7 ms·

Ask HN: Finding the Australian Aboriginal flag in all artworks

For those who don't know, the Australian Aboriginal flag (https://i.imgur.com/sGsnLkv.png https://i.imgur.com/sGsnLkv.png) is actually copy-righted by an individual although it is recognized as a national flag. It was created in 1971 by an artist named Harold Thomas and went onto to become culturally accepted as the flag of the Aboriginal people. And then as above, went onto being proclaimed a national flag by the government. Unfortunately, since then, Harold Thomas has licensed the flag to various private agencies. One of the licenses was exclusive to a clothing label, which now means that no other Aboriginal business can print clothes with the flag on it without paying royalties. (Sitting around 20%) A lot of Aboriginals feel dismay at the current situation of the licensing. I am rather free market orientated and do respect the artists desires. But, the situation is rather unique, I can't seem to find any other examples in the world of a nations/cultures flag being owned by an individual. The creator has no intention to relinquish the copyright, so movements have already sprung up. A good timeline of events can be found here -> https://clothingthegap.com.au/pages/aboriginal-flag-timeline https://clothingthegap.com.au/pages/aboriginal-flag-timeline The page above found an artwork released 4 years prior that contains the visual elements of the flag -> https://i.imgur.com/rKbS2m4.jpg https://i.imgur.com/rKbS2m4.jpg The flag artist studied European art just before he created the aboriginal flag so he may have already copied it himself. For a bit of fun and to build a case, I thought it would be a cool experiment to try find the Aboriginal flag in as many pre-existing artworks as possible. I am looking for API's and libs that would help me achieve this as I think it is a fun problem. Regardless, I've used HN for over a decade and have no doubt some of the smartest people on the planet live here. So if you find this tale intriguing and perhaps unjust, any advice on how to tackle this problem from a public policy perspective would also be great.

