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Unsplash is being acquired by Getty Images

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Re: Unsplash is being acquired by Getty Images

#151
post #71

This reminds me of 500px. I used to be a huge fan of 500px. It was the most beautiful photography site on the internet, designed with attention to every tiny detail. It allowed you to share your photos under a CC license, presented them beautifully and had fantastic curated feeds with photos by fantastic photographers. In 2018 they were acquired by an investor company and partnered exclusively with Getty. As a contri…

IMHO, it is hard to run a sustainable business around sharing pictures.

Re: Unsplash is being acquired by Getty Images

#152
I was wondering what Unsplash's business model was, and I stumbled onto [1]:

> Nor is it going to slap banner ads on every page of its website. Yes, it’s unveiling a digital advertising business, but Unsplash is taking a specific approach — working with companies to create branded photos, which will then appear on desirable searches.

> Square, for example, could upload photos of the Square Register, which will then show up when Unsplash users search for “cash register” and other terms.

> Brands working with Unsplash will get prominent placement in relevant searches, as well as their own brand channel, but Cho said the real impact only begins on the Unsplash website.

So basically, without you realizing it, you may end up with paid product placement in your presentations and (pointless) header images on your Medium articles.

Sometimes I wonder of the answer to the Fermi Paradox and the Great Filter is: eventually all alien civilizations end up converting their entire society and economy into advertising monetization, all corporations consolidate into one giant inert behemoth, all real progress stops, and the species converts its entire planet into fuel for AdCoin cryptomining and winks out of existence.

I miss the days where people just, like, started businesses that charged people for stuff, and people bought that stuff, and the business stayed in business without having to be acquired or snuffed out by a megacorp.

[1]: https://techcrunch.com/2019/12/10/unsplash-for-brands/

Re: Unsplash is being acquired by Getty Images

#153

My main association with Getty is their 'copyfraud' practises where they claim public domain images (NASA, Library of Congress etc) as their own and sell licenses[0]. They're also well known for aggressive acquisitions[1]. Perhaps this a good time to create a mirror [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Getty_Images#Claiming_copyrigh... [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Getty_Images#Acquisitions

Regarding Getty's "aggressive acquisitions", some interesting background turned up in this recent NY Times obit for Daniel Wolf: Daniel Wolf pulled off what may have been the greatest legal art caper of all time: Over the course of two years in the early 1980s, he quietly amassed some 25,000 classic and contemporary photographs, buying them from the world’s most renowned collectors on behalf of his client the J. Paul…

That is a different entity than Getty Images.

https://www.getty.edu/research/library/faq.html#gettyimages

> No, Getty Images has no relationship to the J. Paul Getty Trust.

The "Getty" name derived from the same person, but the museum and Getty Images have nothing do with each other.

Re: Unsplash is being acquired by Getty Images

#155
post #71

This reminds me of 500px. I used to be a huge fan of 500px. It was the most beautiful photography site on the internet, designed with attention to every tiny detail. It allowed you to share your photos under a CC license, presented them beautifully and had fantastic curated feeds with photos by fantastic photographers. In 2018 they were acquired by an investor company and partnered exclusively with Getty. As a contri…

Reading through the press release, this really stood out: > In 2016, we first met the Getty Images team. We weren’t sure they would see the world the same way we did given their business was largely built on licensing. Over years of conversations, however, we learned about the level of respect they had for the Unsplash community and the rights of creators to choose how and where their imagery is made available. While…

The quoted paragraph reminds me of something I once read from a blog post by the WhatsApp team

Re: Unsplash is being acquired by Getty Images

#156

If the automobile was invented today it would be owned by the largest conglomeration of horse breeders.

I remember reading that at the beginning,there was a requirement for a person to walk ahead of an automobile and alert others that it's coming. It was related to horse industry lobbying too.

> there was a requirement for a person to walk ahead of an automobile

Yes. In the UK this requirement lasted until 1896 when it was removed by an act of Parliament [0]

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Locomotives_on_Highways_Act_18...

Re: Unsplash is being acquired by Getty Images

#158
post #141

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hmm, the text of the Creative Commons license is such that I would think such suits would be unsuccessful in court. Specifically, it has a section about reinstating your rights if you fix a violation of the license after you are notified. Has this ever been litigated? Of course receiving a demand letter is still a nuisance. If this is a problem that you have knowledge about, have you ever considered contacting Creati…

I actually was sued over this exact thing and lost (and paid quite a bit of money). All for a little UI experiment that nobody saw but me, google and (via google image search) these vultures.

Wow really, that's a pretty big problem. Which country?

Re: Unsplash is being acquired by Getty Images

#159
post #153

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Regarding Getty's "aggressive acquisitions", some interesting background turned up in this recent NY Times obit for Daniel Wolf: Daniel Wolf pulled off what may have been the greatest legal art caper of all time: Over the course of two years in the early 1980s, he quietly amassed some 25,000 classic and contemporary photographs, buying them from the world’s most renowned collectors on behalf of his client the J. Paul…

That is a different entity than Getty Images. https://www.getty.edu/research/library/faq.html#gettyimages > No, Getty Images has no relationship to the J. Paul Getty Trust. The "Getty" name derived from the same person, but the museum and Getty Images have nothing do with each other.

To be more precise, Mark Getty of Getty Images is J. Paul Getty's grandson.

Some of the initial investments in Getty Images came from other members of the Getty family (who had inherited probably quite a lot of money from J. Paul) but that seems to be the extent of the relationship.

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