Photography is not harassment

 
This is an open letter to the ITV management who have promoted their programme “Tonight: Harassment Uncovered” which, in places, confuses photography with sexual harassment. The programme aired at 7.30pm on the 23rd of February 2017
Dear ITV
Professional photographers are against any and all harassment of people going about their private and lawful business. To suggest or imply anything else would be disingenuous at best and libellous at worst. Street photography is a legitimate and entirely honourable form of documentary photography practised the world over.
Should any individual use this or any other art form as a cloak to hide their illegal activities then that is an issue that should be part of a Police investigation and not an excuse to demonise an entire genre of documentary photography and film-making.
The laws already exist to stop harassment and stalking and a blanket ban on any and all photography or filming without permission (amateur or professional, it matters not) would be to the detriment of society as a whole.
The BPPA

An open letter to Time Inc UK

 
When several photographers started getting letters from Hamish Dawson, Publishing Director  of  Time Inc.(UK) Ltd, Specialist Sport and Leisure with a new rights grab which asked them to agree to sign away all rights in any work that they carried out for the magazines and websites in the group we decided to write to him. Below is that letter and below that is his reply.
We are pretty sure that few people will bother to go down and read what he said in reply but it is worth noting that in the final paragraph he says:
If an individual contributor does not wish to enter into an All Rights agreement, it may be possible for that individual to negotiate a different arrangement, for example, a Qualified Rights agreement. Each case continues to be considered on its own merits, and that decision remains with the senior team on the brand concerned.”
This is a long way from being the response that we would be looking for but it is a course of action that is open to individual photographers to follow if they are offered work by one of the Time Inc UK titles and they don’t want to sign the new contract.

Dear Mr Dawson

What would make a photographer with well over twenty years experience, a mortgage and a family tell one of his key clients to “get lost” – using language that we couldn’t and wouldn’t want to post on a public facing website?

The answer is your new rights-grabbing contract which includes a not-so-subtle line giving them a choice between signing what appears to be a massively unfair deal or losing any and all chance of supplying you ever again. Sadly, you aren’t the first major publisher and buyer of photography to decide that you want to tear up long-standing agreements which saw you buying licenses to use the photographs whilst the copyright remained with the photographer. Sadly, you probably won’t be the last either.

The reason that the old one was a ‘long-lasting agreement’ was because it was fair – the word ‘equitable’ even comes to mind. The fees paid were OK but the ability to re-sell the work after an initial period of exclusivity made the jobs worth doing. Had you, the publisher, substantially increased the fees payable to the photographers to redress this balance then that sense of fairness may have been saved from what most of those photographers feel will be a sad, painful and untimely death.

Receiving these letters just before Christmas has been causing anger, resentment and pain for a large number of photographers who can be excused for assuming that the calculation within the Time Inc UK management must be that enough existing people with no real option to do otherwise will sign and enough struggling photographers who don’t yet work for you will grasp their opportunity to get more work and keep their heads above water.

Make no mistake, this is not a small adjustment to the terms and conditions under which so many photographers supply work to you. This is moving the goalposts, repainting them and renaming them as ‘scoring portals’.

We would like to give you the opportunity to explain why this is being done. We probably know the obvious answers about maximising shareholder returns and the less obvious ones about protecting the brands but what about the relationship that you had with talented, creative and dedicated suppliers?

Does a rights-grab of this magnitude make it worthwhile destroying relationships that have stood the test of time and that have worked well?

Any explanation that you can provide will be shared with photographers because many of our members are struggling with your decision.

Kind regards

Neil Turner

vicechairman@thebppa.com

Dear Mr Turner,

Thank you for your e-mail.

As you correctly observe, we are not the first publisher to re-evaluate our rights purchasing position, and a number of our agreements are indeed long-standing.

Unfortunately, while the agreements may not have changed, the markets, media and commercial circumstances in which we all operate have changed quite dramatically over the last few years, and we now operate in quite a different publishing and media landscape to the one which pertained  when many of our existing rights agreements were first set up.

I would first make the point that most of our existing agreements are between IPC Media and the contributor concerned. Since becoming Time Inc. (UK) Ltd., we have viewed it as necessary to bring these agreements up to date. Secondly, many of our agreements do not acknowledge the fact that the company now has significant and rapidly growing, digital publishing platforms and the new agreements reflect this development.

