Jolie baby pics leaked
2006-06-07 14:11
London - The celebrity magazine Hello! launched legal action on Wednesday against internet sites that printed a leaked exclusive shot of Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt with their infant daughter.
Just as People magazine announced it had landed exclusive
North American rights to the first pictures of the baby, an
image of the newborn Shiloh Nouvel Jolie-Pitt and her parents
popped up on at least two websites as the cover shot for Hello!
"We were very shocked and horrified to see that this embargo
has been breached," Juliet Herd feature editor for Hello!
Magazine, which sells in Britain, Spain, Turkey, Russia, Dubai,
Thailand and Greece, said.
"Hello! is taking legal action around the world to stop
internet sites and everyone else who may seek to publish," she
said. "We are sending out legal 'Cease and Desist' letters to
each of these sites."
"It is very difficult to control the web and this proves how
rampantly out of control it is. We have absolutely no idea how
the picture was leaked," she said.
The couple announced on Monday that they had agreed to let
photo agency Getty Images market pictures of their newborn with
all proceeds going to help the less fortunate.
Experts said worldwide rights to the pictures could sell for
anywhere from $5m to $7m.
The picture surfaced on celebrity-lampooning Defamer.com
www.defamer.com and the LiveJournal gossip blog
http://community.livejournal.
Photo of the year
Defamer.com, whose image portrays the baby in a golden glow,
said: "Mere moments after staring upon the Chosen One's image, we felt as if we were bathed in the same golden light that
surrounds the infant's still frail form."
Alison Crombie, press spokesperson in London for Getty
Images, told Reuters: "Our legal team are looking into it and we
will take it from there. But I really don't think it will
devalue the pictures as everyone is dying to see the full set."
"Other deals are still being negotiated," she said.
The baby was born on May 27 in a hospital in Namibia where an army of paparazzi had descended, hoping to capture their own photos of the child.
For celebrity magazines and photo agencies, there is
increasingly cut-throat competition to land exclusives and sate
the appetite of readers obsessed by the lives of the stars.
Prices have gone through the roof in the past two or three
years and Alan Williams, head of celebrity agency Big Pictures,
told Reuters: "The first pictures of Brad and Angelina with the baby are a massive opportunity.
"It is the photo of the year for US magazines - they are
royalty over there. In Britain it would be fantastic for Hello!
even though they are not the stars they are in the United
States," he told Reuters.
"This is all part of the blog culture where people are
stealing pictures from photographers and agencies and putting
them on the internet."