A certain commercial website has pilfered images from my private site and is using them to sell products.
In the general scheme of things, this is not worth an enormous amount of angst, nor is it costing me money. I am ticked, though, that a business saw fit to rip off images that I placed online for the enjoyment and education of others, without permission. Links to my site are fine, and I would donate images to certain non-profit organizations on request. This is different.
Strictly speaking, is the current state of the law that anything online not explicitly copyrighted is fair game for others to take for commercial use? If there is at least a token acknowledgment by the Law that this practice is a no-no, what would be the best way to get these bozos to stop using my photos (that doesn’t involve a major expenditure of money or time)? I’ve already e-mailed them asking them to desist, and we’ll see how that goes.
I would suspect the “thief” already has the unaltered image that he wants locally, so I doubt anything that Jackmannii changes now would have little effect, no?
How big is this commercial enterprise? If they’re “big” they’ll probably ignore your rants because they know you cannot fight them in court. Yes, the big guy will do that to the little guy.
Do your images have digital signatures? You don’t have to do anything fancy, including registering such images. I know folks who created their own images, then used a HEX editor to insert code into the images identifying them them as unique. Works great when you go to court and show the judge what you’ve done and strange that the big guy’s web site has the same hidden code in “their” images.
Do your images have unique names? Sure an image of a key – key.gif – may be all you need, but if labled “key001a453.gif” ends up on someone else’s web site, you may stand a better chance proving it’s your image.
Do you have copyright information displayed on your web site? Even though US copyright law says you own the copyright from creation, you do need to take steps to protect that right.
If you really want to fight them via copyright, you need to register the images with the Copyright Office right now before you bring any legal action.
When you emailed them to complain, did you email the webmaster (who probably ripped you off), or did you email the CEO (who may have no idea their webmaster ripped you off)?
When all else fails, if you have a few web developer friends, tell them what happened. Perhaps you all could complain to them, even publicly announce on your web sites that the company ripped off your images. Sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn’t.
These are images that someone evidently right-clicked on and saved to their files, then reproduced on the commercial website. So colorful local alterations as suggested would not work.
I e-mailed both the “Webmaster” and the manager of the business. The manager now promises that the images will be removed. We’ll see.
All I had in mind to do if they don’t comply, is to embarass them with a pungent message on my site and in a few relevant Internet forums. Going to court really isn’t worth it.
Any recommendations as to preventing this theft in the future? What sort of copyright information should I display on my site?
And thanks to all for the suggestions.
In a friendly tone, you inform them that they don’ thave permission to use your images, and then ask what they’d pay for non-transferrable, non-exclusive permission. A reasonable business will just pay to use them if they really like the images and the fee is minor, and they might even look to you next time they want something new. Otherwise, ignore it. Post nasty stuff on their guest book if they got one, I supose, but an ordinary individual simply does not have the financial resources to go after everyone who is capable of stealing web content. If you do post nasty stuff anywhere, make it clear what’s wrong: say “they are using images of mine without permission”, don’t just say “they’re thieves”.
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There are various schemes to protect images from being stolen, each scheme with its own degree of success and drawbacks. My suggestion if you are concerned about stealing is to not post the images online. The drawbacks are real for many viewers but the protections can all be defeated without much expertise.
As far as the copyright notice, it’s unnecessary. Either you have the rights to the stuff or you don’t, and posting such a statement won’t change that nor will it usually matter to the criminal.
Ive dealt with this problem several times before. I just email the web page administrator with a relativly nice email. Topics to include: Mention that they are using your copyrighted images without permission. Mention that you will give them permission for a smallish fee (if you REALLY dont want them to use the images mention a huge fee, otherwise mention whatever you think is reasonable). Mention the laws about copyright infringment (sorry I dont remember the number) Also mention that you will contact their ISP/Domain Name Provider if they do not reply or take some action about this.
Actions you should take: Contact the parent company, if any. Contact their ISP/DNP if they do not reply or take action.
Also remember that the web administrator/web page creator could be using your images without the parent company knowing, I have ran across this several times…Well at least thats what the parent company TOLD me.
About me: I am the network administrator and manager of a computer store.
There’s a cute little javascript that prevents visitors from right-clicking anywhere on a page. The JavaScript Source has lots of free goodies. The right-click preventer is on http://javascript.internet.com/page-details/
It’s about as useful as a lock on a sliding glass door on a house. It’s not going to stop a real thief, but it serves as a deterent to the casually dishonest.
A trademark holder who does not enforce his own trademark for a long time can be considered to have effectively given it up in court. I think this is how some trademarks have become legally acceptable generic terms. I don’t know if the same is true of copyright but it is certainly good practice to vigorously enforce your copyright.
Strictly speaking, this is not entirely true. Your image is copyrighted automatically just by publishing it on the web. You don’t need to go through the Library of Congress’s Copyright office for this. You also don’t need to have it officially copyrighted by the Office before bringing legal action.
What happens if you don’t have it “officially” protected is that you’re limited to actual, not punative damages. This means that you can only sue for any money you have lost as a result of the infringement. You cannot sue to punish the thief.
I am unsure on one point, however. I don’t know if you need to have registered it before the infringment occurred or if it’s acceptable to register right now before legal action takes place.
So if Jackmannii’s images have been up for less than 3 months, he can register now and still get punitive damages.
One suggestion might be to put the copyright symbol, year and your name directly onto the image that is displayed on your website. Then put the all the copyright verbiage at the bottom of that page and end something like with “If you would like to use any of the images on this site, please contact Jackmannii (with an email link).” Then there’s no way the thieves can claim they didn’t know it was copyrighted material in the future.
But first you should consider whether minor deterrents to image stealing such as these are worth making the site unusable or inconvenient for a large number of visitors with no ill intent. I personally refuse to patronize sites that disable right-click with Javascript. And if a site doesn’t want me as a user because I have Javascript disabled, who am I to argue? I just leave.