lathiat 6y ago
Good luck.m
thomasfromcdnjs 6y ago
Just to add more juice to the story. The company he gave the exclusive rights to was co-founded by his friend. Who got fined 2.4 million dollars the year prior for selling "authentic" Aboriginal art that was actually made in Indonesia. https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2019/jun/11/company-that-holds-aboriginal-flag-rights-part-owned-by-man-prosecuted-for-selling-fake-art https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2019/jun/11/compa...
- andrewflnr 6y ago
  Wow, based on OP I thought Thomas was just a colossal idiot, but that tips the scales to malicious.
toomuchtodo 6y ago
https://tineye.com/ https://tineye.com/ might be able to help.
- LatteLazy 6y ago
  "Your image is too simple to find matches. TinEye requires a basic level of visual detail to successfully identify matches. Please upload a more detailed image."
- tomcooks 6y ago
  I'd rather use yandex images (https://images.yandex.ru https://images.yandex.ru), has the best reverse image search
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]
jszymborski 6y ago
The recognition is the easier part (I'd be more than happy to help, email in my profile), the far harder part is identifying what historic photos to identify them in. News archives would be a good source but copyright laws (rearing their ugly neck again) prevent us from easily obtaining a large stack of them. I know the Australian Broadcasting Company has a lot of their archival video under Creative Commons, so that might be a good bet. If anyone has a better idea, please let us all know :)
- perilunar 6y ago
  Australian Broadcasting Corporation archives: https://www.abc.net.au/archives/openarchives.htm https://www.abc.net.au/archives/openarchives.htm
airbreather 6y ago
The concept of licensing a national flag is interesting, other than to maybe prevent unwanted use in certain ways, is this not something owned by all Australian people? If I draw one on a piece of paper and hang it from my balcony, where do I stand under this licensing? And if I sell that on Etsy, or maybe a landscape that has an element in the background where this flag can be seen? (I am an Australian, but not indigenous)
- thomasfromcdnjs 6y ago
  Here is a decent summary of the ongoing copyright debate -> https://theconversation.com/explainer-our-copyright-laws-and-the-australian-aboriginal-flag-118687 https://theconversation.com/explainer-our-copyright-laws-and...
  - pueblito 6y ago
    From that link, "Thomas was successful in establishing his claim to authorship before the Federal Court in 1997." IANAL, but I believe you're 23 years too late
    - pbhjpbhj 6y ago
      Authorship isn't sufficient for ownership of copyright. Trademark is probably the issue that's most pertinent. Even if the flag weren't a work owned by Thomas, for copyright purposes, then it seems it's their trademark (registered or established by use). IANAL
DarthGhandi 6y ago
> For a bit of fun and to build a case, I thought it would be a cool experiment to try find the Aboriginal flag in as many pre-existing artworks as possible. Wouldn't this be the exact thing that the copyright holder would want too, only not "for fun" but for litigation? I'd be interested if it ever existed before the original artist made it but have my sincere doubts is even a remote possibility, historians seem to be of the opinion he just made it up in the 70's and it stuck. Flags have never held meaning to real indigenous culture.
- luckylion 6y ago
  pre-existing is the keyword there, I believe. You can't claim copyright on something you copied, you have to be the original creator.
  - njharman 6y ago
    > You can't claim copyright on something you copied, you have to be the original creator. Depending on jurisdiction and when copyright was claimed (laws change) that is not necessarily true. In USA use to be first to file was awarded the copyright. Also in USA, for instance, copyright is granted for collections, organizations, arrangements or compositions of pre-existing things. Such a photographer can claim copyright on photo of a bridge. Or editor for a collection of public domain poems.
    - jcranmer 6y ago
      You're mixing up patents with copyright. First-to-file is an element of patent law, where priority is given to the first person to file the patent as opposed to the prior version in the US law (first-to-invent) where priority would be given to someone who demonstrated that they invented it first. The actual law for the US (17 USC §201 (a)): > Copyright in a work protected under this title vests initially in the author or authors of the work. The authors of a joint work are coowners of copyright in the work. You cannot own copyright on a work that you have not authored, unless it has been (lawfully) transferred to you. Incidentally, this is basically the core of the "Happy Birthday" copyright dispute: it was never established that the Hill sisters authored the lyrics, so they never had a copyright interest in it.
hadrien01 6y ago
Please don't put tracking links in your text
- thomasfromcdnjs 6y ago
  I was just over the character limit so put them in. No intention to use, happy to switch them to some privacy centric alternative, but I don't know any.
  - gpm 6y ago
    Just switch them for the full urls. Editing bypasses the text length restriction.
  - dang 6y ago
