Texas Congressman Lamar Smith is facing questions after a series of Twitter photos show his campaign website using an image that appears to have been directly lifted from an artist’s Flickr page.
The image in question (viewed here) comes from the Flickr account of artist DJ Schulte. In a statement posted on his Flickr account on Thursday, Mr. Schulte said he has never been contacted by Mr. Smith’s staff.
I have no recollection, nor record of Lamar Smith or anyone from his organization requesting permission to use my image “Mist Lifting Off Cedars”. That lack of request does not violate the Creative Commons license although it does show high disregard for creative material producers,” said Mr. Schulte. “What does violate my Creative Commons license though is that I do not see anywhere on the screen capture that the image was attributed to the source (me). It would seem this image was improperly used by the organization of the very author of the SOPA bill that is being debated in Congress.”
Mr. Smith, the author of The Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA), has spent the past several days defending the measure, which was protested by some of the internet’s largest websites on Wednesday.
In a statement released Wednesday, the Texas Republican said he remains committed to passing the measure. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, a Senate Democrat, has vowed to bring to vote a similar proposal in the Senate.
“I am committed to continuing to work with my colleagues in the House and Senate to send a bipartisan bill to the White House that saves American jobs and protects intellectual property,” said. Mr. Smith in a statement.
Smith’s bill, known as the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA), would empower the Justice Department and copyright holders to demand that search engines delete links to sites deemed to be “dedicated” to copyright infringement. Ad networks and payment processors would be prohibited from doing business with the sites.
