Getty Images, one of the two power-house photo agencies in the US is facing a barrage of questions from photo editors across the nation about their business dealings conflicting with their editorial decisions. As a wire service, hundreds of newspapers depend on the news feed Getty Images provides. But recently there have been charges that Getty Images which has business relationships with the National Hockey League (NHL) and the National Basketball Association (NBA), has failed to send through their service some poignant and editorially important images.
The most recent controversy sprung from the lack of images from the infamous ice hockey game between the Vancouver Canucks and Colorado Avalanche. Colarado's Steve Moore was sucker punched by Todd Bertuzzi of the Canucks. Moore fell face forward and broke his neck and ended his season. But curiously there were no images of this particular incident on the Getty wire service. Naturally Colorado papers using the service will be miffed.
Is Getty Images censoring their own photographers, on behalf of their business partners – the NHL, the NBA or more recently the Major League Baseball (MLB)? Who looses in the end? Not only do the photographers loose the sale of the image nation or even world-wide, but so does the audience from seeing what happened. While I am open to the idea of promoting businesses, I get antsy when editorial freedom gets curbed in the process. It kills the notion of ‘what you see is what you get' and that's plain troubling. It's time to revisit our Ethics 101 books about this.
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Tim says
That’s facinating. Suppose it is the case that the censor certain photos, would it be ok? Certainly newspapers censor many many photos before they put up the “right” one.
Tim says
That’s facinating. Suppose it is the case that the censor certain photos, would it be ok? Certainly newspapers censor many many photos before they put up the “right” one.
Seshu says
Well there is such a thing as balance – between taste and censorship. Newspapers do edit (I wouldn’t necessarily call it censorship) images all the time. Not all images can be displayed (again with consideration of time, space and taste). Taste is a subjective thing. There are gory images from the Rwandan war that we’ll never ever see, yet they have been shot by James Nachtwey and others. We, in America, are much to skittish about things like that. Those same images have been published in Europe. It’s what our culture will dictate (or self-censor, if you will). But this post was about how one company seems to see fit to cut out images from controversial and somewhat ugly moments in sports history. If you were a newspaper in Colorado, in this instance, and were subscribing to the Getty wire service (which is at a premium as well), you would be pretty upset that the image from THE game of the year (in terms of hockey is concerned) didn’t make it to the top of your sports section. It prevents the newspaper from telling the story in full. And that’s plain wrong.
Seshu says
Well there is such a thing as balance – between taste and censorship. Newspapers do edit (I wouldn’t necessarily call it censorship) images all the time. Not all images can be displayed (again with consideration of time, space and taste). Taste is a subjective thing. There are gory images from the Rwandan war that we’ll never ever see, yet they have been shot by James Nachtwey and others. We, in America, are much to skittish about things like that. Those same images have been published in Europe. It’s what our culture will dictate (or self-censor, if you will). But this post was about how one company seems to see fit to cut out images from controversial and somewhat ugly moments in sports history. If you were a newspaper in Colorado, in this instance, and were subscribing to the Getty wire service (which is at a premium as well), you would be pretty upset that the image from THE game of the year (in terms of hockey is concerned) didn’t make it to the top of your sports section. It prevents the newspaper from telling the story in full. And that’s plain wrong.