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We previously wrote about a lawsuit filed in the Northern District of California against Instagram regarding the use of Instagram’s embedding tools. The plaintiffs, in that case, are two photojournalists who captured images of the George Floyd protests and the 2016 election and posted them to Instagram. Various media companies embedded the photos using Instagram’s proprietary embedding tools. The photos, therefore, appeared on websites without any license from the original photographers.
Continue Reading Instagram Defeats Embedding Lawsuit

We recently wrote about a case in the Southern District of New York against Mashable relating to the embedding of content from social media platforms like Instagram.  In that case, the court held that Instagram’s terms of use (which were accepted by the plaintiff, a photographer, when he created an Instagram account) were insufficiently clear to allow Mashable to escape liability for publishing Instagram content through the process of embedding.  Thereafter, the parties settled out of court.  Legal watchers speculated that the ruling would encourage copyright infringement claims based on the embedding of content.
Continue Reading Instagram Faces Claims That It Encouraged Media Companies to Illegally Embed Images Posted to Instagram by Users

A recent case in the Southern District of New York calls into serious question the ubiquitous practice of embedding photographs on a content creator’s website.

An embedded photo is one that is not hosted on the website’s own server, but instead is linked to a third-party server like a social media site.  Instead of the photo being permanently available on the website, the website pulls the photo from the third-party site live when the website is accessed by a user.  Platforms like Twitter, Instagram, and TikTok make it extremely easy for websites to embed user posts, and provide website designers with tools specifically meant to make embedding seamless for the user.

In a recent case (Sinclair v. Ziff Davis, LLC, 1:18-cv-00790, S.D.N.Y.), a professional photographer posted a photo to Instagram that was later embedded by Mashable in an article on its website.  In its original ruling, the court held that Instagram’s terms of service (which every user, including Sinclair, accepts when signing up) permitted the embedding on links on third party websites.  The court ruled that Instagram had the right to relicense Sinclair’s image to Mashable, and granted Mashable a dismissal of Sinclair’s claims.
Continue Reading Recent Case Demonstrates the Need for Caution When Embedding Links to Social Media Posts

In today’s age of rapid fire social media, posting to feed the ever growing hunger of a digitally connected audience has become second nature to celebrities and other influencers.  In fact, the larger the number of followers, the greater the compulsion to constantly connect.  And that’s where the problems can arise.

The facts underlying the…