We have also been encouraging our specialist editorial staff to improve the clarity of their commissioning and written communication, and have set out some standards which we expect to be followed, and which we believe are in the interests of both contributors and the brands alike.

Regarding the All Rights agreement that is being sent to Time Inc. (UK) specialist contributors, it has been our practice for a number of years to ask many of our freelance contributors to enter into either an All Rights or Qualified Rights agreement when we purchase content from them. In many instances we’ve asked contributors to sign on-going agreements to cover all the material that they sell to Time Inc. called ‘Core Rights Agreements’. So the agreements that are now being dispatched, while they have been updated and re-worded, are not a new innovation and having a Core Rights Agreement in place ensures that payments can be made to contributors much more speedily than might be the case if individual contracts had to be sent out and agreed on a job-by-job basis.

If an individual contributor does not wish to enter into an All Rights agreement, it may be possible for that individual to negotiate a different arrangement, for example, a Qualified Rights agreement. Each case continues to be considered on its own merits, and that decision remains with the senior team on the brand concerned. Contributors should, however, bear in mind that commercial realities dictate that we will be using the content that we purchase in many different ways, both now and in the future and quite clearly, unless both parties are willing to enter an agreement that suits them both, there is no viable basis on which work can be commissioned or accepted.

I hope that this clarifies our position.

Kind regards

Hamish Dawson
Publishing Director 

Time Inc.(UK) Ltd. Specialist Sport and Leisure

Golf Monthly; Rugby World; World Soccer; The Field; Shooting Times; Sporting Gun; Shooting Gazette; Shootinguk.co.uk; Angler’s Mail; Amateur Gardening

If you know any photographers who are affected by this or who might be affected by it in the future, please share this with them. The terms and conditions under which many of us work are being steadily eroded by publishers who seem to opt for the ‘nuclear’ all-rights option rather than consult with their previously loyal contributors and explore the more equitable route of agreeing licenses that suit the current world of publishing. It is also interesting to note that Time Inc haven’t tried to do this to their US photographers… YET!

The one on the left is a snapper…

Mikael Buck

On the left we have a Snapper, it’s a type of fish, on the right we have a photographer – please learn the difference.
Would you like to demean everything I have achieved in my career with one word? Great! Then just call me a snapper – you won’t be the first or the last person to do it.
With few exceptions, the term snapper is used as a description for photographers by almost everyone we work with – from journalists, to PR professionals, picture editors and other press photographers. What began as a jokey phrase used amongst photographers has been taken from us and turned into a widely accepted description of what we do.
Often when I bring this subject up the reply I get back is something along the lines of “What’s your problem? It’s just a word. I think it’s quite fun”. Well, here’s my problem…the term implies that our sole contribution at work is to own a camera and turn up on time. In nobody’s dictionary is a snap considered to be something that took any skill or input to achieve – it is without a doubt a derogatory term when used to describe a photo.
Of course, most people using the do not really believe we are just taking ‘snaps’. I’ve heard the term used by many colleagues and clients who I know to have a great respect for, and understanding of, what we do. But the term has slowly seeped into our collective consciousness and rarely gets questioned. Whether the person using them intends it or not, some words are loaded with meaning.
One defence of the word I’ve often heard is: “Well OK, obviously some of you guys are photographers, like those who do reportage and high end portraiture – but you can’t exactly call waiting outside court or a night club and taking a few snaps of someone leaving photography”. Yes you can. If you think having five seconds (that’s not an exaggeration) to get a sharp picture of someone running towards you in the dark isn’t a skill then I suggest you try it for yourself. Afterwards you’ll need to talk to quite a few people to make sure that you’ve identified the right person in your photo. But it’s just a snap so maybe don’t worry about that part too much, eh?
Some of my colleagues will no doubt think that I am getting carried away over an insignificant and almost endearing term. And they might compare me to a cabbie who would like to be know as an Executive Transportation Route Consultant (sorry cabbies – if that’s what you want, then that’s fine by me!). Indeed, the online forum where the majority of Britain’s working press photographers discuss their profession is called Snapperweb, so obviously not everyone feels the same way as me.
But I believe if press photography as a profession is going survive the transition to online then we need to learn to acknowledge and communicate to others the contribution we make to journalism – and the language we use is a powerful symbol to the wider world as to how we view ourselves.
Despite what some people will have you believe, press photography is alive and well – most of the space in our national newspapers and news website is given over to photographs and most of these photographs are taken by professional news photographers and not amateurs. This tells you all you need to know about the power of the still image and the skill of the people taking these pictures. Yet shift rates have remained the same for over a decade, the public view our profession with complete disdain and staff positions are almost unheard of. That tells me that as a profession we do not have the power or influence that is commensurate with the contribution we make – stopping using the term “snapper” to refer to ourselves is a small, easy step we can take towards rectify that situation.
So then, just to sum up – a snapper is a type of fish and not a press photographer. Spread the word!
I’d love to hear your thoughts, whatever side you take in this debate. Leave a comment below or tweet me and the association – @mikaelbuck and @TheBPPA
The views expressed here are solely my own and do not necessarily represent the views of The BPPA.
You can see Mikael’s gallery page here.

