I applaud the convenient availability of a DMCA takedown form for Google sites, but there seems to be little enforcement beyond that. Does Google do enough in your opinion? Do the accounts of repeat infringers get taken down fast enough, or ever? I heard that one of the presenters at the G+ Photographer's Conference trained attendees on how to right mouse click save and re-upload other peoples' photos!
#copyright #photography #copyrightinfringement #copyrightlaw
Reshared post from +Daniel Schwabe
Google+, copyright violations and the fight for attention
warning: long rant – if you don't feel like reading all of it, please skip to the proposal at the end!
I’ve been increasingly bothered by the rampant abuse of photo sharing within Google+. By this I mean people who find beautiful images in the Internet, download them, re-upload them to their own photo streams, and share them, most often without any attribution. Google+ assumes that either you took the photo yourself, or you have the right to post such content. When one hovers over the photo, a hover text says “XYZ’s photos”. Some (I believe most) do it out of sheer ignorance, others, not so much – they even go to the length of removing watermarks, or adding their own! .
The recent inclusion of the “views” statistics has made the effects of this behavior even more evident. A typical example I’ve come across is a poster who has over 8 million views and only slightly more than 2000 followers – without a single photo of his own. There are some communities in Google+, (e.g. Amazing Places to See, Nature Photography ) that are choke full of this kind of photo sharing, and their moderators don’t seem to make any effort to discourage improper sharing.
It is no secret that we are now in an “attention economy” – everybody is, in some sense, trying to get everybody else’s attention. For many, this is directly translated into monetary rewards, for others, the rewards are less tangible – fame, recognition, etc…Google+ is no different. It has become very popular with photographers and photo lovers in general, being an important place to share and see beautiful images, for professionals and amateurs alike. Whereas there are several other photo sharing sites (e.g., Flickr, 500px, 1x, …), the quality of interactions and variety of photography-related subjects being discussed sets it apart. So photo sharing is especially relevant.
There are many so-called “social marketeers” who understand very well the importance of visibility, and resort to this tactic to increase their own visibility. Sometimes they actually include either a reference or a link to the original site in the text of the post, but the shared photo still shows up as if it was their own and not the author's. Some have claimed that it is often difficult or impossible to find the owner, or requires too much work. And, truth be said, the copyright ownership of many photos found on those "free wallpaper" sharing sites (a very common source of photos for reposting and attracting many views) is not so clear – many claim these images a free, although I suspect they free for personal use on one's own machine, not for reposting.
I have also heard the claim they are actually doing the photographer a favor by exposing the photo to a much larger audience than the one they have, and that many photographers are even grateful to them for doing this. In one case, there was a photo where the photographer's page in 500px had 13k views, and the sharer's had 73k views (which never went to the photographer's site or account) – and one comment on the G+ post even inquired whether he (the poster) sold that and other photos! To me it is evidence that many readers, if not most, do not realize the photo is not from the poster, in spite of the credit text at the top of the post itself.
So, in spite of what they claim, in my view they are benefiting, ultimately for commercial purposes, from other people’s work, without providing any return to the original author. Some may disagree with this perception, but in absence of more concrete data supporting this claim (that they are concretely benefitting the photographer), I take it as a rationalization to explain inadequate behavior. It seems to me to the equivalent of those requests one gets to allow the use of one's photos for free, in exchange for "recognition".
I can understand that it no so simple for Google+ to deal with this, for legal reasons. Currently, only the copyright owner can report violations. And it is nearly impossible to completely eradicate such behavior.
But Google+ could at least discourage it, in at least two ways It could put a visible reminder when one is uploading content, emphasizing that sharing other people's work without their consent is a copyright violation. In addition, it could include a link to some tutorial/clarification (there are many available, in layman terms), as a way to educate those who don’t have any knowledge about copyrights and proper posting etiquette.A second initiative would be to use the tools they already have and use them to detect "suspicious" material. It would be easy to put up a warning, when an image is uploaded, if the same image was found elsewhere, along the lines of "we have detected this material exists somewhere else in the Internet. Please make sure you have the right to post it, you may be violating its copyright".
