New York Civil Rights Law Section 51 - Action For Injunction And For Damages
September 20, 2008 | Filed Under Legal Issues | Comments Off
“In order to maintain an action under [N.Y. Civil Rights Law] section 51, a plaintiff must show that the defendant (1) used his name, portrait, picture, or voice, (2) for advertising or trade purposes, (3) without his written consent.” 2008 WL 2485524.
§ 51. Action for injunction and for damages. Any person whose name, portrait, picture or voice is used within this state for advertising purposes or for the purposes of trade without the written consent first obtained as above provided may maintain an equitable action in the supreme court of this state against the person, firm or corporation so using his name, portrait, picture or voice, to prevent and restrain the use thereof; and may also sue and recover damages for any injuries sustained by reason of such use and if the defendant shall have knowingly used such person’s name, portrait, picture or voice in such manner as is forbidden or declared to be unlawful by section fifty of this article, the jury, in its discretion, may award exemplary damages. But nothing contained in this article shall be so construed as to prevent any person, firm or corporation from selling or otherwise transferring any material containing such name, portrait, picture or voice in whatever medium to any user of such name, portrait, picture or voice, or to any third party for sale or transfer directly or indirectly to such a user, for use in a manner lawful under this article; nothing contained in this article shall be so construed as to prevent any person, firm or corporation, practicing the profession of photography, from exhibiting in or about his or its establishment specimens of the work of such establishment, unless the same is continued by such person, firm or corporation after written notice objecting thereto has been given by the person portrayed; and nothing contained in this article shall be so construed as to prevent any person, firm or corporation from using the name, portrait, picture or voice of any manufacturer or dealer in connection with the goods, wares and merchandise manufactured, produced or dealt in by him which he has sold or disposed of with such name, portrait, picture or voice used in connection therewith; or from using the name, portrait, picture or voice of any author, composer or artist in connection with his literary, musical or artistic productions which he has sold or disposed of with such name, portrait, picture or voice used in connection therewith. Nothing contained in this section shall be construed to prohibit the copyright owner of a sound recording from disposing of, dealing in, licensing or selling that sound recording to any party, if the right to dispose of, deal in, license or sell such sound recording has been conferred by contract or other written document by such living person or the holder of such right. Nothing contained in the foregoing sentence shall be deemed to abrogate or otherwise limit any rights or remedies otherwise conferred by federal law or state law.
New York Civil Rights Law Section 50 - Right Of Privacy
September 20, 2008 | Filed Under Legal Issues | Comments Off
§ 50. Right of privacy. A person, firm or corporation that uses for advertising purposes, or for the purposes of trade, the name, portrait or picture of any living person without having first obtained the written consent of such person, or if a minor of his or her parent or guardian, is guilty of a misdemeanor.
Raffaello Follieri Italian Con Man Seeks Redemption in Waverly Inn Spirit
September 3, 2008 | Filed Under Legal Issues | Comments Off
London Community Support Officers Bully A Videographer About Filming in Public Spaces
June 28, 2008 | Filed Under Legal Issues, Politician | Comments Off
The act of filming or photographing subjects in a public space is a contentious issue these days, especially when confronted by a police officer who feels it is within his or her legal authority to control such behavior. The issue pits two rights against each other: the right of privacy versus freedom of the press. In a democracy, freedom of the press trumps the right of privacy when the subject is present in a PUBLIC SPACE.
The argument is simple: a person who ventures out of his or her home or some other private property has no reasonable expectation, once they have stepped foot into a public space, of maintaining their privacy. A person’s actions in public spaces are open to view and therefore the mechanical recording of those actions by a law-abiding citizen is perfectly allowable. In essence, your right to privacy ends the moment your actions are viewable from a public space.
Freedom of the press to record any actions in a public space protects the fundamental nature of a Democracy: you are being held accountable for your public behavior. The evidence of your behavior provides the basis upon which your actions can later be held accountable to the laws of society. If you deny freedom of the press, the social contract and laws that govern all human behavior becomes a folly of authoritarian agendas where the human spirit is subjugated to the will of a those who value power and control over personal expression.
Suppression of freedom of press destroys a citizen’s right to privacy. You can’t have one without sacrificing the other.
The above video nicely demonstrates what happens when those invested with authority choose to enforce laws with little or no understanding of the reciprocal rights of those they are confronting. The reply of “Because I told you to” is the hobgoblin that not only fails the public trust but infects the human spirit with a logic that trades freedom for conformity under the guise of expediency.
I, for one, will have none of it.