Author: Leslie Burns

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I Do. What Did I Do?!

Ah, love. I love love.
Marriage, however, well, let’s say I am not such a fan. The idea of getting married gives me Humback-whale-sized willies, just as a concept. But I’m odd in that–most people want to get married at some point, including creative pros.

Many traditional wedding vows point out that a marriage shouldnt be entered into lightly or unadvisedly. Good advice, but it’s given too late, while you’re standing there in front of friends and family, sealing the deal. For creative professionals, there is an extra wisdom to that advice that you need to think about long before saying,”I do.” If you are a creative professional, particularly a self-employed one, then marriage may affect you in ways you never dreamed.

As a creative pro, you create intellectual property: copyrights. When a creative work is made, fixed in a tangible (including digital) medium, the copyright automatically comes into being. I like to tell photographers that every time the shutter clicks, a copyright is created, but its the same for any creation; when I finish writing this post, its copyright will come into being.

The initial owner of the copyright is usually the author/artist who made the work. There are exceptions, like if you are an employee and make the work as a part of your job, or if you have signed a work-for-hire agreement before creating the work; but, for independent artists, the initial owner is usually the artist. That means, if you are a self-employed creative pro, you automatically own the copyright in each work you make. You make art; boom, you make its copyright.

Copyrights are assets. They are property (there is a reason copyright, trademarks, etc., are called intellectual property). They have value separate from the art-object itself. You can buy a painting, but that does not mean you own the painting’s copyright[1]. Copyrights can be bought and sold all on their own, separate from the art-object, too. The rights associated with copyright, like to reproduce a work, can be licensed to others. If you register your copyrights (and, please, register your copyrights), you get extra tools if they are infringed but, even without registration, copyrights are valuable assets, just like a car or a house.

Because copyrights are property and are like any property acquired during a marriage, if you divorce, they can become part of the calculations for spousal support, child support, or even be a part of the actual division of assets.

If you live in a community-property state, except for California (where copyrights still matter, but differently so, and well get back to that bear–pun intended–in a minute), the value of your copyrights has to be included in the division of property calculations. They also may affect spousal support and child support, but I’m not going into those support issues in this post (trust me, it’s a nightmare). In a community-property state, virtually all assets[2] acquired (or created) during a marriage must be split 50-50 at divorce. Very roughly speaking, this means adding up the value of all the assets in the marriage and dividing by 2.

As a massively simplified example: imagine you created only 2 copyrights during your marriage and they are valued at $5000 and $45,000; your soon-to-be ex gets half that total value, that is, $5K + $45K = $50k 2 = $25,000[3]. Get out your checkbook.

Now, think about how many copyrights you create in just a month or a year. Yup, we’re talking a ton of potential value. Just determining the value of the copyrights is going to be costly. You don’t get to say They’re worthless! Nope, you will need to hire experts and it is likely your ex will as well, adding to the costs and the legal fees as this is all hashed out.

Now, if that isn’t bad enough, even more concerning is that if you get revenue from the copyrights, your ex may also be entitled to a share of that revenue. This may betrue even for future revenue, after the divorce, as long as the copyrights were created during the marriage[4]!

Turning back to the California bear, things here are even more troubling for the creator-spouse. In my adopted state, not only does the non-creator-spouse (if you split) get the (ahem) gift bag described already, the state courts have decided that the non-creator spouse, at the moment of the copyright’s creation, automatically owns an undivided half of the actual copyright in any work created by the creator-spouse during the marriage[5]. You read that right–you create and your spouse magically becomes the joint owner of the copyright, right then.

Whats the big deal with that? Well, lots (including that I think that is contrary to federal law) but, practically speaking, it means that, even without divorce, the creator-spouse loses control over her/his work. I don’t care how much you love your partner, this can really suck. The non-creator spouse in California can sell or bequeath his/her half interest in the work to anyone, without the creator-spouses permission. S/he can also license the work to anyone (assuming that thelicense is otherwise legal), again, without the creator-spouses approval; the only requirement is that revenues must be (equally) shared.

