Gggrrrrrr!! Private Tree on Ancestry photos copied (Part 2)

[Sinann]

I don't have a subscription to Ancestry but my cousin's son does, he has a private tree.
I got a gift of a DNA test so I put a very very basic tree on Ancestry.
Ancestry was giving me loads of hints to improve my very basic tree so I turned off hints.
Than they sent me an load of photograph hints.
Every one of the original photographs are sitting in an album in my house, I'm the person who scanned them and gave copies to family there are even one or two which I took.
I doubt he, the cousins son, realizes they turn up as hints.
It is sort of disconcerting to see your own photos coming back at you.

[Sloe Gin]

Photographs aren't necessarily unique.  Families that went in for studio photographs often had multiple prints made to send to other family members.  So descendants of various branches of a family may have a copy of the same photograph.

[Maiden Stone]

Photographs aren't necessarily unique.  Families that went in for studio photographs often had multiple prints made to send to other family members.  So descendants of various branches of a family may have a copy of the same photograph.

I've downloaded 3 from public trees, of my grandma, aunt and uncle. 2 are more than 100 years old so copyright, if any, should be expired. They are all studio portraits.  The 2 older photos would have been paid for by my grandparents. None of them were among photos we inherited from the grandparents.
I did try to contact tree owner. I was unsure about protocol re photos.

[youngtug]

Lots of the photo's on Ancestry tree's are not of who they are said to be. Many have been copied several times and not all have checked that they are of the correct person, some are even of people with similar but different names

 

[andrewalston]

I've downloaded 3 from public trees, of my grandma, aunt and uncle. 2 are more than 100 years old so copyright, if any, should be expired.

Copyright is an awkward area.

In the UK, the rights on a photo expire 70 years after the death of the originator, not the date the photo was taken.

If you take a scan of a family photo which is out of copyright, the rights on that computer file expire 70 years after YOUR death. There are agencies such as Francis Frith and Getty Images which produce prints from very old negatives. The period on one of these starts when they issue the print.

Because of this, and the fact that the rules are different in other countries, the likes of Ancestry put clauses in their terms and conditions which in effect mean that if you upload anything, you give your rights over to them, and they can reuse those images for whatever purpose they like. If you don't actually have legal rights to an image, it becomes your fault if you upload to their website.

Images are so easily copied in this internet age that many organisations place "watermarks" on their images. Sometimes the marks are obvious, sometimes they are hidden as "noise" inside the image data. In the latter case it can be organised such that the offender can be traced.

[Maiden Stone]

Lots of the photo's on Ancestry tree's are not of who they are said to be. Many have been copied several times and not all have checked that they are of the correct person, some are even of people with similar but different names

I instantly recognised Grandma and uncle as toddler and youth. Photo of aunt as young girl was new to me. Her only sister was 20 years younger so it's not likely to be anyone else. It was probably taken to send copies to her aunt in U.S. and her grandfather in Ireland. She emigrated herself not long afterwards.  Stamp of photographer's studio in my home town was on back of each picture. One photograph was a postcard sent to my aunt by name and signed. I'm confident about provenance. Tree is fairly accurate. Tree owner is some relation of my aunt. Photo of my uncle is also on a tree belonging to his grandson. 
I noticed several photos of an aunt-by-marriage. I recognised her straightaway too. A hint for a tree was a woman with the same name, correct date and place of death and correct name of spouse. However this spouse apparently died in Oman whereas my uncle died at his home in England.

[Maiden Stone]

That's interesting Andrew.
 Is the originator of a photograph the person who commissioned it, in my case my grandparents? They died 80 years ago.
A presumed descendent of theirs, probably a resident of U.S.A. scanned the photographs and put them on a computer file. Copyright of this version now belongs to this person. They were uploaded to Ancestry which now has rights over them.
My grandparents had another professional photograph taken. That one was professionally restored  more than 20 years ago and several copies made. Has copyright on that one expired?

[locksmith]

That's interesting Andrew.
 Is the originator of a photograph the person who commissioned it, in my case my grandparents?

Copyright is not held by the person who commisions a photograph. The Copyright is held by the person who took the photograph. For example if you "commission" someone be it a proffessional photographer or just your neighbour, they will hold the copyright not you.

Simon

[NooshieW]

I may be in a minority, but I have never had a problem with other people having my family photos. I currently have a tiny family and if those people who are long gone can live on due to other people having their photos on their trees I don’t mind at all. However, I always ask permission to copy or share other peoples photos.