Use of DMCA to enforce "model regret" ?

[rowan]

I've just received a nice legal notice from a lawyer in Hungary, quoting both Hungarian and USA law, pointing out that his client did modelling some time ago, and would now like the photos of her removed from the internet.

I'm an affiliate, using those images with permission. As a model I presume she signed a release, therefore, the DMCA cannot be used to remove such images as she does not actually own copyright. Is this correct?

The email also mentions issuing a cancel message (RFC 1036) which I think is for usenet, so this lawyer is obviously fishing. I'm going to remove the images, for her sake, but this lawyer sounds like he's incompetent, or an asshole. Or maybe both.

[Google Expert]

Well, what did his email claim? That he (she) owned the copyright?

[rowan]

Well, what did his email claim? That he (she) owned the copyright?

The only mention of the word "copyright" seems to be in the DMCA boilerplate notification text. Including - "I swear under penalty of perjury that I am fully
authorized to act on behalf of the copyright holder."

The email also references what seems to be a privacy act in Hungary.

Since I am not in Hungary or the USA neither law applies to me. Fishing.

[rowan]

BTW: just checked the paysite and her thumb still appears on the tour, implying there's content of her inside. I'll contact the program and see what they have to say.

[MaDalton]

i'd forward that to the sponsor

[_Richard_]

reminds me of the lawyer boyfriend from AZ

[Axeman]

I would just email the sponsor and ask if they still hold the ownership of the content, or if they have recently sold the rights back to the model? Usually when that happens though, the sponsor notifies all affiliates stating that is the case, and to please remove the content at your earliest convenience.

[marcop]

One of my clients will pull down a model's content IF the model pays him what he paid for the content. Some girls pay, some don't--so their content stays up.

If the model in your case signed a properly worded release and is over 18, there's no legal reason to remove her content, AFAIK.

[rowan]

The sponsor hasn't updated their website since 2007, so I'm not really too hopeful of a quick response.

The email also included her date of birth, an identification number, and a street address. Guess it's necessary to properly identify her to the actual copyright holder, but if this lawyer is sending this info to everyone who's ever posted a pic of her on the net, well...

[rogueteens]

I once had a model ring me up asking me to remove her images from my affiliate site. I removed them but had the devil's own task in trying to explain to her that I was just an affiliate and had no control over the rest of the images on the net! :D

[rowan]

I once had a model ring me up asking me to remove her images from my affiliate site. I removed them but had the devil's own task in trying to explain to her that I was just an affiliate and had no control over the rest of the images on the net! :D

Wish someone would explain that to her lawyer, although I suspect he knows exactly what he's doing.

Quick search...

3340 web page results
2340 image results

She was promoted using her REAL name (not sure why she ever allowed that) so I'd say it's going to be near impossible to get rid of all traces of her modelling pics from the net.

Incidentally, it looks like she's a lawyer herself now, specialising in antitrust.

[_Richard_]

Incidentally, it looks like she's a lawyer herself now, specialising in antitrust.

[Rochard]

Photos are owned by the program or the company that took the photos. Model has no claim at all.

[pornguy]

Photos are owned by the program or the company that took the photos. Model has no claim at all.

Documents pending of course.

[georgeyw]

Have received the same and whilst they might not own the content, I take it down purely to save continued head fuck.

[2MuchMark]

I've just received a nice legal notice from a lawyer in Hungary, quoting both Hungarian and USA law, pointing out that his client did modelling some time ago, and would now like the photos of her removed from the internet.

I'm an affiliate, using those images with permission. As a model I presume she signed a release, therefore, the DMCA cannot be used to remove such images as she does not actually own copyright. Is this correct?

The email also mentions issuing a cancel message (RFC 1036) which I think is for usenet, so this lawyer is obviously fishing. I'm going to remove the images, for her sake, but this lawyer sounds like he's incompetent, or an asshole. Or maybe both.

Removing her images is a good idea. Forget the legal reasons. Removing them will help you sleep tonight because you did the right thing. It's not like there's any shortage of models to promote either and who knows? The next one you promote may make you more money.

[shimmy2]

dont take down shit. upload more. aggravate her. buy a domain just for her pics, put it for sale. sorry but i have no more sympathy for jaded video models who were paid

[shimmy2]

Removing her images is a good idea. Forget the legal reasons. Removing them will help you sleep tonight because you did the right thing.

these hoes will walk all over you if you let them. fuck that

[Joe Obenberger]

A friend sent me a link to this thread and seems to want me to post.