The final California insult: at divorce, if you are the creator-spouse, you’re going to have to negotiate ownership with your soon-to-be ex, which will likely mean buying him/her out. Ouch. If not that, then agreeing to transfer halves to each other, meaning that you lose ownership of some of your own work. Ouch again.

Most states are not community-property states, luckily. However, even under their various laws, the value of your copyrights may significantly affect any financial settlements in your divorce.

You can avoid much of this by getting a prenuptial agreement that includes provisions to keep copyrights as separate property and describes how revenues related to them will be handled, in the event of a split. If you are already married, you can still have such an agreement drafted (a post-nup) and (hopefully) executed by you and your spouse. As in all things, consult with your own attorney before doing anything–preferably one who does primarily family law (so, um, not me) but who understands IP law or who can collaborate with someone who does (like me).

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[1] Unless you bought that too, and that transfer has to be in a signed writing.

[2] There are some exceptions, depending on the state.

[3] See, e.g., Berry v. Berry, 277 P. 3d 968 (Hawaii 2012)

[4] See, e.g., Rodrigue v. Rodrigue, 218 F.3d 432, 443 (5th Cir. 2000)

[5] In re Marriage of Worth, 195Cal App. 3d 768, 241 Cal. Rptr. 135 (1987) is the controlling case in California.

 

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Pay Your People, NOW

If you are working in California and use crew (including models/cast) of any kind, you need to pay your crew before they leave on the last day of the project. UPDATE: As of September 5, 2019, you have up to the next REGULAR payday after the end of the project. Still, don’t screw it up. 

No, I am not kidding.

California’s labor laws are some of the most complex in the USA, but you probably already knew that. Maybe you’ve heard that some of those laws state that when you dismiss an employee, that employee must be paid in full on the day of the dismissal (that includes things like accrued vacation time, by the way). What you likely did not know is that when you hire a model or a stylist or an assistant (etc.) for a project, be that for 2 hours or 2 weeks, or 6 months, when that project ends, you are “dismissing” the person for the purposes of the applicable laws; that means that you must pay the person everything s/he is owed, on that very day. There is a minor exemption for motion pictures (it gives a little leeway) but, trust me, you don’t qualify for it.

I already know what you’re thinking: I’ll just have in my agreement with any crew that they will be paid within Xdays. Bzzz! No.Thank you for playing. The laws specifically prohibit contracting around this requirement.

This is a sneaky requirement and one that can cost you a pile of buckos (considerably more than the Benjis above), especially because there are often layers of players. For example, maybe you are contracted by an ad agency for an end client… you could end up holding the bag. The penalties are very steep–including having to pay the person’s wages for every day you haven’t paid, for up to 30 days, plus the employee can get attorneys’ fees. So, for example, you hire a stylist for $1500 a day, for a one-day shoot; then, you don’t cut the check for two weeks. You now could be on the hook for (on top of the original $1500 you’ve already paid) $1500 x 14 = $21,000, plus attorneys’ fees!

Apparently, models in particular are catching onto this and they are suing or threatening to sue photographers and their clients for these claims. To be clear, you are not out of the woods if you go through a modeling agency whichyou pay later, or a producer, or any agency. Also, trying to claim that someone is an independent contractor will also likely not save you–in California, you should assume that any individual working for you on a creative project under your direction is an employee under these laws (and others, like the workers comp laws).

Now, even if you aren’t in California, your state may have similar laws. It’s something you should definitely check on.

So, what can you do? Your best action is to pay your cast and crew on the final day of anyproject. If you are using an agency or a producer who will be paying others, still pay on the final day and have that person/entity indemnify you against any claims related to these laws (talk to your lawyer about this). Have your payroll company on notice that you need to pay on that day. Maybe arrange to pay electronically, on that final day.

