Well, no I didn’t. But get this.
So this vending machine is selling stickers of Internet memes (or “meme’s”), which is clever enough I guess. But do you see what I see?
No? Look closer.
I’m sure Dave is getting a piece of this action. Right?
Jan 27 2013
So I Ran Into American Atheists President Dave Silverman at the Supermarket
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Stacy
January 27, 2013 at 3:51 pm (UTC -5) Link to this comment
Silverman knows about the meme. He’s got a sticker of it on the AA office door in New Jersey.
http://knowyourmeme.com/memes/are-you-serious-face-seriously
I think it’s pretty awesome that this meme exists.
Paul Fidalgo
January 27, 2013 at 3:59 pm (UTC -5) Link to this comment
Yes, but I wasn’t sure if he was aware the meme bearing his image was being *sold*.
Stacy
January 27, 2013 at 4:29 pm (UTC -5) Link to this comment
Hmm. On the one hand, this strikes me as Fair Use (But IANAL.)
On the other hand, what an awesome way for AA to make money. Maybe they should be making and selling stickers…
F [nucular nyandrothol]
January 27, 2013 at 5:33 pm (UTC -5) Link to this comment
“Fair use” only applies to whatever image, if any, the Dave-face was taken from, and the Dave-face with the meme, since I doubt the person who created it is printing these stickers. (These things are copyrighted by default, automatically, which is why CC and other licensing, including release to public domain, are sometimes a big deal and quite useful.)
Now, there is a murky area known as “publicity rights” which might apply, but other than that, you don’t own copyright on your face.
leftwingfox
January 28, 2013 at 2:34 pm (UTC -5) Link to this comment
Yeah, the artist who worked from the video is the copyright holder not Dave Silverman. Dave almost certainly signed away any right to that particular image when he appeared on Fox News (where the image was traced from).
The Meme image might be in violation of the copyright Fox News holds on the original broadcast, but that depends on whether the copyright image is “transformative” enough to be considered fair use or a derivative work.
nakarti
January 29, 2013 at 4:45 pm (UTC -5) Link to this comment
Nope.
The Work in question is the whole video. Everyone who worked on it owns the copyright as a group (Fox probably did make them all sign it off to the company,) but a representative sample, which an image or even a short clip is, is permitted under fair use rules, and a creative derivative (which the meme template clearly is,) or even a parody (which the Silverman template could be and the ‘can’t explain that’ meme clearly is,) are actually new protected works*.
Who owns those rights and did they possibly release them by posting under certain greedy EULAs, we aren’t sure.
*The RIAA and MPAA (and their international clones) not wanting you to know that notwithstanding.