MicrostockGroup
Microstock Photography Forum - General => Image Sleuth => Topic started by: antistock on May 17, 2012, 11:40
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Pinterest valued at $1.5 BILLION, bags $100m in funding
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2012/05/17/pinterest_raises_100m/ (http://www.theregister.co.uk/2012/05/17/pinterest_raises_100m/)
now W-T-F !!
This gang of leechers, well known and proud pirates and copyright infringers ...
so now it's official ... investors don't give a F_uck_ing sh-it about copyright and stolen photos, they're all laughing all the way to the bank and who cares if MILLIONS of stolen pictures are already available and stored in Pinterest servers ?
this is the typical "F_uc_k and forget" silicon valley approach ...throwing the sh-it at the wall and see what sticks ... no matter how .. and no matter if content is stolen or original ... that's stuff for the lawyers eventually or the gullible ones buying their stock later or the new inventors joining their ponzi schemes ...
i'm really tempted to launch a piratebay-style web site where not only you can download torrent links but paying an annual fee you can download your whole zipped pirated files ... photoshop .. lightroom .. autocad .. whatever ... and who cares after all as no one is going in jail and the Pirate parties are now even represented in the german and swedish parlament ???
NEVER as in 2012 creatives and photographers have been scr-ewed so bad, fact !
we might as well soon get another job, or apply at Pinterest, Flickr, Facebook, Google ... as once the photo business will be finally killed they will be the only ones left dealing with images and who knows they could even start selling online our stolen images claiming they're "orphan works".
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...and I noticed today there is at least one micro that has a button allowing you to pin images from the site directly onto Pinterest.
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...and I noticed today there is at least one micro that has a button allowing you to pin images from the site directly onto Pinterest.
:-\
Which site?
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DT
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...and I noticed today there is at least one micro that has a button allowing you to pin images from the site directly onto Pinterest.
:-\
unsurprisingly.
agencies don't give a sh-it about us, we're 100% expendible and replaceable, in their eyes one photographers is worth the other.
pinning, linking, and even outright piracy is all free advertising for them as long as the image has a watermark with the agency name.
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DT
I would have guessed that. They give away over 100,000 images for free and have that scheme to buy image rights for $25.
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DT
...and Photodune, and Stockfresh.
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Bogus valuation with the aim of striking gold by getting snapped up by Facebook...
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DT
...and Photodune, and Stockfresh.
Unbelievable. Well, I mean it's believable, but what jerks.
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Good news. Congrats, Pinterest.
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Good news. Congrats, Pinterest.
Are you on their payroll?
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Nope, just like the site and don't see all the doom and gloom about pinterest that others here do.
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Good news. Congrats, Pinterest.
Are you on their payroll?
+1
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I found several images of mine on Pinterest. Usually I don't bother, but in this case, in view of the popularity of the site, I thought it might be an opportunity to "help" people realize that images just can't be used freely anytime anywhere.
I am sure every one of us can find a few of their images there. I found 8 in 15 minutes. Pinterest has an easy on-line form to report infringements. Why don't we all use that once or twice. Not to make Pinterest change it's policy (I'm not THAT optimistic!), but to make as many people as possible realize that we just don't accept free use of our images. This won't harm us - it won't solve the problem either - but we might contribute just a bit to people's "education" towards image use.
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...I am sure every one of us can find a few of their images there. I found 8 in 15 minutes. Pinterest has an easy on-line form to report infringements. Why don't we all use that once or twice...
I prefer to leave my images there. What I've found are watermarked images that link to Shutterstock. If someone wants to pin my watermarked image and be kind enough to give me some free promotion, they're certainly welcome as far as I'm concerned.
This isn't a negative to me. There's some positive power in this kind of promotion. There's a reason some people happily release their intellectual property into the bit torrent world and other pirating sites and services. It's promotion. The Counting Crows just released part of their new album via bit torrent. I read about an author who had a book that wasn't selling until it hit the torrents. Then it started selling like crazy.
This stuff isn't all bad. I'm not condoning rampant piracy, just saying that maybe things like Pinterest can do more good for you than harm, if you let them.
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I partly agree. But half of the images I found did not come from microstock sites, but from websites who (hopefully legally) bought from microstock sites. For instance : one image of mine (a lavender nature shot) can be found 20 times on Pinterest, and it's linked to a company selling wedding stuff in lavender colors. No free publicity for my photos there, just free publicity for the wedding shop.
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Oh wow, the "Piratenpartei" in Germany and all other anti-ACTA supporters appear to be satisfied to pin watermarked images or even use those in their blogs.
Yay what an improvement in serious blogging or publishing good content (WITH WATERMARK).
Sheesh, I can see that a bunch of people want to "share" cool pictures in one place (Pinterest for this matter) but at least do it properly for heaven's sake.
Either only post content you hold the rights to or simply contact the copyright owner to work out a deal. It's not always about us (copyright owners) wanting billions of dollars for one web sized image but maybe proper contribution with clickable links and images with usable watermarks (in the corners maybe) which may be an option.
The blatant, naive and impulsive pinning of unwatermarked images is the problem indeed.
I guess it's too much to ask (the pinners) to put at least a little effort into it...
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I partly agree. But half of the images I found did not come from microstock sites, but from websites who (hopefully legally) bought from microstock sites. For instance : one image of mine (a lavender nature shot) can be found 20 times on Pinterest, and it's linked to a company selling wedding stuff in lavender colors. No free publicity for my photos there, just free publicity for the wedding shop.
Exactly, and there's nothing we can do about it: you can't make the wedding shop put a 'nopin' on their site, and they'll be happy enough for the publicity.
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But we CAN do something against it. Just click on "copyright" (right hand menu) on the Pinterest website and you'll find the on-line form.
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But we CAN do something against it. Just click on "copyright" (right hand menu) on the Pinterest website and you'll find the on-line form.
If you've done it, did you get a good response?
(Did you find it via Google Image Search?)
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I prefer to leave my images there. What I've found are watermarked images that link to Shutterstock. If someone wants to pin my watermarked image and be kind enough to give me some free promotion, they're certainly welcome as far as I'm concerned.
This isn't a negative to me. There's some positive power in this kind of promotion. There's a reason some people happily release their intellectual property into the bit torrent world and other pirating sites and services. It's promotion. The Counting Crows just released part of their new album via bit torrent. I read about an author who had a book that wasn't selling until it hit the torrents. Then it started selling like crazy.
This stuff isn't all bad. I'm not condoning rampant piracy, just saying that maybe things like Pinterest can do more good for you than harm, if you let them.
It's not the kind of "good" I want. For instance, I shouldn't care when my image: http://pinterest.com/pin/202943526928682144/ (http://pinterest.com/pin/202943526928682144/) gets put on 100 blogs for free using the embed code on the side?
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It's not the kind of "good" I want. For instance, I shouldn't care when my image: [url]http://pinterest.com/pin/202943526928682144/[/url] ([url]http://pinterest.com/pin/202943526928682144/[/url]) gets put on 100 blogs for free using the embed code on the side?
Is that really happening? Do you know it's been posted on any blogs, let alone 100? I ask because there have been a lot of out-of-proportion worst-case scenarios discussed regarding Pinterest, and I'm just wondering if this is another one.
As for whether you should care of not, well, if it's my image, I personally don't care. It's watermarked, for starters. I think the usefulness of it in any situation is greatly diminished due to the watermark. But if someone is inclined to post a watermarked istock image on their blog, I doubt they'd have been a buyer anyway. I don't view it as a lost sale or anything. And of course the lack of intention to license the image doesn't grant a license to use the watermarked version for free, but it does make a strong argument for the "why should I care" side of things.
Obviously you care enough to justify taking the time to pursue any unlicensed use of your images, from Pinterest or anywhere else it seems. I don't have the time, nor do I care enough, to pursue tiny little infringements like these. I let this stuff go, along with misuses like Hero Turko and such, because they're not lost sales, they don't really matter, and they don't have any negative impact on my earnings. And as mentioned, in the case of Pinterest I view these things as positives, providing some promotional value.
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But we CAN do something against it. Just click on "copyright" (right hand menu) on the Pinterest website and you'll find the on-line form.
And when my house was burglarized, I should have spent my time hunting for the burglar and then filled out a form asking him to stop using the stuff of mine he stole.
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But we CAN do something against it. Just click on "copyright" (right hand menu) on the Pinterest website and you'll find the on-line form.
And when my house was burglarized, I should have spent my time hunting for the burglar and then filled out a form asking him to stop using the stuff of mine he stole.
haha, yeah right. But the difference is here (I think) that the "average burglar" knows very well he's doing something illegal ...
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It's not the kind of "good" I want. For instance, I shouldn't care when my image: [url]http://pinterest.com/pin/202943526928682144/[/url] ([url]http://pinterest.com/pin/202943526928682144/[/url]) gets put on 100 blogs for free using the embed code on the side?
Is that really happening? Do you know it's been posted on any blogs, let alone 100? I ask because there have been a lot of out-of-proportion worst-case scenarios discussed regarding Pinterest, and I'm just wondering if this is another one.
As for whether you should care of not, well, if it's my image, I personally don't care. It's watermarked, for starters. I think the usefulness of it in any situation is greatly diminished due to the watermark. But if someone is inclined to post a watermarked istock image on their blog, I doubt they'd have been a buyer anyway. I don't view it as a lost sale or anything. And of course the lack of intention to license the image doesn't grant a license to use the watermarked version for free, but it does make a strong argument for the "why should I care" side of things.
Obviously you care enough to justify taking the time to pursue any unlicensed use of your images, from Pinterest or anywhere else it seems. I don't have the time, nor do I care enough, to pursue tiny little infringements like these. I let this stuff go, along with misuses like Hero Turko and such, because they're not lost sales, they don't really matter, and they don't have any negative impact on my earnings. And as mentioned, in the case of Pinterest I view these things as positives, providing some promotional value.
@helix
It is a shame that you don't care much about your work being used without consent as that is very easily translated into not attributing much value to it. If one is ok with "little infringements" soon you'll be ok with "medium sized infringements" and so on - the line gets pushed further and further away. If someone is using it, it has value - if you didn't get paid/asked you were robbed, taken for a mug. In my local supermarket they report all thefts to the police - doesn't matter whether they broke in during the night and emptied the shop or snuck a pack of Skittles into their handbag - same thing, theft is theft.
And for promotional value - there isn't any for you, none, zilch. For Pininterest or the poster's page, your image has added content (value) and without content they would have nothing (worthless) - leechers.
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deleted (double post)
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^^ Agree with everything.
Did anyone contacted Dreamstime or Depositphotos regarding their "feature" of sharing our work on Pinterest?
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how about this, we all head over and start commenting on pics we find with something like this:
"This is a stunning photo of Sean's, who is an amazing stock photographer. Did you know I can't take a photo of you or your property and use it without your permission? Yet here I find Sean's pic on your board.......... this photo is FOR SALE on iStock, you may purchase it for use."
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^^ Agree with everything.
Did anyone contacted Dreamstime or Depositphotos regarding their "feature" of sharing our work on Pinterest?
I was wondering that as well. Does it automatically get shared or does a contributor at DT have to be opted in to the Partner Program? I looked around yesterday on DT and didn't see any mention specifically.
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i'm just tired by all this :(
i can't see a way out.
and today facebook will launch its over hyped IPO in wall street, so more and more focus on social network and stolen content with nobody even talking anymore about copyright issues.
let's face it, we're the last ones left talking about copyright, even journalists have given up and some are now actively advocating and supporting readers stealing and copying their articles all over the web in the vain hope of getting some credit and recognition, how sad is that ?
it's a vortex ending up with the final devaluation of content creation, text, images, concepts, and anything in between.
and we wonder how the Huffington Post can get away hiring only non-paid bloggers, this is the future of journalism i'm afraid, working for free as a hobby, just for the sake of vanity to see your name on it while the owners running the biz make billions and don't value your work even worth 1$ !
please give me a job grilling burgers rather than stay in a business ending up like this.
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^^ Agree with everything.
Did anyone contacted Dreamstime or Depositphotos regarding their "feature" of sharing our work on Pinterest?
I was wondering that as well. Does it automatically get shared or does a contributor at DT have to be opted in to the Partner Program? I looked around yesterday on DT and didn't see any mention specifically.
There's a "share" button on DT and DP next to each image.
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Here's a blog on Dreamstime that talks about the rollout:
http://blog.dreamstime.com/2012/04/26/pinterest-and-stock-photography_art37491 (http://blog.dreamstime.com/2012/04/26/pinterest-and-stock-photography_art37491)
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Here's a link on Dreamstime that talks about the rollout:
[url]http://blog.dreamstime.com/2012/04/26/pinterest-and-stock-photography_art37491[/url] ([url]http://blog.dreamstime.com/2012/04/26/pinterest-and-stock-photography_art37491[/url])
What makes them imagine that most of the people using pinterest are in the market for buying images? If someone targets e.g. hair styles to show their hairdresser; fashion pics to give them ideas when they're shopping, crafting ideas, recipes to try out, ideas of where to go or what to do on holiday, or, in the case of my pic pinned from flickr, specific tartans for a shortlist to be selected from, is there any more than the remotest chance that they'll actually buy an image?
Also, that DT blog gives details about the nopin thing, but does DT allow you to insert a 'nopin'? Even if they did, who with a port of more than about 20 images has time to go and insert this on every file page (same for all the agencies).
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I think I'm going to write a blog post today with lots of hotlinked/embedded images from Dreamstime/Pinterest.
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I think I'm going to write a blog post today with lots of hotlinked/embedded images from Dreamstime/Pinterest.
Gee, thanks.
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^^ Agree with everything.
Did anyone contacted Dreamstime or Depositphotos regarding their "feature" of sharing our work on Pinterest?
I was wondering that as well. Does it automatically get shared or does a contributor at DT have to be opted in to the Partner Program? I looked around yesterday on DT and didn't see any mention specifically.
There's a "share" button on DT and DP next to each image.
Ah, I see. Thanks.
edit: I just started a thread in the DT forum asking for my images to be opted out.
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^^ Agree with everything.
Did anyone contacted Dreamstime or Depositphotos regarding their "feature" of sharing our work on Pinterest?
I just sent an email to DT asking them to remove the Share button from my images. Maybe others here could do the same?
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^^ Agree with everything.
Did anyone contacted Dreamstime or Depositphotos regarding their "feature" of sharing our work on Pinterest?
I just sent an email to DT asking them to remove the Share button from my images. Maybe others here could do the same?
I'm looking but can't find a "share button." I also want OUT. Where do you find the "feature", Cathy?
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I'm looking but can't find a "share button." I also want OUT. Where do you find the "feature", Cathy?
(http://i826.photobucket.com/albums/zz187/rimglow/Tam.jpg)
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It's not the kind of "good" I want. For instance, I shouldn't care when my image: [url]http://pinterest.com/pin/202943526928682144/[/url] ([url]http://pinterest.com/pin/202943526928682144/[/url]) gets put on 100 blogs for free using the embed code on the side?
Is that really happening? Do you know it's been posted on any blogs, let alone 100? I ask because there have been a lot of out-of-proportion worst-case scenarios discussed regarding Pinterest, and I'm just wondering if this is another one.
As for whether you should care of not, well, if it's my image, I personally don't care. It's watermarked, for starters. I think the usefulness of it in any situation is greatly diminished due to the watermark. But if someone is inclined to post a watermarked istock image on their blog, I doubt they'd have been a buyer anyway. I don't view it as a lost sale or anything. And of course the lack of intention to license the image doesn't grant a license to use the watermarked version for free, but it does make a strong argument for the "why should I care" side of things.
Obviously you care enough to justify taking the time to pursue any unlicensed use of your images, from Pinterest or anywhere else it seems. I don't have the time, nor do I care enough, to pursue tiny little infringements like these. I let this stuff go, along with misuses like Hero Turko and such, because they're not lost sales, they don't really matter, and they don't have any negative impact on my earnings. And as mentioned, in the case of Pinterest I view these things as positives, providing some promotional value.
+1.
Look at the case of the person with the community garden pictures. That person would have never bought dozens of photos for the purpose of putting together a page of pics he/she likes. And if someone else stumbles on this and likes some shots, they can either embed the watermarked version and look like an idiot (and this person also would likely never buy a shot anyway) or the person will follow the link and properly buy the picture. To me, it seems like a net positive, and Pinterest has driven sales that you wouldn't normally get.
Now, this theory only holds if the watermarks are effective. There are a bunch of worthless getty watermarks that could be easily cropped out of those garden shots.
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Now, this theory only holds if the watermarks are effective. There are a bunch of worthless getty watermarks that could be easily cropped out of those garden shots.
It also only works if it is watermarked. You assume most people search their Pinterest photos at stock agencies. If a Pinterest member is interested in - let's say - food recipes, he/she will not visit Dreamstime, but recipe sites. There he'll find our unwatermarked images, and whoever clicks on those images will never be redirected to a stock agency.
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+1.
Look at the case of the person with the community garden pictures. That person would have never bought dozens of photos for the purpose of putting together a page of pics he/she likes. And if someone else stumbles on this and likes some shots, they can either embed the watermarked version and look like an idiot (and this person also would likely never buy a shot anyway) or the person will follow the link and properly buy the picture. To me, it seems like a net positive, and Pinterest has driven sales that you wouldn't normally get.
Now, this theory only holds if the watermarks are effective. There are a bunch of worthless getty watermarks that could be easily cropped out of those garden shots.
So, you're saying that anyone who uses images that are freely offered for use (by Pinterest) would not have licensed them anyways? I fail to see the logic there. And of course, what of non-watermarked images that people decide to "pin"?
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I'm looking but can't find a "share button." I also want OUT. Where do you find the "feature", Cathy?
Took me a while to find it too. Thanks for posting the pic, Rimglow.
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Now, this theory only holds if the watermarks are effective. There are a bunch of worthless getty watermarks that could be easily cropped out of those garden shots.
It also only works if it is watermarked. You assume most people search their Pinterest photos at stock agencies. If a Pinterest member is interested in - let's say - food recipes, he/she will not visit Dreamstime, but recipe sites. There he'll find our unwatermarked images, and whoever clicks on those images will never be redirected to a stock agency.
Exactly. What makes you think they will be linking to a watermarked version? Just as likely, if not more likely they will be linking to a non watermarked version on the site of the one guy who actually bought an image.
On a related note, here's an idea, a subs agency that stores the files and lets people hotlink to them using their unique customer code as long as they keep up their subscription. End subscription and all your hot linked images disappear. I now want a cut when this happens.
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Now, this theory only holds if the watermarks are effective. There are a bunch of worthless getty watermarks that could be easily cropped out of those garden shots.
It also only works if it is watermarked. You assume most people search their Pinterest photos at stock agencies. If a Pinterest member is interested in - let's say - food recipes, he/she will not visit Dreamstime, but recipe sites. There he'll find our unwatermarked images, and whoever clicks on those images will never be redirected to a stock agency.
Exactly. What makes you think they will be linking to a watermarked version? Just as likely, if not more likely they will be linking to a non watermarked version on the site of the one guy who actually bought an image.
On a related note, here's an idea, a subs agency that stores the files and lets people hotlink to them using their unique customer code as long as they keep up their subscription. End subscription and all your hot linked images disappear. I now want a cut when this happens.
The example given in the post shows all watermarked images. I figured this was mainly what was happening.
But after searching Pinterest for some of my more popular images... yep, they're on there without watermarks, with sources like "Google.com" listed. I'll also be filling out the form and submitting.
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I just want to make sure I am searching correctly. I go to www dot p i n t e r e s t dot com and do a general search for my image. Is that the only way to search? When the results come back with all the images "pinned" and you scroll to the bottom, is that the extent of the search and that shows ALL images for that search term? I also went to the Photography section and did a search there, but it seemed to return the same results. Am I missing anything?
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I'm just using the search bar at the top left.
Searched a few of my more popular images, and I'm finding NON-WATERMARKED versions all over the place. Multiple times each.
This is going to be a HUGE PROJECT to come up with a complete list, and I'm sure I won't get everything. Looks like I will have a list a mile long.
I am copying the URLs and doing screen captures. I plan to submit both with my required form. Looks like you can provide multiple examples with one form.
If anyone is up to looking into a class-action lawsuit, COUNT ME IN.
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I haven't finished my list yet, but I'm certainly not even trying to make a complete list. Just long enough to make a point.
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Has anyone - like Sean for instance - contacted CR at iStock about pinned photos?
I've just found, with great ease, two photos there pinned from, presumably, a legitimate buyer's site, each with several repins.
I'll contact CR. We were told to contact them first, so I'll do it to see what their response to this is.
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...let's face it, we're the last ones left talking about copyright... it's a vortex ending up with the final devaluation of content creation, text, images, concepts, and anything in between...
Too true. We creatives are in the process of losing our intellectual property rights.
The big companies which make billions in profit by providing access to the content of others - while paying the others nothing - are cynically supporting the 'free-shairing' anti-copyright movement (remember when Google and social networking sites et al protested SOPA?). While those companies are quick to sue to protect their software patents.
