Does The Monkey Own The Copyrights To His Selfie? PETA Files Lawsuit Against Photographer David Slater
People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) has filed a lawsuit against British photographer David Slater for profiting off of the monkey selfies of Naruto, a macaque monkey.
In the lawsuit that PETA filed on behalf of Naruto on Tuesday, the animal rights group claims Naruto owns the copyright to the monkey selfies that David Slater published in his book, Wildlife Personalities.
The official complaint, which was filed in the U.S. District Court in Northern California, requests that the court protect the monkey’s rights and to ensure that he and his community benefit from the sale and commercial use of the monkey selfies.
Monkey who took now-famous selfie should be copyright owner of photos, lawsuit says http://t.co/aYsHPa5JsW pic.twitter.com/sj2mjvWJi1
— CBS News (@CBSNews) September 23, 2015
“Naruto has the right to own and benefit from the copyright in the monkey selfies in the same manner and to the same extent as any other author,” the lawsuit said. “While the claim of authorship by species other than Homo sapiens may be novel, ‘authorship’ under the Copyright Act is sufficiently broad so as to permit the protections of the law to extend to any original work, including those created by Naruto.”
Naruto’s selfies were taken on the island of Sulawesi in 2011. According to the wildlife photographer, the curious macaque played with his camera and managed to take a few selfies. Thinking he owns the copyright to the monkey selfies, Slater published the pictures in his book. One of the selfies was also published on Wikipedia, which prompted the photographer to ask the website to take down the image. Wikipedia refused to comply and reasoned that Slater doesn’t own the copyright to a photo that was taken by an animal. The site also said animals can’t own copyrights.
The U.S. Copyright Office has issued a document that says copyrights only apply to works produced by human beings. PETA, however, asserts that the law doesn’t limit copyrights to humans. “Since Naruto took the photo, he owns the copyright, as any human would,” PETA said in a blog post. Meanwhile, David Slater is saddened by the lawsuit filed by PETA over the monkey selfies because he considers himself as an advocate of human rights just like the group.
Glad 2 see @PETA focused on the important issues “PETA Sues on Behalf of a Monkey for Rights to His Selfies http://t.co/vaH1nVEpf6 via @NRO” — Katherine Timpf (@KatTimpf) September 24, 2015
In an email sent to the Washington Post, the photographer claims he owns the copyright to the monkey selfies: “PETA are deluded in this stunt. The images are my copyright and are registered at the U.S. Copyright Office – yes, that’s right! The office has never decided my case, but have probably been the recipient of Wikipedia cash to get involved in my dilemma – the dilemma protecting images in the Internet age and the age of Wikipedia drip-feeding the world its consensus knowledge.”
[Image via Wikimedia Commons]
