A special message to THUGS & CRETIN MORONS: So if you think images can’t be copyrighted because natural scenes can’t be copyrighted, right?

A challenge about copyright to cowardly THUGS.

A special message to THUGS & CRETIN MORONS: So if you think images can’t be copyrighted because natural scenes can’t be copyrighted, you probably also think books can’t be copyrighted and songs can’t be copyrighted. It’s just words (and musical sounds), right? You can’t copyright words or musical notes! Hey, go ahead and copy that Michael Connelly book under your name, or publish that Rihanna song under your name. As your entire, “special ed” defense, tell them that words can’t be copyrighted. Copy their work word for word. You’ll see how far you get. They might just think you’re a flaming moron and let you off the hook because of that. Well, once you are held liable for millions in damages, that is.

Do THUGS really just like to take pictures? Is it true that I can’t prevent my pictures from being copied by THUGS? These and more myths explained.

Some THUG & MORON myths explained.

You will read many comments on the Loserphotographers.com and Marc Adamus LIES 2.0 blog. Invariably, most are extremely negative, wishing death, pestilence, and serious bodily harm on us (now you know why we call them THUGS). There are also comments that make preposterous claims such as the ones in the title. Let’s go over some of the most popular myths:

1. We just like to take pictures/I shoot for myself/Photography is my hobby

MYTH. This is a special kind of lie because it’s designed to paint THUGS & MORONS as victims, poor babies who were just minding their business and enjoying photography when Loserphotographers.com thundered on the scene.

The fact is, however, that photography isn’t really a hobby, like say, mountain biking or fishing. There’s no intrinsic pleasure in simply taking a picture, for most of the population. For a majority of the rest, it’s about the photography gear itself, and not taking pictures (gearheads). Taking pictures is simply a part of a bigger process, designed to either produce satisfaction (at a later part of the process) or income. The actual taking of pictures is rarely an end unto itself.

Apart from the real artists, the remainder are the THUGS & LOSERS. Why do they take pictures? Simple. It’s all about taking a picture (usually, a stolen composition that has some artistic validity), uploading it to any of dozens online photo “sharing” or “critiquing” sites, and feeling what can only be described as a sexual experience from the praise and comments bestowed by fellow losers. Pretty sad, right? We think so too.

2. Is it true that pictures can’t really be copyrighted? I can’t copyright my picture of Tunnel View or Mt Hood?

MYTH. Completely untrue and contradicted by every piece of law and case law ever written! This deceptive claim is written in a facetious manner as if to claim that copyright would prevent anyone from ever taking a photo of iconic scenes. That’s completely untrue! Copyright is designed to protect an artist’s unique expression of an idea or scene. Now, those two words are the key. Most thugs have no idea what “artist”, “unique”, or “expression” means. To pieces of shit like Miles Morgan, being an “artist” simply means exactly copying what others before you have achieved, and acting as if you thought it up all along. And most artists would probably interpret the same in several different ways. Unlike THUGS, who just seek to exactly replicate the work of Galen Rowell or Ansel Adams, a true artist hears the scene call to him in an unique manner, and his/her work reflects that. THAT’s what copyright is designed to protect, so THIEVING SCUM like Miles Morgan can’t just lay claim to what YOU thought up in the first place!

3. “If I prevented my images from being copied, I’d be the most hated person in the photography world (next to Marc Adamus LIES 2.0 and Loserphotographers.com, of course).

Well, if LOSERS and SCUM who want to exactly copy your images are going to be offended, who cares? You can’t please everyone, and certainly not the dishonest and immoral. This bullshit claim is like saying that we shouldn’t focus attention on the horrors of the holocaust because one would become the most hated person in neo-Nazi circles. Who cares? You don’t need to provide an account to thieves, morons, and immoral scum (like Miles Morgan). Your work deserves protection. If someone can’t understand that, they don’t respect you, don’t value your work and time, and they don’t deserve your attention.

What does US Copyright Law say about stealing images, and about copyright in photography? A primer/FAQ for professional photographers under siege by the Chris Moore MD’s and Miles Morgan’s out there.

Copyright and Image theft.

A Loserphotographers.com feature: Protecting your copyright, part two. See Part one here.

