October 5, 2011 by pmelcher.

Goksin was a tall man. In a country where most men are small (you have Napoleon and two world wars to thank for that), he was even taller, towering easily in the  crowded office of the company he build and named after himself.
But Goksin was tall for other reasons. He was always above anyone else when it had to do with news photography. He was always looking further and higher than anyone else. He was a giant.
The ancient Greeks believed that sometimes the Gods would come down to earth and take human form to play tricks on us. If the Greeks had a God of photography, he would have certainly resemble Goksin, and acted like him. He had an uncanny ability to outwit, outsmart and outperform anyone in his field always delivering the “plaque” to the amazement to everyone. He knew photojournalism better than anyone and knew the impact of photography better than any editor in chief.
Like the Greek gods, he had an acute sense of humor as well as deep warm love for his fellow human. His generosity knew no boundaries. But more so than anything, no one could escape his charm.
In a few seconds of meeting him, you would fall into his inescapable charm and forever remain at his service, which you did with immense pleasure. It is hard to beleive that he ever heard the word “no”.
He was an unbelievable worker to the point that most of us thought he would die behind his desk. He had a foresight like no one else and believed in you more than you ever could.
There is hardly no one in the photo world today that he hasn’t touch and inspired and we are all his forever in debt children.
To say he will be missed is obviously an understatement but he has left so much to so many people in this business that it is hard to say he is gone. He continues to live in agency owners who thrive to replicate his style, he lives in the inside voice of thousands of photographers around the world who keep on hearing ” a little more” every time they are on a shoot. He lives in photo department everywhere when editors look for that images that will end up as a double page spread and sell more copies.
The passion for photography that Goskin had was unlimited and we are forever in debt to him. He was that shoulder we all stand on.  We will have to learn how to live like orphans because today we lost all lost a father.

Posted in SIPA, newspaper, magazine, photojournalism, finance, france, editorial, news | Print | No Comments »

May 23, 2011 by pmelcher.

 A couple of events rattled the world of photography recently, with no particular effect. Unaccustomed to be put into question, photographs of news event have continue to pour into our field of vision, with little regards for what just had happened. Here’s the narrative:

A little while ago, a bunch of very aggressive US Navy Seals dropped from the sky into a previously quiet compound and killed most of the people inside, including the number 1 most wanted person in the US, if not the world. No need to elaborate more on the event, besides asking why we are style fighting in Afghanistan, if the target of that mission is now eliminated. No, what happened next is what matters. After weeks of speculations and pointless editorialism, president Obama, acting as the Daddy  of us all, decided NOT to release any images of the attack or the dead body of Osama Ben Laden. We are not mature enough, he said, to handle pictures like that. Only he and it is presumed, a few of his staff members could see the images. End of story. Go play somewhere else.

Problem is, people do not beleive anything if they do not see it. Photography has become proof. Even thought we are fully aware that our eyes can be misleading and that photography can lie, we still need to see to beleive. One can tell you the most credible story , you will not beleive it until you see it for yourself. We do not beleive words, we beleive images. Photography has become proof. The interesting part of this, is that proof in of itself is not even truth. It is just the confirmation of a thought. It’s the exclamation point at the end of an argumentation.  A proof is nothing more than a rhetorical tool that confirms a point. But a proof can lie, it just needs to confirm. Photography can lie too ( ask Photoshop) but we still rely on it to confirm.

The second story is more recent and involves a very important Frenchman, a hotel room and a cleaning lady. The events are well known so no need to repeat them. However, what is less known, at least on the US side of the Atlantic is the reaction caused by one photograph : That of the person being walked out of a Police station with handcuffs in his back. The French press and the French people went haywire. How can you publish such a photograph ? What about the presumption of innocence, what about the respect of one’s private life, what about….on and on and on. See, in France, you are not allowed to publish such images : by law. Actually, the French law has lots to say about what images can be, or not, published. A little too much, actually. But this is not our point here.

