Have any suggestions for the 3 Count? Let me know via Twitter @plagiarismtoday.

1: Photobucket Easily Rebuffs A Copyright Lawsuit

First off today, Photobucket has fended off a pro se lawsuit filed by an artist, Sheila Wolk, who claimed that the company was not doing enough to keep her work off of their site. However, Photobucket, according to the court, qualified for safe harbor protection under the DMCA as it promptly removes works when notified and has completed all other formalities under the law. Wolk had wanted Photobucket to remove works preemptively or filter out infringing content but the judge, in issue the injunction, said that Photobucket had no such obligation.

2: Baidu CEO Seeks Win-Win Business Model in Copyright Dispute

Next up today, Robin Li, the Chariman and CEO of the Chinese search engine Baidu has issued an apology to authors who are upset about infringement on Baidu’s books and documents search tools. Talks between authors and the search engine broke down last week, leading Li to issue his statement, his first on the dispute. He went on to say that he is hoping to find a “win-win” business model that works for both side.

3: Anonymous Launches New DDoS Attack Against RIAA

Finally today, Anonymous has launched another DDOS attack against the RIAA’s site, this time in response to the RIAA’s ongoing case against Limewire, where the organization mentioned damages against the company could reach as high as $75 trillion. The judge denied those high damages, saying that the RIAA could only collect statutory damages once per work, rather than per download as the RIAA had claimed. The RIAA site has been up and down since the DDOS attack began.

Suggestions

That’s it for the three count today. We will be back tomorrow with three more copyright links. If you have a link that you want to suggest a link for the column or have any proposals to make it better. Feel free to leave a comment or send me an email. I hope to hear from you.

Want the Full Story?

Tune in every Wednesday evening at 6 PM ET for the live recording of the Copyright 2.0 Show or wait and get the edited version Friday right here on Plagiarism Today.

The 3 Count Logo was created by Justin Goff and is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution License.

Update 4/21/2010: Sadly it appears I spoke too soon. Flickr is still stripping EXIF data on resized images. Update coming.

Though the orphan works bill has been defeated for this year, there is still a tremendous amount of interest among visual artists about ensuring that their works carry their names and information with them. It is largely assumed that the bill will be reintroduced next year and that, at some point in the near future, that there will be a risk of their works becoming orphaned.

However, in the age of the Internet, photographers have also become more reliant on photo sharing services for hosting their work and their online portfolios. It has been an easy way to get their works online and find an audience.

Unfortunately, at least some of those services seem to be working against artists in keeping their works clearly marked. Though many routinely insert EXIF metadata into their images, at least two of the most popular image hosts, Flickr and Facebook, are routinely stripping that information out before posting the information online.

This could, should the orphan works bill passed, cause many photographers, including those that used due diligence in marking their work, to have their works become orphaned and used legally without their permission.

The worst part is that it is a simple fix on the host’s part, but also one that Flickr has been aware of for at least six months.

Background

Back in April, photographer James Duncan Davidson posted a blog entry detailing an error with Flickr that caused copyright and other metadata to be stripped from uploaded and resized images. He also posted his observations to Flickr’s feature request forums, where it became a popular suggestion.

However, even after over six months of activity, the post has not gotten a single response from the Flickr admins nor has the feature been implemented. So, I decided to conduct an experiment to see if Flickr had quietly instituted the fix and also see if a few other popular image hosts had similar problems.

The results were very surprising.

An Experiment

To conduct an experiment, I took one of my snapshots from my trip to Newcastle, UK and added some very basic copyright metadata to it. To do this, I used the open source application Reveal for the Mac.

After I added the metadata, this is what was shown in the photo information.

I then uploaded the image to some of the popular photo sharing sites and re-downloaded the image to see if the metadata remained intact. I started with Flickr.

After uploading and re-downloading the displayed copy of the image, I noticed that the file size was significantly bigger but, once I opened up the metadata in Reveal, this is what I saw.

The new photo had completely stripped out the pertinent copyright information, along with all of the other metadata that I could see.

After that, I decided to try Facebook. With over 10 billion photos hosted, Facebook is the largest image host in the world currently. I did the same process with Facebook and, when I re-opened the metadata in Reveal, I saw that, again the information had been stripped out.

