ANNE OF CARVERSVILLE has been FREE since 2007

My Legal Bills Are Not Free. AOC is on Life Support

Both AOC and Anne Enke personally are being sued for copyright infringement in two cases by plaintiffs Alexander Stross and August Image LLC, represented in both cases by Doniger | Burroughs.

The two cases are different, although they share the very narrow view that there is nothing to discuss about Anne of Carversville, except that we are guilty of image infringement.

jakayla-toney-24TPYKy_9Fc-unsplash (1).jpg — If AOC lives, it’s because of YOU. I cannot carry this burden alone.

SUPPORT ANNE OF CARVERSVILLE
Photo by Jakayla Toney on Unsplash

AOC — and I personally — are now at a crossroads on this legal topic. I’m not having an ounce of pleasure anymore spending every waking moment with copyright trolls nipping at my heels. I’m tired of being the American who gets sued — or beats back the threat of being sued as part of my daily life — while the same images run worldwide on other people’s websites.

More than anything, I’m tired of the hardball assault on me and AOC by a tiny group of people that ignores the quiet will of the larger photographic community and other AOC readers. I have the same problem with this assault on myself, that I do with our politics in America.

Alexander Stross is a one-off — I won’t touch anything like his images for the last three years — but August Image LLC is a 24/7 365 days a year sword over my head. As I told them, they should be paying ME for all the FREE exposure that I give to their photographers.

They can make crazy assertions about AOC and I devaluing their photographers’ works, but we all know this is NOT TRUE. Anne of Carversville does not devalue the work of any photographer! Period.

It’s irrelevant in the world of Doniger | Burroughs copyright law that almost 200 photographers are represented for a decade on Anne of Carversville and they and their agents are pleased and happy with our FREE services.

This is not Models.com — which I love, but is a toll road for professional photographers. I’m tired of reading boiler-plate legal documents about how I am destroying the value of photographers’ works and how much money I am making doing it. It’s a big, fat lie.

There is no income stream on Anne of Carversville. I get up and work for FREE every day. And what is my reward? Spending increasing amounts of my time worrying about copyright lawyers taking my social security.

Thankfully, I’ve now learned they cannot do that. BUT THEY WOULD.

If AOC Lives, It’s Because of YOU. I Cannot Carry this Burden Alone

A demand for large sums of money from a website that has no revenue is a demand I cannot meet. ~ Anne

SUPPORT ANNE OF CARVERSVILLE
Photo by Steve Halama on Unsplash

I spoke with an enormously competent, brilliant and impressive lawyer this afternoon, and she is not cheap. If you spoke with her, you would understand why.

She said: “What are you going to do?” I replied “Well, I sure as hell can’t afford you, so I must go to the creative community and say — once and for all:

If Anne of Carversville is to exist as a resource for showcasing creative work with a strong dose of activist commentary by me and links to other fine minds with a lot to say about racial justice, climate change, sustainability and women’s rights — then this ongoing legal issue must be a shared expense.

Also, some kind of arrangement must be worked out with photographers and/or their agents that they acknowledge — not by silence, but by affirmation — that they know their images are on AOC and they are fine with that fact.

The stronger their affirmation, the weaker the argument August Image is holding over my head, when the creative community stands up for me.

Do not lecture me about poor, abused, underfed, undervalued photographers. I KNOW what it is to be taken for granted. And I do not mind, except that now August Image, in particular, wants to silence me.. They will sue me for over five-year-old images that the photographers gave me to post. It does not matter to them.

August Image is the ONLY agency ever to treat me like this, so I hope they are really bringing in the dough for their photographers.

Torching the Jewel that is Anne of Carversville

Into this eco-sphere of Anne of Carversville peace, love, harmony and helpfulness have come the copyright enforcers who are allegedly protecting their clients by suing the hell out of me. In the wrong state, I might add. Without using a DMCA takedown notice.

All those legal procedures and human, business courtesies are OUT THE WINDOW with the copyright enforcers.

My email and phone # are known to the players. But they decided that I didn’t deserve to KNOW that they have sued me in a state, in which I’ve not lived for six years. And then about 14 days before the 120 days were up for me to respond to a court filing that I did not know existed because there were zero conversations — not ONE WORD — about the August Image demand for money, some legal person said “We better let her know, because we haven’t served her.”

Send her the “Settle NOW or we will ask the court for a summary judgement” message.

This is my life. This is how August Image, LLC, Doniger | Burroughs and Alexander Stross deal with me. To add insult to injury, the world-class (and they are) lawyers forgot they sued me twice. I got a woops email a few days later.

Anne Is At the End of Her Rope

For now, please consider getting out your credit card, because everybody's goal is to get the maximum money possible from me. And I do not have it. Period. I’m the last person who thinks of myself as a “little old lady”. But I felt better last night learning that they cannot take my social security — as if either Stephen Doniger Esq. or August Image, LLC needs their cut of my social security check.

Make no mistake — they WOULD take my social security if it was an option. ~ Anne Enke