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Bill Stephens

9 Years Ago

Someone Is Selling My Art On Imikimi.

What to do?

They might have your art on there as well.

http://imikimi.com/main/view_kimi/AhU9-14H

Reply Order

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Mike Savad

9 Years Ago

if you didn't put there, and its not a scraper site pretending to sell it, complain to the owners with a dmca to have it taken down.

---Mike Savad
MikeSavad.com

 

Adam Jewell

9 Years Ago

Search for all the similar threads about the same topic.

 

Mike Savad

9 Years Ago

interesting addition. well someone took yours and modified it, so i would have that removed. on the plus side, someone saw it.

---Mike Savad
MikeSavad.com

 

Mike Savad

9 Years Ago

http://imikimi.com/main/view_kimi/AhU9-14J yours also right?

---Mike Savad
MikeSavad.com

 

Mike Savad

9 Years Ago

what that site is, you upload your image, someone steals your image and they montage on there with a bad fade. hard to do a search though, kind of a lame site.


---Mike Savad
MikeSavad.com

 

Edward Fielding

9 Years Ago

Is that Adam Lambert?

 

Mike Savad

9 Years Ago

i never heard of this site, yet they claim that they were made 71 months ago.

https://www.pinterest.com/pin/432908582900642634/ one of yours?

---Mike Savad
MikeSavad.com

 

Bill Stephens

9 Years Ago

I just found out about it and wondering what to do. They are using other people's work too. I have to take off but will be back later.

 

Bill Stephens

9 Years Ago

Double post.

 

Mike Savad

9 Years Ago

once its gone its gone. it looks like people just rip stuff off to put their own face there. and then they go. its not really set up as a pod and people really wanting that would have have that schmucks face on it. just find the dup's and have them remove it. the site is too much of a pain to search on to worry about my stuff. though most of my stuff has no negative space to allow for such a thing.

---Mike Savad
MikeSavad.com

 

Cynthia Decker

9 Years Ago

The Adam Lambert addition is kind of hilarious, but the image theft is not.

Bill, (and everyone) go to a website called Tineye.com. Tineye lets you search the web with your images to find unauthorized uses. Use it to search for all your popular images. You can see where and how your images are being used and decide whether or not to follow up. Hopefully, most of what's out there was put there by you or websites you work with, but it's worth looking.

I have been using Tineye for years to stay on top of image theft. I search every 6 months or so on my top 25-30 images. I find an image used without my permission (and there have been many). If it's a small image and my signature is there and it's someone's blog or something, I let it go. If it's a commercial site, or an objectionable site I go after them. I send a cease and desist letter and if necessary a DMCA. Abbie has text for a cease and desist letter on her website at http://1stangel.co.uk/.

So far, I have had pretty good success getting my images removed and I feel I have as good control as is possible online these days.

As for imikimi, they have a Facebook page and that might be the easiest way to contact them and inform them they can't redistribute artwork that they do not own. They are putting (R) marks on their edited versions of your work. Clearly they don't know the law. Bad news is, if the website is overseas, sometimes your only recourse is to ask that they remove the image or pay you for its use. And they may not do either.

 

Robert Kernodle

9 Years Ago

If it's on the net, then it's out of your control.

That's the game. At worst, zillions of people are using 900 pixel images of all my submissions to FAA. I really do not have the time or the interest to find them.

 

Bill Stephens

9 Years Ago

Thanks Cynthia. I will look up that resource.

 

Rita Drolet

9 Years Ago

To Cynthia

How much does Tineye.com charge for their services?

Rita Drolet
http://rita-drolet.artistwebsites.com

 

Cynthia Decker

9 Years Ago

It's free, Rita. www.Tineye.com

I have it loaded into my browser (Firefox on a PC) as a plug-in, so I can just right click on any image and it offers me the option to "search image with Tineye".

