I dont like all that about Pinterest but in fact I see hundreds of actually stolen images on Facebook everyday. They are liked, shared, downloaded and used all the time. As someone mentioned stealing was never easier. And it will not become socially accepted - it is already widely socially accepted.  

The public  never accepted the concept of intellectual property with regard to "entertainment" or "art" products that can be easily duplicated - music, video, still imagery.   This began with reel tape recorders in the 60s, continued with videotape and cassette - it only accelerated with digital technology and the internet.  

To the average person, a claim of intellectual property - literally a "copy right" - only has validity to the extent to which it's enforced; no enforcement means no "right".  Since it's easy to make a copy of a piece of music and give it to a friend - and no one tries stop me - I did nothing wrong.  

It's always been ok to lend a book to a friend; I paid for it, I own it, right?  If publishers now assert that it's wrong to lend an eBook, no one takes them seriously.  It might be technically difficult - for now - but it's not wrong.  The public never bought the "loss of potential sale" argument either. 

The music companies made things much worse by telling people they couldn't even make copies for their own use.   Any remaining public support for musical copyright vanished along with those hated DRM systems.

I'm confused now... if I receive a magazine in the post and like a hair style in it, and take the magazine to the barber/hairdresser/hairstylist, and ask them to eg: shave my hair similar to like in the photo, is that illegal?  If I tear out the sheet, and do the same, is it illegal? If I cut out only the photo or only the haircut is that illegal? [As of proof reading this, I've realise that copying the hairstyle might be break copyright and IP law too.  Just to play it safe, when I next shoot a model, I shall have the make-up artist sign a makeup-release  ]

( Re lending a physical book to a friend to read and then have it returned, or not, or if I sell it on, I am not aware of this being illegal, or requiring licensing.  This does not mean I'm right or wrong, so I'm asking on this? ... However, just as when we used to play football at school, and some kid brought his ball, we did not pay a rent/licence/etc to play with that ball.  He owned the ball, and we did what we wanted with it...  I draw the line at, not being able to 'reproduce' the content of the book, and then sell it.  ie: The book that I have purchased, maybe be sold on, however I'm not entitled to photocopy it, or re-write it for that matter.  However in the case of school-projects, Thesis's, etc, proper referencing/bibliographing needs to be done. )  [ If you really want to be anal about things, no original content is really original.  Where do you draw the line, on what is original content in a book, such as "how to use your camera".  Lets assume an author was taught at school/college/other about aperture and shutter and then focuses (no pun intended) on ISO in the book.  Self taught on ISO, but to describe ISO, makes reference to shutter/aperture.  Some authors credit their teachers, but not all do.  I'm not saying that its right or not too, but its practically impossible, since we learn daily thought human-interactions. .. enough of that off topic RANT ]

Back to my first example, magazine are disturbed, and the companies would be glad of us, the general public 'showing' their adverts around.  I'm hoping my hair-dressing example is not illegal, because the next scenario is a bride, tearing out sheets from various magazines, 'these are the flowers I want for my wedding', 'this is the dress style I'm going for', etc... is that illegal?

So far what I've seen of Pinterest is that, as some others have mentioned, is its a public billboard.  If you tear out a photo from a magazine, hang it on a wall in you bedroom/house, is that illegal?  What about when your friend comes over and sees that 'famous singer/actor/other' hanging on the wall.  Is that act now illegal?  Pinterest seems to link to the hosting website, and does not hold the content itself from what I've seen.  Please correct me if I'm wrong!?  Is google illegal, or google-images illegal?  It points to the hosting-site.  Pinterest can be seen as a 'google' where users pick what makes it to the page and not.  When it comes to facebook/etc. and someone downloading a photo off another site, and then placing that in their album, then that, I believe is illegal.  HOWEVER sharing/posting a site with the content I would like my friends to see, is something else, and I don't believe that is illegal.

