What do I do now?

mishele · May 13, 2011

bennielou said:
As someone who has had my photos stolen about a zillion times, the copyright deal doesn't work overseas. The only thing that has worked for me was to prove to the internet provider that my photos were jacked. And for good measure I also spread the word with all my photo friends who ultimately humilate the poster via very public internet outrage, to take the photos down. (They normally steal my photos as well as others). Public Internet Humiliation works way better than you could ever imagine.

Webnode.com must have my pictures somewhere because that is where people are making website w/ my picture. Yes and most of the sites are overseas and they don't speak English.

KmH · May 13, 2011

For international copyright protection the US (and 160+ other countries) is a signator of the Berne Convention: Berne Convention for the Protection of Literary and Artistic Works - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

j-dogg · May 13, 2011

I dont have a Flickr and don't post anything decent on Facebook either for this exact reason. If a client wants to see what I can do, they can come look at my portfolio, printed out like old school, in person. Theft is a big deal right now with the ****ty economy major corporations don't want to pay for a photographer they're all about maximizing profits.

Stick those bastards to the wall and put the screws to them for every last dime.

Fiendish Astronaut · May 13, 2011

Lawyer letter sent asking them to pay me and his (not inconsiderable) costs. It's from an established copyright lawyer who's a friend of my family - this could be fun to watch.

Re: Flickr - why shouldn't I use such a site? It's sad that internet thieves should stop me being able to showcase my images in whatever way I want and get feedback from my peers. I get joy from sharing my photos in this way and sometimes I learn a thing or two. So I'm not going to stop this practice just yet although obviously it is not appropriate to post everything I shoot (especially private commissions).

Bitter Jeweler · May 13, 2011

I didn't say you should stop using Flickr. I said you should stop tagging and titling your images IF you are concerned about theft. Tags and titles make it EASY for people to find your photos, and use or steal them.

Search for 3 carat on Yahoo! The VERY FIRST IMAGE is mine. It gets hits all the time. It's tagged!

Images with no tags or titles, aren't searchable. It's a tool you can use to help stop theft of your images.

Fiendish Astronaut · May 13, 2011

Bitter Jeweler said:
I didn't say you should stop using Flickr. I said you should stop tagging and titling your images IF you are concerned about theft. Tags and titles make it EASY for people to find your photos, and use or steal them.

Search for 3 carat on Yahoo! The VERY FIRST IMAGE is mine. It gets hits all the time. It's tagged!

Images with no tags or titles, aren't searchable. It's a tool you can use to help stop theft of your images.

Great shot!

That is an option I may consider in future - and a good idea.

Bitter Jeweler · May 21, 2011

Just as another example of how images are used as stock photography from Flickr...

This is quite an extensive blog/help site. A majority of images come from Flickr. To be fair, the image used of mine is under the creative commons license, credit and a link back is given.
Again, it is a tagged and titled image.

An Urban Garden for Beginners II: 14 Herbs to Grow Yourself

Scroll down, the "Chives" shot is mine. This is the third (website) time this image has been used. Only once, was I asked.