You can also reverse image search with Google. Go to the google homepage, and click "images" (usually in the upper right somewhere) Then in the search bar, you'll see a little camera on the right side of the bar where you type in your search terms. Click that camera, and it will give you the option to upload a photo from your computer or to paste a URL address of a photo and it will search on that. If Google is your default search engine, You can also search images by right clicking on them.

They both work well - Google gives more results - but I've always used Tineye and like it just as much.

 

Evelyn Haye-Primus

9 Years Ago

Wow! Cynthia Decker, Thanks for the info. It is great to have the resources you shared. I will be using them in the near future!

 

Jennifer White

9 Years Ago

Nice info Cynthia. I'll have to look into that.

 

Jennifer White

9 Years Ago

Sorry had to repost to follow. Following post.

 

Drew

9 Years Ago

Tineye works very well. Google image search with similar image filter helps find images that have been use in image manipulation and compilation.
Lot of pledgerism going on
Cynthia, I use firefox too. Need to get that down load.

Everyone, Do yourselves a favor, even if an image is free from copyright protection, reference the artist when known. If you don't, you risk yours reputation.

 

Mike Savad

9 Years Ago

tineye has a small database. but it can show you variations of a work, and is getting better each year. however it's tripped up over the FAA frame and will send back false positives. google usually has more finds and cropping bits out will find other work faster. its also doing a better job. both things have right click addons for firefox.

also remember just because you don't find it this month, doesn't mean no one took it, its just that the bots haven't found it yet.

also, in the case of google if you do an image search and it leads here, it almost always goes to the search page. and its a 50-50 if your work is actually on that search page.


---Mike Savad
MikeSavad.com

 

Bill Stephens

9 Years Ago

How long is the search for an image suppose to take?

 

Vanessa Bates

9 Years Ago

Condolences, Bill. The search might be a lifetime occupation? I do mine as frequently as Cynthia, but it's really hard sometimes with some website owners holding the attitude that the [copyright] law is for foreigners.

 

Jeffery Johnson

9 Years Ago

Congrats Bill on getting someone to sell your art for you.

 

Drew

9 Years Ago

Is there any law against purchases a print say, from FAA and reselling it?

 

Cynthia Decker

9 Years Ago

Bill, once you upload an image the results happen in seconds. Upload a screen-res version, not a print res version. With the right-click integration it happens just about instantly.

Drew, an individual can sell a single print to another individual. They can't make reproductions and sell those.

 

Drew

9 Years Ago

Exactly Cynthia. How many websites are doing Just that. Acting as the middle man.

 

Mike Taylor

9 Years Ago

I think there was a site called photostealers to report this kind of thing to.

I see it all the time with my microstock. I frequently do URL searches on my popular images and find them al over the web

 

Drew

9 Years Ago

As long as there is no duplication, what does it matter how many hands it passes through. As long as the originator gets paid.

 

Cynthia Decker

9 Years Ago

Right Drew, but this isn't that.

This is (imikimi) someone taking copyrighted images, altering them, obscuring the original signature and/or adding their own copyright, then redistributing the altered image under their name for users to alter further.

I'm fine with someone selling an image they bought on etsy or ebay or wherever. More power to 'em. I hope they make a little profit. That's a sale I've made and already been paid for. It's when others use my work for commercial reproduction and sales that I go all mama bear.

 

Drew

9 Years Ago

Cynthia, I'm sure this is all true. Not disputing Bill's claim. He has his hands full defending his work as it is.
I'm asking these questions because i collect and sell art.

 

Phyllis Beiser

9 Years Ago

I have found that when running an image search, if you use low resolution or small pictures, it is very fast. If you use your large file, you will get frustrated and wait forever to get results. I also use google because you get more results than tineye.

 

Drew

9 Years Ago

It is still my continuation that to protect your art from being reproduced illegally, keep the images low resolution that you uploaded to the net.

 

Mike Savad

9 Years Ago

for google and such you don't need a large image. just make it smaller, 200k or so. it will recognize a very small image. and the neat thing is, not only will it find the image, but it will guess what the image is and or the title to it.


