CyberMinions.net

great Tips C.  I imagine you sitting at a desk with all sorts of warning buzzers and bells.  Thanks for keeping an eye out for us.  I do use google alerts but not any of the others.  May have to start paying attention more.  Have a great Monday Sis

Thank you, Paddy. Enjoy your day as well, sweetie. :-)

C,  I don't know how u find the time to continue to put out informative and content rich blogs! I blog a fraction of what you do and I feel like I need a staff writer!!!

Luv ya!

Wow....I didn't even know that was out there. Now I'm convinced you never sleep! I wish I had half your energy! Amazing....I'm glad you are out there watching out for us! XO

Thank you C.  You should start an on-line P.I. firm. Wordy C - All Knowing, All Seeing!

C, Thank you for the information.  The only thing I have set up is Google Alerts (and plenty of them) but they're not going to show me my pictures.  I'm bookmarking this and can investigate your other suggestions but isn't it a shame we sometimes spend more time looking for plagiarism then being able to write?  It's become big business to steal.

C - To be honest, I have been afraid to check for plagiarism of my stuff...  but I will now.  Question: what do you do when you find it??

Wendy, it is up to you to decide to ask for it to be taken down or decide that it is okay for them to use it. You own the copyright so you get to decide each instance what you want to do. I usually e-mail them and start a conversation. Sometimes people are just fans and they don't know they can't take your stuff without permission. Sometimes they are something else and need to be stopped. You have to decide what is the best action for what you discover.

Carole, it is getting crazy. I had a site claiming they had my painting for sale when I didn't paint what they were selling. I had another sight that copied my work and put it on the market for twice they were going for. I guess the assumption was if they found a buyer they would purchase them from the gallery that represents me and make a profit. That flipped my bitch switch like you wouldn't believe. I had the site shut down. It is the worst type of fraud to advertise you have something for sale in your possession that you don't own and are not authorized to sell. I watch my photographs because I do not want them showing up as some fly by night stock photography collection. Had a fight about that as well. Some yahoo once sold me an image they didn't own and I found out almost a year later. I was really pissed... This is why I advocate original content. Take your own shots and you don't have to worry about other people's crap if they are not correct.

Jane, I have friends with PI licenses and they are not happy doing divorce cases (LOL). I like working with attorneys on an as needed basis. Variety is the sice of life. I can say no and not be fired from a firm (LMAO).

Karen, there is even more out there. I just like these. :-)

Tom, 20 minutes here, 20 minutes there (LOL). ;-)

Hey C,

Just like my mom said people love taking the easy way out and stealing other peoples content...it's happen to my mother sooo many times and it's so frustrating that they get away with it.  Thanks for sharing this information...you say they take your art work too?  As a fellow artist I understand how annoying that can be...your heart and the hard work that goes into those creations should not be easily swiped from you.  Yes, take a STAND!

Laura, I am on the war path when it comes to my paintings. My gal pal was messing with me today because she has been waiting for her portrait for months now (LOL). I'm picky. I keep creating and destroying them, so when I finally do decide something is cool and actually display it, it pisses me off that some dumb dumb thinks it is okay to swipe the image and do what they want with it without my permission or the consent of my model who was kind enough to pose.

My friends are frequently dragged into my sketchbooks (LOL). The deal is if they pose for me they get a free-bee and I get unlimited rights to portray them. Because they trust me I have to be careful and protective of where they wind up. It is usually Art News or the Gallery Guide and a few Gallery websites, not some fly by night looking to make a quick buck because the assumption is no one is watching.

I create a lot of images with my kids and they usually are my biggest on-line argument. It has gotten better since I started making a point to search weekly and bitch openly on my blog (not to mention demanding they produce the model release forms when they lie and say they took the photograph instead of me - LOL). I'm their Mama. I didn't sign it. I know they can't produce it because my kids only work for me. I pay them in M&Ms with peanuts (LMAO).  ;-)

Hi C, the pic thing is so funny! I used to sell on ebay. When I would find someone that stole my pics and they used the same URL (stuuuuupid!) I would replace the pic with a porn pic! And that auction would get removed. Thanks for the tips!

