Legality of Fan Sites

[Aquasparkle]

I'm wondering if someone is knowledgeable about fan sites and the legality involved in running one.

I assume that the obvious problems would be running advertising for profit and using what are probably copyrighted images in any photo galleries.

Can anyone share their experiences of problems that they have encountered or how a fan sit emight be safely used within a network of sites?

It's certainly a grey area to me so I'd enjoy any reliable tips.

 

[Keynes]

It is certainly a grey area, and even the established precedents aren't firm. What is clear, however, is that if you're attempting to earn commercial profits from someone else's name/fame without their express permission, you're most likely going to find yourself in hot water soon or later. If you develop a genuine fan site -- gratis, no ads -- there is potential you can keep it but not certainty.

Also, the domain name in use and the nature of the content matter a lot here too. If you have the exact name .com of the celebrity, you're more likely to have issues. Also, if you use or distribute copyright media -- images/music/video etc., then you might have a problem. Certainly there is room for legitimate fan sites, but the question of their commercial, for-profit limiations is still a bit unclear.

 

[tgo]

It is certainly a grey area, and even the established precedents aren't firm. What is clear, however, is that if you're attempting to earn commercial profits from someone else's name/fame without their express permission, you're most likely going to find yourself in hot water soon or later. If you develop a genuine fan site -- gratis, no ads -- there is potential you can keep it but not certainty.

bah, fan sites have every right to make money to pay their expences, and more. The stars would never ever sue a fan site for making a bit of cash as they would be hurting their online presence. Most people now adays find new stars and look for fan sites to get to know the star better. This does nothing but promote the celebrity.

Image are another story, mostly copyright by the taker of the photo(not the star) and can and usualy will be either taken off the site, or the site will get shut down by the host after a complaint.... I know FHM will sue you for using their pics, if you dont take them down with their first warning.

Most celeb sites have a TOS that states they will remove any photos that are requested to do so by the copywrite holder, this is usualy enough to not get sued, if you comply with all requests in a timely manner.

I was contacted a few times to take down a few pics from my site, and most were taken down and replaced, or I found the person was not a copyright holder and was just tring to get me to remove many photos.

Most dont care and they are safe to run as long as you do it right

 

[Dave_Z]

bah, fan sites have every right to make money to pay their expences, and more.

So you won't mind I register your domain namesake and put in tons of PPCs,
adsense, etc. while writing about you and making money for myself from those
ads?

The stars would never ever sue a fan site for making a bit of cash as they would be hurting their online presence. Most people now adays find new stars and look for fan sites to get to know the star better. This does nothing but promote the celebrity.

JimiHendrix.com
http://arbiter.wipo.int/domains/decisions/html/2000/d2000-0364.html

JuliaRoberts.com
http://arbiter.wipo.int/domains/decisions/html/2000/d2000-0210.html

KevinSpacey.com
http://www.arb-forum.com/domains/decisions/114437.htm

MorganFreeman.com
http://arbiter.wipo.int/domains/decisions/html/2005/d2005-0263.html

 

[Crusader]

I've been running one for a year now but we seem to be semi-official now. We haven't been asked to take down any concert mp3s or the music videos.

 

[tgo]

So you won't mind I register your domain namesake and put in tons of PPCs,
adsense, etc. while writing about you and making money for myself from those
ads?

Do you want digital photos of me to? I will send them right away.

I would love to be the target of a fan site. Its a compliment. I dont recomend you reg the name of the person, but if you make a site called lovelyhewitt.com and had pics of her, she would NOT ask to take it down unless you are slandering her or posting fake pics of her.

All the cases you state have the exact name in the case as a .com. If I was famous I would want my name as .com and should have a right to it since I branded it. But this is about fan sites not domain names. So your your point is valid, but not about fan sites, your right about reging famous peoples full names.

Edit -
And what do you think magazines have been doing for years? They interview famous people(free publicity) and then they sell ads to support themselves and make a profit. Its the same thing, just online.

 

[Peter]

And what do you think magazines have been doing for years? They interview famous people(free publicity) and then they sell ads to support themselves and make a profit. Its the same thing, just online.

No it isnt really, magazines are general purpose and do not concentrate on 1 indiuvidual. Alot of the times it is actually the band or managers etc who go to the press/magazines as they want publicity for something that is happening.

I used to run a fan site for a film which starred Cradle Of Filth and Emily Bouffante (she did Bits on channel 4 and operation paintball on bravo). The director knew about the site and was very chuffed to have a fan site for his film. He went to the extent to help me out on a few occassions as well as send me exclusive items and pictures.