In short, pay now,because you sure don’t want to have to pay later.Besides, it’s just good to pay your people immediately; stringing people on (even if you get strung by your client) is, in my opinion, a petty, nasty practice. Don’t do it. If you pay immediately, sure, you may be a bit cash-poor until you get paid but, in the end, you’re doing the right thing.

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Sit On Your Hands and Breathe

In some ways, law school is like learning to be Vulcan–you have to learn to think logically and keep your emotions out of it. It isn’t that we lawyers don’t feel (boy howdy, no!), but we have learned to be ledby logic rather than our emotions, at least when it comes to our cases. We learned to think rather than react. That difference can be rather crucial in legal matters.

My studies in Buddhism have helped me with this. I have learned to sit with thoughts and feelings, to observe them without judgement, and to make better choices from that. It takes a hell of a lot more to make me lose my temper than it used to. I still feel, and profoundly, but I can identify that as “feeling” and not let it interfere with my rational processing.

Creative clients are especially emotional sometimes. I think it is part of what makes you all artists–you make your livings by expressing emotions in some manner. For some of you, this can manifest as reacting before thinking. While that may be great for making your art, it can be very bad when faced with a legal issue.

Let’s take an infringement, for example. If you find your work being used without your permission, you’re going to be angry and hurt and you’re going to want to yell at someone, but that would be a poor choice. You could accidentally limit your recovery (or at least make it damn hard to negotiate a good settlement). You may throw a client under the bus because it accidentally shared your work (maybe if you knew that you’d forgive the client’s idiocy to keep that client). You might say something that isn’t true–my favorite is “The penalty for infringement is $150,000 per infringement!” (sigh…if only!). You may also be mistaken and the user does have a license you forgot about or it’s a legitimate fair use. If you go off half-cocked, you’re not going to catch any of that and, well, that would be bad.

So, when you find an infringement, here is what I think you should do:

  1. Immediately preserve evidence of the infringement (make screenshots, for example). Find every use you can and capture every URL, buy products that bear your work, take photos of your work being used, etc.
  2. Look up the company/person who controls the infringement, likethe website (try a Whois search, perhaps), or the manufacturer of the product. Save that info.
  3. After that, sit on your hands (i.e., do nothing) and breathe.

Do not call or email the infringer/bad actor. Do not call or email the entity you think may have “shared” your work. In fact, don’t even call or email yourattorney (yet). Nothing is going to get fixed immediately and no more harm is going to happen (in most cases)–you have time. You have three years to bring a suit for infringement in the US, so doing nothing for a couple of days after finding the infringement isn’t going to hurt your case. If your work isn’t registered and it is more than 3 months since you first published it, registering it now isn’t going to change anything for the better, even. So just sit and breathe.

After you have calmed down, maybe days later if you are really upset, look at the evidence you gathered. Search for any license you may have granted that might cover the use. Find your registration materials (assuming the work is registered). Basically, get everything together to make your case file. Then re-evaluate your case and set your goals to make you whole. Then you can plan on how to achieve thosegoals. And then you can begin to act.

This is true for many matters–that is, nothing bad is going to happen if you don’t act right that very second but you can do harm by reacting without thinking. Instead, record the evidence; sit on your hands and breathe; think/re-evaluate; set goals; act.

Now, “act” may very well be “call/email my attorney” but, by taking the time to let the emotions cool off, you haven’t hurt your case and you have thought about what really matters to you in it. The slap-in-the-face you felt will have calmed so that you can think more rationally about what you want. And you have all the materials together to help your attorney evaluate your case.

You don’t have to become Vulcan-like, but if yousave most ofyour emotions for your art, you’ll likely get better results in both your art and the law.

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Breach or Infringement?

I’ve heard that some photo organizations may be suggesting that the way to avoid the costs of litigating an infringement claim is to have a liquidated damages clause in your site’s terms of service (TOS), because then (they say) it’s a breach of contract rather than an infringement. For example, if you put something on your site’s TOS like “If you use any of the work from this site without a license, you agree to pay to PhotoBob three times his usual fees for the license” and someone uses your work, then you can bring a breach of contract case in small claims court and avoid the cost of litigating infringement in federal court.