It was immediately clear that both sites strip out all image metadata. Though Flickr does make a point of reading and parsing much of it, especially information pertaining to the camera, before posting it, none of it is displayed on the versions that are public-facing.

Two that Preserve it

After being disappointed with Flickr and Facebook, I decided to try two other image hosts to see how they handled the metatadata. First, I tried a host that I have used in the past on this site, Imageshack.

With Imageshack, I did two checks, first I uploaded the image without resizing and then with a reduction to a “Web-friendly” size. I downloaded both versions. In both cases, the metadata was preserved.

I then decided to try Photobucket, an image sharing service I continue to have many sharp disagreements with, taking a similar set of steps that I did with Imageshack. However, once again, both the raw and the version resized with their online software preserved the metadata perfectly.

While I have many other copyright-related concerns regarding Photobucket, it is nice to see that their system does handle this one issue correctly.

Still, for photographers, these results leave a lot of uneasy questions to be answered.

What Can Be Done

The problem with the results above is that neither Photobucket nor Imageshack are widely used by professional or even amateur artists. They are much more common as image hosts for blogs or social networking sites and host a lot of personal photos as well as more than a decent amount of copyrighted work.

However, there are a lot of photographers and artists putting their work on Flickr to share it or using Facebook as something of a personal resume. In those cases though, any metadata that they are adding is being stripped out before at least most of the images go online.

The onus, right now, is on these services to fix this problem but there seems to be very little push to do so. As such, the only way to ensure that your copyright information is carried with the works you submit through these services is to make it part of the image itself, most likely through some form of visual watermarking.

Until these issues are fixed, artists have to assume that any image posted on Flickr or Facebook will be passed around the Web with no identifying information, greatly increasing the probability that they could become orphan works should the bill pass.

Conclusions

Sadly, these aren’t the types of issues most image hosts think about when designing their product. They worry about providing a good user experience, giving enough space, having enough features and building a good business plan. Whether the metadata is preserved, is not a major issue from their standpoint.

However, to me, these are the types of small details that can have a big impact on artists and separate the great image hosts from the good.

Though Flickr has made a great reputation as a place for artists and photographers, it has shown a lot of disregard for their rights. From snafus with the API to confusing licensing terms, Flickr has been anything but an oasis for artists concerned about how their work is being used.

If the orphan works bill passes, these issues will go from being minor inconveniences to major concerns and all image services are going to have to address these problems, one way or another.

However, the time to start thinking about these things is now, before the law passes and a potential crisis is at hand. Waiting until the law does pass could be too late.

When I first started dealing with plagiarists in 2001, the problem was primarily on message boards and forums. This made sense. Forums were the most popular means of socialization at the time and they were by far the easiest way for someone with limited Web experience to publish content.

So, even though I regularly ran across a personal home page or even a blog that had plagiarized copies of my work, most of my time was spent working with forum admins.

However, over the years that has shifted. Forums are now more of an Internet curiosity than an established meeting place. Social networking is now, quite literally, the hottest thing on the Web and with profile, blogging and image tools built in, they are by far the easiest way to publish a work on the Web.

So, with this trend, plagiarists have also begun to flock to social networks. Of all of the human-made plagiarism of my content I deal with, approximately 75% take place on social networking sites.

However, whenever I say “Social Networking”, I am actually being generous. Nearly 95% of all of my social networking issues, and thus well over half of all of my issues in general, come from one site: Myspace.

This is something that has me very worried.

Rupert Murdoch’s Empire of Social Plagiarism

Sadly, I am not alone in my issues with Myspace. Nearly every author I have asked about their plagiarism problems have put Myspace either at or near the top of their list. This is especially true for anyone who writes poetry, short stories or other creative works that might appeal to Myspace users.

The only group that doesn’t seem to put Myspace at the top of their list is fan fiction authors. They are one of the few groups that still see the worst issue with forums and community sites. However, fan fiction plagiarism creates a whole new set of problems beyond the scope of this article.

The Myspace issue isn’t limited to writers either. Ask any artist or photographer where they see the most unwanted copying, they’ll usually mention Photobucket. Photobucket, however, is owned by Fox Corp., which also owns Myspace, and the two sites are closely linked. In fact, much of Photobucket’s initial popularity, before it was bought out, was derived from Myspace users wanting to host images and videos in their profiles.

