This started making the rounds yesterday. The Stolen Scream: A Story About Noam Galai. I thought it important to post here. Wanted your thoughts to be a part of the conversation.
IMHO, this is:
Exciting.
Scary.
Different.
Opportunistic.
Cannibalistic.
Visionary.
Divisive.
Should we celebrate it or hate it? Lawsuits or a new suit of clothes that recognizes the times?
Two obvious sides with no obvious answer. And on and on… It’s our newest classic challenge as a rapidly evolving industry with the rapid deployment and sharing of information.
What say you?
(via the nice folks at fstoppers)
I think he should post the names of all the site, agencies, organizations etc that have used his photo without proper permission and let the Twitterverse take care of this.
He has – at http://screameverywhere.com/wordpress/
Rather than pursue all the infringers (especially lowball ones) he is capitalizing on it with an online store
http://www.zazzle.com/screamography/gifts/
which all in all is a fairly smart move.
This is outright blatant theft. But given the scale of it, there’s nothing that Noam can do, except embrace what has happened. It’s frustrating that big companies exploited this, and others have benefitted, but Noam has what they don’t, the truth, and the rights to that image. This image should become his trademark for his business, he would have worldwide recognition, and no one will be able to oppose him since he’s the copyright owner.
I think about some theft as just advertising, albeit indirect advertising. If you take a boring picture that’s the same as everyone elses boring picture, then theft shouldnt be a concern. But if you do something exceptional, and it’s taken, shared, or sold, you are changing the mindset of everyone that sees it. If it becomes recognisable, and is like your otherwork, people will be more inclined to like your new work because they’re already programmed that way from seeing the stolen stuff elsewhere.. Not sure if I said that right.
Viral videos work on theft. Someone creates something, but each person has such a small circle of influence that the work needs to be shared freely without barriers. It’s like the movie industry, people will always rip and burn movies. Instead of constantly trying to protect every revenue stream, embrace the way people consume and leverage that.
And if people are really worried about theft, don’t put anything online, dont share anything, dont show anything. Then see how far that gets them.
Learn to roll with the way the world works, and don’t be a barrier to change.
As a amateur/enthusiast/hobby photographer, every picture i sell is important to me and i wouldn’t really mind the graffiti artists use it but when people and company starts earning money with my picture it’s a different story. I would try to contact the person or company that did it and say either you stop selling the thing, whatever it is, or they pay me per thing sold or a bigger amount and they can use it as they want. I’m very carefull to where i post my pictures, for example, none of my pictures have been uploaded to facebook and to flickr i only sumbit low quality, low resolution images.
Chase, I have to say, you bring some awesome stuff to the forefront of discussion. This is a conundrum for everyone. Like Noam said, he likes the statements that have made with his picture, just not the uncompensated commercial aspect of it. His voice is spreading farther than it ever would have, if he were doing this on his own. At the same time, he, and other artists around the world need to represent and defend their work with any means necessary in order to protect their vision. I don’t think there is anything wrong with him saying, “you used my photo for a profit, now pay up.” Chances are, most people would realize what happened and do the right thing. It won’t be an easy road, but I see it as an unfortunately necessary one. This is probably a short sided view, and I look forward to the other comments that will be generated by this post.
very interesting video. I have to really think it over. However, I know it made me feel wrong.