OK. The "C" in DMCA stands for copyright. It's a federal statute dealing with something that's exclusively entrusted to the federal government, namely Copyright. States have no jurisdiction and no say in copyright.

The right of publicity is a creature of state law, incubated in early court decisions and state legislative acts.

These two areas of law converge in every posed photograph and every candid photo depicting a human being. You cannot safely publish any image for commercial purposes without securing a way past copyright - the rights of the person who owns the image - and past rights of publicity - the rights of the person depicted.

DMCA - passed by Congress and signed by the President - deals only with copyright liability.

That being said, things become quite more confusing when we look at 47 USC 230 which deals with "intellectual property rights". There is a division in the courts about whether the model's right of publicity is an "intellectual property right".

[DVTimes]

what is the site

[CYF]

Unless the model was also the photographer, she has no claim of copyright to the images.

[rowan]

Removing her images is a good idea. Forget the legal reasons. Removing them will help you sleep tonight because you did the right thing. It's not like there's any shortage of models to promote either and who knows? The next one you promote may make you more money.

As I said in the OP, "I'm going to remove the images, for her sake [...]"

But there's 100+ other domains that feature her content, including other modelling pics from a pageant about 10 years ago. I don't think it's going to be possible for her lawyer to remove everything - there's got to be at least one person who says "fuck you" or never responds - so it's likely there will forever be modelling images tied to a search for her real name. I do feel sorry for her, but at the end of the day she was an adult and signed a contract. We don't yet have the "delete all youthful indiscretions going forward" option that Eric Schmidt of Google mentioned. It's all super softcore content anyway, just topless.

[shimmy2]

there's got to be at least one person who says "fuck you" or never responds

may as well be you. had you been the photographer who paid her you'd take this more serious

[SilentKnight]

Years ago we worked with a first-time model we paid $400 for the first shoot. It went well, got some great shots. During the shoot she mentioned she wanted some non-adult modeling portfolio shots, but didn't have the money to pay for the photography. I offered to do some in exchange for doing a second adult shoot for us. She agreed.

A few weeks later we arranged to shoot her modeling shots down by a scenic area of the Niagara river gorge. We went to a lot of time, effort and labour staging the shoot. The shots turned out terrific - she was pleased as punch. I spent another few days post-editing to make them perfect for her.

Came time for her to do the second adult shoot she agreed to - and she flaked. No show...no call. We'd booked the studio time and wasted the better part of a day waiting to hear from her. Nothing.

A week or two went by without a call...despite our repeated efforts to contact her. Finally she called us with some lame excuse and informed us she was moving "out west" in a matter of days and wouldn't do the shoot.

I told her if she did the shoot she'd agreed to - we'd do another shoot with her at triple the price of the first paid shoot. That enticed her to finally show up. We did the shoot, and then I never bothered contacting her again.

A year goes by - and she sends me an email (from 'out west')saying she had model regret...and asked if we'd take her photos down from our site. I told her it'd cost her $1600 (the $400 we initially paid her, plus another $800 for my post-editing time...and another $400 for the day she flaked on us).

We never heard from her again.

We left the photos up.

[Roald]

Removing her images is a good idea. Forget the legal reasons. Removing them will help you sleep tonight because you did the right thing. It's not like there's any shortage of models to promote either and who knows? The next one you promote may make you more money.

That makes no sense.

[Major (Tom)]

Removing her images is a good idea. Forget the legal reasons. Removing them will help you sleep tonight because you did the right thing. It's not like there's any shortage of models to promote either and who knows? The next one you promote may make you more money.

Ohh man, that's rich. Ripe with richness!
Ds

[Paully]

I just take it down and wish them the best. I do this when asked by the model. So many models and scenes. Seems foolish to extend someone digitally when they aren't into it.

Only happened a handful of times for me and I work with Max Hardcore. Go figure.

Paully

[acctman]

Just remove it and move on. it's not going to effect you if one model is removed.

[mikesinner]

Removing her images is a good idea. Forget the legal reasons. Removing them will help you sleep tonight because you did the right thing. It's not like there's any shortage of models to promote either and who knows? The next one you promote may make you more money.

lol, that just seems silly, this is a business.

[rowan]

Just remove it and move on. it's not going to effect you if one model is removed.

