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In 2009, total infringement case volume reported by PicScout clients increased more then 3 times over 2006 levels, which demonstrates the ongoing explosion of the use of digital imagery and its non-legitimate use. Current global data, which is based on over 5,000,000 RM images, demonstrates that industry-wide aggregation of infringement cases reported for 2009 show that about 8 out of 10 uses of Rights Managed images on commercial websites today are being used non-legitimately.

In a sample study conducted by Stock Artist Alliance and PicScout in 2005, and further reported in 2007 to assess the level of infringement occurring with Rights Managed Images, the issue of infringement is shown to be world-wide with the study revealing that cases found were distributed 64% in the US, 23% in Germany and 13% in the U.K. The study tracked a sample of 20,000 SAA member images represented in the Rights Managed collections of the leading stock distributors, Getty Images and Corbis, which had never been paid for web usage.

Given the vast increase in the use of images in everything digital – and the lack of user awareness of or willingness to acknowledge copyright and license responsibilities – it is consistent to assume the level of infringement for editorial and Royalty Free is equal to or exceeds that of Right Managed images. If the industry were to expand its infringement claims from commercial websites to include User Generated Content (UGC) websites, PicScout projects that the number of infringement cases would be considerably larger.

PicScout represents stock agencies that control at least eighty (80) percent of the Rights Managed revenue in the U.S., Canada, Europe and parts of Asia. PicScout reviews more than 600 million online images a month globally and compares those images against a Rights Managed critical mass database of agency represented images. In a year, PicScout will audit more than six (6) billion images.

CONCLUSION:

Technology enablers, UGC content sites, consumers/users, artists and governing authorities must jointly accept responsibility to safeguard the creative artist’s products in order to ensure supply of creative artists’ product. Copyright protection must ensure the industry the ability to protect and assert its rights.

Copyright Alliance

Comments:
http://www.copyrightalliance.org/files/copyright_alliance_march_24_2010_comments_to_usipec.pdf

Press release:
http://www.copyrightalliance.org/news.php?id=84

Picture Archive Council of America (PACA)

http://www.pacaoffice.org/advocacy.shtml

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While Picscout has been a leading innovator in image-recognition technology, its business is not to help people find images. It’s to help them manage their copyrights. If you’re thinking that you could use Google’s new image-search to do that on your own, consider these points:

FINDING YOUR IMAGES

• First you have to get Google image search to come up with one of your images in a search (not as easy as it looks), before you can even start with a “similar” search. And then your luck goes downhill faster. As reported by Plagiarism Today, the search isn’t really all that good. But, that’s almost beside the point. Even if it were perfect at finding exact matches, you have to do this for every image you own, one by one. Do you really have that much time on your hands?
• Picscout tracks entire collections of works… Every day.

FINDING “RELEVANT” USAGES

• Do you know the difference between a “relevant” use of your images and a big waste of time?
• Picscout does. And we deliver detailed reports that include the name of the company, a screenshot of the web page that used your image, contact information, and more.

RESOLUTIONS

• Do you know what to do if you find a match? Most people have no expertise or wherewithal to resolve usage disputes. If you try to contact the company yourself, chances are that you’ll be either ignored or treated poorly. And you’ll discover this only after weeks or months of trying.
• Picscout works with a select network of specially qualified copyright lawyers that can not only handle your case professionally with the other party, saving you valuable time, but also come up with a satisfactory resolution that doesn’t alienate business relationships.

Sure, there are ways to “find” your images, ranging from dumb luck to brute force searching. But that doesn’t mean a whole lot if nothing is happening. In the end, Picscout is far more than just a great image-recognition tech company. We provide full-service solutions that actually return results.

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This panel will discuss techniques buyers can use to track down images and what agencies can do to make it easier.

Jeff Downey, Director of Sales and Business Development at PicScout, will present in this session which will take place on Saturday, April 18, 2009, at 4 PM at the Millennium Knickerbocker Hotel.  Chicago is Jeff’s hometown and he is a White Sox fan in case you wondered.

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Together, ImageSpan and PicScout also are addressing a huge and growing problem: online image theft. Lost revenues from unauthorized uses of images online are estimated at upwards of $65 million, according to a comprehensive study by the Stock Artists Alliance. By combining PicScout’s market-leading image tracking and recognition registry services with ImageSpan’s Web-based LicenseStream licensing and royalty settlement service, the partners can provide LicenseStream subscribers with a view into where and how their images are being used online.  The exclusive three-year agreement calls for PicScout to be the exclusive image tracking service and image registry service for all content provided to it by ImageSpan and covers mutual customers in the United States, Canada and the United Kingdom.

“PicScout is proud to partner with ImageSpan and to combine our complementary services: the ImageSpan LicenseStream service and PicScout’s Image Tracker,” said Offir Gutelzon, CEO and co-founder of PicScout. “Image Tracker’s reports will enable both photographers and enterprises to create more sales opportunities which can be monetized by the LicenseStream remedy tools.  In addition, LicenseStream customers will have access to our Image Registry which solves the problem of unidentified copyrighted images or orphan works.”

Please see the entire PR on our website: read more

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VDZ is a German organization of 400 publishers together producing more than 3,000 titles. The Israel Export & International Cooperation Institute also sponsored the event and helped scout out innovative Israeli companies in the digital media and software space.

The summit hosted young and innovative companies from Israel and USA among of them were companies like Kaltura, Clicktale, Tvinchi, Dapper and PicScout which showecased their company and solutions for the digital media market.

I was amazed to see how the traditional print industry is seeking for help and innovation in order to leverage their brand into the digital world. We were sharing how their evolution to online from print was similar to the evolution stock agencies had moving from 35mm to e-commerce websites.

Next month I will speak at the American Bar Association’s Annual Intellectual Property Law Conference which will discuss how emerging technologies, like the PicScout’s ImageTracker, can solve problems relating to “orphan works”.

Offir Gutelzon

(Picture from Raphael Mizrahi’s Facebook Album)

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After the announcement was made, Gutelzon commented, ”I look forward to this challenge and am confident in our team’s abilities to continue to build innovative solutions. We will be using our technology platform to enhance our Software as a Service (SaaS) offering and create new applications and tools for our customers and partners to help them solve their copyright issues. I want to thank PicScout’s co-founder, Eyal Gura, who as founding CEO was instrumental to PicScout’s success from initial vision to market leadership.”

”Six years after its founding, PicScout is a profitable market leader with a unique and scalable image recognition technology and most importantly, a strong team with entrepreneurial culture” says Eyal Gura , PicScout co-Founder and chairman of the board. “The Board of Directors congratulates Offir and has confidence in Offir’s ability to take the company to even higher levels”

As General Manager and co-founder of PicScout, Offir led all product management and R&D activities. Prior to PicScout, Offir worked with several start-up companies and was involved in the vision and creation of various software and hardware solutions. One of the start-ups was Tundo Telecommunications where Offir held product marketing and project management positions. Offir served in a key technology unit of the Israel Defense Force and is a graduate of the Zell Entrepreneurship Program of IDC Herzliya.

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