#SMILING CHIMPANZEE SELFIE FREE#

Slater, for his part, disagrees and is contemplating legal action. Because the monkey took the picture, it means that there was no one on whom to bestow copyright, so the image falls into the public domain.” 5 A spokesperson for Wikimedia, the arm of the Wikimedia Foundation that hosts public domain photos, told The Huffington Post “It’s clear the monkey was the photographer. Wikipedia refused, claiming that since the photo was actually taken by the monkey, Slater did not own the rights to it.

#SMILING CHIMPANZEE SELFIE FREE#

“When Slater discovered that the monkey photo had been added to Wikipedia as a photo in the public domain - meaning it’s free for anyone to use in any way they see fit - he requested they remove it.

Wikimedia has posted the photograph online as being free of copyright. By far the most famous of them was the grinning female macaque’s “selfie” that was then licensed for use by many media outlets.” 3 And here it is:īut here’s where the story gets interesting. The story went viral, with Slater explaining that a group of macaques had taken over his equipment for a bit during the three days he spent in their company…Slater added that the primates took hundreds of photos, most of them out of focus. “The dispute stems from 2011, when Slater’s wildlife photography field trip to Indonesia produced a striking image of a smiling crested black macaque another image shows it holding the camera. The facts of the story are as follows, and the precise nature of the facts is highly relevant here:

1 At issue is a photograph taken by the crested black macaque that has gone viral. Well, to be precise, a crested black macaque.

Monkey in the Middle: Who Owns the Monkey “Selfie”?Ī highly interesting copyright controversy is brewing, with a monkey in the middle of all of it.

Smiling chimpanzee selfie