I have to say, I think this is very bad advice. I hope that pro groups are not recommending it. Short answer? It probably won’t work and, even if it could, it’s not a good choice. Let me explain.

First, it is very possible that your TOS are not binding on your visitors. There is case law that says that in order for TOS to be binding, a user has to either click to agree to those terms (called a clickwrap agreement) or those terms have to be so obvious as to, essentially, be on each page of your site–just having a separate page with your TOS won’t cut it. (Lawyers reading this, yes, I’m generalizing from the cases–we need to know the nitty gritty but creatives really don’t.)

Second, even if you could make the TOS stick, you would be limited to winning no more than your 3X number, and you’d have to prove that you usually got $X as a license fee in the first place. 3X is likely not going to be much money. In fact, it’s going to have to be under like $5,000 if you want to stay in small claims, depending on what the small claims court rules are where you are–that is, there are limits on how big a case you can bring in small claims. Oh, and you probably can’t use a lawyer (many small claims courts bar representation) so you’re going to have to do it all yourself.

Oh, and let’s say you win a judgment in small claims and the defendant doesn’t pay. You can’t then go marching into federal court claiming that it’s now an infringement and demand a lot more money. Even if by some miracle you did pull that off, that is that the court didn’t dismiss the case immediately, the court would likely say your damages are limited to the judgment you got already or darn close to it.

Third, how are you going to prove that the infringer got the work from your website? Have you posted it anywhere else, like Instagram? Good luck enforcing your site’s TOS, then.

Fourth, and this is the big one (yes, I buried the lede): copyright pre-emption will likely make your breach claim a loser. See, copyright is exclusively federal law and can only be adjudicated in federal court; so, if you bring a claim that is really an infringement claim, a smart defendant is going to tell the small claims court “Hey, this is really infringement we’re talking about here so you have to dismiss this case because this court doesn’t have jurisdiction.” I think a defendant is going to win with that and, boom, you’ve just waisted all your time (and filing fees).

There is one possible exception to pre-emption here, but it’s a narrow window and one I don’t like anyway. That is, if you agreed to license the work to the defendant and it later failed to pay for the license, then courts have said that is a breach of contract rather than an infringement (unless the terms of the written license stated that the license was contingent upon full and timely payment). See Effects Assocs., Inc. v. Cohen, 908 F.2d 555, 559 N.7 (9th Cir. 1990). Now, I think you should have written licenses and those licenses should specifically state that no license is granted until full and timely payment is received; but, if you have that, then the courts say it is not a breach of contract and, so, there you go… pre-emption again.

Really, I think it’s cutting off your nose to spite your face to try and convert an infringement claim into a breach of contract one. I mean, if you register your work in a timely manner (before the infringement) then you have the right to elect statutory damages and you have a decent chance at being awarded your attorneys’ fees as well. That is very, very likely going to be a much larger number than what you’d ever get in small claims court. More importantly, if you want to avoid litigation (and I always say: you want to avoid litigation), you have a better chance at negotiating a better result if you have statutory damages and maybe attorneys’ feesto back up your claim. A breach of contract claim is almost always some kind of wonky and the damages are limited–why do that to yourself?

 

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Registration Nag: No. 5226

I know, you’re likely already sick of me nagging about registering your copyrights as early as possible, but until y’all stop sitting on your hands, I’m going to keep at it.Today’s juicy reason is that sometimes a new infringement isn’t new.

The Hollywood Reporter in this article talks about a recent ruling in a copyright case involvingan artist who created some famous tattoos. The artist who created art on LeBron James did not register the copyright when he created the works and when theywere infringed by a video game company (who has Mr. James in its game), twice, it was too late to get statutory damages. So the artist registered later and when the video game company released a new version of the game, the artist tried to say it was a new infringement so that he could get statutory damages and potentially attorneys’ fees. The court, however, said the new release was the same infringement as the old ones because the use was essentially identical. If aninfringement starts before registration, the bright-line rule is you can’t get statutory damages (or attorneys’ fees), so the artist can’t get statutory damages here.