    I've replaced two bit.ly links with the URLs they point to in your text above. In the future, as gpm points out, you can just use 'edit' to get around the length restriction.
- sp332 6y ago
  https://i.imgur.com/sGsnLkv.png https://i.imgur.com/sGsnLkv.png & https://clothingthegap.com.au/pages/aboriginal-flag-timeline https://clothingthegap.com.au/pages/aboriginal-flag-timeline
sloaken 6y ago
I would assume you could not copyright a national flag. If so, well heck I can think of a bunch of flags I need to get copyrighted.
- ithkuil 6y ago
  well, you first have to create a drawing yourself and somehow get a nation state to adopt it as a national flag. Order of events matters.
  - sloaken 6y ago
    Like the 'happy birthday' song, if it is not already copyrighted .... and who would copyright their national flag.
    - 0xfaded 6y ago
      Happy birthday is now public domain https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Happy_Birthday_to_You https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Happy_Birthday_to_You
      - goodcanadian 6y ago
        Well, technically, the claim was never valid, but I guess it was easier to avoid the song or pay up than it was to take it to court.
- stephen_g 6y ago
  How many flags did you design that later got adopted by countries or people groups? There’s no question he designed it (although that artwork that contains a very similar design is very interesting). But the Government should have probably compulsorarily acquired it by now if he isn’t willing to give it up... I guess they’re waiting for him to die so it won’t be as easy for them to be dragged to the high court over the “on just terms” clause in the Constitution.
  - 6y ago
hooper_ 6y ago
Hey mate, Good luck with this, I think its a good cause. It finally got me to register on HN so I could up-vote it :)
ksaj 6y ago
While not exactly the same, the situation with the Canadian RCMP (Royal Canadian Mounted Police) uniform might be an interesting side note to your quest. The RCMP uniform trademark was licensed to Walt Disney in order to protect it for 5 years while the RCMP learned how to do it on their own: https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/mountie-no-longer-disney-s-1.190139 https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/mountie-no-longer-disney-s-1.... Canada has specific laws and protocols on the use of its symbols, which include the flag. It doesn't cover aboriginal or provincial flags, but has some interesting clauses of how and where they can be used: https://www.canada.ca/en/canadian-heritage/services/commercial-use-symbols-canada.html https://www.canada.ca/en/canadian-heritage/services/commerci...
ThePadawan 6y ago
There is similar controversy about the Bisexual pride flag ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bisexual_pride_flag#Licensing_controversy https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bisexual_pride_flag#Licensing_... )
gnopgnip 6y ago
This flag design would not be eligible for copyright in most countries, as it is just geometric designs and doesn't meet the threshold of creativity. For instance the Tommy Hilfiger flag has been denied copyright protection, it is of similar complexity. Has the original copyright ever been tested in court over the threshold of creativity?
- arcticbull 6y ago
  In fact even the current American Airlines logo was twice denied protection for not meeting the threshold of creativity -- before eventually being approved in 2018. [1] The bar is pretty high. [1] https://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-travel-briefcase-american-airlines-copyright-20181214-story.html https://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-travel-briefcase-amer...
SubiculumCode 6y ago
I am not an ML expert, so I cannot respond myself, but I am disappointed at how few responses address the ML aspect of the question.
- jlgaddis 6y ago
  You're disappointed that a bunch of "ML experts" were not monitoring HN, in real-time, just waiting for posts like this so that they could drop whatever they were doing and immediately respond with a solution to this "problem" -- in detail, with the use of ML -- on a Monday morning, within roughly an hour or so after the question was initially asked? --- To make up for this unimaginable transgression that you have been subjected to, I hereby demand that HN/YC immediately provide you with a sincere, heartfelt, and public apology and a signed and notarized guarantee that they have repented for their sins and pinky swear that such an incident will never ever ever happen again. They must do this immediately after they fully refund you every single penny you have ever paid them (in this life as well as any past ones) and, in order to prove they are taking this issue seriously, all of this MUST happen before I click the "add comment" button in about two seconds from now ... --- UPDATE: dang, I am very disappointed in the lack of attention to this matter by HN/YC and you, in particular. It's been 25 minutes since I posted this comment, yet this absolutely unbelievable occurrence should have been resolved before SubiculumCode became "disappointed"!
  - jonnycomputer 6y ago
    This is unnecessarily abusive. It also ignores the fact that the one who asked the question was hoping for the same thing as SubiculumCode.
stareatgoats 6y ago
My two cents: get another flag. It's not even a design that signals Australian Aboriginal imo tbh, it looks Japanese if anything.