But while it makes sense that the largest social networking site and the largest photo sharing site would attract the largest number of plagiarists, these sites see copyright infringement way out of proportion to their numbers. Where Myspace may be a little bit ahead of Facebook, I see hundreds of cases of plagiarism the former with almost none on the latter.

The question becomes “Why is that true?” and “What can be done about it?”

Copy and Paste Haven

To see the problem first hand, all you have to do is either browse around a few Myspace profiles or visit Photobucket’s home page. Though many people use these sites to post legitimate content, the majority seems to have performed at least one act of likely copyright infringement.

The problem is so serious that scripts have been developed exclusively to detect image copying on Photobucket (more on this script later) and it seems that you can’t go anywhere on Myspace or Photobucket without encountering likely infringements.

Users of these sites are content hungry. They need text, images, video and audio to complete their profiles. On one hand, this has created a whole cottage industry around providing licensed content for Myspace, including profile layouts. On the other, it has lead to a copy and paste culture that can be very dangerous.

Though plagiarism and copyright infringement takes place everywhere, in my experience, the number of likely infringements on Myspace profiles dwarf those on Facebook. Why this is seemingly true is complicated, but there are five potential reasons I see for it.

1. Public Profiles: Myspace profiles are, for the most part, visible to general public. This not only makes it easier to find infringements, thus increasing the number found, but adds motivation for people to beef up their profiles, sometimes motivating people to take content that is not theirs. I see a similar trend on dating sites that have public profiles.
2. Younger Audience: Most of the plagiarists I deal with on Myspace are under the age of 25. Myspace seems to cater to a younger audience and, for whatever reason, they seem more prone to abusing copy and paste on the Web.
3. Low Expectation of Originality: In a way, it is hard to call much of the content use on Myspace plagiarism. There is a very low expectation of originality on the site as most people recognize that the images and other profile touches came from somewhere else, attributed or not. This is less true with the blogs and profile information sections, but it is clear that most Myspace users don’t expect fellow members to create every element of their profile.
4. Permissive Takedown System: Though Fox responds quickly to all DMCA notices and removes infringing works, it is very slow to ban users. I have seen many cases where a Myspace user has lifted ten or more works and Myspace simply removed the infringing work without deleting the user as a repeat infringer.
5. High Degree of Customization: Myspace, unlike many other networks, allows users to edit almost every aspect of their profile’s look and feel, leading to far more opportunities for abuse.

All in all, the reason Myspace is such a haven for plagiarists is not a simple question to answer, but rather, there seems to be a combination of factors contributing to the problem.

Fixing it, however, is going to be even more difficult.

Solving the Problem

Myspace, as a site presents several critical challenges for writers and artists.

First, there is almost no way to contact the infringer directly unless you already have a Myspace account and can send them a message. However, such messages are a risky way to resolve copyright disputes as the paper trail is very limited.

Second, as mentioned above, Myspace does respond well to DMCA notices but rarely takes action against heavily infringing users. This can make it difficult to handle any infringer that has taken many different works.

Finally, the nature of Myspace is one where works posted are passed around almost immediately. It is something of an enclosed ecosystem where a poem, an image or an article will enter into the environment and then travel throughout the service, often carrying dozens of different names.

Overcoming this will not be easy and there is no way that a single Webmaster or copyright holder can do so. It is going to take a concerted effort to change both the culture of Myspace and the approach of its parent company.

The best advice I can give right now is to be aggressive when dealing with infringements on Photobucket and Myspace. Actively seek out infringements on the sites and report them quickly. Once image search tools allow users to detect infringements on Photobucket, use those tools as well and aggressively demand removal.

The goal is two fold. First, motivate Fox to create a more efficient and usable copyright system and the second is to change the culture of these sites. Currently, on YouTube, there is a great deal of infringement but users, for the most part, expect any likely infringing video to be pulled down. As a result, those who care about their YouTube account are careful not to post such videos and the most successful YouTube users feature original content.

The goal is not to eliminate copyright infringement on the site, that will never happen, but create an ecosystem that encourages creativity and rewards originality. The difference in such a system is obvious when one looks at a site such as Flickr and then goes to visit Photobucket.

Conclusions

The sad truth is that there is very little that we can do from the outside to help shape the type of site Myspace is to become. In addition to its large size and strong, if at times annoying, culture, there seems to be a lot of foot dragging on Fox’s end.

