This evening I received an email from the administrator of

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site.

Apparently there are a few pictures on this site, which were copied from the l-word.com site and had not been credited appropriately when posting them to this site.

If ANY member has posted pictures from that site or ANY other site, and has failed to properly credit the website in which the photo was obtained from, I would ask that you either immediately remove your post and/or picture OR add the appropriate credit to the picture. If it is from the l-word.com site, then make sure you ensure that it is referenced as coming from

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and show a link which goes directly to where that picture is on their site.

I am going to assume that whomever added this here, did so without understanding the consequences of plagiarizing someone elses website. I would appreciate everyone's cooperations and immediate attention to the concern raised.

If members post pictures and intentionally disregard proper credit, your membership will come under review and you may have it revoked. Please do not put the administrators of this site in that position.

Thank you in advance for your cooperation.
Chicki

I can't agree more with Chciki, please take her note into consideration because we put a lot of hard work in getting this message board running and we don't want to see it ruined because of some inproper posts or a law suit from another site admin.

Thank you
JBL

This is about pics from events and whatnot with a watermark, right?

Okay just making sure. I don't THINK I've swiped any of those and posted them elsewhere.

I'm gonna see and check whether I've posted pics fron their site

It was brought to my attention that perhaps there could be some additional questions remaining surrounding what could be copied to the site, in terms of photographs and such. I am going to try to make this a little more clear, and address it one final time. I want to first say that this follow up is NOT a result of receiving any additional complaints or concerns about anyone posting more pics, so I thank you all for your cooperation. Instead, this is in response to some questions surrounding the absence of a "watermark" or a "copyright" symbol on a picture. I'll address that, as well as a few things on copyright in general as they apply to digital media.

I’ll start by saying that Copyright Law can be quite complex in some areas, like what really constitutes “Fair Use” but rather black and white in other areas.

I’ll try to recap as much as I can in layman’s terms.

The OWNER of a photograph, most times, is the person who physically snaps the picture. When this is done, it is automatically considered a copyright, WHETHER OR NOT there is a watermark or copyright on the photo itself.

The owner of the photo has the right to sell the photo, to transmit it digitally, post to a website, etc. Remember, the photographer will own the copyright unless the copyright is transferred, in writing and signed by the copyright owner, to another person.

Now the use of celebrity images can be a little tricky. First, if you use it for editorial purposes under the First Amendment, like for newspapers and magazines and such, it would most likely be protected under “Fair Use” as long as the image was used to appropriately illustrate something newsworthy or in the form of criticism or a commentary. This would explain why we see the supermarket tabloid magazines getting away with a lot of what they do. However, remember that while a celebrity IS a public figure, it is important that we not forget that a particular photo of a celebrity is also subject to the same copyright protections as other “original” works and must be licensed.

There have been some steps made in terms of trying to protect electronic and digital publishing. In 1993, the Media Photographers Copyright Agency known as (MPCA) was launched to protect and license the works of photographers in the field of electronic publishing, as well as the introduction of Green Paper which made several recommendations about amending current copyright laws, which would include digital transmission over the internet, phone lines, as well as publications to include wording of “digital transmission.”

I won’t even bother to get into section 107 of the “Fair Use” because it doesn’t apply. But if you are interested it can be found on the US Copyright Laws website. Just remember, most of today’s websites, unless newsworthy in nature, would not fall into “fair use,” and therefore it is best to NOT assume that taking a photo from somewhere is considered fair usage. If a photographer who owns the photo wishes to share it on a public domain website, it doesn’t mean they lose the ownership of that, or the right to restrict where that picture is reproduced or placed.

This may be a lengthy response to the question of whether the “ABSENCE” of a watermark, copyright, or trademark symbol constitutes the freedom to take the photo and reproduce it to the site. In short, the answer is NO.

If you have any questions about this, please don’t hesitate to contact me or JBL. I had the privilege of taking a class on Copyright two years ago, as well as work with the Judge Advocate General’s office in the past concerning images that the Public Affairs Office for the Dept of Defense would be using. Images, Graphics, Literature, Music, etc. are just a few forms which we must be vigilant of in terms of ownership.

Again….remember:

1) The ability to obtain content from the Web, does NOT give one the right to duplicate and republish it.

2) Photographs and web pages do NOT need a copyright notice on them to be protected by copyright law. All original works are copyright protected as soon as they are created. They do not need to be registered to be covered by copyright law.

Thank you for your cooperation.