MicrostockGroup

Yeah thanks Paulie, it would have taken me years to pump out that code. You saved my life.
Keep up the great work!

This new google toy is really nice...
I discovered (amongst lots of other usages I hadn't seen before) one of my pictures being offered as products on a website. Because I never sold an EL for that picture, I sent them a short message via their contact form on their website asking (politely) if there has been some kind of error or oversight.
Today they called me and told me they contacted their supplier (looks like they are just a re-seller of products produced by someone else) and would take care of the issue.
Later the day I sold an EL for that file on Shutterstock.
That's how I like to see cases like this resolved....

Congrats Dirk!  Very nice to hear stories like this one

I found three of my images, with "Baylor" sign on them. I translated the site in English, and it's saying something about some illnesses... I don't have an idea what this Baylor is, and why it's embedded in my images...

http://blog.naver.com/PostView.nhn?blogId=bayloryonsei&logNo=30101194966

Huh? Which tool are you using, are you just doing an old fashioned image search on your name?

 Hi Microbius,

 I might be doing it wrong either way it is very interesting to see who has used my images. I get pages of images and they show me who purchased them and where they were used, if that isn't the correct info I would love help on getting to what Paulie is talking about.  I am really enjoying seeing where all my images have been sold over the past 13 years of shooting stock. The number grows everyday I check and sometimes it's by a very solid number. I am checking under andersen ross my company name so it is not showing my Micro just my Macro sales for the past 13 years. If I am doing it wrong please let me know, something more detailed than this would be super cool.

 Best,
 Jonathan

Hi Microbius,

 No, I wasn't dragging an image to the bar that sounds so cool. Thank you for explaining it to me I am just sitting down with my Sunday morning coffee and will try what you said. Thanks again for steering and old boat on the right coarse.

Best,
Jonathan

No problem.
Good to hear you get to sit down and have a coffee every now and then. I imagine you never having the time or being still enough to have a sit down drink!
Let us know how you get on with the search, I gave up after just a couple of images, the number of stolen images is just too depressing.

^^^Do you receive many payments?  How much are the intellectual property lawyers costs?

That's right. I only do it for RM and images from my personal site. Most cases of image theft happen from images that I've got on FlickR. With FlickR, I've got "right click download" and "drag & drop to desktop" disabled. This means that any kind of image theft doesn't happen accidentally and HAS to happen willfully via screenshots. Which makes things easier should it ever go to court (never had that happen).

Pursuing infringements that happen within your own country of residence is never really a problem. Within N-America and the EU, it's pretty straight-forward as well. No experience apart from that.
Some IP lawyers charge a percentage of the infringement money, others want money upfront. It helps if you're a member of one of your country's photographers associations or unions. Some of them offer free legal advice for their members.

Copyright infringement for images I've got with Getty RM have to be pursued by Getty – in other words: I'm not allowed to do it myself. Never had it happen, but I've heard Getty sends out letters to the infringer, asking for about US$1500 – half of which goes to the photographer.

I'm only recently on Flickr and have disabled these options, which of course make it less easy to check uses via GIS.