Its a very fine line, between illegal and legal use, and it seems that people draw that line at different points.

Quote from: Chris S on May 24, 2012, 12:01

Its a very fine line, between illegal and legal use, and it seems that people draw that line at different points.

No, it really isn't.  You're just trying to stretch it to make an argument.  The personal use "license" that comes with your magazine allows you to take it and cut it apart and lend it to your friend, etc.

That has nothing to do with agreeing to upload legalities you have no right to, redistributing content you have no permission to, and commercial uses you haven't licensed the content for.

Well stated.

Quote from: Hummingbird on May 21, 2012, 22:53

Quote from: traveler1116 on May 21, 2012, 22:50

I filled out the DMCA notice and the image was taken down within a couple hours, surprisingly fast.  But having to fill out your name, address, email, and phone number to report it seems a bit much, I couldn't help but think that pinterest is collecting all this info from DMCA takedown requests and selling it to advertisers.  Maybe that's the business model?  The image pinterest had stored seems to have been removed along with the pinned content though.

They remove the SINGLE REPORTED PAGE that calls the pinned image.  Unless they changed the way they operate, they don't remove the repins, nor do they remove the actual image from their servers.

All DMCA take down request require information to identify you in case your take-down notice is countered.

They do remove the repins.  I'm not sure about the image from their servers though.  We'll have to test that.  Next DMCA I send, I'll take note of the image URL before sending it through. 

I just tested this to be sure.

They removed the pin page.

The repins are still there, the images still on their servers.

In that case, hand me a pitch-fork, and light my torch!...

However:
Silly question, but I just want to check if that 'most' of the people/users in here are 'fine' with sites that 'share/post' links.  ie: google search results, facebook posts to an interesting article, tweeting a site you found, (pinning on pinterest IF it is used as a public notice-board, AND that they don't strip & host the image/work as there own) ... (disclaimer: for facebook, etc, am referring to a post like "Wish I had thought of this for my wedding www,url,com/wedding-idea  [image thumbnail]"   ...  People copying an image into there own album is another storey...  )

I don't see copyright violation as a laughing matter. I am NOT fine with ANY site that takes my images, watermarked or not, and uses them on their website or someone else's website without paying for a license. I am NOT fine with allowing the people who steal the images in the first place to re-distribute my images, watermarked or not, because that also constitutes copyright infringement. I am not going to address what COULD be if this world was all butterflies, rainbows and lollipops, I am only addressing what is happening right now, and is getting worse every day. As for which of your above scenarios I am fine with, I think you can decide for yourself from my statement.

Silly question, but I just want to check if that 'most' of the people/users in here are 'fine' with sites that 'share/post' links.  ie: google search results, facebook posts to an interesting article, tweeting a site you found, (pinning on pinterest IF it is used as a public notice-board, AND that they don't strip & host the image/work as there own) ... (disclaimer: for facebook, etc, am referring to a post like "Wish I had thought of this for my wedding www,url,com/wedding-idea  [image thumbnail]"   ...  People copying an image into there own album is another storey...  )

If the law declares something as legal, then I don't have to have an opinion.  I'm going to be "fine" with it whether I like it or not - we're all playing by the same rules, and we know what the rules are.  We have something called "fair use" which, while nebulous to some degree, we all abide by.

The courts will need to weigh in on this, but I don't believe the massive rape of internet pictorial content, enabled by the one-click too that is the pinmarklet, is even close to fair use.

No, it really isn't.  You're just trying to stretch it to make an argument.  The personal use "license" that comes with your magazine allows you to take it and cut it apart and lend it to your friend, etc.

That has nothing to do with agreeing to upload legalities you have no right to, redistributing content you have no permission to, and commercial uses you haven't licensed the content for.

exactly.
imagine a magazine publishing hundreds of stolen AP/AFP/Getty/Reuters war images and trying to get away with that saying they were found on Pinterest and therefore considered of public domain .. hahaha