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Pinterest valued at $1.5 BILLION, bags $100m in funding
[url]http://www.theregister.co.uk/2012/05/17/pinterest_raises_100m/[/url] ([url]http://www.theregister.co.uk/2012/05/17/pinterest_raises_100m/[/url])
now W-T-F !!
This gang of leechers, well known and proud pirates and copyright infringers ...
so now it's official ... investors don't give a F_uck_ing sh-it about copyright and stolen photos, they're all laughing all the way to the bank and who cares if MILLIONS of stolen pictures are already available and stored in Pinterest servers ?
this is the typical "F_uc_k and forget" silicon valley approach ...throwing the sh-it at the wall and see what sticks ... no matter how .. and no matter if content is stolen or original ... that's stuff for the lawyers eventually or the gullible ones buying their stock later or the new inventors joining their ponzi schemes ...
i'm really tempted to launch a piratebay-style web site where not only you can download torrent links but paying an annual fee you can download your whole zipped pirated files ... photoshop .. lightroom .. autocad .. whatever ... and who cares after all as no one is going in jail and the Pirate parties are now even represented in the german and swedish parlament ???
NEVER as in 2012 creatives and photographers have been scr-ewed so bad, fact !
we might as well soon get another job, or apply at Pinterest, Flickr, Facebook, Google ... as once the photo business will be finally killed they will be the only ones left dealing with images and who knows they could even start selling online our stolen images claiming they're "orphan works".
Being here, I assume you generally sell on microstock sites, which means you offer your shots to be downloaded en masse, by anyone with just a handfull of dollars for something like $.5 a pop, or probabaly even less... 25 a day, etc, and they can upload them anywhere after that, of course.... then you whine about some of your shots ending up on pinterest servers? : ) ehmmm.... get a clue... maybe? and your buddies too... really.
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Being here, I assume you generally sell on microstock sites, which means you offer your shots to be downloaded en masse, by anyone with just a handfull of dollars for something like $.5 a pop, or probabaly even less...
No.
Which planet have you breezed in from with prices like that?
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Pinterest valued at $1.5 BILLION, bags $100m in funding
[url]http://www.theregister.co.uk/2012/05/17/pinterest_raises_100m/[/url] ([url]http://www.theregister.co.uk/2012/05/17/pinterest_raises_100m/[/url])
now W-T-F !!
This gang of leechers, well known and proud pirates and copyright infringers ...
so now it's official ... investors don't give a F_uck_ing sh-it about copyright and stolen photos, they're all laughing all the way to the bank and who cares if MILLIONS of stolen pictures are already available and stored in Pinterest servers ?
this is the typical "F_uc_k and forget" silicon valley approach ...throwing the sh-it at the wall and see what sticks ... no matter how .. and no matter if content is stolen or original ... that's stuff for the lawyers eventually or the gullible ones buying their stock later or the new inventors joining their ponzi schemes ...
i'm really tempted to launch a piratebay-style web site where not only you can download torrent links but paying an annual fee you can download your whole zipped pirated files ... photoshop .. lightroom .. autocad .. whatever ... and who cares after all as no one is going in jail and the Pirate parties are now even represented in the german and swedish parlament ???
NEVER as in 2012 creatives and photographers have been scr-ewed so bad, fact !
we might as well soon get another job, or apply at Pinterest, Flickr, Facebook, Google ... as once the photo business will be finally killed they will be the only ones left dealing with images and who knows they could even start selling online our stolen images claiming they're "orphan works".
Being here, I assume you generally sell on microstock sites, which means you offer your shots to be downloaded en masse, by anyone with just a handfull of dollars for something like $.5 a pop, or probabaly even less... 25 a day, etc, and they can upload them anywhere after that, of course.... then you whine about some of your shots ending up on pinterest servers? : ) ehmmm.... get a clue... maybe? and your buddies too... really.
I see you are a newbie here and this is your first post. Like I'm going to listen to anything you have to say. Troll.
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Pinterest valued at $1.5 BILLION, bags $100m in funding
[url]http://www.theregister.co.uk/2012/05/17/pinterest_raises_100m/[/url] ([url]http://www.theregister.co.uk/2012/05/17/pinterest_raises_100m/[/url])
now W-T-F !!
This gang of leechers, well known and proud pirates and copyright infringers ...
so now it's official ... investors don't give a F_uck_ing sh-it about copyright and stolen photos, they're all laughing all the way to the bank and who cares if MILLIONS of stolen pictures are already available and stored in Pinterest servers ?
this is the typical "F_uc_k and forget" silicon valley approach ...throwing the sh-it at the wall and see what sticks ... no matter how .. and no matter if content is stolen or original ... that's stuff for the lawyers eventually or the gullible ones buying their stock later or the new inventors joining their ponzi schemes ...
i'm really tempted to launch a piratebay-style web site where not only you can download torrent links but paying an annual fee you can download your whole zipped pirated files ... photoshop .. lightroom .. autocad .. whatever ... and who cares after all as no one is going in jail and the Pirate parties are now even represented in the german and swedish parlament ???
NEVER as in 2012 creatives and photographers have been scr-ewed so bad, fact !
we might as well soon get another job, or apply at Pinterest, Flickr, Facebook, Google ... as once the photo business will be finally killed they will be the only ones left dealing with images and who knows they could even start selling online our stolen images claiming they're "orphan works".
Being here, I assume you generally sell on microstock sites, which means you offer your shots to be downloaded en masse, by anyone with just a handfull of dollars for something like $.5 a pop, or probabaly even less... 25 a day, etc, and they can upload them anywhere after that, of course.... then you whine about some of your shots ending up on pinterest servers? : ) ehmmm.... get a clue... maybe? and your buddies too... really.
I see you are a newbie here and this is your first post. Like I'm going to listen to anything you have to say. Troll.
Sure, anyone who makes an actual real-life point is a troll....
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By the way, I have complained on the DT forums. Achilles has jumped in. Here's the thread:
http://www.dreamstime.com/thread_31459 (http://www.dreamstime.com/thread_31459)
I am hoping that some of you fellow contributors who express yourselves way more eloquently than I will help out with getting an opt out or having the Share button removed from our images.
I am not convinced at all that people pinning images from DT or any other site or posting to FB are translating into whopping sales for us contributors. I think the same people who are using these images are the same ones who think that anything on the internet is free for their taking. >:(
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By the way, I have complained on the DT forums. Achilles has jumped in. Here's the thread:
[url]http://www.dreamstime.com/thread_31459[/url] ([url]http://www.dreamstime.com/thread_31459[/url])
I am hoping that some of you fellow contributors who express yourselves way more eloquently than I will help out with getting an opt out or having the Share button removed from our images.
I am not convinced at all that people pinning images from DT or any other site or posting to FB are translating into whopping sales for us contributors. I think the same people who are using these images are the same ones who think that anything on the internet is free for their taking. >:(
I followed your post ... and the response -- or, should I say, "The Spin?" ::)
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By the way, I have complained on the DT forums. Achilles has jumped in. Here's the thread:
[url]http://www.dreamstime.com/thread_31459[/url] ([url]http://www.dreamstime.com/thread_31459[/url])
I am hoping that some of you fellow contributors who express yourselves way more eloquently than I will help out with getting an opt out or having the Share button removed from our images.
I am not convinced at all that people pinning images from DT or any other site or posting to FB are translating into whopping sales for us contributors. I think the same people who are using these images are the same ones who think that anything on the internet is free for their taking. >:(
I followed your post ... and the response -- or, should I say, "The Spin?" ::)
Achilles made some good points. He is concerned that social media is such a powerful trend that he ignores it at his peril, and he is probably right. He can't afford to fail to use promotional media that Getty is exploiting.
However, I think we should try to hold the microstock agencies' feet to the fire on this. More and more, it looks like the social media sites and Google are mounting a broad and very real attack on copyright itself (look at the posts of the troll who joined here just to attack us today, look at the Pirate party in the German legislature, and the way that the Polish gov voted to support the pirates). We have a lot to lose if they win.
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I prefer to leave my images there. What I've found are watermarked images that link to Shutterstock. If someone wants to pin my watermarked image and be kind enough to give me some free promotion, they're certainly welcome as far as I'm concerned.
This isn't a negative to me. There's some positive power in this kind of promotion. There's a reason some people happily release their intellectual property into the bit torrent world and other pirating sites and services. It's promotion. The Counting Crows just released part of their new album via bit torrent. I read about an author who had a book that wasn't selling until it hit the torrents. Then it started selling like crazy.
This stuff isn't all bad. I'm not condoning rampant piracy, just saying that maybe things like Pinterest can do more good for you than harm, if you let them.
It's not the kind of "good" I want. For instance, I shouldn't care when my image: [url]http://pinterest.com/pin/202943526928682144/[/url] ([url]http://pinterest.com/pin/202943526928682144/[/url]) gets put on 100 blogs for free using the embed code on the side?
I somewhat agree Sean, but a much larger issue/exploit is the ability to simply right-click download an image which was purchased properly and placed on a blog or website. I'm sure it is done over and over, and there are no watermarks. I can go to any blog with images, save the images, and then post them to my own blog if I want to. I can even use Google Images similar image search function to find any stock photo I want, sans watermark, on the websites which properly purchased it.
Of course I don't because I have respect for others' property, but surely this is a much bigger danger than having watermarked images being spread across Pinterest?
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By the way, I have complained on the DT forums. Achilles has jumped in. Here's the thread:
[url]http://www.dreamstime.com/thread_31459[/url] ([url]http://www.dreamstime.com/thread_31459[/url])
I am hoping that some of you fellow contributors who express yourselves way more eloquently than I will help out with getting an opt out or having the Share button removed from our images.
I am not convinced at all that people pinning images from DT or any other site or posting to FB are translating into whopping sales for us contributors. I think the same people who are using these images are the same ones who think that anything on the internet is free for their taking. >:(
I followed your post ... and the response -- or, should I say, "The Spin?" ::)
Achilles made some good points. He is concerned that social media is such a powerful trend that he ignores it at his peril, and he is probably right. He can't afford to fail to use promotional media that Getty is exploiting.
However, I think we should try to hold the microstock agencies' feet to the fire on this. More and more, it looks like the social media sites and Google are mounting a broad and very real attack on copyright itself (look at the posts of the troll who joined here just to attack us today, look at the Pirate party in the German legislature, and the way that the Polish gov voted to support the pirates). We have a lot to lose if they win.
Attack? I sell microstock too. I'm trying to help, because I see most of you are so incredibly clueless, you go on a rapmage and end up talking... talking?... shouting against your own interest all the time. You are some of the most misled, misinformed people I'v ever seen on the net. No wonder they rip most of you off all the time again and again and again. Don't any of you think, after being humiliated and shafted continuously for years, that maybe, just maybe, you should listen to someone who actually knows whats happening? Correct me if I'm wrong my friend but just about everything happening points towards the conclusion that you ppl are totally incapable of doing anything in your own interest. With the pirate party, once again, you have absolutely no idea what you are talking about. Some enlightenment (clue stick :) )
http://www.archive.org/download/http://archive.org/details/MaxKeiserRadio-TheTruthAboutMarkets-04February2012 (http://www.archive.org/download/http://archive.org/details/MaxKeiserRadio-TheTruthAboutMarkets-04February2012)
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... just about everything happening points towards the conclusion that you ppl are totally incapable of doing anything in your own interest. With the pirate party, once again, you have absolutely no idea what you are talking about. Some enlightenment (clue stick :) )
Your suggestion is ... ?
[url]http://www.archive.org/download/http://archive.org/details/MaxKeiserRadio-TheTruthAboutMarkets-04February2012[/url] ([url]http://www.archive.org/download/http://archive.org/details/MaxKeiserRadio-TheTruthAboutMarkets-04February2012[/url])
"The item you have requested has a problem with one or more of the metadata files that describe it, which prevents us from displaying this page."
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I have found one of my images w/ an IS watermark on there but the image has been removed from IS. It has been repinned a number of times. I doubt it is somehow going to lead to a sale at IS.
I think pinterest is playing fast and loose w/ copyright. The fact that you can use images on pinterest in your blog is completely bogus. I don't know how to search to find images that well on there. If you don't just stumble onto them or they aren't listed with your info then you might never see them.
IF watermarked images from sites were up there and the link took them to the site to buy the image and they couldn't be used for a blog, then that would be ok, but that isn't what the situation is. At least some of the watermarked images seem to lead back to the sites, but others don't. It is a mess.
There will be a messy pinterest lawsuit soon, and pinterest will try to pass the blame to the users, who will plead ignorance.
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^^ Agree with everything.
Did anyone contacted Dreamstime or Depositphotos regarding their "feature" of sharing our work on Pinterest?
I just sent an email to DT asking them to remove the Share button from my images. Maybe others here could do the same?
What will this accomplish? There are so many ways to share files, social media is just a drop in the ocean. Where is the harm in someone posting a watermarked image to their Twitter feed to say that they really liked this particular photo, or whatever?
I think you are all pretty much guaranteeing that stock competition will dry up. Getty is using social media to its full advantage. You want competition for Getty, but you are denying agencies the ability to utilize social media to compete with them.
Will having your images shared on social media sites lead to sales? No. The main benefit is to the agency, which gets added attention from Google and other search engines which recognize a flurry of activity involving the agency. But if you want real competition in this space, you have to allow smaller agencies to create a social media buzz per Getty.
I'll tell you right now that I had a similar idea at Warmpicture to allow social media sharing. But I scrapped the idea because I knew what the reaction would be. I know this won't change any of your minds. But when there is basically one or two agencies left in 5 years and your commissions are even worse than they already are, you will have nothing to complain about because you killed the ability for smaller agencies to compete in the social media space, which is arguably one of the important battle grounds currently being considered by Google.
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' If you find any of your own images on Pinterest that you would like removed, click on the violating pin, select "Report Pin" from the options on the right, and fill out the form related to intellectual property.'
Either it is infringement or it isn't. It isn't a personal decision.
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I am hoping that some of you fellow contributors who express yourselves way more eloquently than I will help out with getting an opt out or having the Share button removed from our images.
Done.
(though I'm not pretending I can express myself more eloquently ;) )
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Being here, I assume you generally sell on microstock sites, which means you offer your shots to be downloaded en masse, by anyone with just a handfull of dollars for something like $.5 a pop, or probabaly even less... 25 a day, etc, and they can upload them anywhere after that, of course.... then you whine about some of your shots ending up on pinterest servers? : ) ehmmm.... get a clue... maybe? and your buddies too... really.
for the record, i'm 50% micro RF and 50% macro RM and trying to diversify with art galleries and fine art.
and for me it's not a matter of price but of principle.
please show me any tangible benefit for getting my photos stolen by the freetards pinning all day on Pinterest or FB.
besides, what about my RM photos where the clients pay more exactly to have exclusivity, just to see it later pinned all around Pinterest with a Getty watermark ?
so of course you're assuming wrong, and you would be wrong even if i was only selling micro RF subs or posting for fun on flickr.
i guess 90% of the whole internet is made of stolen content, and they make billions on it while we get ZERO back, not even a credit, a link, a thank you, zero !
it's outright theft, pure and simple.
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By the way, I have complained on the DT forums. Achilles has jumped in. Here's the thread:
[url]http://www.dreamstime.com/thread_31459[/url] ([url]http://www.dreamstime.com/thread_31459[/url])
so Achilles dare to say "This is a way to make stock photography known and advocate legal use. Chase these users away and they will turn to Flickr where they have Creative Commons for real usage for free." ????
this is B-S !
pinterest scroungers are 99% junk traffic, none of them ever heard about stock agencies and the last thing they would do is paying for a photo just to get the photo repinned for free by their fellow freetard friends.
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... just about everything happening points towards the conclusion that you ppl are totally incapable of doing anything in your own interest. With the pirate party, once again, you have absolutely no idea what you are talking about. Some enlightenment (clue stick :) )
Your suggestion is ... ?
[url]http://www.archive.org/download/http://archive.org/details/MaxKeiserRadio-TheTruthAboutMarkets-04February2012[/url] ([url]http://www.archive.org/download/http://archive.org/details/MaxKeiserRadio-TheTruthAboutMarkets-04February2012[/url])
"The item you have requested has a problem with one or more of the metadata files that describe it, which prevents us from displaying this page."
As always ppl ant some 'magic answer'. There is none. First of all you should have punished these severely unfair agencies when they started shafting you... but that should have happened years ago, by deactivating / removing images. You could have very very effectively protested without even leaving the comfort of your room.... and you ppl did.... tadaaa.. nothin'. You didn't want to loose a few dollars, now you are going to loose everything (not becouse of hackers, because you are poens for the agencies) I'd say thats somewhat more important than pointlessly ranting for hours and days about watermarked thumbnails popping up here and there.
Other thing is that if you take place and promote a market like this, at least look around and see the tendencies. As technology progresses, the price of many generic things (storage, music, etc...) including generic images, is on a curve to zero. Theres nothing you can do about it. Actually endorsing the microstock model for years, you are one of the many ppl making sure this happens. You helped aggressively pushing the price of something down happily went on creating oversupply.... did you seriously think it's just gonna stop at a point comfortable to you despite your own actions? : ) Welcome to the world: it wont. It will keep sliding.
Heres the link:
-http://archive.org/details/MaxKeiserRadio-TheTruthAboutMarkets-04February2012-
Had to post it like this, the board engine is broken, keeps messing up the url.
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^^ Agree with everything.
Did anyone contacted Dreamstime or Depositphotos regarding their "feature" of sharing our work on Pinterest?
I just sent an email to DT asking them to remove the Share button from my images. Maybe others here could do the same?
What will this accomplish? There are so many ways to share files, social media is just a drop in the ocean. Where is the harm in someone posting a watermarked image to their Twitter feed to say that they really liked this particular photo, or whatever?
I think you are all pretty much guaranteeing that stock competition will dry up. Getty is using social media to its full advantage. You want competition for Getty, but you are denying agencies the ability to utilize social media to compete with them.
Will having your images shared on social media sites lead to sales? No. The main benefit is to the agency, which gets added attention from Google and other search engines which recognize a flurry of activity involving the agency. But if you want real competition in this space, you have to allow smaller agencies to create a social media buzz per Getty.
I'll tell you right now that I had a similar idea at Warmpicture to allow social media sharing. But I scrapped the idea because I knew what the reaction would be. I know this won't change any of your minds. But when there is basically one or two agencies left in 5 years and your commissions are even worse than they already are, you will have nothing to complain about because you killed the ability for smaller agencies to compete in the social media space, which is arguably one of the important battle grounds currently being considered by Google.
you are right. everything that is being done with social media is for the agencys benefit, not mine. there are tens of thousands of contributors on DT. my having the share button pulled from my images isnt going to much effect on that for DT, just as my leaving IS had no effect on how they do business. its about the principle. it is NOT ok for agencys to arbitrarily decide what gets done with my images without asking or providing an opt out. i am getting really tired of other people USING me and my property to make millions, while paying me less and less every day. I call bull$hit.
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... just about everything happening points towards the conclusion that you ppl are totally incapable of doing anything in your own interest. With the pirate party, once again, you have absolutely no idea what you are talking about. Some enlightenment (clue stick :) )
Your suggestion is ... ?
[url]http://www.archive.org/download/http://archive.org/details/MaxKeiserRadio-TheTruthAboutMarkets-04February2012[/url] ([url]http://www.archive.org/download/http://archive.org/details/MaxKeiserRadio-TheTruthAboutMarkets-04February2012[/url])
"The item you have requested has a problem with one or more of the metadata files that describe it, which prevents us from displaying this page."
As always ppl ant some 'magic answer'. There is none.
So the point of your rant was just to say, "If only we hadn't..." You can't roll back time. We have to deal with the situation as it is.
The real "If only..." is not about micro pricing, it's actually about the RF model, no matter the price; it makes it very difficult to be certain if an unwatermarked 'find' is a use by a legitimate buyer or not.
Heres the link:
-http://archive.org/details/MaxKeiserRadio-TheTruthAboutMarkets-04February2012-
Had to post it like this, the board engine is broken, keeps messing up the url.
The board engine is not broken.
http://www.archive.org/download/http://archive.org/details/MaxKeiserRadio-TheTruthAboutMarkets-04February2012 (http://www.archive.org/download/http://archive.org/details/MaxKeiserRadio-TheTruthAboutMarkets-04February2012)
I will warn people, which you did not, that this is a 52 minute audio file.
I'm sure what they said could be much more succinctly listed by someone who has enough spare time to listen to it.
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... just about everything happening points towards the conclusion that you ppl are totally incapable of doing anything in your own interest. With the pirate party, once again, you have absolutely no idea what you are talking about. Some enlightenment (clue stick :) )
Your suggestion is ... ?
[url]http://www.archive.org/download/http://archive.org/details/MaxKeiserRadio-TheTruthAboutMarkets-04February2012[/url] ([url]http://www.archive.org/download/http://archive.org/details/MaxKeiserRadio-TheTruthAboutMarkets-04February2012[/url])
"The item you have requested has a problem with one or more of the metadata files that describe it, which prevents us from displaying this page."