What is however is the photographic proof. In this case, this was also the first image of this man after his arrest. We all had heard or read the stories but hadn’t seen much. Finally, we see the culprit in a photograph and all is confirmed. Ok, yes, he got arrested. But for the French, that is too much proof. We didn’t need to see that, they scream. The Americans couldn’t care less as they see thousand of equivalent images a day. Why is it that this time, the photographic poof was seen as too invasive? As if this was too much proof. Photography , suddenly, went beyond its duty to confirm.

The implication are the same for both images. Actually, in the case of the death image, it has potentially more impact on the world than a man in handcuffs ( that couldn’t be seen, by the way, as they were in his back).  Few jurors actually will base their judgment upon seeing this image and if they do, they shouldn’t be jurors. Are some photographs not to be shown, even if they depict reality? Is Obama right ? Are  we so immature that, as someone famously said , ” we can handle the truth ” ? Or at least, we can’t handle it if involves someone we know, if it is too close to us.

We see thousands of images a year of people in much more degrading situation as these yet we do not seem upset about it. Actually, we have entire photo festivals made entirely around these images. Indeed, those are in far away countries with people we do not know and couldn’t care about. It’s almost fiction, it is so far away. We seem ok with those proofs.

The good news about these two ‘affairs’ is that apparently photography still carries a very strong emotional impact. Photojournalists, rejoice : your images can still boil up people’s blood. As long as proof is still very much in demand, you will be needed. More than that, your images could stir up more controversy that the event you covered does.

Posted in newspaper, celebrity, photojournalism, editorial, france, news | Print | No Comments »

March 5, 2011 by pmelcher.

Is it the end of microstock and royalty free ? No, not because of decline in usage but rather as a result of powerful litigation. A french organization certainly thinks so.

The Union des Photographes Professionels , UPP (Union of professional photographers) just recently held a round table 0n the damages of royalty free, it’s damages to the photographic trade and what they intend to do about it.

We can skip the part where they talk about royalty free and it’s damages to the industry as we have all heard it before and there nothing new here. Rather, the panel gets interesting when the lawyer, Maitre Jean Vincent speaks. He explains that after months, years of careful study, they have found various aspect of the law that they can use to challenge royalty free. A couple we found noteworthy was deceptive advertising and pricing. let’s review:

French law designated as void  any sale of goods, product and services that is priced at infinitesimal price.  For example, if one was to purchase one image on Istockphoto for let’s say $5 and use this image for a book, a magazine, an ad campaign, a brochure, on a TV set, in a Movie set, over and over again for 70 years ( life of a copyright), it would amount for less than a cent per usage. Under this law, that pricing is so low that it would not constitute a sale. Thus become illegal. Furthermore, even a third party, not involve in the transaction, can bring this sale to court and have it voided. Nothing in France can be sold for a derisory price, even if both parties accept. Anyone can condemn such a sale, which is exactly what UPP intends to do against the microstock agencies licensing in France.

The second is deceptive advertising. Royalty free, in French, is translated by “libre de droits”, brutally translated to “Free of any kind of rights”. Maitre Jean Vincent explains that definition is deceptive and not true : Royalty free images are neither rights free nor free of royalties. Again, grounds for a legal action.

The organization is  seriously involved in bringing a couple of RF companies - Fotolia seems their primary target - to court in order to create legal precedent. That would facilitate the process for the rest.

Those outside of France might be smiling right now thinking this is more kakaboula crap coming out of the country of whiners. Not so fast.

Remenber that story, Save the Passport photo ? Well, they just have won. President Sarkozy has just agreed to remove all remaining free passport photo machines located in city halls across France ( about 1,000). This will force people to get their passport pictures to be taken by approved professionals.

France is not a consumer oriented economy. Rather, it is strongly entrenched in a long tradition of protecting trades, regardless of their public utility. Thus, there is a good chance that the UPP might win their legal challenge and force Royalty Free companies ( microstock included) to readjust their commercial approach ( raising prices, adjust their license agreements). Some might even close, not seeing any profitability in the new environment.

