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A ski holiday company has stolen one of my photos!!!!

 Poster: A snowHead
Poster: A snowHead
As we're currently in the process of looking into and booking our next ski holiday, i've been looking around for deals etc. well, 10 minutes ago, i came across a ski holiday company and low and behold, on every single page of their website, is one of my photos!!!!

Thieving ********'s!!!! No premission to use it, no credit. They've nicked it off my flickr page!

So, how do i handle it. Do i contact them and ask for payment? I'm a graphic designer so take this kind of thing quite seriously.

What would you do, what should i do?
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 Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
Surely a free holiday with said company would suffice.
ski holidays
 Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
that would suffice... but i doubt they'd be willing!

Has anyone here experienced this kind of thing before?

I actually seem to remember posting the picture in question on this website asking if anyone knew who the skier in the pic was so as i could send them a copy. I really hope this isn't someone from here... that would be even more disappointing! rolling eyes
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Can you give a link to the photo / pages
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 Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
http://www.ski-direct.co.uk/
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You'll need to Register first of course.
Great shot. I don't use flickr, what are their terms and conditions for re-production of pictures? Have you had a look to see?
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 Then you can post your own questions or snow reports...
Then you can post your own questions or snow reports...
Have a quick look through the comments here: http://www.flickr.com/photos/gerryward/3203856068/
ski holidays
 After all it is free Go on u know u want to!
After all it is free Go on u know u want to!
Spam their email with utter filth. That'll learn 'em.
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The users of flickr set their own licenses and user agreements for each, a batch, or all shots. I have the majority of mine set to "© All rights reserved" including this one. Actually, come to think of it, that picture has been taken from this website, as the version i have on flickr, i had edited my mate out of it from the top of the drop!

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 Ski the Net with snowHeads
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I had a firm nick one of my images (and I am a ski company!) and use it in their newsletter - which I subscribe to. They claimed to have found it on a google images search and it had no info in the properties to give photographer or copyright info, which is probably true. I asked them to either give me a credit or remove it from their website - they did the latter. I don't think you can hope for much more without spending a lot of time on it.
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snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
shoogly, 'tis the tinterweb and as ctskifam says the best you can hope for is an apology and a removal of the photo.

Yellow Pages once arranged an advert for one of our competitors and used a picture of our facilities out of an advert that we had submitted. We got 5 grand and a snivelling apology, but that was for a paper directory and it could not be recalled and changed. That was by a private settlement.

I would push it with them and see how fsar you can get.
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 And love to help out and answer questions and of course, read each other's snow reports.
And love to help out and answer questions and of course, read each other's snow reports.
Frosty the Snowman, i don't agree that because it's on the interweb that the best i should hope for is an apology. I wouldn't mind so much if it was just a newsletter or something and they had asked my permission, or even credited me, but they've nicked it to spruce up their website from which they've made financial gain. I'll be contacting them and invoicing them.
ski holidays
 So if you're just off somewhere snowy come back and post a snow report of your own and we'll all love you very much
So if you're just off somewhere snowy come back and post a snow report of your own and we'll all love you very much
shoogly, could they have used the flickr one and edited your mate out themselves?
ski holidays
 You know it makes sense.
You know it makes sense.
Shimmy Alcott, his mate is in the photo on their website.
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 Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:
Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:
shoogly, there was a thread ages ago about some mountainbiking site that had nicked stuff. Lawyers were threatened but I don't think any sums were paid
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 Poster: A snowHead
Poster: A snowHead
1st of all send em an invoice for the use they have already had of your pic. Include within the letter a cease and desist paragraph.
Chase up the invoice - don't let them put you off by saying they are sorry and they have removed it. They (or whoever made the site for them) "knew" they didn't have permission. So go for it.

We use a picture o the top of each of our pages (it's of Phil Smith from the Snoworks) and we asked permission first and got an e mail to confirm this. All other pictures on our site were taken by us or the local tourist info office.

Remember that saying "sorry for what I have done, but I have stopped now, so that’s OK" only works if you're an MP. They owe you cash. Search around the web for the cost that you should charge.