In short, his $1.2million case is now likely worth, at best, a few thousand (and he’s going to have to prove up that value).

Ouch.

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(note, the photo above is not of the tattoo in question; it isn’t even a real tattoo)

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Your Notice is More than CMI

Recently, I wrote about the importance of your CMI (copyright management information) and mentioned that using your copyright notice as a watermark is your best CMI, because it kills two birds withone stone, so to speak. In that other post I talk about the DMCA and CMI removal issues (one bird). Here’s the skinny on the other…

But first, a little about a proper copyright notice. People get the notice technically wrong often, and it matters. So, here’s what it should be, in plain English:

1.  the symbol © (that’s control + g on a Mac) or the word copyright
2. the year of first publication (see here for more on “publication” as defined by the Copyright Office)
3. the owner’s name.

An example is the image above. Since I am first publishing this article here in 2016 and I created the work and own its copyright, the proper notice for this article is as you see there. In the post about CMI from late June 2016 I mentioned earlier, I included a photo (a selfie, actually) that I shot when I was in law school in, I think, 2010, but which I had not published (meaning that it had not been offered for license or given to a client for potential further use or otherwise made available to others, as well as in the sense normal people think of published) until 2015. So, the notice there is correct: ©2015 Leslie Burns. If I wrote “©2010 Leslie Burns” for the photo, the notice would be incorrect–the year in a proper notice must be the year the work was first published.

Okay? Cool. Now to the good stuff…

If you publish your work with a proper notice, that is a proper and visible notice (not just buried in the metadata), then an infringer of the work can’t try to claim “innocent infringement” in mitigation of statutory damages. It can’t even go there! Here’s the super good part of that: this is true even if the infringer got the work from some other source, without your notice! There are several cases that support this rule (and the rule is in 17 USC 401), but here are just two for your attorney’s dining and dancing pleasure: BMG Music v. Gonzalez, 430 F.3d 892 (7th Cir. 2005) and Maverick Recording Co. v. Harper, 598 F. 3d 193 (5th Cir 2010) (cert. denied). The second one is particularly helpful as it looks at the issue in more detail, but both make it clear that the defense is barred if the work is available with proper (and visible) notice, even if the infringer never saw that particular publication of the work.

So, going back to the CMI thing, if you use the proper copyright notice as your watermark, you get the protections I just described and, if the work gets infringed and the watermark is removed, the infringer just committed a violation of 1202 of the DMCA. Putting the pieces together, then, and assuming you have properly registered the work prior to this, your infringer is looking at a minimum of $750 (infringement) + $2500 (DMCA) in damages to you, plus maybe your attorney’s fees.

Those birds must not be chickens ’cause that’s not chicken feed.

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Get it in Writing

This NYTimes articleabout the legal limbo of some Avedon prints just breaks my heart. Besides the obvious part about the amazing work done by all, including the printers, being stuck in boxes, mostly unseen, the stories about why there are issues now make my downright twitchy.

Artists of all kinds are notorious for being crap at paperwork and many so-called great artists often offer(ed)their favors like Raylan Givens asking “one more time” with a smile, while puttinghis hands on his hips,revealing his badge and sidearm. That combo of sloppy business practices or, worse, intimidation by the Artiste, and fear of the employee/contractor to ask for something more concrete or as filthy as actual paymentwill likelyleadto situations like those described in the article, long after the artist is dead and gone.

It even happens when both sides actually like and respect each other but just don’t bother to putsomethingin writing. The road to hell, and all that.

