Legal Question in Intellectual Property in New York
copyright infringement
About a year ago I was approached by a full svc graphics company who wanted to feature my illustration services on their site (they didn't have an illustrator in house and I had worked with this company previously so they knew my work). Through email correspondence I expressed importance of this company NOT putting their copyright on my images I would be providing (these images were done by me for other clients and would be used as samples of the kind of illustration services I would provide). I sent low res samples of artwork to their art director so we could discuss which images would be used on the site. I was told they would discuss with me the layout of site as well as which images would be used. The last correspondence was almost a year ago and in the last email I was told it was slow going and they would keep me updated. All correspondence is via email and I have copies of all. I just happened upon their site today and found 14 samples of my artwork listed in their Illustration Services portfolio. They also put copyrighted ''their name'' on each of the samples next to my name. I do not know how long the images have been up on site. What legal recourse do I have for them taking my images and using them for their own gain?
2 Answers from Attorneys
Re: copyright infringement
That they put a copyright notice on the work is irrelevant. Absent a transfer of your copyright to them, they have infringed upon the copyright that you hold in the work. That copyright is created automatically, by operation of law, at the moment that you fixed the work in a medium from which it could be retrieved. (That's lawyer talk for creating it on paper or on a computer.)
Your recourse is to sue them for copyright infringement. If you'd like to discuss the matter in detail, please feel free to get in touch.
Re: copyright infringement
You didn't mention whether the illustrations have been registered for copyright. If you havn't done so, you won't be able to sue until they'e been registered. Your damages may also be affected if you haven't registered. If you have registered, then you can bring an infringement suit immediately and may succeed with considerable damages. In the meantime, you can also send the ISP a take down notice under the DMCA.
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