Is it ok to use google images

google images are just images on internet. MOST of them are copyrighted, you can not use them without paying or permission. acrually, as far as I know, many people had to pay the penalty, such as $3000/image, simply because you used copyrighted images on their website.

there are some public domain image database online, search google, make sure they are in public domain. you can use these for anything, usually.


david

Here's the thread you need to carefully read and follow! Definitely a nice little money maker if applied correctly as directed...
http://www.warriorforum.com/main-int...s-mistake.html

Dave

Doubt it if you want to avoid any troubles. Try the Creative Commons search where you can search for images licensed under the creative commons allowing you to use it on your sites.

Google images doesn't mean a thing, an image is either under copyright or it isn't. If it is under copyright you can't use it.

So I have a question then about these "copyrighted images" that you will find on Google.

If that's the case, why can Google place them on their website legally? I mean what gives them the copyright permission to place it on there?

I expect those things can be used.

Rahul

But the images from sites which are copyrighted. it won't be a good idea to copy.

Rahul

There's plenty of stock photo sites out there that give you free images you can use on your site. No need to use google images afaic, and better to be safe than sorry

Just Google "free stock photographs" and you should find something useful.

ric

istockphoto.com

You can get royalty-free images there for as low as $1 each. They also have various license agreements that allow you to do different things with the images as well.

Images indexed in Google are a form of promotion for the photographer or artist.

Think of it this way: When you write an article to promote a website or product, you're hoping (and trying usually) to get that article noticed in Google and other search engines. By getting it ranked well and noticed, Google will likely send lots of traffic to the website and/or product you're trying to promote.

Getting your article indexed in Google does not automatically make that article copyright free and/or free for the taking and using by anyone who wants to, right? Hopefully everybody knows this by now - That article is still copyrighted by you and it is illegal for someone to simply copy and paste it to their own sites/materials.

The same applies to images. Google indexes and organizes them just like they do websites and articles. The photographer or artist who created the images allow Google to do this because it's a form of promotion for them.

There are plenty of people online who just want to share their work, skills, knowledge or talents - writers and website/blog builders as well as people who draw, paint, photograph and so on. In those cases the people who create the materials may not care who uses it or how.

There are others however, who do these things for a living. They write articles, books, websites and so on as a way to earn money. And the SAME thing applies to artists - photographers, painters, etc create these things to earn money from them. These items are actually their PRODUCTS that get sold.

So just taking images from the Google image search area could mean you're stealing someone's products and livelihood.

Since Google does not actually own the content itself (text or images) they cannot give you permission to use anything in any given way. They can only tell you "we found this here, go take a look". The owner of the content - again text or images - is the only person who can tell you if you're allowed to use that content, and how.

Hope that helps a bit,
Kathy

And to be on the safe side, since this is often mis-understood: Royalty Free is NOT the same thing as free.

A royalty is an ongoing payment. If you're familiar with residual affiliate programs, the concept is the same: You continue getting additional payments based on either a time span or number of uses.

Timespan royalties are like monthly or yearly subscriptions - a person has to continue paying each month or each year in order to keep the service.

A usage royalty limits how many places or times you can use a given license for something. You see this with some types of software: You buy a license that allows you to use the software on just ONE computer or ONE website. If you want to use it on additional computers or sites, you have to pay additional licensing fees.

Royalty based photo/image/artwork fees are the same. You have to pay additional money to use it in additional places or ways.

Royalty free means you only pay for the image once. You still have to pay for it though. That one time payment gives you the license to use it as often as you'd like, and/or in as many ways as you'd like. Sometimes there are restrictions or limitations and sometimes there aren't, but the point is you still have to pay for a license to use the image. It's not free of cost, it's just free of future payments and costs.

Yes. google images cannot be used.

i suggest one of the stock sites:
istockphoto.com
bigstockphoto.com
or the great free one:
sxc.hu
(although you need to email the artist for permission!)
Also... most of wikipedia's images are copyright free. Just click on the image you want, and scroll down, there should be a licence there!

Mubarak

You should just buy one or two Click Art packages. They can be purchased from Amazon and office supply stores like Staples.

Thanks for the help guys. Lots of great resources mentioned for me to have a look at. And great thread Dave.

Cheers