Dale said:
>Mark, thanks a million for your generosity and time taken to supply
>these resources to all of us FOR FREE and at no benefit to yourself!!
>Maybe it would be a good idea to give acknowledgement to the sources
>whenever possible, but images on the web especially those on eBay
>auctions, are acknowledged by all reasonable folk to be in common play
>and unless personal profit is being made from their "theft", it is
>totally kosher...
Actually Dale, just because an image is on the Web, doesn't mean that it's OK to download it, post it elsewhere, share it, etc. In the same way that hardcopy/printed works are protected, so are those works when digitized. It's not a matter of who is reasonable... I have been working indirectly with copyright issues for the last 17 years, and while they remain gray and generally confusing, I can with certainty that everyone should be thoughtful and maybe careful about how they use images acquired from the Web. I won't go into the Fair Use statutes here, but images on the Web are *not* necessarily public domain.
Finally, it isn't just a matter of whether the poster is in it for profit, but whether the owner of the image is in it for profit. My Velostuf business is NOT a money maker. I do it for fun, and to share the knowledge. If I *were* in it to earn my living, I would be aggravated if someone posted my images without permission and offered them for free to all takers.
There are professional photographers on this list who may be able to shed some light on the issue of images being shared on the internet.
John Barron
Minneapolis
http://www.velostuf.com