Commentating on the race to the bottom

 
Yet again The BPPA finds itself responding to a piece by Professor Roy Greenslade on The Guardian’s website. Yet again Professor Greenslade adds his influential voice to the drastically mistaken notion that anyone can take a picture good enough for a newspaper these days. Seriously? Have you looked at some of the utter rubbish that gets used in some of our newspapers? To assert that anyone with a camera can take a picture isn’t only an insult to the skilled photographers who make silk purses out of sows ears on a daily basis it also invites the bean-counters who are behind the decisions to axe photographers jobs to question the need for written journalists too.
I can just imagine the conversation between the accountants and the owners with an editor sitting there listening to the conversation;

Owner: We need to save some more money. Sales are still in decline and sacking the photographers hasn’t saved us enough.

Accountant: Well, members of the public are providing all of our visual content so maybe we can get them to supply the words too.

Editor: But…

Owner: Brilliant idea. Let’s start with all of the senior reporters who really know what they are doing. Editor – we need you to sell this to the staff.

Editor: But…

Owner: They’re all scared for their jobs anyway. Accountant – you are a genius and you will be rewarded for your work with a big pay rise.

Editor: But…

Accountant: Thanks Owner, maybe we should discuss a few other money-saving ideas that I have over a drink or two. Do we NEED editors?

How long will it be before expensive columnists get their marching orders in favour of a few blokes with word processing software who “can write a bit”? Who will those people actually be? Will they be honest and concerned citizens or will they be people with an agenda and an axe to grind?
We are already at the stage where a large percentage of the ‘supplied’ images being printed in some papers are not properly checked for honesty, accuracy or ownership (not to mention quality). Beyond that, nobody seems to care whether members of the public are putting their own or other people’s lives in danger to get the pictures that they are giving away for free. Even Professor Greenslade has to agree that journalism stands or falls on its honesty and accuracy even if he has already thrown the towel in on quality.
One of the numerous responses to his Media Guardian article points out that very few people remember the words after the event compared to the number who remember the images. You might think that newspaper owners would forget this at their peril – unfortunately they have forgotten and their newspapers are in peril. Another response points out that newspaper decline could well be a chicken and egg discussion. Which did come first – the fall in sales or the loss of photographers?
This is rapidly becoming a race to the bottom and it really doesn’t help the case for quality newspapers and quality journalism when one of the highest profile commentators on the industry has given up on any notion of defending the simple idea that quality products have longevity and cheap ones don’t. We’d wonder if The Guardian’s own Picture Desk team would agree with The Professor’s odd logic or if its own sub-editors would approve of his fact checking.
Losing reporters would be the largest and most recent nail in the coffin of local and regional journalism. National newspapers, radio and television get a lot of their best people from the superb training ground that is (or maybe was) local journalism.
If I were contemplating training as a journalist right now I think that I’d have second thoughts about it. If the learned Professor is right maybe those currently on his course should consider switching to accountancy before it’s too late.

