Link with love - not litigation, Fair Dealing laws

Link With Love

blogwithintegrity.com

• Public domain does not mean you can use anything you find on the Internet. 

Dear readers: 'Fair Dealing' (Canada), 'Fair Use' (Nine Copyright Myths of the Online World - US), does not mean free, even if you posted it on FaceBook or for your non-profit site. Credit your sources.

Link With Love, is a wonderful teaching tool for those who plagiarize or simply misunderstand. I have dear friends who take professional photos, sell them and/or either donate them to a charity fundraiser, or sell them and donate the proceeds, as I do, to a favourite charity. 

This sign was for Oliver, who loved hunting birds!

When I saw Pinterest, I knew that it wasn't fair, nor was it legal, to post a photo that is not your own, for your own purposes. Non-profit site or not. For example, I have posted 'No Hunting No –Trespassing' signs on my property, despite the fact that you need permission to hunt, because hunters think the absence of a sign is an indication!

With Pinterest, one 'pins' a photo on one's Pinterest page, however, Pinterest stores this image and, like Facebook, can store, or sell the image with no credit for s/he who created it.

In the case of someone designing, for example, crafts (e.g., cakes, sweaters, gift cards), someone takes the image and uses it for their own to draw web traffic. The image is no longer linked to the person who created it.

When someone pins your photo, it goes onto the Pinterest’s servers. You no longer have control of that image, Pinterest does.
Pinterest has been charged with permitting spammers to make money.

Pinterest Spammer Makes $30,000 in a Month

Taking advantage of the startup’s fast growth and optimaluser demographics — consisting mostly of brand-savvy women with an annual household income of more than $100,000 and a love of shopping — spammers are making huge amounts of money just by pinning items to Pinterest and directing consumers to make purchases on Amazon.

Many young people feel that everything on the 'net ought to be free. They are entitled to their feelings, but this is not the legal case.
The worst offenders?

• The media, journalists, who grew up in a world where they downloaded music for free, and feel no shame in on-line theft
• Legal Lesson Learned: Copywriter Pays $4000 for $10 stolen Photo ... 
• SEO Professionals, like Official Consulting, who created Muskoka Cottage Rentals. The 'Muskoka' name draws much webtraffic itself, never mind the hundreds of thousands of people who rent in Muskoka (which is why we left Muskoka)! I haven't taken the time, but am sure some stolen photos are there.
• AG Production, this header doesn't belong to them , or the same photo here. (I've seen this style elsewhere)!

Someone has spent time, energy, and years honing skills to create their intellectual property. Many use the Internet to sell their artwork or photos, or market their products.
Pinterest, a for-profit site, much like Facebook, that earns profits off of you, your data, ads, and selling your photos.

• Panties In A Wad With Pinterest

27 Feb 2012 – There is so much flack lately coming out for Pinterest. ... People are pinning pictures that they have stolen from other bloggers and are ... There's a bakery in Europe that is using one of my cake pictures without crediting me

• When did it become OK to take someone’s stuff without asking?

Pinterest says it will take down copyrighted content, but only if the owner goes through the list of steps on its site, for every piece of content they want removed.


 Is Pinterest a haven for Copyright Violations?
Yes, it is. Bravo to Pinterest for attempting to address copyright concerns by providing a snippet of code so that sites can "opt out". It doesn't entirely resolve the copyright issue, since one shouldn't have to "opt out" of a service you didn't join. How many of us, who sell our photos (I have 12,000 in my archives), have time to check the WWW to search for stolen images?

There are people who go to the trouble of removing a Digimarc, or watermark, and re-adding their own copyright to them.


Can you believe it? One friend, and I have blogbuds who are artists, photographers, and card makers, tells me she found more than 50 websites using her images for commercial purposes without permission.  Google does offer a service, but you have to search by image. Time consuming for those trying to earn a living by their hobby, or their work.

Copyscape
Regularly do a search:
 Google does offered service

To protect yourself:

• Only post low-resolution photos. Thieves need large photos for professional ads. 

• Information for Bloggers and People Who Use Pinterest
• Put this in the HEAD section of your HTML: Download text file: NoPinCode.



Firefox Add-on
to search for
theft of images

• So called reverse image search engines can be used to find copies of your images on the Internet. The most prominent ones are Tineye, Yandex and Google.

More horror stories:

Yahoo! Canada Answers - How to remove a child's photo from ...‎ - 21 Sep 2011
PLEASE HELP! Girl stole my boyfriends friends photo and ...‎ - 22 Oct 2010


Media is the worst! They stole my video, with no credit. You can read my story of theft of my entire video from a TV news outlet. I emailed Dr. Michael Geist (U of O) for a professional opinion, and he confirmed my belief. In fact, for-profit media take videos off YouTube, preface them with money-making ads, then post them on their own websites. This means the creator gets NO webtraffic at the original sight, nor a view count. 

Local newspaper stole my photos, what should I do?

5 Jan 2011 – ...and following all that, keep your photos off of stinkin' Facebook! 

Some other helpful sites

• YouTube “Copyright Tips” page
• The Stanford Copyright & Fair Use Center (US law)
• US Copyright Office (US law)
• UK Intellectual Property Office (UK law)