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A photographer I've never met

posted this on May 23rd, 2010

asks to be friends on my Facebook profile.

No problem.

Then on my feed I see that she’s promoting a competition by the UNDP in which she’s a judge. The competition is for professionals and amateurs:

Picture This: We Can End Poverty is a global photo contest seeking to show— in a positive way— what people around the world are doing to achieve the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), eight goals agreed on by world leaders to halve extreme poverty by 2015.

Sounds good. So I decided to have a look at the rules:

5.1 Photos submitted for the contest should as far as possible include the names and contact information of all people shown therein. Minors – meaning children under the age of 18 years – should have the signed approval of their parent(s) or guardian(s) before being photographed. Photographers must attach the signed release form from parent(s) or guardian(s) with their entries. Click here for release form. Send the release form to picturethis@undp.org

5.2 All contestants must agree to release the rights to photos submitted for the contest to UNDP and its affiliates for unrestricted and unlimited worldwide usage and distribution free of charge in various media. UNDP will allow Olympus and the AFP Foundation to use these photos on their websites and other media to promote the work of the photographers.

I make a polite comment that I’m surprised my ‘Facebook Friend’ is fronting a competition that looks like a rights grab.   My friend’s eloquent response was to strike me from her list so that my comment disappeared off her feed.

The bottom line is that by entering your photos into this comp UNDP can use them for anything they like. That gives them a cheap photo library. It also means they won’t need to hire photographers anymore. No matter they’ll always be work for photographers fronting rights grabs photo comps.

Friends anyone?

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May 23rd, 2010 | Category: duckrabbit

1 comment to A photographer I’ve never met

  • Brenda Burrell
    May 23, 2010 at 22:32

    Report them to Pro Imaging. I reported a high profile grab by the RDA here, One NE. They entered a series of elaborate discussions which seemed to take weeks, but the terms were then changed as if by magic, no apology, no response to me direct. There’s an awful lot of it about.

    You don’t need ‘friends’ like that.