Hi,
I bought a text-book for one of my college courses, and lo-and-behold, one
of my renderings (Grade One), was in the book.  I was so surprised and
happy,
considering it was the only non-winning image among other IRTC
winners/runner ups.

The book is called: Computers:
Tools for an Information Age 6th Edition by H.L. Capron
ISBN: 0-201-61211-9
http://www.prenhall.com/capron

Problem is, I was never told that my image would be appearing in the book.
Is this somehow breaking one of the IRTC rules or violating my copyrights?
All the files
included for the submission included a statement from  me regarding
permission of image/file, usage.
I have written on my homepage's gallery and in the IRTC files (.POV, .TXT,
etc.) that if
you wish to use the image, you must first contact me to get my permission.

Some of the images included in the book are (from the IRTC):

- Roger, Gary and Bob by Jeane-Marie Haerens and Fabien Mosen
- Untitled (image of Ice Cream Cone) by Nathan O'Brien (
- Gomusic by Gena Obukhov (not sure if this is from IRTC)
- Toco Toucan by Ian and Ethel MacKay
- Pocketwatch by Kevin Odhner
- Untitled (bucket of Sea Shells) by Steve Gowers (Summer theme)
- Untitled (ship image) by Nathan O'Brien (Elements theme)
- Grade One by Gautam Lad
- Untitled (plane image) by Ian Armstrong (Flight theme)
- Admiral Watch by Adrian Baumann
- Ode to Prianesi by Nathan O'Brien

My question to these artists: Did you receive any notice from the
publisher/author? If not,
do you think they violated your copyrights by using the image without your
permission?

Also, I don't plan on taking any legal action or anything; it's just that
I'd like to know (in advance)
where my work is being used.


Thanks!
Bye!

--
Gautam N. Lad
ICQ #: 7196672

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WOAH... this could be interesting!

Copyright rules can be found here:

http://www.irtc.org/copy.html

The use of the image(s) is not an infringement if the book was somehow
promoting the IRTC competition and its associated activities, or if the
image was being used by a sponsor to demonstrate their products/services
(such as quality of printing by a sponsor that is a printing service).

Otherwise, I'd seriously think of finding out how the hell it got in that
book!!!

Post a reply to this message

On Sun, 26 Sep 1999 22:39:03 -0400, "Gautam N. Lad" <vnl### [at] mynacom> wrote:

>I bought a text-book for one of my college courses, and lo-and-behold, one
>of my renderings (Grade One), was in the book.  I was so surprised and
>happy, considering it was the only non-winning image among other IRTC
>winners/runner ups.
>
>The book is called: Computers:
>Tools for an Information Age 6th Edition by H.L. Capron
>ISBN: 0-201-61211-9
>http://www.prenhall.com/capron
>
>Problem is, I was never told that my image would be appearing in the book.
>Is this somehow breaking one of the IRTC rules or violating my copyrights?

  Gautam, I read the IRTC copyright rules at http://www.irtc.org/copy.html
and, IMO, I believe your copyright on your artwork has been violated by the
publisher and the author, H.L. Capron. You might contact Nathan O'Brien and
Fabien Mosen and ask them if their artwork has also been used without their
permission. They frequent these groups and their e-mail addresses should
also be contained in the comment descriptions that accompany their IRTC
entries.

  I don't know what recourse you have but I would first contact the
publisher by e-mail and save all e-correspondence. If they do not reply to
e-mail then I would write a letter and send it by certified mail accompanied
by a return receipt (if you are in the U.S.) to maintain a record of
correspondence. At this point in time, I would not simply grant the
publisher permission to continue to use your artwork because this might set
some sort of precedent for the other artists involved. While it might be
unlikely that you could force the publisher to pull the books from
distribution without hiring an attorney, you and the other artists might
consider accepting a free copy of the book as a gesture of goodwill, or in
your case, a full refund of the price you paid for the book. I would also
ask that any future editions of the book adhere to the copyright notice
displayed at the above-mentioned IRTC page.

  You might also e-mail Chris Cason to inform him about this book since the
IRTC also has certain rights regarding use of submitted artwork.

  This is what I would do but you might discuss it with others before
proceeding, as I am not a copyright specialist or an attorney.

