I think digital watermarking with an embedded "pinger" is a great idea. Maybe you can even set it up to send an automated email to the offending site, telling them to take the pic down. Then you can focus on your work and let the widget be the sheriff!

Of course, as soon as something like that is developed, people are finding ways around it. But it's the kind of creative thinking we should be doing to address the issues, rather than this nonsense about sending people to jail.

You're welcome to troll here anytime

scott, i'd be interested to get your response on the colloquy that developed on the linked exchange later in the comment thread. i maintain that digital photography (on the distribution side)is making the concept of copyright less valuable to a photographer. yet remember, because of the strange rules of US federal law, photographers cannot collectively bargain as they are independent contractors and to do so would be price-fixing. the sop they get in return is copyright ownership (unless otherwise specified in advance as work-for-hire by the client). thus, at least in part, the lovely tendency of photographers to underbid the shit out of each other, as they are legally bound to be in competition.

the problem is twofold: should jill spend all day every day on the phone with her lawyer suing people? the policy that we have is to pretty much only go after corporate miscreants (although gawker is arguably corporate, but for the sake of this conversation let's call them "editorial") legally and financially. but for each one you go after you lose one more future client permanently. c'est la guerre.

my proposed solution: digital watermarking of images with some kind of a widget embedded that pings the copyright holder immediately upon use. some kind of DRM is necessary. and then a lo-res image used on a site with under x viewers per day would automatically pay y for having used it. or something.

They responded with an apology and advised they had removed the image at my request, then told me "you must understand, I am only 16...." and "I didn't know about copyright, sorry". I pointed out that I didn't have to understand anything - that if they hadn't been 16 they would have received an invoice for twice the license fee. I also explained that they would have noticed the file was copyrighted when they opened it to remove my watermark! and that that I had noted a statement on their blog saying that nobody was allowed to take any of their content!!

OK, the offender was only 16 but hopefully the experience will have taught them a valuable lesson. Unfortunately however, as you say, it is so common now that sadly, it won't make that much difference.

For willful ripoffs like stealing my photos to use as quick free images for your blog, add an instant $300 fine *in addition to* the immediate cease and desist, just like the speeding ticket. Share that fine with the photographer, allowing further debate on royalties etc. to be addressed in court as per the law. Do that and you'll be well on your way to solving the convenient-to-steal problem - just like with speeding.

However, I've stopped trying to hunt down people hot-linking my images or using my images on other websites without my permission. It's just too time consuming in the end. It prevents me from moving forward on my own personal work and other projects...

That being said, the part that burns me, is recognition. Too often there's no recognition, link back or mention of the photographer, his work or website. After all if we quote another blog as a blogger, it's standard practice to link back to that website, no? But it's not the same common practice with photos. People just freely take photos without acknowledging the photographer and linking back to his/her website. This, in my opinion, is where the web-mass lacks "education" - for lack of a better word.

With clients, as much as with people in general, with photography becoming so accessible to everyone... professional work is taken less seriously. How many times have I heard a client tell me "I have a D70 you know, if I had more time I'd be doing this myself..."

Redistribution of someone else's copyright-encumbered work without permission is a usurpation of a right that the violator doesn't actually have - much as someone who "trespasses" is usurping the right of a property owner to control access to their property. Violation of copyright is still a "wrong" just as trespassing is, but if someone snuck into my house, wandered around a while, and then ran off when I got home, I'd probably call the cops, but I wouldn't be screaming that someone had stolen my house.

Also, the problem with someone stealing my car (for example) is NOT that the thief now has my car, but rather that I don't. If someone happens to make a "copy" of my car, it has very little effect on me. Now, since a car is a physical "scarce" object, you can argue that the extra copies of the car actually do you harm by reducing the value of your property. I maintain that even then, this wouldn't be "theft".

One final analogy: imagine JK Rowling decides her bathtub full of 1000-pound notes is not full enough, and writes yet another "Harry Potter" book. She has a publisher make one copy, and she auctions it off. For the sake of this discussion, let's presume you're a rabid Harry Potter fan with a huge amount of money, and you win the auction for a huge sum of money.

A year later, Rowling decides she needs a second bathtub full of money, and has the publisher run off a few million copies of the same book for normal distribution. Instead of being unique, your book is now just the first of several million identical books. Question: Has JK Rowling "stolen" your book?...