OMG - Jackie!!!!!! :-O (LOL)

C - where do you find the time? Thanks for sharing this. I have found a few of my articles/pictures out there but by accident. This will help.

Big Mike, you are very welcome. I am glad that you guys are finding this useful. :-)

C- Ah, then you get the ones from other countries where we can not even get them prosecuted- we had our entire keywords grabbed, our names grabbed, and then attached to a porn site!!! I could not get them for the life of me! There are certain countries that just don't care. 

ok I need your help.

I got this step rep alert today.

CLicked it on and I am in the middle of the page.

Why?

I just don't get it.

Can you take a look?

http://elvis.rowan.edu/geograp ... 0/000/077/000/rsa/canipay.html

Missy I clicked the link and the browser couldn't find the page. Hmm...

Nestor & Katrina, some tasks are more difficult than others... Not impossible but time consuming.

I always wondered how people could find their photographs... it's not like you can do a "word" search for them.  Thanx

Thanks for the tips C. I use icliart for some photos and images but find it to be very limited. Is there another website that you know of that offers good quality photos for purchase at a reasonable rate?

Wow.  What great information to share.  I had no idea of how to track my work.  I will have to come back often, and try to put this in to a system.  

Great information. When I become important enough to steal from, I will use your resources. Not there yet.

C...thanks for the great tips and links to protect our photos and content.  Time, time, where do you find it with all you do and the kids.....guess we should call you the AR super MOM member.

Joe, you have no idea unless you look(LOL). People see stuff they like and start "borrowing" it because they don't realize how complicated the violations can become if the owner doesn't forgive them and/or grant permission to use. A cease and desist letter with a fine attached should be taken very seriously. The fine usually is part of a stipulation of restitution for the unauthorized use in the take down notice. If a person ignores their chance to miss court by settling with the copyright owner, the fines generally start growing with each demand until the owner decides okay, time to take you to court to protect my material. By then the expenses really start racking up because now there are court costs, attorney fees, etc. That initial $500 letter or $2000 letter will seem so much more reasonable than being slapped by a court order with judgments asking for $10,000, $25,000 or even $100,000. The court judgments can be for any amount along the statutes spectrum. Imagine getting hit with a possible $250,000 fine. That would a be an "Oh crap - There goes the house..." moment.

I would not wish that on anyone. Yelling take it down and having my stuff come down makes me happy. I move on when people comply with the request. If they don't then I do what needs to be done to keep my kids on my websites and not where they don't belong. My shorties are cute and people laugh at my stories and sometimes do stuff with my work they are not supposed to. Some people even go so far as to take my name off and pass the work along as theirs when it doesn't belong to them, they did not create it and gamble on the fact that people generally do not look for their stuff.

Here is a partial quote you can read the entire article if you click on it from CheckForPlagiarism.net: "...the true author could sue the plagiarist in federal court for "false designation of origin", 15 USC, Section 1125, since the plagiarist was misrepresenting someone else's work as his own..."

This is why people who scrape content and web feed entire pages without permission should stop abusing widgets and tools that are neutral items in and of themselves. You can't blame the tool. You can blame the user of the tool. Cut and paste bloggers and script jockies need to realize it can be an expensive path to go down. I have never sued anyone for swiping my work (not yet anyway). Getting cranky in public works well with me when being nice in private does not. Then I send them a collection of selected links to help them understand what is wrong with what they have done. That's why the work eventually comes down. No one wants to be on the hook for attorney's fees and fines (LOL).

Alan, you are very welcome. :-)

Sybil, I have quite a list and may have to create a post for you. I love the Kodak collection. I have image disks from them that are very cool. :-)

Tere, glad you found it useful. :-)

Rebecca, more like the Mom who naps because her friggin' kids wont sleep at the same time (ROTFL). If one of them is up, one of us has to stay up. Did I mention my kids are crazy? Busy and crazy? They are funny as hell when they get started so I don't mind most of the time because I am very easily amused (LOL).

