![\"\"](\"http:\/\/www.iangrandjean.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/08\/monkey.jpg\")
<\/p>\nThis photograph was taken on one of photographer David Slater’s cameras.<\/p>\n
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The story is amusing – David explains that while he was taking photographs of a small group of monkeys, one of the older monkeys picked up one of David’s cameras and took a few photographs of itself – the famous \u00ab\u00a0monkey-selfie’.<\/p>\n
When David discovered the image, he thought, rightfully, that he had an interesting image and that he would be able to find someone who would buy it.<\/p>\n
However, this has created a ridiculous situation, in which David is now being sued by PETA (P<\/strong>eople for the E<\/strong>thical T<\/strong>reatment of A<\/strong>nimals) who maintain that the monkey holds the copyright. Apparently in the US there\u2019s nothing in copyright law that says a monkey, or any animal, can\u2019t hold copyright \u2013 but there\u2019s nothing that says they can, either. Strange.<\/p>\n In addition, this is causing huge financial problems for David, who, in his defense, simply wanted to sell a charming photo of a monkey – now he’s being sued for a substantial amount of money – just for doing his job.<\/p>\n Personally I think that PETA are wrong to drag this through the courts – it won’t help anyone, much less the monkeys, if they win or lose. In my opinion they are doing this for publicity, and risk creating a precedent which will only harm photographers, particularly wildlife photographers, who will eventually have to get a signed release from the wild animals personal lawyers before taking any pictures.<\/p>\n Sadly people like PETA, for whom I used to have respect, are their own worst enemies – and create problems far greater than what they are actually there to protect. I’ll just go and put on my plastic sandals, and get out my wooden clothes…<\/p>\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" This photograph was taken on one of photographer David Slater’s cameras. The story is amusing – David explains that while he was taking photographs of a small group of monkeys, one of the older monkeys picked up one of David’s cameras and took a few photographs of itself – the famous \u00ab\u00a0monkey-selfie’. When David discovered … <\/p>\n