Blogging and Copyright Issues

Photo by FreeDigitalPhotos.net

If you are a blogger who uses photographs in your posts, you need to be aware that the photos you use may be copyrighted. Let me tell you...if you aren't careful, you can face legal action.

I was one of those stupid ones who would google my blog topic, then choose a photo from Google Images. Yeah, that's not a good idea. I had used a photo that belonged to an artist who did not appreciate me using it. I was told to remove it or face legal action in three days. I removed it from the blog post, but it kept showing up in Google Image searches. I was told it was my responsibility to have it removed...or else. It took hours of research to figure out how to remove an image from searches, but I did it, and haven't heard any more from the artist. 

I promptly deleted ALL photos from my posts that were not my own; so if you are going back through my backlist of posts to learn from all my "wisdom", you will find lots of those white squares with the little red X's in them. I want to be legal. I want to respect the artist. I want to do what's right. 

During my scary "experience", I emailed back and forth with my Alley Cats, and Mary sent us her list of  links to sites that have copyright-free photos to use. So with her permission, I am sharing her list, along with some other sites that readers from my personal blog sent me. 

Free Stock Photos:  FreeStockPhotos.com 
Stock Xchng: http://sxc.hu/
Wikimedia Commons:  http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Main_Page
Flikr Pingnews Commons:  http://www.flickr.com/photos/pingnews/collections/72157600007938726/
Morgue File:  http://www.morguefile.com./
Free Digital Photos:  http://www.freedigitalphotos.net
Visual Bible Alive:  www.visualbiblealive.com/
Christian Image Source:  http://christianimagesource.com
Dreamstime:  http://www.dreamstime.com/free-photos

Here are a couple of sites that have a great list of photo sites:

http://www.presentationzen.com/presentationzen/2007/11/there-are-many.html
http://www.authormedia.com/2009/07/11/where-to-find-free-legal-photos-online/

Please note that even though these sites have photographs that you can use, some may require an attribution. That means you may have to either link back to the site, or put the name of the author/artist with the photo.

So you bloggers out there, go out and be not afraid. Just be careful.

Do you have a favorite site for gathering photos for your blog posts? Please share!