We at Loserphotographers.com have long documented the unethical theft and lack of shame that LOSERS & LIARS like Miles Morgan, Floris van Breugel, Chris Moore MD, and others, display when they attempt to make exact copies of Marc Adamus images, for example. And we have long documented the cowardly Marc Adamus’ refusal to protect his images, because he’s a weasel who really makes all his money from selling workshops to inartistic LOSERS who think that buying $5000 of camera gear and making copies of Marc Adamus/Ansel Adamus/Galen Rowell images somehow makes them “artists”. 

 Anyway, THUGS & MORONS have long claimed on this blog that one can’t really copyright photography. It’s a straw man argument, but an unsurprising one. Miles Morgan or Floris van Breugel wouldn’t take any images if there was no one they could copy. So clearly, they have to rationalize the theft. Here’s a primer on US Copyright Law. Most of this material was retrieved from:

http://www.copyright.gov/help/faq-fairuse.html

and from other sites dealing with copyright issues.

1. What can I copyright, as far as photography is concerned?

You can’t copyright, say, a snapshot of Zabriskie Point, per se. So THUGS & MORONS can waddle up with their 5Dmk II’s and take all the photos they want, unfortunately. What can be copyrighted is your specific artistic interpretation of that scene. Did some Photoshop work on your image? Use a unique focal length to produce a new interpretation of the scene? This is all protected by copyright. Of course, this still, basically, provides the protection you want. THUGS & MORONS don’t want to just take snapshots of Zabriskie Point (ie, showing it as it “is”). They are hungrily seeking a specific artistic interpretation that they think will make them famous or get them comments & critiques on Photosig/Flickr/photo.net. In other words, they want to find your image online or in a magazine and copy it exactly, down to the last detail.

2. So if I am the only one/the first to photograph some scene, can I copyright that?

YES! Your interpretation of that scene is unique, and more importantly (as far as the law is concerned), you have “first dibs” on the composition. Remember to register your image with the US Copyright Office (we covered that here). 

3. How does intent fit into this? Even if say, Floris van Breugel didn’t copy my image exactly, because he wasn’t able to, does intent to copy make it more legally actionable?

YES! The law recognizes that intent to violate copyright Is more serious than an “accidental” violation. And violations made with the intent to profit from the violation are even more serious, and actionable. 

4. Copyright is too expensive/I can’t afford to protect myself.

Untrue (luckily). You can file online for $35, and each filing can encompass many images in the same session. 

5. Pursuing violations is too expensive/ I know someone who copied one of my images, but I can’t afford to stop them.

Untrue (luckily). With something known as a DMCA takedown, you can easily counter thieving scum and hardly spend anything. Loserphotographers.com blog will be covering use of the DMCA takedown soon. It is the first, and most important tool in the battle against photo theft and thieving THUGS & MORONS.

6. What are my obligations as regards to protecting my images?

You need to pursue all violations of your copyright. That’s one of the reasons that corporations sue each other over even the smallest perceived violations. A failure to protect your work implies that you’re not interested in protecting it, and your copyright may be invalidated.

This is part 2 of a series on Intellectual Property protection on Loserphotographers.com. Stay tuned for part 3, using the DMCA takedown.

The fact that image/composition theft is not considered dishonest among amateur LOSERS is an example of the fundamentally dishonest people that real professional photographers are pitted against. Words alone will not do the job here. You must take proactive steps to secure your rights, before they’re ripped right from your hands and assigned to someone else. Do the right thing; chain your images down!

Protecting your images from thieving THUGS & LOSERS, part one: Register your images with the US Copyright Office.

Protecting your images, Part 1.

A Loserphotographers.com feature: Protecting your copyright, part one: Register your images with the US Copyright Office.

1. Background & Foreword

  We are all aware of the many problems facing the professional photography industry today. One of the largest problems is the entry of completely untalented losers into photography. Loserphotographers.com/Marc Adamus LIES 2.0 has dubbed these cretins THUGS & MORONS. They usually have good jobs, ie, engineering, information technology, doctors, etc. You’d think these losers were pillars of their communities. They certainly act like it. However, their off-duty activities involve theft, ripping off other people, appropriating the work of honest photographers. They then gloat about it on sites like Flickr/Photo.net/photosig, acting as if they are great artists, inspired master of photography. 

