Is this how it's normally done!?

[Ballistics]

Never load anything to facebook ever that you ever want to use for any commercial purposes.

When you upload an image to facebook, they get an unlimited license to resell or distribute or modify it any way they want. Which includes letting other users repost things. Once you uploaded it to facebook, you actually didn't own exclusive copyright on the image anymore, so it wasn't, in fact, necessarily illegal for the bride to repost it, and there's not necessarily anything you can do about it (facebook could stop her if they wanted, but not you).

Facebook could even sell your photos to an advertising agency and put some advertising text and a logo in there in the corner and plaster it up on a billboard to sell Coke. And you couldn't do anything about it. Etc. etc.

If you must post things online, use your own website, or some site that doesn't claim a license on your work, like Flickr, and ALSO watermark and/or reduce to a uselessly small resolution for printing (<1000 pixels long edge)

Again, this isn't true.

 

[Ballistics]

Never load anything to facebook ever that you ever want to use for any commercial purposes.

When you upload an image to facebook, they get an unlimited license to resell or distribute or modify it any way they want. Which includes letting other users repost things. Once you uploaded it to facebook, you actually didn't own exclusive copyright on the image anymore, so it wasn't, in fact, necessarily illegal for the bride to repost it, and there's not necessarily anything you can do about it (facebook could stop her if they wanted, but not you).

Facebook could even sell your photos to an advertising agency and put some advertising text and a logo in there in the corner and plaster it up on a billboard to sell Coke. And you couldn't do anything about it. Etc. etc.

If you must post things online, use your own website, or some site that doesn't claim a license on your work, like Flickr, and ALSO watermark and/or reduce to a uselessly small resolution for printing (<1000 pixels long edge)

It's a license for use, not to modify or sell. There's also nothing ambiguous about it.

Intellectual Property



Facebook respects the intellectual property rights of others and is committed to helping third parties protect their rights. Our Statement of Rights and Responsibilities prohibits users from posting content that violates another party's intellectual property rights. When we receive a valid notice of IP infringement, we promptly remove or disable access to the allegedly infringing content. We also terminate the accounts of repeat infringers in appropriate circumstances.


Rights holders will find information below regarding how to report copyright and other intellectual property infringements by users posting content on our website, and answers to some frequently asked questions regarding our policies.

 

[Gavjenks]

On more than one occasion Facebook has helped me to retrieve my property.

Because they felt like it. NOT because they legally had to.

If your image were to suddenly be worth millions of dollars for some reason (for example, that one picture of Obama that he decided to use for his logo in the first election), then Facebook might very well mysteriously stop being so helpful anymore like they were in the past. And you would simply be screwed.

Relying on the good faith of major corporations, especially ones with horrible privacy track records, is a terrible idea.

 

[Ballistics]

On more than one occasion Facebook has helped me to retrieve my property.

Because they felt like it. NOT because they legally had to.

If your image were to suddenly be worth millions of dollars for some reason (for example, that one picture of Obama that he decided to use for his logo in the first election), then Facebook might very well mysteriously stop being so helpful anymore like they were in the past. And you would simply be screwed.

Relying on the good faith of major corporations, especially ones with horrible privacy track records, is a terrible idea.

You're being a facebook fear mongerer lol. It says cut and dry in their policy what they will do in the event that intellectual theft takes place.

Intellectual Property



Facebook respects the intellectual property rights of others and is committed to helping third parties protect their rights. Our Statement of Rights and Responsibilities prohibits users from posting content that violates another party's intellectual property rights. When we receive a valid notice of IP infringement, we promptly remove or disable access to the allegedly infringing content. We also terminate the accounts of repeat infringers in appropriate circumstances.

Rights holders will find information below regarding how to report copyright and other intellectual property infringements by users posting content on our website, and answers to some frequently asked questions regarding our policies.

 

[Gavjenks]

It's a license for use, not to modify or sell. There's also nothing ambiguous about it.

Terms of Service:

you grant us a non-exclusive, transferable, sub-licensable, royalty-free, worldwide license to use any IP content that you post on or in connection with Facebook (IP License).

"transferrable" and "sublicensable"

Says right in the Terms of Service. Plain as day. That means they can extend the license to other people. As in selling it. Or giving it away, either one..

