Another Great Deal: Pay $25 to give away your photographs

[RSL]

From the official rules for the Digital Photo Magazine B&W contest:

USE OF ENTRY: By submitting an entry, entrant grants the Sponsors and their designees an irrevocable, royalty-free, nonexclusive, worldwide perpetual license to use the entry and his/her name, city and state of residence for credit purposes in Sponsors' online galleries, without further compensation, notification or permission, unless prohibited by law. In addition, each winner grants to the Sponsors and their designees an irrevocable, royalty-free, nonexclusive, worldwide perpetual license to use and distribute the entry (as submitted, or as cropped by the Sponsors), and his/her name, city and state of residence for credit purposes, in any and all media now or hereafter known, including without limitation in Outdoor Photographer, Digital Photo and Digital Photo Pro magazines, for purposes of promotion of this Contest and other Sponsors' contests and/or for purposes of advertising and promoting the Sponsors and, except as otherwise stated herein, without further compensation, notification or permission, unless prohibited by law.

[Slobodan Blagojevic]

In fairness to them, it shall be noted that the use is restricted for "credit purposes" (for all participants) and contest promotion (for winners).

[Ken Bennett]

Yeah, I was waiting for the clause that allows them to sell the entries for stock.... Didn't see that. The rights granted seem reasonable for such a contest.

[RSL]

No kidding. I think you guys should get going and enter. The entry fee is $25. So if you win, you'll have paid them $25 to take unrestricted rights to your winning photographs. Not only that, you've given them an incontestable right to crop your pictures as they please as long as they attach your name for "credit." In other words, when they crop the hell out of one of your pictures and make it look ridiculous you'll still get "credit." Wow! Such a deal. Hard to beat.

[NancyP]

So why DO people enter these magazine-sponsored contests? Sometimes there's a first prize of a prosumer camera and lens, but presumably the entrant already has some similar camera. It's not like they are giving away Canon 1DXs or 500mm f/4 L lenses. Getting recognition for your skills is better done locally if you are thinking about picking up a paid job or two.

[louoates]

My take on it is that many of those so-called contests are like a lottery. But with a crappy payout. Easy cash flow and little effort. Some contests by little-known entities have turned out to be rip-off  stock photo sites who use the contest gimmick to generate huge numbers of entries that they sell as legitimate stock images. And they do find enough suckers to send in their best images and pay for the privilege. The contest that triggered this topic may be legit but it's still a lousy deal. Those kinds of rights divestiture agreements can be so one-sided because few photographers understand what they're accepting.

[Rob C]

Just like the banks; nobody understands the language, not even the banks.

Rob C