Hey, there! Log in / Register
Edge of Censorship
By adamg on Sun, 09/07/2008 - 10:26am
Paul Keleher happened to be in South Station yesterday when "Edge of Darkness" crews took over parts of the place to film their movie. He reports:
The South Station was full of electrical cables, equipment trunks, lighting arrays and cameras, not to mention a small army of the film crew. Security was very tight, yet polite. I was asked to stop photographing a few times.
Since South Station is a public place, Keleher declined.
Topics:
Free tagging:
Ad:
Support Universal Hub
Help keep Universal Hub going. If you like what we're up to and want to help out, please consider a (completely non-deductible) contribution.
Comments
not a public place
Just for your information, South Station is not a "public place." The MBTA owns it.
as the MBTA is a state
as the MBTA is a state agency, "a body politic, and a political subdivision of the Commonwealth" according to their website, is it any less public than the Statehouse or a state park?
Not to mention
No where is there any policy which prohibits photography on MBTA property. There are restrictions regarding tripods, etc, but no prohibitions. Too bad MBTA staff seems to be largely unaware of this, it really reflects very poorly on them.
they do have a photo policy
you can read it on line by searching MBTA photograph policy
they *did* have one that
they *did* have one that prevented public photography but it was repealed about a year ago
they *do* have one
right now they have one, it has an issue date of July 9, 2007. Call the T yourself and ask them about it. It states that any person taking photos for non-commercial/personal use must ID themselves to T officials. I'm not the biggest fan of the T but in this case it does seem like they are looking out for people's safety, you know with terrorism and all.
So we're on the same page
You can get a copy here.
they can ID you but they can
they can ID you but they can no longer ask you to stop, nor do they require a permit
They do indeed;
but that's not what I said. I said no where is there any policy which prohibits photography on MBTA property. The current policy basically prohibits use of tripods and requires photographers identify themselves to MBTA officials if asked. They can ask photographers not to take photographs all they want, but it is well within the photographer's right to refuse such a request. The policy grants MBTA officials no authority to ban photography.
isn't that a "prohibition?"
The way that policy reads to me says that if someone doesn't ID themselves then they can't take photos. That sounds like a prohibition to me. Like with driving laws...a person who has no license is "prohibited" from driving a car.
Just because the MBTA says (or writes) it - doesn't make it so
We just addressed this in the comments section of a recent UH entry MBTA guys warn photographer....
The law in the USA is very clear. You can take all the pictures you want from property you own or from public property commonly accesible to the general public (like...the lobby of a subway station)!
The only restrictions are that you can't take pictures of folks who have a reasonable expectation of privacy (eg, in restrooms, dressing rooms etc.) without their consent, nor can you take pictures of some military or nuclear facilities. And if you want to sell pictures that have images of certain types of copyrighted works (like sculptures, murals, etc), you may have to get permission. (But you're still free to take the pictures in the first place).
Miseducated government and private employees are always trying to tell people that they are restricted from taking pictures from public property. They are nearly always blowing smoke. Check out The Photographer's Right.