Liveanimalcams 6y ago
my startup tracks and finds items in videos. I'm sure I can spin up a new model for you. my email is in my profile
Johnjonjoan 6y ago
The closest flag I could find in the ten minutes of Google searching I could allot is the flag of the kingdom of Württemberg (1805 - 1918). It's just missing the yellow circle. Coincidentally the coat of arms involves a yellow oval and would often be placed in the centre of the flag. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kingdom_of_W%C3%BCrttemberg https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kingdom_of_W%C3%BCrttemberg
arjie 6y ago
Interesting problem. What is the general class of "find this object in other pictures" called? I've noticed that most image search aims at a different goal: "find pictures like this picture" so tineye, Google Image Search, and friends are unlikely to be of use. By the way, it reminds me of the flag of the Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (a party from my home state in India), which coincidentally also uses a Sun amongst their symbols. I wonder if they've got a version with the Sun on their flag. If I were an organization with clout in the field I would propose an alternative flag, but I imagine people are attached to this one. Well, good luck!
- 8note 6y ago
  Image stitching maybe? There's probably a good name on one of the SIFT papers if you're also looking for some algorithms
abhishek2x 6y ago
Noice
- abhishek2x 6y ago
  good
  - abhishek2x 6y ago
    Cool
aaron695 6y ago
Harold Thomas is an artist who created something and is still fully alive. He has every dam right to do as he wishes with his own creation. He has always had copyright and everyone knows this. It's his creation, it came from him, it's used today exactly as he created, nothing derivative. If you don't want to respect this you can also shove your GPL or shove your copyright over books. You show respect what people create or you don't. To the question, to attack him I'd start searching here - https://trove.nla.gov.au/ https://trove.nla.gov.au/ See if you can find early articles saying how he did it, he might say he copied in part something or you might be able to twist what he says against him. Track possible artists or styles over picture search.
- aryonoco 6y ago
  Even if you accept that such a basic shape is copyrightable, it's laughable to have a national flag that is copyrighted and cannot be freely used. When the government declared it a national flag, they should have given him a few million dollars and bought the rights off him. They still can do this easily since they have eminent domain and it applies to IP as well.
  - thomasfromcdnjs 6y ago
    Yeah, this is my position. I want the guy to profit as much as possible, but the flag is pretty much world renowned for Australian Aboriginals at this point. Having one individual choose how it is used on their own personal whims is a bit much.
  - aaron695 6y ago
    > When the government declared it a national flag, they should have given him a few million dollars and bought the rights off him. But they didn't, so the government can get stuffed. I love the way you want the government to steal from an indigenous man here. Haven't they stolen enough yet? Harold Thomas owns it. It's been recognised he owns it. He can do as he wishes with it. If a bunch of people want to continue following something that's owned by someone else they can, but they follow the creators rules. Lets just steal Linux off Linus and co because we feel like it shall we. Remove his stupid GPL v2 because we want to.
deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
gitgud 6y ago
Fascinating, I had no idea that flag was copyrighted. I guess that's one of the reasons why there was a push for alternative flag designs a few years ago. As far as searching for prior art, I would probably look at using a large data-set like the [1] 2.8 million art images released by the Smithsonian. So you can process it all locally rather than uses a SAAS api. Then use something like tensorflow to do the image recognition. Here's a [2] fun tutorial. [1] https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smithsonian-institution/smithsonian-releases-28-million-images-public-domain-180974263/ https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smithsonian-institution/smith... [2] https://codelabs.developers.google.com/codelabs/tensorflow-for-poets/ https://codelabs.developers.google.com/codelabs/tensorflow-f...
- thomasfromcdnjs 6y ago
  Ahhh great! Lots of good feedback here but I that dataset is exactly what I was looking for! And yes it is a rather peculiar situation, I'm still trying to figure out if any other flag on the planet is copy righted by an invididual.
charliebrownau 6y ago
Abos are not Australians Australians are WHITE Australians came from UK and EUROPE ------------ If anything it shows the lack of culture that abos had before white man showed up - No farming - No sewage - No government - No animals domesticated - No currency - over 70 languages -------------- They were conquer , just like Indians and other races time to deal with it and move the fuck on
ipi 6y ago
wow! I was not aware that it is copy-righted. That is shitty at so many levels. But, genuine questions, what's stopping you guys from designing a new flag ? Is it the reach of the existing flag or the resources required to create a new one and spread it again ?

