Recently it does seem to be apparent that some IVAO members have decided to take it upon themselves to become unofficial copyright police and challenge virtually all material created within the organisation in respect to copyright and intellectual property ownership.
Now although this does greatly increase the demand placed upon certain departments to validate and check such complaints we must not become complacent regarding our Creative Intellectual Property Guidelines and must stringently check and manage any such breaches.
Considering the great number of potential contributors from many countries and backgrounds it dawned on me that perhaps if we have our own collection of images that we had license to use internally within the organisation this could potentially remove this problem completely.
Having investigated a number of options from commercial scripts to coding our own I decided to look at 3rd party solutions that already had large market penetration and also emphasis on copyright issues.
I have created a Flickr account for IVAO VZW and subsequently a ‘group’. The principle idea here is that other people who have Flickr accounts are able to ‘share’ their images with the ‘group’ which then gives IVAO VZW a large collection of images at our disposal. Check https://www.flickr.com/groups/ivao/
The originator of the images retains the copyright but grants IVAO VZW a license to use them exclusively for IVAO promotional material within or by the organisation. See Licence section.
If any complaint or request to use these images is subsequently received that lies outside the license, IVAO VZW would simply forward the information to the copyright holder to deal with and would not get involved any further. Standard terms of license agreement could cover this area.
Working with a generous photographer, I have already uploaded some images from my test Flickr account and his Flickr account into the IVAO VZW group. If you are familiar with Flickr simply search for the IVAO VZW group. In here you will see the images along with who uploaded them, including their copyright details.
The current licence agreement that is required to be accepted by all members who wish to contribute to the group is below:
This copyright License Agreement (this “Agreement”) is made effective as of April 01, 2014 between the Copyright Owner and the International Virtual Aviation Organisation VZW. In the agreement, the party who is granting the right to use the licensed property will be referred to as the “Copyright Owner” and the party who is receiving the right to use the licensed property will be referred to as “IVAO VZW”.
The parties agree as follows:
The Copyright Owner owns their imagery (“Imagery”). In accordance with this Agreement, the Copyright Owner grants IVAO VZW, its members or affiliates a non-exclusive license to use, distribute, reproduce, adapt, publish, translate, create derivative works of the Imagery solely for IVAO VZW promotional, educational or entertainment use. The Copyright Owner retains title and ownership of the Imagery and accepts all legal claims arising from challenges.
IVAO VZW will own all rights to materials, products or other works (the Work) created by IVAO VZW its members or affiliates in connection with this license.
IVAO VZW shall be the sole owner of the Work and all propriety rights in and to the Work; except, such ownership shall not include ownership of the copyright in and to the Imagery or any other rights to the Imagery not specifically granted in this Agreement.
IVAO VZW, its subsidiaries, affiliates and licensors, have no responsibility to you or to pay you compensation for financial loss or loss of opportunity, goodwill, reputation, business, revenue, profit, or savings you expected to make, or wasted expenditure.
This Agreement shall be binding on any successors of the parties.
To the fullest extent permitted by applicable law, you agree to indemnify and hold IVAO VZW and its subsidiaries, affiliates, officers, agents, co-branders and other partners, and employees, harmless from any claim or demand, including reasonable legal fees, made by any third party due to or arising out of Imagery you submit or otherwise make available under this Agreement, or your violation of any rights of another.
This Agreement contains the entire agreement of the parties and there are no other promises or conditions in any other agreement whether oral or written. This Agreement supersedes any prior written or oral agreements between the parties.
If any provision of this Agreement shall be held to be invalid or unenforceable for any reason, the remaining provisions shall continue to be valid and enforceable. If a court finds that any provision of this Agreement is invalid or unenforceable, but that by limiting such provision it would become valid or enforceable, then such provision shall be deemed to be written, construed, and enforced as so limited.