If you follow the sports pages of the local newspapers, you will notice one thing – a lot of the pictures and stories come from the Associated Press, Reuters and Agence France Presse.

These are international news agencies that provide pictures and stories to news media around the world. In all likelihood, the Singapore Press Holdings (The New Paper, The Straits Times) and MediaCorp (Today) pay seven-figure sums to these global agencies.

What do they pay locals?

Zero.

And to top it off, they sometimes don’t even credit you for it.

I had a sports picture used by the Straits Times sports desk once in 2007 to help them out because they didn’t have the picture of a particular up and coming youngster. Did they pay? No. To top it off, they didn’t even credit me.

The newspapers know that if they fail to give credit to AFP, AP and Reuters, they’ll get into problems with these agencies (these agencies monitor the papers like a hawk to ensure compliance).

Recently, I was approached by Jason Dasey who was writing an article about Aleksandar Duric for soccernet.com. He saw the interview I had done for Red Sports and gave the site a credit for parts he had used in his article.

That was a class act and for a small blog like mine, much appreciated.

Francis Espeleta, a photographer for the Singapore Slingers, had his photos reproduced in the Straits Times and Today back in October 2008 and didn’t get any credit, never mind payment.

He wrote on Red Sports in October 2008: “I guess, this is media here in Singapore. Yes, it's great to have the photos seen in the (Today) newspaper, even without pay as long as the credit is there.”

“Another photo of mine appeared on Straits Times that same day and the same thing happened. An Erratum is all I wanted. Nothing else.”

Another Red Sports reader, going by the alias watanabe, who was following the story here, wrote: “i think ripping photo belong (sic) to others is juz very unpro.”

An Australian newspaper used Francis’ photo and the treatment couldn’t have been more different.

Said Francis: “(I) got an email today from a sports writer for a new paper in Australia who also asked for a photo for one of the Slingers game and am happy to say that they credited the photo to my name, and even sent me a pdf file of the publication.

“I really appreciate the effort done (sic) by the sports writer and i believe this is the professional way of doing things, especially if the photo was not paid for.”

A reader, slinger_fanatic, wrote also to express his feelings: “(It’s) sad to hear about what happened to Francis. The sports editor of both new(s)prints (sic) should have been remorseful enough to call the guy himself or even bothered to email him. Also, mistakes that deal with intellectual property should be taken seriously.

“Like what les said that folks don’t appreciate the money and effort that go in getting photographs. These photographers invest a lot on their gadgets, and they should not take these for granted.

“I really feel ashamed that this thing has happened here in Singapore to a non-Singaporean. The fact that Singapore is strict about law enforcement, and the fact they are from the media, they should put (sic) no room for errors, or if ever they do, they should amend it.”

It’s unfortunate little guys don’t get the same respect as the global agencies. For the average Joe on the street, you’ve been warned – better to keep your photos to yourselves and not let the vanity of seeing your pictures published in the national media get in the way.

REDpoll

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