lathiat 6y ago

Good luck.m

thomasfromcdnjs 6y ago

Just to add more juice to the story. The company he gave the exclusive rights to was co-founded by his friend. Who got fined 2.4 million dollars the year prior for selling "authentic" Aboriginal art that was actually made in Indonesia. https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2019/jun/11/company-that-holds-aboriginal-flag-rights-part-owned-by-man-prosecuted-for-selling-fake-art https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2019/jun/11/compa...

andrewflnr 6y ago
Wow, based on OP I thought Thomas was just a colossal idiot, but that tips the scales to malicious.

toomuchtodo 6y ago

https://tineye.com/ https://tineye.com/ might be able to help.

LatteLazy 6y ago
"Your image is too simple to find matches. TinEye requires a basic level of visual detail to successfully identify matches. Please upload a more detailed image."
tomcooks 6y ago
I'd rather use yandex images (https://images.yandex.ru https://images.yandex.ru), has the best reverse image search
deleted 6y ago
[deleted]

jszymborski 6y ago

The recognition is the easier part (I'd be more than happy to help, email in my profile), the far harder part is identifying what historic photos to identify them in. News archives would be a good source but copyright laws (rearing their ugly neck again) prevent us from easily obtaining a large stack of them. I know the Australian Broadcasting Company has a lot of their archival video under Creative Commons, so that might be a good bet. If anyone has a better idea, please let us all know :)

perilunar 6y ago
Australian Broadcasting Corporation archives: https://www.abc.net.au/archives/openarchives.htm https://www.abc.net.au/archives/openarchives.htm

airbreather 6y ago

The concept of licensing a national flag is interesting, other than to maybe prevent unwanted use in certain ways, is this not something owned by all Australian people? If I draw one on a piece of paper and hang it from my balcony, where do I stand under this licensing? And if I sell that on Etsy, or maybe a landscape that has an element in the background where this flag can be seen? (I am an Australian, but not indigenous)

thomasfromcdnjs 6y ago
Here is a decent summary of the ongoing copyright debate -> https://theconversation.com/explainer-our-copyright-laws-and-the-australian-aboriginal-flag-118687 https://theconversation.com/explainer-our-copyright-laws-and...
- pueblito 6y ago
  From that link, "Thomas was successful in establishing his claim to authorship before the Federal Court in 1997." IANAL, but I believe you're 23 years too late
  - pbhjpbhj 6y ago
    Authorship isn't sufficient for ownership of copyright. Trademark is probably the issue that's most pertinent. Even if the flag weren't a work owned by Thomas, for copyright purposes, then it seems it's their trademark (registered or established by use). IANAL

DarthGhandi 6y ago

> For a bit of fun and to build a case, I thought it would be a cool experiment to try find the Aboriginal flag in as many pre-existing artworks as possible. Wouldn't this be the exact thing that the copyright holder would want too, only not "for fun" but for litigation? I'd be interested if it ever existed before the original artist made it but have my sincere doubts is even a remote possibility, historians seem to be of the opinion he just made it up in the 70's and it stuck. Flags have never held meaning to real indigenous culture.

luckylion 6y ago
pre-existing is the keyword there, I believe. You can't claim copyright on something you copied, you have to be the original creator.
- njharman 6y ago
  > You can't claim copyright on something you copied, you have to be the original creator. Depending on jurisdiction and when copyright was claimed (laws change) that is not necessarily true. In USA use to be first to file was awarded the copyright. Also in USA, for instance, copyright is granted for collections, organizations, arrangements or compositions of pre-existing things. Such a photographer can claim copyright on photo of a bridge. Or editor for a collection of public domain poems.
  - jcranmer 6y ago
    You're mixing up patents with copyright. First-to-file is an element of patent law, where priority is given to the first person to file the patent as opposed to the prior version in the US law (first-to-invent) where priority would be given to someone who demonstrated that they invented it first. The actual law for the US (17 USC §201 (a)): > Copyright in a work protected under this title vests initially in the author or authors of the work. The authors of a joint work are coowners of copyright in the work. You cannot own copyright on a work that you have not authored, unless it has been (lawfully) transferred to you. Incidentally, this is basically the core of the "Happy Birthday" copyright dispute: it was never established that the Hill sisters authored the lyrics, so they never had a copyright interest in it.

hadrien01 6y ago

Please don't put tracking links in your text

thomasfromcdnjs 6y ago
I was just over the character limit so put them in. No intention to use, happy to switch them to some privacy centric alternative, but I don't know any.
- gpm 6y ago
  Just switch them for the full urls. Editing bypasses the text length restriction.
- dang 6y ago
  I've replaced two bit.ly links with the URLs they point to in your text above. In the future, as gpm points out, you can just use 'edit' to get around the length restriction.
sp332 6y ago
https://i.imgur.com/sGsnLkv.png https://i.imgur.com/sGsnLkv.png & https://clothingthegap.com.au/pages/aboriginal-flag-timeline https://clothingthegap.com.au/pages/aboriginal-flag-timeline

sloaken 6y ago

I would assume you could not copyright a national flag. If so, well heck I can think of a bunch of flags I need to get copyrighted.