Don’t let this happen to you and, almost more importantly, don’t put your minions in impossible situations.This means having open communication with the people you work with–interns, employees, vendors, whomever–so that you each can offer solutions about how to make something happen, without any one feeling taken advantage of or stuck in ambiguity about what s/he gets for her/his efforts. Intimidation is not becoming to anyone, even an artist. Having your minions fear you only makes you an ass (and generally makes them poor workers).

When you hire employees or independent contractors, pay them actual money whenever possible. Also, have signed agreements describing the relationship, the duties of each party, and anything else that comes up like “InternBetty gets to keep one set of the prints she makes for PhotoBob as a part of her compensation.” Veryimportantly, those agreements should describe what happens when and if the relationship turns bad and someone wants out.For individual projects with special circumstances, take the time to lay out the relationships involved so that everyone is, quite literally, on the same page.

And, whatever you do, put it in writing. A formal contract is best, but anything that lays out the understanding of the people involved and is signed (and preferably dated) by everyone is better than nothing.

Sure, you (like Avedon) won’t have to deal with whatever happens after you die, but I suspect you don’t want to leave your loved ones with big legal expenses to sort out your messes, either. Besides, it’s better business to treat everyone with respect. An agreement is the documentation of that mutual respect.

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Excited and humbled

Today is the first day of this new practice. My new practice. It is the culmination of a lot of dreaming and a lot of work and many years of patience.

I wanted to go to law school for a very long time. In fact, I took the LSATs 3 times, not because I did poorly (the opposite, actually) but because my scores expired before I could get all the pieces to work so that I could attend. Scores last for 5 years so you can do the math there. Finally, everything came together and I happily did the work of being a full scholarship law student. I graduated a trimester early and passed the notoriously difficult California Bar on my first try. Then Istarted lawyeringwith Carolyn Wright (photoattorney.com) which was outstanding training in exactly the work I wanted to do (she is a great mentor to whom I owe so much).

And now, today, I get to hangmy (virtual)shingle. Burns the Attorney. Wow. It’s very exciting for me.Thank you to everyone who made this possible. I’m humbled to get to do this.

Thank you also to the clients who have already contacted me for new representation (and it’s not even 9am here as I type this!). It is my intentionto serve you all well, honorably, and as much like a decent human as any lawyer can be.

Let’s do this.

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CMI and the DMCA

As a creative professional, you have a gazillion acronyms and abbreviations in your vocabulary. Here’s another one you should know: CMI.

CMI stands for Copyright Management Information and, generally speaking, it is data that identifies the copyright owner of a work. For example, on the photo above you’ll see my watermark in the form of a copyright notice in the lower right. That watermark is CMI.

In my opinion, you should always have visible CMI on any visual art (or, frankly, any creative work) you put out into the world. Why? Easy, under the DMCA (the Digital Millennium Copyright Act, another acronym for your vocab), CMI is protected. CMI functions as identification that the work is yours and, if your work is infringed and the CMI is removed or altered without your authority, you have extra tools to wield.

Specifically, if your work is infringed and the CMI is removed or altered, the infringer has committed at least one (and possibly two) violations of Section 1202 of the DMCA. Each violation carries statutory damages of not less than $2,500 and not more than $25,000, and the prevailing party may get its attorney’s fees and costs too. Oh, and the work doesn’t have to be registered for you to be eligible for those damages (but register your work, m’kay)!

Also, removal of visible CMI is strong evidence that an infringement is willful. If your work is timely registered (and, please, register all your work), willfulness increases the maximum statutory damages from $30,000 to $150,000. Even if you are unlikely to get the maximum (and, here on planet reality, you are unlikely to get the maximum in most cases), willfulness will be a factor in setting the statutory damages higher overall. So you really should have visible CMI on your work.

Best practice is to use a proper copyright notice like mine (although it doesn’t have to be that size–just visible and readable). A proper notice is the © (or the word “copyright”) and the year of first publication of the work (note that is not the year of creation, unless they are the same of course) and the copyright owner’s name (not your url, not your biz name unless your biz owns the work as opposed to you, personally). Note that you don’t have to have registered your work to use the symbol (unlike for trademarks where you can only use ® for registered trademarks).

