someone is using my photo for advertising!

kingfisher62

kingfisher62

New member
I was just checking out reefs2go for corals and noticed they are using one of my zooanthid pictures for thier advertising and put their watermark on it . Is this common practice? I mean once you post a pic on line without a watermark or copyright is it public domain? It would have been nice if someone asked or offered me a free coral or something.

Here is their link and my picture . You can see without a doubt it is my photo cropped.



http://www.reefs2go.com/product/C-ZOO-HURRICANES/Hurricane-Zoanthids.html

<a href="http://s144.photobucket.com/albums/r174/Kingfish62/?action=view&current=PICT0200.jpg" target="_blank"><img src="http://i144.photobucket.com/albums/r174/Kingfish62/PICT0200.jpg" border="0" alt="Photobucket"></a>
 
No it is not public domain to the best of my knowledge. That is the unfortunate thing about posting stuff on the net. You could try and contact them and tell them they are using a copyrighted image without permission and demand it be removed, they pay a royalty, or you will pursue legal action. Truth is that most likely legal action will be a PITA at best and may lead nowhere.

I'm sure others will chime in. I seem to remember someone else posting about this a few months back. The sad truth is that the only way to avoid this is too not post.
 
I believe I read that post too , did not put much thought into it till now. What really upsets me is how they put their watermark on it like they own it. I have ordered from them before and was happy with the transaction but this seems so unethical.
 
lol, yea I see which zoa they cropped. It is the big one in the bottom right-ish corner. You can tell because it has distinct markings from the rest, it has about 6 obvious white protrusions from the rim leading inward in the exact same locations with the exact same spacing between each marking as in their advertisement.
 
IPT said:
No it is not public domain to the best of my knowledge. That is the unfortunate thing about posting stuff on the net. You could try and contact them and tell them they are using a copyrighted image without permission and demand it be removed, they pay a royalty, or you will pursue legal action. Truth is that most likely legal action will be a PITA at best and may lead nowhere.
Click to expand...

Bingo, what they have done is STEALING. You need to contact them, if you need more information on how to go forward I can dig up some threads on another board from people who are much more knowledgeable about this sort of thing than I am.
 
kingfisher62 said:
Gee, thanks a lot!:sad2:
Click to expand...

Well dont take it too personal, it was a joke of sorts, even if it was lame ;) It's just as far as photos go, if I was going to advertise a product and steal a picture to do it, I would find the sharpest, clearest, best colored and overall best looking photo I could...
 
There's a link on the bottom that says "Contact Us"
Just politely request that they remove the image (don't threat or anything) because it belongs to you.
This usually resolves the issue quicker.
 
xtm said:
There's a link on the bottom that says "Contact Us"
Just politely request that they remove the image (don't threat or anything) because it belongs to you.
This usually resolves the issue quicker.
Click to expand...

Very good advice, and certainly the best place to start. If you are going to really pursue this then be sure to keep written dated records of all the actions you take and any contact you have with these people.
 
Yes. Also, even though you own the copyright from the moment of capture, you can't collect damages unless you've registered the image with the copyright office. They must either pay you the market rate for their usage or remove it.
 
They also have a sponsor forum here, so you could PM them. Interesting to know they aren't using a photo of their own mother colony that the zoa frags are coming from.
 
Good way to take precautions against this is make a decent sized watermark, and DO NOT post High Res images and have a fixed size image to be posted ,that way they may take it but they cant do much with it. Like stated most reputable people and or businesses will respect your wishes and will correct the problem either by taking the image down or compensating you for it....... This happens quite a bit these days.
 
I wouldn't mind some compensation, a few ricordia or maybe 100 blue legged hermits i was about to buy from them when I noticed my picture. It was kind of amazing how I recognized one polyp cropped out of one of my pics from a couple of years ago. The human brain is an incredible thing!
I will be contacting them soon and see what they have to say but I wanted to hear from you all first.
 
Recty said:
Well dont take it too personal, it was a joke of sorts, even if it was lame ;) It's just as far as photos go, if I was going to advertise a product and steal a picture to do it, I would find the sharpest, clearest, best colored and overall best looking photo I could...
Click to expand...
Don't worry,
I am not that thin skinned an did not take it personally................... After my 10 minute cry I snapped right out of it.:lol:
That is probably why they liked it because it had such bright colors and I am sure it catches peoples attention!
 
I had this happen to me before... I was flattered they were using my picture for the header of their website but at the same time I felt violated. I think you should be compensated, blurry and overexposed or not. ;) :lol:
 
Wow! I'm amazed you found that - It took me a few minutes to see where the crop was...kinda like "Where's Waldo".

I would definately contact them, just to put them on notice. They may have been skimming other photographs as well.

As far as compensation - don't hold out for too much - $25 would be more than to be expected.

Here is a scary thought - what if they got this from a stock photo service? All that would take is somebody to skim a bunch of photos and post them for legit customers.

That happened to a friend of mine. There is a stock service that deals with text, about all sorts of topics. Somebody pulled text directly from a book he had written and posted it as their own, and were selling it! The way he found it was he took strings of his book's text and entered them into search engines and got a hit.

Jay

p.s. - their web site also shows some fish photos that I would bet are Dr. Randall's, either scanned out of a book or off of Fishbase. I can't confirm it because Fishbase is offline this morning, but they sure look like his shots.
 
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Yeah thats not right. And they must of thought they could get away with it. At least give the Better Business Bureau a call and complain.
 
I've had this happen with my alien eye watermelon chalice.
The online retailer listed it as Tyree - which it is not.
Pretty sure the pic was lifted from one of coral id sites.
They didn't even crop it! It was easy to recognize - as it has a five inch diameter.
The good news, selling my frags is now very easy.
 
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