I am making a blog with one of my friends, and I'm unsure what pictures I am legally allowed to use on my site. Its going to be a technology blog, and I am not going to be able to find all the pictures I need on flickr. How do sites like dvice.com and geekologie.com get their pictures? Clearly all these technology blogs are just taking pictures, is this okay to do? -Dillmando
Hello Dillmando, What you have to do is, open flickr.com and go to advanced search. There will be two tick boxes near to the search box saying "Search only in Creative Commons". Select that and search images. But if you have commercial purposes, click in the box "find content to use commercially". However, you have to link back or attribute the photographer properly. Hope this will help.. Regards
if you want 100% legit the buy royalty free, it's about $1/1 pic, google for "royalty free" and don't forget to read the license carefuly.
No, that's not necessarily true. Sure some may just steal images, but many are just on multiple mailing lists to receive information direct from the companies and get press packs with images to use as part of that. I have such a blog (music) and I get all of my images with the press and promotions direct from the record companies or promoters. It's not that hard to do...just about every company will gladly add you to their press list as long as they like your site ...for instance, if you have a site that links to illegal music download links, don't expect record companies to send you any promotion packs. The basic rule is, only use what you own, have paid for, or have permission to use from the owner. Period.
Very true. If you haven't paid for it then it is usually owned by someone else. Your lack of knowledge who owns it is irrelevant.
Legally you cannot use a photo you find on the web with out the photographer's permission. Stock photography websites contain thousands of existing photographs that can be licensed for specific uses. A customer who uses stock photography instead of hiring a photographer can save time, effort and money. Typically publishers can either purchase exclusive rights to a single image or they can purchase a subscription of sorts. The subscriptions allow publishers to download a limited number of photos over a specified period of time. Stock photo websites allow webmasters, marketers and publishers to locate pictures for their marketing and promotional materials without the hassle of organizing a photo shoot. With copyright laws businesses must be very careful in using unlicensed photos. There are also risks to using "free" photographs. Many of the free websites contain collaborative works from multiple photographers and artists. While the websites attempt to monitor the images in their collections in violation of copyright laws, there are no guarantees. If you opt to use photographs or images from a free portal, it is important to keep this in mind. My favorite stock photo website is http://www.photo-wizard.net Here is where you can find some other inexpensive stock photo directories: http://www.small-business-software.net/stock-photography.htm Another site list can be found here: http://www.webmaster-elements.com/webmaster-graphics/photos.htm Goodluck
Thanks for all these posts guys, the thing is, I'm not going to need pictures from one company. Sites like geekologie.com and dvice.com just post cool things that are coming out and they are almost always different companies. So it would be near impossible to contact them for permission and still get the news out on time. You see what I mean?
No, I don't see what you mean. It takes time at first, to join all the mailing lists, sign up for press, or drop emails to the people in charge of press revelations and promotions, but, it's what you have to do. Once the word is out, and you have a good blog and start getting traffic..you won't have to ask anymore..you will get press and promotions from people and companies that you have never heard of, as well as , the big names. As time goes by and you continue to run a well organized and respected blog with tons of good information in your niche, those big names will start emailing multiple times to see if you got their press, asking when you can get their news up..."would you like a copy to review?", "do you want to run a contest?", "can I get you tickets to the trade show?"..and so on. It doesn't happen overnight. At first you may only get one or 2 submissions a week, but after while you will have enough information not just for your blog, but to write for others. Other blogs wills start stealing, or scraping your feed because they didn't take the time to make the connections in the industry...you may even have some ask you to write for them. It's not a sprint, it's a marathon. I'm telling you form experience, that is exactly how I grew my blog (the music one in my sig), one artist, manager and record company at a time...and now I get enough information for my blog, facebook page, and to write for Examiner without having to rehash any stories. There was a time in the beginning when I had to struggle for something to write about, now some days I can post 3 times a day if I wanted to...and I get things on time with plenty to spare...most times I get stuff a month or more in advance of a release or event...from all over the world.(mostly U.S., U.K. E.U.) Other than that, you will be constantly looking for information, scraping and rehashing articles, posting stuff after a thousand other blogs have already posted it..and so on. This is the way to do it if you want to be a source of information, not just a blogger scrapping Google for ideas.
Check out the manufacturers sites for 'press kits' with high res images, or email their marketing/PR department? They're usually on the ball with this sort of thing, any exposure they can get is helping their cause - it's in their best interests to help you and be responsive to your requests
Just don't do any modification on the watermarks picture/s. Everything online is free for public used unless you'll site earn big for those pics(big guys don't eliminate small players)
Yes, stock sites are an amazing way to go and very reasonable in price and great quality. Shutterstock, Bigstock, Dreamstime are my favorites.
I checked out your website and I am very impressed. It looks awesome. As a recent house music convert, and I can't seem to get enough! Props on the hard work...
Also if you look at Creativecommons.org you can search for different images from a few different sites, and many images allow you to use their images. It is important to check the licensing for each image, because they could vary from picture to picture.
I wouldn't count on this as a way of doing business. Little guys are the easiest to shut down or sue...it cost less money because they don't have the resources to fight, and you can still make your point. All good suggestions for images, but I assume you will doing some kind of review site or product blog. If that's the case, the manufacturers will either send you images for press, or in many cases, they have a "press" section on their websites where you can go and download images and press releases freely. I know a lot of big named game makers have this on their sites. You also need to know the difference between a promotional photo and one that is privately owned. There are times where you may need a certain image and don't have it, but another site or 2 does. When you have been doing it a while, you will start to recognize promo images. Their purpose is to be reprinted and circulated. If you were to get a promo image from Google and reuse it, you would still be fine...as long as it's actually a promo image. It's kind of hard to explain, but , a good example is...you can almost always be sure that an image of an album or CD cover is a promotional image that is O.K. to use, where as, images of the artists eating at a restaurant probably aren't. Thanks. It's actually easy to run now, but it wasn't always so in the first year. All the things that people told me in the beginning about "Stick with it", "don't give up", "keep making it better", and everything else that sounds like a bloggers book of cliches was actually correct. It was worth sticking with. Don't get me wrong, I have a handful of blog failures in the graveyard as well. Just part of the game if you really want to do this and stick with it. I actually have more failures than successes. But the good ones make it worth while.
I'll give you a big tip on finding images to use. Do any searching and go to the wikipedia results. Click on any photo you see being used on wikipedia. It will take you to a "fair use" policy page and they will claim that they are using the photo in compliance with the "fair use" policy, or it is in public domain. If it's public domain, use it. If they are using it as "fair use," they will explain the "fair use" rules and why they are allowed to use it. I don't recall wikipedia ever getting sued for any photo they use. wikipedia quotes US copyright law: "Per § 107 it is believed that reproduction for criticism, comment, teaching and scholarship constitutes fair use and does not infringe copyright." Stephen C
Images without water marks is good or you can just register on websites that offer stocks photos. Though most of them requires you to pay.