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Clarification on Image Copyright Issues

by henry1805
6 replies
Hi Everyone,

Was wondering if anyone could enlighten me on issue of image copyrights?

It has been bothering me for a very long time. I am running a sports blog, so naturally i would like to use a lot of athlete's images, people like Michael Phelps, Michael Jordan, Tiger Woods etc.

However, I am very afraid of infringing on copyrights when i use them, so much so that very often i dun use it at all. Right now, Zemanta (for wordpress) helps a little by pulling images from wiki and allowed sources, but the images are usually not fantastic.

I noticed many many sports blogs are using similar high quality images as well, some of them seem to straight off Olympics or from Getty Images.

I think its reasonable to think that very popular sports blog or authority sites like NYTimes, or NBC probably purchased the rights, maybe from Getty to use it, but i dun think the smaller blogs would pay that amount of money.

I understand there are free stock photos online, but they do not have pictures of athletes from NBA, EPL, Roger Federer, etc. Can anyone tell me if it is possible for me to just search online for images and copy and use them? If not, then can anyone tell me how come there are so many sports sites that uses them? Is there any way to go about this? Anyone have any experience to share?


sorry for the long post, i really need a clarification on this.
#clarification #copyright #image #issues
  • Profile picture of the author CSwrite
    Hi Henry!

    A lot of bloggers will just pull an image and use it, regardless of the copyright. They figure if anyone complains, no big deal - they'll just pull the image. Nine times out of ten, no one probably notices. While it's nice for bloggers, it's bad for photographers that need to get paid.

    Buzznet.com has quite a few images - some are copyrighted, some not, it's a big mix.

    Flickr allows you to search for only images that can be used commercially and once in a while you can find a few on there to use.

    There is a sports only licensing photo agency, DNA News

    They are pretty limited though and charge a pretty penny.

    It's a tough call, you can stick with so-so images and obey copyrights, or you can grab indiscriminately and get really nice images. Some bloggers will go the Corbis route and just use the watermarked imaged.

    It's nice to see that you do care about copyrights though! If I find any good sports photo sources, I'll pass them along to you.

    CS
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    • Profile picture of the author SpicyRobby
      There's a nice service -- PicApp - the best content for the best publishers -- dedicated specifically for bloggers.

      Those pictures aren't really images - they're inserted as scripts, but still you get all the latest stuff.

      Rgds,

      Robert
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      • Profile picture of the author BIG Mike
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        • Profile picture of the author Treece
          Copyrights on images belong to the photographer or publication that paid the photographer to take the photo. You can't use them without permission from the person that owns the image.

          Photographers will usually demand that you take an image down if you are using it without permission. It is no different than taking someone's copy, article, or web design and graphics. It's how they make a living and taking it without permission is outright stealing.

          My husband is a commercial photographer and has had numerous photos "taken". The first thing we check for is a photo credit and a link to our site. If it is positive, and the image provides him visibility and credibility, he might let it go. If the website owner or blogger has outright stolen the image for his own profit, we will demand it be taken down.

          I can't offer legal advice, but I hope this helps.
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          • Profile picture of the author scene4u
            I buy pictures from iStock.com to save any copyright issues. The photos are normally quite good and relatively cheap.
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            • Profile picture of the author ExRat
              Hi Robert,

              There's a nice service -- PicApp - the best content for the best publishers -- dedicated specifically for bloggers.
              That's REALLY useful - thanks. Where were you on my other thread the other day where CSwrite was trying to help me find a solution for the same problem?

              No matter, I have what I need. Just need to see how much they plaster their logo/watermark all over the pics. Cheers!
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              • Profile picture of the author henry1805
                Wow! This is extremely valuable information! Thanks to everyone else for your input.

                CS >> Yeah, me really dun want to be involved in some needless copyright legal issues, so really wish to get this out of my way. And i really appreciate your offer to provide me any sources of sports photos.

                This forum is fantastic!
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