No, but I don't really appreciate being strong-armed by a C&D from a lawyer, threatening legal action if I don't remove the images. The ask nicely approach would probably work better as a first contact attempt.

[Jim_Gunn]

I can't believe all these people saying they will remove content just because someone claiming to be a model asks. Is this a business or a hobby for you guys?

First of all, is it even realistic to agree to this? The content that I own personally- and I imagine it's similar for other webmasters- is spread across a plethora of web sites including but not limited to a pay site or a VOD site; other VOD networks; my hosted galleries; TGPs, link lists; tube sites; affiliates free sites; adult resource sites etc.. Not to mention DVDs,TV, magazines and various other places. There's no way to put the genie all the way back in the bottle even if I wanted to.

And secondly, why would you want to encourage former models and their new boyfriends or husbands to interfere with your business and cost you money and aggravation? Not to mention all the times I see you guys guys pass on the hassle of pulling content to your affiliates.

[Jim_Gunn]

Just remove it and move on. it's not going to effect you if one model is removed.

When Should You Use Affect?

Affect with an a means "to influence," as in, "The arrows affected Aardvark," or "The rain affected Amy's hairdo." Affect can also mean, roughly, "to act in a way that you don't feel," as in, "She affected an air of superiority."


When Should You Use Effect?

Effect with an e has a lot of subtle meanings as a noun, but to me the meaning "a result" seems to be at the core of all the definitions. For example, you can say, "The effect was eye-popping," or "The sound effects were amazing," or "The rain had no effect on Amy's hairdo."

[Barefootsies]

I can't believe all these people saying they will remove content just because someone claiming to be a model asks. Is this a business or a hobby for you guys?

"Are you guys hobbyists or businessmen? To be honest I don't see too many posts that seem to be made by businessmen."

-Shap

[Dirty Dane]

And secondly, why would you want to encourage former models and their new boyfriends or husbands to interfere with your business and cost you money and aggravation?

On the other hand, some empathy may recruit more models into the industry.

[Major (Tom)]

I can't believe all these people saying they will remove content just because someone claiming to be a model asks. Is this a business or a hobby for you guys?

First of all, is it even realistic to agree to this? The content that I own personally- and I imagine it's similar for other webmasters- is spread across a plethora of web sites including but not limited to a pay site or a VOD site; other VOD networks; my hosted galleries; TGPs, link lists; tube sites; affiliates free sites; adult resource sites etc.. Not to mention DVDs,TV, magazines and various other places. There's no way to put the genie all the way back in the bottle even if I wanted to.

And secondly, why would you want to encourage former models and their new boyfriends or husbands to interfere with your business and cost you money and aggravation? Not to mention all the times I see you guys guys pass on the hassle of pulling content to your affiliates.

100% correct, bottom line
Ds

[Jim_Gunn]

On the other hand, some empathy may recruit more models into the industry.

I can tell you this as a guy who has been specializing in producing porn with new faces for over twenty years. There are more new models- and younger and more beautiful girls- getting into porn every month. It's a steady increase with no sign of abating.

[Harmon]

A friend sent me a link to this thread and seems to want me to post.

OK. The "C" in DMCA stands for copyright. It's a federal statute dealing with something that's exclusively entrusted to the federal government, namely Copyright. States have no jurisdiction and no say in copyright.

The right of publicity is a creature of state law, incubated in early court decisions and state legislative acts.

These two areas of law converge in every posed photograph and every candid photo depicting a human being. You cannot safely publish any image for commercial purposes without securing a way past copyright - the rights of the person who owns the image - and past rights of publicity - the rights of the person depicted.

DMCA - passed by Congress and signed by the President - deals only with copyright liability.

That being said, things become quite more confusing when we look at 47 USC 230 which deals with "intellectual property rights". There is a division in the courts about whether the model's right of publicity is an "intellectual property right".

Why are none of you fat ass shit stains listening to this man?

[fitzmulti]

LOL at "model regret".
If you are the shooter {so this is not directed at affiliates}, and "some period" of time goes by, and the model gives you some sob story {whether you shot her once, or 30+ times}...don't fall for that crap.
They signed model releases, did 2257, etc...and suddenly found a new man, or whatever lame excuse...too bad.
Because, in once instance with me...where I "paused" using the content, then eventually used it to the full extent of months worth of content...the model whined and moaned...and 6 weeks later {earlier this year} was shooting with Holly Randall.

