Rumor had it that Amazon would be opening 300-400 brick-and-mortar stores in the upcoming years this past Tuesday, according to a Wall Street Journal article. By Wednesday the original source admitted his words were not the plans of Amazon, but not without getting the hopes up of several reporters and many Americans old enough to remember Borders. The reality of a future with the perks of digital commerce and the advantage of neighborhood stores may be a short lived dream, but it is an indication that we are not completely sold on the idea of a future with total digital reliance.

The rumor all began with Sandeep Mathrani, CEO of General Growth Properties (GCP), a real estate investment trust that specializes in shopping malls. During an investor call, Mr. Mathrani reportedly said, “You’ve got Amazon opening bricks and mortar bookstores, and their goal is to open, as I understand, 300 to 400 bookstores.” The Wall Street Journal took Mr. Mathrani’s word about the stores, and soon other reporters were spreading the word about Amazon’s new plan for a bookstore on a corner near you. Just yesterday though, GCP distanced itself from comments made by the CEO. The company iterated that the CEO’s statements did not represent Amazon’s plans.

The first Amazon bookstore opened in Seattle this past November, so it is not hard to believe they could exist. In Seattle, Amazon’s store stocks its shelves with the most popular selling titles online. Similar to other bookstores, Amazon sells related products such as its own Kindles and even Bose headphones. Any items sold in the store match the price of items online, so the prices are not displayed on the actual books or anywhere next to the books in the store. Instead customers have to scan the books in the store or use an App on their phone to find out prices, which one visitor in Seattle found to be an “infuriating difference” in what first appeared to be a normal bookstore.

Why would Amazon even need bookstores though, especially if they were one of the reasons for the decline of so many bookstores a few years ago? Well, it has been interpreted as a new trend for online retailers. E-tailers such as Birchbox, Warby Parker, and Bonbons use retail stores as a way of expanding their brand name, while mall retailers welcome the companies to fill in the vacancies of traditional stores closing in their malls. Sometimes these physical stores only come in pop up form, but whether they are there for one day or five months, physical stores allow customers to try out the items they’re interested in purchasing. Amazon needs little help expanding the brand’s name, but the stores would be helpful in promoting its new Echo speaker and Fire TV.

Along with worrying whether the bookstores were indeed real, some blogs assured readers not to get their hopes up. However, this warning wasn’t because of the speculation about the actual bookstores, but rather because the bookstores would not resemble those of the past. Fast Company noted the bookstores as “part showroom/boutique, part warehouse, part pickup and shipping window, and, yes, part traditional bookstore.” In some respects the furor over the Amazon bookstores surfaced from our own expectations of the past to return. Bookstores were always more than just a place to buy books. They were alcoves in neighborhoods where all generations could lose themselves in the surrounding titles of narratives, cookbooks, historical novels, and other works. Hopefully, Amazon realizes mixing a little bit of the past with the future would not be such a bad rumor to prove true.

Dorsey Hill

Dorsey is a member of Barnard College’s class of 2016 with a major in Urban Studies and concentration in Political Science. As a native of Chicago and resident of New York City, Dorsey loves to explore the multiple cultural facets of cities. She has a deep interest in social justice issue especially those relevant to urban environments. Contact Dorsey at Staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

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Memes are fun–they’re customizable, shareable, and all over the internet. But they do bring up some important questions about copyright laws and photo ownership. For example, many of you have probably seen the “confused face girl” meme that has gone viral all over social media. While most people find this meme utterly hilarious, a news story spread last week that the “face” of the meme–a girl named Keisha Johnson–wasn’t laughing. In fact, she supposedly tried to sue Instagram for $500 million for copyright infringement and defamation because people keep using a picture of her posted on Instagram as a meme. This story ended up being a fake, created by the satirical news outlet OD Gossip, but news organizations who didn’t know any better still picked it up.

Thanks Hundike

Here were the made-up details of Johnson’s legal battle:

The 16-year-old Alabama native was just hanging out with her friends when one of them took a bad photo of her and uploaded it to Instagram. Almost instantly, the photo went viral and was shared on millions of profiles, including those of celebrities. In addition to turning the photo into a meme, people everywhere have been posing for their own “confused face” photos in apparent attempt to mock Johnson. Clearly embarrassed by the photo, Johnson said, “my face looked ugly like I was about to throw up. I look nothing like that in real life… I’m really a bad b*tch!”

While this made-up girl named Keisha Johnson did not, obviously, sue Instagram for $500 million, the story and resulting press attention got me thinking: what would happen if someone were to actually sue Instagram? Well, according to the Instagram terms and conditions that every user must agree to before they sign up for the social media site, people who use the network are responsible for the content that they choose to share.  Now in fairness, in the hypothetical story, Johnson was not the one who posted the photo. However, according to the terms, her friends would have been 100 percent responsible for choosing to embarrass their friend. So hypothetically, if the girl in the photo were to sue someone, it’s her friends who are responsible for deciding to post a bad photo of her, not Instagram.

The site OD Gossip also released another fake story about another fake lawsuit–this time over a selfie that was turned into a meme. According to OD Gossip, “Makayla Edwards,” known more commonly as the topless boy/girl face a** meme, has also decided to file a defamation lawsuit against Instagram. Just like the story about Johnson, this is a hoax, but there have been millions of photos posted to people’s Instagram accounts making fun of the meme. The photo has also popped up on sites like Facebook and Twitter.

Now as previously established, the fake “Makayla Edwards” cannot sue Instagram for people choosing to repost her photo. But, is there anything stopping her from suing the people who reposted her photo? In order to figure this out, I looked into copyright laws and how they apply to social media selfies.

First, it’s important to understand the basic copyright laws for online images. Copyright attaches to a work, in this case an image, as soon as it is created. Unlike with patents and trademarks, people do not need to apply for a copyright, it’s automatic. So once you create an image–by drawing it, creating it on the computer, or by taking a photo–you have the rights to do whatever you want with it. This includes reproducing it, displaying it publicly, altering it, selling it, and distributing it.

But most of us don’t create our own images, we use ones created by others. In order to legally use someone else’s image, you must get express permission from the copyright owner and, once you get permission, give them proper credit for the image. Now, there are ways that you can legally use a copyrighted image without getting permission, such as by using one with a creative commons license, but these likely do not apply to social media photos.

So what are the rules when it comes to social media, where people constantly and publicly post their photos for anyone to see? According to Social Media Today, images posted on social media sites are still bound by copyright. This means that if you want to use or re-post someone else’s photo on Facebook or Instagram, you need their permission.

So these made-up lawsuits are not completely ridiculous–they probably could happen, although for way less money. However, if anyone has a reason to sue, it’s the person who took the picture, not the girl in it. And they wouldn’t be suing Instagram, but the millions of people who re-posted the photo without permission. Still, next time you snap a silly selfie, or take a bad picture of a friend, these rules are something to keep in mind.

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Brittany Alzfan (@BrittanyAlzfan) is a student at the George Washington University majoring in Criminal Justice. She was a member of Law Street’s founding Law School Rankings team during the summer of 2014. Contact Brittany at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

Featured image courtesy of [Shawn Ahmed via Flickr]

Brittany Alzfan

Brittany Alzfan is a student at the George Washington University majoring in Criminal Justice. She was a member of Law Street’s founding Law School Rankings team during the summer of 2014. Contact Brittany at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

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