Terms Of Use

http://fineartamerica.com/termsofuse.html

Nowhere on the site does it state you are giving up your rights to your images NOR that you cannot sell elsewhere

Really, Diana? Where did you hear that?

no you don't. you keep the copyright. they only have publishing rights in a non exclusive way. you can sell your work any place because you own the work. always read the contracts each place has, this place does not have that clause, if they did - no one would stay here. i'm not sure where you heard that.

however if you made a deal with getty - they may have rules about selling your images on places like this. and if your selling stock here - and getty and it conflicts, that may be an issue. i would never get involved with getty they are a rather crooked bunch suing anyone who they think took images from them.

be sure to read getty's terms of service VERY carefully.


---Mike Savad
MikeSavad.com

Rights to Contents and Intellectual Property

The copyrights to all original materials, content, selection, and arrangement of the Website (including text, user, and visual interfaces, images, look and feel, design, sound, etc. and any underlying software and computer codes) are proprietary to Fine Art America, its parents, affiliates, subsidiaries, or third party licensors. You may not copy, reproduce, post on any other Website, republish, upload, encode, modify, translate, publicly perform or display, commercially exploit, distribute or transmit any portion of this Website or make any derivative works from this Website in any way without the express prior written consent of Fine Art America.

Any name, logo, trademark, service mark, patent, design, copyright, domain name or other intellectual property appearing on this Website is owned or licensed by Fine Art America or its parents, affiliates, or subsidiaries and may not be used by You without the prior written consent of Fine Art America or the appropriate owner. Your use of this Website does not grant You any right, title, interest or license to any such intellectual property appearing on this Website. Any unauthorized use of the content of this Website may subject You to civil or criminal penalties.

Just make sure you have the right to upload what you upload here or the Honeymoon is over.

Looks like your issue is between multiple licensing vendors.

If you sign up for exclusivity some where (FAA doesn't have such a thing) you have to check the fine print. I know of one stock site where exclusivity precludes selling on PODs but that's rare. Typically the two markets are considered different.

Jessica "original materials" refers to materials created by or owned solely by FAA and displayed on the website (logos, web elements, scripts, code, etc). Not to artist's uploaded work.

What Edward said. Artists should read all the terms carefully, especially on stock sites. If you sign up for somewhere that requires you to give exclusive rights to sales, and you're already selling somewhere else, you're immediately in breach of contract. I haven't come across any PODs that request exclusive rights, but I only sell at one or two others besides here.

Read what Jessica posted there.. That is what I read! This says we pass on our rights!!!

No. That's FAA claiming the rights to the content it has created —"original content" —for this website. (page layout, logos, coding, etc)

Your uploaded work is not FAA's "original content", nor can it ever be construed as such. Specific terminology is important.


Additionally, when you upload your own content to websites like this one and Facebook and Pinterest, there is usually a paragraph talking about how you give the website the right to "use" your uploaded content in any number of ways. This also is NOT you giving away your ownership rights. This is you agreeing to allow FAA and other websites to display your image to site visitors. Some sites include advertising and display on affilliate sites as well. By agreeing to clauses like this one, it allows FAA to display your art to buyers.

Thank you Cynthia! That was confusing, I guess they are referring to the "purchaser".... cannot copy and sell the work... and not the artist!!! Whew!

yeah that stuff is only FAA stuff. like you can't take their logo and make art from it. or steal code and use it on another website etc, its on most sites. always read the contract to you

its under the second part



Submission of Images

By submitting images to Fine Art America, You grant to Fine Art America a worldwide, non-exclusive right to sell, license, sublicense, reproduce, prepare derivative works incorporating, publicly display, market, sublicense and sell any images uploaded by You and accepted by Fine Art America in exchange for specified compensation as agreed upon by You and Fine Art America, until such time as this Contributor Agreement is terminated pursuant to its terms. You further grant to Fine Art America a worldwide, non-exclusive right to use the images You submit and Your name, username and Images in connection with Fine Art America's marketing and promotional activities without the payment of any compensation to You.

You expressly waive any artists' authorship rights or any droit moral that You would otherwise have under the laws of the State of New York, United States Copyright Act or similar laws of any jurisdiction.

If you choose to sell image licenses for any of your images, You grant permission to Fine Art America to add, modify, or remove information related to Your Images in order to manage and license such Images.

Fine Art America has the right to refuse to accept or to remove Images from the Website for any reason. Images will be removed if Fine Art America believes that the Images will subject Fine Art America or any of its officers, managers, directors or employees to legal liability or if the Images violate these terms and conditions of use.


i'm not sure where the sub licensing part falls into it, unless this is a blanket statement for everything. i think there should be another contract for that.

in any case, it's a non exclusive deal. not sure what getty says.



---Mike Savad
MikeSavad.com

Yes, they are saying folks cannot copy and sell artwork they find, for example, on FAA. FAA assumes we hold the rights to upload and sell what we do.