Could this spread out in other countries ? The challenge could be elevated to become a European issue and, depending on the politics of the time, certainly pass. However, it would take a long time and allow RF companies to find new ways to market themselves. The US ? Doubtful, as this Adam Smith based economy revers its consumers as semi-gods and would never impair in their ability to get “a good deal”

Nevertheless, this is a new development in what seemed the finished war between RF and RM. It could also be the last salvo.

Posted in copyright, commercial stock, license, CEPIC, transaction, france | Print | No Comments »

March 1, 2011 by pmelcher.

The fire has been put out, at least for now. According to an article on the BJP, maitre Gorrias has clearly said he will not destroy the images that are now under his control.

It  still remains very important that those photographers who suspect they have images in the Sygma archives ( and who have not signed an agreement with Corbis) to reach Maitre Gorrias and ask for them to be returned.

Maître Stéphane Gorrias

SCP BTSG

1 place Boieldieu

75002 Paris – France

Posted in finance, france, law, corbis | Print | 2 Comments »

February 25, 2011 by pmelcher.

In an interview given to the french blog A l’Oeil, the court appointed administrator of the defunct Corbis Sygma , the french company set up by Corbis after its acquisition of Sygma, declared that he is about to destroy millions of Sygma’s photographs.

You might remember that Corbis, during its heavy acquisition years, purchased the legendary French news photo agency Sygma for about $20 million in the hope that it would give them the reportage-news cachet it was missing so much. After strikes, mismanagement, business bloopers and other incongruity, Corbis forfeited this summer and declared total bankruptcy. They used the pretext of a lost lawsuit by a french photographer as the reason and very quickly closed everything.

You might also remember that they had open an archive facility amidst the cows of Normandy, similar to the underground facility they have in Pennsylvania . All the negatives and originals were transferred there to preserve them for eternity.

Well, apparently, eternity is now partly over.

Maitre Gorrias, legal administrator of the defunct Corbis Sygma and in charge of its dismantlement,   announced on February 8 that after a failed attempt to sell the images at auction he will destroy them. Yes, you read well : destroy.

What are we taking about ? According to Dan Perlet « Global Director of Communications of Corbis » : The Preservation and Access site  contains approximately 50 million photographic elements which about 75% are under the control of Corbis Corporation (photographers who signed a contract with Corbis Corporation) and 25% of photographic elements remaining under the control of liquidator (photographers without a signed contract with Corbis Corporation and is represented by Sygma). We have no precise figures on the number of photographers. “

The images about to be destroyed are the last 25%.  That is 12 million images !

Maitre Gorrias apparently doesn’t have any issue in returning those images to the photographers who took them. However, he doesn’t have the resources to try to find them.

Thus, if you or someone you know might have images in the Sygma archive, please urgently contact :

Maître Stéphane Gorrias SCP BTSG 1 place Boieldieu 75002 Paris – France

and tell him you would like your images back.

More on this story on the excellent french photography blog written by Michel Puech , A ‘L’oeil ( In French)

Posted in photojournalism, license, copyright, transaction, editorial, corbis, law, france, Uncategorized | Print | No Comments »

October 28, 2010 by pmelcher.

Seems like all the news is coming from France these days. You would think they were all out in the streets protesting against having to work two more years, O but no, they are actually busy. Well Getty Images is busy.

Via a grandiloquent press release, they have just announced the distribution of the Gamma - Keystone collection for the whole world, besides France. For those of you who were not paying attention, Gamma Rapho Keystone used to be called Eyedea no longer than a year ago before sinking into bankruptcy. After weeks, months of negotiation, the discovery of a trust fund, alliance and dis-alliances, the liquidators managed to find a buyer in the  person of  Mr Lochon. Ex-photographer from Gamma in the 80’s, Lochon used his personal money to buy the company with the promise he would resuscitate it from the dead.  His plan ? Well, give it to Getty Image. As if Getty needed more content to distribute.