---Mike Savad
MikeSavad.com

 

David Bridburg

9 Years Ago

My job for this afternoon was registering four works with copyright.gov

I was on my way to doing that now anyway.

I will never sue anyone, but if some corporation with very deep pockets
should make a really bad move, well my retirement accounts would look better.

It is my work.

Dave

 

Mike Savad

9 Years Ago

can you really sue or register art if it's based off a public domain image that you didn't make?

---Mike Savad
MikeSavad.com

 

Dan Turner

9 Years Ago

"but if some corporation with very deep pockets should make a really bad move, well my retirement accounts would look better."

The very purpose of incorporating is to provide a legal shield for the owners against claims on their personal assets. Remember that corporations with very deep pockets can also afford very good lawyers. I would not tie your retirement fund to hoped-for copyright infringement.


Dan Turner
Dan Turner's Seven Keys to Selling Art Online

 

Karen Skinner

9 Years Ago

Thank you, Cynthia Decker, for the information. I will start adding this to my list of checks.

 

David Bridburg

9 Years Ago

Mike

I have registered six out of my ten images so far. So the answer is clearly yes.

The max you can claim is $150k per incident as statutory damages.

Your current use of the LOC images recolored may or may not be copyrightable. Probably are,
since it is obviously your hand at work.

Dave

addition: Mike, I am not totally clear on the law, but some of the ins and outs have to do with
the percentage of change you have effected. I do not know if that applies and how. With your colorization
you altered a massive number of pixels. So more than likely you can register your work. Last year the copyright.gov
site began to take uploads of up to 170 MB. I think you need to have at least 600 x 600 px per image for the review
to take place. Multiple image uploads cost $55. Single image uploads are $35. You need to use Firefox or IE, but can
not use Chrome and possibly other browsers.

 

David Bridburg

9 Years Ago

Dan,

You are probably right. But exposure looks bad. Settle and get it over with.

I am not tying my retirement to suing anyone. The statement might have come off that way, but
that would not pan out.

Dave

Addition: for personal reasons I am leaving my work as of now in my estate for my nephews and niece. Trends
over a period of 70 years after my demise could go in any direction. Who knows. This is the main reason the
works are being registered as a proof of claim much further out into the future.

 

Cynthia Decker

9 Years Ago

Mike, nobody can claim or assign copyright on a single unchanged public domain image. You can, however, claim copyright on the changes and additions you made to the PD image to make it your own. The source image isn't part of the copyright, but your work and additions are. In your case that would be colorizing, texturizing, the works. This protects your image in it's entirety, even though the copyright specifically only covers your changes and additions. (so someone using your version of a PD image is infringing on your copyright, but you don't own the source image and they can use that all they want).

Using David's work as an example; I can take "Girl with a Pearl Earring" and slap some of my poetry on there and sell it as a print. But I can't take David's version with the red background and do the same thing.

It's all a little mushy and based on whether or not an artist could prove they were the one who made the changes. Your alterations are so recognizable, and you have a body of work that's all clearly by your hand, I don't think you'd ever have a problem showing ownership of your changes to PD images.


 

Mike Savad

9 Years Ago

they will take your money. bring it to court though and you'll lose. the work your doing on it, isn't enough of a change to count for anything. cutting the background out of something isn't enough of a change. but they will take the money to register.

out of principal i would never try to copyright someone else's copyright. even though i'm making it my own.

as i understand it, change has to be quite a bit, enough that it no longer looks like the original. changing the tone of something, cutting out backgrounds or adding things is not enough of a change. i don't know what or how colorizing it falls into that category since more than one person can colorize the shot. since the base image is in the PD. it would be impossible to hold up in court and it would be a huge waste of money if i tried.

i would never sell these as stock due to all kinds of other issues. it becomes far more confusing when you color something and someone copies your colors or look - it would be too much trouble to even bother registering for anything. how suing works i don't know. if someone makes a colorized image of a PD, and another person copyrights their version, could they sue someone else because they also had a colored version? i just don't think it could ever get to court.


like if it took dave's image and i cut the background out, stuck a maroon background in, i can do that. there wasn't anything special being done. i don't think the PD images have as much, if any, protection. but the gov will take the money.