As always ppl ant some 'magic answer'. There is none.
So the point of your rant was just to say, "If only we hadn't..." You can't roll back time. We have to deal with the situation as it is.
The real "If only..." is not about micro pricing, it's actually about the RF model, no matter the price; it makes it very difficult to be certain if an unwatermarked 'find' is a use by a legitimate buyer or not.
Heres the link:
-http://archive.org/details/MaxKeiserRadio-TheTruthAboutMarkets-04February2012-
Had to post it like this, the board engine is broken, keeps messing up the url.
The board engine is not broken.
[url]http://www.archive.org/download/http://archive.org/details/MaxKeiserRadio-TheTruthAboutMarkets-04February2012[/url] ([url]http://www.archive.org/download/http://archive.org/details/MaxKeiserRadio-TheTruthAboutMarkets-04February2012[/url])
I will warn people, which you did not, that this is a 52 minute audio file.
I'm sure what they said could be much more succinctly listed by someone who has enough spare time to listen to it.
mess up, then say you can't roll back time? thats all? what kind of attitude is that?
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mess up, then say you can't roll back time? thats all? what kind of attitude is that?
Realistic.
Your alternative is?
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mess up, then say you can't roll back time? thats all? what kind of attitude is that?
Realistic.
Your alternative is?
Participate in the same system but hurl insults at everyone else involved? ;)
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^^ Agree with everything.
Did anyone contacted Dreamstime or Depositphotos regarding their "feature" of sharing our work on Pinterest?
I just sent an email to DT asking them to remove the Share button from my images. Maybe others here could do the same?
What will this accomplish? There are so many ways to share files, social media is just a drop in the ocean. Where is the harm in someone posting a watermarked image to their Twitter feed to say that they really liked this particular photo, or whatever?
I think you are all pretty much guaranteeing that stock competition will dry up. Getty is using social media to its full advantage. You want competition for Getty, but you are denying agencies the ability to utilize social media to compete with them.
Will having your images shared on social media sites lead to sales? No. The main benefit is to the agency, which gets added attention from Google and other search engines which recognize a flurry of activity involving the agency. But if you want real competition in this space, you have to allow smaller agencies to create a social media buzz per Getty.
I'll tell you right now that I had a similar idea at Warmpicture to allow social media sharing. But I scrapped the idea because I knew what the reaction would be. I know this won't change any of your minds. But when there is basically one or two agencies left in 5 years and your commissions are even worse than they already are, you will have nothing to complain about because you killed the ability for smaller agencies to compete in the social media space, which is arguably one of the important battle grounds currently being considered by Google.
you are right. everything that is being done with social media is for the agencys benefit, not mine. there are tens of thousands of contributors on DT. my having the share button pulled from my images isnt going to much effect on that for DT, just as my leaving IS had no effect on how they do business. its about the principle. it is NOT ok for agencys to arbitrarily decide what gets done with my images without asking or providing an opt out. i am getting really tired of other people USING me and my property to make millions, while paying me less and less every day. I call bull$hit.
And there (the bold statement) is "The Spin." What is good for the Agency is good for the contributor.
@Achilles ... I beat you to it. ;D
Or, maybe not? ??? ::)
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Had a quick check with all the agencies I'm in. So far, those offering "share on Pinterest" are Dreamstime, Depositphotos, 123RF, Photodune.
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mess up, then say you can't roll back time? thats all? what kind of attitude is that?
Realistic.
no its just repetitive denial
Your alternative is?
?? I'm not the one whining, opening threads about pinterest, blogs, etc, etc. So... what are you going to do? Any action plan, anyone?
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I've got images pinned without any watermark from commercial websites (that I assume paid for them).
They're locational / travel shots. I've seen similar things before where people use google images to find a shot and then just paste it into their blog post.
I don't have the time to police this stuff. I'm better off spending my time producing more photos than chasing $1 sales missed.
I'm not saying they should be able to do this or I'm happy. I can see it as another tool to find images and take them/ use them for free.
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And there (the bold statement) is "The Spin." What is good for the Agency is good for the contributor.
pure rubbish.
whoever follows the development of the SEO industry is aware that free links and FB/digg/stumble/twitter sharing are a thing of the past after google's operation Panda and operation Penguin scr-e-wing overs the search engine rankings.
ask any decent SEO professional how to rank higher and the answer is about buying advertising space, buying tons of paid links, paid blog and magazine reviews, and eventually tens of thousands of paid links in social networks (for what they're still worth).
thinking that a stock agency could ever go "viral" because they add a sharing button says it all about their marketing department and their bogus online marketing strategy.
sorry guys, viral marketing is a thing of the past and it's unthinkable a multimillion dollar agency should bet anything on it.
we're in the hands of agencies who have no fu-cking idea how to push sales for our products and yet they keep lowering our royalties with the excuse their marketing costs are rising.
one more good reason to dump DT and the other muppets.
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.never mind.
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pure rubbish.
whoever follows the development of the SEO industry is aware that free links and FB/digg/stumble/twitter sharing are a thing of the past after google's operation Panda and operation Penguin scr-e-wing overs the search engine rankings.
This is incorrect. First, Panda was over a year ago and it is old news. And Panda did not attack social media linking. Its main effect was to diminish long tail keyword targeting by smaller entities, and unfortunately swung the pendulum in favor of large websites/businesses.
The new update is Penguin. Google is on record as saying it takes a lot more cues from social media activity than it ever has before. Look up some of Matt Cutts' blog posts if you want to learn more, or read SEOMoz regularly where a lot of this information is talked about in depth. Choosing not to compete in social media, whether it is Twitter, Facebook, Google+, or whatever is to handcuff yourself. You don't have to do them all, but you have to have a presence on a major social media site if you want higher rankings.
The reason for this is simple. It is very hard to manipulate search engine activity. If people are talking about you, and linking to you, they are showing genuine interest in your content. The days of SEO keyword density analysis, etc are thankfully over.
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you are right. everything that is being done with social media is for the agencys benefit, not mine. there are tens of thousands of contributors on DT. my having the share button pulled from my images isnt going to much effect on that for DT, just as my leaving IS had no effect on how they do business. its about the principle. it is NOT ok for agencys to arbitrarily decide what gets done with my images without asking or providing an opt out. i am getting really tired of other people USING me and my property to make millions, while paying me less and less every day. I call bull$hit.
I love you Cathy, but you are mistaken and you are about to make a uninformed, poor business decision.
Each webpage is treated within Google as a separate entity which is influenced by the authority of the overall domain. For instance if I search for "stock photos" I see a list of major player agencies returned by Google. But if I do a search for "stock photo of people" in Google Images, I get a varied return from major agencies, minor agencies, and websites which have purchased stock photos on them.
Each one of these pages is handled individually by Google's search ranking algorithm. Which should rank on Page 1? The same cues which affect the domain authority of the main website are all used on the individual pages. So if a social media buzz starts up around one of your images and the relevant keywords are "stock photo" and "people", you move up higher within Google Images. So yeah, it is important for you to have your images linked and talked about.
At this point, usually someone comes in and proclaims "Nobody buys anything through Google Images, blah, blah..."
I won't disclose our Google Analytics data, but I will tell you that Google Images is a very significant source of our SALES. Not visits, SALES. But if you don't believe me, read the blogs written by Dan Heller and QT Luong. Both make their living selling stock independently. Both share Google Analytics data from time to time. Both have noted that Google Images is one of their best sources of income. And these people are selling licenses for $100, $500, and higher. Obviously there are serious buyers searching within Google Images, not just people looking for a $3 image for their blog.
I am crossing my fingers that Dreamstime will allow an opt-out. This will serve the purpose of handcuffing all of the opted-out images within Google Images, and allowing mine to move higher. And since this is about making money ultimately, I won't cry for anyone who loses sales.
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correct, djpadavona but after reading the mainstream stuff on SEOmoz, SEObook, and the whole mess of SEO blogs and forums you should had a look at black hat forums too you would notice even hackers are struggling to rank and increase sales at the moment, scrapers have been finally hit badly for instance and so many blog farms and pyramid networks, bots, and spammers using xrumer, scrapebox, ubot studio, etc
my feeling has always been that google couldnt give a sh-it about who's ranking well or not, their final goal is just to make it harder and harder to rank in order to force small and medium business to spend more in paid advertising.
and you know what ? they're right.
it's unthinkable to bet your success on google's unpredictable and unstable rankings.
if you want to be in the first page, you gotta pay.
and let me say it will also save you a lot of trouble.
if your product is priced correctly you can get a nice return on investment.
no need to mess with SEO, white hats, gray hats, blackhats, and do it all over again after every fart of Matt Cutts.
Terra Galleria is probably a unique case in this scenario, it's a very old site, well established, authority, bla bla bla.
but if he had to start all over again in 2012 he would be sandboxed and forgotten.
he's one of the few who benefited from the early web viral linking, something that is impossible to replicate today in such a massive scale.
things will eventually change when web searching will focus on local and regional things, but i can't see it happening at the moment, for every different keyword we have a bunch of 50-100 big sites dominating the search rankings, and all the others biting the dust, no matter if they're 100 times better than the cr-ap at the top.
take POD .. good luck ranking well and selling your images on your server unless you're getty or any big-4 micro agency or any other established POD site that spent millions to be where they are now.
AND .. to stay where they are now also in the future they plan a monthly and yearly budget for advertising, in many cases we're talking about millions of dollars, please enlight us how can you expect to beat the big guys with white hat SEO or other less known gray/black tricks .. small POD sites have no chance unless for whatever reason you make a scoop and you end up being linked in articles by NYT, WSJ, CNN, BBC, etc and by domino effect in 1000s of other smaller sites, blogs, forums, and social networks, and RIGHTLY SO, why should google/yahoo/bing rank at the top a site nobody is "talking" about ? are your travel images more authority than getty or corbis ? no, sorry, so you're sandboxed as that's the place you deserve.
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SO, however we look at DT's genius idea of allowing pics to be pinned it's in the best scenario something that will barely scratch the bottom of the barrel...a few random links on facebook and twitter, a few pinnings on Pinterest, and so what ? yes maybe a few sales but it can't go far and it will cost DT yet another loss of reputation and trust by their contributors, and maybe even by few buyers, as a buyer i would not be amused by seeing pinning/fb/twitter buttons on a stock agency, it smells very bad of cheap charlie and fly-by-night.
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what DT can do, considering they're selling the same stuff of their competitors, is at least take in consideration to improve their landing page and their layout !
i mean, it really looks bad, old, not sexy, and not inviting.
it's one of the uglyest among the micro agencies.
please hire a skilled designer, it will be money well spent !
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you are right. everything that is being done with social media is for the agencys benefit, not mine. there are tens of thousands of contributors on DT. my having the share button pulled from my images isnt going to much effect on that for DT, just as my leaving IS had no effect on how they do business. its about the principle. it is NOT ok for agencys to arbitrarily decide what gets done with my images without asking or providing an opt out. i am getting really tired of other people USING me and my property to make millions, while paying me less and less every day. I call bull$hit.
I love you Cathy, but you are mistaken and you are about to make a uninformed, poor business decision.
Each webpage is treated within Google as a separate entity which is influenced by the authority of the overall domain. For instance if I search for "stock photos" I see a list of major player agencies returned by Google. But if I do a search for "stock photo of people" in Google Images, I get a varied return from major agencies, minor agencies, and websites which have purchased stock photos on them.
Each one of these pages is handled individually by Google's search ranking algorithm. Which should rank on Page 1? The same cues which affect the domain authority of the main website are all used on the individual pages. So if a social media buzz starts up around one of your images and the relevant keywords are "stock photo" and "people", you move up higher within Google Images. So yeah, it is important for you to have your images linked and talked about.
At this point, usually someone comes in and proclaims "Nobody buys anything through Google Images, blah, blah..."
I won't disclose our Google Analytics data, but I will tell you that Google Images is a very significant source of our SALES. Not visits, SALES. But if you don't believe me, read the blogs written by Dan Heller and QT Luong. Both make their living selling stock independently. Both share Google Analytics data from time to time. Both have noted that Google Images is one of their best sources of income. And these people are selling licenses for $100, $500, and higher. Obviously there are serious buyers searching within Google Images, not just people looking for a $3 image for their blog.
I am crossing my fingers that Dreamstime will allow an opt-out. This will serve the purpose of handcuffing all of the opted-out images within Google Images, and allowing mine to move higher. And since this is about making money ultimately, I won't cry for anyone who loses sales.
And I love you too Dan. If you believe in this, then you are free to make your choice. I will make mine whether you think I am uninformed and making a bad business decision or not. It's MY choice. And I certainly don't expect you to cry for my lost sales. And I will be very happy for you when you are making millions off of your images because you are using social media. Go ahead, prove me wrong. When I see it, I will think about changing my decision.
When my images were on istock and showing up many many times on google images, my images were being stolen all over the place. Since I've pulled my images at istock, they barely show up in google images. Since that same time, my sales have almost doubled on shutterstock, and up until a couple of weeks ago when DT decided to start manipulating their searches, I was doing OK there (my sales on DT are going to dwindle regardless of whether the Share button is there or not. With the Share button there...sales will dwindle AND my images will be stolen more). Without social media, without even uploading any new material.
The fact of the matter is I am not a social media fan. I don't spend hours and hours a day on it. So far, I see my images being stolen from it. I see my sales increasing on sites that DON'T use it that way. I'm a small potato in a big sea of big fishes and sharks. I admit I don't know everything and I admit that I don't care. Some of my images are good, sellable stock...most of them are crap. I am not a full-time stock photographer. I used the money I made from microstock to purchase equipment and learn about photography so I can use that skill in my full-time career. When it's over for me, it's over. When sales dwindle down, from whatever reason, I will delete my images and move on to something else. There are hundreds of thousand of photographers out there who have more money than I do, who have more skills than I do, who have the money to travel, who have the business saavy, and who create way better stock images than I do. I accept that.
For you big entrepreneurs who want to play the game, go for it! I wish you all the success in the world. Truly. For me, I don't want the Share button on my images on DT. I should at least be able to make my own decision about my own images. That's really all I'm asking.
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For you big entrepreneurs who want to play the game, go for it! I wish you all the success in the world. Truly. For me, I don't want the Share button on my images on DT. I should at least be able to make my own decision about my own images. That's really all I'm asking.
it's not just that, it's also a matter of principle : we join an agency because the agency is promising to make SALES.
and to make serious sales i expect an agency to invest a sh-itload of money on advertising, which is something i can't afford at the moment and for why i agree the agency should take a cut bigger than mine in each sale.
if i had to pay someone to spam social networks with random links and pins, there are many other better and cheaper ways, and if it worked so good anybody would be doing it since a long time, which is not the case.
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I wonder why when sjlocke thinks this is a bad idea, he's making a good business decision. But when I make a decision to not participate, I'm uninformed? Can anyone explain? :'(
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I wonder why when sjlocke thinks this is a bad idea, he's making a good business decision. But when I make a decision to not participate, I'm uninformed? Can anyone explain? :'(
I don't think it's personal. :)
FWIW, I know jack squat about SEO, social media, or any of the other complex marketing concepts being discussed in this thread. I find that both sides of the issue are being presented very well and thoroughly. I've gotten a lot to think about from you, Dan, and antistock.
Whether this works for DT and its contributors remains to be seen. However, I agree with you 100% that they are OUR images, and we should get a choice whether to participate or not.
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Reading this thread I got curious, started doing some image searches for my material and on the third search found one of my shots, on pinterest, sans watermark, sourced from cartoonsandcomics.co (whom I presume licensed it) and re-pinned 11 times.
Not sure how I or any stock agency could possibly benefit from that as there's no indication how anyone would go about buying the image legitimately.
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For you big entrepreneurs who want to play the game, go for it! I wish you all the success in the world. Truly. For me, I don't want the Share button on my images on DT. I should at least be able to make my own decision about my own images. That's really all I'm asking.
it's not just that, it's also a matter of principle : we join an agency because the agency is promising to make SALES.
and to make serious sales i expect an agency to invest a sh-itload of money on advertising, which is something i can't afford at the moment and for why i agree the agency should take a cut bigger than mine in each sale.
if i had to pay someone to spam social networks with random links and pins, there are many other better and cheaper ways, and if it worked so good anybody would be doing it since a long time, which is not the case.
None of that needs a cut bigger than yours... but go on encouraging them, very smart. you ppl excell at working against your interest, than whining as if the resulting situation is someone else's fault, pure brilliance. I think thats by far the most important moral of threads like this that you should be contemplating, forget pinning this and that.... : )
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Drugal needs a "share button." It's a shame to keep all that knowledge isolated in MSG Forum.
:P
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Reading this thread I got curious, started doing some image searches for my material and on the third search found one of my shots, on pinterest, sans watermark, sourced from cartoonsandcomics.co (whom I presume licensed it) and re-pinned 11 times.
Not sure how I or any stock agency could possibly benefit from that as there's no indication how anyone would go about buying the image legitimately.
That is where I see the problem, not with watermarked images pinned from the stock sites - so that if you click on them you are taken to where you can buy them.
The problem is from some random site that by pinning it is saying they own the rights and are allowing others to use it. The more it gets re-pinned and then inserted in blogs the more it becomes an orphan work that is just used for free - seemingly legitimately - from pinterest. The only parties that benefit at that point are pinterest and the people using it for free.
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Drugal needs a "share button." It's a shame to keep all that knowledge isolated in MSG Forum.
:P
It is shared. It's on that thing called teh internets. :))
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I've had a look and here's a scenario that I've just observed:
1. An article on a well-known company's website has (one assumes) a legitimately purchased stock image to head it's article.
2. The 'Pin it' logo is there to allow others to 'pin' the article on their board.
3. When the member clicks the pin, the stock image appears on their board as the link to the article.
So in this case the intention of the original 'Pin-it' does not appear to be to proliferate the image, but to profilerate a link to the article. What I'm not clear on is who/what determines that the image becomes the proliferated link, rather than (say) the article's title. Is that the fault of the image buyer for making that choice, or is that a default action from Pinterest's site?
If the buyer makes that choice themselves, I wonder if they purchased a license that allows for such indeterminate proliferation.
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I've had a look and here's a scenario that I've just observed:
1. An article on a well-known company's website has (one assumes) a legitimately purchased stock image to head it's article.
2. The 'Pin it' logo is there to allow others to 'pin' the article on their board.
3. When the member clicks the pin, the stock image appears on their board as the link to the article.
So in this case the intention of the original 'Pin-it' does not appear to be to proliferate the image, but to profilerate a link to the article. What I'm not clear on is who/what determines that the image becomes the proliferated link, rather than (say) the article's title. Is that the fault of the image buyer for making that choice, or is that a default action from Pinterest's site?
If the buyer makes that choice themselves, I wonder if they purchased a license that allows for such indeterminate proliferation.
I have to assume that you haven’t read their terms?
1. Sharing Your Content
a. Your content. Pinterest allows you to pin and post content on the Service, including photos, comments, and other materials. Anything that you pin, post, display, or otherwise make available on our Service, including all Intellectual Property Rights (defined below) in such content, is referred to as “User Content.” You retain all of your rights in all of the User Content you post to our Service.
b. How Pinterest and other users can use your content. Subject to any applicable account settings you select, you grant us a non-exclusive, royalty-free, transferable, sublicensable, worldwide license to use, display, reproduce, re-pin, modify (e.g., re-format), re-arrange, and distribute your User Content on Pinterest for the purposes of operating and providing the Service(s) to you and to our other Users. Nothing in these Terms shall restrict Pinterest’s rights under separate licenses to User Content. Please remember that the Pinterest Service is a public platform, and that other Users may search for, see, use, and/or re-pin any User Content that you make publicly available through the Service.
8. Indemnity
You agree to indemnify and hold harmless Pinterest and its officers, directors, employees and agents, from and against any claims, suits, proceedings, disputes, demands, liabilities, damages, losses, costs and expenses, including, without limitation, reasonable legal and accounting fees (including costs of defense of claims, suits or proceedings brought by third parties), arising out of or in any way related to (i) your access to or use of the Services or Pinterest Content, (ii) your User Content, or (iii) your breach of any of these Terms.
http://pinterest.com/about/terms/ (http://pinterest.com/about/terms/)
Scary!
Only the copyright holder has the right to 'pin' their images and by 'pinning' them, they allow others to 're-pin', share and USE their images (for free). In your scenario, a buyer who purchases a license, does not own the copyright and therefore is not allowed to 'pin' the image. The problem is, 'pinners' don’t read the terms of service. They read what's written on the website which is misleading and they assume they are free to 'pin' anything they like on the internet. When something is 'pinned' there, it's perceived to be in public domain and others believe they are free to use it, in any way they want to use it (for free). This is the problem.
I hope Serban removes the 'pin-it' option from our files because he is breaching our copyright by having it there. Has Serban read Pinterest's terms of service? If he hasn't, that’s incompetence and irresponsible, and if he has, that's criminal!
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I am crossing my fingers that Dreamstime will allow an opt-out. This will serve the purpose of handcuffing all of the opted-out images within Google Images, and allowing mine to move higher. And since this is about making money ultimately, I won't cry for anyone who loses sales.