It’s a great deal for Getty. They didn’t have to buy anything thus no risks of being investigated for monopoly . They don’t have to scan, edit, or deal whatsoever with cranky mostly french photographers. Just sell the images and keep a cut . If they don’t sell anything, well, they don’t care, they haven’t spend a dime. For Lochon and Gamma - Keystone ? Well, not so good. Getty already has the Hutlon-Deutch archives ( some 80 million  images) as well as  what is left of Archive Images; Both trump Keystone historical content in size and content. Gamma’s content ? Well, it all depends on what gets scanned and how well.

The reason this deal went through ? Probably because Getty was to only one to ask. It is doubtful that AP or Reuters even approached Gamma Rapho . Corbis, freshly out the of dubious bankruptcy of Sygma, will probably never deal with anything French for centuries to come. What happens next? Little to nothing. Getty is now apparently in an aggressive strategy to represent as much content as possible, if only to take it out of its competition hands.

On a related note, the director of the French office of Getty Images continues in the tradition of making false statements when he proudly announces that Getty was the first agency to license an image online in 1995 . He’s got a good excuse, he wasn’t at Getty at the time so he’s just repeating what his corporate communicator told him to say. Finally, the real amusing part is that his portrait used to illustrate the article is credited “DR“. At least there is one constant : Corpocrates will remain corpocrates.

Posted in transaction, photojournalism, Corpocrates, editorial, france, corbis, law, getty | Print | 2 Comments »

October 27, 2010 by pmelcher.

While the French are busy protesting about how many years it will take them to retire, the French Parliament is about to also pass a law governing orphan work.

Up to now, a publication could just slap the credit “DR” ( Droits Reserves: Right reserved)  under an image and ignore any licensing fees. This worked well when those images were handouts send out by publicist for promotion. However, in the last few years, the practice has extended to any and all images where a credit was not immediately identifiable,regardless if a search for the copyright owner was done or not.

Since no legislation was in place, it became  a common practice, some using it to avoid paying for any fees at all. Not so anymore. The law will define how and when DR can be used, as well as creating an organization whose role will be to monitor and collect licensing fees to redistribute to legitimate copyright holders. It will receive the money for usage when the copyright owner cannot be immediately found and will have up to 10 years to redistribute the funds to the owner. If never found, the money will then go to help a project involved in helping photography.

The Union des Photographes Professionels, the main union of independent photographers in France is 100 % behind the bill.

This bill could be a good example for the United States to follow while it still awaits a resolution on it’s own Orphan Work legislation.

Posted in copyright, commercial stock, license, transaction, france, law | Print | No Comments »

October 24, 2010 by pmelcher.

Is Pixpalace involved in price fixing ? On a recent email send out by the company last week, Pixpalace, an online aggregation of photo agencies content similar to Newscom, asked it’s suppliers to agree on prices so it would be easier for publishers to purchase images. The intent is noble, the result is horrific.

Pixpalace has been trying to breach into the content aggregator market in the USA for a couple years, with little or no success. While they have grown in the amount of suppliers they mash up, 86 photo agencies at the last count, they have yet to demonstrate that they are actually a beneficial service for this industry.

Plagued with numerous glitches ( the system has been hacked recently and thousands of images stolen), they have also found that publishers in the United States are not  attracted to these type of platforms. One possible reason:

Any photo agency can sign up to add their images, including foreign photo agencies ( non US based) . The result ? a huge mish mash of doubtful quality with sub par metadata, often in a foreign language. Like Newscom, it has become a huge photo dumping ground where anything goes. Not really a resource/time saver for anyone.

Now, probably pushed by book publishers always looking for discount volume pricing, they are trying to convince their current 86 suppliers to agree to similar pricing. Armed with an Excel that appears to have been directly edited out of Getty images online price calculator, they strongly suggest for everyone to fall in line.

There is a lot of issues with the pricing and the rights that Pixpalace is suggesting everyone accepts, not the least is that price fixing is illegal in the United States. It also prices, for the exact same usage, commercial stock photography at four times higher than editorial . According to them, a photograph of a couple walking on the beach has four times the value of a picture taken of the war in Afghanistan. Wow.

It also treats, how quaint of them, digital rights  as a side thought of print publishing.

