Hi everyone,
I’m a photographer from Belgium. I discovered one of my photos has been printed illegally and is on one of the walls in a cruise ship. It’s a major US company. I discovered this because a passenger recognized my work and sent me a photo of it.
Does anyone now what’s the best thing to do here?
Thanks!
OK - the cruise ship (and by extension the line) is probably not at fault. Whomever they bought it from is the actual infringer.
First things first - before contacting a lawyer you have to register the copyright on your image, presuming you haven’t already.
You can not litigate copyright infringement or even threaten to without registering the copyright first - and it has to be registered, not simply filed for. File for the copyright and then contact an attorney - they can send a demand to the cruise line to reveal the source they bought the print from. The cruise line does not have to answer that demand because there’s no litigation yet - but they will. Once you know who to go after, your lawyer will take it from there.
Note that this is worth litigating - willful infringement of a copyrighted work is worth treble damages and it’s per infringement… and if it’s in one cruise ship it’s probably in more than one, and elsewhere as well. All kinds of infringements might come to light once subpoenas start getting tossed around.
tl;dr – file for your copyright today, then call an attorney.