And since you have 'pinned' your images there, according to Pinterest's terms of service, they are now in public domain and any user is free to use them (for free) and there's nothing you can do about it because you pinned them there yourself. I might just put your images on my website and blog. Thanks for the freebie from me and from behalf of the world wide web ;D
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Be sure to change the image link to benefit yourself, as there is no requirement for it to point at the original image. Might as well get full benefit from these free to use images!
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Here's a link to the DT images being pinned.
http://pinterest.com/source/dreamstime.com/ (http://pinterest.com/source/dreamstime.com/)
ALL of those images being displayed with the watermark are copyright infringements. It doesn't matter whether the image leads back to DT to buy the image or not. The fact that it has been used in the first place is illegal, and both DT and the pinning are promoting the infringement by making it seem to be OK.
That's just wrong.
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I am crossing my fingers that Dreamstime will allow an opt-out. This will serve the purpose of handcuffing all of the opted-out images within Google Images, and allowing mine to move higher. And since this is about making money ultimately, I won't cry for anyone who loses sales.
And since you have 'pinned' your images there, according to Pinterest's terms of service, they are now in public domain and any user is free to use them (for free) and there's nothing you can do about it because you pinned them there yourself. I might just put your images on my website and blog. Thanks for the freebie from me and from behalf of the world wide web ;D
Since the internet has become fast and easily accessible to so many, the price of generic images (among many other things) has been on a curve to zero. This is one of the final steps before getting to that pricepoint of zero. You, yes You, endorsed this by creating oversupply by adding your content to mass sale schemes. Theres nothing you can do about it now... and if you think it can't get worse, you are - as always - wrong. They can, and probably will charge you for uploading to gain popularity.
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Be sure to change the image link to benefit yourself, as there is no requirement for it to point at the original image. Might as well get full benefit from these free to use images!
You can too! Thanks for the tip ;)
I can't see Dan's images on that link Cathy provided. Was he telling fibs about 'pinning' them or has he had a change of heart and removed them since his last post?
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Since the internet has become fast and easily accessible to so many, the price of generic images (among many other things) has been on a curve to zero. This is one of the final steps before getting to that pricepoint of zero. You, yes You, endorsed this by creating oversupply by adding your content to mass sale schemes. Theres nothing you can do about it now... and if you think it can't get worse, you are - as always - wrong. They can, and probably will charge you for uploading to gain popularity.
Who says I think it can't get worse? It just did. It gets worse by the week. I'm sure they'll keep screwing us but that's your solution? You believe that since they're going to screw us further, since the market is so over-saturated with images and since commissions and prices are dropping, we may as well hand over our images to anyone for free? Awesome solutions! I will now give in and pin all my images on Pinterest. Thanks for your brilliant advice!
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Since the internet has become fast and easily accessible to so many, the price of generic images (among many other things) has been on a curve to zero. This is one of the final steps before getting to that pricepoint of zero. You, yes You, endorsed this by creating oversupply by adding your content to mass sale schemes. Theres nothing you can do about it now... and if you think it can't get worse, you are - as always - wrong. They can, and probably will charge you for uploading to gain popularity.
Who says I think it can't get worse? It just did. It gets worse by the week. I'm sure they'll keep screwing us but that's your solution? You believe that since they're going to screw us further, since the market is so over-saturated with images and since commissions and prices are dropping, we may as well hand over our images to anyone for free? Awesome solutions! I will now give in and pin all my images on Pinterest. Thanks for your brilliant advice!
And as typically happens by these trolls spouting the rhetoric, blame the contributors for the theft instead of the parties actually involved, like the agencies or the pirates. ::)
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Scary!
Only the copyright holder has the right to 'pin' their images and by 'pinning' them, they allow others to 're-pin', share and USE their images (for free). In your scenario, a buyer who purchases a license, does not own the copyright and therefore is not allowed to 'pin' the image. The problem is, 'pinners' don’t read the terms of service. They read what's written on the website which is misleading and they assume they are free to 'pin' anything they like on the internet. When something is 'pinned' there, it's perceived to be in public domain and others believe they are free to use it, in any way they want to use it (for free). This is the problem.
I hope Serban removes the 'pin-it' option from our files because he is breaching our copyright by having it there. Has Serban read Pinterest's terms of service? If he hasn't, that’s incompetence and irresponsible, and if he has, that's criminal!
Thanks for your reply grafix04. Very interesting and no, I hadn't read the terms. That looks like a whole can of worms for the agencies and buying 'pinners' to consider. I do hope the agencies will get their act together and figure out how to protect their and our remuneration without continuing to add to the problem on the basis of 'it's the future, mannnn'. They need to remember that they have a part to play in shaping that future, and a responsibility to copyright holders.
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I can't see Dan's images on that link Cathy provided. Was he telling fibs about 'pinning' them or has he had a change of heart and removed them since his last post?
Well, Dan can speak for himself, but I assume he has pinned his images from Warmpicture, the site he owns, rather than from DT.
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Since the internet has become fast and easily accessible to so many, the price of generic images (among many other things) has been on a curve to zero. This is one of the final steps before getting to that pricepoint of zero. You, yes You, endorsed this by creating oversupply by adding your content to mass sale schemes. Theres nothing you can do about it now... and if you think it can't get worse, you are - as always - wrong. They can, and probably will charge you for uploading to gain popularity.
Who says I think it can't get worse? It just did. It gets worse by the week. I'm sure they'll keep screwing us but that's your solution? You believe that since they're going to screw us further, since the market is so over-saturated with images and since commissions and prices are dropping, we may as well hand over our images to anyone for free? Awesome solutions! I will now give in and pin all my images on Pinterest. Thanks for your brilliant advice!
Where did I say i'm offering any solution? Kids demanding a magic spell-word that makes the boogieman disappear.... there isn't. The only point I'm pressing here is that this is all the direct consequence of your own actions. It's incredible how not one person can face that. I don't think I ever seen this level of denial in my life, except for religious cults. I personally don't mind or care about pinterest or the rest. So, solutions... what you are going to do? Whine here for days without even a hint of any action plan, like the case with Istock? What a waste of time.
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Where did I say i'm offering any solution? Kids demanding a magic spell-word that makes the boogieman disappear.... there isn't. The only point I'm pressing here is that this is all the direct consequence of your own actions. It's incredible how not one person can face that. I don't think I ever seen this level of denial in my life, except for religious cults. I personally don't mind or care about pinterest or the rest. So, solutions... what you are going to do? Whine here for days without even a hint of any action plan, like the case with Istock? What a waste of time.
Exactly where have I whined? Rubyroo asked a question and I posted to answer it, to help her out by explaining their TOS which I'm familiar with.
My actions? Do you know me at all or do you simply jump from thread to thread typing the same repetitive nonsense to anyone, regardless of who they are, hoping that your assumption is correct for all. You’re making a bit of a fool of yourself by doing this. Instead of making stupid assumptions, why not ask a question or two before you pass judgement on anyone? Or is your only intention to stir the pot in here?
Yes I have an action plan. If Serban doesn't remove the Pin-it option, I'll drop them like I've dropped some others who have made changes I didn't agree with. Violating my copyright is serious stuff and I certainly won't roll over and let them. But is it any of your business what I do or what anyone else does? Mind your own and stop annoying everyone with your repetitive posts. We heard you. "Contributors are to blame." To an extent we are but also our hands are tied and with the big four, they often don't respond to our outcries. In the end our only option is to either contribute or to leave which equates to making some money or losing it all. Decisions to leave an agent isn't so easy to make for people earning a living from this. Some whining is essential otherwise how will they know we don't agree with their decisions that effect us directly? I don't have the time, but if I want to whine for days in here in the hopes they'll listen before I make a financial decision, then I'll whine and you will just have to put up with it.
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Some whining is essential otherwise how will they know we don't agree with their decisions that effect us directly? I don't have the time, but if I want to whine for days in here in the hopes they'll listen before I make a financial decision, then I'll whine and you will just have to put up with it.
Isn't it ironic that he keeps coming on to whine that he doesn't like to read other people whining. ::) Yawn.
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I don't think I ever seen this level of denial in my life, except for religious cults. I personally don't mind or care about pinterest or the rest. So, solutions... what you are going to do? Whine here for days without even a hint of any action plan, like the case with Istock? What a waste of time.
and who told you we're all microstockers here ? there are also photojournalists, hobbyists, macrostockers, midstockers, people on assignment, and many here do micro just as a side job.
and about overproduction, i can say there were zilions of images and agencies even 20 yrs ago so where's the point ?
the bar simply goes higher and newbies will find it impossible to get a foot in the door, for anything else if your portfolio is big enough it's still an asset and you still make decent sales.
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Where did I say i'm offering any solution? Kids demanding a magic spell-word that makes the boogieman disappear.... there isn't. The only point I'm pressing here is that this is all the direct consequence of your own actions. It's incredible how not one person can face that. I don't think I ever seen this level of denial in my life, except for religious cults. I personally don't mind or care about pinterest or the rest. So, solutions... what you are going to do? Whine here for days without even a hint of any action plan, like the case with Istock? What a waste of time.
Exactly where have I whined? Rubyroo asked a question and I posted to answer it, to help her out by explaining their TOS which I'm familiar with.
My actions? Do you know me at all or do you simply jump from thread to thread typing the same repetitive nonsense to anyone, regardless of who they are, hoping that your assumption is correct for all. You’re making a bit of a fool of yourself by doing this. Instead of making stupid assumptions, why not ask a question or two before you pass judgement on anyone? Or is your only intention to stir the pot in here?
Yes I have an action plan. If Serban doesn't remove the Pin-it option, I'll drop them like I've dropped some others who have made changes I didn't agree with. Violating my copyright is serious stuff and I certainly won't roll over and let them. But is it any of your business what I do or what anyone else does? Mind your own and stop annoying everyone with your repetitive posts. We heard you. "Contributors are to blame." To an extent we are but also our hands are tied and with the big four, they often don't respond to our outcries. In the end our only option is to either contribute or to leave which equates to making some money or losing it all. Decisions to leave an agent isn't so easy to make for people earning a living from this. Some whining is essential otherwise how will they know we don't agree with their decisions that effect us directly? I don't have the time, but if I want to whine for days in here in the hopes they'll listen before I make a financial decision, then I'll whine and you will just have to put up with it.
wow, thats short memory, actually you were whining to me. You even demanded a solution from me. Thats what each of you did... thats funny :)) This is a whine thread (as always). Thats ok if that brings ppl together who feel 'offended', to form some common strategy. But it doesn't, it's just whining to infinity, just like with Istock canisters and commission. You dropping out is not a startegy, it won't even be noticed... and pls don't ask me for some magic answer again. I don't mind pineterest, and I don't want to delete flickr, I actually like it. It helped me market myself for IRL comissions.
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I don't think I ever seen this level of denial in my life, except for religious cults. I personally don't mind or care about pinterest or the rest. So, solutions... what you are going to do? Whine here for days without even a hint of any action plan, like the case with Istock? What a waste of time.
and who told you we're all microstockers here ? there are also photojournalists, hobbyists, macrostockers, midstockers, people on assignment, and many here do micro just as a side job.
and about overproduction, i can say there were zilions of images and agencies even 20 yrs ago so where's the point ?
the bar simply goes higher and newbies will find it impossible to get a foot in the door, for anything else if your portfolio is big enough it's still an asset and you still make decent sales.
I suggest you look at the url.
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Since the internet has become fast and easily accessible to so many, the price of generic images (among many other things) has been on a curve to zero. This is one of the final steps before getting to that pricepoint of zero. You, yes You, endorsed this by creating oversupply by adding your content to mass sale schemes. Theres nothing you can do about it now... and if you think it can't get worse, you are - as always - wrong. They can, and probably will charge you for uploading to gain popularity.
and again, who told you here we all make "generic images" ??
i sold many obscure subjects on RM agencies, you will never find them on micros, nor on Flickr or Pinterest and if you need them you must pay RM price.
actually they're so obscure i wonder how they even find them and this only shows once again that anything can still sell.
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Since the internet has become fast and easily accessible to so many, the price of generic images (among many other things) has been on a curve to zero. This is one of the final steps before getting to that pricepoint of zero. You, yes You, endorsed this by creating oversupply by adding your content to mass sale schemes. Theres nothing you can do about it now... and if you think it can't get worse, you are - as always - wrong. They can, and probably will charge you for uploading to gain popularity.
and again, who told you here we all make "generic images" ??
i sold many obscure subjects on RM agencies, you will never find them on micros, nor on Flickr or Pinterest and if you need them you must pay RM price.
actually they're so obscure i wonder how they even find them and this only shows once again that anything can still sell.
and that kind of stuff represents the majority of output from ppl coming here, right? :) gimme a break...
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Since the internet has become fast and easily accessible to so many, the price of generic images (among many other things) has been on a curve to zero. This is one of the final steps before getting to that pricepoint of zero. You, yes You, endorsed this by creating oversupply by adding your content to mass sale schemes. Theres nothing you can do about it now... and if you think it can't get worse, you are - as always - wrong. They can, and probably will charge you for uploading to gain popularity.
and again, who told you here we all make "generic images" ??
i sold many obscure subjects on RM agencies, you will never find them on micros, nor on Flickr or Pinterest and if you need them you must pay RM price.
actually they're so obscure i wonder how they even find them and this only shows once again that anything can still sell.
and that kind of stuff represents the majority of output from ppl coming here, right? :) gimme a break...
Good idea. You need to take a break.
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gimme a break...
Good idea. You need to take a break.
+1
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gimme a break...
Good idea. You need to take a break.
+1
+2 Have one on me.
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I know I'm new here, but anyone victim of excessive copyright infringements on Pinterest is invited to get in touch with me by way of PM.
In the meantime, for your entertainment:
pinterest-out.blogspot.com (http://pinterest-out.blogspot.com)
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I know I'm new here, but anyone victim of excessive copyright infringements on Pinterest is invited to get in touch with me by way of PM.
In the meantime, for your entertainment:
pinterest-out.blogspot.com ([url]http://pinterest-out.blogspot.com[/url])
hey, I see you are a glass artist - Was the glass background difficult to create?
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Was the glass background difficult to create?
It's from a free background site.
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Was the glass background difficult to create?
It's from a free background site.
are you sure about that? ::)
Because I might disagree with many on here about Pinterest but I'm completely united with them when it comes to the illegal use of copyrighted material.
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gimme a break...
Good idea. You need to take a break.
+1
+2 Have one on me.
I took a break, and now I'm back full of positive energy!! freedom, america, f!* yeah!!
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gimme a break...
Good idea. You need to take a break.
+1
+2 Have one on me.
I took a break, and now I'm back full of positive energy!! freedom, america, f!* yeah!!
Sadly, I don't think they can see your posts anymore. I may as well join them. A few more ignores and you'll be deleting your account and re-emerging with a new one. That's how it goes, right?
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Sadly, I don't think they can see your posts anymore. I may as well join them. A few more ignores and you'll be deleting your account and re-emerging with a new one *(AGAIN). That's how it goes, right?
Wow, I was #2 in the old Ignore parade. Now it's up to 13 in only a couple of days? Impressive record! Let's see if he can top himself next time! ;)
*(AGAIN) added by me.
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gimme a break...
Good idea. You need to take a break.
+1
+2 Have one on me.
I took a break, and now I'm back full of positive energy!! freedom, america, f!* yeah!!
Sadly, I don't think they can see your posts anymore. I may as well join them. A few more ignores and you'll be deleting your account and re-emerging with a new one. That's how it goes, right?
Nah, I don't care that much at all. I made my point pretty clearly that the place is loaded with ignorant ppl, and they keep providing the proof for it with their ignore buttons. That ignorance got them to their constant-whiner level, and they keep pressing it. Good luck :)
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Sadly, I don't think they can see your posts anymore. I may as well join them. A few more ignores and you'll be deleting your account and re-emerging with a new one *(AGAIN). That's how it goes, right?
Wow, I was #2 in the old Ignore parade. Now it's up to 13 in only a couple of days? Impressive record! Let's see if he can top himself next time! ;)
*(AGAIN) added by me.
I was coin tossing on whether I should reply to this post. On the one hand I wanted to have a laugh and on the other, I wanted to be silent so he can disappear from existence earlier. Laughs got the better of me ;D
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It just occurred to me...the share button on DT may explain why my sales have taken a dive. Since the pics are free on pinterest, who needs to buy them? ;)
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And it's not only DT. The "share" or "pin it" button is also on 123RF, Depositphotos and Photodune. How about them?
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And it's not only DT. The "share" or "pin it" button is also on 123RF, Depositphotos and Photodune. How about them?
Fortunately I don't submit to them, so I only have 1 agency to worry about right now.
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It just occurred to me...the share button on DT may explain why my sales have taken a dive. Since the pics are free on pinterest, who needs to buy them? ;)
It's possible although I'm leaning towards believing that the share button is a desperate attempt to gain exposure due to the fact that sales have been dropping. DT don't seem to know what they're doing lately, running tests with their pricing and subs plans, running off buyers. Playing with their search results and changing image levels. I'd be betting they're headed towards financial trouble. Instead of an IPO, Serban wants to hold onto his creation, having full control and instead, he tries to save the day by squeezing both buyers and contributors. They don't want to spend any money on marketing so instead they're using free advertising on social networking sites at the expense of contributors. They don't seem at all professional and I'd go so far as to say they're acting like amateurs. I'd be concerned, but sales are so low that I consider them middle tier, if that. I'm thinking of bailing before my images are spread everywhere because this problem is only going to get worse. This Pinterest business is madness. It's all kicking off over in the forums but he seems reluctant to remove the pin-it button. I can't see why they don't remove it temporarily till they, or if they come to some sort of agreement with Pinterest. The way it all works now is a mess on both sites, both contradicting themselves and each other. So far what I’ve picked up are these contradictions:
Copyright:
Pinterest’s terms only allows the owner of the intellectual property to 'pin', however, Pinterest's 'Help' section states: "Pinterest allows you to organize and share all the beautiful things you find on the web." Despite the fact that only the copyright holder can legally 'pin', DT encourages anyone to 'pin' the image and breach copyright laws and Pinterest's TOS.
Commercial Use
Pinterest states: "You agree not to... Use the Service for any commercial purpose or the benefit of any third party, except as otherwise explicitly permitted for you by Pinterest or in any manner not permitted by the Terms." Yet Serban wrote: "We don't have an alliance with them, hence we cannot add this to our network of partners" Seems there is no agreement and it seems he is breaching their policies by encouraging pins for commercial use.
Testing
Pinterest states: "You agree not to... Attempt to probe, scan, or test the vulnerability of any Pinterest system or network or breach any security or authentication measures." Serban wrote: "Depending on their reaction and results from our current tests we will decide whether they will be part of our network of "sharing" sites." Again, breaching Pinterest's policies on testing their vulnerabilities.
Embedded DT images
Carmen wrote: "using images via the referral links or embed them is allowed only if this is meant exclusively for the referral program - to promote the site and contributors. You cannot use images with watermark to illustrate articles." However, when images are 'pinned' or 're-pinned', anyone can then freely embed the code onto their sites or blogs 'legally', if the copyright holder has pinned it himself.
To sum up. Pinterest is a shambles and their TOS contradict the way the site runs. It seems now DT is a shambles as well and is contradicting their own TOS. They seem to be confused over their own rules, they have no regard for the rights of their photographers and also no regard for Pinterest's TOS. Both companies seem to think they're above the law.
Maybe we should teach DT a huge lesson for screwing with our property. Maybe we should choose a smaller agent that pays higher commission, such as GL for example, and 're-pin' all of DT's images, changing the links to point towards the same images on GL. Then we can all re-pin the re-pin, pushing DT's pin down the bottom of the barrel. It will drive traffic to GL, giving us a better return and helping their Google ranking. Best of all, all of this can be done within Pinterest's TOS that the pinner agreed to when pinning. DT may then have a change of heart. Of course I am just waffling out loud to make a point but this could turn out to be a master plan. Or an evil one :D
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It just occurred to me...the share button on DT may explain why my sales have taken a dive. Since the pics are free on pinterest, who needs to buy them? ;)
My sales have been way waay up in the last 7-8 days
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It just occurred to me...the share button on DT may explain why my sales have taken a dive. Since the pics are free on pinterest, who needs to buy them? ;)
It's possible although I'm leaning towards believing that the share button is a desperate attempt to gain exposure due to the fact that sales have been dropping. DT don't seem to know what they're doing lately, running tests with their pricing and subs plans, running off buyers. Playing with their search results and changing image levels. I'd be betting they're headed towards financial trouble. Instead of an IPO, Serban wants to hold onto his creation, having full control and instead, he tries to save the day by squeezing both buyers and contributors. They don't want to spend any money on marketing so instead they're using free advertising on social networking sites at the expense of contributors. They don't seem at all professional and I'd go so far as to say they're acting like amateurs. I'd be concerned, but sales are so low that I consider them middle tier, if that. I'm thinking of bailing before my images are spread everywhere because this problem is only going to get worse. This Pinterest business is madness. It's all kicking off over in the forums but he seems reluctant to remove the pin-it button. I can't see why they don't remove it temporarily till they, or if they come to some sort of agreement with Pinterest. The way it all works now is a mess on both sites, both contradicting themselves and each other. So far what I’ve picked up are these contradictions:
Copyright:
Pinterest’s terms only allows the owner of the intellectual property to 'pin', however, Pinterest's 'Help' section states: "Pinterest allows you to organize and share all the beautiful things you find on the web." Despite the fact that only the copyright holder can legally 'pin', DT encourages anyone to 'pin' the image and breach copyright laws and Pinterest's TOS.
