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Comment by jmathai | Hacker News Reader

Unlike Facebook, I don't think Instagram can afford these antics.

Instagram's target market doesn't care. These aren't professional photographers, or even amateur ones like flickr, they're teens and 20-somethings with camera phones who want to be able to take and share cool photos with their friends.

I bet celebrities will care when their picture unknowingly appears in some ad.

Or on TMZ.com...

(Put another way: the right of publicity will limit commercial use of Instagram photos, at least in the states that recognize it. But TMZ is editorial use, not commercial use.)

UIAM you can't publish an advertisement with someone in it until they sign a model release form.

You supposedly read and agreed to the TOS, aren't they effectively giving your permission?

The person reading and agreeing to the TOS is not necessarily the same person as the one(s) appearing in the photos. It is the latter that needs to sign a model release.

In the UK I think the person has to be "featured", ie a central focus(?), to require a model release - based on the ECHR right to a private life for example; exclusions apply for news reporting it seems.

http://www.apug.org/forums/forum137/82809-legalities-relatin...

After 20 minutes of searching with Google and reading on about 10 websites I couldn't find any photog sites that even reference the law ...

The point about the model release form is interesting. While you can sign away your own rights to your photos, you can't sign away the rights of friends and strangers who appear in them.

According to Wikipedia[1]:

"Publishing an identifiable photo of a person without a model release signed by that person can result in civil liability for whoever publishes the photograph."

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Model_release

But wouldn't it mean the user who uploaded the photo is liable, not Instagram? -- I asked off of the Pinterest TOS drama earlier this year: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3660323

Both would be liable, but:

1) Usually it does not make sense to sue amateur photographer.

2) It may make sense to sue Instagram and their clients, especially when serious money are involved.

IANAL

The same discussion happened with just about all Twitter image-hosting services except yFrog. It didn't seem to cripple their business.

Not sure I agree with this. I think the social connections on Instagram are much weaker then on Facebook (hence my comparison). The moment Instagram appears not to be in fashion anymore people can leave without giving up much.

Granted, I'm not an Instagram user so I could be entirely wrong but the network effects of Instagram don't seem to be strong enough to push their users around too much.

Oh, I think you're right there. My point is that the people who use it won't care about this issue - this isn't the thing that's going to drive them away.

It's far more likely to be something less damaging but more obvious to users, like in-feed advertising.

It's sad that we agree on this.

Exactly why I deleted my account, and are many others. Hopefully that will get their attention. If not, so long! =)

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