When a person creates something, he usually owns it. When a photographer takes a picture, he owns it and has absolute control its use (unless he took the picture on behalf of a client or employer). The rights that a photographer has in his pictures constitute his “copyright”. It’s backed up by law and those laws provide stiff penalties for breaches. Copright law is international. The World Intellectual Property Organization is an arm of the United Nations and has 177 members. Countries are bound by the provisions of the WIPO treaties that they have signed and residents of those countries are bound by the resulting laws.

See bilesasylum.com for an example of how a copyright holder who is sinned against, can make a pirate deeply regret his actions.

Visit WIPO’s web site for more information or download the WIPO copyright treaty itself.

Copyright lasts for a very long time after a photograph was created. There is almost no such thing as a picture “in the public domain”. Although thousands of pictures are posted in the newsgroups every day and more thousands appear on web sites (often after having been harvested from the newsgroups) most of them are not posted or displayed by the copyright owner and are therefore illegally-displayed.

Some copyright owners are actually quite happy to see their pictures being posted. Others are not. World-wide, there must be a very small number of people indeed who truly earn their living exclusively from their art. David is one of them. Truth be known, most artists are probably tickled pink when someone downloads their work, posts it in the newsgroups, trades it or modifies it and uses it somewhere else. It’s a sign that he’s “made it”, an indication that someone else likes his work.

But the fact is, professional artists have quite different considerations. In the nineties, David was sinned against on the internet probably more than all other professional artists combined. Instead of being heavy-handed, we worked to secure a voluntary agreement from his fans not to pirate and, these days, all is calm on that front.

Disclaimer: We have put these notes together with great care but anyone needing an authoritative comment should consult a lawyer.

But the damage had been done. The heady days of nineties piracy more or less destroyed his business. Before the popularity of the internet exploded, David had enjoyed a career extending over more than thirty years, during which time he sold many millions of books, posters, prints, postcards, calendars and greeting cards all around the world. That made him one of the biggest-selling and most popular artists ever. Almost certainly the most popular art photographer the world has ever known. Now, though, he has been forced into almost-retirement and this web site and the prints he sells, are virtually his only sources of income. There will probably never be another Hamilton movie or book.