If a Monkey Takes a Photograph, Who Has The Copyright? | The Scholarly Kitchen

"Monkey Copyright… of all the juxtapositions of words; I never thought I’d be entering that particular two word combination into Google. This particular search combo was prompted by (what else) a selection of updates in my twitter feed about a monkey that took a selfie and a takedown notice for the photo in question. Over here it’s ‘Silly Season‘ so my initial assumption was that this was either a hoax, or the particularly florid work of some overheated PR company attempting to corner the press cycle for some film or other. Nope, monkey copyright is the latest entry in the debate about what can or cannot be copyrighted. Or to be more accurate, the endless tit-for-tat of takedown notice and rebuttal that characterizes the use of creative works in the digital age. Frankly, it’s also another entry in the sorry file of arrogance, hubris and dogma that the self appointed guardians of the internet succumb to on an all too frequent basis. Here’s the facts: In 2011, David Slater a British professional wildlife photographer based in Gloucestershire (in the UK) took a trip to Sulawesi, Indonesia. This trip was for the purpose of taking wildlife photos. As a professional photographer, he clearly intended to profit from this endeavor by selling reproduction rights to the photographs that he took. As part of his trip, he decided to try and take photographs of the Crested Black Macaque, a rare species of primate confined to the islands that make up that part of Indonesia. In fact, he actually shadowed a troop of Macaques in the jungle, for three days. He enlisted the help of a local guide to assist in this effort. He was successful in his photography; returning home with a series of spectacular shots that showcase the species in their natural habitat. If you want to see what those photographs look like, I recommend you visit his website – respecting the source of the images that some of you may already be aware of. On the 11th July 2011, a version of one of those images was uploaded to Wikimedia Commons, the 'database of freely usable media files' by a contributor named Sandstein. The file 'Macaca nigra self-portrait.jpg' is the subject of a request for removal by David Slater, who asserts that he has the copyright of the image. Mr Slater discovered the use of the image recently when searching for further images of Black Crested Macaques. On Wednesday of this week, Wikimedia came forth with their considered opinion of his request. I’m reproducing their comments here ..."