Tony
First, I'm not a lawyer and I don't play one on television. 
http://www.socialmediaexaminer.com/copyright-fair-use-and-how-it-works-for-online-images/
At the end of the day, your not a stock photographer. If my source is correct, this issue falls under the "Fair Use Doctrine". It allows for limited and reasonable uses as long as the use does not interfere with owners’ rights or impede their right to do with the work as they wish. Since your not selling stock photography and your copyright is on the work, Alex can use it. Alex is not selling your photo as his own.
I think we had this discussion once before on post your collection. Most don't use big watermarks on photos because, one they are ugly and two It does not stop people from using them. What your doing by adding your copyright/name on the bottom right looks fine and your getting credit for your work. Stock photographers use big watermarks because they are selling those images and if stolen impedes on their right to do with the work as they wish.
What I don't understand is that Alex is known in the industry for taking his own photos. Why would Alex want or need to use someone else's photos? If it were me, I'm not using anything on a website I own that was not shot by me or licence purchased by me, let alone give anyone credit for something I can do myself.
Consider it a compliment, Alex used your photo. He should not have. Not because he's not allowed but because its in poor taste as a producer.
Allow me to play devil's advocate for a little while...
17 U.S.C. § 107
Notwithstanding the provisions of sections 17 U.S.C. § 106 and 17 U.S.C. § 106A, the fair use of a copyrighted work, including such use by reproduction in copies or phonorecords or by any other means specified by that section, for purposes such as criticism, comment, news reporting, teaching (including multiple copies for classroom use), scholarship, or research, is not an infringement of copyright. In determining whether the use made of a work in any particular case is a fair use the factors to be considered shall include:
the purpose and character of the use, including whether such use is of a commercial nature or is for nonprofit educational purposes;
the nature of the copyrighted work;
the amount and substantiality of the portion used in relation to the copyrighted work as a whole; and
the effect of the use upon the potential market for or value of the copyrighted work.
The fact that a work is unpublished shall not itself bar a finding of fair use if such finding is made upon consideration of all the above factors.The very article you quoted has a series of questions to ask, in order to determine if one's use of an image falls under fair use.
#2: Why are you using the image? If it is “…for purposes such as criticism, comment, news reporting, teaching (including multiple copies for classroom use), scholarship, or research…” you’re on the right track.
If you’re just using the image to pretty up a post, then think twice; or better yet, get permission or buy a stock image.I don't think an advertisement for products for sale would qualify as a fair use case for appropriating the photo.
Another question from the same article:
#4: How much of the image are you using? If you’re using a thumbnail and linking to the original location, there is greater likelihood of finding fair use than if you just post the original image. If you’re doing a post about facial features and are just using a portion of the face from an image, you stand a better chance of arguing fair use than if you used the entire image.I got a fair look at the page - it looked to me like the entire photo, right down to the watermark, was in use in the Blue Crown's advertisement.
Fair use will protect the user in certain limited cases - but using the full image for the purposes of making money by placing it in an advertisement, even if it is a photo of one of your own products, really wouldn't qualify, as far as I can tell. There's no greater public good that's being served, it's not "news" in the sense of a report on a current event, scholarship and research were the furthest things from the company owner's mind when he used the photo, etc. It's not even like it was being appropriated for inclusion into an artistic work of some kind, like audio samples used in a song or the image of a Campbell's Soup can in an Andy Warhol painting.
Even in such cases, there are limits as to how far one can go - for example, when one adds an audio sample from another work to a song, you're limited to a certain number of seconds for it to be considered fair use - past that, and you owe the copyright holder some cash. Just ask the band Pop Will Eat Itself - they went past the length defined when they used a sample from the opening sequence of the TV show, "The Twilight Zone," and it cost them a pretty penny or two.
Anyway, at this point, this entire thing is a moot point. Tony came to an agreement with Alex - the details of which haven't been revealed, but it's in place nonetheless. Fair use doctrine is an important part of our culture, allowing people to use a work for a specific purpose in their own generation, while it still retains some degree of relevance, instead of having to wait several generations for copyright to expire. But its use is really quite limited, especially when it comes to commercial use of a copyrighted work - and a copyright need not be registered to be enforceable, though it certainly helps. Copyright attaches to a work the moment it is created, not the moment some government clerk stamps "Rec'd" on it.
