Who owns your selfies? You do. And as the copyright holder, you have the right to prevent others from making copies of them or using them in a “derivative work.” Copyright law gives artists and creators the right to the exclusive use of their work the moment the creation is “reduced to a tangible medium of expression.” But what if the creator is an animal…like a monkey? Who owns the copyright then?
This exact question was the subject of a case that went to the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals. In 2011, a nature photographer named David Slater left some camera gear unattended while shooting in the rainforests of Indonesia. A cheeky monkey — yes, really — identified by an anthropologist as “Naruto” took up the camera, shot a self-portrait, and then scampered off, leaving the developed world to enjoy his photograph and the controversy that ensued.
The photo predictably went viral, and was uploaded to Wikimedia Commons as an image in the public domain. Slater couldn’t claim the copyright, because he didn’t shoot the photo, and the United States Copyright Law doesn’t recognize animals as “authors” under the copyright law. Normally, works produced after 1978 enter the public domain 70 years after the death of the author. Legally, however, the photograph couldn’t be protected under copyright law at all, as it had no legal “creator,” and so became a public domain image immediately.
PETA (People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals) sued photographer Slater when he included the monkey-created image in a book of his photography, claiming that he violated monkey Naruto’s copyright by publishing his work. Just wow.
The Ninth Circuit has already ruled that animals do not have standing to sue, so PETA was likely bringing suit as a publicity stunt. The Ninth Circuit, predictably, ruled that copyright law covers only human authors, and not animal authors. Oh, and it awarded Slater attorneys’ fees, and remanded the issue to district court to calculate that amount.
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