But what is frustrating about this problem is just that infringement seems to be so rampant on these sites, but that legitimate users of them seem to share the burden.

There is a reason why Myspace is not taken as seriously as Facebook or Photobucket as seriously as Flickr and the issue of copyright infringement is a big part of the equation.

This is most unfortunate not just for the artists and writers that have their work misused, but those that use those sites and try to do good things with it. Their reputations are tarnished by association.

Fortunately, most of those who use or did use those sites for the purpose of displaying their own work have at least established presences elsewhere.

If one wants to be taken seriously, it is clear that Myspace nor Photobucket is the place to do it.

photo credit: Keyser_ Soze

It happens about once per month. I get an email a software programmer who believes that he or she has developed the perfect DRM solution. They send me the usual promotional copy about how great their product is and why I should promote it on this site.

Even though my faith in DRM as a solution to content theft issues has been completely shattered, it is hard for me to not get my hopes up a little bit. However, they are almost immediately dashed every time as I test the solution.

Usually within a few minutes I’m breaking the DRM scheme and emailing back the person their “protected” sample image. Though I offer a detailed analysis of how I was able to perform the feat and offer suggestions on how to improve the product, I never hear back from them.

This is in stark contrast to detection and licensing companies, such as Copyscape that have listened to my issues and made changes to fix them. In fact, many of these companies go on to become paid clients to take even further advantage of my beta testing and trouble shooting.

The DRM guys, however, disappear, They almost always resist even a simple email exchange and never defend their product against the flaws that I find.

This is not to say that all DRM schemes are unscrupulous, just that I have serious questions about the ones who have approached me. If there is a DRM solution out there that works, I want to find it and I want to give a chance to the legitimate DRM problem solvers to get their products reviewed.

However, to ensure that the playing field is fair, I’ve created a simple DRM challenge. A format by which any image DRM solution provider can submit their product, have it reviewed on this site and, potentially, win the prize of free advertising.

The rules are below.

The Big Idea

The big idea of this challenge is fairly simple. If there is a magic DRM solution out there, I want to feature it on this site. I haven’t found it yet and, currently, do not believe it exists, but I would love nothing more than to be proved wrong.

So, I wanted to give every DRM producer a chance to have their technology tested and reviewed on this site under a standard set of rules. If anyone can meet my criteria and beat all of my efforts to break your DRM, then I am offering a month of free advertising on this site (delivered in the form of a 200×200 button near the top of the sidebar), bearing in mind this site does not currently show ads, as well as a text link at the footer in the RSS feed for a week.

To get the prize though, you must meet the following rules.

How It Works

The premise of the challenge is easy. If you are a DRM solution creator and would like to take me up on the challenge, what you first need to do is email me with the following things:

1. General information about your DRM solution, including name, how it works and any promotional information you wish to include
2. A logo or other graphic to include in my review (if applicable)
3. A link to an image that is protected using your technology

Please bear in mind that, right now, this is ONLY for image DRM solutions for simplicity reasons.

Once I have that email, when I am able to, I will attempt to break your DRM and email you either your image or the critical parts of it. To do this, I will bring a series of tools to bear including, but not limited to, the following:

1. Source code snooping
2. Browser tricks
3. Screen capture tools
4. Decompiler programs
5. File extractors

If I am unable to break the DRM in a reasonable amount of time, approximately one hour of work (Note: the work may actually be over a period of many hours due to my schedule) I will then turn the system over to a friend that is even more savvy about breaking DRM and give them the same chance.

(Note: If you are interested in helping to break image DRM schemes, send me an email to jonathan@plagiarismtoday.com and let me know. I have some people in mind but if there are a lot of applicants I may need more people to keep the line moving.)

If the DRM system survives both attempts to break it and meets my other criteria, then it wins the challenge.

It is that simple.

Usability Criteria

However, since it is easy to lock down an image so that no one can get to it, including a legitimate viewer, I’m also laying out a series of usability criteria any such system must meet.

