On Mon, 23 Sep 1996 08:41:15 +0100  Murph the Surf wrote:
>amalyah keshet writes:
>
>> We sell reproduction
>> rights to our photographs, which are very much in
copyright &
>> not in the public
>> domain (yet).
>
>I've found no examples of U.S. courts upholding the
copyright on
>photographs taken to document an item in a collection. They
aren't
>considered original enough.

What you have in mind is a photograph of, let's say, a
painting with nothing else in
the frame. An original photograph of, for example, a group of


related objects,
however, is copyrightable.

>I think a postcard is, though.

A postcard can potentially carry three copyrights: the
postcard's as a publication
, the artist's copyright if an artwork in copyright
is displayed on it, and the
photographer's.


>Even though
>something seems as though it is copyrighted, it's the case
law that
>determines the reality of the right.
>
>> I'd look at it this way: in the US, the on-line version of
>> the NYT competes with
>> conventional subscriptions;
>
(snip)> The Times also doesn't want to have to deal with
international
>rights for the writers, or things like libel laws outside
the U.S. They
>don't put the book review up at all because the rights issue

is so
>sticky with all those freelancers.


Right you are: that must be it. Sigh. Back to my deprived
state of NYT starvation...

-------------------------------------
amalyah keshet
director, visual resources, the israel museum, jerusalem
e-mail: [log in to unmask]
date: 09/23/96
visit our web site at http://www.imj.org.il
-------------------------------------