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The monkey selfie case goes on: the court refuses settlement between PETA and photographer

by 16 Comments

When PETA and David Slater reached the settlement over the famous “monkey selfie case,” we thought it was finally over. Well, it appears that it wasn’t. The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals has refused the request to dismiss the case. In other words, we’ll soon hear an official appellate decision about the famous selfie.

To remind you, it all started in 2011 when Slater was photographing endangered crested black macaques in Sulawesi, Indonesia. One of the monkeys took his camera and snapped a few selfies. They went viral and eventually ended up on Wikimedia Commons under public domain. Slater asked Wikimedia to take the photos down, but they refused. They claimed the monkey pressed the shutter, so he was the copyright owner.

Then, in 2015, PETA got involved. They sued Slater, claiming that the monkey named Naruto should own the copyright to his selfie. This lawsuit even led to the Copyright Office releasing a document that establishes new policies and reaffirms the existing ones. It states that “The Office will not register works produced by nature, animals, or plants.”

The case went on, reportedly even leaving Slater broke. In September 2017, it finally ended in a settlement. Slater agreed to donate 25% of any future revenue from the famous selfies to charities that protect the habitats of crested macaques. But, I guess this wasn’t where it ended after all.

The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals refused to dismiss the case, stating that “the grant of a voluntary dismissal is not mandatory, and sometimes neither is it advisable.” They cited several previous cases where humans had tried to represent animals. Also, they mentioned other instances when requests for case dismissal were rejected. In spite of the settlement, the court believes it’s justified that they refuse it it. So, we will finally find out who is legally right in the bizarre PETA vs. Slater case.

[via Digital Trends]

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  • Tj Ó Seamállaigh

    with due respect, sometimes i feel really sick and diseased by such cultures.

  • *Benny Hill theme resumes playing*

  • Trino Pam

    PETA is pure evil. 🙁

  • Adrian Williams

    Maybe the crested black macaques should sit on the bench to judge the case.

  • What a waste of time and moneyy

  • dracphelan

    I’m betting they are going to lay the smack down on PETA over this.

    • The Nineth Circut … smack down on PETA … ? LOL no that’s not going to happen. The photographer is going to have his butt handed to him. Then the 9th and PETA are going high-five at a local vegan restaurant drinking wheatgrass smoothies in biodegradable containers.

  • rifki syahputra

    oh dear…

  • Alecio P

    Peta should really do something a little for productive for animals, when I think about this thing with the monkey selfie I have no respect for peta

    • Wouter Anquer

      If you knew everything PETA does, you’d not only not respect them but start seeing them as a domestic terrorist organisation…

  • Bryan Butterfield

    With this logic shouldn’t they ask the monkey if he wants his copyrighted image on a public domain site? Asking for a furry friend…

  • whitehound

    I think one of the points here is that so far as we know the macaque did not *know* he was producing a selfie – it was an accident. The arguments would be different in the case of, say, a painting produced by a chimp who had intentionally set out to make pretty coloured splashes on a canvas.

  • I really wonder why this monkey couldn’t testify before the court ? That should have ended this case !

  • Dave Robinson

    Pathetic, unbelievably pathetic!

  • Fred

    Well, this is a very interesting case because it raises all kinds of philosophical issues.
    Since PETA is complaining about animal rights and base their wisdom on such things as all beings having a right to be free from suffering, one has to consider some deeper underlying issues.

    I would assume that their classification of “being(s)” derives from an evolutionary worldview. In which case they are operating on a rather dubious self-defeating foundation. I say this because if their whole premise is based on that worldview then they really have absolutely no basis for claiming to own the rights to the definition of what is “suffering”. If all life is purely the result of some accidental, random event or events then there is really no basis for things like good, bad or evil. These kind of abstract words can only be meaningless and subjective in the absence of an almighty and overriding authority. One person’s good will be some other person’s evil. Similarly one “being”‘s suffering will be some other “being”‘s pleasure. So who decides which is which? Therein lies the rub – PETA claims to be that almighty overriding authority on the issue. Where do they get that from? Who are they to say what is suffering? or that certain “beings” are entitled to copyright ownership? In the evolutionary worldview, I have as much right as they to declare whatever I want to be good or evil and no one can contradict me on that – except if they want to bash it out with me in the street – or the bar – or the house – or wherever we run into each other, including the internet.

    Just so by the way – they have a love affair with Peter Singer’s writings. Perhaps they should consider whether the unborn living person has a right to a LIFE.

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