You mean this?

" You may not copy, reproduce, post on any other Website, republish, upload, encode, modify, translate, publicly perform or display, commercially exploit, distribute or transmit any portion of this Website or make any derivative works from this Website in any way without the express prior written consent of Fine Art America."

they mean the site itself. The function, design, and specific coding of the website. Not the contents. That language above prevents some random yahoo from cloning FAA and using the same site shell to create another POD. By being a member here, you agree to give FAA the right to display and produce your artwork according to the rules they set forth. You hold all other rights to your own work.

*Not a lawyer, just a long time internet art seller and avid decipherer of boring terms of service language. :)

"Jessica "original materials" refers to materials created by or owned solely by FAA and displayed on the website (logos, web elements, scripts, code, etc). Not to artist's uploaded work:.


I didn't say that I just copied the terms here.

Just my opinion - if my interpretation is incorrect, let me know...

I'm looking at the following, and seeing language that does not transfer copyrights to FAA, but you have to read carefully to see it: sorry about the all-caps, I'm not yelling, I just can't make my computer highlight what I want to emphasize:

"...proprietary to Fine Art America, its parents, affiliates, subsidiaries, or THIRD PARTY LICENSORS"

"...may not be used by You without the prior written consent of Fine Art America or THE APPROPRIATE OWNER."

I'm assuming I'm a third party licensor who has licensed FAA to sell and display my art under the usual system FAA uses to do that. And/or I'm the appropriate owner. I don't see any language limiting my rights in my own work. Actually, I like the language, it looks as if it is intended to protect me from unauthorized use.

Joseph, I don't think FAA offers us any protection from screen res versions of our work being snagged and displayed or even sold elsewhere. That's on us to chase down. Also a standard bit of POD TOS language.

The language here protects FAA's intellectual property; the structure of this site.


Ok Jessica, you posted it and I was just sharing what I knew about it. I was just addressing you because it was your post. :)



Again, not a lawyer, but I am 99.9999% sure that This whole clause of the TOS

"Rights to Contents and Intellectual Property"

is about the site structure and intellectual property that FAA CREATED and OWNS. Not our work, theirs. "Appropriate owner" probably refers to if they hired someone to do a job and that person retained the rights, or FAA bought a website script that was owned by a different creator, or FAA is displaying some item on the site (like a picture of a frame, for example, or a stock image) that FAA didn't originate. Things like that.

Mike:
Again, just my opinion - I don't know for certain what FAA was doing, so this is just an educated guess:

My understanding is that licensing is essentially transferring some subset of my rights, exclusively or non-exclusively, to another party: in this case FAA.

FAA can't sublicense any rights that I have not transferred (licensed) to FAA. However, if FAA were to, for example, contract out some of it's functions, marketing or whatever, they could grant the group of rights, or a portion of the group of rights, they got from me to a 3rd party by way of a sublicense.

Well... we could argue about this all day long. Maybe someone from FAA will weigh in and clarify.

The language includes "content" so, while it does expressly address rights to FAA's website, coding, etc., the word "content" looks to me like it would include the part I provide when I upload images.

i do know they don't print it, and have to send it out to the place that prints it, so i would guess that must be the sub-licence part? i can't worry myself about it...


---Mike Savad
MikeSavad.com

Mike: Agreed. I'm done worrying about it.

Is there any one who works at FAA that can help clarify these questions? I read the terms too and wasn't sure if they were asking me to forfeit my ownership of my own creations in the state of New York etc.

No one has clarified these statements:

"You expressly waive any artists' authorship rights or any droit moral that You would otherwise have under the laws of the State of New York, United States Copyright Act or similar laws of any jurisdiction.

If you choose to sell image licenses for any of your images, You grant permission to Fine Art America to add, modify, or remove information related to Your Images in order to manage and license such Images."

According to wikipedia (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Artists_Authorship_Rights_Act_%28New_York) "the New York Act provided for artists the right to disavow works that were altered against their wishes."

What does it mean for FAA to have the right to add, modify or remove information related to my images in order to manage and license them? How might they be modified or altered?

Read the thread, Malaika. The answers are in the thread. Abbie, who is a moderator, commented to clarify.

Everything seems pretty clear if you read the post frm start to finish. We own all rights to our own work

PLEASE do what Joseph and others suggest. Do not just read one area but all areas of the Terms of Use

The artist/photographer retains ALL copyright to their own images

The artist/photographer gives us permission to publish the work and print copies in the event of a sale when that has been allowed by the artist/photographer

Ownership of Images

The copyrights in and to all Images You submit remain with You as the owner of such copyrights. Nothing contained herein shall be construed to transfer any copyrights to Fine Art America or its sublicenses.
http://fineartamerica.com/termsofuse.html?document=contributortermsofuse