Hi Guest above,

Your concerns / past experiences are noted but should not deflect from the main thrust of this thread which is on how best to share images of cultural value, taken of performers in public places in the main, where (for a weird reason) copyright of the images is assigned to the photographer and not the person in them (for videos and audio recordings the opposite applies). Such images already exist - a lot more than just the subset being discussed here, which are those taken by mudcat members - and if persons wanted to use them for nefarious purposes, well that horse has already bolted I am sure. However it should not affect consideration of the bigger issue, which (in my case at least) is that I would like my images to persist and be potentially useful to others rather than go to the tip on my demise...

One could argue that the performers' privacy is being infringed by taking their photographs at live gigs but copyright law does not see it that way, at least in most venues (unless photography is banned by the management). Also if you think back to previous generations of performers in any genre, they are often made most memorable via images taken of them in performance, complementing other media such as sound recordings and concert footage.

Just my 2 cents worth of course,

Regards - Tony