---Mike Savad
MikeSavad.com

 

Mike Savad

9 Years Ago

i think this all falls under the same rule of - the exact same image - copyright. if we both stood in the zoo and shot the same lion in the same pose, we both have our copyrights even though the image is the same. and if we apply the same effects to it, well it becomes confusing, but we both hold the copyright to the same image. it would cancel out i guess.

---Mike Savad
MikeSavad.com

 

David Bridburg

9 Years Ago

Mike,

You are twisting everything involved with this. I dont know where to begin, but those are only your opinions, your principles and your misconceptions
of this. The copyright office does not agree with you. And neither would any court of law.

You have such a large inventory that it would cost a lot to register everything. as they would say in France, "not my concern".

Cynthia actually cleared it up quite well. Only the changes are mine. The image underneath is not my copyright at all. I have a specific copyright.

Besides the work I am using is not copyrighted to anyone else. It is PD work. So in fact you own the underlying of my work, I own it, everyone here
owns it. It is PD again.

If someone one hundred years ago took the first photo of a poodle should no other photos of poodles ever be taken? There is a time limit on such notions.

Every object has patent rights, and the images of it can have copyrights. There is a time limit for those rights. The exception to time limits are valuable
trademarks. But the moment coke or whomever drops a trademark and no longer creates commercial value others can use it, and I believe trade mark the
symbol or whatever again.

Dave

 

David Bridburg

9 Years Ago

I will never go to a zoo with you. Problem solved.

I will take Bill to the Zoo or see his images any time he wants. Have you seen his work?
His amazing lions?

Dave

 

Cynthia Decker

9 Years Ago

"as i understand it, change has to be quite a bit, enough that it no longer looks like the original."

That's with copyrighted images, not public domain images.

 

David Bridburg

9 Years Ago

Cynthia,

Interesting clarification. I had not thought that twist through, no need to before.

Dave

 

Mike Savad

9 Years Ago

no, they aren't misconceptions.

i'm not registering anything. i don't consider it worth it. registering assumes your going to court over these matters. and it's not worth my time or the money.

i don't know what you would have to do to tell people what you did that made it your change and how that change can't just be copied by another person. the ones where you smooshed them into flowers you can fight. cutting out a background or spherizing something, you have no case. and because your using PD work, you can't re-copyright it to your name.

your poodle example doesn't at all fit here.

what i'm saying is this - your not doing anything unique. its not unique enough that it would hold up in court. you mostly have cut and paste montages, and cut out backgrounds. anyone can make those. but they would not be stepping on your copyright of the changes you made, because what you did, is not unique enough. understand? 10 other people could be doing the same thing right now without even having seen your version. you wouldn't have a fight.

as far as photos go, as long as i press the shutter its my image. if there are two identical images taken by two people at the same time and moment, neither one could sue for having the same images.

---Mike Savad
MikeSavad.com

 

Colette Dumont

9 Years Ago


Good information. Thanks Cynthia.

 

Mike Savad

9 Years Ago

now what exactly would be covered in my copyright.

i start with a PD black and white.
i turn it into a color so much so, it never looked like a black and white.

what would be covered?


---Mike Savad
MikeSavad.com

 

David Bridburg

9 Years Ago

Mike? Really? You are not reading well.

Every pixel you added color to would be your copyright, depending on your specific choices of color etc.....

The underlying belongs to all of us, the public.

You really are in over your head on legal issues. You have misconceptions about all of this.

See a lawyer who specializes in IP.

Dave

 

Mike Savad

9 Years Ago

that part doesn't matter, if it was just a matter of pixels all i had to do is download your version and rotate the hue. it's usually a lot more. its a style color choice, editing you did. its more than just changing colors. most people are under that thought, that it's mine now because i turned the blue sky into purple. but its not.

have you seen a lawyer dave, because i really doubt you have.


