Photographer Calls Out Taylor Swift For Being a Hypocrite

As Sheldon, who runs the UK agency Junction 10, wrote on his blog, these restrictions make it difficult for freelance photographers, who are paid “IF and when the photos are used,” which means they typically make money licensing their photos to other publications in the future.

Now.. forgive me if I’m wrong, but if you take points 2 and 3 in that contract (which is provided to Photographers who need to agree to those terms before they are allowed to do their job in photographing you for editorial outlets), it appears to be a complete rights grab, and demands that you are granted free and unlimited use of our work, worldwide, in perpetuity. You say in your letter to Apple that “Three months is a long time to go unpaid”. But you seem happy to restrict us to being paid once, and never being able to earn from our work ever again, while granting you the rights to exploit our work for your benefit for all eternity….

How are you any different to Apple? If you don’t like being exploited, that’s great.. make a huge statement about it, and you’ll have my support. But how about making sure you’re not guilty of the very same tactic before you have a pop at someone else?

Photographers need to earn a living as well. Like Apple, you can afford to pay for photographs so please stop forcing us to hand them over to you while you prevent us from publishing them more than once, ever.

In a statement given to the BBC, Swift’s spokesperson pushed back at Sheldon’s characterization of the contract, arguing that photographers simply need to contact Swift’s team to sell their photos elsewhere:

“The standard photography agreement has been misrepresented in that it clearly states that any photographer shooting The 1989 World Tour has the opportunity for further use of said photographs with management’s approval.

“Another distinct misrepresentation is the claim that the copyright of the photographs will be with anyone other than the photographer – this agreement does not transfer copyright away from the photographer.

“Every artist has the right to, and should, protect the use of their name and likeness.”

But Sheldon disagrees with that interpretation.

Swift is hardly the first musician to try and control images circulating of them; most recently, Beyoncé got slammed for banning photographers from shooting her shows at all, releasing only Bey-approved photos to the press. But as Swift is presenting herself as a voice for all the little artists out there, this criticism comes at a bad time for her.

And it seems to be escalating. In common practice among celebrities, Swift regularly posts professional pictures of herself to her Instagram. But as one photographer noted, Swift recently reposted a photo she doesn’t have the rights to on her Instagram, without credit.

Which of Taylor’s songs should I use to end this post? “Bad Blood”?

Image via Sascha Schuermann/Getty for TAS