ALERT: Ebay seller pilfering our images and selling them on disc.

Jo

Jo

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Jo Fisher
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Hi all.

There is a seller on ebay at the moment who has been brought to my attention.

They are copying images from Facebook, Flickr and many other sources then putting them all on a disc and selling the for £2 a pop.

There are many many categories, including sport, animals and landscape. Loads more though.

THIS is the seller and her listings.

I'm not in a position to buy all of the relevant categories to me, so if anyone buys them to check please look out for anything that could be mine too :D

These images are being sold as free to use on cards ad other crafts. So those that make cards and things for craft stalls will be profiting from them also.
 
aligibbs said:
Just report them- how do you know they are copying images from facebook/flickr etc?
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Because the lady who alerted me to the seller bought one after seeing her image as the cover. When she got the CD it contained several of her pictures from various sources.

By reporting the seller, the listings are removed, along with any proof of copyright infringement. Best to gather the proof first if you decide to invoice her ... which I will be doing if I find she has used any of mine.
 
Jo said:
Because the lady who alerted me to the seller bought one after seeing her image as the cover. When she got the CD it contained several of her pictures from various sources.

By reporting the seller, the listings are removed, along with any proof of copyright infringement. Best to gather the proof first if you decide to invoice her ... which I will be doing if I find she has used any of mine.
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With the millions and millions of pictures out there- doubt you will have any. Better to get their account suspended, make them start all over again etc.
 
well if anyone has got photos on there that are also sold through agencies like istock, then notify them, they will have records as to whether this lady bought a copy, (illegal anyway to resell a copy), then they can use their great corporate might to go stop her
 
Jo said:
Because the lady who alerted me to the seller bought one after seeing her image as the cover. When she got the CD it contained several of her pictures from various sources.

By reporting the seller, the listings are removed, along with any proof of copyright infringement. Best to gather the proof first if you decide to invoice her ... which I will be doing if I find she has used any of mine.
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I'm not sure that suggesting every member of TP goes and buys a disc is the best way to stop this happening again.
 
Bay page updated at 14.14 and now no listings on it.

Andy
 
Andysnap said:
Bay page updated at 14.14 and now no listings on it.

Andy
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Check the show completed listings only, seems like a lot were ended all at the same time
 
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I am the seller that you are all discussing and I am shocked and distressed by the tone of your messages. Just for your information: my cds contained mainly my own images - I am a photographer and an artist, any other images that i added to my collections were, as far as i was aware, royalty free. It has been brought to my attention that this may not be the case so i have therefore withdrawn all of my items from sale until i can have my cd contents verified.
 
Fair play for sticking your head over the parapet here. Hopefully this will get resolved calmly and fairly (y)
 
TriggerHappy said:
Fair play for sticking your head over the parapet here. Hopefully this will get resolved calmly and fairly (y)
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Yep fair play indeed, but as a fellow tog I am sure you can understand peoples's concern over this, but as usual on internet forums and maybe more so on this forum people jump to conclusions before having all the facts.

Hope it all gets sorted
 
Thank you for your support. Yes i do understand the concerns of photographers and that is why i have taken fast measures to withdraw my items from sale whilst I have them verified and revised appropriately.
 
five said:
Thank you for your support. Yes i do understand the concerns of photographers and that is why i have taken fast measures to withdraw my items from sale whilst I have them verified and revised appropriately.
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Fair play for withdrawing them from sale asap. However, I see you've been selling lots & lots of different CD's, each with hundreds of images. Aside from your own, it looks like you've been pulling images from lots of different sources, many of which I'm sure you either won't remember or be able to verify.

It would seem safer to just stick with selling your own images rather than taking them from anywhere else at all. Those who've had their images taken by you (at least two people have noticed) have every right to be angry at having them sold on.
 
five said:
I am the seller that you are all discussing and I am shocked and distressed by the tone of your messages. Just for your information: my cds contained mainly my own images - I am a photographer and an artist, any other images that i added to my collections were, as far as i was aware, royalty free. It has been brought to my attention that this may not be the case so i have therefore withdrawn all of my items from sale until i can have my cd contents verified.
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Surely you ensure and verify that the images do not have any copyright before selling them. How did you come to the conclusion that the images you used were "royalty free"?
 
Anyone sees these cd's for sale again, buy one just so that you can leave a feedback rating which says you are the copyright holder of some images contained within the cd and that you will be taking action against the sale of your images. That might put some people off buying it. Then report the seller.

This whole thing is another good reason to justify me putting my url across my own images, never uploading high res examples and always putting my copyright info in the file information.
 
The internet is full of charlatans. Ebay just seems to be a storage den for most of the best in the business :mad:
 
five said:
I am the seller that you are all discussing and I am shocked and distressed by the tone of your messages.
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You may well be "shocked and distressed by the tone" here, but what has been said and the manner it has been conveyed in has been perfectly reasonable and polite. Perhaps you would find a letter from a solicitor less shocking and distressing? As a "photographer and artist" selling work, you should be thoroughly familiar with copyright issues, and you should be grateful that you have been given a wake-up call in such a pleasant way.

Perhaps you would be happy with us copying your CDs and reselling them on E Bay or here?
 
