To Post or Not to Post?
Artists don't work in a vacuum, we are social creatures, we make work to show it. Fans and critics alike are necessary to the process of making art. These days showing your art almost always involves posting it online through social media. But how can you prevent getting ripped off? While it may take an artist a hundred hours to produce a single piece, it only takes thieves a matter of seconds to profit off of someone else's' work. Just as important as producing the work itself is learning how to protect it. Following are some options to do so:
Circle C
The first step is the simplest: add ©, the year, and your name to anything you create. This is your declaration of copyright and marks the art as yours. The © is important because it tells the viewer the work is protected by copyright. The © can be added digitally or drawn on by hand, the technique is not important, just the mark itself.
Watermark
Some artists choose to watermark their work. This is a visible branding that overlays your images. It is usually transparent and fairly large. Experts in digital imaging can remove it with Photoshop or other image editing software, however, it's usually not that easy to do. You can add watermarks to your images with Photoshop or similar image editing programs, some of which feature batch processing to make it easy and efficient. The downside besides the time it takes to do it is that it also compromises the viewing experience as it visibly alters the image.
Creative Commons
Founded by Harvard Law Professor Larry Lessig, Creative Commons is an organization dedicated to making it easier to share work without the sometimes arduous process of copyright registration and without the same restrictions. Creative Commons offers a wide range of options to allow people to share their work on their terms. All have some level of sharing, the most restrictive being "Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs." Licenses are in effect immediately upon implementation and there is no required fee. Creative Commons is a non-profit organization and donations are gladly accepted.
Copyright Registration
You can register your copyright with the Federal Copyright Office. Online registration fees start at $35 for a single registration. There is a wait time that can be up to 5 months. It's also important to know that while many international laws closely follow copyright laws in the U.S., they do not automatically apply internationally—you'll need to check those if you are selling your work internationally or find that your work has been used elsewhere in the world.
Following Up
You can check on your images to see if they turn up anywhere unauthorized by uploading your image to a reverse image site like TinEye or Google Reverse Image Search. This isn't full proof, but can certainly help you take a cursory look.The answer "to post or not to post" is complicated, and as with most ethical issues, it depends—on your circumstances.Sources:http://www.finearttips.com/2010/07/how-i-stopped-a-copycat-artist-on-facebook/https://www.thoughtco.com/what-is-a-watermark-1701744https://www.copyright.gov/https://creativecommons.org/http://copyrightregistry-online-form.com/
Searching for the great image
When searching for that great image online it’s easy and tempting to simply right click and copy any image you find. There is no warning signal or stop sign that appears with a message asking, “Yes, you can take this image, but should you?”Finding images online, and then what you do with them, poses legal questions as well as ethical ones that touch upon issues of integrity and morality. The ease with which internet surfers can grab images encourages copyright infringement. It doesn’t necessarily take that much more time to search through resources that provide images that aren’t in violation of copyright law.Creative Commons is one place where you can start. A non-profit organization that was founded by Larry Lessig, Creative Commons offers free tools that enable the sharing of images with a variety of options. Users can give permission to use their images with options like “some rights reserved.” Those seeking images can go to Creative Commons Search and find a number of resources that provide images utilizing Creative Commons licenses.If you decide to start where most of us do, Google, go one step further to Google’s Advanced Image Search. Here you’ll find a tool that not only let’s you search by format, language, geography, and more, but also by usage rights.There are a number of sites that offer free stock images. A post by Smashing Magazine lists a directory of sites offering free images for both personal and commercial use. This is in addition to the plethora of stock photography sites that offer a wide range of purchasing and licensing options for both royalty free images as well as for rights managed images.Another option internet surfers can try are images that are in the public domain. MakeUseOf has a list of 6 Free Website For Public Domain Images & Free Stock Photos.The last thing that users should consider is asking for permission. If you find an image that’s copyright protected, you can ask for permission to use it. Depending on how and why you are using it, you just may find the copyright owner is happy to share the image along with a photo credit.
Creative Commons: Copyright with Flexibility
Creative Commons is a non-profit corporation that offers ways to grant copyright permissions for creative work that make it easier for people to share or build upon the work of others.The Creative Commons licenses enable people to easily change their copyright terms from the default of “all rights reserved” to “some rights reserved.” Creative Commons licenses are not an alternative to copyright. They work alongside copyright, offering a means to modify standard copyright terms. Creative Commons offers a spectrum of possibilities between full copyright and the public domain.Critics claim claim that it undermines copyright. Last month ASCAP (American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers) began a fund-raising campaign to fight groups that support free culture and digital rights, among them Creative Commons. Some feel this claim is laughable because Creative Commons actually creates licenses to protect content creators.Which side are you on? Do you think Creative Commons are offering options that make copyright licensing easier to implement and enforce, or do you think they are undermining copyright and compromising the rights of artists?Read More http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2010/06/ascap-assails-free-culture-digital-rights-groups#ixzz0vOlNNRiN