]

This looks like a job for the “If you have any questions about our copyright policies, please send feedback.”

[Elsinore]

I’m glad you brought this up, cause I’m wondering myself. If posting our pictures to Fark does in fact mean we’ve given up our copyrights, that concerns me greatly. It would make more sense if we retained copyright and posting automatically gives Fark the license. Either way, the wording suggests that Fark’s license back to submitters allows them to do anything they want with it, but I guess it’s just the principle of the thing that concerns me. Please let us know if you get a definitive answer!

[staplermofo]

I asked: “when a picture is uploaded to fark, does it then become the property of fark LLC? In other words, is this an issue for those incredibly talented folks who plan on (or already are) selling the pictures they submit?”

I got this in reply:
“no it doesn’t. We do request non-exclusive reprint rights, but ownership
does not transfer to us. Feel free to spread the word”

I hope that helps.

[schnee]

Adding to the discussion

The Fark copyright policy seems to indicate that when someone posts an entry in a Farktography contest, the copyright of that image is transferred to Fark. Is that the intent?

Response:

nope. We request a non-exclusive right to republish but we don’t ask for ownership the language is strong because the attorneys like that way, however I’ll go on record as saying I’m never going to claim we own those

and then followed up with:

not at all, reprint away. The more people who know the better. I’d rather this be public record to put peoples’ minds at ease

[monkeybort]

thank you schnee and stapler for looking into that!

[Elsinore]

Thanks for clearing things up!

[Author]

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