The Volokh Conspiracy

Thanks for the link Prof. Barnett, the most interesting thing I've seen in a while. Reminds me of the movie Deja Vu (they tell the main character they are using a technology similar to this one as a lie), thought it was very cool then and now amazed that it's a reality.

Wow, again.

That is absolutely amazing.

I do remember when the web first came to being, the industry which took advantage immediately was the adult entertainment industry. Same with HD. Imagine what they can do with this new technology!

All kidding aside, I'm no IP lawyer, but stealing and using photos off of the internet --doesn't that violate some copyright law?

The technology is amazing. It'll be real helpful when we get the national ID cards along with face recognition technology.

Percuriam: Doubt it, in itself.

Merely manipulating photos for a demo seems like pretty obvious fair use, especially since random online photos typically A) had no monetary value to begin with and B) lost none via this use.

(For instance, does showing eg the NYT website in a demo for your web browser violate their copyright? Nobody seems to think so!)

Houston: How is that relevant, particularly? Remember, people move around, unlike Notre Dame.

The different-angle and different-zoom pictures they "synth" together for this wouldn't include someone's face from another picture, unless there were a bazillion cameras all shooting at once at the moment the person happened to be present.

If you're worried about a Panopticon state, this isn't the context in which to worry; Britain's leading the utterly ineffective way there.

Very cool!

See more of Photosynth here

On the IP side the big question will be fair use and whether the use is transformative. Perfect 10 v. Google touched on this and found that Google's thumbnail display was transformative.

If we assume that Photosynth is infact a search engine then there is at least a very good arguement that there is no infringement of the copyright in the underlying images. If Photosynth provides links back to the original Flickr images the case would be strengthened. Also Flickr alwos the use of the Creative Commons Deed that specifies how a photo may be used.

Here is something similar done with a Henry Moore sculpture. Nuclear Energy. I found it by looking for a good picture of the Moore Sculpture.

I was looking for something to illustrate a trip I took to the Moore Sculpture to pray for Nuclear Fusion, and to celebrate Jonathan Simon Graduates From The University Of Chicago.