Does the cooperation between online anchors and platform accounts mean that their personal images can be used at will?Recently, the People's Court of Xiangzhou District, Zhuhai City, Guangdong Province concluded a personality rights dispute case, and the court ruled that the company must delete the relevant ** and publicly apologize.
Use of likeness without remuneration
In 2021, a cultural media in Zhuhai contacted Chen Linru to discuss cooperation in filming, and hired her as the anchor of the company's Douyin account.
Between December 2021 and April 2022, Chen worked with the company's team to shoot a number of **. The company posted ** on the "XX Zhuhai" Douyin account, and also used her portrait as the profile picture of the Douyin account, and left messages or replies to comments in the comment area in her name.
In the past six months, the company has neither signed a labor contract in accordance with the law, nor paid a salary that meets the standards, and even the expenses for traveling and horses, costumes, props, makeup and other expenses that were originally promised to be reimbursed during the filming period have not been cashed. Chen Linru said bluntly.
In May 2022, Chen Linru decided to stop cooperating and asked the company to delete all appearances on Douyin**. However, the company refused to delete ** on the grounds that she had worked for the company, and continued to use her portrait as an avatar, and replied to netizen comments in her voice.
Take it down** and apologize publicly
On May 30, 2022, Chen Linru applied for labor arbitration on the grounds that the company had not signed an employment contract with the employee. After mediation, it was agreed that the company would pay 160,000 yuan, the two parties reached a settlement.
Although the labor dispute has been resolved, Chen Linru believes that she has never signed an agreement with the company regarding the use of portrait rights, and has not authorized the company to continue to use her portrait after ceasing to shoot and there is no employment relationship. On September 28, 2022, Chen Linru complained to the Douyin platform, and the platform removed the relevant **. On October 8, the company asked the platform to restore all ** works in the account.
Chen Linru filed a lawsuit with the Xiangzhou Court, demanding that the company delete the ** involved in her, and publish an apology statement on the main page of the account, stay for a month, and compensate the lawsuit and mental losses of 10,000 yuan.
The use of the likeness is subject to authorization
After trial, the Xiangzhou court held that although Chen Linru and the company did not sign a written portrait license contract, before the termination of cooperation, she did not raise any objection to the company's release of the ** involved in the case, indicating that the two parties had actually established a license contract for Chen Linru's portrait.
According to the provisions of the Civil Code, if the parties have not agreed on the term of the portrait license or the agreement is not clear, either party may terminate the portrait license contract at any time, but shall notify the other party before a reasonable period.
After the trial, the court held that Chen Linru repeatedly requested the company to delete the ** involved in the case, indicating that she had notified the company to terminate the portrait license contract between the two parties, and it could be determined that the contract should be terminated at the latest on the date when the parties reached an arbitration settlement agreement. After the contract is terminated, the company is not allowed to use or disclose Chen Linru's portrait by means of publication, reproduction, distribution, rental, exhibition, etc., without her consent. However, until the ** involved in the case was removed from the platform, the company continued to use the ** involved in the case, and the company's above-mentioned behavior infringed on Chen Linru's portrait rights.
In the end, the court ordered the company to delete the ** involving Chen Linru on its Douyin account, publish an apology statement on the main page, and keep it for one month. Although the company infringed on Chen Linru's portrait rights, it did not deface her and other behaviors that damaged her personality, and after the other party complained, the ** involved in the case had been taken off the shelves, so the court did not support Chen Linru's litigation request for the company to compensate for mental losses of 10,000 yuan.
The judge handling the case reminded that the existence of an employment relationship or cooperative relationship between the company and the anchor does not mean that the anchor's portrait can be used at will. In order to avoid risks for both parties, it is necessary to jointly determine the details of what platform the portrait will be used on and whether there will be an expiration date by signing an agreement in advance. If the employment relationship or cooperative relationship between the two parties ends, and the company still wants to continue to use the anchor's portrait, it shall sign the corresponding authorization agreement. In addition, in this era of national live broadcasting, in many cases, the appearance of the anchor itself is traffic, and enterprises and practitioners should improve their awareness of portrait rights while using their external image to "do business".
*:Worker**.