Posted by Kevin Matthews on February 25, 2002 at 13:20:52:In Reply to: Re: please tell me...Copyright clarification ? for Kevin posted by JWmHarmon on February 24, 2002 at 21:17:18:
Some of the original posting has now been answered in various other posts. I'll try to skip much of that, but still there will be overlap. I apologize to those who find these legalities tedious --alhough they are also a matter of essential responsibility for each of us...
It would appear from Kevin's posting of European copyright law that one would need the permission of the architect even if a person were to post one's own pictures. Am I misinterpretting this? Or can we also post our own photographs of European buildings without getting anyone else's permission? I emphasize here "our own photographs." Are there any other countries where one needs to get permission to publish one's own photos?
As Paul hinted, the absolute bottom line to some these points can only be determined in a court of law. Yuck!
Publishing from the U.S., I am not as sure about the details of European copyrights.
But the hinge-point in the question is "we". As I understand it, we can take photographs in Paris, say, and and publish them in the U.S., or on this U.S.-based forum, without the building owner or architect's permission.
To publish our own photos in France - or perhaps if we were citizens of France? - we might need the building owner or architect's permission. That's what I understand from a French architect, publisher, and photo agency executive who had been through some copyright battles. (Jacques, you must know or know of Xavier Soule?)
I'd be happier hearing from a Euorpean copyright expert on these points -- but anyway, they don't apply to this forum!
If we draw our own interpretation of a floor plan of someone else's building, can we publish our own floor plan? Example: If I draw a floorplan of Fallingwater after my recent visit, based on my own observations, can I publish MY floorplan or do I need permission from the current owner of the building (The Pennsylvania Conservancy) or the Frank Lloyd Wright heirs?
This is heavily into the interpretive area of copyright law (i.e. when the courts decide...). But my interpretation, after looking into it in detail, is that your own simple interpretive drawing of the plan of a building is free of the original design copyright, because it is describing the facts of the building, rather than the creative content.
This has gotten a bit murkier under the most recent revision to the main U.S. copyright law, which had stuff added to protect construction documents created by an architect. But I'm standing by the interpretation that simple diagramatic plans and sections are still just factual communications, and therefore free from the origianl architect's copyright.
Example 2: If I go over to a nearby town and photograph a Louis Sullivan bank building to illustrate a recent post, do I need permission from the owner?
No, you don't.
Or is it ok to publish MY photographs of a building in the public eye on the main square of that town?
Yes, that is fine.
Example 3: May I publish photos I took of the exterior of Fallingwater (Photos of the interior are not permitted) or any other building without permission since they are MY photos?
Yes, publishing in the U.S., I do not know of any copyright restrictions on publishing photographs which you took, and to which you own the copyright.*
* ((Note that in the U.S. if you take photographs in the course of your work duties as a regular employee, your employer owns the copyright to those photos, unless your terms of employment specify otherwise.))
I guess at this point I need to put some kind of discalimer here that I'm not a lawyer, and none of these postings constitute legal advice, but only my best personal understandings - and therefore the guiding rules of this forum and of ArchitectureWeek. So disclaimed! Phew.
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