The Copyright Fight – David Bailey weighs in…

 
Today is the day when the UK Government could vote to include a seemingly innocuous clause in an otherwise largely uncontroversial piece of legislation that will not only harm our industry but also place this country at odds with a vital international treaty. It is upsetting, bizarre and unnecessary to the point of being farcical.
The BPPA has been trying very hard to get the Government to see sense and drop the copyright clause from the Enterprise Regulatory Reform Bill for a while now. In a world where the intervention of a celebrity can unclog jams and open doors we decided to ask UK Photography’s biggest celebrity, David Bailey, to write to cabinet members on behalf of all owners and creators of intellectual property. He decided to write to George Osborne MP, The Chancellor of the Exchequer personally and he has given us permission to circulate that letter as widely as we wish – and here it is…
The text of the letter in full:
Dear George
I am writing because I am appalled at what the government is doing to our rights in the ERRB (Enterprise and Regulatory Reform Bill). Why the ERRB by the way? Why can’t copyright be dealt with properly in a proper Copyright Bill? I’m told everyone will be able to get their hands on our so-called “orphans” so libraries and museums can publish old photographs whose authors have long been forgotten. But never mind what’s lying around on dusty old shelves, what about the millions of “orphans” that are being created now every day!
Why? Because social media, and everyone else for that matter routinely strip our names and contact details from our digital files. They simply should not be allowed to get away with this. They can because our government refuses to give us the right to our names by our pictures (Moral rights). So now commercial organisations will be allowed to make money from our “orphans”, but not us, the creators.
This legislation should never have been even considered without first giving us our moral rights, and is contrary to our rights under the Berne Convention. Why the rush? A scheme, the Copyright Hub – a scheme backed by the government – is being developed to ensure that those who wish to find our pictures can not only do so quickly online, but also find the contact details of the pictures’ owners. You are about to put the cart before the horse.
I’m told the real reason for speed is that “releasing” orphans will create growth. We all understand the need for growth. But where’s the evidence? The seemingly impressive financial figures presented originally in the Hargreaves Review have mysteriously had to be revised – down by 97%! Which now apparently amount to no more than 80p per taxpayer per year. Given the damage this legislation will now cause to taxpaying creators, damage no-one has so far taken into account, the effect of this legislation on economic growth will in fact be negative.
It’s not too late to think again!
Best,
David Bailey

Another open letter to Professor Greenslade

An Open letter written by Chris Eades – a member of The BPPA’s Board in response to Professor Roy Greenslade’s inaccurate blog on The Media Guardian website:

Dear Mr Greenslade

I am writing on behalf of your photographic colleagues in the British Press Photographers’ Association to express our disappointment and frustration at your recent series of articles about “paparazzi” seeking to photograph Vicky Pryce while in prison.

I regret to say that the suppositions upon which you have based your article are for the most part untrue, with the result that your subsequent analysis and opinions are based on an ignorance of the facts.

When photographers sought to correct your mistakes and question your motivations in slurring your colleagues you responded not by seeking the truth, but by turning off comments on your blog to disable further criticism.

As someone who lectures in journalism, and presumes to lecture his peers on ethics, it is distressing that you have made no effort to substantiate the facts – but have chosen instead to rely on rumour, supposition and lazy stereotypes with the unfortunate result that you have thereby reinforced those stereotypes.

For your information we have laid out below the true events surrounding the taking of pictures of Pryce, and have sought to address the questions that you raise about the implication of these events.

In short – No laws were broken, the PCC code was adhered to and there is a strong case that a govt minister and his wife both being jailed for criminal offences is a valid news story, strengthened by the perception that Pryce is receiving preferential treatment by being transferred to open prison less than a week after being convicted.

You question the legitimacy of photographing convicted criminals in prison – but there is a long tradition of doing so. Myra Hindley, Jeffrey Archer, Sarah Tisdall, George Best, Rose West, Ernest Saunders, Maxine Carr, even Dr Crippen have all been photographed in prison.

If you think this is wrong then campaign to change the law, or the PCC code – but please don’t vilify your beleaguered photographic colleagues for legitimate news gathering.

We respectfully request a correction in full – with equal prominence to the original articles.