And your exceprt about intellectual property is not a legal document like the ToS. It's just a random information page about their policies, which they are not necessarily obligated to uphold. They can change their policies whenever they feel like it. Even ToS's are often on shifting legal ground, much less non-agreement informational pages. Those are meaningless.

Does it say anything about them promising to act on any third party reproduction of content in the ToS itself? If so, then okay.



Also, even if it does say that, it doesn't solve the problem of them being able to sell your images THEMSELVES.

 

[Ballistics]

It's a license for use, not to modify or sell. There's also nothing ambiguous about it.

"transferrable" and "sublicensable"

Says right in the Terms of Service. Plain as day. That means they can extend the license to other people. As in selling it. Or giving it away, either one..

And your exceprt about intellectual property is not a legal document like the ToS. It's just a random information page about their policies, which they are not necessarily obligated to uphold. They can change their policies whenever they feel like it. Even ToS's are often on shifting legal ground, much less non-agreement informational pages. Those are meaningless.

Does it say anything about them promising to act on any third party reproduction of content in the ToS itself? If so, then okay.

In other words, you just didn't bother to do any research and are developing an opinion on it. Are you sure you have a doctorate?

 

[Ballistics]

This Statement of Rights and Responsibilities ("Statement," "Terms," or "SRR") derives from the Facebook Principles, and is our terms of service that governs our relationship with users and others who interact with Facebook.

Our Statement of Rights and Responsibilities prohibits users from posting content that violates another party's intellectual property rights. When we receive a valid notice of IP infringement, we promptly remove or disable access to the allegedly infringing content. We also terminate the accounts of repeat infringers in appropriate circumstances.

Now what?

 

[Gavjenks]

In other words, you just didn't bother to do any research and are developing an opinion on it. Are you sure you have a doctorate?

1) I did, and that content is not in fact in the ToS that I saw. But you can't prove a negative with quotes. What do you want me to do? Quote the entire ToS as evidence of it NOT being there? No... it's much simpler and more forum-appropriate for the person who does believe something exists to post it, rather than the physical impossibility (or extreme impracticality at least) of posting the absence of something.

2) I never said I had a doctorate. What on Earth are you talking about?

 

[TCampbell]

Keep in mind... you are talking about Zuckerberg's company.

If anyone wants to exercise extreme caution when it comes to Facebook's IP policies... I completely understand.

 

[Ballistics]

In other words, you just didn't bother to do any research and are developing an opinion on it. Are you sure you have a doctorate?

1) I did, and that content is not in fact in the ToS that I saw. But you can't prove a negative with quotes. What do you want me to do? Quote the entire ToS as evidence of it NOT being there? No... it's much simpler and more forum-appropriate for the person who does believe something exists to post it, rather than the physical impossibility (or extreme impracticality at least) of posting the absence of something.

2) I never said I had a doctorate. What on Earth are you talking about?

1) You are looking at the TOS in the post above. This is facebook plainly telling you, what their TOS is, and what it intends to do to protect the IP of their users.

2) You said that you were a psychologist. Psychologists have doctorates in psychology.

 

[Gavjenks]

This Statement of Rights and Responsibilities ("Statement," "Terms," or "SRR") derives from the Facebook Principles, and is our terms of service that governs our relationship with users and others who interact with Facebook.

Our Statement of Rights and Responsibilities prohibits users from posting content that violates another party's intellectual property rights. When we receive a valid notice of IP infringement, we promptly remove or disable access to the allegedly infringing content. We also terminate the accounts of repeat infringers in appropriate circumstances.

Now what?

You didn't quote the Terms of Service. Again, you quoted a random policies page that is not part of the legal document. if you actually go to the legal document, you will not find anything that says they promise to remove the content that copyright infnringers have reposted.

They write in the ToS that they CAN remove it (if they feel like it). They write that they give you the tools to report it. Etc. etc. They do NOT, at least not anywhere I see, write that they WILL remove it.

Unless I missed it. In which case, feel free to point out.





Also again... even if they do promise that, it doesn't address the other issue of them potentially selling your images themselves while you still have them posted (not the bride, you.) And then it being too late if and when you remove yours.

Psychologists have doctorates in psychology.

That's news to me.

 

[Gavjenks]

Also, if you'll notice, any time you use any sort of app that has permissions on posted IP content, you are effectively giving that app all your image permissions for the purposes of the app storing it and displaying it for app stuff.