---Mike Savad
MikeSavad.com

 

Mike Savad

9 Years Ago

http://fairuse.stanford.edu/2014/12/22/much-photo-need-alter-avoid-copyright-infringement-hint-cheshire-cat/

here is a court case, where someone took someone else's photo and placed it on a tshirt. in this case the image was very different from the original, that the side with the shirt won. the image of yours would have to be just as different.


---Mike Savad
MikeSavad.com

 

Diana Der Maro

9 Years Ago

well mine is so unmarketable I should not ever have problems with that LMAO.

 

Mike Savad

9 Years Ago

you never know, all kinds of work end up in odd place. i'm sure sooner or later your stuff will be stolen, so ummm cheer up...


---Mike Savad
MikeSavad.com

 

Drew

9 Years Ago

One scam could go like this:

Creat a website under an alias
Upload your work
claim you are a genius
to attempt to prove your genius,
announce you are so good, people steel your work.
show them the web site to prove your genius.

There are many, many scams.

 

Ted Raynor

9 Years Ago

Diana I can so relate. If there is a criminal out there who can sell my stuff then I will hire him(or her)!

The only place I have full-rez images are here on FAA. I can only hope they are secure. But when I post images anywhere else they have a big watermark right through the middle.

Here is a site that will track theft it anyone wants to.

http://www.pixsy.com/

 

Rose Santuci-Sofranko

9 Years Ago

Here is their "Who Is" info....have you sent them a "take down" notice?

http://whois.domaintools.com/imikimi.com

Email is associated with ~12 domains

is associated with ~2,152,229 domains

Registrant Org Imikimi, LLC is associated with ~13 other domains
Registrar MELBOURNE IT, LTD. D/B/A INTERNET NAMES WORLDWIDE
Registrar Status clientTransferProhibited
Dates Created on 2006-11-27 - Expires on 2018-11-27 - Updated on 2013-09-27
Name Server(s) ED.NS.CLOUDFLARE.COM (has 652,081 domains)
EDNA.NS.CLOUDFLARE.COM (has 652,081 domains)

IP Address 141.101.112.66 - 4 other sites hosted on this server
IP Location United States - California - San Jose - Cloudflare Cdn Network
ASN United States AS13335 CLOUDFLARENET - CloudFlare, Inc. (registered Jul 14, 2010)
Domain Status Registered And Active Website
Whois History 1,662 records have been archived since 2007-06-12
IP History 20 changes on 13 unique IP addresses over 9 years
Registrar History 1 registrar
Hosting History 4 changes on 5 unique name servers over 9 years
Whois Server whois.melbourneit.com
Website
Website Title Imikimi.com - Sharing Creativity
Server Type cloudflare-nginx
Response Code 200
SEO Score 82%
Terms 209 (Unique: 112, Linked: 110)
Images 4 (Alt tags missing: 2)
Links 50 (Internal: 41, Outbound: 2)
Whois Record ( last updated on 2015-02-07 )
Domain Name: imikimi.com
Registry Domain ID: 687677881_DOMAIN_COM-VRSN
Registrar WHOIS Server: whois.melbourneit.com
Registrar URL: http://www.melbourneit.com.au
Updated Date: 2013-09-27T18:14:38Z
Creation Date: 2006-11-27T21:54:54Z
Registrar Registration Expiration Date: 2018-11-27T21:54:54Z
Registrar: Melbourne IT Ltd
Registrar IANA ID: 13
Registrar Abuse Contact Email: .au
Registrar Abuse Contact Phone: +61.386242300
Domain Status: clientTransferProhibited
Registry Registrant ID:
Registrant Name: Imikimi, LLC
Registrant Organization:
Registrant Street: 1900 Glen Garry Dr
Registrant City: Lakewood
Registrant State/Province: CO
Registrant Postal Code: 80215
Registrant Country: US
Registrant Phone: +1.2063358043
Registrant Phone Ext:
Registrant Fax:
Registrant Fax Ext:
Registrant Email:
Registry Admin ID:
Admin Name: Shane Brinkman-Davis
Admin Organization:
Admin Street: 1900 Glen Garry Dr
Admin City: Lakewood
Admin State/Province: CO
Admin Postal Code: 80215
Admin Country: US
Admin Phone: +1.2063358043
Admin Phone Ext:
Admin Fax:
Admin Fax Ext:
Admin Email:
Registry Tech ID:
Tech Name: Shane Brinkman-Davis
Tech Organization:
Tech Street: 1900 Glen Garry Dr.
Tech City: Lakewood
Tech State/Province: CO
Tech Postal Code: 80215
Tech Country: US
Tech Phone: +1.2063358043
Tech Phone Ext:
Tech Fax:
Tech Fax Ext:
Tech Email:
Name Server: ED.NS.CLOUDFLARE.COM
Name Server: EDNA.NS.CLOUDFLARE.COM
DNSSEC: unsigned
URL of the ICANN WHOIS Data Problem Reporting System: http://wdrprs.internic.net

