Using Photos on Yelp for my App

[Confused Develo]

What is the name of your state (only U.S. law)? California

I am creating a phone app that would use unedited pictures that were originally posted on yelp. I understand that using photos on a website or app without explicit permission from the owner is illegal; however, after reading through yelp's Terms of Service, I am uncertain whether or not using photos on yelp would be illegal.

According to yelp's TOS (5. Content, B. Our Right to Use Your Content),

We may use Your Content in a number of different ways, including publicly displaying it, reformatting it, incorporating it into advertisements and other works, creating derivative works from it, promoting it, distributing it, and allowing others to do the same in connection with their own websites and media platforms ("Other Media"). As such, you hereby irrevocably grant us world-wide, perpetual, non-exclusive, royalty-free, assignable, sublicensable, transferable rights to use Your Content for any purpose. Please note that you also irrevocably grant the users of the Site and any Other Media the right to access Your Content in connection with their use of the Site and any Other Media. Finally, you irrevocably waive, and cause to be waived, against Yelp and its users any claims and assertions of moral rights or attribution with respect to Your Content. By "use" we mean use, copy, publicly perform and display, reproduce, distribute, modify, translate, remove, analyze, commercialize, and prepare derivative works of Your Content.

My uncertainty was caused from what I put in bold. The wording makes it seem like the photo's original poster has granted yelp as well as all of yelp's users (as defined earlier in the TOS as someone who accesses, browses, crawls, scrapes, or in any way uses yelp), the right to use their content (photos) in connection to their usage of yelp as well as any Other Media (Other Media as defined in the paragraph as including one's own website and media platforms -- which would include my phone app). Now I've only taken a semester of business law a few semesters ago in college so my legal knowledge is very limited, but it seems to me that I am legally allowed to use another yelp user's posted photo on my phone app.

Of course, my above paragraph was under the assumption that the "right to access Your Content" is equivalent to having the right to use the posted content on my app. Or does "right to access" only mean that I am allowed to view the photos on yelp and Other Media that yelp has given permission to use the photos?

Also, the next sentence in the TOS seems to state (according to my interpretation) that the photo's original poster waives the right to claim that that yelp or any of its users (me) are claiming ownership when using that person's photo. Does this mean that the photo's original poster could not sue me on the basis of me "stealing" their photo by using it on my app? Or is the sentence stating that the user cannot sue yelp or me for using "their" photo as they waive any attribution to that content?

If I am interpreting anything incorrectly (which I probably am), please correct me. Thanks for the help.

 

[quincy]

What is the name of your state (only U.S. law)? California

I am creating a phone app that would use unedited pictures that were originally posted on yelp. I understand that using photos on a website or app without explicit permission from the owner is illegal; however, after reading through yelp's Terms of Service, I am uncertain whether or not using photos on yelp would be illegal.

According to yelp's TOS (5. Content, B. Our Right to Use Your Content),

We may use Your Content in a number of different ways, including publicly displaying it, reformatting it, incorporating it into advertisements and other works, creating derivative works from it, promoting it, distributing it, and allowing others to do the same in connection with their own websites and media platforms ("Other Media"). As such, you hereby irrevocably grant us world-wide, perpetual, non-exclusive, royalty-free, assignable, sublicensable, transferable rights to use Your Content for any purpose. Please note that you also irrevocably grant the users of the Site and any Other Media the right to access Your Content in connection with their use of the Site and any Other Media. Finally, you irrevocably waive, and cause to be waived, against Yelp and its users any claims and assertions of moral rights or attribution with respect to Your Content. By "use" we mean use, copy, publicly perform and display, reproduce, distribute, modify, translate, remove, analyze, commercialize, and prepare derivative works of Your Content.

My uncertainty was caused from what I put in bold. The wording makes it seem like the photo's original poster has granted yelp as well as all of yelp's users (as defined earlier in the TOS as someone who accesses, browses, crawls, scrapes, or in any way uses yelp), the right to use their content (photos) in connection to their usage of yelp as well as any Other Media (Other Media as defined in the paragraph as including one's own website and media platforms -- which would include my phone app). Now I've only taken a semester of business law a few semesters ago in college so my legal knowledge is very limited, but it seems to me that I am legally allowed to use another yelp user's posted photo on my phone app.

Of course, my above paragraph was under the assumption that the "right to access Your Content" is equivalent to having the right to use the posted content on my app. Or does "right to access" only mean that I am allowed to view the photos on yelp and Other Media that yelp has given permission to use the photos?

Also, the next sentence in the TOS seems to state (according to my interpretation) that the photo's original poster waives the right to claim that that yelp or any of its users (me) are claiming ownership when using that person's photo. Does this mean that the photo's original poster could not sue me on the basis of me "stealing" their photo by using it on my app? Or is the sentence stating that the user cannot sue yelp or me for using "their" photo as they waive any attribution to that content?

If I am interpreting anything incorrectly (which I probably am), please correct me. Thanks for the help.

You are free to access the copyrighted content on Yelp but you have not been granted any rights in the copyrighted content. It is Yelp that has been granted non-exclusive rights in the content posted to its site, which allows Yelp to exercise the same rights held by the copyright holders.

Because the rights granted Yelp are non-exclusive, the copyright holder retains rights to the content they contribute to the site.

Bottom line: You would need to get permission from the copyright holders to use any copyrighted photos for your phone app.

 

[Confused Develo]

You are free to access the copyrighted content on Yelp but you have not been granted any rights in the copyrighted content. It is Yelp that has been granted non-exclusive rights in the content posted to its site, which allows Yelp to exercise the same rights held by the copyright holders.

Because the rights granted Yelp are non-exclusive, the copyright holder retains rights to the content they contribute to the site.

Bottom line: You would need to get permission from the copyright holders to use any copyrighted photos for your phone app.

Thank you for the quick reply. Would I need to get permission from both yelp and the photo poster or just one of them? I'm assuming just one of them would suffice.

 

[quincy]

Thank you for the quick reply. Would I need to get permission from both yelp and the photo poster or just one of them? I'm assuming just one of them would suffice.

It appears from what you have quoted of Yelp's TOS that Yelp has the right to license or assign or transfer to others the rights that they have in the content posted on their site. Given that, you would need to get permission from either Yelp or from the author/creator of the copyrighted material, but you would not need to get permission from both Yelp and the content creator.

You might wish to have reviewed by an attorney in your area all specifics.

Good luck with your phone app.