Lay My Hat

Has anyone ever linked through to pictures on your web site without your knowledge, acknowledgement or permission?

Recently I found a B&B on Dartmoor that had linked through to a picture of Torcross beach on one of my sites. Rather than getting into a grumpy argument, I changed the name of the picture file on my site and replaced the original with the same image but with the addition of a prominent slogan:
http://lustleighdartmoor.com/things-to-do/
(7th picture down on the right)

In fact, the majority of those images are linked in from other sites like Geograph and the BBC.

If you want to see if any of your images have been hijacked, browse your site with Google Chrome. Right-click on likely images and select 'Search Google for this image'.

So not even a case of nicking your picture, but linking to it......

I'll have to check mine some time when I've got a spare afternoon and can remember how to disable the right click disable (which probably serves very little purpose, although it might foil the likes of Bev)

ps I don't suppose devon holiday cottages, kingsbridge holiday cottages and toad hall cottages would be particularly chuffed at Bev's antics either.....

Cant see a problem myself. That may even count with google as an incoming link. You can never have too many of those

Klockstone, are you actually telling us that you have sought the permission of all the site owners of all the pictures on that example page ? I didn't see any acknowledgement on that page, so maybe I've misunderstood your issue ?

e-richard wrote:Klockstone, are you actually telling us that you have sought the permission of all the site owners of all the pictures on that example page ? I didn't see any acknowledgement on that page, so maybe I've misunderstood your issue ?

Richard, the page that Klockstone references isn't his - it's the page of Bev who's been linking to other pix without acknowledgements - including one of Klockstone's.

Unless I've misunderstood your misunderstanding........

Richard - no, what I'm saying is that 'Bev' has linked through to my web site:
http://www.bucklandcourt.com/but_pic_slap.php (7th image down) and used my Intellectual Property (ie photo) without my knowledge, acknowledgement or permission.

She will have no idea of what she's doing - just googled nice images for her website, not changed the search for the relevant usage rights and landed with an image from your website. I'm not saying it's right, having had several copyright issues happen to me, it's very unpleasant, but inevitable it seems as most people, (apart from those that have LMH to educate them ) have no clue about copyright and image rights.

I would hope that actually Bev maybe quite willing to learn, especially as you've now linked to an image that's advertising your place. You see I wouldn't have thought about doing what you have; not sure I'd know how to either!

I like your style, klockstone

FC (filing this away for future use )

klockstone wrote:Richard - no, what I'm saying is that 'Bev' has linked through to my web site....

Humble apologies.
I did completely misread your post and indeed, like FC, I like your solution

I think there is a huge difference between linking and copying.
Google links to millions of images and that's fine - no copyright infringement.
I presume that if one hovers the cursor over the linked image, it will actually show the link to your website...

newtimber wrote:I presume that if one hovers the cursor over the linked image, it will actually show the link to your website...

Well I tried to find the links back, as mentioned above, but couldn't. I didn't spend long admittedly and there's much I don't understand technically, but if I can't, then I certainly won't be alone.

One way is browse your own site with Google Chrome. Right-click on likely images and select 'Search Google for this image'. Then check out what Google hits on.

When you've got a likely site with what seems to be your image, right-click on that image and select 'Inspect element' - the screen will split and show the html source. If the '<img src="' links to your site then it's easy to divert. Otherwise if the image file comes from his site, there's no way of influencing what's displayed.

When this happened with my pic of the Chantry Tower at Slapton, I called the site owner and negotiated free advertising for his continued use of the image.

newtimber wrote:I think there is a huge difference between linking and copying.
Google links to millions of images and that's fine - no copyright infringement.
I presume that if one hovers the cursor over the linked image, it will actually show the link to your website...

The images on the offending site aren't clickable, and hovering doesn't show the link. I right clicked on them to get a "copy image address" option and a paste into the browser bar for the source (I was bored at the time, okay.....?)
There is a difference between attributed linking and blatant copying, but in the case of Bev's offending website the use of the link is the same as if it was copied - the photo simply appears on her website - eventually. At a guess I'd imagine this contravenes the "reproducing in whole or part by any means etc etc etc" legalese.

As the few clickable links on Bev's site (for local pubs) don't open in a new window I'd imagine that whoever did the site is fairly naive, and I wonder how long before klockstone's perfectly legitimate mod to his own photo on his own website is noticed, and if it is noticed, how long it will then take to work out what's happened........ Oh the temptation to change the photo completely........

What Bev is doing is often referred to as hotlinking... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inline_linking

Interestingly, the Wikipedia article suggests that it is not infringing copyright according to US law. Not sure if the same would be true in the UK.

Most hosting environments will allow you to block hotlinking by adding some code to your .htaccess file. I can post the code if anyone wants it.

DaveT - that code would be interesting. Would it prevent people adding our photos to Pinterest though? That's one instance where we do want our images to be posted somewhere else - as long as they always appear with a link through to our website of course.

And I love the modified image - you've turned copyright infringement into free advertising!