Pixpalace had the same issue in France, it’s country of origin. After being a succesful trading platform, it’s started getting involved in the pricing of the images they hosted, leading to the violent departure of it’s top suppliers and the creation of a competing platform, this time owned by photo agencies themselves.

There is a good chance that all of PixPalace suppliers who are not based in the USA will agree as they do not know the US market, creating a ” price dumping” situation and forcing others to follow in order to survive. There is a good chance that the no one will investigate the process for alleged price fixing. Finally, there is a good chance that  this will damage even more the marketplace thanks to a combination of ignorance, greed, incompetence and blindness, attributes that seem more and more frequent in the photo industry world.

Posted in technology, commercial stock, license, transaction, france, editorial, getty | Print | No Comments »

July 6, 2010 by pmelcher.

So, the French minister of Culture ( at least they have one) descends to the Arles photo festival like a conqueror and announces, probably very proud of himself, that he and his photo committee he created a while back,  will create a photo portal. A French one, in three languages ( French , English and ???).

70,000 images are supposed to be made available to the public and amateur thanks to this portal. Nothing is said about what photography, from where, edited by whom, for what purpose ? Just 70,000 images; Et Voila. Packs his stuff into his limo and goes back to take a early afternoon nap in his hot office in Paris.

And we are left to wonder: From the country that has laws banning street photography, from the country that has created  social laws responsible for the death and suffering of many photo agencies and their photographers, from the country that has banned citizen photojournalism, that is all they could come out with ?

If they really wanted to help photography, the French government would do a few things : Repel the law that forces everyone to blur faces of people in public spaces, repel the law that makes illegal to photograph a news item if you are not a professional, repel the law that makes photo agencies responsible for more than 75% of free lancer contribution to social security. This is what is killing photography in France, not the lack of a “tri langual pro/amateur photo” portal.

If they really wanted to save photography, wouldn’t they help photography live and breath instead of creating a useless on line museum that will cost millions and sit unused. France already has one huge portal of photography for professional called PixPalace. Why create a state sponsored competition ?

Why don’t they rather make an institution that gives out grants and supports young ( and not so young photographers) in their projects? Why don’t they reward websites or print magazine for their usage of photography? Why don’t they create incentives instead of museums ?

There might be a long time before this online photo portal ever sees the day of light since everything take a long time in France ( years, decades). It is just so very frustrating  to see a minister who made a movie about the Rapho agency, who contains such great  photographers as Robert Doisneau, Édouard Boubat, Denis Brihat, Jean Dieuzaide, Bill Brandt, Izis, André Kertész, Yousuf Karsh, Jacques Henri Lartigue, Janine Niépce, Willy Ronis, Emile Savitry, and Sabine Weiss, continue to support a law that would have made these photographer unable to practice their trade.

Furthermore, in a society that is about to ban the wearing of Burqa’s because it hides women’s face, it is quite ironic that they force publications to hide the face of people in photographs.

I have an idea : Let’s go on strike.

more , in French

Posted in Search, celebrity, magazine, technology, No sense, photojournalism, france, editorial, filter, law | Print | 1 Comment »

May 26, 2010 by pmelcher.

It used to be the recession. Companies would shed dead branches and blame it on the recession even if it wasn’t the real cause. But not Corbis. it missed that boat. Instead, and what irony, it blames photographers. The announcement, at the eve of a long three day week-end, of the total and complete liquidation of Corbis Sygma, came as a surprise.

Never before did the Seattle based Bill Gates owned company had ever admitted failure is such a big scale. It used to be that they would acquire healthy companies, get rid of all the people that had made them succesful, water down the archives , integrate them into a vast digital mash up and the job was done. Promises were forever abandoned, names synonym with success would forever vanish into oblivion, pictures would sink deeply into a immense tasteless database. The triumph of the corpocartes. The rule by committee at it’s best. The Borgs (resistance is futile: You will be assimilated) of the photo industry had talent at erasing any and all traces of those companies it had so proudly acquired. In  it’s typical corporate arrogance, it never admitted failure. Just successive strategy changes.

