The Monkey Selfie Caper apparently has legs, as they say in the
news business. Long legs with opposable toes. (For background, see
our earlier post: Monkey See, Monkey Do... However
Monkey Does Not Enjoy Copyright Protection )
On September 21, PETA announced that
it had filed a copyright infringement
lawsuit in U.S. federal court in San Francisco.
PETA is suing "the owner of the camera, photographer David J.
Slater and his company, Wildlife Personalities Ltd., which both
claim copyright ownership of the photos that Naruto indisputably
took. Also named as a defendant is the San Francisco–based
publishing company Blurb, Inc., which published a collection of
Slater's photographs, including two selfies taken by Naruto.
The lawsuit seeks to have Naruto declared the "author"
and owner of his photograph. ... U.S. copyright law doesn't
prohibit an animal from owning a copyright, and since Naruto took
the photo, he owns the copyright, as any human would."
