Tourism Australia, Australia, Gov

About This Organisation

Tourism Australia

About this Organisation

Tourism Australia is the Australian Government agency responsible for the international and domestic marketing of Australia as a destination for leisure and business travel.

Under the Tourism Australia Act (2004) their objectives are set out as follows:

To influence people to travel to Australia, including for events;
To influence people travelling to Australia to also travel throughout Australia;
To influence Australians to travel throughout Australia, including for events;
To help foster a sustainable tourism industry in Australia; and
To help increase the economic benefits to Australia from tourism.

Their total revenue in 2009 was in excess of $161 million of which the tax payer contributed $137 million. They are governed by a Board of Directors who report to the Australian Federal Minister for Tourism, the Hon Martin Ferguson AM, MP.

About this Report

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Competitions or appeals seeking submissions of creative works from the public, works such as photos, videos, poems, music, etc., are reviewed by the Bill of Rights campaign. The reviews are to help you decide whether you should participate in the competition or appeal. The only thing you need to understand is that when you create a work (e.g. a photo) the law automatically makes you the sole beneficiary of certain rights over that work (but see note 1 below). These rights are called intellectual property rights.

Rights have a value and you are free to decide what that value is. If a person or organisation would like to use your work to promote something, you have the right to refuse permission, or to set a fee for a specific use and decide how long they may use it. More information about intellectual property rights and their value to you as an individual can be read in our Guide to Rights & Licensing. Listed on the next tab are some competitions or appeals promoted by the above organisation. For each we detail how the organisation's terms and conditions will exploit your rights to their advantage for works you submit to their competition or appeal.

A copy of this report was submitted to the organisation to help them review and change their terms and conditions. We also took the opportunity to invite them to join the Bill of Rights Supporters' Group. This would have enabled them to enjoy the benefits of being a member of a group which supports and respects others' intellectual property rights. Unfortunately the negotiations did not conclude successfully.

The main aims of the Bill of Rights Campaign are to help everyone understand that their intellectual property rights have a value and to encourage competition and appeal organisers to adopt the standards set out in the Bill of Rights for Artists.

Note 1. Rights for works created as an employee are usually owned by your employer.

About Their Competitions

How this Organisation's Competitions or Appeals are Listed

How to Use this Tab

Listed below in order of closing date are the competitions or appeals promoted by this organisation that have been reviewed by the Bill of Rights for Artists campaign. To see the review of each competition or appeal just click on its title and a window will open to reveal its details.

The following information is provided for each competition or appeal;

the terms and conditions that impact on your intellectual property rights for any works you submit;
an explanation of how the terms and conditions will affect you and the rights you have in any work you submit to it;
a list of any other organisations sponsoring the competition or appeal;
who you should contact and how to complain to the organisation concerned.

There's Nothing Like Australia; closing date 12 May 2010

There's Nothing Like Australia

Closing Date 12 May 2010

TERMS AND CONDITIONS AT 20 APRIL 2010

11. By entering the Promotion, Eligible Entrants absolutely and unconditionally assign (and agree to use their best endeavours to procure any relevant third parties to absolutely and unconditionally assign) to the Promoter all right, title and interest in all intellectual property rights in their entry, including ownership of intellectual property rights in any photograph that forms part of an entry.

12. By entering the Promotion, Eligible Entrants acknowledge that their entry may be used by the Promoter, the Promoter's related entities, agencies engaged by the Promoter, or any other third party nominated by the Promoter, for the Promoter's current and future promotional and marketing purposes without further reference or compensation to them. Eligible Entrants unconditionally and irrevocably:

(a) consent to any act or omission that would otherwise infringe any of their moral rights in their entry (as defined in Part IX of the Copyright Act 1968 (Cth)) and present and future rights of a similar nature conferred by statute anywhere in the world whether occurring before or after this consent is given (Moral Rights); and

(b) waive all Moral Rights in their entry that arise outside Australia.

The Promoter is listed in the terms as Tourism Australia.

HOW THE TERMS AND CONDITIONS AT 20 APRIL 2010 AFFECT YOU

We are lost for words to describe how we feel about the above terms and conditions as set by an agency of the Australian Government. Their terms and conditions remove all rights held by entrants, including copyright and moral rights. While the terms set by the Australian Government for this contest might be legal, they heap shame on those who drafted and approved them.

Not only is the Australian Goverment setting terms that nullify the rights that entrants have under Australian law, they are seeking to nullify via rule 12b) rights entrants enjoy under the laws of other countries.

As they say in the competition title "There's Nothing Like Australia", a most unfortunate choice of title.

TERMS AND CONDITIONS AT 18 MAY 2010

11. By entering the Promotion, Eligible Entrants grant Tourism Australia a non-exclusive, perpetual, irrevocable, worldwide, royalty-free, transferrable licence to use, reproduce, publish, modify, adapt, distribute, store, run, display, creative derivative works from, cause to be seen or heard and communicate to the public the entry (or including the photograph and text that forms part of the entry) in all media.

(b) waive all Moral Rights in their entry that arise outside Australia.