1. No software install to view
2. Must work on Mac, Windows and Linux
3. Must work in at least IE, Firefox, Safari, Chrome and Opera
4. Ideally, legitimate users should not even be aware of the DRM in place but the DRM should definitely not hinder normal viewing in any significant way
5. It can not incorporate watermark as the goal of DRM is to prevent copying, not reduce effectiveness of any copies made

Please bear in mind that these are not absolutely all of the guidelines in this area and that any DRM that greatly hinders regular viewing of a file could be disqualified from the ultimate prize.

It will be up to me and readers that I poll whether or not a DRM system hinders viewing too greatly.

(Note: I am on the fence about slideshow systems such as Slideroll. Though these systems are relatively secure, they do hinder viewing of the images and have other vulnerabilities. I am seeking artist feedback on whether to allow such systems into the challenge.)

Other Rules

Before we go any further, here are a few miscellaneous rules to the challenge.

1. You must be the creator or a representative of an image DRM system to apply. Users can not nominate a system for the challenge (but can suggest them to me informally for outreach).
2. Once I have completed my testing of your system, I will email you with the results. You will have a 48 hour period to respond. If you don’t reply in that time, I will publish my article without your commentary.
3. All systems submitted, whether they complete the challenge or not will be reviewed on this site, possibly including a screencast. By submitting your service, you agree to allow me to do so.

In short, if you submit a DRM system for this challenge and it is trivially broken or creates a horrible user experience, the world will know about it.

Objections and Questions

Finally, here are the answers to some of the more common questions/concerns many will have regarding this challenge.

This is impossible! No system can do this!

I’m on record saying that I agree. No image DRM system I have seen has been able to balance usability and provide good protection. Please bear in mind that I am not some kind of elite hacker or tech guru, I’m just a computer-savvy Webmaster with a lot of experience testing image DRM.

If your system can not survive my test then there is no way it will survive on the Web. The image only has to be jailbroken once for it to be all over the Web.

The inclusion of screenshots as a means to break DRM is unfair, those are low-resolution images.

This argument is suspect to me for many reasons.

First, there is no reason to post high-resolution images on the Web unless they are intended for printing. Posting extremely high-resolution images is, usually, a waste of bandwidth.

Second, as was shown during the first round of concern with Photobucket, low resolution images can still be used very successfully in prints.

Third, screen shot tools are almost universal now, built into every major operating system. It is the first way many amateur image plagiarists obtain an image.

Finally, the most common use for an illegally-copied image is on another Web site, for that, a screenshot is more than adequate.

Do you have to get the whole image?

No. I look at it from the artist’s perspective. If I can get the bulk of the image, enough to virtually replace the original work, then I will consider that a failure.

Though such omissions might help prove which image is the original, it doesn’t help the artist keep their work from spreading. However, there will be a note in my review that I was not able to get the full image.

What if my system doesn’t meet your usability criteria?

You can still apply to be reviewed, just understand that even if I can not break your DRM, you will not win the challenge. I realize that there may be works and artists that find such a trade off rewarding so I will not bar such products from this site, though I will be honest about any such issues.

What if my system doesn’t prevent copying but tracks it?

Those systems are not designed for this challenge. If you have such a system you wish me to look at, let me know. However, it is not eligible right now for this challenge. More on this later.

What if my system is commercial?

That is not an issue, I will mention the price in my review but so long as there is no charge for me to test it, I will not object. Such systems are still eligible to win.

When is the deadline?

There is none. This is an open-ended challenge until either someone wins or I decide to close it down. If I receive too many entries at once I may put a temporary halt on new submissions.

I will announce changes/closures on this page.

A Word About Rule Changes

I am writing these rules a bit by the seat of my pants. Remember this, the spirit of the competition is to create a DRM system for images that is both user-friendly to legitimate viewers but also difficult to impossible for a prepared computer-savvy user to break.

Please keep your submissions in the spirit of the competition.

I will likely be posting minor rule changes to this page over the coming days. If I have to change a rule between the time you submit an entry and when I test it, I will email you to let you know of the changes and make sure you agree.

I don’t expect anything drastic to change.

Ask Questions

I encourage people to post questions about the contest in the comments form below so that I can give public answers. If you have a question that is specific to your system email it to jonathan at plagiarismtoday dot com.

Enter

If you want to enter the challenge and agree to all of the mess above, send me an email with the required elements to jonathan at plagiarismtoday dot com and I will let you know when to expect met to start work.

