U.K.’s Daily Mail pays The Batavian for unauthorized use of photos

HowardOwens.com
Twice this summer, the Daily Mail pulled photos from The Batavian and republished them without permission or compensation. After some effort, Howard Owens finally was paid on Friday. He got nowhere with the Daily Mail until he saw Jim Romenesko’s post in September describing how the website had rewritten a Washington Post story and then asked the Post reporter for help in getting a photo for it. Owens sent a Facebook message to Bradford Noble, the editor named in that post, who referred the matter to a photo editor in London. Owens says that he was paid $150, twice the Daily Mail’s freelance rate, for each of the three photos. “The photo [of Suzanne Corona] has shown up other places without compensation, such as WTSP, MSN, CBS12,Hot97 and Barstool Sports,” Owens writes. “I guess I need to send some letters to these publishers next.” As for the London blogger who complained about the Daily Mail using her photos of a mannequin at The Gap (the post that spurred Owens’ first complaint to Poynter.org), she blogged in late August that the newspaper had agreed to donate £2,000 to two charities for using her photos. She told me this morning that the charities got their money, too.