Photographic fraud

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Someone from Flickr was exposed for stealing pictures of the moon, wow he he get some abuse

 

Not exactly fraud, but just as pertinent ..... How many times do we see pictures published in the railway press credited, for example, "Collection P.Ch******r", "Collection N.E.S****" or merely "Colou****l".
These people DO know who provided them with the original images. I bet the photographers concerned (or their heirs) don't see a single penny of the reproduction fees! [-X

 

And in the case of at least one company mentioned, where the photographer is still alive and has merely loaned his work, reproduction fees are paid based on sales etc.

 

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As generally is the case, it isn't simple.

I run the Archive for the Stanier Mogul fund, and we probably have around 1,500 images covering all members of the class. All are recorded digitally in several places (to prevent accidental loss of the originals) and on a database. This database (and the file name of the scans) includes details of the photographer where known. The database splits the images into three basic types:

1 photographer known and permission to reproduce granted
2 photographer known but permission to reproduce NOT granted
3 photographer unknown.

The first two present no difficulties: should an image be reproduced under 1 above, the photographer is fully credited and a copy of the publication sent. Few ask for payment from a loco owning group, which is much appreciated, but these would be dealt with as they arose. In the second situation, the photograph simply remains in the Archive and not made public.

But we have many images that fall into the third category, aquired ove 30 odd years from postcard fairs, etc., with no intimation of the original photographer or copyright owner. Yet some of these contain valuable information which deserves to be shared with the world. Do we then keep these hidden away until the photographer is found, which is probably never; or do we publish and make the information available?

It's never black and white (no pun intended); there are always grey areas.