 

Rose Santuci-Sofranko

9 Years Ago

Thanks Cynthia...I just added the "Tineye" extension to Chrome

 

Rose Santuci-Sofranko

9 Years Ago

I don't know if this link will work for you, Bill, but I just did a "TinEye" search on the image you linked to in your opening post and it found it on 60 different sites...not sure how many are posted from you tho.

http://www.tineye.com/search/8508f4fd198272a3b799013c87204b2ea73436dc/?pluginver=chrome-1.1.4

 

Erin Shipley

9 Years Ago

Wow, that is something...honestly I certainly would not want that.Can this happen?

 

Robert Kernodle

9 Years Ago

What is to prevent a company from buying a print, scanning the print at high resolution, and making prints to sell?

Sadly, I think the answer is time, money, determination, and willingness to undertake a risky venture.

The fear of being exploited is an interesting conundrum. I just do not know that there is any absolute solution giving the degree of comfort artists here seem to seek.

The world moves too fast to afford this sort of comfort, I am afraid. Unless you have an international security force working 24/7 seeking out infringers, you pretty much have to accept the reality of your being a potential target.

Again, I cannot worry about it, ... not how I want to spend my days.

 

Erin Shipley

9 Years Ago

What a fascinating conversation! Bill, when you try the TinEye search do let us know what you find out. Rose, thanks for the education. I had no idea about a TinEye search before, I too will try this. thank you!
Erin

 

Bill Stephens

9 Years Ago

Erin, someone else did a search of one of my works and found over 60 places where that work was being used, and that is just ONE image!!!!

When people are in another country, you really don't have much option.

 

Jennifer White

9 Years Ago

I need help. I tried a reverse image search with one of my older images on both Tineye and Google. I copy and pasted the link for both of them. Was a little nervous about uploading the photo. Tineye came up with my photo on FAA and then several other FAA artists popped up. Google said: The URL doesn't refer to an image, or the image is not publicly accessible. Why won't it find even mine which are not just on FAA.

 

Cynthia Decker

9 Years Ago

It may have to do with how the link was indexed. I don't really know. If you're pasting an FAA link there may be coding in there somewhere that makes that version unique or something. You can safely upload low res versions of images at both Google and Tineye, I do it regularly. They don't get stored, they're just used for reference temporarily and then deleted.

 

Jennifer White

9 Years Ago

Ok. I was tying to avoid that, because regardless, everything is stored. What resolution do you recommend?

 

Erin Shipley

9 Years Ago

Is it best then perhaps to NOT put your photos on this site in full res?

 

Cynthia Decker

9 Years Ago

Jennifer, I usually search with a 400 x 600 image or so. Nothing big enough to worry about.

Erin, Jennifer and I are talking about uploading images to reverse search engines, like Google or Tineye. if you plan to print your work through FAA, you want to upload the highest resolution, best versions you have.

 

Erin Shipley

9 Years Ago

thanks very much Cynthia...

 

This discussion is closed.