The only profit made was through the sale on the film and soundtrack (which he put me in contact with distributors for them).

Done right a fan site will become very accepted, loved and acknowledged by the people the fan site is for.

1 consideration on wether to start a fan site is who is the site for. For example if it is for Metallica I would be very weary with what I put on the site, they have a track record of taking matters further and not letting it drop at all. Other people on the other hand couldn't care less (as long as you do not slander them etc)

 

[Aquasparkle]

Thanks Guys. I'm finding this discussion very interesting.

 

[Masahiro]

^Relevent?

Anywho, It depends on who it's for. Try finding out if they have sued about fansites before. If they have, I say steer clear.

 

[Xyzer]

My advice would be to stand clear, just in case.

 

[Shorty]

The best thing you can do is establish a connection between you and the personal responsible for the content you're making a fansite for. If it's harry potter, get in touch with warner bros, if it's new jersey devils then email the NHL...

 

[OvenMitt]

Do you want digital photos of me to? I will send them right away.

I would love to be the target of a fan site. Its a compliment. I dont recomend you reg the name of the person, but if you make a site called lovelyhewitt.com and had pics of her, she would NOT ask to take it down unless you are slandering her or posting fake pics of her.

All the cases you state have the exact name in the case as a .com. If I was famous I would want my name as .com and should have a right to it since I branded it. But this is about fan sites not domain names. So your your point is valid, but not about fan sites, your right about reging famous peoples full names.

Edit -
And what do you think magazines have been doing for years? They interview famous people(free publicity) and then they sell ads to support themselves and make a profit. Its the same thing, just online.

Novices should not speak on topics that they have 0 (zero) knowledge regarding.

(Just in case the point was missed: tgo, you're missing the forest for the trees.)

 

[rivux]

Companies have an interest in protecting their brand as long as you are not doing anything to harm someones brand then you are generally going to be ok. For the past 5 years Ive operated close to 125 different fan sites and have had a wide variety of experiences with them, a couple of examples for you:

1. I ran a Torrie Wilson fan site and had her Playboy pictures up on the site 4 days before the magazine hit newstands. Within 2 days of the pictures being up I had faxes and emails coming from Playboy's lawyers like you wouldn't believe. The pictures were taken down right away.

2. I ran a Sable fan site and had her Playboy pictures up that were 3 years old with absolutely no complaints from Playboy. I know they were aware of it because I gave them a list of other websites I had playboy content on and ONLY the Torrie Wilson pictures were asked to be taken down.

Why? Because the Sable pictures were several years old and were not costing them any revenue at that point. The Torrie Wilson pictures though were online before they even got the magazine to newstands and as they told me, that was going over the line.

The second set of examples have to do with the wwe themselves.

1. I ran a set of wwe fan sites that had been online for more then 2 years and I had two of them featured on TechTV and most of them ranked #1 for the wrestler/managers name. Not once did I hear a complaint from the WWE though they were obviously aware of them because....

2. Two days after I sold one of the sites, the new owner plastered the site with hardcore porn ads. Previously I had no ads on the site other then for other fan sites I operated. Within 24 hours of the hardcore ads going up, the new owner received a letter from the WWE demanding he take the sites down and hand over the domains to them. He was obviously a little upset about this considering what he paid for them, but it was his own damn fault for putting porn ads up on fan sites. I exchanged emails with both the WWE and him and they let him keep the domains/sites up as long as he took the ads down. Alls well that ends well.

So with first hand experience from two large companies and their brands I can tell you that as long as you don't harm their brand in any way, they have no problem with you running fan sites.

edit: had to fix some spelling since it looked like I attempted to write this message with my toes.

 

[Aquasparkle]

Thanks again to everyone who's been adding to this thread. I especially like hearing the first hand accounts for a real world perspective.

Rivux, I was looking at some of the sites in your network the other week and wondered how you utilize ths sites to your best advantage. I assume you do not have these sites simply becaue you are a fan. The sites seems to lack advertising in most cases and other than links to similar sites within your network things seem very clean. My initial interest would be to provide inbound links to other non fan sites. Any reason you're not gone this route?

Thanks again everyone.

 

[rivux]

Until a site (especially a fan site) reaches a certain level of traffic I don't believe its in the best interest of the site to load it up with advertising. I would rather have people link to the sites (which happens more often when they are clean and free of advertising) and have repeat visitors come to the site then make the 5-10 bucks a month it might make from ads at the beginning. I do have some standard banner ads and some skyscrapers on a couple of sites but those are non-obtrusive and generally of great interest to the visitor. If you like Jessica Alba lets say, then chances are you have no problem visiting a Keira Knightley fan site.