These chicks, LIE and bullshit around, when they think it will "benefit" them.
Fuck that!

[Tom_PM]

I'm sorry for skipping right to the bottom without reading and ignore if answered, but shouldn't you have the documents or ability to get them from the sponsor if sponsor provided? If so, I'd just reply with a scanned copy or something similar.

[Major (Tom)]

LOL at "model regret".
If you are the shooter {so this is not directed at affiliates}, and "some period" of time goes by, and the model gives you some sob story {whether you shot her once, or 30+ times}...don't fall for that crap.
They signed model releases, did 2257, etc...and suddenly found a new man, or whatever lame excuse...too bad.
Because, in once instance with me...where I "paused" using the content, then eventually used it to the full extent of months worth of content...the model whined and moaned...and 6 weeks later {earlier this year} was shooting with Holly Randall.

These chicks, LIE and bullshit around, when they think it will "benefit" them.
Fuck that!

Exactly. The best bet is telling them up front that this will be up forever & once the cat is out of the bag just own it
Ds

[rowan]

I'm sorry for skipping right to the bottom without reading and ignore if answered, but shouldn't you have the documents or ability to get them from the sponsor if sponsor provided? If so, I'd just reply with a scanned copy or something similar.

Technically there should be no need to send proof of release, as the lawyer would already know that his client has no claim to copyright. Unless copyright has been reassigned he is knowingly sending false DMCA notices.

I'm assuming that the wording of the release would also cover use of the model's likeness for commercial purposes and may therefore also negate the Hungarian privacy/identity act claim. But that's a bit more grey, I know zero about Hungarian law, or whether it's worth taking someone in another country (and continent) to court over it.

[2MuchMark]

As I said in the OP, "I'm going to remove the images, for her sake [...]"

But there's 100+ other domains that feature her content, including other modelling pics from a pageant about 10 years ago. I don't think it's going to be possible for her lawyer to remove everything - there's got to be at least one person who says "fuck you" or never responds - so it's likely there will forever be modelling images tied to a search for her real name. I do feel sorry for her, but at the end of the day she was an adult and signed a contract. We don't yet have the "delete all youthful indiscretions going forward" option that Eric Schmidt of Google mentioned. It's all super softcore content anyway, just topless.

Good. If the other sites keep her content up its their problem. You're doing the right thing.

We had a chat model who worked for us a long time ago. She quit and moved on and I deleted her content.

A few years later she called me crying her eyes out because her new husband found porn she shot with another company (BJ's and facials). Her husband for some stupid reason contacted her father and it became a nightmare for her.

She contacted the company (a big one here in Montreal) and they refused to talk to her at first but I emailed my contact and let him know the devastation it was causing, and they quickly removed her content too).

I didn't hear from her after that but I'm pretty sure it destroyed her marriage. With so many other models to work with it usually costs the site owner zero to remove content and probably saves a model's family from ruin. DMCA or no, it's best just delete the content.

[Major (Tom)]

Good. If the other sites keep her content up its their problem. You're doing the right thing.

We had a chat model who worked for us a long time ago. She quit and moved on and I deleted her content.

A few years later she called me crying her eyes out because her new husband found porn she shot with another company (BJ's and facials). Her husband for some stupid reason contacted her father and it became a nightmare for her.

She contacted the company (a big one here in Montreal) and they refused to talk to her at first but I emailed my contact and let him know the devastation it was causing, and they quickly removed her content too).

I didn't hear from her after that but I'm pretty sure it destroyed her marriage. With so many other models to work with it usually costs the site owner zero to remove content and probably saves a model's family from ruin. DMCA or no, it's best just delete the content.

Once it's up it's up. You can't put shit back in an ass. Even if you pulled it it will still be up for free on tubes & lockers. What's done is done.
ds

[Barry-xlovecam]

I encourage our Affiliates when asked about this subject, or on their addressing the current issue of some model requesting a "take down" of her/his/their images from the Affiliate's website, to hot link to any images of our models.

We own copyright on all transmitted or model provided images, but will agree to take down images of inactive models upon request -- just to keep the "peace." We ask Affiliates to hot link to the images for that reason -- we replace this images with image template defaults.

In our business there is no real financial gain in continuing to use these images even though we own the copyright but I could understand the position of those buying content for its own value -- it's bought and paid for (Modeling fees paid) and is inventory in trade ...

