Proper use of images in blogs?
Cesar Sanchez
Tuesday, 15 May 2007 08:47 UTC
Hi, everybody. I live “around London”, where “around” is understood as “in a country around”. I’m starting a blog, so I thought I might join the group (if you don’t mind).
As a beginner, I have some questions. I’m concerned about the proper use of images or figures taken from the web.
1) In the best cases, a web site clearly states that you can use the image in your blog/page for non-profit use, by mentioning the source/author/credits. Can you recommend websites with collections of this class of public images? Do you prefer to insert the image as a link to the source, or save and upload the image?
2) What about the rest of cases? Should I ask for credit every time I want to use an image? (I mean for non-profit, educational use or scientific discussion) What about images from websites of:
- Private organizations or individuals
- Organizations funded with public money (government, ministries, national agencies, educational sites)
- Scientific societies
- Scientific journals. You probably have known about a recent polemic on the use of a figure in a blog (summarized here or there). Can we understand that anybody can use any figure from a scientific paper in a blog? (as long as it is for “fair use”)
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Replies
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Sorry for replying to myself. After my initial post, I’ve found very useful the following links:
- A Blog Around the Clock: here and here.
- Electronic Frontier Foundation.
Anyway, I’d love to read your answers based on your personal experiences.
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Hi Cesar
You know, you ask a very interesting question to which I don’t know the answer—I run a couple of blogs at Nature (Nautilus and Peer to Peer) and though I don’t use pictures that often, I am at the level of “if I succeed in getting it onto the blog at about the right size I am doing well”.
My suggestion is that the London bloggers part of N Network perhaps isn’t the best place to have an informed discussion—if you ask the question on one of the more technological forums, I think you will get the (non-London) tecchy network people joining in, and we can all learn. Well, I can.By the way, Pedro’s posting (to which you link) is very useful on the accreditation question, I’ve already featured that on Nautilus, the author blog. I guess you saw Euan’s post on FnL about that Wiley accreditation flare-up?
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Hi Cesar -
This is a frequently occurring question. Here are a few links:
Wikipedia has a list of links to “public domain” images.
The JISC legal service has further links towards the bottom of the page
Creative commons search is a good way of limiting your search to images that are definitely intended for sharing/reuse.
Yotophoto is another similar tool (though I’ve not used it.From what you write I think you are aware that just because an image is made available publicly on the web it does not follow that that image is in the public domain. Hence strictly speaking you should request permission before using any image unless you are sure that it is public domain (e.g. creative commons licence).
Some copyright advisors talk about “managing risk” i.e. asking yourself what is the likelihood a) that a rights owner will discover you have used their image and b) that the rights owner will object? The trouble with that is you may get wrong on occasion and be required to remove an image from the blog.
Perhaps talk to your librarian or copyright advisor if you want more advice.
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—I’m concerned about the proper use of images or figures taken from the web.—
“Blog Use Image License”: http://featurepics.com/Editorial/Images-for-Blogs.aspx
You can use these images legally in your blog or news content.
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For nice copyright-free images, I just search Wikipedia Commons or a website called Morguefile. The former is more comprehensive (and honestly, more useful for science-y stuff) but the latter is good for more generic everyday shots.
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