Using a proper copyright notice kind of kills two birds with one stone (a post for a different day) so I encourage doing that. Still, any visible watermark that identifies the owner of the work will very likely count as CMI, so you can use something other than the notice, if you insist (but I will give you the squinky eye for that).

What is important is that the watermark must identify the owner for it to count as CMI. You can’t just put anything on there and have it count. Today, I saw a tweet by Image Rights that suggested putting its”protected by Image Rights” watermark on works to “help protect” the work. While maybe using that might discourage someone from using the work, that watermark will not count as CMI, so I don’t think it’s a good idea to use it. I mean, you could, but then you’d also have your own CMI watermark on the work as well. With all that on a work, it’s going to get pretty crowded and likely lose whatever marketing value displaying the work may generate.

For what it’s worth, your own watermark also functions for marketing purposes. Credit lines (while also CMI if posted adjacent to the work, and so its removal is a violation) don’t usually travel with a work when it gets ripped off or legitimately shared on sites like Facebook.

Finally, when you discover an infringement and realize that you haven’t properly, timely registered the work, the DMCA violation(s) may make the case something that an attorney would be willing to take on a contingency fee basis, since the potential recovery is more than just actual damages. If for no other reason than that, I suggest artists should make sure to use CMI-proper watermarks!

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A Few Don’ts

I have posted often (especially on the old BAP Super Premium blog) about things you should do, like registering your copyrights. Today, though, I think it’s time for some don’ts. Most of these are things that people seem to think are really good ideas but, when the rubber hits the road, they aren’t. Some of them can be downright dangerous. Some of these are legal-related, and some are just general business advice. So, here’s my list of 10.

Please, don’t:

