Quote from: Sadstock on September 08, 2011, 03:21Interestingly ooopic has renumbered the images.

That must be because they partner with more sites, there would be ID collisions if they didn't renumber.

Quote from: Sadstock on September 08, 2011, 02:59Can you post links to some images you recognize from elsewhere?  This should help figure out who they are getting their content from.

Good idea, some results are below. Almost all of the images I could find are at 123RF and / or CanStockPhoto. I also found assetdelivery.com, which gives this message: "123RF image caching server".

Both assetdelivery.com and 123rf.com are registered to Andy Sitt, so it looks like a 123RF partner site.

What made me suspicious was that I found an image at ooopic that I only uploaded to Fotolia, but it was one that was stolen by someone and uploaded to many sites, including 123RF. That's probably how it got there, I can't find it anymore.

But they must be partnering with more sites, maybe CanStockPhoto, since they have images I don't have at 123RF.

I guess it's explained then, thanks for the suggestion sadstock  .

--------

ooopic
CanStockPhoto
Graphic Leftovers
123RF

ooopic
Dreamstime

ooopic
ShutterStock (and at 123RF too)

ooopic
Cutcaster Also at 123RF, CanStockPhoto and Dreamstime

Hi,

Found many of my images on some chinese site, ooopic.com. The copyright is credited to tuke135 and there are over 6 million images in his portfolio. Checked a few and they're from different people on well known agencies.

Is this a partner site? Can't find any info on them...

Quote from: RacePhoto on August 30, 2011, 18:58Sounds strange unless you mean he's taking them from FT and selling someplace else and not on FT.

Yes, that's what I mean, but I was hoping they would warn the photographers about it. They're not willing to do so, apparently.

Quote from: qwerty on August 30, 2011, 03:17I thought most of that crap was what they said don't load to IS editorial.

Indeed :

"We do not accept photographs of celebrities and public figures. It is a can of worms we just aren't opening."

And I had one rejected because the location and date were on all caps. I resubmitted and now I'm expecting it to be rejected because it isn't on all caps .

Quote from: click_click on August 29, 2011, 18:52
I don't know if the buyers who bought it from the thieves' accounts get a note of invalid licenses. I don't think so, haven't hear of it.

Really doubt it, that would give a bad image of the agency and could be a lost costumer. I asked Shutterstock about the royalties on the stolen image and haven't heard from them since I started the thread...

Meanwhile, found our dear copyright infringer selling the free stock photos that come with Photoshop 7. I think Adobe is looking into it.

By the way, is there a way to contact photographers at Fotolia? I tried to discuss the matter with Fotolia support, but apparently they don't care that one of their contributors is ripping other Fotolia contributors... They told me to file a DMCA complaint .

Quote from: dirkr on August 22, 2011, 10:18
Off Topic: those dice are not realistic. Real ones always have six and one on opposite sites, as well as three and four.

Heh, well caught, I had never noticed that.

Found more, this time from Javier Larrea / Age Fotostock. This guy sure has imagination, look at this (just a sample):



Original:

Quote from: aeonf on August 20, 2011, 15:15Maybe you can start your own "find your stolen photos" service 

Haha, not too shabby! It is kind of fun, in a way. Reminds of the pixel hunts of the old point-and-click adventure games .

Found one more from iStock exclusive Subman:



Original:

No problem, rubyroo  .

I understand what this guy is doing. Essentially, he creates derivative works, mashups. He picks portions of several images, creates a new one and tries to get away with it.

Check this:


It was tricky, but I managed to track the branch image to a book cover. Eventually, I was able to check the book and the cover images are credited to Jupiter Images. Here it is:



It looks like the copyright belongs to Photolink, I contacted them to clear it up. Maybe he works for them, somehow I doubt it...

Quote from: rubyroo on August 20, 2011, 08:34
Not so sure about that one.  Is it not possible that xedos4 is the microstock name of that actual person?  

Have I missed something?

Xedos4 is Jean-luc Cochonneau. I already contacted Jody Frank and he confirmed ownership of the photo.

Found another. When you look at the copyrights page, it says the cover photo's copyright belongs to Jody Frank.

Feature Pics
Shutterstock (search results) / image popup
StockPhotoMedia
StockPhotoMedia
Pixmac
Pixmac
Pixmac
Pixmac
YAY Micro
YAY Micro
Zoonar
MostPhotos
Photo Licence
Pond5
Pond5
Pond5
Pixelia
Pixelia

Not sure what to think of this:

by Jean-luc Cochonneau
by Gbydream
by Laschon Maximilian.

Caught him again. This time he took a photo from FogStock photographer Enrique Sol.

Feature Pics
Shutterstock (search results) / image popup
Pixmac
StockPhotoMedia
YAY Micro

Sent an email to FogStock.

Quote from: cuppacoffee on August 18, 2011, 16:27
I don't know if it is premature, but DT has already suspended this member. The portfolio in question is still on the other sites (as of today).