ithkuil 6y ago
well, you first have to create a drawing yourself and somehow get a nation state to adopt it as a national flag. Order of events matters.
- sloaken 6y ago
  Like the 'happy birthday' song, if it is not already copyrighted .... and who would copyright their national flag.
  - 0xfaded 6y ago
    Happy birthday is now public domain https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Happy_Birthday_to_You https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Happy_Birthday_to_You
    - goodcanadian 6y ago
      Well, technically, the claim was never valid, but I guess it was easier to avoid the song or pay up than it was to take it to court.
stephen_g 6y ago
How many flags did you design that later got adopted by countries or people groups? There’s no question he designed it (although that artwork that contains a very similar design is very interesting). But the Government should have probably compulsorarily acquired it by now if he isn’t willing to give it up... I guess they’re waiting for him to die so it won’t be as easy for them to be dragged to the high court over the “on just terms” clause in the Constitution.
- 6y ago

hooper_ 6y ago

Hey mate, Good luck with this, I think its a good cause. It finally got me to register on HN so I could up-vote it :)

ksaj 6y ago

While not exactly the same, the situation with the Canadian RCMP (Royal Canadian Mounted Police) uniform might be an interesting side note to your quest. The RCMP uniform trademark was licensed to Walt Disney in order to protect it for 5 years while the RCMP learned how to do it on their own: https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/mountie-no-longer-disney-s-1.190139 https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/mountie-no-longer-disney-s-1.... Canada has specific laws and protocols on the use of its symbols, which include the flag. It doesn't cover aboriginal or provincial flags, but has some interesting clauses of how and where they can be used: https://www.canada.ca/en/canadian-heritage/services/commercial-use-symbols-canada.html https://www.canada.ca/en/canadian-heritage/services/commerci...

ThePadawan 6y ago

There is similar controversy about the Bisexual pride flag ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bisexual_pride_flag#Licensing_controversy https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bisexual_pride_flag#Licensing_... )

gnopgnip 6y ago

This flag design would not be eligible for copyright in most countries, as it is just geometric designs and doesn't meet the threshold of creativity. For instance the Tommy Hilfiger flag has been denied copyright protection, it is of similar complexity. Has the original copyright ever been tested in court over the threshold of creativity?

arcticbull 6y ago
In fact even the current American Airlines logo was twice denied protection for not meeting the threshold of creativity -- before eventually being approved in 2018. [1] The bar is pretty high. [1] https://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-travel-briefcase-american-airlines-copyright-20181214-story.html https://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-travel-briefcase-amer...

SubiculumCode 6y ago

I am not an ML expert, so I cannot respond myself, but I am disappointed at how few responses address the ML aspect of the question.

jlgaddis 6y ago
You're disappointed that a bunch of "ML experts" were not monitoring HN, in real-time, just waiting for posts like this so that they could drop whatever they were doing and immediately respond with a solution to this "problem" -- in detail, with the use of ML -- on a Monday morning, within roughly an hour or so after the question was initially asked? --- To make up for this unimaginable transgression that you have been subjected to, I hereby demand that HN/YC immediately provide you with a sincere, heartfelt, and public apology and a signed and notarized guarantee that they have repented for their sins and pinky swear that such an incident will never ever ever happen again. They must do this immediately after they fully refund you every single penny you have ever paid them (in this life as well as any past ones) and, in order to prove they are taking this issue seriously, all of this MUST happen before I click the "add comment" button in about two seconds from now ... --- UPDATE: dang, I am very disappointed in the lack of attention to this matter by HN/YC and you, in particular. It's been 25 minutes since I posted this comment, yet this absolutely unbelievable occurrence should have been resolved before SubiculumCode became "disappointed"!
- jonnycomputer 6y ago
  This is unnecessarily abusive. It also ignores the fact that the one who asked the question was hoping for the same thing as SubiculumCode.

stareatgoats 6y ago

My two cents: get another flag. It's not even a design that signals Australian Aboriginal imo tbh, it looks Japanese if anything.