Commercial Use
Pinterest states: "You agree not to... Use the Service for any commercial purpose or the benefit of any third party, except as otherwise explicitly permitted for you by Pinterest or in any manner not permitted by the Terms." Yet Serban wrote: "We don't have an alliance with them, hence we cannot add this to our network of partners" Seems there is no agreement and it seems he is breaching their policies by encouraging pins for commercial use.
Testing
Pinterest states: "You agree not to... Attempt to probe, scan, or test the vulnerability of any Pinterest system or network or breach any security or authentication measures." Serban wrote: "Depending on their reaction and results from our current tests we will decide whether they will be part of our network of "sharing" sites." Again, breaching Pinterest's policies on testing their vulnerabilities.
Embedded DT images
Carmen wrote: "using images via the referral links or embed them is allowed only if this is meant exclusively for the referral program - to promote the site and contributors. You cannot use images with watermark to illustrate articles." However, when images are 'pinned' or 're-pinned', anyone can then freely embed the code onto their sites or blogs 'legally', if the copyright holder has pinned it himself.
To sum up. Pinterest is a shambles and their TOS contradict the way the site runs. It seems now DT is a shambles as well and is contradicting their own TOS. They seem to be confused over their own rules, they have no regard for the rights of their photographers and also no regard for Pinterest's TOS. Both companies seem to think they're above the law.
Maybe we should teach DT a huge lesson for screwing with our property. Maybe we should choose a smaller agent that pays higher commission, such as GL for example, and 're-pin' all of DT's images, changing the links to point towards the same images on GL. Then we can all re-pin the re-pin, pushing DT's pin down the bottom of the barrel. It will drive traffic to GL, giving us a better return and helping their Google ranking. Best of all, all of this can be done within Pinterest's TOS that the pinner agreed to when pinning. DT may then have a change of heart. Of course I am just waffling out loud to make a point but this could turn out to be a master plan. Or an evil one :D
My issue with pinterest is not really a financial one. I don't believe serious buyers hang out there, I think it's a haven for teenagers, hobbyists and scrapbookers, so it's not so much lost sales or pushing traffic to a particular site that gets to me. It's the principle of copyright abuse. Intellectual property is still property. It is that same to me as someone walking into my house, taking my TV and giving it away as a Xmas gift. Intellectual property may not be tangible but it's theft is still a violation.
My problem with DT is in their assumption that my work is available for them to use as they please, which, hmm, seems like copyright violation. They're as guilty as pinterest of taking my property and using it, as well as allowing it to be used by others, without my consent. I believe a large part of the commissions they take for representing me should be going to legitimate marketing and promotion in areas that serious buyers will see, not trying to get freebies at my expense.
for the record, my previous comment correlating lower sales with pinterest was just a joke. I don't think it's connected.
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My issue with pinterest is not really a financial one. I don't believe serious buyers hang out there, I think it's a haven for teenagers, hobbyists and scrapbookers, so it's not so much lost sales or pushing traffic to a particular site that gets to me. It's the principle of copyright abuse. Intellectual property is still property. It is that same to me as someone walking into my house, taking my TV and giving it away as a Xmas gift. Intellectual property may not be tangible but it's theft is still a violation.
My problem with DT is in their assumption that my work is available for them to use as they please, which, hmm, seems like copyright violation. They're as guilty as pinterest of taking my property and using it, as well as allowing it to be used by others, without my consent. I believe a large part of the commissions they take for representing me should be going to legitimate marketing and promotion in areas that serious buyers will see, not trying to get freebies at my expense.
for the record, my previous comment correlating lower sales with pinterest was just a joke. I don't think it's connected.
I missed the joke but I don't think it will be a joke in about a year's time. I'm not so concerned about what's on Pinterest itself, but more and more people will be helping themselves to images from there and placing them on their sites, both with the watermark and without. It's not so much that serious buyers will take the image, it's that they will be bombarded with the image all over the place and be turned off by it. An image that's only six months old could potentially end up seeming outdated just because it's been distributed everywhere. I also believe the site will end up converting legitimate buyers (not serious ones) into thieves because the more the image is out there, the less risk of being caught if they steal it. We can't track who purchased a license as it is and this is only going to get harder. I'm trying to imagine what this industry will be like in three years and it's looking pretty grim in my head. Maybe it's time for a new hobby/career.
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I missed the joke but I don't think it will be a joke in about a year's time. I'm not so concerned about what's on Pinterest itself, but more and more people will be helping themselves to images from there and placing them on their sites, both with the watermark and without. It's not so much that serious buyers will take the image, it's that they will be bombarded with the image all over the place and be turned off by it. An image that's only six months old could potentially end up seeming outdated just because it's been distributed everywhere. I also believe the site will end up converting legitimate buyers (not serious ones) into thieves because the more the image is out there, the less risk of being caught if they steal it. We can't track who purchased a license as it is and this is only going to get harder. I'm trying to imagine what this industry will be like in three years and it's looking pretty grim in my head. Maybe it's time for a new hobby/career.
I don't think that the microstock industry is a bad idea. Obviously, there was a market for it and I believe there still is a market for it. In fact, the market for it was so huge, that big business has now stepped in to reap all the benefits. That's when the problem started. The industry has been soured because of bottom line profits for the agencies and contributors' rights and property getting trampled on.
As for the bolded part above, I agree. What I don't get is why DT (and the others using these Share buttons) can't come to this conclusion. This is going to eat into their bottom line eventually. No one will want to buy.
I just shake my head and say it's a shame. Just like I did when Getty took over istock.
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What really makes me sad is the fact, that there was a HUGE talking about SOPA/PIPA and later ACTA, all the politicians full mouth of IP protection and blahblah. Megaupload was taken down partially illegally and tons of absolutely legal data and backups were deleted illegally and without any hesitation, just because someone got feeling megaupload is damaging intellectual property.
And then we have BILLIONS of illegal shares, likes, downloads etc. on Facebook and now Pinterest and because we are not a photographers union or music studio or Hollywood studio, nobody gives a s**t... And as a bonus, the agencies which should in their own interest make their best to get as much profit as possible are the first in line to make "pinning" (read abusing) of our images easier...
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What really makes me sad is the fact, that there was a HUGE talking about SOPA/PIPA and later ACTA, all the politicians full mouth of IP protection and blahblah. Megaupload was taken down partially illegally and tons of absolutely legal data and backups were deleted illegally and without any hesitation, just because someone got feeling megaupload is damaging intellectual property.
And then we have BILLIONS of illegal shares, likes, downloads etc. on Facebook and now Pinterest and because we are not a photographers union or music studio or Hollywood studio, nobody gives a s**t... And as a bonus, the agencies which should in their own interest make their best to get as much profit as possible are the first in line to make "pinning" (read abusing) of our images easier...
Thats why anyone from these parts supporting SOPA / ACTA was a total idiot. They would have kicked down your door, cuffed and dragged you out of your home face down, and threw you in jail for a random mp3, while your pictures get stolen left & right without anybody giving a sh%=t. Megaupload was raided because it was giving most of its ad income directly to the artists uploading, so they were getting rid of the copyright cartel middlemen taking 70-80-90% of the profit just for sitting around on a monopoly based on political connections. It's a small death for democracy that these guys can use the state, the police as their personal mob style enforcers to wipe someone out because they put up competition as it's supposed to happen in a free market capitalism... they really hate the free market. By the way I heard they are free to delete anything from any user without any consideration. Thats millions and millions of users. Wasn't USA about the sanctity of private property? What a huge failure on that notion... and some people applauded this.. unbelievable.
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I can't see Dan's images on that link Cathy provided. Was he telling fibs about 'pinning' them or has he had a change of heart and removed them since his last post?
Well, Dan can speak for himself, but I assume he has pinned his images from Warmpicture, the site he owns, rather than from DT.
No I have never pinned an image. I don't even have a Pinterest account (though Pinterest sends my Disney World blog traffic ;D).
At one point Warmpicture had a "Share It" button under every image which allowed people to Tweet it, post it to Facebook, etc. I don't think Pinterest was an option back then. I decided to remove the button because I didn't like the way that it distracted people from the buying process. When a buyer clicks through to the image purchase page at WP, I want them to stay focused and not think about social media sharing.
There is a benefit (imo) to sharing these images, to get them ranked higher in Google Images. But there is also a trade off. If we lose even one sale because a buyer gets distracted by social media stuff, then I have failed the contributor. So what I do instead is use Twitter to promote things like our "contributor of the month," our blog articles, and new images.
We're trying to do things the right way. It's a 50/50 split for the contributors, and every major decision made is run through the message board to get everyone's thoughts. I have the final say, but I created Warmpicture to empower us as contributors. We will succeed or fail together. I'm optimistic by the sales we are seeing the last two months.
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I believe a large part of the commissions they take for representing me should be going to legitimate marketing and promotion in areas that serious buyers will see, not trying to get freebies at my expense.
I guess I don't follow your argument. An agency doesn't make a penny by giving away freebies. They only make money by selling photos for contributors. Clearly they believe allowing social sharing will lead to image sales, whether it be via SEO benefit, free advertising, or direct sales. They can't "make millions" (as others in this thread have alluded to) unless you are greatly benefiting with them.
An agency can "make millions" at your expense by lowering your commissions. But that isn't what is being proposed here.
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There is a benefit (imo) to sharing these images, to get them ranked higher in Google Images.
there's no benefit actually as what they're sharing is the URL of the Pinterest image stored in their servers, not the original one in our sites !
we may eventually benefit from the watermark but i've yet to see hard data about this, how a set of watermarked images spread around social networks really brings buyers on a site.
in my experience not much and not worth the hassle, it's like having a text credit below any stolen image, very few users even read it or click your URL and when they do is just for curiosity.
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An agency can "make millions" at your expense by lowering your commissions. But that isn't what is being proposed here.
if the micros really wanna make millions they should go "old economy", hire a good and experienced sales force, send their men to deal with big publishers and design studios, make them sign multimillion contracts.
betting the farm on just online sales by small designers and cheap buyers can only fill a specific market niche and market demand, once it's filled it's stagnation and saturation.
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I missed the joke but I don't think it will be a joke in about a year's time. I'm not so concerned about what's on Pinterest itself, but more and more people will be helping themselves to images from there and placing them on their sites, both with the watermark and without. It's not so much that serious buyers will take the image, it's that they will be bombarded with the image all over the place and be turned off by it. An image that's only six months old could potentially end up seeming outdated just because it's been distributed everywhere. I also believe the site will end up converting legitimate buyers (not serious ones) into thieves because the more the image is out there, the less risk of being caught if they steal it. We can't track who purchased a license as it is and this is only going to get harder. I'm trying to imagine what this industry will be like in three years and it's looking pretty grim in my head. Maybe it's time for a new hobby/career.
I don't think that the microstock industry is a bad idea. Obviously, there was a market for it and I believe there still is a market for it. In fact, the market for it was so huge, that big business has now stepped in to reap all the benefits. That's when the problem started. The industry has been soured because of bottom line profits for the agencies and contributors' rights and property getting trampled on.
As for the bolded part above, I agree. What I don't get is why DT (and the others using these Share buttons) can't come to this conclusion. This is going to eat into their bottom line eventually. No one will want to buy.
I just shake my head and say it's a shame. Just like I did when Getty took over istock.
It's not a bad idea, no, and there is definitely demand for it and a market for it, however the market is getting bigger and cheaper every year and there's also a black market out there which is increasing at an alarming rate. There's no control. There's nothing in place to prevent or police theft and there's so much out there that encourages it. When our own agents take part in promoting theft, then something is seriously wrong. I can't see a future in microstock, not the way it is now. Something will have to change and eventually it will. Only when it does, I doubt it will be for our benefit.
There are too many of us with too many images. Some will give up but there'll be plenty of others that will stay, keeping terms unfair, prices and commissions low. Look at DT, look at the brown-nosing that goes on there. It doesn't matter what these agents do to them, they still give them their support. They cut commission and there are people in there saying stupid things like "I trust DT" and "I’m sure they know what they’re doing". Sometimes I think they're fake contributors (DT staff) that type in there to keep everything balanced or tipped in their favor. I'd rather believe that than believe these people are that naive, but who knows. It's these people and the hobbyists that have ruined this industry.
Long gone are the days when Microstock was booming with enthusiastic contributors. I haven't uploaded anywhere for months. I can't find the motivation to do so. For what? All the sub sales at DP, the low prices at 123rf and CS, the immoral acts of DT, IS and FT? For the shifty deals going on between Veer and Alamy behind the scenes? The IPOs and private sales? Even SS isn't performing as it should and who know what this IPO will lead to. Everyone is negative. It's not because we're negative people, whiners or pessimists as some here have suggested. It's that there's nothing positive going on in the entire industry. It's all doom and gloom and it's only going to get worse. I'm tempted to hang my hat and sneak away while I still have my sanity and dignity.
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I don't like the idea of Pinterest and its clones because it multiplies the idea that most people have that anything they find on the web is free for the taking. I also just read that Pinterest strips the metadata from pinned images, regardless of the originating source. Could someone confirm this by checking an image of theirs that they have/find there?
Pinterest has also starting stripping affiliate links from some pins (amazon and others), altering destination links to prevent users from making money on pins. Will they eventually include stock agencies in this move? http://www.hasoffers.com/blog/affiliate-links-kill-pinterest/ (http://www.hasoffers.com/blog/affiliate-links-kill-pinterest/) Could Affiliate Links Kill Pinterest?
Oooo, interesting. I clicked on one of the DT watermarked images on Pinterest that was pinned there by the photographer as a self-promotion pointing to his "latest sales" and got this message -
Sorry! Users have reported that this links to spam or other inappropriate content.
Show me anyway Back to Pinterest
I clicked on Show me anyway and it went to the photographer's portfolio on DT. Other DT images when clicked on went right to the appropriate portfolios without this message so it looks like they are cracking down on photos purposely linked to selling sites? So, you might not be able to pin your stock images if you want to try and market them but if they are pinned by someone else for a non-commercial purpose that is ok. Hmmmmm
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I don't like the idea of Pinterest and its clones because it multiplies the idea that most people have that anything they find on the web is free for the taking. I also just read that Pinterest strips the metadata from pinned images, regardless of the originating source. Could someone confirm this by checking an image of theirs that they have/find there?
Hard to tell, as iStock and Alamy both strip out the copyright metadata too, as far as I can see.
Flickr doesn't, but I can't remember which of my Flickr pics I found pinned. I'll see what I can do on that one.
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I don't like the idea of Pinterest and its clones because it multiplies the idea that most people have that anything they find on the web is free for the taking. I also just read that Pinterest strips the metadata from pinned images, regardless of the originating source. Could someone confirm this by checking an image of theirs that they have/find there?
Hard to tell, as iStock and Alamy both strip out the copyright metadata too, as far as I can see.
Flickr doesn't, but I can't remember which of my Flickr pics I found pinned. I'll see what I can do on that one.
http://seanlockephotography.com/2012/03/24/pinterest-announces-new-terms/ (http://seanlockephotography.com/2012/03/24/pinterest-announces-new-terms/)
'When an image is “pinned” that does not need to be resized, the meta data seems to be retained, but their resizing function loses all the data that could actually point someone in the direction of the art creator.'
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Thanks Sean, that sums it up great.
[url]http://seanlockephotography.com/2012/03/24/pinterest-announces-new-terms/[/url] ([url]http://seanlockephotography.com/2012/03/24/pinterest-announces-new-terms/[/url])
'When an image is “pinned” that does not need to be resized, the meta data seems to be retained, but their resizing function loses all the data that could actually point someone in the direction of the art creator.'
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I believe a large part of the commissions they take for representing me should be going to legitimate marketing and promotion in areas that serious buyers will see, not trying to get freebies at my expense.
I guess I don't follow your argument. An agency doesn't make a penny by giving away freebies. They only make money by selling photos for contributors. Clearly they believe allowing social sharing will lead to image sales, whether it be via SEO benefit, free advertising, or direct sales. They can't "make millions" (as others in this thread have alluded to) unless you are greatly benefiting with them.
An agency can "make millions" at your expense by lowering your commissions. But that isn't what is being proposed here.
The owner of a stock photo agency doesn't follow the argument of why an agency shouldn't benefit from exploiting it's contributors. Colour me surprised.
I can see further arguments are pointless and yet... even if it were true that sales to an agency like DT would increase from their sharing of my property with pinterest thieves, that increase in sales, let's say an even 10% for the ease of demonstration, would be spread across all 130,000+ contributors. In other words, there would be no direct benefit to me as 10% spread between 130,000+ would be negligible. The benefit to DT would be a full 10% increase in revenue since they take a cut from every single sale regardless of who's image it is but to me? I doubt I'd even notice. However I do notice that they are using my work, without my consent, to generate that increase. that's exploitation and unfair.
As I stated before though, I don't think there is an increase as pinterest is not a place where buyers frequent.
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The owner of a stock photo agency doesn't follow the argument of why an agency shouldn't benefit from exploiting it's contributors. Colour me surprised.
I can see further arguments are pointless and yet... even if it were true that sales to an agency like DT would increase from their sharing of my property with pinterest thieves, that increase in sales, let's say an even 10% for the ease of demonstration, would be spread across all 130,000+ contributors. In other words, there would be no direct benefit to me as 10% spread between 130,000+ would be negligible. The benefit to DT would be a full 10% increase in revenue since they take a cut from every single sale regardless of who's image it is but to me? I doubt I'd even notice. However I do notice that they are using my work, without my consent, to generate that increase. that's exploitation and unfair.
As I stated before though, I don't think there is an increase as pinterest is not a place where buyers frequent.
Very well stated.
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The owner of a stock photo agency doesn't follow the argument of why an agency shouldn't benefit from exploiting it's contributors. Colour me surprised.
I can see further arguments are pointless and yet... even if it were true that sales to an agency like DT would increase from their sharing of my property with pinterest thieves, that increase in sales, let's say an even 10% for the ease of demonstration, would be spread across all 130,000+ contributors. In other words, there would be no direct benefit to me as 10% spread between 130,000+ would be negligible. The benefit to DT would be a full 10% increase in revenue since they take a cut from every single sale regardless of who's image it is but to me? I doubt I'd even notice. However I do notice that they are using my work, without my consent, to generate that increase. that's exploitation and unfair.
As I stated before though, I don't think there is an increase as pinterest is not a place where buyers frequent.
Very well stated.
Seriously?
If sales rise by 10% for the entire agency, then the average contributor will see a 10% rise on their own sales. Why on earth would you think it would be otherwise? There's no reason to divide the 10% by 130,000, or whatever you decided to use in the example. A 10% aggregate rise is a 10% aggregate rise.
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The owner of a stock photo agency doesn't follow the argument of why an agency shouldn't benefit from exploiting it's contributors. Colour me surprised.
I can see further arguments are pointless and yet... even if it were true that sales to an agency like DT would increase from their sharing of my property with pinterest thieves, that increase in sales, let's say an even 10% for the ease of demonstration, would be spread across all 130,000+ contributors. In other words, there would be no direct benefit to me as 10% spread between 130,000+ would be negligible. The benefit to DT would be a full 10% increase in revenue since they take a cut from every single sale regardless of who's image it is but to me? I doubt I'd even notice. However I do notice that they are using my work, without my consent, to generate that increase. that's exploitation and unfair.
As I stated before though, I don't think there is an increase as pinterest is not a place where buyers frequent.
Very well stated.
Seriously?
If sales rise by 10% for the entire agency, then the average contributor will see a 10% rise on their own sales. Why on earth would you think it would be otherwise? There's no reason to divide the 10% by 130,000, or whatever you decided to use in the example. A 10% aggregate rise is a 10% aggregate rise.
This is correct but it won't be spread evenly across the contributors. The ones with many 'pins' will be the ones with the ones with many infringements both on Pinterest and on websites and blogs. It will devalue the image. It won't appeal to serious buyers. The ones that will benefit are the ones whose images aren't spread across the web. Anyway, it's pointless because buyers don't hang around Pinterest, housewives do. Why would they buy an image when it's already there on the site, free for them to take with the assistance of embed code.
All this is irrelevant because the whole point is that allowing people to 'pin-it' is infringing on our intellectual property. Dan, in your previous post you mention you created Warm Picture to empower the contributors and that you removed the 'share' buttons on your site because of this. So you're aware that having these buttons there is immoral, yet you continue to support DT's decision to have them there. You yourself won't use it, so why do you expect strangers to 'pin' DT images against the wishes of contributors?