Back in the 90’s Bill Gates wanted a  news agency. He had the Bettmann Archives, he now wanted something more lively. The Co-Ceo’s at the time went shopping for the boss. For a while, it was the financially weakest (at the time) SIPA that was heavily courted. But it’s legendary owner, Goskin Sipahioglu, could not surrender himself to the idea of being run by incompetents, whatever the amount would be. So all eyes turned to Sygma. In a more precarious financial situation with an exhausted management team, incapable to fund it’s much needed transition to digital, it surrendered much easier. Like others before, it thought that Corbis would help. Instead, it tried to swallow it.

This one was just too big. Arguments, strikes, misunderstandings, culture shock,  mismanagement, incompetence followed. Instead of listening, Corbis send it’s minions to make the Sygma beast surrender to it’s will. That cost some more millions. Since Sygma was losing money when acquired, there was no reason for the senior management of Corbis, at the time, to listen. Or so they thought. They proceeded with their assimilation plan. However, when you have a news photo agency run by people who are trained in licensing commercial stock or archival images, it doesn’t work. When decisions cannot be made without marathon meetings, and least, 2 to 300, 000 exchanges of emails, there is little, or no chance, for a news agency to survive. No way. And since Corbis thought of itself as infallible (probably some Microsoft legacy carried over by it’s owner), whatever they did was right…Or so they thought.

But they couldn’t stop the bleeding. And they couldn’t completely swallow it. So after reducing it to 29 people, changing it into a stock agency, spending what they claim is 20 millions dollars into a remote facility to protect it’s assets, it is now, for the first time, throwing the towel.

It used a ridiculous judgment as an excuse : 1,5 million euros for 750 lost images. That is 2,000 Euros per image. Corbis has just recently claim victory, in the USA, for a $7 per image verdict. What a difference. But let’s not be fooled. Even if their assets had been seized by the French justice, this was too good an opportunity to pass. As it’s current not for long manager said, Stefan Biberfeld,  ” Our tax debts  have risen to 73 millions in the last 10 years and we have lost 2 millions Euros just in 1999″.

Let’s stop right here. A few things to note. Why is a lawyer running a photo news agency ? Does that make any sense . Stefan Biberfeld was Senior Corporate Council, EMEA,  overseeing the Sygma Preservation and Access Initiative before becoming its managing director. Why else if it wasn’t to run a “straight to the ground” strategy?

Side note : EMEA, for those who don’t know, is a corpocrate lingo to say “Europe,Middle East, Africa” because, as we all know, it’s the same thing. Well, at least for Americans.

Another note : Sygma was losing $ 2 million in 1999, when Corbis acquired it. The tone of the phrase hints at this going on, maybe even worse after. 10 years at $2million, that is $20 million. Same as what Corbis spend on the Facility. That is $40 million total. Plus that $73 million in tax debt. That’s $113 million. Dominique Aubert’s claim to $2 million for lost transparencies seem very little in comparison, doesn’t it?.

So let’s cut the crap here: Corbis closes Sygma because it was bleeding money and didn’t know what to do. Corbis closes Sygma because of poor management. It closed Sygma because they couldn’t make it work, like everything else they bought. But not after securing distribution contracts with the best photographers so that Daddy Corbis can continue to license the content . The rest ? thrown into the air. Who cares? 29 people will lose their job, which, in this economy, is also nothing.

According to Michel Puech, the judgment, executed yesterday in Paris, was a lonely event. No screams, no cries, hardly anyone. Corbis management representatives were on call to acquiesce and leave. That beer must have tasted quite good.

Photographers have 4 months to claim their images, after which they become “rights free”, meaning whomever purchases them has  the rights to license them.

Sygma, the name, the legacy, the history, the people who build it, the photographers who died for it, it’s impact on the world, forgotten. Forever.

Thank Guys. we really needed that.

Posted in finance, license, copyright, commercial stock, transaction, editorial, news, law, france, corbis | Print | 2 Comments »