Copyright

The Lawsuit

In 2008, Shepard Fairey, a street artist, illustrator, and graphic designer, created a poster "Hope and Change" depicting a pensive-looking Barack Obama. The poster was to help Obama in the 2008 presidential campaign. However, the image of Obama referenced to make the poster didn't belong to Mr.Fairey. The image belonged to Mannie Garcia, who worked for the wire service Associated Press. Mr.Garcia took the photo of Obama in 2006 at The National Press Club. Associated Press wanted Mr.Fairey to pay them compensation for using their photo, but Mr.Fairey claimed that he only used the photo as a reference that he transformed in his poster. Mr.Fairey filed a declaratory judgment saying the photo fell under fair use law. That prompted the Associated Press to file a countersuit claiming Mr.Fairey misappropriated their photo, which led to a lawsuit lasting 4-years.

The Outcome

In the end, Mr.Fairey and Associate Press did not change their views on the law but made an agreement that Mr.Fairey would not use another Associate Press photo for his work without obtaining a license. They also decided to share the rights to the "Hope and Change' poster and collaborate on a series where Mr.Fairey would create images based on Associated Press photos. Along with their agreement, they settled financially with terms that remain confidential. However, Mr.Fairey was found guilty of destroying and fabricating evidence during the trial. He served 300 hours of community service and paid a fine.

The Significance

The Associated Press v. Shepard Fairey case is one of the most famous cases about copyright infringement laws to date. It changed public perceptions about fair use in art and what constitutes fair use. The case created new legal rules about how much needs to be transformed of someone else's work to be considered a new piece. As a result, news organizations are more protective of their work because it is very easy to plagiarize for money, which raises a debate about when "borrowing" material online is alright.

My Opinion

In this case, I can understand both sides. If someone created a piece of artwork that closely resembles mine and potentially profited from it, I would be upset. However, using references for artwork has been prevalent throughout history since the beginning. I believe both sides are valid in some regards, but they could have gone forward differently. Mr.Fairey should have asked permission to use Associated Press's photo before making the artwork and allegedly profiting from it or checked to see if it was copyrighted and changed to a fair-use photo. But he did transform his poster quite a bit from the original reference and made it his own instead of stealing the photo. I believe that Mr.Fairey made his artwork different enough from the reference to be fair use, but had he handled the lawsuit better, it could have gone better.