  1. Before you actually hire an attorney, and I mean have a written agreement covering that particular matter (and paying a retainer, if required), cc the lawyer-you-think-may-be-your-lawyer on your email to some potential opposition. This sucks for the attorney on multiple levels, including being blindsided (never good) and pissing off the attorney’s malpractice insurance provider. Most of all, and I’m sure you don’t realize it, but you are using that lawyer’s professional reputation without her/his permission or payment! You know how you don’t like having your work ripped off? Same for us. You have, in a way, forced the attorney to represent you without that person’s permission. It’s just all kinds of bad.
  2. In any email–whether you cc’ed the attorney (who is not yet actually your attorney on that matter) or not–tell the potential bad guy “My lawyer will make you pay $X” or “My lawyer says you will owe me $150,000!” or even “If you don’t pay me $X now, you will regret it! My lawyer will rip you a new one” and the like. Ugh, even typing that gives me the willies. Don’t put words into a lawyer’s mouth; you are pretty much sure to get the law wrong and more often than not, when I’ve had potential clients do that, they didn’t even have a good case (register your copyrights, already). The threats end up hurting you. Later, when you do hire a lawyer, you will have dug a bigger hole for her/him to work out of and, it’s possible, that you could have traipsed into the realm of extortion. So very not good.
  3. Make unreasonable demands and then get pissy when they aren’t met. If you contact someone who has potentially breached a contract or infringed (or whatever), giving them an arbitrary 24 hours (ish) to fix it/pay up just makes you into the jerk. Real life sometimes takes time. Give people time to do the right thing. Sometimes they have to get their heads out of their butts first and that doesn’t always happen overnight. Same goes for money demands–don’t ask for $20,000 when a photo is used (without a license) on a personal blog–you won’t get it and now you just look like a bully.
  4. Generally, act like an ass.You get more flies with honey is a good old saying for a reason: it works. Sure, it’s not 100% effective, but I think it works much better than being a jerk. If you make it easy for someone who’s done you a wrong to make it right, without humiliating him/her or beating him/her up (verbally, I mean, please tell me you don’t hit anyone), you are much more likely to achieve your goal. When someone gets caught doing something wrong, it can be embarrassing and humans often react defensively (read: like idiots) when embarrassed. Don’t rub the person’s nose in it–rise above the nasty gut-reaction s/he may initially respond withand talk instead about how “we” can “make it right.” Look for solutions, don’t make more problems.
  5. Be greedy. Let’s say you want to get $5000 from a potential infringer (and, yes, you should always have a number in mind that you would be perfectly satisfied with from the get-go; not a pie-in-the-sky number but one that you would happily take). You’re going to ask for more than that as an opening offer–that is expected. Whenever the other side agrees to pay $5000 (or if it offers more), take the deal–you got what you wanted. You don’t have to push for even more. It isn’t about getting all you can, it’s about getting enough. Satisfaction doesn’t mean “all you can squeeze out of the bastard.” This is also true for project estimates and all negotiations in your business.
  6. Beat up Betty for what Bob did. By that I mean, it’s important to take each matter on its own merits and each potential person on hers/his. Don’t be a chump, but if Bob said he was poor and couldn’t pay a dime and it turns out he owns a mansion and a yacht, don’t expect that Betty is lying when she says she’s poor. Give each person a chance to prove her/his side of the case. Sometimes it really is a hacking or someone really is on foodstamps. I’ve found that when someone legitimately has extenuating circumstances, s/he usually is more than willing to provide some proof.
  7. Try to sound like a lawyer when someone does you wrong. You’re not one and mostly you end up sounding like you’re trying too hard and being unnecessarily nasty. You can be appropriately assertive (and be assertive, not aggressive) in your own voice and without using $20 words. See #4 above, too.
  8. Refuse to have a plan. There are a bunch of plans you should have as a businessperson. You need to have a business plan, a marketing plan, and an estate plan, just to name three. None of these need to be complex, but you do need to have an idea of where you are (A) and where you want to be (B) to be able to get from A to B. When you have a work project–be that a photoshoot or a series of illustrations for the New York Times Magazine–you plan out what you need to do to accomplish that project. Do the same for your business as a whole. As for the estate plan, well, don’t be Prince.
  9. Expect to learn the law from a creative professional (or, worse, the interwebs). Okay, I know this is going to ruffle some feathers, but creative professionals, even those who have been in lawsuits often or who have registered a gazillion copyrights*, are not lawyers and do not know the law the way a lawyer does. I swear I’m not tooting my own horn here–I can’t do what a great photographer can do even though I’ve worked with them since the 1990s. It’s just not the same as devoting yourself to the intensive study and practice for years and years. Anyway, you wouldn’t go to a graphic designer for medical advice, right? Why then do you spend good money to have one teach you about business law or copyrights? There is a reason we lawyers have to be licensed, just like doctors–when we get things wrong, it can really be life or death in some cases (there is a reason I don’t do criminal law) or at least economic life or death in others.
  10. Get angry and take things personally. This one is huge. In business (and law) the ego gets in the way too often. When people do things that negatively affect you–be that infringe on your work or try to get you to agree to work for half your normal rate, whatever–it really isn’t about you, it’s about them. Maybe the art buyer is getting yelled at and squeezed by an impossible client or the infringer is oblivious to copyright, who knows what is going on in their heads. I can tell you that almost always what is not going on is “I want to screw over this artist.” Even when the other side is acting like total jerks, it’s still about them. For example, I’ve had cases where infringers have called me horrible names; what the infringers were really trying to do was make the problem go away– each knew it was caught and was embarrassed so it lashed out in anger. Taking that anger personally would have been wasted energy. Instead, I think it’s better to approach it more dispassionately like “I understand you’re upset; there is a problem here and now we need to find a way to fix it” and then start trying to think of solutions. Your goal is to find a solution that works for you so keep your focus there.

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*I can tell you from personal experience that more than a few creative pros who think they know how to register their work have done it wrong. So wrong, in fact, that some of their registrations could be broken by defendants.

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