Liveanimalcams 6y ago

my startup tracks and finds items in videos. I'm sure I can spin up a new model for you. my email is in my profile

Johnjonjoan 6y ago

The closest flag I could find in the ten minutes of Google searching I could allot is the flag of the kingdom of Württemberg (1805 - 1918). It's just missing the yellow circle. Coincidentally the coat of arms involves a yellow oval and would often be placed in the centre of the flag. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kingdom_of_W%C3%BCrttemberg https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kingdom_of_W%C3%BCrttemberg

arjie 6y ago

Interesting problem. What is the general class of "find this object in other pictures" called? I've noticed that most image search aims at a different goal: "find pictures like this picture" so tineye, Google Image Search, and friends are unlikely to be of use. By the way, it reminds me of the flag of the Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (a party from my home state in India), which coincidentally also uses a Sun amongst their symbols. I wonder if they've got a version with the Sun on their flag. If I were an organization with clout in the field I would propose an alternative flag, but I imagine people are attached to this one. Well, good luck!

8note 6y ago
Image stitching maybe? There's probably a good name on one of the SIFT papers if you're also looking for some algorithms

abhishek2x 6y ago

Noice

abhishek2x 6y ago
good
- abhishek2x 6y ago
  Cool

aaron695 6y ago

Harold Thomas is an artist who created something and is still fully alive. He has every dam right to do as he wishes with his own creation. He has always had copyright and everyone knows this. It's his creation, it came from him, it's used today exactly as he created, nothing derivative. If you don't want to respect this you can also shove your GPL or shove your copyright over books. You show respect what people create or you don't. To the question, to attack him I'd start searching here - https://trove.nla.gov.au/ https://trove.nla.gov.au/ See if you can find early articles saying how he did it, he might say he copied in part something or you might be able to twist what he says against him. Track possible artists or styles over picture search.

aryonoco 6y ago
Even if you accept that such a basic shape is copyrightable, it's laughable to have a national flag that is copyrighted and cannot be freely used. When the government declared it a national flag, they should have given him a few million dollars and bought the rights off him. They still can do this easily since they have eminent domain and it applies to IP as well.
- thomasfromcdnjs 6y ago
  Yeah, this is my position. I want the guy to profit as much as possible, but the flag is pretty much world renowned for Australian Aboriginals at this point. Having one individual choose how it is used on their own personal whims is a bit much.
- aaron695 6y ago
  > When the government declared it a national flag, they should have given him a few million dollars and bought the rights off him. But they didn't, so the government can get stuffed. I love the way you want the government to steal from an indigenous man here. Haven't they stolen enough yet? Harold Thomas owns it. It's been recognised he owns it. He can do as he wishes with it. If a bunch of people want to continue following something that's owned by someone else they can, but they follow the creators rules. Lets just steal Linux off Linus and co because we feel like it shall we. Remove his stupid GPL v2 because we want to.

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gitgud 6y ago

Fascinating, I had no idea that flag was copyrighted. I guess that's one of the reasons why there was a push for alternative flag designs a few years ago. As far as searching for prior art, I would probably look at using a large data-set like the [1] 2.8 million art images released by the Smithsonian. So you can process it all locally rather than uses a SAAS api. Then use something like tensorflow to do the image recognition. Here's a [2] fun tutorial. [1] https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smithsonian-institution/smithsonian-releases-28-million-images-public-domain-180974263/ https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smithsonian-institution/smith... [2] https://codelabs.developers.google.com/codelabs/tensorflow-for-poets/ https://codelabs.developers.google.com/codelabs/tensorflow-f...

thomasfromcdnjs 6y ago
Ahhh great! Lots of good feedback here but I that dataset is exactly what I was looking for! And yes it is a rather peculiar situation, I'm still trying to figure out if any other flag on the planet is copy righted by an invididual.

charliebrownau 6y ago

Abos are not Australians Australians are WHITE Australians came from UK and EUROPE ------------ If anything it shows the lack of culture that abos had before white man showed up - No farming - No sewage - No government - No animals domesticated - No currency - over 70 languages -------------- They were conquer , just like Indians and other races time to deal with it and move the fuck on

ipi 6y ago

wow! I was not aware that it is copy-righted. That is shitty at so many levels. But, genuine questions, what's stopping you guys from designing a new flag ? Is it the reach of the existing flag or the resources required to create a new one and spread it again ?