Wikimedia refused to take down the selfie photo of a monkey after the photographer requested for its removal.
The photo was taken by the crested black macaque itself when David Slater was in Indonesia in 2011. Slater went to the macaque's territory hoping to capture close pictures of them when one of the monkeys played with his gear and accidentally took hundreds of pictures.
"They were quite mischievous, jumping all over my equipment, and it looked like they were already posing for the camera when one hit the button," Slater told The Telegraph when the picture first went viral. "The sound got his attention and he kept pressing it. At first it scared the rest of them away but they soon came back - it was amazing to watch."
Most of the pictures taken by the monkey were blurry, and some featured the jungle floor. But, among these pictures was a perfect selfie featuring the grinning face of the female macaque.
After being featured in various shows, websites, and newspapers from around the world, Slater is now suing Wikimedia to take down the picture. Wikimedia is the organization behind Wikipedia, and they have included the monkey's selfie in their collection of more than 22 million royalty-free images.
Slater, who is based in Gloucestershire, argued that the addition of the image to the site's royalty-free collection would affect his income severely because now, anyone can use and download the picture without paying him. On the other hand, editors of Wikimedia determined that Slater has no right over the image for it was the monkey who pressed the shutter. The transparency report created by the organization concluded that it was the monkey who owned the copyright to the image.
"It makes me very angry, I'm a professional photographer - it costs me over £2,000 to do the trip. It's my livelihood," Slater told Mirror Online.