C.,

Thank you so much for sharing this with us. I will look into who's doing what with my images.   I am very careful of waht I post so that if someone 'borrows" it, I would be very upset, but it would not be terrible. Excellent post (as always)!!

What a great resource! Thanks for the tip- I will be looking for your next blog on Syndication.

www.GarrigusRealEstate.com

C,

Thank you for the information!  I did not know photo searches were possible unless you were on a CSI show - or 24!  I do use the Google Alerts and, while I'e found nothing out of place, it is intereting how the little I have "out there" turns up over time.

I'm glad these tools are here & helping. Thank you for sharing & all the time you put into this!

Bruce

Hey C - when you become a famous writer and publisher, we'll be able to say we knew you back when you were jacking posts! :-)

I dont post many pictures.  I am not overally concerned at this point with people using my content but overall I understand protecting it and why.

Chuck, it really is okay not to mind because you get to make decisions about what is the acceptable use or unacceptable use of your material. The protections are there for the people who need them. :-)

Lori, if that ever happens I will still be here jacking posts and spoofing with my bay-bays (ROTFL). I love this place. Look at all the famous people who blog here who haven't changed a bit(e.g. Elizabeth Weintraub and Margaret Rome). :-)

Bruce, you are very welcome. :-)

Todd, it is huge and I am working on making it so long only serious people will read it (LMAO). I refuse to chop it up. I want all of the links to be in one place. :-)

Jeana, you are very welcome. I've discovered a few people who actually created fan pages and collected every mixpo, facebook and youtube video I ever posted on-line. I was stunned. Didn't say a peep to them but I was really, really stunned. It took a lot of work to do that. They really liked my music and thought the kids were a pip. Sometimes you have to let fans be fans when they advertise you better than you do (LOL). Copyright owners can decide what stays and what goes but if you don't know where it is you can't make that decision. :-)

Jeez....how do you find all this stuff?  When do you sleep?  You are amazing.  I can barely keep up with all the new stuff that pops up on the internet daily.  I think someone up above said you probably have alerts on your desk.  lol

Thanks for the tip on TinEye. I didn't know there were reverse image search sites available. I'm planning on including a lot more photos in my posts this year, and this site will come in handy.

C Tann,

Once again, you are sooooo far ahead of me.  Thanks for sharing all of your knowledge.  I'm gonna get to work!  Happy serving and selling 2010!

kp

Carolyn - A very timely post for me.. I too have pictures clipped from me quite often.. In fact the Newspaper The Record just used one of my pics without crediting me. I did get them to correct this in the next days edition crediting me with the shot. I use Google alerts all the time.. It's amazing how many people I find using my pics... I will look into to this later tonight... Have to go get a listing now Yay!

C Tann - This is a very timely post for me, just last week I stumbled on someone else using my pictures through google images.  I'll definitely be checking out www.tineye.com.  Thank you for sharing all of this great information!

Hi C....as always, thanks for the great post. I'm going to check this out.

Patricia/Seacoast NH

I've bookmarked it for future reference.

Patricia

HI C,

Wow, cannot begin to explain the valuable info you shared here. This is a big issue and won't be resolved anytime soon. However, if we all took action like you to keep monitoring our stuff it would go a long way. 

Lorraine

C...

I saw this post earlier in the day. I just came back to thank you for it.

I also thought it would be a good idea to warn the Membership I'll be looking for my images.

Can we say Lawsuit? I plan to use the funds collected for some self serving selfish reason :)

TLW...ROAR!

Great stuff! Would you be willing to come on Social Media Edge and talk about this here in the near future?

I have seen your bay-bay protection in action and I admire the voracity with which you pursue the ragged fringe of leaches out there. Keep up the great work.

