The source: Ghoul
The pigeon photo used to illustrate this article is NOT ours (it is a stock image). We just want to settle that…because, lawyers.
A judge recently ordered a private company paid a photographer $1.2 million for using his pigeon image for over a decade without compensation.
The payment stems from a 2019 lawsuit, when photographer Dennis Fugnetti filed a copyright infringement lawsuit against bird company Bird B Gone. Fugnetti was originally contracted to photograph and create the design in 1999; but that ended four years later when Bird B Gone turned to in-house advertising design.
Despite this, Bird B Gone continued to use the image on the packaging for more than 10 years. They even trademarked the photo, which alerted the photographer to the potential for misuse of his photograph.
Bird B Gone’s attorneys argued “implied consent,” but the judge sided with the plaintiff’s daughter—Fungetti died suddenly in 2019. Read more about the lawsuit, this.
