"GoPhoto" is trying to take over my images
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All of a sudden I notice that when someone clicks on one of my images, they now get a link to the corporate website of GoPhoto. The image is an old pre-copyright illustration from the Civil War. It is true that I did not create this image myself. But now this image is being used to funnel people to the GoPhoto website. Here is an example of the link people get when they click on the picture:
Infuriating that a picture on my site is being used to serve their corporate purpose! How on earth did they piggyback onto this? It’s like someone who uses Project Gutenberg getting an advertisement for a corporate site when they click on a page.
The blog I need help with is: (visible only to logged in users)
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I don’t know. I suggest you use another public domain image instead. Note that I tagged this thread for Staff. Please subscribe to it so you are notified when they respond.
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Thank you for responding. Unfortunately I can’t substitute another image for this one, as it’s specific to the battle being described. I think this is a very important issue for WordPress. Images posted by WordPress bloggers are being used to promote corporate websites like GoPhoto. They are hijacking WordPress images. Aren’t you a bit concerned about that? Anyway, in response to your request, the original URL was: http://www.sonofthesouth.net/leefoundation/civil-war/1862/march/capture-fort-henry.htm
It wasn’t easy to come up with that. Someone may say, Well, you took the image from Sons of the South. Yes, I took a noncopyright picture that they used…which originally came from Harpers Illustrated. It’s all fine for folks interested in the Civil War to share images, but it’s not fine for a corporation like GoPhoto to come in and funnel a viewer of the picture toward their site.
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Did you hotlink the photo from the GoPhoto site? If so, don’t hotlink at all. Simply download it to your computer, then upload it to WordPress.com. If it came from Harper’s, link it to Harper’s. Hotlinking and embed codes from other sites will always expose you to vulnerabilities like that, something I learned the hard way via PicApp.
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No , I didn’t hotlink from the GoPhoto site. I have no use for those people and would never originate an image from their site. I first posted this image about three years ago. It was never linked to a corporate site until just now. Most of the photos on my site are from my own camera {which get stolen all the time, but that’s another story), and the others come either from Wikimedia or from other noncopyright sites. I am scrupulous about that. I do not link from corporate websites. I am very concerned that something new is going on, some new way that companies are piggypacking on blogger’s photos. Please stop it from happening!
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I’m just seeing timethief’s response. If it is hotlinked, this is not something I did myself. This is something GoPhoto figured out how to do. Please do what you can to stop it.
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But “noncopyright” doesn’t mean they won’t try to take over your site, as you have seen. If you want to avoid this, you MUST host the images on your own site.
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After all, all kinds of noncopyright sites are corporate-owned, or get sold to corporations, or, as with Picapp, work fine for years and then suddenly somebody decides to “monetize” and poof, you have no recourse.
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There is some problem with this – on Feb 10, 2013 and a couple of other days in my Clicks section is shows clicking to GoPhoto.it – sorry folks – my image – here on WordPress.COM – somehow WordPress.COM let them click from inside my site – links posted below
My Posting: http://captnmike.com/2009/10/01/piloting-and-navigators-quick-reference/
The link on MY site to MY photo: http://captnmike.files.wordpress.com/2009/10/navigators-quick-reff-card-page-1-v5.jpg
The link from my Clicks Section:
http://www.gophoto.it/view.php?i=http%3A%2F%2Fcaptnmike.files.wordpress.com%2F2009%2F10%2Fnavigators-quick-reff-card-page-1-v5.jpgNote to staff: there is another gophoto.it reference just below the above one and some other gophoto.it links a bit earlier in my stats
Why a link that I did not put in??
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raincoaster, what do you mean by “host the images on your own site”? What I have done is to save noncopyrighted images to my own computer, then upload them to the blog. As mentioned, most of these are Wikimedia. “Sons of the South” is not a corporate site like Picapp or Gophoto. As mentioned, I had the image on my blog for the past three years and only now had this corporate intrusion. I honestly believe something new is going on. Please take a serious look at this!!
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I had the same thing happen on Feb 7, 2013 also – gophoto.it is showing as linking out of my Posts below – again – my images – no hot-linking etc
My Post: http://captnmike.com/2010/03/01/navigation-exercise-1/
My image:
http://captnmike.files.wordpress.com/2010/03/18441-exercise-1-th1.png"Magic" gophoto.it link in my stats Clicks section:
http://www.gophoto.it/view.php?i=http%3A%2F%2Fcaptnmike.files.wordpress.com%2F2010%2F03%2F18441-exercise-1-th1.pngMy Post: http://captnmike.com/2010/05/11/navigation-exercise-2/
My Image Link:
http://captnmike.files.wordpress.com/2010/05/exercise-2-chartlet-th1.pnggophot.it magic link showing up in my Stats / Clicks:
http://www.gophoto.it/view.php?i=http%3A%2F%2Fcaptnmike.files.wordpress.com%2F2010%2F05%2Fexercise-2-chartlet-th1.pnghttp://www.gophoto.it/view.php?i=http%3A%2F%2Fcaptnmike.files.wordpress.com%2F2010%2F05%2Fexercise-2-chartlet-th1.png
OK – any thoughts on what is going on?Sorry about the double gophoto link posting inside and outside the code tags – not sure about the translation of this editor
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Yeah, so please stop disrespecting me for my nontechnical communications and please help solve this problem.
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No one here has in any way disrespected you. We are Volunteers. This thread is tagged for Staff intervention. Most support Staff are at a meetup, and it’s not likely that there will be a Staff response to this thread until next week.
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I am a volunteer for Project Gutenberg myself, and I truly understand the effort involve in making a gigantic effort like this work. Thank you for your work. I appreciate your response. The important thing is to get GoPhoto or any other corporate website de-linked from WordPress.
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Looking at the gophoto site – there is a link to add their junk to your browser – there is a “Open Original” – and looking at the image properties shows that they are hot-linking to my WordPress.COM site-
Not good at all – and how is the click showing up in my stats? Smells like a security issue also to me
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As I said above this matter will receive Staff attention as soon as they get to it. They deal with threads with the earliest dates first and then move forward. There are many thread that were tagged for Staff attention prior to this one being tagged.
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@streamsandforests
Ignore the spammer. It and all low life bottom crawling scum like it have been reported to ToS Staff.
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