Shame on FlickR & NYT

[Jim Bryant]

Pretty shocking post on a NY Times blog advising people to decorate their houses with photos taken from Flickr; "you may not have realized that the photo-sharing site combined with a photo printer can be an invaluable decorating resource." And even better "Oh, and if you‚re wondering about copyright issues (after all, these aren’t my photos), the photos are being used by me for my own, private, non-commercial use. I‚m not selling these things and not charging admission to my apartment, so I think I‚m in the clear. (Any lawyers out there who want to weigh in on this?)"

I find this amazing that the NY Times would allow this to be posted. Your thoughts all?

NY Times blog

Why do you find this amazing? Do you think that the NYT actually CARES about photographers? Ever seen a NYT photo contract or their fee schedule?

I don't agree with her advice, but if you post high res images on a photo sharing site you are bound to get ripped off. The reality is that if a photographer is serious about people not ripping them off they will register their image, post lo res images with a watermark and preferably embed the proper meta data that relates to copyright and contact info. Anything less is pretty much a license for the public (who don't care about photographers or our rights either) to steal away. Actually even if you do all this, it is still open season on your photos once they hit cyberspace, but that is another post for another day...

[Dayna]

I don't like that at all! What if the person was printing out a picture of my daughter and hanging it on thier wall? Yikes. I'm changing my Flickr controls to NOT be able to download the fullsize.

Thanks for posting this!

[digirebelva]

remember that a lot who post on flickr neither know nor care about copyright or whether or not someone is "borrowing" their images for use...some simply want the exposure and/or the credit that the borrower will obviously give (yeah right)

as others have said, you post your images online its open season..
especially if you are foolish enough to post full-size images without copyright on them..(yes I know the determined can remove them)..

[lputman]

Quite pathetic of her!

[fletch]

This is what I wrote as a comment to that blog a while ago.

"This could have been an ariticle that promted so much good, helped the flickr comunitity, raised awareness of copyright issues etc. However its seems your lazy style to decorating your home is replicated in you journalism. Some research would have been nice.

You could have mentioned CC licenced images or that you Flickr Mailed the photographers to ask permision to reproduce their © images. You could have added links to the flickr photogrphers whos work you have used giving them the exposure of being on an NYT blog. It would have been great.

Instead you took the lazy option and ended up perpetuating the myth that the internet is one big image library to use as they see fit."

I really hope the NYT comes down on here like a ton of bricks. Despite the encouragement to break copyright it very sloppy jounalism. If I did my job this badly I'd get fired.

[fletch]

On the bright side the she has to go home to a house full of images that will now make her feel very guilty. Hope she feels the shame every time she looks up.

[bobajob]

Hello Jim
I have posted images on flickr. They are very small will not print bigger than a half a post card, does this help?

[SusanH1970]

I found this - thought it was pretty funny.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/smacknally/3662230823/

[RustySterling]

I know that I'm not happy about the blog or that NYT would publish it. I'd think editorss at a newspaper of the stature of NYT would be more sensitive to the issue of copyright. Thankfully, I only upload downsized images to my Flickr account and also have those images protected from downloads. But that doesn't help if someone does a screen capture.

NYT should be ashamed.

[waffles]

Originally Posted by waffles' email to Assistant Managing Editor Michele McNally

Since the NY TImes obviously has no problem with theft as shown by the publishing of Sonia Zjawinski's post "Flickr as an Interior Decorating Tool ," does this mean I can go steal copies of the NY Times as long as I only plan to use them for myself?

Because by her logic, it looks like I can take a copy and read it for myself as long as I don't use them for commercial purposes.

I'm looking forward to your answer,
Chris Osborne

I sent this to assistent editor. I have a feeling she'll get a lot of stuff like this.