How fussy are you about your articles?

[bobt]

Let's say you have written an article in one of the forums. It might be a tutorial, a general "How to do something" item, or some other sharing of wisdom/knowledge with your fellow photographers. It took you a while to create.

Some time later you find your article on another photographic website, repeating the knowledge sharing but not giving any accreditation to you for writing it in the first place.

Do you just feel flattered that someone else has picked it up, and happy to share the knowledge even if it's unaccredited?
Do you feel irritated, but don't pursue it?
Do you get furious and demand that the site acknowledge your authorship?
Do you spit the dummy, contact the site owner and demand it be removed?
Do you realise it's all a dream because you have trouble stringing two words together at the best of times?

[ricktas]

I have had to do this a few times, when sections of AP have been 'borrowed', including member posts, photos. I have had one site removed completely because of their action.

So I would say I contact the owner and demand it be removed, if they refuse, I issue a take down notice to the ISP hosting their site, and that works!

[ricktas]

I have merged your two threads as you had asked the same questions in two different forums

[bobt]

Yeah ... I thought that one had been deleted ... I was struggling with creating a poll - ended up in the sandbox experimenting. If that other one is still there feel free to toss it.

I was curious to see if people felt the same way about written work as their photos.

[Kym]

I cleaned up your thread!

When I was managerfor a software development company we had some commercial stuff ripped off by a small startup; We sued and won... next?

[para]

Had a situation about a year ago,shot a wakeboard comp for our local paper then was checking out a wakeboard forum there where on some ones thread... Found out the thread starter was a major wakebord importer
sent the user a message it came out that some of the guys at the cable park had scanned the paper and sent them to him, had a discussion about copyright ended up doing a shoot for them and gave me credit on the forum so it all ended nicely.

[bobt]

I guess I'm a bit more laid back on this sort of thing. I figure that I've learned most of what I know from reading other people's articles on the web. Now I know enough to write a few myself, I think it's just giving back to the photographic community.

If my name isn't attached to it, it doesn't really matter all that much - it's only my ego that's at risk.

[Xenedis]

I am fussy about everything.

I tend to pursue (so far with a 100% success rate) people who use my images in an unauthorised manner.

One guy was offering thousands of images (not his own) as mobile phone wallpaper. My image had been modified and published without my consent. I had his site pulled offline.

Another non-profit organisation in the USA used one of my images on its site.

I sent an email stating that I was the photographer and copyright holder, advised that the image was not authorised for use and was never intended for that type of use, and advised that if the image was not removed within 72 hours, an invoice for $5,000 would be on its way. The next morning the MD emailed me, apologised and stated that the image had been removed (it had; I checked).

Another case was a deviantART user (German teenager or some such) who'd 'borrowed' one of my portraits and processed it to look like a painting. It looked bloody awful, but that wasn't the point. I told him about copyright. He apologised and removed the image.

I don't even mention lawyers when dealing with people who breach my rights.

The only people who mention lawyers are:


those who've used them, know how much it costs, and are really prepared to take action; and
those who have no idea, and just huff and puff.

Mentioning the word 'invoice' is far more frightening and effective, it seems.

As far as spreading knowledge, I believe in sharing knowledge with the wider community, as it has shared knowledge with me.

I don't like people ripping my intellectual property word for word. One guy, in setting up his photography site, used verbatim the wording from an older version of my site's 'about' page, and even 'borrowed' other stylistic and literal elements I had adopted. That annoyed me, and I exposed the idiot in public for the pathetic plagiarist he was.

If people use knowledge I've shared, and express it in their own terms, I'm fine with that.

[Rattus79]

Having never been ripped off, I am uniquely unable to post.

But I do have an imagination!

and I imagine that I'd be quite flattered but manage to be annoyed at the lack of credit.
I would kindly ask for the credit and a link. Fail that, I can be nasty.

[ving]

I like to share whatever knowledge i have and I dont care how it spreads. The fact is that what I know, thousands of other people know anyhow...

if its a photo its different of course!

[fabian628]

I would be pretty angry. It is unacceptable to take others work without crediting. I think it is just best to share the original link rather than copy over the info onto another website.

[Ms Monny]

How would you know?? Unless I am on the net 24/7 looking at ALL the different sites etc etc, I wouldn't have a clue if anyone used my info or images (I did pick it would be a dream because I am soooo bad at Grammar!!). How did you, Xenedis, find out about your image that was being used as wallpaper? Personally, though, I would pursue!!

[zollo]

for me it would depend on whether your income is based on those tutorials/articles.

[ricktas]

How would you know?? Unless I am on the net 24/7 looking at ALL the different sites etc etc, I wouldn't have a clue if anyone used my info or images (I did pick it would be a dream because I am soooo bad at Grammar!!). How did you, Xenedis, find out about your image that was being used as wallpaper? Personally, though, I would pursue!!

Sometimes people you know will tell you. Amazing how often someone has found a photo taken by a friend on another site and told their friend, 'guess where I saw your picture'. There are also image searches available. http://www.tineye.com/

[Xenedis]

I like to share whatever knowledge i have and I dont care how it spreads. The fact is that what I know, thousands of other people know anyhow...

That's pretty much what I was thinking when I responded.

The knowledge I have isn't something that is unique or puts me in an exclusive position; as such I prefer to show people my post-processing and other techniques so they can incorporate it into their methods.


How did you, Xenedis, find out about your image that was being used as wallpaper? Personally, though, I would pursue!!

Looking at the referrer entries in my site logs revealed one of the breaches. The offender actually linked back to my site!

I cannot remember how I discovered the other breaches.