Yes, DT confirmed the infringement and blocked his account. Not only did he upload a photo he did not own the copyright, he also upscaled it from 3 MP to 7 MP! I can't believe it was accepted...

By the way, this was the photo he stole:
http://www.fotolia.com/id/327909

Can't believe it made it into Shutterstock, either...

Hi all,

Thanks to Google image search, I found, a couple of days ago, someone called Jean-luc Cochonneau selling one of my photos on pixelia.fr, a french stock site. It was a photo I donated to Fotolia free section and it was only available there. I emailed the agency and they took it down immediately.

Now I found it again on Shutterstock search results and I'm getting a bit pissed off, although it is already down. I'm about to contact Shutterstock to know if the photo had any sales.

I've been checking his portfolio for further violations, but I couldn't find any. However, it smells funny... Some of the photos are quite bad, others are almost National Geographic level, lots of montages... I'm listing his portfolio at all the agencies I could find, in case anyone wants to check it out:

Shutterstock
iStockPhoto
Dreamstime
Fotolia
BigStockPhoto
123RF
CanStockPhoto
Feature Pics
StockPhotoMedia
Cutcaster
Gimmestock
StockPodium
Most Photos
Deposit Photos
Pixmac
Pixelia
Zoonar
AgeFotoStock
Visco Images
Photaki
Free Web Photo

Edit: found in on Dreamstime, too  . Edit2: And on many others...

Support confirmed the "free" image was keyworded in 2010 and they moved it back to the commercial section. Didn't explain the missing image, nor did they offer compensation for the free downloads, though...

I consider the matter closed. Keep an eye on your free images!

Quote from: cclapper on May 11, 2011, 16:46
Is there an easy way to check whether or not one has images in the free section? I don't think I do, as I have never donated any, but would be happy to check.

Click on My Profile, on the top of the page. If you have free images, there should be a listing, just like the ones for the latest uploads and most popular images. Or visit the url

http://www.dreamstime.com/USERNAME_free-images_pg1

replacing USERNAME with your actual user name.

Edit: just checked your profile and it seems you don't have any. Thank you for your interest .

Or at least so it seems.

Last week, it occurred to me to check the stats of the two images I have in the free section. To my surprise, one of them was missing from my portfolio and, worse, I found there an image which was sent to the keymasters.

Both images got a warning about being online for more than 4 years without sales. I donated to the free section the one that is missing, but the other one was sent to re-keywording, something that indeed happened, since the title, keywords and description were revised. I don't remember ever donating it, why would I do that after having it re-keyworded?

Maybe I'm going crazy or my memory is playing tricks on me... Too bad I deleted the emails with the warnings. But hell, I feel 99% sure about this.

Support is looking into it, but I would like to check if anyone else is having the same issue. Do you have images in the free section that shouldn't be there?

Quote from: leaf on January 19, 2010, 10:39
What we don't want!

Images which are sold elsewhere as RF/RM commercial

Looks like they want exclusivity on editorial.

Great news! Thanks to everyone who kept nagging on Fotolia to get their facts right. Too bad they handled it so poorly, all of this could have been avoided...

Hello,

I picked up Warren's email to get a posted letter and adapted it to sound more general, so anyone can send it right away:

QuoteDear Fotolia,

According to what you stated in your emails and in the Tax Center, in order to receive tax treaty benefits I need an ITIN number.

With this in mind, I respectfully ask you send me by post, not email, an original letter on fotolia's letterhead, addressed to me and stating my account number with Fotolia. I need that document to send along with the W-7 form to IRS.

As you well know, I must comply with the IRS tax regulations in this matter.

Thank you for your help.

Best Regards,

I have no intention of getting an ITIN number, but this seems to be to only way to pressure Fotolia to get their facts right. Let's ask for thousand's of letters .

I hope this is not a repost.

If it is not, I am sure you're going to love this big collection of photographers photographed at work. Warning: some of the photos are not safe for work .

Yes, but that butterfly could be used for commercial projects without releases, no? What if there are logos / identifiable property or people?

There is XnView, it is free and available for MacOSX, Linux and Windows. The only problem I have is with iStockphoto, as for some reason the IPTC is not recognized.

When editing IPTC, don't forget to do go into browse mode, then right click your image and select "edit IPTC data". This way, when saving the IPTC data it doesn't re-compress the jpg, so it's a lossless operation.

Hi,

From what I've seen, when uploading editorial for Alamy they ask if the photo was digitally altered. I'm well aware of the restrictions against digitally altering a newsworthy photo, in such a way that would modify it's truth value. However, not all editorial is newsworthy...

What I'd like to know is if they do accept digitally altered editorial (strong color / saturation manipulation) or if that question is there to filter such images and refuse them on the fly. If they actually accept them, is there a notice for the buyers stating the image was digitally altered (I would like it to be so...)? If there is, I can't find them on their samples.