Oh yeah - just asked Mrs Wayne at lunch about this (she's a lawyer) - she said to copy each page that your pic is used on now (use the PrintScreen button then paste into Word or somewhere else, then save) , before they delete it, so you have something to back up your claim. Send a print of each page with the invoice.

Good luck
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 Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
Frosty the Snowman, I think that was Lee Lau's little upset - which led to a thread getting yanked a couple of years ago and Mr Swiller provided some useful common-sense.
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 Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
Cheers for that lot Wayne. The first thing i did was take screen grabs of all the pages!

i'll let you know how i get on.

Confused
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shoogly wrote:
i'll let you know how i get on. Confused


I think you'll get nowt - but at least they won't steal anyone else's stuff.


Last edited by You need to Login to know who's really who. on Wed 24-06-09 14:04; edited 1 time in total
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 Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
I believe "theft" of photos from flickr is quite common. However that doesn't make it any more excuseable.
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They've used it over 250 times on their website... i'm going to invoice them for £10 for each usage, which is pretty cheap for stock photography nowadays!
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Then you can post your own questions or snow reports...
Go for it shoogly, reckon a free ski hol will look like a bargain if they think about it. Toofy Grin
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 After all it is free Go on u know u want to!
After all it is free Go on u know u want to!
A decade or so ago ago there was a major kerfuffle at the London Ski Show. Tour Operator A noticed that Tour Operator B had plaigerised part of Tour Operator A's brochure... resort write ups that were almost word for word. Tour Operator B was forced to remove the offending brochures and go for a reprint. An expensive mistake. I'm not sure if same tactics would work in shoogly's case but worth making the threat perhaps with the aim of getting a decent rate for picture usage. You can bet your life that some agency is responsible (not the tour op) and I would think the tour op would therefore be able to make the agency suffer.

stoatsbrother, those were the days Toofy Grin
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Bode Swiller, that's inexcusable - stealing another company's lies!
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Ski the Net with snowHeads
What's even more peculiar is that they have a section crediting other sources of material. Does this mean that the company may have a policy of crediting sources and someone inside it has forgotten to follow it?


"Bibliography and Sources

Creative Commons

We have used during the course of development and maintenance of this site, the following commercially licensed work from the creative commons and are thus exempt from our copyright statement or ownership. We thank the works authors for placing their work in the creative commons:

Morzine Ski Runs by romainguy (Attribution Share-a-like Derivs)
sunshine - wee cliff skiing by Peter Macdonald"
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 snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
Steve Sparks wrote:
We have used during the course of development and maintenance of this site, the following commercially licensed work from the creative commons and are thus exempt from our copyright statement or ownership. We thank the works authors for placing their work in the creative commons:


Won’t get em out of paying in this case. "You" can apply a creative common licence on something "you" own the copywrite on. You can't do this with other people's stuff.
ski holidays
 And love to help out and answer questions and of course, read each other's snow reports.
And love to help out and answer questions and of course, read each other's snow reports.
Some travel agency in Thailand "borrowed" my images for their website, but just used a remote url, so it was using my paid-for bandwidth as well as my images for their commercial use. I couldn't be bothered with any legal means, so found some filthy images on the internet and swapped them over Wink OK so I guess I was technically guilty of copyright infringement too, but the images would only be visible thru this thieving company's website.
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 So if you're just off somewhere snowy come back and post a snow report of your own and we'll all love you very much
So if you're just off somewhere snowy come back and post a snow report of your own and we'll all love you very much
shoogly, as a first step preserve the evidence. Print off the web pages as they stand. Copyright infringement is still copyright infringement even if the pages are changed. Then send them a strong letter requiring them to cease and desist, i.e. to take the images off the website and to destroy all material (they may have printed brochures) bearing your copyright material and to send proof of doing so, then demand suitable damages such as the 5k suggested by Frosty. Finish the letter with a threat of court proceedings if they don't comply within 14 days. You could offer them a deal to continue using the image, but that should be separate to any damages for infringement. Then sit back and see what happens. Getty Images do this sort of thing regularly.
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 You know it makes sense.
You know it makes sense.
andy, if you have access you can even use a web-server setting to forbid remote linking, allowing you to use the image on your own site but prevent it being used (or even replace it with something else) from other sites. This once caught a friend out who posted an image from the somethingawful forums of what he thought was a jokey image to quite a family-oriented site. SA had prevented remote linking and everyone viewing the image on the site were presented with a rather graphic image of a transsexual Shocked
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 Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:
Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:
Quote:

