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An unnamed female Celebes crested macaque in
North Sulawesi,
Indonesia took this selfie. Photo: WikimediaCC. |
Four years ago, wildlife
photographer David Slater left his camera unattended while at the Tangkoko
Reserve in Sulawesi. That’s when a crested macaque monkey got hold of the
camera and took several “selfies” with it. Those images have since been used in
a book self-published by Slater, but now he’s being sued by PETA for copyright
infringement, on behalf of the monkey who took the selfies.
PETA
maintains that, since the monkey took the pictures himself, he owns those
pictures and should be awarded damages for their use in Slater’s book.
Damages that PETA will manage, since the monkey obviously can’t.
Slater describes himself as
struggling to make a living off his wildlife photography, and as someone who
loves animals and fights for their rights. He even makes the argument for
animals having property rights in that very book. Just not copyrights.
He also thinks the lawsuit is
basically a publicity stunt, and is upset that PETA didn’t contact him
directly, but instead moved right to legal proceedings. If it is a publicity
stunt, it’s in pretty poor taste, as nothing that Slater has done has hurt the
monkey or the rest of his species, which happens to be endangered.
While donating some of the
money from to book to the preservation of crested macaques seems like a worthy
cause, and one that Slater might be willing to undertake, this isn’t a very
good way to go about it.
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