Copyright my entire site? Digimarc ? Other?

Archived from groups: rec.photo.digital (More info?)

I’m close to launching a brand new site that my wife and I
have worked very hard to build that contains beautiful pictures and
text (stories).
It just happened that somebody stole one page of my primary business’
website and used it for his own, so I realize that I better think
about copyright issues before launching the new one and being robbed
again.

(BTW, I am not sure about what to do about the stolen page me an
entire big page from my primary business site, to use it in his own
(this just happened and I’m not sure what I’m going to do), now I
realize that I’m not going to upload my brand new site,containing
hundreds of beautiful pictures I took after traveling all around the
world, just to be robed again, so my questions are:

I just checked the Digimarc site and I like what thy offer. They have
3 pricing levels: Portfolio, Collection, and Professional, and only
the more expensive “Professional” assures the “tracking” option. Is
this important?

Does this mean that Digimarc does the tracking or they offer the tools
so I do the tracking? Can I do the tracking myself?

I do not have many images, so I’ll prefer to go with the less
expensive Collection (3000 images).

Besides the pictures, what to do next to have the best protection
regarding the entire home site itself?

What to do to protect/Copyright not only my pictures, but my
home site design, text and others as well?

I’ll appreciate any help regarding this matter, and of course you
are going the first to know as soon my new site is ready to see.

(BTW: I am not sure what to do about the unauthorized use of my other
website.
I called the thief and he reacted like an idiot, saying that maybe I
stole from his webmaster instead. Do I need to call a lawyer?)

Thanks in advance
Paul

Archived from groups: rec.photo.digital (More info?)

Paul wrote:
> I'm close to launching a brand new site that my wife and I
> have worked very hard to build that contains beautiful pictures and
> text (stories).
> It just happened that somebody stole one page of my primary
> business'
> website and used it for his own, so I realize that I better think
> about copyright issues before launching the new one and being robbed
> again.
>
> (BTW, I am not sure about what to do about the stolen page me an
> entire big page from my primary business site, to use it in his own
> (this just happened and I'm not sure what I'm going to do), now I
> realize that I'm not going to upload my brand new site,containing
> hundreds of beautiful pictures I took after traveling all around the
> world, just to be robed again, so my questions are:
>
> I just checked the Digimarc site and I like what thy offer. They
> have
> 3 pricing levels: Portfolio, Collection, and Professional, and only
> the more expensive "Professional" assures the "tracking" option. Is
> this important?
>
> Does this mean that Digimarc does the tracking or they offer the
> tools
> so I do the tracking? Can I do the tracking myself?
>
> I do not have many images, so I'll prefer to go with the less
> expensive Collection (3000 images).
>
> Besides the pictures, what to do next to have the best protection
> regarding the entire home site itself?
>
> What to do to protect/Copyright not only my pictures, but my
> home site design, text and others as well?
>
> I'll appreciate any help regarding this matter, and of course you
> are going the first to know as soon my new site is ready to see.
>
> (BTW: I am not sure what to do about the unauthorized use of my
> other
> website.
> I called the thief and he reacted like an idiot, saying that maybe I
> stole from his webmaster instead. Do I need to call a lawyer?)
>
> Thanks in advance

I have seen these exact questions discussed by the knowledgeable,
helpful, usually courteous posters at
alt.www.webmaster.

Essentially, you should put nothing online you are not willing to
share. If it is there, it can be had. Deface or otherwise reduce the
usefulness of your pictures as presented for free. For my part, I
usually don't think ill of someone printing a 4x6 from my work, but
larger should cost them. If you have a "Hang in there, Baby" gem,
nothing bigger than 300x200 should be accessible without a credit card
number.

If you are doing the site just to show off and share, don't worry
about copyright of the other 2,999 images. If it is a
pictures-for-sale site, get advice from the professionals, and start
looking for a good Intellctual Property attorney. At least by a few
books from Nolo Press.

Did you actually read what Digimark's services are? Better be certain
before plunking down any money.

A lawyer will write a letter to the "idiot's" ISP, and the Idiot and
his webmaster will find themselves searching for a new place to ply
their thefts. ISPs have a lot to lose, and for the most part will
dismiss a thief rather than suffer the process of investigation and
compensation.

Was your site made to an available template? There are a lot of Web
sites out there. Could be chance. Could be theft. You can show the
date of origin of your work, right?