What a great collection of useful sites! Thanks so much for taking the time to put this together. Some I was aware of, some not. I'll be checking them all out soon! Thanks again ;)

C- I have been alerted by Google  alert of my content being used else where.  Sometimes it is overseas so not much can be done.

The sites you mentioned are really handy.

Hi C -- I rarely have looked online for this, but then again, I'm not sure anyone would want my stuff anyway LOL, but it would tick me off if they did.  You are very sophisticated and have even more tricks up your sleeve.  I barely have enough time to blog, let alone try and find deadbeats who would want to steal stuff.  I'm glad you are diligent, I wish no one had a need to do this, what a sad commentary on human behavior eh?

C- I had no clue that these "tools" existed.  So, again, I must humbly thank you for keeping all of us informed.  I don't have that much now in the way of photos or blogs that anyone would want to use but who knows.  Someday, someone might.  BTW: if you pay in peanut M&M"s, you can take my pic and use it anytime!

WoW C - This is great information. I think this is something I really should check into. Thanks for sharing !

I have to bookmark this and come back to it... as always you provide such good information and so do many of the people who comment...  I feel clueless among you.. thank you very much

interesting

I can't believe what is going on out there! Thanks for keeping us informed...and for the valuable tools we can use to make sure our content is left un-meddled with...

Hi C Tann, I use Google alert for my main keywords. It can quickly become an overwhelming job to track and look at what you are publishing online...

Bookmarked it, don't have enough stuff out there yet but I can really see why you need to protect it, especially the little ones.

Thanks.

Good stuff C. The larger the body of content we create, the more exposure we have to this theft. I've already had to file one DMCA. 

Wow!  Useful tips.  I've bookmarked it.  It's amazing all you can do with technology.

Count me as another "Wow!". Good stuff here, and lots of it. I'm going to start looking for some of my pictures today.

You are incredible, CC, for sharing this. Some rainy afternoons, if business is slow, I might check out copyscape and notify plagiarizers, but it generally irritates me so much that I end up feeling like wringing their necks, so I don't do it. But I do go after major media when they do it.

C.....as a former paralegal I KNOW how your mind works and I LOVE IT!!!!  Great links and info....keep it up.

Wow, C, you are scary smart. I wish I had a few more hours a day to do all I should be doing here...

Oh my word... I have a lot of people to chat with tonight (LOL).

Okay, shall be back after the wee people have their showers and select their bedtime movie. We had a great day today. I put the shorties to work right after school and we've been running the streets for hours. Noah took some really great shots in Cunninghan park and I have to post the film of him doing this in Facebook before I embed it here (as well as post the pics) because I promised I'd let you guys see how he picks them.

The strange part is sometimes I hear the shutter click and he appears completely oblivious to it. Then you look at the shot and go: OMG. That is really cool. WTF??? How do you do that??? (LOL). He darts forward, backs up, darts forward and you're thinking what a waste of simm card and he's thinking gotcha, got it, gotcha (LMAO).

Dude has a wonderful photographer's eye for a 7 year old. I think part of his Autism quirks regarding patterns and textures is going to make him a great artist when he grows up. I bet I could license some of his photography right now because he has a really cool perspective for a kid. Wait until you see some of today's shots. They'd make a nice poster and/or calendar. This is going to be a fun year for eye candy hunting. I may have to buy him his own Nikon for his birthday. He'll be 8 at the end of the month. I'm thinking camera, game room and pizza... :-)

Entry level camera for that kid for sure! Encourage all levels of creativity!

Great tips, C. Thanks so much for educating all of us! I'm off to sign up . . .

Hi C...I see I have some catching up to do.  This was a great read and now I'm off to find your web syndication post.

Kate

Great post. Thanks for putting this together.  Gives me a few new tools.

My web syndication post is going to be a very long read. I'm editing it but it seems to be growing rather than shrinking (LOL). I have a lot to share with you guys... Will try to get the rest of the links done today after I get the shorties in school.  :-)