CNN's I-Report: robbing photographers blind.

Now that sharing video and image files is easier than ever before, major news outlets are quick to exploit amateur and budding professional photographers. Scams like CNN's I-Report invite us to send in provocative imagery for potential, unpaid use in for-profit media. This extends beyond the I-Report homepage I've linked. User-submitted photographs often appear accompanying the headline article on CNN.com, saving the company hundreds (if not thousands) in licensing fees from agencies like AP, AFP, Getty, etc.

The terms of use, which one must agree to before sending anything in, stipulate that

you hereby grant to CNN and its affiliates a non-exclusive, perpetual, worldwide license to edit, telecast, rerun, reproduce, use, syndicate, license, print, sublicense, distribute and otherwise exhibit the materials you submit, or any portion thereof, as incorporated in any of their programming or the promotion thereof, in any manner and in any medium or forum, whether now known or hereafter devised, without payment to you or any third party.

What amazes me is how many people will sign their content away, unaware that it has monetary value. That CNN and other news organizations are replacing top-of-the line content with stuff they're getting via email bothers me. It's certainly not the quality of the images and video. It's the increased profit that comes from unpaid talent.