Don't forget: professional photographers have another chance to fight the existing 1099 reporting requirement. We need you to make your voices heard by contacting your congressperson today to bring H.R. 5141 - the Small Business Paperwork Mandate Elimination Act out of committee.

Rep. Dan Lundgren's (R-3rd -CA) bill, H.R. 5141, fully repeals Section 9006 of the new health care law that mandates small business owners to file a 1099 form for every business-to-business transaction over $600 a year. This new reporting requirement will wreak havoc on small businesses (like photography studios) by drastically increasing their paperwork burden.

This new reporting requirement has nothing to do with improving health care...it is just another way to raise government revenue on the backs of small-business owners, while forcing them to spend more time on regulatory compliance than on running their businesses.

On Tuesday, September 14th, the Senate voted not to include a repeal of the 1099 reporting requirement in their version of H.R. 5297 - Small Business Jobs Act of 2010. With the Senate's passage of the bill, the House now has an opportunity to make sure a repeal provision is included!

We need 218 members of Congress to sign on to the discharge petition. Contact your congressperson today and urge him/her to sign the petition, so Congress can vote to stop this new paperwork tidal wave. Visit the Contact Congress page now to call, write or e-mail.

In addition to representing members on copyright issues, SAA is a strong advocate on small business issues, primarily relating to health care. Through the Small Business Coalition for Affordable Healthcare, SAA advocates health care solutions that meet the needs of small business owners, employees, the self-employed and their families. In previous congressional sessions, SAA has supported various health reform bills, in particular those that would provide trade associations the ability to create insurance pools on behalf of its members.

Stock Artists Alliance joins a new organization to aid in the preservation of digital collections for the benefit of citizens now and in the future.

WASHINGTON, August 4, 2010—–The Stock Artists Alliance (SAA) is proud to announce their affiliation as a founding member of the National Digital Stewardship Alliance (NDSA). NSDA was created in conjunction with partners of the National Digital Information Infrastructure and Preservation Program (NDIIPP) to aid in the preservation of digital collections for the benefit of citizens now and in the future.

The Library of Congress is organizing NDSA as an outgrowth of the NDIIPP. It is truly a collaborative effort among government agencies, educational institutions, non-profit organizations and business entities.

"During the past several years, the Standardized Metadata for Stock Photography project made significant contributions to the NDIIPP network,” stated Lauren Campbell, the Associate Librarian for Strategic Initiatives Chief Information Officer at the Library of Congress. “This project determined current metadata practices and identified problems in metadata preservation; developed Photometadata.org to educate the SAA membership and other interested parties about best practices for metadata in the field of photography; and also conducted outreach activities to promote improved metadata handling and related preservation practices at SAA education seminars and imaging conferences."

Those activities have forwarded the understanding and practices of the digital preservation community as a whole. With the creation of NDSA and SAA joining as a founding member, the goal is continue the progress.

In addition to being the only photographic trade association focused on the business of stock photography, SAA also created the Photo Metadata Project to promote industry-wide use of standardized photo metadata in every digital file. For more information, please visit www.photometadata.org.

Contact: Claire White
888-722-1334
www.stockartistsalliance.org
www.photometadata.org

Recently stock image distributors have sent messages to their contributors offering to file to collect reprographic royalties in the United Kingdom from the Design and Artists Copyright Society (DACS). SAA suggests that contributors would do better to file a claim directly with the DACS website.

Background
DACS is the British visual arts organization which collects and distributes reprographic reproduction royalties for various non-user-specific uses of visual imagery in the UK. DACS distributes royalties to visual artists based on collective licenses for educational uses (including TV and radio), photocopying of books and magazines, and cable retransmissions

The DACS website says the following: "Each year DACS has £3 million [$4.4 million] of royalties to distribute to visual artists whose work has been reproduced in UK books or magazines or on certain television channels. DACS negotiates these royalties on behalf of visual artists. Last year DACS paid out a share of £3 million to 11,628 visual artists.

"Payback royalties come from revenue generated through collective licensing schemes. Collective licensing is used in situations where it would be difficult or near impossible for you as the creator to licence your rights on an individual basis, for example, when an individual wishes to photocopy a page of a book which features your work."

Who can file a claim
Any visual artist whose works have been licensed for qualifying editorial uses in the UK can file for reimbursement. You do not need to be a UK resident or citizen. If you file directly, you can claim royalties for all licenses—direct or through any agency—and you will get 100 percent of the payment. If you allow a distributor to file on your behalf, they will take a percent, and there is no guarantee they will include all usages from past years or from other distributors.

How to make a claim
To make a claim, complete the online claim form providing details of the number of qualifying publications in each category published during any year through the end of 2009.  Forms and instructions will be available starting on June 21, at http://payback.dacs.org.uk/   The filing period runs until September 17th 2010.

For a writeup on the process with special notes for Alamy contributors (but with helpful info for all photographers) see the Alamy blog http://j.mp/bd3XGd