Both measures would have a more "educational", rather than coercive, approach, and I believe could help improve the general sharing culture within Google+.
Your thoughts?
(I'm tagging a few people who I believe could contribute to the discussion –
+Thomas Hawk +Jeff Sullivan +Joe Azure +Jay Patel +Varina Patel +Mike Spinak +Colby Brown +Elia Locardi +Barry Blanchard +Lori Hibbett +Patrick Smith +RC Concepcion +Gideon Rosenblatt +Mark Traphagen +Robert Scoble +Yonatan Zunger +Brian Matiash +Victor Bezrukov
+Karen Hutton +Alan Shapiro +John Paul Caponigro +Jim Goldstein +Ron Clifford +Sean Bagshaw +Toby Harriman +Martin Rak +Jim Patterson +Vincent Mo +Trey Ratcliff +Google+ Photos +Google )
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Facebook Software Engineer Teaches You How to Steal Copyrighted Images
According to his bio, Jesse Chen is a software engineer at Facebook and recent graduate of UC Berkeley. Jesse has a personal blog which we recently stumbled across that includes a blog post from 2012 that detailed how to go about stealing copyrighted images and removing watermarks. The…
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Comments
Just because we like it and want some one else see it, dosen't mean were wanting to sell it. If it has a water mark, then what could we do with it, other then look at it. If you don't want people to view your work, then don't show it.
The question begs answering why are you putting legitimate version of your intellectual property, copyright product on the Internet?
"Jesse wouldn’t be cool with someone stealing some of his code for use in their own website, even though it can be done just as easily" ….but, then FB was started by pirates, yes?
Right Click – Save As… is the way of the web. Get over it.
+Jasper Hanks +Leddyn Rhulund many businesses these days are internet based. I sell much of my photography by putting it online – it is the best way for people to see it. I only use relatively low resolution photos online though. Would you go on a website and buy a photographic print you had never seen?
+Michael Russell watermark images, low resolution as you have done and if client is interested, full registration to view high resolution images. Tracking any attempt to copy or screen capture. Then charge the account. you would need to run your own server for this.
+Leddyn Rhulund I agree in that paying clients are the only ones that get my full resolution images in the form of a file or a print. I don't need to track these people much as they have already paid when they get the file. I do check up to make sure people are using a licensed image correctly though. Still, I do get a lot of people taking the low resolution images for various reasons. Many of those people wind up writing me a cheque after I find them. 🙂
+Michael Russell your trying to make a living and I understand why you protect your works so ardently. At lot of time and skill goes into any art form.
I would personally become familiar with Google own copyright rules and how they may effect you. You don't want to be publishing on a google site to find out you have wavered your intellectual property and copyright rights.
+Leddyn Rhulund I have read the Google TOS many times, and am comfortable with it. I did stop posting to Facebook last year though, as I was not as comfortable with their TOS language or the general attitude of the company in these matters. Your point is a good one though – everyone who shares their content on social media platforms of all kinds should be aware of the terms of service for those sites.
Yes, I would buy, and have bought photos i fell in love with off the internet. How else am I going to get them 11by 16 or bigger
I would like to clarify one thing relative my post. I was not referring so much to people "ripping off" images to sell, or to print for their own use. It is much subtler than this. What these people are doing is gaining social media capital (views) through other people's work, and eventually making money out of it (some). My whole point is that they could do it – gain social capital – and benefit the original author as well, just by sharing a clickable image that takes the reader to the original author's site/page. Of course photographers put up their work also to gain social capital, but in this case it is different, because it is not a zero-sum game anymore. A curator can benefit together with the artist – this is what the Internet and digital technology has brought about!
