You see, I try to discourage people wantonly grabbing photos from my site. I accept that to some extent, I will never be able to avoid this kind of carefree transfer of information. Fortunately I don't think I have to worry too much about any kind of genuine theft of images (yet!). So far the only infractions I've noticed are people posting stuff of mine to Facebook. I don't hold any grudges, it seems like the most natural thing for any socialite to do these days, and there's really no harm involved.
Right?
Curious, I headed over to Facebook and clicked the little "terms" link at the bottom of the page. I didn't have to wade in very far when I found this gem in the legalese:
"For content that is covered by intellectual property rights, like photos and videos ("IP content"), you specifically give us the following permission, subject to your privacy and application settings: you grant us a non-exclusive, transferable, sub-licensable, royalty-free, worldwide license to use any IP content that you post on or in connection with Facebook ("IP License"). This IP License ends when you delete your IP content or your account unless your content has been shared with others, and they have not deleted it."--Facebook Statement of Rights and Responsibilities
For those of you not too up on your copyright law, this says that Facebook can do anything it wants with your content, globally, for free, and that includes reselling it to others. The upshot? Facebook at least allows you to retain rights to the content for your own use (their rights are non-exclusive, so you can still sell copies of your own without getting sued.)
While you can delete this content, it won't make any difference if someone else has also copied it and has it in existence somewhere else on Facebook.
Real world harm? Probably not. First off, Facebook does not seem able or inclined to host anything of very high quality, so good luck trying to get a nice print from photos hosted there, this quality is also doubtful to be of much interest to a potential buyer. Secondly, if we're worried about images someone else posted without permission, that is copyright infringement, and if I find the time and inclination, I can submit a DMCA takedown form in true music industry style.
All the same, I'd rather not see my images, which have required a considerable amount of time and money to produce, casually forked over in this way. It's the principle of the thing.
So the next time you NEED to broadcast a nice shot to the world, use a link instead. (My site has a handy little "Share" button just for this)
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