Thank you very much for your time and patience with this. I sincerely hope that there is a holy grail of image DRM out there and would love nothing more than to be proved wrong.

Bear in mind that, if such a system has been created, this challenge would not even be the beginning of what the creator could do. With so many artists clamoring for a means to control their images, such a system would almost certainly lead to much greater things.

On that note, I look forward to being challenged and to seeing what creative solutions the programmers of the world have come up with.

If you have not seen the video, here it is:

If you want to take action, you can do so by contacting Photobucket and contacting Qoop to let them know about the video and express your displeasure at the feature.

Also, consider signing the original petition and making your voice heard that way.

Thank you for your continued support on this issue and, with luck, cooler heads will prevail in this matter.

Specifically the post highlighted the lack of a “take down, stay down” system, such as the one Myspace, Photobucket’s parent company, uses and the ability for any user to print any image they see on the site. These two factors were also the subject of a petition against Photobucket, which now has some 6,700 signatures.

Photobucket, for their part, did not respond favorably to this and I was unfortunately forced to drop the matter for a while as other projects came up.

However, after a hiatus on the topic, I’m returning to it, this time with a 9-minute video illustrating one of the issues, namely the problems surrounding the printing system, but this time calling for users of Photobucket (as well as potentially infringed copyright holders) to pay attention to these issues.

The video, entitled “Commercial Printing with Photobucket” is embedded below and details how easy it is to turn any image on the site into a t-shirt, including personal ones, and how it compares to a similar service, namely Flickr.

PhotoBucket: Your Images for Sale from Jonathan Bailey on Vimeo.

Embed Code:

<object width="400" height="302"><param name="allowfullscreen" value="true" /><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always" /><param name="movie" value="http://www.vimeo.com/moogaloop.swf?clip_id=1400807&server=www.vimeo.com&show_title=1&show_byline=1&show_portrait=0&color=&fullscreen=1" /><embed src="http://www.vimeo.com/moogaloop.swf?clip_id=1400807&server=www.vimeo.com&show_title=1&show_byline=1&show_portrait=0&color=&fullscreen=1" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowfullscreen="true" allowscriptaccess="always" width="400" height="302"></embed></object><br /><a href="http://www.vimeo.com/1400807?pg=embed&sec=1400807">PhotoBucket: Your Images for Sale</a> from <a href="http://www.vimeo.com/user628766?pg=embed&sec=1400807">Jonathan Bailey</a> on <a href="http://vimeo.com?pg=embed&sec=1400807">Vimeo</a>.

You can find the video on these following video sharing sites:

YouTube
Vimeo (above)
Revver
Blip.tv

Note: If you put it on another video sharing site, let me know so I can include it in the list.

Also, the video is licensed under a Creative Commons BY-SA license meaning that you are free to copy and share the video as well as create derivative works so long as the new work is licensed under the same terms.

If you wish to express your displeasure to Photobucket about this matter, you can reach them via their contact form. Also, please consider contacting their partner in this process, Qoop, to let them know you disapprove of Photobucket’s policies. You can do so via their contact form and selecting “Photobucket” as the partner involved (You first have to solve the CAPTCHA to go to the form).

On that note, if you wish to upload the video to your account, edit it or otherwise have a copy of it, you can download the original .mov file by visiting drop.io here (click the “save” link above the video):

Drop.io Download

If you have any questions or comments, please feel free to let me know.

I look forward to your feedback on this video.

However, Flickr, as I pointed out in my previous article, manages to confuse and befuddle with its licensing terms to the point that mistakes seem inevitable. Looking through Flickr’s dizzying array of poorly-worded options, it is easy to see how photographers and artists make simple mistakes and end up losing rights to their work.

So what exactly is wrong and how can it be fixed? That is what we’re taking a look at today.

The Options

When you pull up your privacy settings, you get a list that looks a great deal like the one to the right, it contains a series of questions about the rights you want to reserve in your work and the options you have set for them.

To save time, we’re going to take a look at them one at a time.

