You CAN Get Sued for Using Photographs on Your Blog
(My CP Leigh Ann also blogged about it here)
This isn't news to me. In journalism school, they hammered into our heads the need to protect our images. My husband works in the movie business and has numerous tales of live destroyed because of copyright infringement. But it's a good reminder.
Photographs add visual interest and dimension to blog posts. It would be rather bland if we all stopped including picture on our posts, but most of us can't afford stock photos and fair use is just confusing. Sites like Flickr do allow you to search for Creative Commons image, which have specific licenses for use on blogs and the like, but even those can be confusing.
As an alternative, some lovely writers and photographers (including me) have been going through our archives to put together a collection of images that are free for any blogger to use. We'd love for you to include an attribution - basically something stating that name of the photographer. To add a caption in blogger, click on the photo and a box will pop up with the option. Easy-peasy and no risk of being sued!
Here's some links to free, Creative Commons photos for bloggers:
Creative Commons Photos by Jenny Kaczorowski
Creative Commons Photos by Leigh Ann Kopans (and here)
Creative Commons Photos by Cait Peterson
Enjoy - and let me know if you have photos you'd like to share. I'll add your links here!
Thanks so much for sharing these photos! It's nice to not have to worry about looking for copyright stuff and just have links to photos. Plus these are great images!
ReplyDeleteWow! I never knew that. It seems sorta odd to me. I mean, I get using a professional person's photos, but does this include random photos on photobucket? Because if they don't want people to use it, I feel as if they shouldn't have posted it at all.
ReplyDeleteI mean, on photobucket, they even give you links to use it, some I'm guessing it's okay. I understand the whole google image thing. I don't even trust it in the first place.
I think the problem with sites like Photobucket is anyone can upload anything created by anyone. There's no way to know who actually owns the images. Whenever you can, try to find the original creator & ask permission!
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