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Comment by kstrauser | Hacker News Reader

Where's your constitutional right to photograph me and use my photo on your billboard if you see fit? If you don't believe that's OK, and it's clearly not, then we can agree that there are limits to your right to use photographs you've taken of someone.

Also, I've heard approximately zero people from Portland calling for more police presence, even if it would cut down on the non-Portlanders traveling there to start problems. From what I can tell, they're not asking for or welcoming of that kind of "help".

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I live in Portland. I don’t live downtown where most of the videos you see are coming from, but I do live in a neighborhood very close to downtown. Over the past few months there have been a bunch of smashed windows (and presumably theft) at many of the businesses on the main street, graffiti is out of control, theft appears to be increasing as well. This is all just in my neighborhood. There are also the fires being set downtown and other violence between various battling groups. I can’t say for sure that putting more police on the streets would solve all these problems, but we need to do something. We are not headed on a good trajectory but for whatever reason it seems like our political leaders are in support of this destruction. We do need help.

We must live near each other. For privacy I won't say where, but I am within two miles of downtown East of the river. The neighborhood has changed for the worse in the past 6 months by an insane amount. I don't feel safe and I'm a fit young male.

Yup, sounds like we are in pretty much the same neighborhood. I wouldn't yet say I feel unsafe, but it sure doesn't seem like the city is moving in a positive direction. It makes me sad because I love this city and maybe I'm naive but I would like to believe that there are ways that we can address injustices that have been perpetrated against some of our neighbors without burning everything to the ground.

Unsafe is relative. I don't think I'll be assaulted, but I do think I could be robbed, or my property stolen. There is also the constant risk of folks in mental health crises or high as fuck being unreasonable or aggressive.

Stay safe, Portland is a good town at times, just it's 2020 you know?

That's fair. And seriously, now I can say I have heard of Portlanders wanting help.

I live in Portland, too. And we do need help. But facial recognition is unreliable. I'd hate to be the one who's misidentified but, overzealous law enforcement keeps insisting it's me. Or, maybe I'm shaking hands with some random person and then facial recognition is used to make it look like we're buddies, and accomplices in some mess he's in.

And I've seen enough unreliable technologies hit the market and marketers don't talk about the flaws or limitations in a responsible way. They highlight when the tech has done something miraculous.

With all of this kind of stuff I ask: what happens when the tech is wrong? Who's accountable? Who makes the victim whole? Too often the answer is nobody is accountable.

LOL - you only hear what you want to hear.

it is so damn easy to support the protests in Portland and some other cities when you don't have to experience it. The violence and fear is real, when your city officials effectively abandon their duties to score political points it should tell you your worth.

I live near a not so violent city now; we had a time with it but it died out awhile ago because it was embarrassing an important mayor but I too had coworkers looking to get out of the area. People expect the government they elect to protect people and property and it is very disconcerting when they won't.

Worse is the excuses they use for not doing so making you ask, then at what point would you step in?

Same. Was watching twitter feeds if people planning to come up to “F$&@!” My area. Lots of people with guns near me. Could have ended very badly.

Police shutdown the highway and trains. Eventually people gave up and went back to burning downtown.

> Where's your constitutional right to photograph me and use my photo on your billboard if you see fit

If it’s in a public place I would absolutely have a constitutional right to use that photograph, sell that photograph etc

Not for all purposes, no. You don't have an unlimited right to publish other people's imagery for commercial purposes absent permission, even if they are photographed in public, and they would be able to recover damages from you for doing so.

> You don't have an unlimited right to publish other people's imagery for commercial purposes absent permission, even if they are photographed in public

You 100% absolutely do if it is in public when it comes to publishing, even commercial publishing. Where do you think news gets their photos? Travel magazines? Professional photographers? You don’t need permission to publish or sell a photograph taken in a public place regardless of who or how many people are in it.

Your photos are fair game but if you present someone prominently in your ad they absolutely can come after you for damages or for monetary compensation for using their image. Why do you think that celebrities can sue for it? You think the average joe can't do the same thing?

That is true - the problem isn’t the photo though it is the false endorsement. A false endorsement in any medium is illegal.

Yes, that's why I mentioned the publication of the photo for some commercial purposes, eg advertising. Nobody is disputing your right to take pictures in public.

> You don't have an unlimited right to publish other people's imagery for commercial purposes absent permission, even if they are photographed in public

You disputed it right here. You 100% have a right to PUBLISH even for commercial purposes without permission.

Slight misconception. You don't need a release for some narrow commercial purposes, like artwork, academic study, or selling to news/wire services. But if you want to use it for stock photography, marketing (i.e. local businesses, tourism boards), entertainment production, or to produce a likeness or design which you intend to own separately, then you would need a release.

Good test here is if you could reasonably make a civil claim against the person reusing/redistributing the cropped images of themselves for their own purposes after the fact without permission.

The problem is that "commercial" is an ambiguous/misleading term in this context. (Cue the long-standing discussion over non-commercial in the context of Creative Commons that was never resolved.)

As you say it means certain types of uses but does not mean simply that I'm making money off it. I can absolutely take your picture in a public place and , in general, sell it to any newspaper or sell a poster made from it if I want.

Again not true at all. If I take a picture of Times Square with 1000 people in it, I don’t need permission from anybody there. I can sell the photo as a stock photo or otherwise with absolutely no permission. The same principle is true for a picture of one person on your local street.

Crowd photo yes. Photo of one recognizable person? Stock sites will absolutely look for a model release so that it can be used in marketing materials, ads, etc. You can, of course, simply publish it on a blog or in a newspaper or sell it as a poster without permission.

Stock sites may but again, not the law

With all kindness, it is you who are mistaken. Right to Publicity laws vary state-to-state. For example, California has rather strict Right to Publicity Laws[0] while (oddly) Oregon has less strict rules[1]. There are various factors to consider in every jurisdiction, but the rule of thumb is definitely not ‘if you take a photo in a public space then you can use it for commercial purposes’.

[0] http://www.dmlp.org/legal-guide/california-right-publicity-l... [1] https://www.rightofpublicityroadmap.com/law/oregon

Edit: corrected intended phrasing of 1 sentence.

> The mere fact that a person’s likeness is used in connection with a commercial product or service does not violate the statute

Nope even your own source confirms it. You can publish a photo taken in public for commercial purposes without permission - the only exception listed there is if your present it in such a way that it appears as an endorsement. Then you need permission (for the endorsement). In that case though it isn’t the photo that is the problem it is the false endorsement (which is illegal no matter what the medium, photo, words etc).

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