Intellectual property law is a hot mess. Were I on the other side of the question, I would take your position. I'm not. The law is just so much fun!

Earlier this week, a news organization published on its web site a picture of a reality person recently in the news. They cited Fair Use doctrine in copying the image from a reality site that had pirated the original image from our web site which is clearly copyright labeled and image protected. Quite simply, the image was hacked by the reality site (imagine the dishonor). I spent several hours tracking down the offending parties, going through the motions of the DMCA cease and desist process and providing a list of precedent cases. With one phone call, the hosting ISP gave up the reality site owner's contact info. Six hours later the offending images were removed and the Fair Use argument never tested in court. We were fully ready to litigate with very expensive outside counsel. Bottom line: I take it personally when someone steals my property and I have the resources to be very nasty about it.

PS, I think Sarah is cute in the pic. I may just copy it to my personal file...