-- 
Alan
http://www.povray.org - Home of the Persistence of Vision Ray Tracer

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On Mon, 27 Sep 1999 13:40:37 +1000, "Lance Birch" <lan### [at] usanet>
wrote:

>The use of the image(s) is not an infringement if the book was somehow
>promoting the IRTC competition and its associated activities, or if the
>image was being used by a sponsor to demonstrate their products/services
>(such as quality of printing by a sponsor that is a printing service).

  Gautam said in his post that it is a college textbook. Judging by its
title it probably doesn't contain advertising or promotion of a product
between its covers.

>Otherwise, I'd seriously think of finding out how the hell it got in that
>book!!!

  The author either downloaded it from the IRTC pages or got the images from
an official IRTC CD-ROM, which is also a copyright violation. These images
are not public domain and someone else is profiting from Gautam's work.

-- 
Alan
http://www.povray.org - Home of the Persistence of Vision Ray Tracer

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Both interesting and disturbing.  More so interesting to me though.
Now I wish I had entered a lot of things into the IRTC ; )
The fact there is a considerable number from a single source like a
IRTC CD is odd in that it would (or should) have been obvious of the
copyrights.

Bob

Alan Kong <ako### [at] pacbellNO-SPAMnet> wrote in message
news:U=zuNxpJIpWFysmH5I96T5Dcai0w@4ax.com...
> On Mon, 27 Sep 1999 13:40:37 +1000, "Lance Birch"
<lan### [at] usanet>
> wrote:
>
> >The use of the image(s) is not an infringement if the book was
somehow
> >promoting the IRTC competition and its associated activities, or if
the
> >image was being used by a sponsor to demonstrate their
products/services
> >(such as quality of printing by a sponsor that is a printing
service).
>
>   Gautam said in his post that it is a college textbook. Judging by
its
> title it probably doesn't contain advertising or promotion of a
product
> between its covers.
>
> >Otherwise, I'd seriously think of finding out how the hell it got
in that
> >book!!!
>
>   The author either downloaded it from the IRTC pages or got the
images from
> an official IRTC CD-ROM, which is also a copyright violation. These
images
> are not public domain and someone else is profiting from Gautam's
work.
>
> --
> Alan
> http://www.povray.org - Home of the Persistence of Vision Ray Tracer

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I agree totally, action should be taken on this immediately.

The other authors should be contacted also.

Post a reply to this message

Alan Kong wrote:
>   Gautam, I read the IRTC copyright rules at http://www.irtc.org/copy.html
> and, IMO, I believe your copyright on your artwork has been violated by the
> publisher and the author, H.L. Capron. You might contact Nathan O'Brien and
> Fabien Mosen and ask them if their artwork has also been used without their
> permission.

 I've been informed by Gautam's message on IRTC-list, and I'm very
upset,
because I NEVER gave such permission !!
 I suppose that we must first get the opinion of every injured artist
before deciding how we must react.
 Wait and see...

Fabien.

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For factual information of copyright law, it's enforcement, and possible
remedies within the USA see the following page:

http://www4.law.cornell.edu/uscode/17/

It will of course vary from country to country but the info here should be
enough to let you know where you stand from a general legal point of view
without first having to contact a lawyer for this type of information.

There is more general information on the subject on the copyright FAQ and
resources page at:

http://www.aimnet.com/~carroll/copyright/faq-home.html

-- 
Ken Tyler
1100+ Povray, Graphics, 3D Rendering, and Raytracing Links:
http://home.pacbell.net/tylereng/index.html

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Since the US is usually regarded as litigation heaven, I would say: Sue
them! You can finally make some money with your hobby!

Now, jokes aside, I actually mean that quite seriously, because of the
following reason:

They should not get away with it. If you don't sue them, they'll do it
again. If it is a large publisher, you'll probably get some nice punitive
damages too.


Greetings,
Johannes (who isn't an attourney)

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Johannes Hubert wrote:
> 
> Since the US is usually regarded as litigation heaven, I would say: Sue
> them! You can finally make some money with your hobby!
> 
> Now, jokes aside, I actually mean that quite seriously, because of the
> following reason:
> 
> They should not get away with it. If you don't sue them, they'll do it
> again. If it is a large publisher, you'll probably get some nice punitive
> damages too.

The problem is that it seems that some images comes from non-US people
(Nathan O'Brien, myself,...), and while it is clear that they did
something
wrong, suing them from here is not an easy matter.

Is there any known case of such multi-country copyright infringement of
net-availiable material ?

Fabien.

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