The monkey selfie
You might remember it as Naruto macaque selfie
The archive does not hold a copy of this image that it may show.
2011·The social era·informative
A grinning macaque took a photograph of itself, and seven years of copyright litigation followed.
At a glanceThe facts
- Remembered as
- Naruto macaque selfie
- Spread in
- 2011
- Began as
- A photograph
- Where it started
- publisher-site
- Format
- Photograph
- Made by
- A Celebes crested macaque in Sulawesi, Indonesia, using equipment set up by the British photographer David Slater
- Who or what it shows
- The macaque was given the name Naruto in a lawsuit brought on its behalf
- Origin
- Not an upload originally
- Available
- Not held by ViralWorld
What this wasThe story
In 2011 the British wildlife photographer David Slater set up a camera among a troop of Celebes crested macaques in Sulawesi. One of them pressed the shutter repeatedly, and among hundreds of blurred frames was a sharp, direct, delighted self-portrait. Newspapers published it in July 2011 and it went round the world.
A US judge ruled in 2016 that a monkey cannot own a copyright. Slater said the dispute had cost him his livelihood as a wildlife photographer. The episode is now standard teaching material on authorship, and a permanent reminder that the question of who owns an image on the internet can be genuinely unanswerable.
Why it matteredWhat changed
A macaque pressed the shutter on a photographer’s camera, and the question of who owned the result went to an American appeal court. The answer was that an animal cannot hold a copyright.
TimelineIn order
- Posted
The photographs are uploaded to Wikimedia Commons.1
- Later
The Wikimedia Foundation says publicly that it has refused Slater’s request to remove them.1
- Later
The United States Copyright Office lists “a photograph taken by a monkey” among things that cannot be registered.1
- Later
The animal-rights group PETA sues on the macaque’s behalf.1
- Corrected
An appeal court rules that animals cannot hold copyright or sue under the Copyright Act.1
What people misrememberSet straight
Commonly remembered asA monkey stole his camera.
ActuallyEarly reports said so. Slater later said that was a different incident: for these he had set the camera on a tripod with a remote trigger and chosen the framing.1
Why it is here: something the internet still knows by name · it got out of its own corner of the internet fast · still being watched and quoted years later
This began as a photograph, not as a video. Originally published on publisher-site.
Where it came fromWhat we know
There is no original upload to identify: this did not begin as one. There is no copy of it here either — what it was, when it appeared and what people called it is what this page can tell you.
Nothing here is claimed to be the first publication of this Moment, because the first publication was not an upload. This began as a photograph, not as a video. Originally published on publisher-site.
Not established. This index only names a creator where the evidence supports it.
More from 2011You were there
More from the social eraMore of the archive
SourcesWhat was read
Sources last read on . That date is about the history on this page. Whether the media still plays is checked separately and can change any day. How ViralWorld documents things