Once a site reaches a certain traffic level (generally 200k page views a month) I will start thinking of putting some ads on them, never pops, just some simple banner ads or adsense depending on the content of the site.

 

[Aquasparkle]

Thanks Rivux. Nice to get a glimpse into how others run a network.

 

[Crusader]

The best thing you can do is establish a connection between you and the personal responsible for the content you're making a fansite for. If it's harry potter, get in touch with warner bros, if it's new jersey devils then email the NHL...

He's spot on but in our case we met the person via the website. I would assume that if your site is about Harry Potter you could also contact Ms. Rowling.

 

[tgo]

Novices should not speak on topics that they have 0 (zero) knowledge regarding.

(Just in case the point was missed: tgo, you're missing the forest for the trees.)

Zero Knowledge? And you say this because?

I have 2 fan sites, 1 I have run for over 5 years with no problems, check http://rlcmedia.info. This page not only has adverts, but it has over 200mb of video clips of Rachael Leigh Cook. I have never had any complaints or problems at all.

I also run http://famousqt.com, and have done so for 4 months. I have recieved 2 complaints about this one, both of which were delt with within a day by remving a few pics. And it was a photographer that contacted me, not a star and I agreed with his complaint. This site gets over 30k page views a day so I would think I an now on the radar of the celebs.

If this changes I will let you know, but I will have this site up for a long while. You just have to comply with the changes that are requested by companys and people that contact you. If you dont you will be in hot water. If someone asked me to remove the ads on my sites I would not, and they canot force me. Its my site, I coded it and put the time and effort into it. I also have large bandwidth bills that I could not pay and would not pay wthout the ads. If a celeb requested I remove the ads I would remove the celeb, not the ads as I need them. But really i dont see them doing so when all I am doing is promoting them and their works.

I do not post photos of nude celebs, or even risky photos, as its not the point of the site. Its to showcase how cute and beautiful these celebs are.

Unless you are on a free host, how would any fan site survive without ads? I dont get the logic behind "you cant put ads on a fan site". There is sites that do not, but they tend to have some other way of paying the server bills.

I dont think there would be so many fan sites out there if this was a problem.

There is a small chance that a celeb would not like your site, and ask for it to be removed, but the chances of this when everything on the site is legal, and not slandering the celeb in anyway are next to zero, even if you have ads, as long as they dont promote porn, or other crap.

Celebs are in the public eye, think about the enquirer, why are they still running? Because its legal to publicly release and sell pictures and info on celebs(even rumors). I personaly hate that mag, but the celebs cant stop them from selling the mags or ads to make money off their pics/info/rumors, unless its slandering(which it usualy is in someway) but its still running... can you explain why it is?

Please dont think I am a Novice, I have been coding sites for about 8 years, 5 of which were all celebrity related.

 

[Aquasparkle]

While it may be legal for a photographer to take photos of a celeb in public places and then publish them, it would seem that as soon as I put these on a fan site I am violating the rights of the photographer. It might seem that the greater risk is from those who hold the rights to the photographs and not from the celeb's lawyers.

 

[tgo]

While it may be legal for a photographer to take photos of a celeb in public places and then publish them, it would seem that as soon as I put these on a fan site I am violating the rights of the photographer. It might seem that the greater risk is from those who hold the rights to the photographs and not from the celeb's lawyers.

Yes, them and any company they sell the photos to. If either a photographer or company contact you about photos, you MUST remove them if they so wish. Almost all photographs are copyright by the photographer, or whomever they sell the photo to. The people with the copyright usualy dont have a problem unless you post the photos before or shortly after they are making their money off of them, but they have a right to not allow the photos at all.

The money made from these photos, usualy lasts about a year, while they sell and resell photos. Then after that time, unless they are still using them they most probably wont run out and sue you, but they do have the right to if they choose that road. They should send a takedown notice before legal precedings however. In which case you just comply and thats the end of it.

Like I stated, It depends on the comany. FHM is very vigilant in protecting their images, and will go to any extreem to see they are not being freely distributed via any other mediam than their own. They will contact and warn you about this, and you will want to comply with any and all takedown notices.

I know there is more than FHM that do this, sites such as WireImage have many celeb photos that canot be used on any other site unless you pay them for redistribution rights. Companys like MediaVast inc also persue violaters alot. Mediavast inc represents WireImage, FilmMagic, Contour Photos and WireImagesSTOCK, etc. Do be carefull when adding images, and make sure you know the source and when the photo was taken.