Food Blogging and Copyright: Protecting Original Content on Social Media

Author

Saanvi Sethi, Dr. Ashmika Agrawal


Abstract

 Food blogging has grown from online personal diaries into a commercial creative industry conducted mainly on Instagram, YouTube and similar platforms. Bloggers invest considerable effort in developing recipes and in photographing and filming them, only to find their content downloaded and re-uploaded by others, either without acknowledgement of the source or with only slight rewording. This paper examines, under the Copyright Act, 1957, the elements of food-blog content, who owns them, when reuse amounts to infringement, and what remedies are realistically available on social media. It argues that recipe photographs, videos and the narrative expression of a recipe enjoy strong protection, whereas the ingredient list and the method enjoy little or none. It also shows that enforcement depends heavily on the notice-and-takedown mechanisms of intermediaries. The paper concludes with practical protective measures for creators and suggestions for reform.



Keywords

food blogging, copyright, recipe, social media, idea–expression dichotomy, intermediary liability, moral rights.



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References


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