IF I were to take a demotivational poster, and change the picture to a stock photo but use the same sentence or a very similar sentence. Is this legal? E.g. demotivational poster: http://www.funnyforumpics.com/forums/Demotivational/3/demotivational-posters-rock-bottom.jpg Do people own the rights to these little phrases?
Pretty much completely. Your changing it in bad faith. There is a good faith rule of usage. That sentance is not like an article you are changing. It is quite short, and you would pretty much have to change the whole sentence. (you could probably keep the title and be ok though)
Well, the question is, do they have access to the image they used? Is it in the public domain, or do they own the rights to it? I would guess no. This would mean that as long as you get permission from the copyright owner for the image, it would be difficult for the person who came up with the phrase to press charges, as they are breaking copyright themselves.
This is what I thought originally. I feel usually they find funny images (that almost definitely do not belong to them) and then post them to humor sites. This is why I'd change the image to royalty free stock photos.
Actually, they may not be able to copyright the phrase. See: http://www.copyright.gov/help/faq/faq-protect.html#title. And always, tread at your own risk.
Yes, if they found a funny image on the internet then they would not be able to stand up in court lol. If they are the copyright owners of the picture and added the phrase on there, it may be protected. Best thing to do is to judge your risk at someone finding it out lol.