Aircraft app's

MalcolmClarke

I have just received the following email.

Hi !

I would like to link to your photos at airliners.net in an android app which shows aircraft information by pointing at the plane in the sky. I requested the site administration for permission, but they gave we the answer to ask every photographer by himself because you are the owner.

I hereby ask you for your permission to link to your photos in this app. We will show your name and copyright at the footer under the picture shown. If you are willing to give permission you will receive a free version of the app at any time. Just ask me for it.

Thanks in advance

At first glance it seems like a golden opportunity for exposure of my images.

However it is almost certain to be a commercial exercise and from my past experience, to ask for some payment is likely to result in the guy going elsewhere for free usage from someone else as most current regs will have been photographed by many persons.

Would anyone care to comment?

Malcolm.

Ken Wang

I think it doesn't hurt anything by giving him permission to use your photo. Though I am wondering two things:

1. How to recognize an aircraft by simply point your smartphoto and take a picture of it? Aircraft are not bar codes, not the mention "the plane in the sky".

2. How to obtain permission from every single photographer that may have photo(s) to be used in the app?

I would be very interested if the guy/gal really mean it.

Ken

MalcolmClarke

My understanding is that every/most aircraft? has its individual transponder and I assume that it may be possible for a mobile telephone to pick up the transmitted signal and a programme would convert this into a written identification/description of the aircraft similar to the way that air traffic control identify aircraft on their screens. However it is my understanding that the transponder only responds to radio-frequency interrogation and so would the mobile phone have to send a signal in order to receive the identification data.

Would anyone care to confirm or clarify my assumptions please?

On the subject of permission, I have to confess to having become a bit weary of those who assume the right to use published works as they see fit. In this case a guy has asked and on balance I will probably grant permission. I have also just been made aware of a site displaying some of my images. Admittedly each image has the website identity strip containing the copyright notice but I would still have expected to be asked for permission.

Malcolm.

ChrisHall

I have heard of the mobile phone app and have spoken to a few people who use it, it appears to work like an SBS box. If they are offering the app for free then I would give permission.

I get several requests for use of my images each month, but only ask for a fee if it is for commercial use. If it is for use in a book or magazine I only ask for a copy of the book/mag.

If an owner or operator ask to use an image on a website I normally send them every image of their aircraft, this has resulted in free flights or tours of airfields. I still have the promise of a flight in a glider and a PA28.

I look at it this way, it is my hobby which i enjoy doing and by giving an electronic image of an aircraft to someone may help me gain a new contact at an airfield, then it can only help me in the future. Especially when more airfields in the UK are stopping airside and hangar access on the grounds of H&S or insurance issues.

red750

I'm with you Chris. I have a few photos on a-d and a.net which were taken 40 years or so ago. I've had requests for permission to use by someone who updates wikipedia foreign language versions, and an Australian aviation historian who has a website documenting aircraft registered in Australia prior to 1970. I have given both approval.

I was given a formal copyright release to sign by Wikipedia, which requires anyone using the image to attach a legal document almost a page long, which discourages unorthorised use. My images now appear in Russian, Italian, Czeck, Korean and Turkish editions of Wikipedia.

If an owner requests a photo of his aircraft, I will supply a hi-res version by email. If he requests a printed copy, I ask him to pay printing and postage.

I also supplied a photo to Australia's ATSB for inclusion in an accident report.

All users attached credits to photos used.