Maybe this perspective on a few of myriad potential problems will help
you think about your project.

--
Frank ess
"I can't sing, but I know how to,
which is quite different."
-- Noel Coward

Archived from groups: rec.photo.digital (More info?)

"Peter" <nospamplease@rsii.net> writes:

> When it comes to websites there are only two irrevocable truths.
>
> 1. Get over yourself.
>
> 2. Don't post anything you don't want stolen.
>
> Copyrighting, Digimarc and the thousand other methods used to try
> and protect content are all useless against a simple PrintScreen on
> any Windows computer in the world. That is the bottom line.
>
> As for the other website, Google for "cease and desist" and send
> a notarized copy to the administrator who hosts his site. It'll be
> taken down within a few days.

The next level of threat is a suit for damages. Statutory damages.
Make sure you have satisfied the preconditions -- in particular
registration. In fact, talk to a lawyer early, copyright law has lots
of ins and outs, and is relatively fast-moving after two centuries of
being fairly static. The great thing about statutory damages is you
don't have to prove financial loss to collect. This is very useful in
web-related cases.
--
David Dyer-Bennet, <mailtod-b@dd-b.net>, <http://www.dd-b.net/dd-b/>
RKBA: <http://noguns-nomoney.com/> <http://www.dd-b.net/carry/>
Pics: <http://dd-b.lighthunters.net/> <http://www.dd-b.net/dd-b/SnapshotAlbum/>
Dragaera/Steven Brust: <http://dragaera.info/>

Archived from groups: rec.photo.digital (More info?)

Many thanks to Peter, Frank, Marvin and David for your help.

Regarding the problem that moved me to post my original message,
the guy that had copied my business home page has now removed
most of it from his site. He still uses some information but has
changed the format, colors and syntax and I am happy that he
(somehow) did the right thing.

This was warning enough, and this week I will contact the
U.S.Copyright office to learn how to register and copyright as much
of my site as possible.

I just added some code I found in the web that disables the right
click most people use to download pictures from web pages. It even
works with browsers such as Firefox, and although a good hacker
will find a way, this is meant to discourage occasional web-thieves.

BTW: What if I build my web photo galleries in Macromedia Flash
format? Will pictures be more difficult to download?

I was very enthusiastic about Digimark, but it seems it is just
another way to tag the copyright notice to pictures, not too
different to the metadata file anyone can fill using Adobe Photoshop,
Bridge or similar softwares. The advantage of Digimark seems to be
that the photographer data is embedded on the entire picture file and
nobody can mess with it, right? I wander why it has not become more
popular then.

I'm my own webmaster. I have installed the complete Adobe Creative
Suite CS2, but I assemble, upload, and manage my site with Microsoft
Front Page 2003. It would be useful if there was some encryption
software that I can use with Front Page to better protect my sites
before uploading them to the servers.

Thanks again.

Regards,
Paul.























On Sat, 17 Sep 2005 10:32:34 -0700, "Frank ess" <frank@fshe2fs.com>
wrote:

>Marvin wrote:
>> Paul wrote:
>>> I’m close to launching a brand new site that my wife and I
>>> have worked very hard to build that contains beautiful pictures and
>>> text (stories).
>
><snip>
>
>>> Thanks in advance
>>> Paul
>>
>> The creator(s) of the Web pages and the photos own the copyright
>> automatically, unless it was "work for Hire, meaning that the
>> creator
>> was paid for the work. Absent an agreement that says otherwise,
>> even
>> if you hired someone else ot make your Web site, the copyright
>> should
>> be yours.
>> Like a patent, a copyright is often described as a "right to sue",
>> since that is the ultimate way to enforce either one. Legal
>> enforcement costs money; do you want to spend it?
>> A copyright can be registered, and that can make legal enforcement
>> easier. For a lot of information on U.S. copyright law for the
>> layman, go to the U.S. copyright office site:
>> http://www.copyright.gov/. There are other informative sites on the
>> Web that you can find with google or another search engine.
>
>Right. I forgot to mention
>http://editorialphotographers.com/
>a fine resource for serious shooters.

Ehm, digimarc is an solution. But it has restrictive license politics. SignMyImage is the name of shareware tool, that can do the same job for the fraction of the digimarc price. No restrictions.