obama joker artist revealed!

by Mark Milian
Sept 2nd 09

Flickr came out looking like the bad guy when it removed an image of President Obama portrayed as the Joker from "The Dark Knight." Onlookers accused Flickr of having a "political agenda" and being a "bully."

For the most part, Flickr has stuck to a retort along the lines of: Sorry, kids, but that's the way the law works.

But the Yahoo-owned photo-sharing site has since retreated, at least in one respect. Flickr revised its takedown policy Tuesday to be more clear when something has been removed as a result of a copyright-infringement claim.

One of the site's 38 million users suggested in the support forums that instead of completely removing the page in question as it had been doing, Flickr should delete just the image, leaving the comments and other relevant information, such as when the offending image was uploaded and how many hits it had gotten.

That's just what Flickr says it is now doing. As of Tuesday at 3:30 p.m., takedown requests filed under the Digital Millennium Copyright Act, or DMCA, will result in the image being replaced with one that reads, "This image has been removed due to a claim of copyright infringement."

Yahoo's legal team routinely puts the images back up after it receives a complete counterclaim by the original poster -- "complete," meaning it has all the boxes filled in and appears legitimate. Firas Alkhateeb's "Obama Joker" picture has not been reinstated, but that's because he hasn't filed a DMCA counterclaim.

One potential problem with this process is that it could easily turn into a merry-go-round of filling out forms in order to have images someone doesn't like removed without any actual claim to the copyright.

"You can both love and hate the DMCA," said Heather Champ, Flickr's director of community. "It's not perfect," but, "it's sort of the process that's been handed down to us from the government."

Those rules apply to other sites as well. YouTube, which is owned by Google, has developed a technology called ContentID to help in identifying actual copyright holders, which is heavily used by ...

... the music, TV and film industries. But even Google must abide by the rules set by the DMCA, meaning after it receives a complaint, it is obliged to remove the video in question.

The natural progression, though, should eventually trot the two bickering parties into court to settle the dispute. That's why Alkhateeb is looking to secure a lawyer before filing a counterclaim.

The strangest part of the "Obama Joker" dispute is that the copyright-infringement claim wasn't filed by Time magazine, whose cover had been mangled, or DC Comics, whose character had been unknowingly portrayed, or the original photographer, Platon.

Instead, it was Edward Przydzial, a freelance photographer in Southern California, who had apparently filed the takedown request with Flickr.

Przydzial last month contacted the Los Angeles Times, furious that The Times had credited Alkhateeb with creating the "Obama Joker" picture, claiming that he had created the image. Przydzial said he had a "copyright time stamp" as proof he was the artist of not only the original image but also of the one captioned with "socialism" and of another showing Obama as a zombie -- all based on the Time magazine cover. (Przydzial couldn't provide high-resolution versions of the images we requested.)

His evidence was a LiveJournal post dated Oct. 9. The post shows a date nearly three months prior to Alkhateeb's Flickr upload, but as any blogger knows, a time stamp can be changed with the click of a button.

This nugget probably won't quiet critics such as TechCrunch founder Michael Arrington, who wrote, "Yahoo/Flickr should have asked its attorneys if the copyright claim had any validity at all before removing the image." Thomas Hawk, chief executive of a competing photo-sharing site called Zooomr, questioned whether Flickr's snap removal was due to "sheer incompetence."

But for Flickr and many user-generated-content sites, evidence is not required for removal. As is the nature of the DMCA, Yahoo takes claims on good faith, a Yahoo spokeswoman said. When signing a DMCA form, the person reinforces that they're telling the truth under penalty of perjury.

The lesson is that if you simply don't like a picture on Flickr, you can fill out a form to have it taken down. But you could be only one jury away from seriously regretting that decision.

- Mark Milian

Follow my commentary on technology and social media on Twitter @mmilian.

Image: "Obama Joker" on Firas Alkhateeb's Flickr page before it was removed

Image copyright edwardprzydzial.com 09

by: Thomas Hawk

For the past week or so I’ve been reporting on the DMCA takedown case involving Flickr user Firas Alkhateeb. By way of background, Alkhateeb had uploaded the controversial Obama/Joker image to his Flickr account in January of 2009. The image garnered over 20,000 views and many comments before Flickr staff removed the image from the site. The Los Angeles Times subsequently reported an article identifying Alkhateeb as the author of the original and controversial Obama/Joker image also noting the Flickr had removed Alkhateeb’s image from their site.

After a number of negative articles over the removal of what seemed like a fair use parody image, Flickr responded publicly in justifying their actions for removing Alkhateeb’s image citing a DMCA takedown notice that they said they received without identifying who had sent it. Initially many assumed that Time or DC Comics may have requested the takedown.

Subsequently PDN contacted representatives from Time, DC Comics and Platon (the photographer who had taken the original photograph which was remixed into the Obama Joker) who all denied sending Flickr a DMCA takedown notice over the issue. Although at first Alkhateeb had said that he did not know who had filed the DMCA takedown notice but assumed it was Time, after he revisited the email that Flickr had sent him over its removal he was able to confirm the identity of the individual who had filed it.

