Copyright on Twittering

The Haitian photojournalist Daniel Morel took pictures of the devastations soon after the earthquake in Haiti and posted them on Twitter. News agency Agence France Presse (AFP) took the pictures of Morels Twitter page and spread them amongst their associated media. Morel now demands a substantial compensation of AFP before U.S. court, because AFP should have asked permission to Morel first. Morel claims 150,000 USD for each copyright infringement. The total amount for compensation could become quite significant, because Morels photos were published by various media worldwide.

AFP states that permission is not necessary because the terms of use of Twitter would allow reuse of materials posted on Twitter. According to the AFP’s lawyer Twitter is designed to spread text and images as soon and widely as possible.

The Twitter the terms of use however state that Twitter users grant permission to Twitter to publish tweets, but the Twitterer retain all copyrights to their own texts and photographs.

9 May 2010