1. Who can download your stuff: Allows users to download larger sizes of your image. Users can still download smaller ones though Flickr uses a transparent overlay to try and make that more difficult. Does not disable all downloading via the API.
2. Who can share your photos or videos: Turns off and on the “Share This” button in the upper right hand corner of the image page. The button allows users to email, link, embed or blog the photo. However, all of those options can be done either directly or by turning on other options.
3. Who can print your photos: Does not actually disable printing of photos, just the ability for users to order prints via the Flickr partnership with Qoop. Users can still print the images themselves, especially if they can download the full-sized images. On the other hand, it is still much better than Photobucket.
4. Who can blog your stuff: Turns off the “blog this” button at the top of your image. Bloggers can still link to the image and, in some cases, embed it directly.
5. Hide your EXIF Data: Hides metadata embedded into the image automatically upon creation and saving. (Not a licensing option)
6. Hide your stuff from public searches: Displays two options, see more information below.
7. Hide your profile from public searches: Same as above.
8. What license will your content have: Allows you to choose either all rights reserved or a Creative Commons License for your image. Only functions as the default and can be changed on a per-image basis later. (Not pictured)

However, there are still more options to look at, when you click either the “Hide your stuff” or “Hide your profile” links, you are presented with still more licensing and rights options.

That page, which is the same no matter which link you click, offers you three options:

1. Hide your photostream from site-wide searches on flickr.com: Removes your images from local Flickr searches, making your photos private. See comments below for correction on this issue.
2. Hide your photostream from searches on 3rd party sites that use the API: Removes your images from the API so that sites using it can not locate your images or use them.
3. Hide me from searches: Removes your actual profile from Flickr searches so you can not be found by name or email address.

The end result is ten different options that control how and when users of Flickr can access your images. However, as we’ll see in just a minute, many of those options are completely useless or hopelessly redundant.

The Problem

The problem with Flickr licensing becomes clear almost immediately. Of the eight initial options above, only four do what they say they do. Of the four that do what they say, three require you to select further options on a second page.

This leaves only one option that works “out of the box”, the EXIF data feature, which is not even a licensing tool.

Worse still, the first four options overlap one another in many places. For example, the feature to disable blogging clearly overlaps with the feature to “share” images since sharing allows blogging. However, even if both are disabled, users can still blog images in many cases, especially if the API is still turned on.

Likewise, turning off the ability to print an image does not actually disable printing, to do that you also have to disable high resolution image, otherwise users can just save and print clear images, but that involves the “download your stuff” option.

Quickly, compare this to how Creative Commons handles licensing. You’ll see how beautiful and simple content licensing can be. Though Flickr has more options to worry about than CC, it is clear that licensing can be a beautiful thing, if done correctly.

However, looking at CC also reminds you of exactly how out of order Flickr’s current system is.

Fixing the Issue

Since Flickr has integrated CC so deeply into the site and CC has such a great handle on these issues, it seems to be a good place to start when looking to fix the problem.

Currently, when you set up a new account, all of your photos default to all rights reserved, the API is turned on, as is all public searching, and downloads/sharing are both enabled.

This makes almost no sense. A photo that is all right reserved would have very little usefulness in the API, at least legally, and would be limited in its usefulness for embedding.

Rather than assuming what the user wants, new users should be walked through a short licensing questionnaire, one that would closely resemble the one CC uses, and would only ask basic questions. From there, Flickr could suggest a default licensing scheme tailored to what the user selected.

For example, a photo that is all rights reserved could be removed from the API, or only included in thumbnail format, and have downloading disabled with blogging and embedding only available to the owner. A CC-licensed work available for commercial use could have the API turned on, embedding and downloading fully available and commercial printing turned on.

These options could be set by the user him or herself, but the defaults would be based upon the user licensing.

Speaking of those options, I would recommend that the Flickr licensing be reduced to the following options:

1. Allow embedding of your images: Since there is no way to actually prevent emailing or linking to an image (without turning on privacy), it makes sense to focus only on embedding.
2. Allow image downloads: Turns on the “All sizes” feature and removes the psuedo-DRM Flickr uses when this is disabled.
3. Enable Privacy: Would have sub-options to hide your profile, your images or both. Would prevent linking or emailing any images if images are private.
4. Enable 3rd Party Access: This option needs to be front and center, not buried. This would disable the API access to the photo. Also, ideally would have granular choices to allow third party access to certain types of images, such as thumbnails only or certain sets, but not others.
5. Select License: Same as today, the option to choose a CC license.

The option that was eliminated was the one to allow “printing” of an image. This is a confusing option and it makes more sense to base printing upon the license the photo is under than whether this is ticked.

