Hi
About a year ago I got a nasty shock when I opened my email
I’d got one from a US company saying I had used a copyrighted image in a blog post on one of my websites.
The post was 5 years old
They had attached a screenshot of the image and blog post in question along with details of the photographer and the agency he used to sell the image
The blog post was a tutorial about Google Hangouts and the picture featured a screenshot of president Obama on a Google hangout with the other attendees images along the bottom.
(I vaguely remember finding the image on Google and when I checked again it was still there - no watermarks, no copyright info and used by someone else in an ad)
They used a lot of Legalese and were demanding a fairly hefty payment
I Obviously would rather not have to pay this fine but fair is fair - if you use someone else’s work you should pay them for it. I sell photo’s myself and would expect the same.
Nevertheless I first consulted some friends of mine who I knew had some experience in this area
I also looked around online for details on this company and on copyright infringement in general and found some interesting stuff that in the end saved me paying the fine.
Firstly: the image I had used was not the original which was a portrait shot of the president. Someone else had photoshopped the computer screen and other people into the image.
Secondly: One of my friends used an image search app and found 272 websites using the same image with zero info on copyright
Thirdly: I found a blog by a lawyer who offered information on these type of letters which I learned are known as extortion letters. The idea is to shock you into paying up before you check their claim out too closely.
Fourth: I sent the company a very long and very detailed email using the phrase “without prejudice or liability” a lot and outlining everything I had found.
I removed the blog post with offending image from my site and the sever it is hosted on as a goodwill gesture to the photographer.
There were a couple more emails back and forth but in the end the claim was withdrawn. A nasty experience but a useful learning curve.
Lesson:
Copyright is a serious thing. Using images found on Google is precarious. Big media companies like Shutterstock and Getty Images will pursue claims to the ends of the earth for eye watering fines.
They do however cover their images in watermarks so its pretty obvious that they are pay to use.
Otherwise its realistically very unlikely that you’ll be caught using copyright images you found on Google - But see above story!!
I can tell you I went through every page on that site after this incident and removed or changed any image I thought might be a problem.
I prefer to use my own images so there weren’t many. But I have paid for blog posts in the past and have no idea where the writers got their images.
Luckily the SFM have this covered (as they do most things internet business wise) and have added a media library to their Digital Business Lounge suite of tools
Its full of royalty/copyright free images on every subject under the sun.
If you’re not an SFM member (Why not? 🤔) you can still find safe to use images on sites like Pexler and Pixabay
So just watch those images - in case they are watching you….
Bests
Dave