Yesterday evening Alkhateeb shared with me the name that Flickr had provided him as the person who filed the DMCA notice against him, “Edward Przydzia.” He asked me initially not to publish this name but has subsequently given me permission. The email that Alkhateeb said Flickr sent him is below:

“Dear khateeb88,

We have received a Notice of Infringement from Edward
Przydzia via the Yahoo! Copyright Team and have removed the
photo “Obama the Joker” from your photostream.

Subsequent NOIs filed against your account will result in
further action that may include termination without
warning.

If you believe that you were designated by mistake or
misidentification, or if you believe that you have not
infringed the copyright, you may submit a sworn
counter-notification as to the mistake or
misidentification.
Please contact the Yahoo! Copyright Team for more
information on this process:

http://docs.yahoo.com/info/copyright/copyright.html

- Flickr Team”

After learning the identity of the person who had allegedly had filed a DMCA notice against Alkhateeb, I began trying to research “Edward Przydzia.” A Google search of the name “Edward Przydzia” yielded no results for that name specifically which made me wonder as to the legitimacy of the takedown notice. Earlier today I blogged the story “Does Flickr Censor User Content Over Blatantly Fake DMCA Notices?” in response to being unable to associate the Edward Przdzia name with anyone who would appear to have a legitimate IP interest in the Obama/Joker Image.

Later this afternoon I began searching variations of the “Edward Przydzia” name and was able to come up with an “Edward Przydzial” who has, it seems, made claims, online at least, that he is the originator of the Joker/Obama image not Alkhateeb. So I suspect that it may have been Edward Przydzial, someone with at least a stated IP interest in the Joker/Obama image, who filed the DMCA takedown notice with Flickr. I’ve emailed and facebook mailed Edward Przydzia asking him to confirm if he in fact filed the DMCA takedown notice and if he is indeed claiming ownership over the Joker/Obama image but have not heard back from him as of yet. I will report back once I do hear from him.

There is at least one post on what appears to be Przydzial’s Live Journal page showing a version of the Time Joker/Obama image dated October 9th, 2008 (before Alkhateeb’s January post of the same image on Flickr)

When I asked Alkhateeb about that October posting from Przydzial this is what he replied to me:

“I don’t know how livejournal works but I can assure you 100% that I made this image in december/january this past winter. I have the original file on my computer with date created/modified data to prove so. The images he has on his site are copies he must have taken off the internet. The one with the socialism caption is an image that’s been on several news sites and was taken of a poster on the street in LA in early august. If you do a google news image search youll find the exact same photo of the poster. You can easily tell its a photo of a poster on the street. It’s impossible for that livejournal to be authentic if an image he has in it thats dated October 9th is a photo that was taken 3 weeks ago.”

In digging further into who Przydzial is online I was able to find this press release about him suing Gene Simmons from the band Kiss over unauthorized use of his photographs. The press release, however, does seem suspect, having been issued by presscorp.blogspot.com — a blog it seems that has existed only to issue this single press release about Przydzial’s case against the famous Kiss vocalist Gene Simmons. In another post on a Kiss forum board refuting Przydzial’s claim against Simons he is referred to as a “fraud” and “good ol crazy Edward Przydzial (not his real name).” I think I found Przydzial’s Flickr page here. Several forums online make reference to what is supposedly an April 25, 1988 article about Przdzial from the Detroit news alleging that he spent time in Federal prison “for multiple counts of fraud and interstate transportation of property obtained by fraud.”

Here is another article about Przydzial and a sort of odd post apparently written by him representing the “Associate Press” on April 3rd 2009 regarding the Obama image.

Update: I received a reply back this morning from Przydzial to my Facebook message asking him if he filed the DMCA takedown notice against Firas and if he is claiming ownership to the Obama image. Here is his reply back to me: “i do not own the image. time magazine photographer does… i am the “creator” of said image not firas whatever. i posted them in los angeles and they went viral. he is stealing my thunder. btw, my intention was not to make money off of or sell this as a way to make money… this art was designed to wake american’s up to obama’s false healthcare reform. the photoshop is all i’m claiming. as far as flickr goes… you’ll need a court order for flickr to inform you of identity status for dmca takedown notice… if flickr has a court order to release that info, that’s news to me.”

Update #2: I just received back a second reply facebook mail to my reasking Edward the question as to whether or not he filed this DMCA takedown notice and this is what he replied:

“i’m finding you have already posted a blog about me, made your assumptions and printed all type of trash that has been deemed harassment. the links to all the false federal blah, blah, blah… same old “he’s a crook” crap. i voted for bush twice and i was no way voting obama. your article is somewhat confussing even to me. i’m not sure what your major malfunction is…? i’m not pursuing anyone just promoting the poster. many blogs want me to speak but since it’s been turned into a liberal slant i’d rather not comment. i will continue to make my claims. firas is lying. flickr would need a court order to do that. ask him to show you his court ordered document with the judges signature on it… then maybe i’ll answer your question.”