This is one of those things that only photographers care about. We make sure we caption our photos accurately, and if it looks like something is happening in a picture, but we know it wasn’t, then it’s important to make that clear in the caption. You don’t want a paper using a picture of a footballer kicking a dog when he was actually jumping over the dog to avoid kicking it.

Today’s Daily Mail has a story about a tragic accident at the Queen’s Salute, in which a horse was seriously injured and had to be put down. The story includes a series of images by an agency photographer, and by freelancer Mary Stamm-Clarke. This is one of Mary’s pictures:

Compared to the other pictures used with the article, there isn’t a strong reason to use that one. The injured horse is almost entirely obscured from view, and there’s nothing of any great interest going on anywhere else in the frame. So why is the picture there? The caption explains:

Distraught, a horseman buries his face in his hands

So a perfectly good reason to use the picture. A photo of someone’s reaction to an incident is a good news image, because it shows the emotional impact. Except that isn’t what this picture shows. The horseman with his head tipped forward isn’t burying his face in his hands. For a start his left arm is still down by his side. And he still has his riding crop in his right hand, which is up to the front of his hat.

This isn’t the photographer’s fault. You can see her caption info for the photo on the download page of the Demotix web site. Her caption reads:

Members of the The King’s Troop, the Royal Horse Artillery come to the aid of an injured horse during the Queen’s Gun Salute at Hyde Park.

Naughty caption writer at the Mail. Say what it is, not what you want it to be.

If you’re a keen concert photographer in the US then hurry up, you’ve only got a couple of days left to get ripped off by Soundgarden. The Grammy Award-winning rock band are touring for the first time in 13 years and have a competition to be the "guest photographer" at each show. People submit their best concert photo and 17 winners are chosen, each getting to photograph one show.

Check out some of the terms and conditions you’ll be held to:

• Winners will be required to submit their photographs, of the show they attend, to Soundgarden within 24 hours after the show to ensure the winner’s photographs can be featured in a timely manner on Soundgarden’s official website and social networks.
  
• Winners must receive written approval from Soundgarden to publish or sell any of the photographs.
  
• Winners grant all ownership and copyright of all photographs at the respective Soundgarden performance to Soundgarden.

The fine folk from Soundgarden (or perhaps their management) have dressed this up as a competition, but really all they’re doing is getting 17 talented photographers to work for free and surrender their copyright. You even have to pay for your own travel and accommodation.

Ever been done out of a job by someone willing to work for low money? Imagine how you’d feel if you received this email. The recipient was a photographer who did regular work for a public relations agency. He thought he was doing an upcoming job for them at a food company, but then this message arrived:

Sorry, ****** decided they didn’t have the budget for a professional photographer on Friday and I have popped into work on bank holiday Monday to let you know!

Cheeky question, but I’m now looking for a photographer who is just starting out. Do you know anyone who would do it for free on 6th and 7th June? There is no payment but petrol will be paid for, it could lead to freelance work with ****** in the future and they’ll get free pies too!

The photographer in question, who gave permission to quote this email, hasn’t responded to the client yet. He’s waiting until he calms down. Good idea.

My blog post the other day, BBC flouts cookie law with ironic cookie, attracted a fair few negative responses, both in the Slashdot discussion and posted here as comments.

Firstly a simple correction: people pointed out that the use of the word ‘flout’ was wrong because British companies have been given twelve months to comply with the new law. True. My mistake. I wasn’t aware of the year’s grace period. Sorry about that.

But we also seem to have uncovered a mass confusion about what type of cookie the law applies to. Example comment from Slashdot: "The new cookie laws are only about tracking cookies, not session cookies or cookies necessary for the functioning of the website." And a comment posted here: "The law forbids TRACKING cookies, this is, cookies with some kind of UUID destinated to user tracking, NOT session/prefs/other (anonymous) cookies! Specifically the law doesn’t forbid the general use of cookies at all."

Obviously this needs to be cleared up, and it already has been, in guidance published by the Information Commissioner’s Office:

Does this consent rule apply to every type of cookie?

The only exception to this rule is if what you are doing is ‘strictly necessary’ for a service requested by the user. This exception is a narrow one but might apply, for example, to a cookie you use to ensure that when a user of your site has chosen the goods they wish to buy and clicks the ‘add to basket’ or ‘proceed to checkout’ button, your site ‘remembers’ what they chose on a previous page. You would not need to get consent for this type of activity.

This exception needs to be interpreted quite narrowly because the use of the phrase “strictly necessary” means its application has to be limited to a small range of activities and because your use of the cookie must be related to the service requested by the user. Indeed, the relevant recital in the Directive on which these Regulations are based refers to services “explicitly requested” by the user. As a result our interpretation of this exception therefore has to bear in mind the narrowing effect of the word “explicitly”. The exception would not apply, for example, just because you have decided that your website is more attractive if you remember users’ preferences or if you decide to use a cookie to collect statistical information about the use of your website.

(Underlining by me.)

I’m not sure why some people are convinced that the law only applies to "tracking" cookies, but there’s no good excuse for them spreading such nonsense. The law is clearly written (see page 2) and the ICO has published clear guidance on all aspects of the law, including exceptions. So, no, it isn’t limited to tracking cookies, and anyone why tries to convince us otherwise is either ignorant of the facts, or deliberately misleading people for their own reasons.

Silly old Internet

Television listings site Radio Times is operated by the BBC’s commercial wing, BBC Worldwide. The first time you visit the site after 26 May you see this message about the new privacy law on cookies:

Here’s a close-up:

Go back to the Radio Times web site again though and you don’t get the message. How does the site know you’ve already seen it? By using a cookie of course! Yes, to avoid repeatedly telling you that cookies can’t be set without your permission, the Radio Times web site sets a cookie without your permission. Here’s the cookie info shown by Firefox: