Pro-Imaging

New York Photo Awards 2008 ends 21 April 2008

The Rules of this Contest

Listed below are extracts from the rules of this competition. These extracts detail the rights being claimed from entrants.

"THE POTENTIAL WINNERS ARE REQUIRED TO EXECUTE THE FOLLOWING: (1) AN AFFIDAVIT OF ELIGIBILITY AND LIABILITY RELEASE; (2) WARRANTY OF OWNERSHIP AND LICENSE; (3) PUBLICITY RELEASE; AND (4) ANY OTHER AFFIDAVITS AND/OR RELEASES OR ADDITIONAL DOCUMENTS THAT MAY BE REQUIRED BY PRIZE SUPPLIER(S). UNLESS PROHIBITED BY LAW, THE POTENTIAL WINNERS MUST SIGN THESE THREE DOCUMENTS NO LATER THAN 15 DAYS FROM THE DATE OF PRIZE NOTIFICATION IN ORDER FOR SPONSORS TO AWARD THE PRIZE. NONCOMPLIANCE OR RETURN OF PRIZE NOTIFICATION AS UNDELIVERABLE MAY RESULT IN DISQUALIFICATION AND, AT SPONSORS' DISCRETION, SELECTION OF AN ALTERNATE WINNER."

"Entries may be published by The New York Photo Festival ("NYPH"), The New York Photo Awards ("NYPHA"), any NYPH or NYPHA affiliated Sponsors and/or their designees, licensees or affiliates (the "Authorized Parties") in magazines or books, on websites, or in any other medium, at Authorized Parties' discretion. Such use will be restricted to promotion, publicity, news, or informational education or awareness usage of NYPH and/or NYPHA. By participating, all entrants grant a license in the Entries to the Authorized Parties, and acknowledge that any Authorized Party may use the entries and a name credit in any media now or hereafter known, without restriction in relation to the uses stated above. Authorized Parties will not be required to pay any additional consideration or seek any additional approval in connection with such use."

Results of Testing the Rules

Listed below are the results of the tests we carried out on this competition's rules. The tests are all based on the standards set out in The Bill of Rights. By adopting these standards competition organisers can create competition rules that meet the needs of organisers and are fair and respectful to the rights of entrants. For each test a result is given which can be Pass of Fail. Competitions that pass all these tests go on The Rights On List, those that don't go on The Rights Off List.

If the rules are vague and we cannot determine whether the rules pass a particular test or not the result is shown as Unclear.  Where a test is not necessary the result is shown as N/A.

Click on any result below for more information about that specific test.

1 Copyright & Moral Rights 

• Pass, All photographers entering the contest retain their copyright
• Pass, The contest does not require any entrants to waive moral rights
• Pass, A credit is always given to the photographer when the image is published
  
• Fail, All the documents that must be completed by each entrant to participate in or win a contest are shown
  

2 Free Usage Durations Claimed

• Fail, The organisers free usage is time limited as per The Bill of Rights
  
• Fail, The sponsors free usage is time limited as per The Bill of Rights
• N/A, Book usage is time limited as per The Bill of Rights
  
• Pass, free usage only promotes the contest or is used for a book 

3 Commercial Usage Rights Claimed

• N/A, Commercial usage is rights managed & time limited as per The Bill of Rights
• Pass, Entrants are not required to sign commercial usage licenses

4 Declarations

• Pass, The organisations that acquire rights are all named
• Pass, This (or last) years Judges are named along with brief bio details

5 Contest End Date

• Pass, The contest end date is within 16 months of the contest being announced

Conclusions

This contest fails The Bill of Rights because -

• There is no statement limiting the duration of free usage as per The Bill of Rights
• Winners are required to sign a document, failing which they will forfeit their prize, and this document is not displayed on the web site.

If you submit an image to this contest, although you can continue to license your image non-exclusively, you will lose forever the right to exclusively license your image.

It is unfortunate that free usage for this contest was not time limited as per The Bill of Rights and that documens to be signed by winners are not on display. Had both these conditions been satisfied this contest could have been placed on the Rights Off List.

This contest is not recommended. 

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Organisations - New York Photo Awards, Canon USA, PHOTOSHELTER, 4thebest

Judges -

Tim Barber , photographer, curator, publisher, designer
Elisabeth Biondi , visuals editor, The New Yorker magazine
Frank Evers , Managing Director, VII Photo Agency

Lauren Greenfield , photographer
William Hunt , collector, curator, consultant, Hasted Gallery
Charlie Melcher,founder, Melcher Media
Daniel Power , founder, powerHouse Books
Jody Quon , photography director, New York Magazine
Benjamin Trigano, founder, M+B Gallery

Meagan Ziegler-Haynes , Director of Photography, Photoshelter

 

Meredith Birkett, senior multi-media producr, MSNBC.com

Snorri Bros, directing music videos, commercials
Greg Clayman, Executive Vice President of Digital Distribution& Business Development for MTV
Bjarke Myrthu , executive editor, Magnum Photos, New York

Contact - Send enquiries and views about this contest to This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it , Canon, PHOTOSHELTER, and This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it

© 2008 Pro-Imaging; Last updated 12 June 2008

The above text may be reproduced providing the Pro-Imaging copyright notice is displayed with a link to the Pro-Imaging website.

Text reproduced above in quotes has been extracted from the competition website for the purposes of review in this report.

NB. If the competition rules are changed after updated date shown above it is the competition organisers responsibility to notify Pro-Imaging of changes made.