The app can't go and resell it, but what the app CAN do is simply hold onto the image on some server hard drive somewhere. Then, when you delete it, Facebook can just say "Oh sorry, you shared that image with others (the app), and they haven't deleted it yet. So therefore, according to our ToS, we still have an unlimited worldwide transferable license for your images until they delete it (which they never have any reason to.)"

And if you complain that the app has your content against copyright, too bad, because they don't. They have it with your permission, so there's nothing wrong with it at all and they can keep it for 1000 years.

And then if your image ever becomes very valuable, Facebook can proceed to sell it to all the magazines or whoever wants to buy it, and they will probably be able to do so more efficiently than you, because they're a huge company with marketing contacts and resources.

And if you try to badmouth them for it, they could potentially sue you for slander.



Just one of I'm sure dozens of fun examples of loopholes that this extremely underspecified and questionable ToS allows for.

 

[Ballistics]

This Statement of Rights and Responsibilities ("Statement," "Terms," or "SRR") derives from the Facebook Principles, and is our terms of service that governs our relationship with users and others who interact with Facebook.

Now what?

You didn't quote the Terms of Service. Again, you quoted a random policies page that is not part of the legal document. if you actually go to the legal document, you will not find anything that says they promise to remove the content that copyright infnringers have reposted.

They write in the ToS that they CAN remove it (if they feel like it). They write that they give you the tools to report it. Etc. etc. They do NOT, at least not anywhere I see, write that they WILL remove it.

Unless I missed it. In which case, feel free to point out.





Also again... even if they do promise that, it doesn't address the other issue of them potentially selling your images themselves while you still have them posted (not the bride, you.) And then it being too late if and when you remove yours.

Psychologists have doctorates in psychology.

That's news to me.

Anything that Facebook posts is binding legally. It says on their registered page that they WILL remove content.

 

[vintagesnaps]

It's not that surprising that someone could or would take your photos from your page on a social media website and post them elsewhere. Once you post photos online, particularly I think on sites like Facebook, they're usually unprotected and potentially gone and I don't know how likely it would be that the photos would always be recovered or that some sort of restitution would be made.

I took my own photos off my own Facebook page some time ago because of their terms. I know a couple of photographers who post some select images only and/or just the link to their site on their FB page.

There's a difference between ownership and usage; putting your photos on their website means you are agreeing to their terms. The red flags for me are words like worldwide, royalty free, transferrable - I don't know how photos posted there might potentially be used but I'm not posting my photos on there to find out.

Even if it's not allowed for others to take users' photos from their pages, what's to prevent someone from using your photos once they've been able to take them off your page? By then they've already got them.

 

[Gavjenks]

Link me the ToS that I'm apparently not quoting.

https://www.facebook.com/legal/terms is what you are actually agreeing to legally. Nowhere in that document that I can see does it say that they WILL necessarily delete infringing content that a 3rd party posted. Only they they can do so, and that they give you tools to report it, and so on.

It also says this:

When you publish content or information using the Public setting, it means that you are allowing everyone, including people off of Facebook, to access and use that information, and to associate it with you (i.e., your name and profile picture).

Which clearly implies that anybody you share your images with DOES have a limited license to repost your images (they only specifically mention the public setting, but the implication is that any privacy setting yields such rights to whoever the privacy setting is set visible for. Since they don't say that ISNT how it works anywhere else).

Which leads me to believe that when they talk about "copyright infringement" later on, it probably only actually applies to people posting images who did NOT have them visible to them via your facebook page. For example, somebody taking an image off your own private professional website and posting it on facebook, but NOT somebody sharing or reposting an image that you posted on facebook with them set to have permissions to see it.

Which would mean that the bride wouldn't even be considered in copyright violation in the first place by Facebook, and so even if you reported her, they wouldn't have any particular obligation to take down the content, even if you take their policy pages as promises (which you shouldn't).

They might choose to do so to make their customers happy on any given singular instance. But no obligation to do so if they decide they don't feel like it at any point.




There's seriously like 5 or 6 LAYERS of redundant loopholes here. It's one of the most farcical terms of service I've ever read. Look at Flickr's by comparison and you will see what I mean. The difference is blatantly obvious.