Well… I really don’t know… There’s always two ways in looking at the matter. I’m not sure how the others will look at it, some might agree, some might not.
As a blogger, I sometimes get invited to attend events. It can be given with free entrance/food/drink/products or with a fee in addition to the earlier mentioned. The latter is rare but there were some. Usually if I am required to cover an event, I was only expecting to blog about it, I’m not required to provide them with the photos or videos that I had taken.
Worst things is that when people did not bother to hire the professionals for the tasks and expecting the bloggers to give them all those for free which usually might cost thousands if they were to hire the pros. Even if they did get the pros, I do not expect to give them as it is way out of my job scope.
I’m not sure about the reporters. Do you release the photos you had taken to the organizers? Maybe some photos I guess depending on your relationship with the person but you are not oblige to give right? As far as I know, you only use the photos for newspaper reports. Basically, that’s my understanding. I’m not your photographer, I’m not your videographer, unless it was earlier agreed upon. On normal case, I’m a blogger, I only blog, nothing more, nothing less.
I do admit that I did release my photos taken for free last time for events because I wasn’t aware of the consequences. Another reason was also because they were friends’ events. It’s similar like how amateur photographers giving free photo shoots or giving their photos up for the sake of building a portfolio.
Let’s put it this way, I think photos or videos are subjected to certain extend of copyrights. If you gave them up for free, if the people that you gave didn’t use it for commercial usage, it’s fine. If they did, then you are really at a losing end. They are earning money from it for long term and you get nothing from your hard work.
Another problem is that once you give out your photos or videos for free, others will expect to get it free from you next time. Correct? When you say you will charge, they will be caught with surprise and think that you are so money oriented. Hmm…
Sometimes people don’t understand or just being ignorance. *Shrug* I don’t know.
I blog for a living, just like the others that work for a living. If you are expecting me to give you things for free without giving anything in return(e.g. barter trade or monetary compensation or at least not asking for something more than my job scope), how am I going to live?
For those who do not rely on blogging as their main source of income, that might be a different story. Then, this might give a wrong impression to the public that bloggers don’t have to be paid to do things. Sadly, many people do think so. There is not enough awareness on this issue I guess…
Really, there’s two ways to look at it. No right or wrong. I guess at the end you are the one that will decide whether you should give them up for free or not.
As for me, it’ll be on a case-by-case basis.
Lastly, I guess I will get less assignments now to cover events because people have to be very careful when dealing with me hahaha… Oh well… What I’m trying to say is that we should be all working together for a win-win situation rather than taking advantages of each other which will not do any good to anyone.