In the end, I was able to condense Flickr’s option list just five with sub-options. This prevents option overlap and confusion about how to convert option settings into real-life results.

Conclusions

Licensing is hard. I know that well. I also know that my system is far from perfect and does not actually reduce that many options, just organizes them in a manner that is less confusing. I also know that there is much room for improvement and, most likely, some technical challenges associated with simplifying the licensing.

However, it is clear reading Flickr’s licensing system that they have literally built it piece by piece over the years. As they added new features, they added new licensing options with little thought to how they interacted with previous ones.

It is past time for Flickr to do some spring cleaning on its licensing and help both its current users and its new ones understand the wide array of features Flickr supports.

Fortunately, through their heavy use of Creative Commons, they have something of a head start in helping to explain licensing. Now it is just a matter of taking what they’ve done well and meshing it with the other features they provide.

It is easier said than done, but far from impossible.

One of the lesser-used features on the home page of the site is the “Most Popular” articles box. It contains a list of the current top five articles based upon a weighted system accounting for comments, trackbacks and visitors.

The current number one story, Artists Express Concern Over PhotoBucket has remained in the top slot since the new feature was added. The reason, 77 comments and a steady stream of traffic from the deviantArt crowd and from various art forums.

Clearly it still resonates with the artist communities.

Another one of the more popular stories is Why Your Copyright Protection is Second Rate, which makes some unfortunate distinctions between the U.S. and other nations when it comes to copyright law.

Finally, one of the articles is no longer true. Why I Embed My Images, though true when I wrote the article has not been the case for some time. Though I still strongly believe in the strategy and am actively seeking a good image host, speed issues forced me to pull back and use my own server, at least for the time being.

Expect more on that story later.

All in all, it is a great feature that regularly updates. However, I might do a clearing of the cache to allow other stories the chance to get some front page exposure.

Conclusions

Thank you all for your patience during this rather slow week. I hope you enjoyed this look back and I’m very excited about creating new favorite articles in the weeks and months to come.

Please feel free to leave your feedback and thoughts on these as well as any other stories here on Plagiarism Today.

At issue, specifically, is PhotoBucket allowing users to print the photos of strangers, including photos that were uploaded illegally, and the lack of a take down stay down system on the service.

PhotoBucket, through their PR agent responded by saying the following:

“Photobucket is committed to protecting and empowering content owners and creators. The site offers features that give users the ability to set private and public settings for their photos and videos. The company also strictly adheres to government DMCA guidelines to protect copyrights through the prompt removal of infringing material and action against repeat offenders.”

It seems unlikely that the response will do much to quell the concerns of the signatories of the petition, which is now over 5500 signatures, or address the issues raised.

I will report more on this as I get more responses and feedback.

As of right now, the petition has gartered nearly 900 signatures and is growing at a very rapid pace. This is due almost exclusively to a huge push from the art community itself, specifically the efforts by several well-known deviantART member including lone-mono, budgie and dozens of others.

I have to say that I have been thoroughly overwhelmed by the response and I want to thank everyone that has posted the petition and the original article on their site. Without your help in getting the work out, this would not have been possible.

Right now my plan is to allow the petition to collect more signatures. Once it reaches over a thousand signatories, I plan to present it formally to the PhotoBucket staff. I will resubmit every time the petition crosses another 500 signatures until we receive a response.

I want to stress that there is a need for both unity and civility at this point. Though emotions understandably run high with this issue, cooler heads prevail in these types of disputes. I want to encourage everyone to give PhotoBucket a chance to address these issues and to not take any unilateral action that could hurt the cause. The next steps are being being planned already and everyone will be involved.

Finally, to all of the deviantART members who are new to this site, I would encourage you to take a look at the Ripped Art Task Force. They are a great deviantART group that deals with the issue of art infringement in a strong, professional manner.

They are a highly recommended resource for deviantART members.

Again, thank you all for your support and please, continue to help get the word out there. As the saying goes, this battle has just begun!

Update 1 PM CT: We are now one of the top ten most active petitions on PetitionOnline.com. See Image Below:

Update 4 PM CT: Rather than send the petition end at the tail end of a work day, I will send it in first thin the morning. I will post updates here and to the other entry after it has been sent off.