[PornDiscounts-V]

Bullshit. Fuck her

[Jim_Gunn]

Good. If the other sites keep her content up its their problem. You're doing the right thing.

We had a chat model who worked for us a long time ago. She quit and moved on and I deleted her content.

A few years later she called me crying her eyes out because her new husband found porn she shot with another company (BJ's and facials). Her husband for some stupid reason contacted her father and it became a nightmare for her.

She contacted the company (a big one here in Montreal) and they refused to talk to her at first but I emailed my contact and let him know the devastation it was causing, and they quickly removed her content too).

I didn't hear from her after that but I'm pretty sure it destroyed her marriage. With so many other models to work with it usually costs the site owner zero to remove content and probably saves a model's family from ruin. DMCA or no, it's best just delete the content.

You have absolutely no way of knowing what caused this person's marriage to end. It could have been any number of reasons since we all well know that marriages often end in some very finite period of time even if neither party ever did porn. The fact that her husband made an issue out of it from content you had nothing to do with makes this even more irrelevant. Your "pulling down" of that model's content that you owned obviously didn't save anyone from ruin since it wasn't an issue and even if it was, it would have been saved or screencapped by the husband already once he became aware of it.

If it costs you nothing as a site owner to attempt to remove content from your web site(s) then I would suggest that you aren't getting the most return out of your content and are leaving a lot of money on the table since the marginal value of those scenes is nothing to you supposedly. I'm not the most genius of webmasters by any stretch of the imagination, but I still earn at least some money from scenes I shot five, ten and even fifteen years ago. I don't know if you have any affiliates that use your content on their free sites or if you place it on tube site, link lists, TGPs, Freeones etc, but if so, did you hassle all of them to remove this same content as well?

It seems crazy to me that you are so eager to drop your pants and let people take advantage of you. Maybe the rest of your former models will find out about what you did and inundate you with requests to remove their content too now that you have rewarded this model's behavior.

[DirtyDanza]

so stupid... you think the gov hides your work record for flipping burgers at mcdonalds ..

if these whores have regret then hey they should have thought of that before hand...

your an adult.. im never removing content.. I fwd every bitch ive ever filmed to my attorney we force them to take us to court... stupid fucking whores....

who cares if a whores marriage ends.. thats not my biz.. I have enough of a time keeping mine together... this is a business to me...

destroy whores and never think of them again... they don't want to be destroyed and everyone knowing? then don't get destroyed on camera how about that... mark prince are you being serious? us real pornographers have a name for guys like you ... bitches... pussies.... white knights.... your the reason these girls think they can get away with this shit...

girl want he footage taken down.. either sue me or pay me 100,000k simple

[Roald]

Good. If the other sites keep her content up its their problem. You're doing the right thing.

We had a chat model who worked for us a long time ago. She quit and moved on and I deleted her content.

A few years later she called me crying her eyes out because her new husband found porn she shot with another company (BJ's and facials). Her husband for some stupid reason contacted her father and it became a nightmare for her.

She contacted the company (a big one here in Montreal) and they refused to talk to her at first but I emailed my contact and let him know the devastation it was causing, and they quickly removed her content too).

I didn't hear from her after that but I'm pretty sure it destroyed her marriage. With so many other models to work with it usually costs the site owner zero to remove content and probably saves a model's family from ruin. DMCA or no, it's best just delete the content.

Sorry but you still don't make sense.

Once we start doing this in no time others find out and start asking to get their content removed. Sure we have 28k+ models but that does not matter one bit, we run a business here

[fuzebox]

Good. If the other sites keep her content up its their problem. You're doing the right thing.

We had a chat model who worked for us a long time ago. She quit and moved on and I deleted her content.

A few years later she called me crying her eyes out because her new husband found porn she shot with another company (BJ's and facials). Her husband for some stupid reason contacted her father and it became a nightmare for her.

She contacted the company (a big one here in Montreal) and they refused to talk to her at first but I emailed my contact and let him know the devastation it was causing, and they quickly removed her content too).

I didn't hear from her after that but I'm pretty sure it destroyed her marriage. With so many other models to work with it usually costs the site owner zero to remove content and probably saves a model's family from ruin. DMCA or no, it's best just delete the content.

Maybe she should have told her husband before they got married?

[rowan]

Maybe she should have told her husband before they got married?

I found this image showing several models who want to move on with their new life. No one will ever find out.