You can’t just take a work that has copyright protection and make a Christmas greeting out of it for your business. When it is done by a business that is in a business that services and depends on copyright creators, it is really wrong.

I received this as a holiday e-mail greeting yesterday. It is from a photography rental studio, one that services professional photographers. Obviously they do not own the copyright and I suspect they did not license the copyright to this image for the use. I did send them an inquiry asking about that but they did not reply.

My guess is that they used it without so much as a passing thought. Often the case when you have newer people in your business who just think anything online is “fair game” for use. I use that term because it has been repeated to me. Usually my explanation to them about my copyrights and my defending my work in Federal Court ends that.

Anyway people who are in the business of copyright creation must lead by example. Do not use other peoples work, images, art, music or whatever just because it is online. It is not yours to do so.

By the way, my using this example in this post falls under a “Fair Use” exclusion in copyright law.

One more of my pet peeves is photography industry magazines that use really bad photographs in their magazines. Posts about that another time.