Getty Images: copyright hawk or corporate appropriator?

This working paper explores the dual pull, often felt at both organisational and individual levels, towards simultaneously asserting one’s own intellectual property and appropriating other people’s. It does so with specific reference to Getty Images, the largest commercial archive in the world. The paper begins by scrutinizing how Getty Images amassed and safeguards its vast image repository, highlighting three elements that have underpinned its rapid growth: takeovers, litigation, and platformisation. The paper’s focus then shifts to the role of appropriation in the company's historical and current activities, and in particular to how the company differs from public archives in how it approaches content with ambiguous copyright. The paper concludes by reflecting on the current legal dispute between Getty Images and Stability AI, and highlighting the contradictory stance held by Getty Images towards the emergence of generative AI.