The truth is that, right or wrong, the ease of copying that the internet enables will probably win out over traditional copyright law in the long run. The internet is just too big of a place to police effectively (at least, right now it is). It can be hard to find infringement of one's own copyrights even on the same site on which the originals were posted. As a content creator, the analysis has to be "will I gain more from sharing this, in spite of the fact that others will benefit from it in an unapproved manner, than I would if I did not share it," and enforcement needs to focus most on those who actively seek monetary gain through copyright infringement. Education of those who don't would also go a long way towards directing traffic towards content creators themselves; there are far more people than I would have thought who really think that posting something on the internet is the same as putting it in the public domain.
I think it would be interesting to find out (if possible) whether those who repost images in this manner are actually diverting traffic from the originals or if there wouldn't really be much of a difference.
I think it's really hard for people who are stuck with market economy thinking to grasp, what the internet is all about; sharing.
We are talking about digital mediums, which can be copied, altered and spread. If you don't like the internet-based tool, you can just get a film camera and sell the pictures as physical copies, which include some of the "property" things you need.
I think instead of trying to make internet a closed property safe behind a paywall, it's easier to figure out what it is and use other mediums if this one is not the right one for the intented use.
Owning a thought or a certain line of bytes seems pretty crazy, but that is the current paradigm. In the end it's just a social contract, which people can choose if it fits their train of thought 😛
+Daniel Schwabe we are also dealing with young people who are not legally responsible who innocently just copy and paste and are savvy enough to know that they can attract income from Facebook, youtube etc. This is a growing issue. Not everybody is 18+ on the internets social media.
If you post another artists work you should credit that artist. You may think it's unimportant but it's important to the artist.
+Leddyn Rhulund Yes. That's why, if you look at the proposal in my original post, and the discussion, you will see that I advocate an educational (rather than coercive) approach towards changing the culture of sharing within Google+, with the support of technological tools.
+Ezra Allen Yes. What I am stressing is that in case of photos, the credit should also be in the form of a link in the photo itself (ie, clicking on the image takes you to the photographer's page/website. Just mentioning the author in the text of the post is not enough. Most people don't read the text, or don't pay attention.; there is strong evidence about this in user's comments on such posts – most congratulate the poster on the photo, as if s/he was the one who took it.
+Daniel Schwabe
Yes a link is ideal, a credit is useful too. Neither needs to become the new "there their" of the internet. It's great that you brought it up.
On YouTube there's a 3 strikes policy, I think they need one here, too.
It's a difficult issue for sure and some of these content thieves are completely heartless and have no mercy for other peoples intellectual or creative property.. I think there should be a system similar to the 3 strikes on #youtube..
After 3 strikes that person is banned from +Google+
Thoughts?
+Daniel Grozdanov – I think it's up to the indivdual to protect there own intellectual property and copyright items. Don't post the item if you don't want it stolen and used for someone else's gain. You wouldn't leave your wallet on the side walk would you. Use water marks and low quality imaging. google provides a conduit for discussion and sharing and the ability to promote business. They shouldn't be copyright police.
This kid does not teach how to share,…he is outright outlining how to steal. The internet is not about stealing
I think part of posting online has to be the knowledge that people can steal your work if they are so inclined. It is as easy as a screenshot, etc…
However, I believe if folks are going to do that there is no real way to stop them. I do think that Google should do more to stop the folks that steal images and pass them off as their own on here.
I am not tech savvy, nor am I a photographer. However, I enjoy sharing beautiful pictures both on Google+ and on Facebook. It frustrates me as a layperson that the burden is on me to try to figure out how to convey the source of the photograph, especially since the place I found it may not be its source. I wish there was a technology that would cause the original artist's name or website always to appear when the photograph is shared. I used to try to give credit every time, but it became overwhelming. I like the idea that the person above mentioned regarding an embedded link to the artist's website. I would never purposely take someone else's photo and claim it as my own; but it appears to me that the current technology seems to work that way. Kudos for bringing up the subject. I hope that the artists and the web professionals will be able to fix this. Regards.
+Lane Pietrylo there is such a technical solution. It's called an EXIF tag. Google keeps them; Facebook strips them off. Most people don't customize them because they don't know they exist. A committed thief can strip them easily, but it would at least catch casual "right click and save" misattributions.