As for directing traffic to the site, sure, this will direct some traffic to DT, but the increased traffic doesn't mean increased sales. And DT's Google ranking isn't really effected by the number of links pointing from the same domain (Pinterest). Google only takes the first one into account and disregards the rest. DT will achieve the same result if they make one Pin with a link to their home page. 10,000 're-pins' won't make a difference. In fact, Google doesn't like that and could treat it as spam which would have an adverse effect on DT's SEO. If they were serious about gaining position on SEO then they should be leaving backlinks on various domains. But again, this is not, or should not, be about DT and their Google ranking. This is about exploiting contributors and infringing on their rights. It's odd that only a handful of people in here are worried about it. We're a group of photographers. We should be outraged but instead, the majority of people here have become numb to the way we are mistreated. This is why I don't see a future in microstock, from the contributors point of view. How can there be a future when we won't even stand up for our basic rights to our property. Amateur photogs on Flickr didn't stand for this and made Flickr make some changes on their site. Yet the majority of DT contributors who are supposed to be professionals (I say that very loosely), support Serban and everything he does.
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Dan, in your previous post you mention you created Warm Picture to empower the contributors and that you removed the 'share' buttons on your site because of this. So you're aware that having these buttons there is immoral, yet you continue to support DT's decision to have them there. You yourself won't use it, so why do you expect strangers to 'pin' DT images against the wishes of contributors?
Actually I never wrote that. I simply laid out an opinion that failure to participate in social media will be a huge SEO loss for the agency, or any contributor who chooses not to participate. I don't "expect" you to do anything beyond your wishes. I realize any alternate opinion will be met with criticism and resistance. If you don't care about the search position of your images, believe me, I'm quite fine with it.
What I wrote was that I felt the button was a distraction from the buying process. But the button doesn't have to be on the buying page. It could be under the thumbnail, or wherever. I don't feel it is immoral. I decided against it because I knew the response would be similar to the one in this thread, not because I felt it would not be effective.
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Dan, in your previous post you mention you created Warm Picture to empower the contributors and that you removed the 'share' buttons on your site because of this. So you're aware that having these buttons there is immoral, yet you continue to support DT's decision to have them there. You yourself won't use it, so why do you expect strangers to 'pin' DT images against the wishes of contributors?
Actually I never wrote that. I simply laid out an opinion that failure to participate in social media will be a huge SEO loss for the agency, or any contributor who chooses not to participate. I don't "expect" you to do anything beyond your wishes. I realize any alternate opinion will be met with criticism and resistance...
What I wrote was that I felt the button was a distraction from the buying process. But the button doesn't have to be on the buying page. It could be under the thumbnail, or wherever. I don't feel it is immoral. I decided against it because I knew the response would be similar to the one in this thread, not because I felt it would not be effective.
Well actually you wrote this:
"We're trying to do things the right way. It's a 50/50 split for the contributors, and every major decision made is run through the message board to get everyone's thoughts. I have the final say, but I created Warmpicture to empower us as contributors. We will succeed or fail together. I'm optimistic by the sales we are seeing the last two months."
So adding the button is the wrong way? Why? Could it be because it's immoral because it's not your decision to make? If you believe Pinterest is worthwhile and will have such a huge impact to the site's SEO, why don't you have an account and pin just your images from warmpicture there?
If you don't care about the search position of your images, believe me, I'm quite fine with it.
That's a rather simplistic and silly comment to make. Why would you think I don't care about the search position of my images. Is Pinterest and Facebook the only places where I can promote myself and leave backlinks? I promote my images just fine and don't need to add my images on Facebook and Pinterest where doing this offers the image for free to anyone on the web as per their terms of service. This comment is as if life before Pinterest didn't exist.
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You throw around the term "immoral" rather casually. Regardless, it's your decision to make. I simply presented a counter opinion, and never advocated that you change your position.
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Well adding a Pinterest button on someone else's images is immoral isn't it? I don't know how many times I have to repeat myself and I just wrote this on the other thread, but anything 'pinned' on that site gives an implied permission to the public that it can be taken and used for free on their site. If you 'pin' your own images on that site, then you grant me permission to take it and use on my site, according to their TOS. The image is no longer RF, it is free. So how can adding a Pinterest button under someone else's image not be immoral, especially if you are their agent? If you do, you are implying that the public has permission to 'pin' it and therefore you are implying that anyone else on the internet can take it and use on their sites, without purchasing a license.
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Drugal i am wondering do you have any sites you submit to? And if so how about the links to them i am sure that some here would like to see your work that is if you have any!
So could you post us some links so we can see what you have?
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Well I didn't have time to read the whole thread, just the first page and it seems (at least at that stage) to be Helix vs everyone else. Well you can throw another vote in Helix's corner.
I just completely remade my website and heavily incorporated pinterest buttons on it, why?
Well for starters social media drives more traffic than google these days, and Pinterest has surged to be the 3rd biggest social media site now, some websites report that pinterest drives them more traffic than facebook. But aside from the direct promotional benefits you also get some pretty kick ass seo value out of it. First off goggle is placing more and more emphasis on social media signals to influence search rankings and secondly every pinterest pin (and here's the important part - also REPIN) is a link back to the original image.
The main critea goggle uses to sort search results is backlinks. Every backlink your page, site, youtube video or STOCK IMAGE gets is counted by google as a vote for that page. It's a lot more complicated than that and there are many other factors but there is a reason we have so much blog comment spam and articles in online article databases that make no sense is because its the way spammers build backlinks to trick google into thinking their page is more important and more interesting/engaging than it is.
So next time someone pins one of your shutterstock photos and you want to get all in a huff about it - you should take into consideration that it wasn't some evil mastermind lurking in a basement somewhere trying to steal something off you - it's a real person that likes one of your shots and want's to share/promote it, I'm sure 99% of the time in the pinner's mind they are doing something nice for you. And then on top of that you are seeing real world seo and traffic driving benefits out of it. If it becomes popular and gets tens (or hundreds) of repins then that is tens or hundreds of votes for your image/page in google's eyes. It also makes any pages that page links to get a "stronger" vote from that page, and what pages do your images normally link to? Well your folio page for one, sometimes other pics of yours. So those backlinks that come in and make your image more important to google, also make it's votes more important which helps make your other shots more important. So in reality every pin (and repin) you get helps out your whole folio in a tiny/tiny/tiny way. But like like 25cent sales these tiny factors add up...
On an aside,
I used to know a girl who's job it was for her boss to download watermarked pictures his company might want to use and remove the watermarks from them. This was a despicable act and an intention to do the wrong thing. But it also shows that if you put your images online - watermarked or not they WILL be stolen.
If you can't handle this fact then get . out of this career and go do something else. Or you can be smart, play the numbers, realise that some images WILL get stolen but you'll still make enough money to do well out of it..or you wont and you'll go do something else.
But either way getting all pissed off about someone pinning one of your photos?....man...come on, get a life people...
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But either way getting all pissed off about someone pinning one of your photos?....man...come on, get a life people...
Phew, thank goodness you showed up with that advice.
"it's a real person that likes one of your shots and want's to share/promote it, I'm sure 99% of the time in the pinner's mind they are doing something nice for you" - 99% of the people don't give a crap about you. They want to take what they want, when they want to take it, and use it as they see fit. When you read their comments on the Pinterest blog, you are the last thing from their mind. They like something, they want to grab it and get credit for showing it off, and that is their god given right.
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If you can't handle this fact then get . out of this career and go do something else. Or you can be smart, play the numbers, realise that some images WILL get stolen but you'll still make enough money to do well out of it..or you wont and you'll go do something else.
This made me laugh a little. Your images will get stolen and everything will be fine or it won't.
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I'm sure 99% of the time in the pinner's mind they are doing something nice for you.
Seriously, are you that naive? They don't even care whether its a snapshot or a professional well produced photo, as long as they like it. They're just interested in using it.
And how does your precious seo "benefits" translate into sales? Does it put food on your table?
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And how does your precious seo "benefits" translate into sales? Does it put food on your table?
Actually...yes.
But before I go on I have a question: So is it that you DON'T think people search for photos using search engines? Or you don't understand in even it's simpliest form what SEO is and does?
I've only been an image buyer a few times, but more than once I've had a hard time finding the image I wanted at the first couple stock sties I looked at, so where did I turn? Google....with google images I managed to find quicker and easier a good image on a stock site (I think one ended up being dreamstime, maybe both, not quite sure on this point).
If I've done it as a newbie image buyer I'm sure others have and I'm a microstock photographer, if I need an image of course the first place I think is a microstock agency. But most potential image buyers out there and those who buy images now and then but don't have "microstock in the consciousness" the way I do would be even more likely to use google.
Aside from that I have my personal website ranking for some reasonable "photo" related terms that bring in advertising clicks, one is a rather main term that I've gotten on the first page of google. Which is all done by seo (mostly social sites - facebook, 500px, devient art, twitter, pinterest etc) and yes, strangely enough advertising clicks DO put food on the table.....as did whatever SEO that existed for the photos that I bought from searching google - the artist of that work can thank whatever SEO his agency did because it got him my sales....
To think SEO on a site/page with a PURCHASABLE PRODUCT that is well keyworded to be useless in this day and age is.....rather strange...
But for all of you that are exploding your heads with worry over this terrible unfair treatment of having others do some work promoting for you....how many of you have your folios at Istock? How many of you are doing business with a company that is ACTIVELY shafting photographers up the poo tube? You sit back and support an agency who thinks it's ok to pay 16% commissions and then get on your high horse about social sharing of photos by people who never would have been customers?
When someone pins your image there is no malicious intent, nor even a greedy/thoughtless one. It's more a "oh, this is beautiful, I want to share this with my friends and/or keep it somewhere where I can come back and see it again", it's a personal recommendation, it's product exposure, it's non-commercial use, it's free, and....it's a bargain!
You all can get scared about people pinning your work....me, I want as many pins (and likes and shares and +1s and diggs etc) as I can get...
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And how does your precious seo "benefits" translate into sales? Does it put food on your table?
Actually...yes.
But before I go on I have a question: So is it that you DON'T think people search for photos using search engines? Or you don't understand in even it's simpliest form what SEO is and does?
I've only been an image buyer a few times, but more than once I've had a hard time finding the image I wanted at the first couple stock sties I looked at, so where did I turn? Google....with google images I managed to find quicker and easier a good image on a stock site (I think one ended up being dreamstime, maybe both, not quite sure on this point).
If I've done it as a newbie image buyer I'm sure others have and I'm a microstock photographer, if I need an image of course the first place I think is a microstock agency. But most potential image buyers out there and those who buy images now and then but don't have "microstock in the consciousness" the way I do would be even more likely to use google.
Aside from that I have my personal website ranking for some reasonable "photo" related terms that bring in advertising clicks, one is a rather main term that I've gotten on the first page of google. Which is all done by seo (mostly social sites - facebook, 500px, devient art, twitter, pinterest etc) and yes, strangely enough advertising clicks DO put food on the table.....as did whatever SEO that existed for the photos that I bought from searching google - the artist of that work can thank whatever SEO his agency did because it got him my sales....
To think SEO on a site/page with a PURCHASABLE PRODUCT that is well keyworded to be useless in this day and age is.....rather strange...
But for all of you that are exploding your heads with worry over this terrible unfair treatment of having others do some work promoting for you....how many of you have your folios at Istock? How many of you are doing business with a company that is ACTIVELY shafting photographers up the poo tube? You sit back and support an agency who thinks it's ok to pay 16% commissions and then get on your high horse about social sharing of photos by people who never would have been customers?
When someone pins your image there is no malicious intent, nor even a greedy/thoughtless one. It's more a "oh, this is beautiful, I want to share this with my friends and/or keep it somewhere where I can come back and see it again", it's a personal recommendation, it's product exposure, it's non-commercial use, it's free, and....it's a bargain!
You all can get scared about people pinning your work....me, I want as many pins (and likes and shares and +1s and diggs etc) as I can get...
I think you're wrong.
Your income from microstock agencies come from their relationship with their clients, obtained through other means than social networks. Probably you can get to a point where someone says "look, I can buy neotakezo's photo from...x agency. But wait, I've seen it so many times pinned and facebooked and whatever - I can get it from there". Not everybody is thinking of stealing, but you're offering your stuff free of charge by repins and so on, instead of educating them that a professional image costs MONEY.
And regarding SEO, I'm quite confident that at least 90% of the people who search for images are aware of the likes of flickr, deviantart and others, if they want free images.
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This made me laugh a little. Your images will get stolen and everything will be fine or it won't.
I can see how you'd get a laugh out of it. But seriously, it's also the truth. Your images WILL get stolen (if they are any good) to pretend otherwise is to be naive. Do you have enough time or will to scour the net looking for your images? and then the means to find out if they were purchased from an agency when you are on perhaps 7 or 8 different agencies selling your images under a (more or less) "use as much as you want" llicense?
I know I don't. I'd rather be sitting back on my balcony admiring the sunset or perhaps if I'm in a more motivated mindset make new images - fretting about something I can never control is something I try to make a habit not to do...
enjoy your stress!
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All I can say is, if people are so naive,etc, good luck to them and their 100 mil, wish I had done it! ;D
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For non commercial use, the music industry has failed to stop music being stolen. It was going on well before the internet. So the reality is that we can't stop images being stolen. I do think that the music industry has done a good job of publicising the fact that artists need to make some money from their music. And most people know they should pay for MP3's and where they can buy them. So there is still a huge amount of money being paid to artists, even if it's much less than it should be.
There still a lot of ignorance about using images and their copyright laws. The stock images sites are well known by us but ask people in the street and I doubt many know about them. I presume most of our earnings come from commercial use and most of the image theft is for non-commercial use. The question is, can we make more money by educating the non-commercial sector and giving them the option of somewhere to buy at a price they're interested in?
People are used to buying music for non-commercial use but that's not the case for images. Perhaps a very cheap non-commercial use license for small blog size photos with some way of linking to the site where more extensive licenses can be purchased would be a good idea? I can't see people who have never paid for an image license paying much but like microstock, starting low and finding out if they will pay would be a good start. The other option is for sites like Pinterest to pay a lump sum each year for all the copyright violations and give us a way to claim our share of that money. Some of these sites will end up being worth millions or billions of dollars and it's appalling that they aren't paying anything for the copyright infringements on their sites.
Perhaps the bigger problem we have is when people don't buy a license for commercial use and they think they can get away with purchasing a license if they're caught and nothing more. I'd like to see those people pay a hefty fine that puts others off doing it.
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The owner of a stock photo agency doesn't follow the argument of why an agency shouldn't benefit from exploiting it's contributors. Colour me surprised.
I can see further arguments are pointless and yet... even if it were true that sales to an agency like DT would increase from their sharing of my property with pinterest thieves, that increase in sales, let's say an even 10% for the ease of demonstration, would be spread across all 130,000+ contributors. In other words, there would be no direct benefit to me as 10% spread between 130,000+ would be negligible. The benefit to DT would be a full 10% increase in revenue since they take a cut from every single sale regardless of who's image it is but to me? I doubt I'd even notice. However I do notice that they are using my work, without my consent, to generate that increase. that's exploitation and unfair.
As I stated before though, I don't think there is an increase as pinterest is not a place where buyers frequent.
Very well stated.
Seriously?
If sales rise by 10% for the entire agency, then the average contributor will see a 10% rise on their own sales. Why on earth would you think it would be otherwise? There's no reason to divide the 10% by 130,000, or whatever you decided to use in the example. A 10% aggregate rise is a 10% aggregate rise.
yep. many here seem to have problems with basic math. and logic.
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Well I didn't have time to read the whole thread ...
The main critea goggle uses to sort search results is backlinks ...
But either way getting all pissed off about someone pinning one of your photos?....man...come on, get a life people...
At least you admitted your lack of diligence in actually reading our concerns.
As people who licence images for a living, we are concerned when a photo of ours, legitimately bought or even stolen and put on a website, can then be pinned and repinned with NO backlink to our agent, but with inducements to copy it off pinterest willy nilly. There is no possible benefit to us in this scenario - someone who saw our image would not easily be able to find it to license it even if they wanted to (other than via Google Image Search, and then only if our image had been catalogued by GIS).
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At least you admitted your lack of diligence in actually reading our concerns.
As people who licence images for a living, we are concerned when a photo of ours, legitimately bought or even stolen and put on a website, can then be pinned and repinned with NO backlink to our agent, but with inducements to copy it off pinterest willy nilly. There is no possible benefit to us in this scenario - someone who saw our image would not easily be able to find it to license it even if they wanted to (other than via Google Image Search, and then only if our image had been catalogued by GIS).
Exactly. These people think we are all worried about housewives "pinning" images for their friends to be amazed at their ability to spot a nice image. It goes much farther than that.
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Well I didn't have time to read the whole thread, just the first page
Well that's where you first went wrong.
I just completely remade my website and heavily incorporated pinterest buttons on it, why?
Well for starters social media drives more traffic than google these days, and Pinterest has surged to be the 3rd biggest social media site now, some websites report that pinterest drives them more traffic than facebook. But aside from the direct promotional benefits you also get some pretty kick ass seo value out of it. First off goggle is placing more and more emphasis on social media signals to influence search rankings and secondly every pinterest pin (and here's the important part - also REPIN) is a link back to the original image.
The main critea goggle uses to sort search results is backlinks. Every backlink your page, site, youtube video or STOCK IMAGE gets is counted by google as a vote for that page. It's a lot more complicated than that and there are many other factors but there is a reason we have so much blog comment spam and articles in online article databases that make no sense is because its the way spammers build backlinks to trick google into thinking their page is more important and more interesting/engaging than it is.
You clearly don't understand Google, SEO or Pinterest. 'Re-pinning' has no effect on SEO (not yours anyway) and if it does it will go against you because if you get enough backlinks on the same domain linking to the same page, Google treats it as spam and drops you off the search.
Only one backlink will be counted by Google and that's the first one. Your image that you 'pin' can 're-pinned' 5,000 times with the same link and still, only the first link will give you any juice, provided Google doesn't drop you for spamming. Furthermore, spamming is fast becoming popular on Pinterest and why wouldn't it? Spammers ('repinners') are taking full advantage of the site and are changing the link when 're-pinning' directing traffic to their own site. If 5,000 people 're-pin' your image and link it to their site, your image on your site will have to compete for a spot on Google against 5,000 others and these spammers obviously know a hell of a lot more about SEO than you do.
[ETA: Oh and I forgot to mention that people will also embed the image from those 5,000 're-pins' and say you may end up with another 5,000 people using your image. Google will include in their rankings those hotlinked images too, but they will be directed to their sites. So now your poor little single image on your site is suddenly competing with 10,000 others, all linking to different domains. Do you like Pinterest now?]
I'm sure 99% of the time in the pinner's mind they are doing something nice for you.
What planet are you on?
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Some of these sites will end up being worth millions or billions of dollars and it's appalling that they aren't paying anything for the copyright infringements on their sites.
This is the real problem. Not SEO or getting a quick cheap bump in Google Image search. It's about us losing our right to get paid for what we do.
"Pinterest might be the most illegal network to hit the Internet yet. More illegal than Napster. More illegal than Megaupload."
Business Insider
http://articles.businessinsider.com/2012-02-17/tech/31070312_1_copyright-holder-napster-youtube (http://articles.businessinsider.com/2012-02-17/tech/31070312_1_copyright-holder-napster-youtube)
Pinterest is pirates - they are part of a large and growing effort to get rid of copyright entirely. And the more money they get, the more they effectively will attack copyright itself. And so far they are winning. We can't afford to help them.
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Pinterest is pirates - they are part of a large and growing effort to get rid of copyright entirely. And the more money they get, the more they effectively will attack copyright itself. And so far they are winning. We can't afford to help them.
I agree completely. But how can we stop them???
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The main critea goggle uses to sort search results is backlinks. Every backlink your page, site, youtube video or STOCK IMAGE gets is counted by google as a vote for that page. It's a lot more complicated than that and there are many other factors but there is a reason we have so much blog comment spam and articles in online article databases that make no sense is because its the way spammers build backlinks to trick google into thinking their page is more important and more interesting/engaging than it is.
[...] And then on top of that you are seeing real world seo and traffic driving benefits out of it. If it becomes popular and gets tens (or hundreds) of repins then that is tens or hundreds of votes for your image/page in google's eyes. It also makes any pages that page links to get a "stronger" vote from that page, and what pages do your images normally link to? Well your folio page for one, sometimes other pics of yours. So those backlinks that come in and make your image more important to google, also make it's votes more important which helps make your other shots more important. So in reality every pin (and repin) you get helps out your whole folio in a tiny/tiny/tiny way.
You haven't read this.
http://pinterest-out.blogspot.com/2012/05/nasty-linking-practices.html (http://pinterest-out.blogspot.com/2012/05/nasty-linking-practices.html)
Seriously. You have to read that article before you consider that Pinterest backlinks are good for you, and worse, telling people that Pinterest links are good for them.
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You haven't read this.