  None of this is true. Their involvement is strictly due to digital photography, which makes it easy to steal the works of real photographers. The parade of “photography” magazines out there only encourages this theft. See Galen Rowell’s work. Get GPS coordinates to where he stood. Now, if someone copied 90% of Microsoft Windows (even if it was Windows 98), maybe added some inconsequential flavor of their own, and then marketed it as their own work, the consequences would be extraordinary. The individual responsible would be strung out to dry, the target of more lawsuits and legal action than he/she could imagine. The public would rightfully jeer and call for a legal lynching. 

  But when it comes to photography, it is unique in the world when it comes to protecting its work. Or rather, it is unique in that it doesn’t protect its work. You can go out there, buy a great large format camera, learn to be relatively proficient with it, and then show up at Yosemite to exactly copy a unique Ansel Adams (for example) photo, like these turkeys (insert link to Ken Rockwell here) did. Now, Ken Rockwell, a straightforward and frank man, called out their bullshit, but who else does? And Ken Rockwell is hated all over the Internet for speaking his mind. And the losers Ken Rockwell speaks of ignore his words, and the words of others like him, because no action is taken. As long as people don’t speak out en masse and make it shameful and financially expensive for these LOSERS to continue their theft, nothing will change.

 

  It’s Marc Adamus LIES 2.0 and Loserphotographers.com’s job to make it shameful for these SCUM to continue what they are doing; it’s professional photographers’ jobs to make it financially expensive. The first step to making it financially expensive is to provide a basis, a strong foundation, for protecting your own images: 

2. Register your images with the US Copyright Office.

 This is the first step to properly protecting your images from unethical clients, first of all, but most importantly, from frauds like Miles Morgan or Chris Moore (MD, of course, about whom we will be writing a lot soon), who want to steal your images pixel for pixel and upload it on their own sites, pretending that they came up with the images all by themselves. 

 We won’t pretend to know about every step in detail; many other ethical photographers/attorneys have talked about this at length. Here’s one website we recommend you start out at:

http://www.peterkrogh.com/copyright/main.html

Visit the US Copyright Office to begin the process:

www.copyright.gov

  We cannot understate the importance of taking the first step to protecting your work, if you are a professional photographer who currently relies on the honesty and goodwill of men to secure your rights. There is no goodwill and no honesty left out there. Frauds like Miles Morgan or Chris Moore MD, flush with cash from their day jobs, and freed of the heavy moral and ethical guidelines that prevent someone from taking something that’s not theirs, scour the Internet in search of images just like yours. They will steal them and flaunt them as their own work. You will have limited recourse without registering your images with the US Copyright Office. Remember, if you were the first to photograph something in even a remotely unique manner, you have first claim to that composition and must protect your rights. 

  On a side note, we have noticed that frauds like Chris Moore MD and Miles Morgan have aggressive “copyright statements” on their sites. These statements are completely invalid. When one of these frauds steals the compositions of other photographers, they have no rights to the resulting image and cannot enjoy any copyright protection. Copyright statements on a Ryan Dyar, Miles Morgan, Chris Moore MD, Kevin Mcneal, or Luke Austin website are equivalent to a car thief who now threatens legal action against any other thief who steals “his” car. 

 The fact that image/composition theft is not considered dishonest among amateur LOSERS is an example of the fundamentally dishonest people that real professional photographers are pitted against. Words alone will not do the job here. You must take proactive steps to secure your rights, before they’re ripped right from your hands and assigned to someone else. Do the right thing; chain your images down!

This is a multi-part instructional series courtesy of Loserphotographers.com. The advice contained in this series is directed at career professional photographers and is intended to protect professional photographers from amateur scum and losers.  

Who qualifies for airtime on Marc Adamus LIES 2.0 and Loserphotographers.com? Part 1: Wide Range Galleries/Jack Brauer website

What are the standards for inclusion on MAL or Loserphotographers.com?

(Note: Due to the multiple elements covered in this post, it is also available on the Marc Adamus LIES 2.0 blog)

A recent email we received made some excellent points. In fact, we’ll be quoting extensively from this email in the future.

