I learned a good lesson today in the use of photos on your blog found on the web — not every image is free.

While looking for an image to use on my Vote for Kineda post a few weeks ago, I scoured the search engines for something that conveyed the feeling of being happy. Up came the perfect image that I cropped and used without second thought. It’s the usual process that I take and I’m sure many other bloggers take when looking for a matching image to go with a post.

Would this be considered Fair Use of the image I found?

Let’s first find out what Fair Use really means before answering this question. According to this Copyright and Fair Use article found at Stanford University Libraries:

“Fair use is a copyright principle based on the belief that the public is entitled to freely use portions of copyrighted materials for purposes of commentary and criticism. For example, if you wish to criticize a novelist, you should have the freedom to quote a portion of the novelist’s work without asking permission. Absent this freedom, copyright owners could stifle any negative comments about their work.

Unfortunately, if the copyright owner disagrees with your fair use interpretation, the dispute will have to be resolved by courts or arbitration. If it’s not a fair use, then you are infringing upon the rights of the copyright owner and may be liable for damages.

The only guidance is provided by a set of fair use factors outlined in the copyright law. These factors are weighed in each case to determine whether a use qualifies as a fair use. For example, one important factor is whether your use will deprive the copyright owner of income. Unfortunately, weighing the fair use factors is often quite subjective. For this reason, the fair use road map is often tricky to navigate.”

The key phrases in the Copyright and Fair Use article are:

  • “… the public is entitled to freely use portions of copyrighted materials for purposes of commentary and criticism.”
  • “… one important factor is whether your use will deprive the copyright owner of income.”

In this case, my photo wasn’t used for commentary or criticism, but promotional purposes. Also, the photo is owned by Adam
Nollmeyer who runs Acme Photography (Commercial Phoenix Photographer) in Arizona. Adam, like many professional photographers, makes a living off the photos they produce. If their photos are used freely without permission or compensation, they’d be out of a job.

So where can you find photos to use on your blog?

Free photos:

  • Creative Commons Images is a good place to start. You are free to share or remix any photo as long as you attribute the work
    in the manner specified by the original author or licensor.
  • Flickr CC has a dedicated pool of images under the Creative Commons license.

Cheap and Inexpensive Photos:

  • For a few bucks or a small subscription fee, you can also scour the stock photo galleries like iStockphoto or Shutterstock.
  • Pow Stock is another great site that aggregates many free and cheap stock photo galleries into one easy to use resource.

These images are usually Royalty-free and can be used as long as you follow their licensing agreement.

As bloggers, we play a fine line with the use of images found on the web. Even in this fast paced world of blogging, if we can take a moment to see if the image in use really falls into Fair Use before posting, it’ll go a long way in our relationship with professional photographers. Don’t wait for a photographer to find out on their own that their photo has been used without permission before taking it down. And trust me, they’ll find out. The web is big, but someone will notice. In this case, the photo was of two well known web celebrities — Justine Ezarik and Brian Shaler — who has quite the fan following.

If you’re not sure whether an image is copyrighted or not, contact the photo owner. Be proactive. It only takes a minute to write an e-mail asking for permission. If we respect them, they’ll respect us.

My apologies go out to Adam for using his great photo without permission. I had a good talk with him over the phone about his profession, and he even took the time to learn a bit about mine. Photographers don’t bite, but the improper use of their images will. I hope other bloggers can learn from my mistake.