I am not a lawyer, so it would not be correct or polite of me to make a specific judgment on your issue, but I can nonetheless share my opinion.

When you posted the image to the forum site as your avatar, you were implicitly granting certain use rights for that image to the proprietors of that website, which would make it difficult for you to seek recourse against them. However, you said that the post in question “made national coverage,” which indicates to me that maybe it appeared in the news media somehow.

The fact is that the news media, through first amendment protections, probably carries practically no copyright infringement liability in this case. The editorial use of photographic images and re-postings of website content, etc., is protected under “fair use,” because it is not commercial, but rather editorial. It is precisely these protections that make our society free.

If anything, you should look at the bright side: your image has now been viewed by many people!

I think that despite my strong phrasing, you have misinterpreted the message I was trying to get across, which is simply that audacious watermarking does little to prevent misappropriation of images on the Internet and more to distract from their content.

I am skeptical that an image presented on the Internet for the purposes of a gallery would provide much in the way of profit for any third party; such images are of too small a pixel dimension (or at least, should be) to be reproduced in any pleasing way. Images used improperly on other websites are a fact of life, and one that can be combated using technologies such as Digimarc. Still, the damage done by such re-posting of images is, I feel, largely overestimated.

To what degree does the availability of a 600-square-pixel image impact sales to real customers whose needs are much greater? As you said, you use your website to back up contacts you make in real life, with people who are genuinely interested in legitimate use of your work. The same fallacy is demonstrated by the Recording Industry Association of America, who claims that every mp3 download is a lost sale. In actuality, it is not likely that even 5% of the songs downloaded illegally would have been purchased by those individuals, and those individuals have a tendency to purchase the songs and albums they feel are worth the money in the first place. The iTunes Music Store should be a resounding example of that theory.

That said, we all have our ways of doing things and there is no “right” way or “wrong” way; I simply stated my opinion and I thank you for taking the time to state yours.

This is a hell of a read :)

I found it via PopPhoto Flash (I think) and I gotta say I’m impressed. I’m also glad to hear I’m not the only one who find watermarking incredibly tacky and ugly.

I’ve added you to my RSS feeds and blogroll :)

Your ability as a photographer to understand and apply the tools and techniques available to protect your copyrights will contribute largely to how easily someone else can wrongly profit from your work and how easily you can seek remedies for that infr…