Dear all
If you add a photo to a forum post then you are implicitly giving TMC the right to publish that photograph, because as soon as you press "Submit" that is exactly what will happen and you know that.
I *think* I made it clear in my recent thread requesting photos that any pictures sent to the forum *may* be reused to illustrate articles as we consider that we already have permission to use them.
However, I have just been gently told off by a valued TMC member and friend for doing exactly this.
I don't really know what to do here for the future. This bothers me a lot. We take great care normally not to use photos from elsewhere on the web, particularly after the accidental nastiness with Mark Prince earlier this year. (Ours was the accident, Mr. Prince's was the nastiness but I don't think that was accidental).
Clearly it isn't practical to ask every member who ever posts a picture on the forum whether or not we may have permission to reuse it at some unspecified time in the future.
I really don't know what the correct position is in UK copyright law (which is probably what governs this sort of thing as the server is in the UK and so am I).
I would like feedback from the membership as to whether they consider this policy of reuse to be appropriate as it stands. I'm adding a poll to this thread so that we can collate the feedback. Depending on the outcome, I intend to update our FAQ to clarify this situation.
Hanging my head in sorrow
Phil