The Nature Conservancy - Photo Contest Guidelines

Hi Everyone-

I am a moderator on TPN, but check in here frequently.The talent here is great and I like to keep up on the topics in the discussion forum.

I thought I might take a day-trip to the Hassayampa River Preserve near Phoenix, and happened to notice on their site that they are accepting entries for a calendar for 2010. After reading the entry guidelines it seems to be another "image stealer".

To possibly open a dialogue with their representitive, I sent the following email.


From: bob miller [mailto:over1mshot@yahoo.com]
Sent: Saturday, October 18, 2008 9:25 AM
To: Bernadine McCollum
Subject: Hassayampa River Preserve - Photo Contest

Hello-

After reading the submission guidelines I am disturbed to see that the photographer will lose ALL rights to the image.

8. All entries shall become the exclusive property of The Nature Conservancy to be used solely as it determines, including printing the winning photo in the Hassayampa River Preserve’s newsletter, on its websites and in its publications, or using the photo in conjunction with the logos of The Nature Conservancy and its partner organizations.
Winning photographers may not sell or use these images in any way.

This is a perfect example of taking advantage of those of us who would gladly help to promote TNC. The guidelines could easily be re-written to allow limited use to TNC, with the photographer retaining rights to his/her image.

Myself, and other photographers WILL NOT be submitting under the current guidelines.

Thank you,
Bob Miller
Scottsdale, Az

And here is the response:

RE: Hassayampa River Preserve - Photo ContestSaturday, October 18, 2008 1:04 PM
From: "Bernadine McCollum" <bmccollum@tnc.org
To: "bob miller" <over1mshot@yahoo.com>

Bob, I'm sorry to hear that you won't be entering the contest. Unfortunately, we're bound by the guidelines our attorneys give us.Bernadine

Here's the link to the guidelines - http://www.nature.org/wherewework/northamerica/states/arizona/files/hrp_photo_contest.pdf

Anyone else want to sound off?

I find the terms of the contest very disturbing. I hope they get few quality images submitted.

I remember when attorneys used to work for those who hired them, and not the other way around.

Guy

I see this all the time now. It makes me sick. Fire the godamn bored lawyers. National Geographic is doing the same thing. Local and well known companies in the photography equipment business are doing it too.

I write serious letters every time. I ask them to pay me to enter. They laugh. I tell them I beat them to it, and they have already been laughed at.

I'm probably in the minority here, but this just doesn't bother me.

I do think they're reducing the likelihood of receiving high quality submissions as most won't people won't want to surrender rights to their better images, so I think TNC is just hurting themselves. Most likely, they'll get plenty of submissions from amateur photogs who are more than happy to trade an image for potential publicity.

At least the terms are clearly stated and an informed decision can be made.

I also find this disturbing, but it is certainly not the practice of TNC to require photographers to relinquish all rights in their general photo contests. You can go to the following link to see the rules for the just closed 2008 photo contest

http://support.nature.org/site/PageServer?pagename=rules_ph6 .

These are the same rules that prevailed for the 2007 general contest as well. These rules pIainly state that the photographer retains all rights to the winning image, but grants TNC a non-exclusive license to use the photograph, which is the normal language. It sounds like someone in the local Arizona chapter is having a not-very-good idea to promote their particular preserve in a contest limited to that preserve. I too doubt that they will get many good submissions, and I can't understand why the rules would be so restrictive for a contest that probably wouldn't draw significant interest outside of the local area anyway. Hopefully TNC will not be going down this path for their general photo contests in the future.

What a load of you-know-what. Theyre not 'bound' by anything the attorneys give them, as Guy mentions. As an attorney (no longer practicing, thank God) i can't imagine what the reason for this is, common as it is. Maybe the attorneys tell them all sorts of exagerrated horror stories to make them paranoid and make the attorneys advice sound more valuable. I see zero reason for those types of clauses other than what Bob has alluded to. Ive passed up many contests that i would have liked to have entered because of this kind of nonsense.

I went around a couple of times on just this issue with Oregon Wild and Distinctly Northwest Magazine and have also come across the same type of language at National Geographic and other places. It bothers me too. I agree that part of the reason for such terms might be to make sure they are completely covered legally. However, I have also found other motives. The first two organizations I mentioned above clearly told me that they wanted rights to images so that they could cut image licensing costs. Oregon Wild actually auctions off prints of the images entered in their contests as fund raisers, and by retaining rights has the ability to use the images in calendars, posters, books, etc. for as long as they want, free of charge. The editor at Distinctly Northwest came right out and told me that they wanted to own all rights to images so they could build their own image archive which would allow them to hire photographers and/or license images much less in the future. If they wanted to they could eventually sell their entire collection to Getty.

I agree with Rick that such terms only decreases the likelihood that people will submit top quality images. The simple answer for the wise photographer is just don't make a submission if you don't like the terms.

However, I really feel that any organization on the up and up should make their true intention very clear. I find it very shady to hold a contest under the guise of showcasing and honoring great photography while having a second, often hidden, purpose of acquiring rights to a large archive of images in order to avoid paying for them and even using them to generate income. Oregon Wild is a great organization that I would really like to support. If they came right out and said, "photographers, please help us protect wilderness by making a tax deductible donation of some of your images for use in our environmental campaigns", I'd probably be willing to lend a hand. However, I wouldn't send in my best images, and that gets us back to why they do it as a contest...so people will enter their best work hoping to win.

Here's part of the email I sent to some contests:

"I was just about to enter your photo contest. However, I am put off by the rules and conditions. How many lawyers did it take to write that stuff? There is a sad trend lately concerning contests, and everyone including National Geographic is following suit. Clearly, the purpose of these contests is for organizations and businesses to amass large quantities of images that they are free to use endlessly without paying a dime. Sure, there's a prize or publication opportunity you have to provide, but basically you're getting image rights from ALL the entrants for free. This is simply a huge grab to avoid paying proper royalties. I'm sure you realize how much money and effort is spent by photographers on gear, travel, and personal time to create their valuable work. No offense intended, but these contest rules are an insult to every photographer. I could see asking for non-exclusive publishing rights for the winners only, but from all entrants? Losing a contest is one thing, but add losing a sale to that and it starts to hurt. "

For those that might be interested - I sent this along to Carolyn Wright and she blogged about it. See it here.

Thanks for your help David. I just sent links to this page and your link to the TNC rep. Let's see if we get a response.

I doubt you will get a response, or if you do it will be a "thanks but we are not changing" response. Visibility to poor contest rules is always a good thing, though.

No response as of this post.