Surely "royalty free", if that is what they are, gives people the right to use the images. It doesn't extend to flogging the images for profit.
 
five said:
I am the seller that you are all discussing and I am shocked and distressed by the tone of your messages. Just for your information: my cds contained mainly my own images - I am a photographer and an artist, any other images that i added to my collections were, as far as i was aware, royalty free. It has been brought to my attention that this may not be the case so i have therefore withdrawn all of my items from sale until i can have my cd contents verified.
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I agree with the other person who said 'as a photographer yourself, you should be well aware of copyright issues'. (y)

Sounds to me like you're peeved to have been found out to be a thief.:shake:

Lisa
 
2blue4u said:
Surely "royalty free", if that is what they are, gives people the right to use the images. It doesn't extend to flogging the images for profit.
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Magazines use them for profit :thinking:
 
Magazines usually (if they are honorable) will not outright steal images - they will enter into a contract for use of the image. I dont believe that this lady has done most of these photographs herself. They are just too far ranging - extreme weather, border collies, landscapes from all over the world by the looks of things. She has sold sports cd's with every sport imaginable - just impossible to be photographing all of these sports....or she is one heckuva busy woman!. I believe she has been stealing from the net and her luck has run out. I hope e-bay kicks her off for good. Miserable of her to be profiting from the works of others.
 
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royalty free does not mean they are "free" to purchase.
They are "free" to be used as one likes and as often as one likes, ie they are not under a licence.
They still have to be purchased in the first place.
 
Wikipedia:

Royalty-free is a term employed in negotiating the right to use creative content, such as photographs, video, or music. The term royalty-free means that once the content is licensed under a set of guidelines, the licensee is normally free to use it in perpetuity without paying additional royalty charges.

Royalty-free licenses contrast with rights-managed licenses, which usually allow buyers to use the content in very specific ways, with restrictions placed on things like period of time used, geographic region, industry, size published, etc. Rights Managed is so called because the licensor is specifically managing the publishing rights for the content.

For an image that has been licensed as royalty-free, the licensor is unable to provide a history of usage to a prospective licensee. This may negatively affect the licensee, because they cannot be assured specific content is not being used in a certain geographical region by a competitor, for example. There are examples of the same royalty-free content being used in large promotional advertising campaigns by competitors.

The concept of royalty-free comes from copyright, a statute that allows authors and publishers of works to be the sole arbiter of the exploitation of that work, and to set fees associated with that work. The economic incentives afforded by copyright give artists one way to make a living through their creative works.

Typically, the royalty charged for content under a royalty-free license is based on the physical attributes of the content. For example, the larger pixel size of a digital image, the larger the fee, since the licensee gains more benefit from an image with more resolution. The typical charge for an image that reproduces well at a two page magazine spread size may incur a charge of up to $500, whereas a blog-sized image may run much less. Likewise, a longer piece of music or a more complex Flash animation could command higher prices.

Royalty-free does not mean a user is free to take and use whatever content they find available to them.It only refers to a specific licensing contract between two entities. The licensor, usually the content creator, always retains all copyright to the content, including the ability to distribute it, or allow redistribution. Each licensing contract is different. Some may allow reselling of items that include that content, such as a t-shirt or calendar with an image, and others do not. The terms of the license should be researched, to be assured if the license includes the rights desired by the licensee.
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To anyone who has the CD, I suggest looking for the metadata of each file and contacting any photographers who sensibly filled it in. It won't take that long and you'd be doing them a favour - unless the eBay seller is dedicated enough to conning people to have stripped it all out, of course.

Anyone who has found their images to be used here should be invoicing the eBay seller, before proceeding with court action against them if that doesn't work.
 
Five: If you are not the artist/photograher then you have no rights to sell on anyone else's work. I trust you will be contacting all the buyers of the CD's and letting them know that they have no right to use them either?

As has already been mentioned, royalty free does not mean free to take and use, it is covered by a particular licence and I have never seen any that include resale
 
Lower than a snake's belly - should be ashamed at the bare-faced cheek of it. However, she's probably not the only person to have done this and she won't be the last. Yep, she's apologised but I take it she won't be sending the profit to the rightful owners?
 
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five said:
.....any other images that i added to my collections were, as far as i was aware, royalty free.....
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Sharon,
If you read the "Terms and Conditions" of the hosting site where you sell your own images (presumably your own), it clearly states that "Copyright of Rights Managed and Royalty Free images remains with the photographer".

I assume that you read and understood these terms when you signed up so what lead you to believe that the rules were different for other peoples' images?

Bob
 
stuart anthony said:
royalty free does not mean they are "free" to purchase.
They are "free" to be used as one likes and as often as one likes, ie they are not under a licence.
They still have to be purchased in the first place.
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Good grief .... what a confused and misleading statement.
 
Looks like some copyright law suites maybe swanning the way of the purple swan, looks like it could be costly to me for a certain swanbody.
 
Ajophotog said:
Looks like some copyright law suites maybe swanning the way of the purple swan, looks like it could be costly to me for a certain swanbody.
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Alby, do you know if any of yours were on the disc? If so, how? I'm interested in case any of mine are on there....(doubtful though!)
 
davekiddle said:
Alby, do you know if any of yours were on the disc? If so, how? I'm interested in case any of mine are on there....(doubtful though!)
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Dunno Dave, I have hidden loads of my images on flickr lately due to people thieving them, I had a Australian gov site nick some booklice shots, I sent them a invoice and they said sorry and removed them within the hour, the cheeky buggers.
 
Ajophotog said:
Dunno Dave, I have hidden loads of my images on flickr lately due to people thieving them, I had a Australian gov site nick some booklice shots, I sent them a invoice and they said sorry and removed them within the hour, the cheeky buggers.
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Ah, I wondered why some of the images on your old posts on here weren't showing up.

Barstewards! Can't you insist they pay though, as they have used them?
 
They used them on their website and removed them rather then pay so I'm ok with that, if they had if put them into a publication that would be a different matter entirely.
 
I don't know why people think apologising for copyright infringement makes it all ok in the end. She sold those images to make a profit, then when found apologised for it? I wander how that would stand up in court...
 
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