andy, if you have access you can even use a web-server setting to forbid remote linking, allowing you to use the image on your own site but prevent it being used (or even replace it with something else) from other sites

bit pointless really... unless you also disable right click copying and then hope that the graphic designer who is nicking thr painting hasn't got a decent video card with a high res screeen capture....

So it certainly won't prevent it from being used anywhere else.


Last edited by Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name: on Wed 24-06-09 15:36; edited 1 time in total
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 Poster: A snowHead
Poster: A snowHead
flangesax, I guess you don't understand the bandwidth issue. If you host the image yourself, you (or your ISP) pay for the bandwidth charges whenever anyone looks at that image on your site. Most large sites have a bandwidth limit, and one popular image directly linked can easily take a small site over its bandwidth limit and incur large costs for the owner of the site. This is why a large number of popular sites implement this directive.
ski holidays
 Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
shoogly wrote:
http://www.ski-direct.co.uk/


I would just like to make clear that the company named above, has no relationship to any other company of similar name, with which I am involved wink

Sorry for your hassle shoogly - hope you get a satisfactory result Very Happy
ski holidays
 Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
andy, Nice. That's given me a few ideas. . . . people are always linking to my web site pics from their myspace pages....
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david@mediacopy, forgot about myspack. Someone there was linking images too, but their search is so cack that I could never track down the culprit. plus myspack pages tend to have so much flash and media that even an 8 core + hyperthreaded Mac Pro is challenged when loading the page.

Also found 1 image in some forum "guess the place" thread. Don't think they were too impressed when I regged, and correctly "guessed the page" with post #1 Wink
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 Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
It is theft. I have had several conversations about theft of photographs on another forum. Several of mine were used to advertise another property next to mine. They were asked to remove them and they did so.
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You'll need to Register first of course.
With regard to photos posted on the snowmediaZone I have raised the question of watermarking in the past and at that time there was not much enthusiasm for it. However I hadn't realised that I could set up permanent watermarking on a "per category" basis. So, for example, there could be one (or more) categories into which those who were interested could post pics which would then be permanently watermarked.

I have set up an example here



or indeed the whole site could be set like that.

Would there be any demand for this? (Post under mediazone stuff in the suggestions forum so as not to derail this thread too much please).
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 Then you can post your own questions or snow reports...
Then you can post your own questions or snow reports...
shoogly wrote:
Actually, come to think of it, that picture has been taken from this website, as the version i have on flickr, i had edited my mate out of it from the top of the drop!

Was there a copyright notice on the picture posted on this site? Is there any standard copyrighting of images in snowHeads? (hadn't read the post just above when I wrote this - watermarking seems a good idea)

And, if there wasn't copyright specified in snowHeads, does that mean that it landed in the public domain?
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 After all it is free Go on u know u want to!
After all it is free Go on u know u want to!
You might find some information about when the photograph was used from the Internet Archive: http://web.archive.org
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 You'll get to see more forums and be part of the best ski club on the net.
You'll get to see more forums and be part of the best ski club on the net.
Basically if you don't want to people to copy your pictures don't put em on the web. I understand that’s not how it meant to work but in the real world .....
and watermarks don't work not does anything else you can put on a picture. Anyone who will steal your photos will not worry that they are not meant to

I will, of course, delete this bit if you want Little Angel
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 Ski the Net with snowHeads
Ski the Net with snowHeads
Quote:

flangesax, I guess you don't understand the bandwidth issue.


I do get it... but it is not relevent to the OP as the company have already edited the picture... unless they are doing some very time wasting .png'ing and floating the text over the linked image!

But... by editing the image and putting the text on; does this mean that they have been even more naughty?...
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