[url]http://pinterest-out.blogspot.com/2012/05/nasty-linking-practices.html[/url] ([url]http://pinterest-out.blogspot.com/2012/05/nasty-linking-practices.html[/url])
Seriously. You have to read that article before you consider that Pinterest backlinks are good for you, and worse, telling people that Pinterest links are good for them.
Serban's BS speech about using the 'pin-it' button for SEO benefits made me believe that Pinterest don't use the nofollow attribute in their code. I'm surprised that they do. Those sneaky ratbags! Well that makes my example above useless because there are no SEO/PR gains from 'pinning'. Only for Pinterest.
So DT added the 'Pin-it' button without even doing any homework. They're encouraging people to infringe on our copyright, without any real benefit to us or to DT. 'Pinning' won't even bring in an valuable direct traffic as buyers don't hang around there. Anyone else there doesn't care about buying the image and they don't even need to click through to DT because they can grab the full size image directly from Pinterest.
It just gets worse.
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'Pinning' won't even bring in an valuable direct traffic as buyers don't hang around there. Anyone else there doesn't care about buying the image and they don't even need to click through to DT because they can grab the full size image directly from Pinterest.
It just gets worse.
their japanese VC, Rakuten, thinks it can be certainly junk traffic but it can be monetized somehow, said that i'm afraid the LAST thing their users will buy are images and RM/RF licences !
instead they could buy merchandising and prints, yes, like RedBubble, Zazzle, CafePress, good idea eh ? but who gave them any permission to do that ? what about copyright ??? unbelievable, and dont worry it's gonna end up like this soon, i wonder why they dont make a pinterest for pirated warez, with leechers pinning the last Photoshop CS6 and crack-ed versions of Windows 8 and OSX .. just click the button and download .. easy ... and forget about copyright, adapt or die as they say eh ?
i mean years are passing, piratebay has been condemned, megaupload has been condemned, and yet none of these guys are in prison or paid a single dollar ! piratebay guys fled overseas and moved their servers in ukraine, kim dotcom has been freed, the napster guy is millionaire and is also a small early investor of facebook, youtube is still there and so are flickr, google images, yahoo images, bing images, and the tons of warez sites like Heroturko.
what to do, really ..what to do ?
the whole internet is now just a place for po-rn, pirated videos, movies, music, photos, and software, no wonder is a success with young people, they just couldn't live without it and they will never go back to pay-per-view or pay-per-use, it's over .. it's game over.
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You haven't read this.
[url]http://pinterest-out.blogspot.com/2012/05/nasty-linking-practices.html[/url] ([url]http://pinterest-out.blogspot.com/2012/05/nasty-linking-practices.html[/url])
Seriously. You have to read that article before you consider that Pinterest backlinks are good for you, and worse, telling people that Pinterest links are good for them.
after google's Panda and Penguin disruptive update is not clear what actually is still benefiting CEO and ranking authority.
links alone are no more the end and be all like in the past, and links on social network are now weighted in a way to rank a "social trend" so they don't count as much as real on authority web sites like being reviewed and linked on WSJ or NYT or CNN for instance.
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Pinterest is pirates - they are part of a large and growing effort to get rid of copyright entirely. And the more money they get, the more they effectively will attack copyright itself. And so far they are winning. We can't afford to help them.
i agree.
and no matter how we look at this scenario artists are once again at the bottom of the food chain.
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...what to do, really ..what to do ?
the whole internet is now just a place for po-rn, pirated videos, movies, music, photos, and software, no wonder is a success with young people, they just couldn't live without it and they will never go back to pay-per-view or pay-per-use, it's over .. it's game over.
So nobody ever buys music from places like iTunes or eBooks form Amazon?
There's a huge problem but I don't think it's anywhere near as bad as you make it out to be. There's also a big difference between people that were never likely to pay for an image and the commercial buyers that want to make sure they have a license.
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their japanese VC, Rakuten, thinks it can be certainly junk traffic but it can be monetized somehow, said that i'm afraid the LAST thing their users will buy are images and RM/RF licences !
I get Rakuten’s interest in Pinterest and it makes sense for them to invest in them. Pinterest is a site for consumers and their collective pins are grouped in a meaningful way. With Pinterest, shopping sites don’t need to target consumers themselves. Instead, like-minded consumers target and attract each other and recommend products to each other sending them directly to the shopping sites. I get all that. For this scenario, it's a brilliant self-sufficient marketing tool. But, RF/RM don’t belong there. Consumers aren't interested in stock images. Even if they were, they wouldn't want to pay for them when they can find free images all over the net (even legitimately) that are 'good enough'. Even if commercial buyers used the site, it wouldn't be effective because image buyers don't say to one another , "hey buddy, check out this fanatastic image I licensed. My client loved it. You should license it too!" If anything, they prefer to license something that's new and hasn't been used a thousand times before.
If Pinterest cracks down on Pirates and puts procedures in place to deter them, it could be a fantastic site. It doesn’t make sense for them to continue risking litigation over copyright infringements when there is real potential to make money from the site legitimately – as affiliates from referrals. If I were heading the site, I wouldn't allow just any site to use the 'pin-it' button. I’d only allow sites to contract with Pinterest to use it. I certainly wouldn't allow any person to be able to 'pin' anything from the internet. I'd also put the onus and responsibility of the copyright to the website owners who used the button and have different types of 'pins' they can use. For instance, retailers who are happy for their images to be shared and distributed as a full sized image, could opt for a type of pin that does just that. Microstock sites or any site that hosts copyrighted images could opt to pin smaller thumbs only. They should lock the link so when a 'pin' is 're-pinned', no-one can change it. They should get rid of the embed code and they should re-word the site so that it doesn't contradict their terms and conditions.
Somewhere down the line, I'm hoping the law will crack down on them and they'll be forced to make these kind of changes. If they don’t, I agree with you, we're screwed. I have a feeling they'll change the way they operate when they begin to monetize the site. They're not a pirate site like megaupload. There is actually a real potential for them to make money legitimately, so why wouldn't they. In the meantime though, the site absolutely sucks for us.
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after google's Panda and Penguin disruptive update is not clear what actually is still benefiting CEO and ranking authority.
links alone are no more the end and be all like in the past, and links on social network are now weighted in a way to rank a "social trend" so they don't count as much as real on authority web sites like being reviewed and linked on WSJ or NYT or CNN for instance.
Panda and Penguin came about to penalize spammers who use shifty SEO techniques like keyword stuffing. I wonder if they're likely to penalize Pinterest for their dodgy link practices? I hope so but in the eyes of Google, I'm not sure that it's dodgy enough.
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If Pinterest cracks down on Pirates and puts procedures in place to deter them, it could be a fantastic site. It doesn’t make sense for them to continue risking litigation over copyright infringements when there is real potential to make money from the site legitimately – as affiliates from referrals. If I were heading the site, I wouldn't allow just any site to use the 'pin-it' button. I’d only allow sites to contract with Pinterest to use it. I certainly wouldn't allow any person to be able to 'pin' anything from the internet. I'd also put the onus and responsibility of the copyright to the website owners who used the button and have different types of 'pins' they can use. For instance, retailers who are happy for their images to be shared and distributed as a full sized image, could opt for a type of pin that does just that. Microstock sites or any site that hosts copyrighted images could opt to pin smaller thumbs only. They should lock the link so when a 'pin' is 're-pinned', no-one can change it. They should get rid of the embed code and they should re-word the site so that it doesn't contradict their terms and conditions.
You're hired!
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Panda and Penguin came about to penalize spammers who use shifty SEO techniques like keyword stuffing. I wonder if they're likely to penalize Pinterest for their dodgy link practices? I hope so but in the eyes of Google, I'm not sure that it's dodgy enough.
i dont think so, usually they hand-pick these big sites manually and mark them as "trusted".
pinterest is already an alexa top-50 site, at this point they don't really need any dodgy trick to rank high, they've got more than enough critical mass already.
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If Pinterest cracks down on Pirates and puts procedures in place to deter them, it could be a fantastic site. It doesn’t make sense for them to continue risking litigation over copyright infringements when there is real potential to make money from the site legitimately – as affiliates from referrals. If I were heading the site, I wouldn't allow just any site to use the 'pin-it' button. I’d only allow sites to contract with Pinterest to use it. I certainly wouldn't allow any person to be able to 'pin' anything from the internet. I'd also put the onus and responsibility of the copyright to the website owners who used the button and have different types of 'pins' they can use. For instance, retailers who are happy for their images to be shared and distributed as a full sized image, could opt for a type of pin that does just that. Microstock sites or any site that hosts copyrighted images could opt to pin smaller thumbs only. They should lock the link so when a 'pin' is 're-pinned', no-one can change it. They should get rid of the embed code and they should re-word the site so that it doesn't contradict their terms and conditions.
You're hired!
Huh, thanks!
Who am I kidding, I would run them in the ground just for making me waste time sending lots of DMCAs and having to whine endlessly about them on this forum.
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Panda and Penguin came about to penalize spammers who use shifty SEO techniques like keyword stuffing. I wonder if they're likely to penalize Pinterest for their dodgy link practices? I hope so but in the eyes of Google, I'm not sure that it's dodgy enough.
i dont think so, usually they hand-pick these big sites manually and mark them as "trusted".
pinterest is already an alexa top-50 site, at this point they don't really need any dodgy trick to rank high, they've got more than enough critical mass already.
Yea, you're probably right, however I've seen articles written about them this year (as late as March in an article called 'Not Pinterested' from memory) where people have noted that they use 'dofollow' in their code. This means the sneaky sh!ts would have added the 'nofollow' recently. I wonder when they started using the other dirty link tricks and if Google's onto them?
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As people who licence images for a living, we are concerned when a photo of ours, legitimately bought or even stolen and put on a website, can then be pinned and repinned with NO backlink to our agent,
And that is different to being able to right click save and then reuse "willy nilly" how? People already surf blogs, save pictures and then post to facebook, image sharing sites, forums, their own blogs, myspaces etc etc..there is no new door that's being opened here...
But my point is that there is theft and there is theft. There are legitimate concerns out there like the companies that remove watermarks, or purchase under a regular license when they should have bought an EL, or more criminal are (some (mainly one) of) the stock sites themselves. Don't we have real concerns? Don't we have real enemies? Are a bunch of casual web browsers that were never going to be image buyers anyway collecting some of our shots that they like to show off their good taste to others really that big of a concern?
I think anyone who is getting upset about pinterest while tolerating Istock has their crap really, REALLY out of whack...
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I think anyone who is getting upset about pinterest while tolerating Istock has their crap really, REALLY out of whack...
Well I don't agree with most of what you are saying. There is cause to be concerned about where this is all headed.
But I do agree with your above statement. :D
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RE: You clearly don't understand Google, SEO or Pinterest.
Really? funny, I'm about to say the same thing...
RE 'Re-pinning' has no effect on SEO (not yours anyway) and if it does it will go against you because if you get enough backlinks on the same domain linking to the same page, Google treats it as spam and drops you off the search.
Absolute rubbish - ever hear of a blogroll link? millions of blogs around the world link to millions of other sites with blogroll links - these are sitewide links that link out from every page on a site...sites don't get banned from them. Sites get banned mainly due to unnatural backlink anchor profiles, ie all the inbound links to a page are anchored with whatever keyword the spammer is trying to rank for. Repins are perfectly safe to get in bulk though because they are anchored as images - there is no anchor text and so n chance of an anchor text penalty there and the anchor text that is used on them is the domain name from the site they were pinned on. Once again google doesn't "ban" sites for lots of links using their domain name, in fact they expect it. Whenever I've had a shot go viral on dA or 500px a whole bunch of bloggers will make posts sharing my shots and linking back to my site for my root domain name - it's never hurt me in the serps at all.
RE: Only one backlink will be counted by Google and that's the first one.
Once again you are wrong. Repeated backlinks from the same domain give diminished backlink power it's true, but they still give it. I have a page on 500px that is a PR 3, it has NO links to it from outside sources, only links from inside it's own domain. If only the first link to my page from the 500px domain was counted I'd have a n/a page...not a pr 3 page. It's a PR3 page though because I've had shots go viral and get on the front page of 500px and get hundreds of votes and faves, each one is a link back to that shot from the posters account and each shot links to my profile page, also every follwer of mine (about 1600 now) link back to my page from their friends page and to every new shot that I post from their friends photos pages....in the ends it's these thousands upon thousands of links from the ONE domain that make my page there a PR3...
As well as make article and blog comment spam, spammers also create online databases (rental property listings agregated off another site for instance) for the very purpose of creating sites with thousands or hundreds of thousands of pages they control, why? To create backlinks for their portfolio of money making sites...this wouldn't be a viable tactic if only one link from these data base sites counted...it doesn't, they all count and that's why they use them. The first one just counts more beacause as well as being a link it's also increasing the overall TLD (top level domain) profile linking into the page, which is one of the other high ranking factors.
RE: What planet are you on?
One where I do my research before I talk about a topic, you should join me....
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RE: You clearly don't understand Google, SEO or Pinterest.
Really? funny, I'm about to say the same thing...
RE 'Re-pinning' has no effect on SEO (not yours anyway) and if it does it will go against you because if you get enough backlinks on the same domain linking to the same page, Google treats it as spam and drops you off the search.
Absolute rubbish - ever hear of a blogroll link? millions of blogs around the world link to millions of other sites with blogroll links - these are sitewide links that link out from every page on a site...sites don't get banned from them. Sites get banned mainly due to unnatural backlink anchor profiles, ie all the inbound links to a page are anchored with whatever keyword the spammer is trying to rank for. Repins are perfectly safe to get in bulk though because they are anchored as images - there is no anchor text and so n chance of an anchor text penalty there and the anchor text that is used on them is the domain name from the site they were pinned on. Once again google doesn't "ban" sites for lots of links using their domain name, in fact they expect it. Whenever I've had a shot go viral on dA or 500px a whole bunch of bloggers will make posts sharing my shots and linking back to my site for my root domain name - it's never hurt me in the serps at all.
RE: Only one backlink will be counted by Google and that's the first one.
Once again you are wrong. Repeated backlinks from the same domain give diminished backlink power it's true, but they still give it. I have a page on 500px that is a PR 3, it has NO links to it from outside sources, only links from inside it's own domain. If only the first link to my page from the 500px domain was counted I'd have a n/a page...not a pr 3 page. It's a PR3 page though because I've had shots go viral and get on the front page of 500px and get hundreds of votes and faves, each one is a link back to that shot from the posters account and each shot links to my profile page, also every follwer of mine (about 1600 now) link back to my page from their friends page and to every new shot that I post from their friends photos pages....in the ends it's these thousands upon thousands of links from the ONE domain that make my page there a PR3...
As well as make article and blog comment spam, spammers also create online databases (rental property listings agregated off another site for instance) for the very purpose of creating sites with thousands or hundreds of thousands of pages they control, why? To create backlinks for their portfolio of money making sites...this wouldn't be a viable tactic if only one link from these data base sites counted...it doesn't, they all count and that's why they use them. The first one just counts more beacause as well as being a link it's also increasing the overall TLD (top level domain) profile linking into the page, which is one of the other high ranking factors.
RE: What planet are you on?
One where I do my research before I talk about a topic, you should join me....
Sorry, you're wrong :)
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Panda and Penguin came about to penalize spammers who use shifty SEO techniques like keyword stuffing. I wonder if they're likely to penalize Pinterest for their dodgy link practices? I hope so but in the eyes of Google, I'm not sure that it's dodgy enough.
Exactly what "dodgey link practices" are you reffering to?
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Panda and Penguin came about to penalize spammers who use shifty SEO techniques like keyword stuffing. I wonder if they're likely to penalize Pinterest for their dodgy link practices? I hope so but in the eyes of Google, I'm not sure that it's dodgy enough.
Also Penguin and Panda were more about duplicate content and inbound anchor link over-optimisation, nothing to do with keyword stuffing....that was taken care of years ago...
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RE: What planet are you on?
One where I do my research before I talk about a topic, you should join me....
Research this:
"Pinterest might be the most illegal network to hit the Internet yet. More illegal than Napster. More illegal than Megaupload."
"...Media law attorney Itai Maytal, who's an associate at Miller Korzenik Sommers LLP, 'In its terms of use, Pinterest actually specifies that users shouldn't pin photos they don't own the rights to, a request that is being ignored to an absurd degree. Even if you link and attribute, that does NOT absolve you of the fact that you took someone else's work and re-appropriated it.'"
http://articles.businessinsider.com/2012-02-17/tech/31070312_1_copyright-holder-napster-youtube (http://articles.businessinsider.com/2012-02-17/tech/31070312_1_copyright-holder-napster-youtube)
Helping Pinterest destroy copyright because you get a little SEO bump, whether it's real or not, is like helping an invader destroy your country because sometimes they give you free candy.
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Panda and Penguin came about to penalize spammers who use shifty SEO techniques like keyword stuffing. I wonder if they're likely to penalize Pinterest for their dodgy link practices? I hope so but in the eyes of Google, I'm not sure that it's dodgy enough.
Exactly what "dodgey link practices" are you reffering to?
It all boils down to who's lazier. You, who can't be bothered reading the entire thread or other recent threads about Pinterest? Or me and others who can't be bothered repeating ourselves and wasting time and space. We win in this case. Read the thread and catch up and then get involved.
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And well it MIGHT BE...as your article post says.
I'm not arguing whether they are breeching copyright, they well MIGHT be...I'm saying I don't care. Firstly because, well I DON'T care, and secondly because it isn't worth caring. Web 2.0 and social media, online sharing etc...that's way bigger than any one company, any small band of photographers that don't even get taken seriously by some of their own agencies. It's the way the internet is surging...like it or not it ain't about to stop. If we all banded together then MAYBE we could get better conditions at some of our agencies, but wasting time and energy fighting the next facebook....isn't there more productive things to do with your time? Something that might actualy yield a result? (other than frustration)
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And well it MIGHT BE...as your article post says.
I'm not arguing whether they are breeching copyright, they well MIGHT be...I'm saying I don't care. Firstly because, well I DON'T care, and secondly because it isn't worth caring. Web 2.0 and social media, online sharing etc...that's way bigger than any one company, any small band of photographers that don't even get taken seriously by some of their own agencies. It's the way the internet is surging...like it or not it ain't about to stop. If we all banded together then MAYBE we could get better conditions at some of our agencies, but wasting time and energy fighting the next facebook....isn't there more productive things to do with your time? Something that might actualy yield a result? (other than frustration)
Well, it's OK if you don't want to care. There are plenty of us who DO care, and if it weren't for this forum, and the people talking about it, most of us might not even know about it. So I don't consider this whole discussion a waste of time or energy AT ALL. For me, it is productive to be here. I wonder why, if you DON'T care, are you wasting your time and energy here? I see that you are a new user here. Are you a partner in, or associated with, pintere$t at all? Because it kind of sounds like you are, from your posts.
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I'm a '"new" user that's been here a couple years. Yes....I'm a sneaky pinterst emplyee that forsaw this debate and registered an account here in advance back in 2008...try looking up the date I joined rather than just my post count.
As for why I'm commenting here? Well pretty much because I see what seems to be a lot of misplaced anger and there's certainly some serious misinformation (especially about the SEO elements and benifits to pinning and repinning) that would be better off corrected, or atleast I saw a discussion that was overwhelmingly one sided and to which I might be able to bring a fresh perspective and something new to think about. But I see my perspective isn't particularly welcome...
And so an equally valid answer to that question (seeing as only the people who share the majority opinion seem to get treated with respect) is: Bloody good question...
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It all boils down to who's lazier. You, who can't be bothered reading the entire thread or other recent threads about Pinterest? Or me and others who can't be bothered repeating ourselves and wasting time and space. We win in this case. Read the thread and catch up and then get involved.
He get's shown how much rubbish he's speaking (rudely too I might add) and he get's snarky....fair enough...
Seeing as it's SEO school here for people that think they already know all about it: Sites are "banned" (actually this almost never happens) generally only for linking out to really nasty pages or hosting malware etc. What is more common is a penalty, which is normally applied to just the keyword term in question. So if a page is very highly optimised for "stock phtography" and has an inbound link profile where 50% of the links coming in are text and anchored as "stock photography" then that page might get a -50 pr -100 (whatever) penalty in google for the keyterm "stock photography" or closely related terms. However search for "*site name* royalty free images" or a unique block of copy from that page and it would still show up.
However this penalty is still about inbound links. I've skimmed over much of this thread now and a couple others...I haven't seen anything mentioned about pinterst manipulating search results with "dodgey" inbound links and they as are the only ones that would cause a penalty and as I also haven't seen anything about pinterest hosting malware I was genuinely asking what link practices you are talking about...I apologise if I missed the post(s) you were talking about but I guess a bit of courtesy is too much to ask for (though that's been obvious from your first reply to me).
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I'm a '"new" user that's been here a couple years. Yes....I'm a sneaky pinterst emplyee that forsaw this debate and registered an account here in advance back in 2008...try looking up the date I joined rather than just my post count.
As for why I'm commenting here? Well pretty much because I see what seems to be a lot of misplaced anger and there's certainly some serious misinformation (especially about the SEO elements and benifits to pinning and repinning) that would be better off corrected, or atleast I saw a discussion that was overwhelmingly one sided and to which I might be able to bring a fresh perspective and something new to think about. But I see my perspective isn't particularly welcome...