Yours

Chris Eades
On behalf of the BPPA Committee

THE TRUTH
The true events surrounding the pictures on Pryce at Sutton Park prison are as follows.
On sunday 17th The Sun ran a story that Pryce had been transferred to an open prison after less than a week in prison. This is unusually soon for a prisoner, even on a short sentence, to be moved – and raises the legitimate question is Pryce receiving preferential treatment?
Five newspapers dispatched staff / regular freelances to the prison to try to obtain pictures of Pryce in her new surroundings. All of the photographers were news photographers, not paps, on wages for the day and acting under instruction of their respective picture desks.
(For clarity I define news photographers as those who photograph individuals in the news, as opposed to paparazzi who concentrate on celebrities. These may overlap but it is a good general distinction).
There are several points where pictures could be taken at Sutton Park, without the need to trespass on private property. The easiest of these is from the grounds of the church which overlook the rear of the prison.
Security staff at the prison became aware of photographers presence fairly early on the sunday, and came over to ask who they were and what they were doing. They were asked to not enter the prison grounds and to be relatively open with their activity so as not to cause security concerns. No request was made for them to leave.
On the Monday they were joined by two more photographers from Fame/Flynet – who joined the existing crowd in the church yard and on a footpath that provides a view of the front drive.
Photographers also met a man wearing a dog collar, who they assume to be the vicar. He passed the time of day with them but again did not at any time express concerns at their presence or request that they leave.
The photographers were openly present in the church grounds, in full view, and with the knowledge of both prison and church authorities.
On Wednesday 20th photographers spotted Pryce being escorted to an outbuilding which they took to be a library or education centre, roughly a hundred yards from the church yard – and took pictures which subsequently appeared online and in the next days Sun, Mirror, Mail and Telegraph. All photographers present got images. Flynet were fortunate to get the best angle, and subsequently the majority of the publications.
These pictures were taken openly from from the churchyard, with the knowledge of church and prison authorities – neither newspaper or agency photographer used subterfuge or trespassed on prison property. Very long lenses were not used, the distance being relatively short.
After the first of these picture appeared online the PCC forwarded a letter from Pryces family asking that photographers withdraw. The photographers had infact already pulled back, having got their picture. To the best of my knowledge none has returned to the prison since.
I know this account to be true – as I was there. I understand that Jim Bennett has also explained much of this to you in person.
ADDRESSING THE CRITICISM
In your first article you publish a series of untruths and make a number of suppositions as well as posing a number of questions.
You state that prison officers “prison officers asked the paparazzi to go away and allow the woman to serve her eight-month sentence for perverting the course of justice in peace” – This is factually untrue, no such request was made at any stage, either by prison officers or by the prison officers press liaison officer who came over for a chat.
You state that – “There is, of course, no proof that any newspaper commissioned the photographers. It is highly likely that the snappers turned up on their own initiative.” This supposition is untrue, at the point when this article was written the ONLY photographers in attendance were in fact working directly for papers.
You also pose the questions:
Is it in the public interest to take pictures of a person in jail?
Is it against the editors’ code of practice?
Is there a law against it?
Photographers working for papers do not as a rule get asked for their views on ethics, these being generally reserved for greater minds in nice warm offices. We tend instead to deal with the practical application of the rules on the ground.
But in answer to your first question “Is it in the public interest to take pictures of a person in jail?” the consensus between those on the ground was that it was questionable whether Pryce was receiving preferential treatment – and as such was a valid news story. The majority of editors with access to the pictures agreed.
In answer to your second question “Is it against the editors’ code of practice?”
You yourself admit that you are unclear as to which part of the code this would breach. The PCC advisory draws newspapers attention to section 4 harassment which states “ii) They must not persist in questioning, telephoning, pursuing or photographing individuals once asked to desist.”
As I have explained nobody at any stage asked photographers to desist or leave – until the advisory was issued by the PCC, by which time the photographers had already got their pictures and departed.
SO in answer to your question – In our opinion the PCC code was studiously observed.
As to your third question “Is there a law against it?”
No there isn’t
So to sum up the pictures are arguably in the public interest, do not breach the PCC and are not against the law. You have every right to debate this view – but you should make clear that these decisions are made by our bosses, rather that choosing to stereotype and vilify your news gathering colleagues.
When your original article was published a number of photographers commented on your blog that you had the facts wrong which you chose to ignore – choosing instead to repeat your allegations a day or so later, but this time disabling comments to prevent anyone challenging your inaccurate and biassed account.
Furthermore, while we are debating journalism ethics, may I take the opportunity to deplore your decision to publish an unattributed and cowardly attack from an “anonymous” press photographer. An attack full of inaccuracies, from someone who wasn’t even there.
(we all know an anonymous source usually means “my mate in the office” or “I made up these quotes”).
How can you justify publishing a cowardly attack without verification while censoring responses from photographers who were there?