Need some advice...........3500 avatars

I have just found 3500 very high quality avatars on one of my spare hard drives (I can't even rem where I got em) and was wondering what to do with them.Is there any money in avatar sites as I can see them using masses of bandwidth or is there any kind of market for them?Any advice would be appreciated.

Thanks

All replies starting with "stick em up......................." will be ignored

 

well..the old copyright problem... who made them..etc

 

Yeh that could be a problem ....is there a way to find out?There's nothing in the file info etc.Can I assume that as I got em for free from somewhere (I know I didn't buy em) that they are for free use?What about just hosting them?

 

I have no idea. maybe write a statement below the pages...

 

stick em up.......................

 

You could implement a payment system to download them for a certain fee.
And if any copyright problems would occur you could always take it down since you can always argument you didn't know about it.

I am not sure what the consiquences are for trying this approach and because you already could have earned on ''their'' (for ever who that may be) copyrighted material they could reclaim some money from you.

I think it's very risky if you would stick them up and make money of it if you don't inquire for more information on the subject through an Attorney.

Check out an Attorney specialised in Copyright Law is my best advice to you.

But using a payment system would be a good way to earn of that huge collection.
Also ad a free section Visitors like free stuff.

 

The problem with the "I didn't know about it" defence is, that it will definitely not hold up in a court of law. Everything is copyrighted unless specifically stated that it is provided in the public domain.

Even if something is provided free of charge, it doesn't mean that you now have the right to take that and host it on your own site without getting permission from the authors first.

So my advice would be to find out exactly who made them, get permission and host them, otherwise, stay far far away.

 

i think it would be safe to say that if you didn't create those avatars yourself, it is the work of someone else and is copyrighted. i'd not put it up on my site to be treated as mine...

 

Thanks for all the replies guys.It looks like I'll just forget about them

 

But how can you find out if an image holds a original owner and even more important how can you trace the original owner.

And how to tell if the person contacts you is truly the owner of the image?

Crusader wrote:

It isn't supposed to hold up in court, if the owner of the image can truly prove without a doubt the image is his/her's then you can take it down from the site and move on

These copyright issues always start as far as i know with a cease and desist letter. These letters wil also contain proof i guess that the claimer is truly the original owner. If this is so you can remove the image.

But once again i would say you would have to visit an Attorney specialised in this since of course i am not specialised in this sort of material.

I would not give up on this so fast.

 

I've done a search on google for some of the names of the files and it didn't come up with anything at all

Here are a couple of samples.....they really are good quality.

 

Yes, those are good quality. However, I can pretty much guarantee that those are derivative works based on copyrighted material. The first one is from The 6th Day and you can contact the legal departments at Sony Pictures Entertainment -- see sonypictures.com/corp/cliplicensing.html -- and find out the license fees they charge for the use of their material. If you have more than one image derived from Sony Pictures' work, they may cut you a deal on the fees.

For Harry Potter, you'll need permission from Warner Bros -- start with their legal department and they can refer you to the appropriate party in order to sign a licensing deal. You get the picture. It's their material which has been used, likely without permission. Even if the company freely gave them out themselves you certainly don't have distribution rights so you'd be in hot water there, and doubly so if you start selling them. To put it bluntly, even having them on your hard drive is likely a copyright violation similar to downloading music from Napster in the old days.

For some people, they don't really care and would start selling them anyway... hoping that they wouldn't get caught. Your call, but if those 3500 icons are similar in nature to the ones you've posted, then your best course of action is to simply delete them. The amount of time and money involved in tracking down the copyright holders, striking licensing deals, negotiating terms, etc. is so prohibitive that you'd be better off flushing your wallet down the toilet every day for a month. There are millions of other ways to make money on the internet without dabbling in dubious doodads.

 

I agree with Wakefield, it is going to be a very big task to contact all the right people, this alone would for me not be a problem but i guess they will charge you beforehand if you are going commercial with these pictures.

Why don't you contact someone via www.copyright.com and tell them your specific situation and needs and see what comes out of this.
I see loads of avatar sites that display these kind of images...they must have some sort of permission since they are around for a while.

Visit above mentioned website to inform yourself some more or contact a Attorney for your dilemma.
I don't know how many major film studios there are but i guess it's not going into the hundreds, unless your talking xxx

It depends of course if you have to pay licence fees before hand, if not i would go for it, no matter how many people i would need to contact (at some extend of course).

 

You totally missed the point of my post. The point I was trying to make is that unless you have specific permission from the author to make use of their images/content you are NOT supposed to use it. It's simple as that.

Most webmasters have the wrong perception that you can use anything as long as you are willing to remove it if (and only if) the original author tracks you down, and asks you to remove it (with proof). That's definitely not how it works.

 

If you have no chance to find out who the real author is of a picture then how could you ask them for permission?

There a millions of webmasters out there that use images of all sorts that are probably copyrighted and still put them up their sites and are at the most contacted through some lawyer with a cease and desist letter.
And if you get such a letter then you oblige to that if for instance such a lawyer represents the person in a image.

Real people images hold by default a portrait image copyright and is obviously assigned to the person on the image but how about other sorts of images?
If there is nothing on the picture itself that refers to the real author/creator how do you know whom to contact and even better how do you know when someone contacts you that it is the real author/creator?

If you don't have proof it's yours you have no chance in court. The displayed examples are of course related to movie production companies but what about other sort of Avatars/Images?.

Anyone can claim there the owner of an image, even you and me but if you can't prove it it's like trying to claim you own the world

Copyright is a very broad concept. And i can't really imagine that i could get in any serious trouble for using a image that i can't trace to the original author/creator. For what would i be charged? violating copyright? who owns the copyright? who or what am i infringing on his copyright?

I agree with you Crusader to some extend but not entirely since copyright is a broad concept and can in some cases hardly be implemented.