The Trump campaign may have violated United State copyright law by selling merchandise featuring the former president’s mugshot, legal experts have warned.
The Trump campaign may have violated United State copyright law by selling merchandise featuring the former president’s mugshot, legal experts have warned.
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“Publicly funded” doesn’t mean “publicly owned.” Plenty of states give grants and tax incentives to film productions to entice them to work there. That’s tax dollars going into a copyrighted work.
And being of a public figure has absolutely no bearing on copyright. If it did, paparazzi wouldn’t exist, because they wouldn’t be able to effectively sell their photos.
Wouldnt the government have the rights then?
For photos the copyright belongs to the photographer. If this was a federal employee (it wasn’t) , then there’s no copyright. If it’s a state employee then it’s possible it could be copyright or you could argue that the ban on copyright for government works is incorporated to states as well. There’s also the technicality that if it’s a contractor then there’s copyright no matter what.
Copyright of a photo doesn’t belong with the subject. The photographer owns it.