And so an equally valid answer to that question (seeing as only the people who share the majority opinion seem to get treated with respect) is: Bloody good question...
When your posts showed before, there were no gauges beneath it and it said new member. No, didn't go investigate further. Don't care that much, was only going by what was showing. But sorry for the mistake. And I don't think I have said anything disrespectful to you, so I will assume that your post above is talking to other people. And no, not everyone is going to agree with you. But I do like to hear both sides of the story.
edit: and since most people here are anonymous, people like me don't have a clue to ANY of the posters' credentials...how would I know which one of you knows what you are talking about? for that matter, you both could be full of $hit and I wouldn't know.
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It all boils down to who's lazier. You, who can't be bothered reading the entire thread or other recent threads about Pinterest? Or me and others who can't be bothered repeating ourselves and wasting time and space. We win in this case. Read the thread and catch up and then get involved.
He get's shown how much rubbish he's speaking (rudely too I might add) and he get's snarky....fair enough...
Seeing as it's SEO school here for people that think they already know all about it: Sites are "banned" (actually this almost never happens) generally only for linking out to really nasty pages or hosting malware etc. What is more common is a penalty, which is normally applied to just the keyword term in question. So if a page is very highly optimised for "stock phtography" and has an inbound link profile where 50% of the links coming in are text and anchored as "stock photography" then that page might get a -50 pr -100 (whatever) penalty in google for the keyterm "stock photography" or closely related terms. However search for "*site name* royalty free images" or a unique block of copy from that page and it would still show up.
However this penalty is still about inbound links. I've skimmed over much of this thread now and a couple others...I haven't seen anything mentioned about pinterst manipulating search results with "dodgey" inbound links and they as are the only ones that would cause a penalty and as I also haven't seen anything about pinterest hosting malware I was genuinely asking what link practices you are talking about...I apologise if I missed the post(s) you were talking about but I guess a bit of courtesy is too much to ask for (though that's been obvious from your first reply to me).
The link was given to you by hummingbird, which you conveniently skipped, just like you skipped over most of what I wrote to you. I'm not here to be courteous to people who are rude and obnoxious. You said you don't care about this issue. Odd that you care that we care. It's our property and our copyright. What makes you think we care that you don't care? It's like you coming in here and saying you don't care that my house burns down. You don't have to care, I care though, it's my property. And I don't know what your portfolio is like. Perhaps it's full of worthless junk since you don't care too much about it. But I and others care about our property. You not caring about your property is completely irrelevant to how we feel about ours. So move on. If you don't care, stop being a child and move on and let us discuss an issue that involves OUR property.
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My main complaint with Pinterest is that they lend a veneer of legality to essentially giving our work away for free. If someone else tags my work that is in violation of copyright law, but once that happens as far as pinterest is concerned they now have permission to give that work away for free. Unless I find and send a DMCA notice they feel free to give my work away.
I am much less concerned with watermarked images because at least they are obviously from somewhere else.
Right now it is probably mostly people pinning images they like, but at some point in the future it could easily become the go to site for bloggers and web designers looking for free images. Pinterest would be fine with that, we would lose.
The difference with someone right clicking or using a screen shot to get the image to use is that they are actively stealing the image. Pinterest encourages people to pin the beautiful things they see on the web (glossing over the fact that they aren't really allowed to pin anything they don't own copyright to) and then encourages others to use those images they have pinned. Once they have been pinned and re-pinned a few times they can get lost from their original source and essentially become the property of pinterest. If there is a legal problem pinterest will hide behind their TOS and try to blame the original pinners.
As far as the SEO stuff goes, I am not sure that giving away our images to Pinterest is worth the boost in SEO, certainly not without a big fat watermark.
With a few tweaks pinterest could make itself much more friendly to content creators and remove most of my objections, but they don't want to do that.
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My main complaint with Pinterest is that they lend a veneer of legality to essentially giving our work away for free. If someone else tags my work that is in violation of copyright law, but once that happens as far as pinterest is concerned they now have permission to give that work away for free. Unless I find and send a DMCA notice they feel free to give my work away.
One of the main issues, exactly.
Right now it is probably mostly people pinning images they like, but at some point in the future it could easily become the go to site for bloggers and web designers looking for free images. Pinterest would be fine with that, we would lose.
At some point in the future?
The difference with someone right clicking or using a screen shot to get the image to use is that they are actively stealing the image. Pinterest encourages people to pin the beautiful things they see on the web (glossing over the fact that they aren't really allowed to pin anything they don't own copyright to) and then encourages others to use those images they have pinned. Once they have been pinned and re-pinned a few times they can get lost from their original source and essentially become the property of pinterest. If there is a legal problem pinterest will hide behind their TOS and try to blame the original pinners.
Right. Here is a mega-corporation actively inciting constant infringement, teaching millions that is ok to do whatever you like until you get caught. Much different than Sally down the street grabbing one image here or there for themselves.
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And I don't think I have said anything disrespectful to you, so I will assume that your post above is talking to other people.
You assumed correctly, I certainly wasn't talking about you.
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Odd that you care that we care. It's our property and our copyright.
Mine too, I still make a large chunk of my income through stock photography.
RE What makes you think we care that you don't care?
What makes you think that anyone cares about anything you write? This is a forum mate, people express their opinons and sometimes *shock horror* those opinions are at odds.
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Odd that you care that we care. It's our property and our copyright.
Mine too, I still make a large chunk of my income through stock photography.
So run past me again ...
How does it benefit you or me, as stock sellers, if pinterest pins our photo from a site other than our agency's whereby the only way of a potential buyer finding us would be for them to use GIS?
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The link was given to you by hummingbird, which you conveniently skipped,
The link provided by hummingbird has nothing whatsoever to do with inbound links...did you read it yourself? Seriously man, you gotta stop smoking whatever it is your are smoking....
It's about the fact that their OUTBOUND links are no-follow and their INTERNAL links are do-follow...and the argument (or at least so it seems to me) is totally irrelevant as there's nothing "illegal" about making outbound links nofollow. Wordpress blog comments are nofollow by default, TWITTER links are nofollow...gee, wordpress and twitter must be breaking the law too...*rolls eyes*
Although I must admit that the nofollow bit was something I didn't know. I actually read somewhere not long ago that pinterest links were DOfollow...guess they changed things up at some point. And this admittedly does give the site less power seo wise, but still not zero as that article is claiming - it's been proven that no follow links do still help out a page, just not anywhere near so much as do follow links. Google still records them and it knows how many do follow links a page has and how many no follow (this too is where you need diversity - if all your links are do-follow that isn't natural, so nofollow links are important to keep your back link profile out of the nasty crosshairs of google's algorithm). Twitter links are no-follow and they can help sites enormously in the serps (which is why there are so many spammers on twitter) Still I must admit to disappointment at reading the no follow thing. However I'm no lawyer, but no follow out bound links are laughably far from illegal and also the "poor anchor" text link that that article talks about hurting a site is also total rubbish. Even more so these days in the era of Penguin we need more and more naked url non-anchored links, because that is what the search engines see as natural.
And more links from social media is what the google counts as being interesting and engaging to viewers....for a reason, the internet is turning more and more toward social networks, and so each google algorithm upgrade tends to mirror and use that data by becoming more and more influenced by social signals. Which is part of why twitter (and I hope now pinterest too) can considerably help SEO wise even with no follow links.
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Odd that you care that we care. It's our property and our copyright.
Mine too, I still make a large chunk of my income through stock photography.
So run past me again ...
How does it benefit you or me, as stock sellers, if pinterest pins our photo from a site other than our agency's whereby the only way of a potential buyer finding us would be for them to use GIS?
It doesn't.
But it does (potentially) help you every time someone pins your image (or repins it subsequently) from your stock folio, or your website etc. And I still reckon that if someone is going to steal an image for their blog sure they might go to pinterest, or they might go to google images, or devient art, or 500px...they are all collections of pretty photos, or a million other places online...someone that's going to share/steal a photo is going to share/steal it they aren't going to go and buy one for 50cents or even 5cents. So what have you lost if/when they do?
Worth the trade off in my mind as I really don't see how anyone pinning your image can hurt you, even if it comes from a blog somewhere with no link back to you. Doesn't help doesn't hurt...but pins from your stock sites or own site have the potential to help. Pretty easy maths equation in my mind.
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edit: duplicate post
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I really don't see how anyone pinning your image can hurt you, even if it comes from a blog somewhere with no link back to you. Doesn't help doesn't hurt...
OK, I'll agree to disagree. To my mind, it's just one more place from where people can lift our images without paying for them. And any repins are more 'steal me' possiblities. I know people can lift them from any legitimate or stolen use, but pinning is just making them easily available to more people.
I'm aware that people who care can search for CC images from e.g. Flickr. But I'm not convinced most people care that much, they'll just take images from wherever they find them. Most people don't even know that might be wrong (i.e. they might be using images that have not been freely shared). Pinterest just reinforces that mindset.
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Odd that you care that we care. It's our property and our copyright.
Mine too, I still make a large chunk of my income through stock photography.
So run past me again ...
How does it benefit you or me, as stock sellers, if pinterest pins our photo from a site other than our agency's whereby the only way of a potential buyer finding us would be for them to use GIS?
It doesn't.
But it does (potentially) help you every time someone pins your image (or repins it subsequently) from your stock folio, or your website etc. And I still reckon that if someone is going to steal an image for their blog sure they might go to pinterest, or they might go to google images, or devient art, or 500px...they are all collections of pretty photos, or a million other places online...someone that's going to share/steal a photo is going to share/steal it they aren't going to go and buy one for 50cents or even 5cents. So what have you lost if/when they do?
Worth the trade off in my mind as I really don't see how anyone pinning your image can hurt you, even if it comes from a blog somewhere with no link back to you. Doesn't help doesn't hurt...but pins from your stock sites or own site have the potential to help. Pretty easy maths equation in my mind.
Your signature says "artistic photography" and I like your work, this is not a personal attack but forgive me for saying it; you don't sound like an artist. You don't sound like someone who works hard to realize a vision, creating something personal and artistic and then seeing it spread out of control on the web until even ownership is lost. You sound like a businessman calculating losses of product and dismissing it as just part of process of marketing your widgets. Sort of like Walmart factors in losses from shoplifting as part of the retail experience.
If I were so rich I wiped my A** with 50 dollar bills I would still have a problem with someone stealing my work. Or sharing it directly from my portfolio on Dreamstime. That's why copyright exists, to protect the rights of artists and creative people.
It's not about the money, it's about MY WORK. That's where the hurt is.
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Your signature says "artistic photography" and I like your work, this is not a personal attack but forgive me for saying it; you don't sound like an artist. You don't sound like someone who works hard to realize a vision, creating something personal and artistic and then seeing it spread out of control on the web until even ownership is lost. You sound like a businessman calculating losses of product and dismissing it as just part of process of marketing your widgets. Sort of like Walmart factors in losses from shoplifting as part of the retail experience.
If I were so rich I wiped my A** with 50 dollar bills I would still have a problem with someone stealing my work. Or sharing it directly from my portfolio on Dreamstime. That's why copyright exists, to protect the rights of artists and creative people.
It's not about the money, it's about MY WORK. That's where the hurt is.
Interesting points you make. As for the artist thing, well I'd like to think of myself as an artist, I do try very hard to produce artistic photography. However I also don't really put too much stock in labels. A label by its very nature is more exclusive than inclusive. To define something is more often than not to define what it is not, or to put barriers up to what it may be.
It took a great upheaval in mindset for me to start selling my pictures for 25cents each, as I'm sure it did to anyone else here who was already producing professional grade images before getting into microstock. I had to let go of a lot of restrictive notions about what I believed one of my photos to be worth and you know what? It was the most liberating thing I've done and the best decision of my careers (I've had several) I've made.
I now live a life of 6 months a year at least (this trip is over 7 months now) travel around Asia, I work when I want to work and take weeks or months off when I feel like it. I shoot and write what I feel like when I feel like it and earn money after the fact. I owe all of that to microstock and finally getting over that "these agencies are stealing off the photographers and driving prices down low" mindset and getting into a different one instead, seeing the other side of the coin.
What I love is to make the pictures I want to make, to let inspiration hit where and when it will. It is the creation the image I love, that and the sharing of it among as many people as possible (something I was doing with my images long before stock - I was posting them to forums, displaying them on photo.net, deviant art, other photography and model/shooter network sites etc) because I think art is to be enjoyed, spread and shared. Isn't that why it's created, to be enjoyed? As such I can't see any logic in your "creating something personal and artistic and then seeing it spread out of control on the web until even ownership is lost" viewpoint as if I got some of my work spread that far around that it was admired by that many people and it touched them enough to spread it virally....then I'd call that a major artistic success. Whether I earn money from it or not, my vision of beauty was shared by the maxium amount of people it could be....what more could a legitimately artistically motivated person want?
In the end if I can shoot what I want to shoot and make enough to get by then I'm happy...and I'm doing that but stock roi on stock IS going down so the reality is that that being the case I kinda HAVE to be a "businessman calculating losses of product and dismissing it as just part of process of marketing your widgets" don't all of us in this industry? I have to be the businessman so that I CAN keep being the artist. The businessman always comes second and the artist just wants to see his work touch and be appreciated by others...I see no contradictions there.
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"Whether I earn money from it or not, my vision of beauty was shared by the maxium amount of people it could be....what more could a legitimately artistically motivated person want?"
I'm here to make money, not massage my 'artistic' ego by having my work 'shared' (which can damage my income several ways). My intent is to create highly saleable content that sends a message, while incorporating my creativity into the process. If I wanted to soley be an 'artist' and share my work to benefit humanity, I'd buy a van so I could live by the river. I'll stick to that as a hobby if I so want.
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"Whether I earn money from it or not, my vision of beauty was shared by the maxium amount of people it could be....what more could a legitimately artistically motivated person want?"
I'm here to make money, not massage my 'artistic' ego by having my work 'shared' (which can damage my income several ways). My intent is to create highly saleable content that sends a message, while incorporating my creativity into the process. If I wanted to soley be an 'artist' and share my work to benefit humanity, I'd buy a van so I could live by the river. I'll stick to that as a hobby if I so want.
And so you should if that is your focus. I'm not suggesting by that monologue that everyone should be like me, I was merely responding to the previous poster who made some points that really made me think, which I always appreciate.
And I guess we just disagree on what will make you more money. You seem to think waging a fight in which you'll have as much effect as a gnat chomping on an elephant and scouring the net for improper uses of your images to be more worthwhile than using that time making new ones and engaging in other, positive forms of marking your images, *shrugs* maybe you are right. I don't see it but whatever blows your whistle...
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Sorry, I don't think you read what anyone else writes. I spend zero time 'scouring the net' for use abuse. I do spend some time trying to raise awareness of the masses, so as a crowd we can be aware and act against egregious practices if it becomes needed, or at least so others are aware of the dangers.
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Sorry, I don't think you read what anyone else writes. I spend zero time 'scouring the net' for use abuse. I do spend some time trying to raise awareness of the masses, so as a crowd we can be aware and act against egregious practices if it becomes needed, or at least so others are aware of the dangers.
I can see you believe in what you are saying Sean, and I admire that you do stand up for what you believe in. So we are on different sides of the fence here, so what?
As for my scouring the net comment, that was extrapolated from something someone else wrote - so forgive me if I'm mistaken about that, I don't spend much time here as my post count would suggest.
But even as I can commend you for you attitude of "spending some time trying to raise awareness of the masses, so as a crowd we can be aware and act against egregious practices if it becomes needed, or at least so others are aware of the dangers." I would question how you can prioritise Pinterest as such a danger while you submit exclusively to the most evil and greedy entity any of us stock photographers have ever had to deal with?
Also isn't it important that we have a balanced view of these "dangers" and that misinformation such as the seo garbage spouted by that article (and others) is corrected so that we can balance the pros and cons fairly? It feels like a witch hunt in here with a bunch of people getting angry and feeding off each others (at least slightly?) misplaced anger...
It really reminds me actually of several years ago when an istock photographer came into our little modelling photography local forums, when she mentioned she shot for istock she got treated with disdain, contempt and patronising lectures from all the old pros as to how she was giving her work away for far too little, devaluing it and it would end in her ruin, she'd never make any money from microstock. She goes by the handle Hidesy and probably earns more today from her photography than all her naysayers on that forum combined. It's easy to get fearful of new technologies that at first seem to be "taking something from us" but just as microstock gave images to people at prices that had never been seen before and full ongoing royalties (most of the old pros used to talk about microstock as "giving your images away for nothing") it also gave a lot back to us that make a living by it. Microstock was the future of stock - those that saw it early and chose not to fight it but to embrace it got rewarded well for it. And it's hard to see social media as being anything other than the future of the internet...
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Also isn't it important that we have a balanced view of these "dangers" and that misinformation such as the seo garbage spouted by that article (and others) is corrected so that we can balance the pros and cons fairly? It feels like a witch hunt in here with a bunch of people getting angry and feeding off each others (at least slightly?) misplaced anger...
I don't understand why you think this is misplaced anger. This is business and these are facts. I used to SELL my images. Now at least one agency, who represents me, is enabling the stealing of contributor's images and copyrights, for which I will never get paid a dime. Why do you say that is "misplaced" anger? You are really belittling us all and making it seem as though none of us actually have a brain of our own and we couldn't possibly think through our own decisions. That we have to rely on others here in the forum to think for us. ::)
It isn't a witch hunt, we know who's responsible. We're all just a bunch of people seeing their future going down the toilet.
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My main complaint with Pinterest is that they lend a veneer of legality to essentially giving our work away for free. If someone else tags my work that is in violation of copyright law, but once that happens as far as pinterest is concerned they now have permission to give that work away for free. Unless I find and send a DMCA notice they feel free to give my work away.
I am much less concerned with watermarked images because at least they are obviously from somewhere else.
Right now it is probably mostly people pinning images they like, but at some point in the future it could easily become the go to site for bloggers and web designers looking for free images. Pinterest would be fine with that, we would lose.
The difference with someone right clicking or using a screen shot to get the image to use is that they are actively stealing the image. Pinterest encourages people to pin the beautiful things they see on the web (glossing over the fact that they aren't really allowed to pin anything they don't own copyright to) and then encourages others to use those images they have pinned. Once they have been pinned and re-pinned a few times they can get lost from their original source and essentially become the property of pinterest. If there is a legal problem pinterest will hide behind their TOS and try to blame the original pinners.
As far as the SEO stuff goes, I am not sure that giving away our images to Pinterest is worth the boost in SEO, certainly not without a big fat watermark.
With a few tweaks pinterest could make itself much more friendly to content creators and remove most of my objections, but they don't want to do that.
+1
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Also isn't it important that we have a balanced view of these "dangers" and that misinformation such as the seo garbage spouted by that article (and others) is corrected so that we can balance the pros and cons fairly? It feels like a witch hunt in here with a bunch of people getting angry and feeding off each others (at least slightly?) misplaced anger...
I thought you were way off-beam with your overinflated estimation of how being pinned and repinned would shoot you up in Google, but to be honest, I have't really been keeping up with Google/SEO recently, so I didn't reply. I don't sell via my own site, so it's irrelevant for me personally.
Notwithstanding, the plain and simple flat-HTML campaign website I run for a local pressure group is no 1 (olf about 14,400) in Google UK for its key search term (above the BBC and several much larger national campaign groups in our anti-coal-ition, and well above the site of the company we're opposing), without a presence on any social media [1] and if we're pinned it's not showing up in my site stats (it shows on Flickr stats, so it might be that it would show up on individual screen stats).
If that's unbelievable, here's a screendump I did five minutes ago: http://www.lizworld.com/CONCH_No1.jpg (http://www.lizworld.com/CONCH_No1.jpg). I have no idea where we are on Google.com, as I can't get into it (always automatically redirects me to the .co.uk site) but it doesn't matter in this particular case. Also, I have jpgs of a particular animal species on my husband's website (not directly for sale) which come higher than any agency's photos except three from Shutterstock, again with no social media presence, no link campaign, and having not updated anything on that section of his site for several years.
Conclusion: As always, relevant content and standard HTML still counts for more with Google than any SEO 'campaign'. (Nevertheless, the chair of the group who does all the email stuff says he still gets these SEO spams offering to improve our position. He says he's considering hiring me out!)
[1] Disclosure: I do have a link to the site on my Facebook page, but as my FB page just sits there and nothing happens, I doubt if anyone has ever seen it, or even that the SE bots have found it. But my site was at the top of the Google UK site before I made the FB link.
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If that's unbelievable, here's a screendump I did five minutes ago: [url]http://www.lizworld.com/CONCH_No1.jpg[/url] ([url]http://www.lizworld.com/CONCH_No1.jpg[/url]).
sorry but with such a long-tail query and the name of a small town it's not surprising it's ranked nr.1, all you need is stuffing the keywords in H1 tags and you will rank fine for a long time, but for less obscure ketwords and locations it's quite another story.