HOW THESE TERMS AND CONDITIONS AT 18 MAY 2010 WILL AFFECT YOU

On 18 May 2010 we recieved a letter from the Office of the Australian Minister for Tourism, The Hon Martin Ferguson AM MP. That letter indicated that Tourism Australia had revised the rules following feedback from Pro-Imaging and others.

Unfortunately, as you can see from the revised rules listed above, all they have done is to relinquish their claim for copyright. The new rules set by Tourism Australia still claim the right to use all the entrants submissions for ever, for any purpose they wish, freely, with no credit, and in any media. They still require all entrants to waive their moral rights, not only under Australian law, but such rights as they enjoy under the laws of other countries.

We are dismayed that the Australian Governments Tourism Department continue with their limitless greed for others intellectual property rights, even to the extent of attempting to nullify certain provisions of intellectual property laws in other countries. We leave it to the reader to consider what ethical principles Tourism Australia followed when drafting such terms and conditions.

The following summarise where the current T&C's fail to comply with the Bill of Rights.

The terms and conditions require you to waive your moral rights. This means you will not be able to object to how your work is used in future, such as it being altered in a manner you may find derogatory, or if it is used to promote a product or cause you find objectionable. You have also lost your right to be credited as the author of your work.
The terms and conditions do not state you will always be credited when your work is reproduced.
The terms and conditions state that if you win, or are a potential winner, you are required to complete various additional forms, but the terms and conditions of these additional forms are not displayed on the competition or appeal website. This is like being asked to sign a blank cheque. It is not an acceptable business practice to require you to accept all the terms and conditions when submitting a work but fail to display all the terms and conditions that will ultimately apply.
The terms and conditions are granting the organiser unlimited use of your work for ever. For non-winning works a usage time limit of 5 years or less should be set with usage limited solely to promoting the competition or appeal. Winning works can be used for ever but only in a permanent winners gallery with the sole purpose of promoting a recurring competition or appeal.
The terms and conditions grant the organiser the right to use your work beyond that needed to promote the competition or appeal. Your work will be used for other purposes. Usage of your work should be restricted solely to promoting the competition or appeal. If the organisation wishes to use your work for any other purpose the organisation should negotiate with you independently of the competition. You should have the right to negotiate an appropriate fee for the specific use they want to make of your work and to set a time limit on such use. You should also have the right to refuse use of your work. For further information on fees and licensing refer to the Introduction to Rights and Licensing.

The above may help you to decide not to submit any works to this competition or appeal. For further guidance please read the Bill of Rights for Artists.

SPONSORS

None listed

CONTACT

To complain to the organiser use this contact form and mark it for the attention of the Chairman of Tourism Australia, Rick Allert AO.

The Minister responsible to for Tourism Australia is the Hon Martin Ferguson AM, MP He supports this organisation with over $137 million of public money. You can complain to him by using this email address; This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it

We submitted, in private, a copy of this report to the Minister responsible for Tourism Australia. This was submitted along with an email setting out the positive benefits of changing the terms and conditions of this competition and of becoming a member of the Bill of Rights Supporters Group. Our invitation to change the rules to comply with the Bill of Rights was declined by the Minister.

To visit the competition website click the competition title above to submit the free image we have created. Note that the competition link may cease to work at some point after the competition results are announced.

You can help the Bill of Rights campaign by complaining to the organiser urging them to change their terms and conditions. If time is at a premium for you we have prepared a complaint email which you can copy and send to the organiser. Alternatively, or as well as, you can submit the free image we have prepared to register your complaint simply by entering the free image to the contest.

Where a contest automatically displays entrants images on the contest website as they arrive the free image can also be used to test the competition and determine if it is stripping metadata. The test results can be submitted to a survey by the Controlled Vocabulary Group.

The Bill of Rights campaign depends on your active support, your help will make a difference.

Updated on 20 April 2010

Failing the Bill of Rights

The Bill of Rights Standards for Photography Competitions

Competitions which meet all the standards set out in the Bill of Rights For Artists do not do any of the following -

claim copyright
seek waiving of moral rights
fail to give a credit for all free usage
add, alter, or remove metadata from submissions
seek usage rights other than for solely and exclusively promoting the contest. Note that a book, posters, cards, or a calendar are seen as legitimate ways of promoting the contest and defraying costs
seek free usage rights in excess of 5 years
use the submissions commercially without the entrant's agreement, and such commercial usage is to be subject to a freely negotiated license independently of the competition.
make it a condition of winning that an entrant must sign a commercial usage agreement
fail to publish all documents on the competition website that an entrant may have to sign
fail to name the judges for this or last year's competition
fail to explicitly state all the organisations who will acquire rights to the submissions
set a closing date more than 18 months after the contest launch date
fail to make clear statements of rights claimed and how submissions are used.

We have written an Organisers Guide to the Bill of Rights to help organisers draft terms and conditions that respect the rights of entrants and at the same time provide legal protection for the organiser.

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The above text may be reproduced providing a link is given to the Bill of Rights For Artists.

Any text reproduced above in italics has been extracted from a competition website for the purposes of review.

Organisations who would like to be promoted as a Bill of Rights Supporter and have their competitions promoted on the Rights On List can use this contact form. One of the campaign team will get in touch with you.