Okay, I must admit that spending the evening speaking about copyright laws, I am left with the fact that it seems to me student at this college are told, if you copy others you could be sued. Now we are used to seeing that at the beginning of movies, but should we have that at the beginning of a college course?

Yes, originality is preferred but when you are learning an art form (and at this college photography is connected with the fine art department and not graphic design) history has had people learn by copying.

In answer to your question - Stupidity, maybe, - lemmings, certainly.

PeggySue,
learning from the masters is one thing; plagiarism is another thing entirely and I would hope that colleges are capable of educating students about the difference.

I do understand that to learn what's good you have to see what others have done that is considered good. When I started out in photography sometime in the middle of the last century I would see an image I loved and then try to recreate it exactly as I remembered it. Once I did that, I'd then try to make it better -- at least in terms of my own vision. Creating the original image taught me the technical aspect of making an image. Recreating the image in my own vision taught me the creative aspect.

All of that is different than simply stealing images off of the internet. People aren't doing that to learn how to take pictures of their dogs. They're doing it to avoid having to pay for pictures of their dogs.

But it's easy to understand that on the educational level, first you copy and then you improve (or personalize). As we've been saying all along, this technological access to images is going to wreak havoc with copyright law. And it's going to be virtually impossible to administer at any level. When you combine that with a categorical loss of ethics, you have what we've been seeing in our businesses. People who think that just because they can it's OK. If I can right-click and copy an image then it must be OK. If I can shoot over the photographer's shoulder when they are taking formals then it must be OK. Etc. Etc.

Ultimately, it all comes down to people's belief in what is right and what is wrong. And if you do something you think is right, no amount of discussion from me is likely to change your mind. Sad, but unfortunately, true.

Jim

Seems to me we need to have an ethics class as a must!

Very difficult topic. Most know by now that the stock photo business is in the toilet and a frantic search is on to come up with new ways to capture revenue. The music and movie industries are experimenting with added value offerings. Other business models encourage repeat business through purhase rewards. I believe photographers will need to follow suit and get creative. The lesson I've learned is that policing and enforcing copyright violations has a very limited impact (that's what I call 'hanging on') whereas experimentation with different business models that can work in the age of the world wide web and the ubiquitous digital camera can lead to meaningful change (I call this 'moving on'). My experience is that moving on is almost always better, much better, than hanging on. One example is the incorporation of video into photojournalism, wedding and event photography. I've stretched to write reviews of events where I was the 'official' photographer because the magazines I deal with don't pay for photographs any more (sure they like mine better but they're not above using the crappy free stuff everybody and their brother sends in) but they pay pretty well for articles. Therefore submitting articles featuring my own images has become important to me. Doing this has not been easy but I can't deny that it's boosted my business.

Buddy,
I think you are right regarding "Moving On" versus "Hanging On". The magazines I deal with don't pay for either photographs or articles so I've not gone that route and our own magazine doesn't pay all that well either but I think that's a great example of added value.

Frankly, the expansion into video is something we've thought about very seriously. With the advent of combo cams, it's possible to shoot events (weddings for example) both in stills and video. The skills required for each discipline are different and very specific and the post-production work in video is somewhat daunting given the hardware/software requirements but I think it's a valid way to go.

So, how much longer until those guys with the video IPhones start shooting events on their own and distributing the videos for free on utube?

Jim