However, the author  also displayed a valid concern, such as the following:

Though you're attacking of random people with tripods in the "loserphotographers" section is a bit unsettling as how I might end up on it, heh, is there some sort of criteria you have for throwing people on there other than whats stated?

It’s a good question, and one that deserves a good answer.  What constitutes a THUG, MORON, TERRORIST, or LOSER? Here are some characteristics that will cause us to take a second look. This is part one of a multi-part series on this subject:

1.  A Jack Brauer (Wide Range Galleries) website

  This will surprise many readers. What the heck does a Wide Range Galleries website have anything to do with Marc Adamus and his moron supporters? As it turns out, plenty.

Jack Braurer websites are extravagantly expensive. In fact, they range from $2000-6000, with more expensive options available. The most common fee is, apparently, $3000. The reality is that this money doesn’t get you very much. The websites are template-based, which is why almost all of them look vaguely similar, and the customization is usually in the form of some custom graphics and slightly different gallery arrangements.

It’s important to point out that these expensive Wide Range Galleries websites are essentially overpriced, underperforming templates that offer no secret formula to internet visibility. So it’s really stupid to pay so much for them.

  So, if we ignore the privy information in the above sentence for a second, you’d think that a very successful photographer is the typical client. And you’d be very, very wrong. In fact, Jack hardly has any real photographers as clients.The typical “client” is a loser who makes almost no money of any sort from photography. Many of them have their own money, or have spent their well-to-do parents’ money on the websites (Ryan Dyar, Floris Van Breugel). Most of them were completely unheard of two years ago. They feel that buying one of these overpriced, template websites is some sort of magic solution to their web presence. Why do they think this?

Simple. Marc Adamus was one of the first people to purchase a Jack Braurer website. 

  For most morons, this is enough by itself to immediately rush out and blow $5000 on a website. Now that we’ve laid it out for you, isn’t it astonishingly insane? If this poser is stupid enough to buy some website just because Marc has one, what else is he stupid enough to do? Bear in mind that we don’t think Marc paid this much for his website. We think that Jack suddenly realized he had a jackpot on his hands, and promptly raised his prices after delivering Marc’s site. And where does it stop? How high do the prices have to be? We guarantee that the Floris Van Breugels and Ryan Dyars of this world would be buying a Wide Range Galleries site at $10,000 a pop. Maybe they’d still do it at $20,000 a pop. After all, Marc has one of these sites, and since Marc is The Best Photographer, The Most Successful Photographer, and the Most Humble Person ever, obviously anyone who wants to be a Real Pro© needs a Jack Brauer website.

  On a more serious note, a Jack Braurer website is one of the sure signs that you’re dealing with a talentless loser, a worthless fuck who thinks that throwing a bunch of money at his latest obsession will make him a noteworthy artist. We strongly urge you to not purchase anything from anyone with one of these websites. In almost every case, you’re dealing with an immature, inartistic poser who hides behind his computer and his expensive website and makes no money from photography except for that “earned” by “teaching” fraudulent photography “workshops” to other loser wannabe’s.

To recap:

1. If you find a Jack Brauer website, you’re probably dealing with a fraud, a poser, and a loser. He purchased that website because Marc Adamus did. No other reason. There is about as much creative thought at work here as could be found in a roadside boulder (maybe less). Hit your back button and find a real artist who doesn’t need a super-expensive website to look like the real thing.

2. Jack Brauer websites are easily identifiable by the “design by Wide Range Galleries” note at the bottom of each one. Avoid anyone whose website sports anything identifying Jack Braurer, Jesse Speers, or Wide Range Galleries as associated with the design or content of the site.

3. Jack Brauer himself is rapidly dipping into the world of fraud by advertising himself as a large format photographer, while he increasingly uses the tools of scum morons, the Canon 5D Mark II, for landscape photography. This camera has no business being within a hundred miles of any website or gallery promising medium or large format quality prints. Do not purchase prints or services of any sort from Jack Brauer. Do not reward his fraud and business relationship with Marc Adamus.

Look for Part Two of this series soon, where we take a look at the 2^nd hint we’re dealing with a loser: The various obsessions and claims of LOSERS & LIARS, and what to look for when reading a photography website.