How to Donate Book Royalties

Dear Rich: How do I go about donating a portion of royalty proceeds from a book to a charity? 
If your publisher is amenable, the easiest method to donate royalties is to request that your publisher pay a portion of your royalties directly to the charity. You can formalize the payment (or payment system if you wish to cap payments or limit them to a specific time period) by including the details in your publishing agreement or in an amendment.
If the publisher isn't willing to make separate payments to the charity, you can either pay the charity directly from your royalty payments, or you can contact the charity for assistance. Many nonprofits have a mechanism for receiving royalties while the author is alive (or as "legacy gifts" following the author's death).
Taxes. The practice of donating book royalties to nonprofits was popularized in the 1980s when authors and publishers began to reap the marketing benefits of being aligned with a social cause (for example, a portion of royalties for a Rock Hudson biography was donated to an AIDS foundation). Some editors and authors believed the practice would also provide tax benefits. In reality -- unless you assigned the book's copyright (which means you give up ownership of your work) to the charity -- there may not be any tax benefits from donating a portion of the royalties. For example, if your publisher pays 75% of royalties to you and pays 25% to your charity, you would still be taxed for the full 100%. You can receive an income tax deduction for your donation, but this deduction can't be more than 50% of your adjusted gross income for the year -- a formula that may not provide much tax relief.

Can We Use Video of Seal Slaughter?

Dear Rich: Certain large charities have video footage of government-sanctioned killing of wildlife. It costs a lot of money to be able to get this footage. Thus small charities generally don't try to do so. They allow journalists to use the footage, but when it comes to providing the footage (and stills) to small charities to further the campaign, the big charities at times and for certain purposes have been helpful but at other times and for other purposes have not. We are now trying to further the campaign by encouraging people around the world to create videos, music videos, songs, digital art, or traditional art to protest against the killing in a creative way. Our hope is that some people will create good enough work that it goes viral and makes a big difference to the campaign. We have asked the big charities to allow us to provide some footage and stills to people for this purpose (of course with copyright credits provided), but so far, our requests have been denied by one and ignored by another. We don't profit from anything at all. We have some stills from the big groups that we have posted on our website in our archives. This is a fraction of what they gave us several years ago. We also have some footage that they have provided us previously for different purposes. Would it be considered a copyright violation or fair use if we tell people that they can take clips from certain footage or use some still photographs that we have as long as it makes up less than a certain percent of their work, they credit the owners, and they only use it for this work and not for other purposes in the future? We don't want to stand in the way of positive social forces but we also don't want you to be misled by the "fair" in fair use. Judges applying copyright law typically do not encourage a sense of charitable fairness when confronted with issues such as yours. They will consider the nonprofit aspect of your enterprise as a minor element when analyzing the four fair use factors. In addition, because nonprofits compete for donation dollars, the copyright owners may argue that stepping on their rights deprives them of an important source of revenue (and therefore discourages their investing in such footage in the first place). We're also not sure whether the uses you're envisioning are transformative; they're promoting the same message as originally intended -- to shock the public into preserving wildlife. Therefore, we're not comfortable arguing fair use, regardless of the percentage taken.
Some other concerns. A major factor weighing against your legal position is that you are encouraging others to use this footage without authorization. That could be perceived as risky behavior for two reasons: (1) it exposes third parties to the potential for legal action (and they may seek indemnification from your organization); and (2) it opens up the possibility that third parties, with your permission, may seek to subvert your message encouraged by your offering of unauthorized footage. And, as you recognize, this will also certainly jeopardize any symbiotic relationships you may have built up with the larger charities, particularly if they are forced into a public relations dilemma of having to go after those whom you authorized. Maybe it's best to encourage creative individuals to create their own imagery.

Does Charity Need Permission to Use Photos?

Dear Rich: We are planning to put up a free website of a non-profit charity project to benefit victims of a tragedy. We have questions: 1. Do we need to ask permission if we are using pictures of those people hit by the tragedy from the published newspaper? 2. Do we need to ask permission if we add links to our website and these links lead you to the TV and radio network? 3. Do we need to ask permission if we are putting links to You Tube video? No permission needed for questions 2 and 3, but you would need permission from whoever owned the copyright in the newspaper photos (probably the photographer, a news syndicate, or the newspaper, itself).  Without that permission, the copyright owner could claim infringement. As noble as your charitable goals may be, it's unlikely that they will matter much in your defense. (On the other hand, nobody can predict whether the newspaper will sue a charitable organization over a purloined image.) As for the victims portrayed in the photos, in general you need permission from real people when using their image for a commercial purpose such as raising money. However, from a practical POV, we don't imagine this will be an issue for a  charity seeking to help victims of a tragedy.

Battle Over Charitable Trademark: Compassion in Action

Dear Rich: Hello, I coordinate a 100% volunteer run non-profit organization that distributes toys and food to low income families at Christmas. Our legal name is Toy& Joy/Compassion in Action Clackamas County. We keep getting calls from a man who says we are illegally using that name. His entity is entitled Compassion in Action. Toy & Joy was formed on 4/7/1994 with the name change to Toy & Joy/Compassion in Action of Clackamas County on 7/20/2007. He stated that people get confused by who is who. As a non-profit with limited income, we don’t have the funds to hire a lawyer to fight this unless it is absolutely imperative. Can you offer an opinion. I went online and found all kinds or organizations across the United States with different variations, however, he seems to have focused on us. I have attached our IRS letter and copy of our State of Oregon registration. First, thanks for doing your charitable work. We're not sure whether we have good news or bad news but we believe that neither you, nor the unhappy caller (nor the dozens of other entities using the term) has a legal right to claim "Compassion in Action" as a trademark for charitable services. The Salvation Army has registered the trademark for that term and has been using it for religious and charitable purposes since November 1967. If the Salvation Army desired it could request that both of you remove the term from your names. Also, just so you know, neither the IRS letter, nor a state entity registration establishes trademark rights.