copy photos from website

B

Broadcaster

Registered User
Messages
159
A friend is seeking planning permission for changes to the inside of this home. He happens to have some photos of the inside on a website.
A neighbour who is objecting to this application has copied my friend's photos and uploaded them to the planning application site to support his objection. The photos belong to my friend and he feels totally violated by the use of his own photos in this way.

Question is, does the neighbour have a right to do this and also does the planning office check to find out who owns the photos in the first place before allowing them to be published.
 
I'll need to ask about that but he did tell me that the site mentioned the reproduction of intellectual property is prohibited. Does that help?
 
Broadcaster said:
He happens to have some photos of the inside on a website.
Click to expand...

Broadcaster said:
he feels totally violated by the use of his own photos in this way.
Click to expand...

If I publish photos of the inside of my house on Askaboutmoney, I can't really object if someone else posts them somewhere else?

Well I can object, but I shouldn't feel violated.

If you are a visitor to my house, and you surreptitiously take photos, and then publish them, I could feel violated.

Or if I published them on a private Facebook Group, then I could probably feel violated, if someone posted them outside the group. Is that what happened?

What sort of website did your friend post photos of the inside of his house on?

Brendan
 
Broadcaster said:
does the planning office check to find out who owns the photos in the first place before allowing them to be published.
Click to expand...

No, they would have no way of validating ownership.

As above, what the general public are permitted to do with an online photo will very much depend on the site they were published on. How successful they might be in taking a copyright infringement action I don't know. I'm trying to think what there could be in a photo that would potentially jeopardise a planning application, but if there was something that could be problematic, it was foolish to publish that to the world.
 
I think they were displayed on an estate agent site some time ago. The T&Cs include : material may not be copied, reproduce, transmit, publicly perform, distribute, commercially exploit, adapt, translate, modify, bundle, merge, share or make available to any person, or create derivative works of such material or content.
I suppose my friend wants to ensure he can get the planning office to remove photos that he has not given permission for use outside of that one site. Seems reasonable to me but not sure as to the legal end of things.
 
Broadcaster said:
I suppose my friend wants to ensure he can get the planning office to remove photos that he has not given permission for use outside of that one site. Seems reasonable to me but not sure as to the legal end of things.
Click to expand...

He can't easily. It might require a civil action against the person who submitted them to force them to withdraw their submission. Attempting to alter someone else's submission directly via the local authority is unlikely to have any affect other than to raise alarms in the planning department.
 
He has no problem with anyone objecting to his planning application but is annoyed that this person has taken control of and used his own photos to try to make a case against him. Just a pity that it seems that although the website has T&C someone can still come along and copy the photos for their own use.
 
We live in a funny old world where someone can feel “totally violated” by something like this.

I’d say Fran felt “totally violated” in the last episode of Love/Hate.

Some punter who has uploaded photos to a website where someone has copied and pasted them, not so much.

Surely that’s only mild or partial violation? That if it’s even on the spectrum of violation.
 
Reactions: jpd
Broadcaster said:
A neighbour who is objecting to this application has copied my friend's photos and uploaded them to the planning application site to support his objection.
Click to expand...
Something is not adding up here. It's not possible for the neighbour to upload photos with an online observation/objection to a planning application as only text can be entered. However, if the neighbour sent his observation in hardcopy then he can include photos and what happens is the LA planning section will scan it into their website. There's no way they would scan in photos of the interior of the applicants home but they can't unsee them. Have you actually looked at the online LA file and seen the photos of the interior of your neighbours home for yourself?
Broadcaster said:
Question is, does the neighbour have a right to do this
Click to expand...
The neighbour can send in whatever he thinks supports his case. It's up to the LA planning section to decide what is suitable to scan onto their website.
Leo said:
I'm trying to think what there could be in a photo that would potentially jeopardise a planning application
Click to expand...
I'm curious about this too.
Broadcaster said:
I think they were displayed on an estate agent site some time ago.
Click to expand...
If there is something that would jeopardise your friends application then why would he leave this evidence on an estate agents website.
 
Last edited:
Reactions: Leo
Broadcaster strange one. Why does your friend need planning permission for changes to the inside of their home. Is it a listed building?
Did your friend have their have the property listed with an estate agent for rental when not permitted?
The bottom line if listed with estate agent for whatever reason rental or sale images supplied to planning are relevant.
Why would your friend be concerned with the images put up for the public on an estate agents website? Maybe you could provide additional detail. But to me it seems someone is trying to hide something. Planning will look at the images and rightly so and make a decision.
 
KOW said:
Did your friend have their have the property listed with an estate agent for rental when not permitted?
Click to expand...

HI KOW

Very interesting speculation.

I was wondering where the photos would be on a public website.

But why would rental not be permitted?

Brendan
 
Brendan Burgess said:
HI KOW

Very interesting speculation.

I was wondering where the photos would be on a public website.

But why would rental not be permitted?

Brendan
Click to expand...

Rental is not permitted under section 47 of planning Act for one off housing for the first five years of occupation to ensure houses are built for a need and not for speculation. Also strict guidelines are in place around the development of garages that are often converted into living units. Many have been converted into housing/rental units. The council in my area have sent out enforcement notices for such development.

I have never heard of an objection to works been carried out to the inside of a house. Broadcaster give us a brief outline of what works your friend needs to undertake internally to the house
 
KOW said:
Why does your friend need planning permission for changes to the inside of their home.
Click to expand...
For converting Garage or Attic into habitable rooms then planning permission might be needed for the former and in most cases would be needed for the latter. Headroom would be one reason. To get the required headroom to use attic space as habitable space then you'd more than likely need to add a dormer to get to (or close to) the 2.4m height over sufficient an area and this needs planning permission.
KOW said:
I have never heard of an objection to works been carried out to the inside of a house.
Click to expand...
Sometimes to convert a garage to a habitable room the applicant will want to extend out beyond the line of the house (and the neighbouring house) and may entail a new slab to support the new front facing wall and the new roof on the garage room (with a stated or implied intention to add another room on top of the garage room at a later date). A neighbour would have grounds to justify an objection.
In the case of the attic conversion with dormer a neighbour might feel justified to object on a number of grounds.
So you can see in these situations that although the new rooms involve alterations to existing internal rooms, they involve altering the externals of the house.

Like you I'd be interested to know what works the OP's friend wants to undertake and what the photos showed that the neighbour thought would support his objection.
 
Last edited:
the simplest thing now would be a link to the planning application
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Menu
Log in
Register