Copyright and DMCA notices
Photographs are the substance of this directory, and every companion warrants they own the ones they upload. When that turns out to be wrong, this is how it gets fixed — quickly, and on the record.
Our policy
Evening Companion responds to clear notices of alleged copyright infringement under the Digital Millennium Copyright Act, 17 U.S.C. § 512, and to equivalent notices under any other law that applies to us. Material that is the subject of a complete, good-faith notice is removed or disabled promptly, and the person who uploaded it is told what went and why.
We keep a repeat-infringer policy. An account that is the subject of repeated valid notices is closed.
What a valid notice must contain
A notice has six elements, and the form below asks for each of them in turn.
One: a physical or electronic signature of the copyright owner, or of a person authorised to act on their behalf.
Two: identification of the work you say is infringed — or, where one notice covers several works on this site, a representative list of them.
Three: identification of the material you say infringes, in enough detail for us to find it. The full address of the profile or of the image is what we need.
Four: your address, telephone number and email address.
Five: a statement that you believe in good faith that the use complained of is not authorised by the copyright owner, its agent, or the law.
Six: a statement that the information in your notice is accurate and — under penalty of perjury — that you are the owner of the right or are authorised to act for the owner.
How to send it
Use the form on this page. It asks for exactly the elements above, records the moment it arrived, and gives you a reference you can quote. A notice sent this way reaches the person who can act on it.
You may write to the address below instead, and a notice sent there is treated identically. Please do not send a notice to the companion in place of us: once material is under review they cannot remove it themselves.
What happens next
We acknowledge the notice, remove or disable the material we can identify from it, and tell the uploader what was removed. Where a notice is incomplete we say which element is missing rather than guess at it: nothing is taken down on a notice we cannot act on, and nothing is left up on one we can.
Counter-notification
If your material was removed and you believe that was a mistake or a misidentification, you may send a counter-notification. It must identify the material and the address it appeared at, state under penalty of perjury that you believe in good faith it was removed by mistake, give your name, address and telephone number, and consent to the jurisdiction of a court where you live or where we are — and to accept service from the person who complained.
We pass a valid counter-notification to the complainant. If they do not tell us within 10 to 14 business days that they have gone to court, the material may be restored.
Notices made in bad faith
Section 512(f) makes a person who knowingly misrepresents that material is infringing liable for the damages that misrepresentation causes. Every notice is kept with its timestamp and the address it came from, and we will produce them.