Images on this site were compressed using e-Vue MPEG4 technology in 2001, which was groundbreaking at the time for its DRM component and higher compression than JPG, however e-Vue is no more — we are transitioning these images to JPEG for 2004.
One of the largest concerns for the many artists, photographers, and businesses who have chosen to bring their creative content online is the worry over malicious or ignorant copying and re-use of images. And rightly so. There have been numerous documented cases of theft of intellectual property (IP), including Web design companies who blatantly ripoff other site designs by doing a screen shot then dropping in a different logo and body text, and artists who use photographs of copyrighted artwork to create derivitive works without the knowledge of the original artist.
There have been numerous laws passed in recent years including The No Electronic Theft (NET) Act passed in 1997, and the somewhat controversial Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA). But these offer little real protection for the individual artist unless it can be proven that a criminal offense has occured; which is defined by someone copying your work for commercial advantage or private financial gain, or the reproduction or distribution, during any 180-day period, or one or more copies, with a total retail value of $1,000 (see CyberLaw.gov for more info). In fact, according to a Forrester Research report, "Web technology will outpace intellectual property law, leaving rights holders in search of their own solutions."
"The tools for copying images are built into the browsers," notes William Kent of ArtistScope, a company specializing in digital rights management, and arguably the first company to offer online image protection solutions, "and those developers are more interested in impressing the public with toys to entertain the user and make everything on the Web as accessible as possible. For example, every time Microsoft updates their browser, there is a new gaping big hole to patch that exposes page and image content."
ArtistScope's Secure Image Pro allows content to be protected from saving, cache-copying, and bandwidth theft. In the image above, an example of the "loading image..." message is shown at left, and then the final image loaded (right), and unable to be copied from the browser or via a URL.
To illustrate the proliferation of content theft one need only follow the case of Huntington Beach, California, photographer Leslie A. Kelly who has sued a New York graphic arts firm and two of its clients for infringement, alleging that they swiped a picture from one of his Web sites to promote a line of cheese products. It is his second lawsuit against someone for unauthorized use of pictures Kelly has posted on the Web. Kelly has published two books on the Amish, and he maintains a Web site showcasing many of his photographs. The infringement came to light when a fellow photographer was hired by the client of the New York firm, and recognized the images on the client's product labels as Kelly's. It's unclear whether the theft occured due to outright disregard for the rights of the original photographer, or because the advertising firm (or the individual or team tasked with the project at the firm) which created the packaging was unaware of the laws relating to ownership of intellectual property.
Artists, too, are sometimes at fault for not making clear in their printed works, and on their electronic media such as CD-ROM and Web portfolios, that the works being presented are owned by the artist and protected by international copyright conventions. It should go without saying that you must always indicate ownership on everything you present publicly, which you wish to claim ownership of. The fact the art or image exists does not in and of itself imply that you own it, to some folks who believe everything is subject to some kind of "fair use," unless otherwise indicated.
Contributing to this problem are certainly search engines like Lycos which allow you to do online searches for images, such as "cats," which may bring you to a Web site where a photographer or artist has done drawings or photos of some furry critters. If you were a relatively amateur design person (such as an admin assistant, or intern at a copy shop) told to find a cat picture for the company newsletter, it's unfortunate that many online search resources present online content as if it were "clip art" free for the taking.
Ironically, one of the largest companies with a vested stake in both creating and controlling intellectual property, Adobe, makes it very simple to steal the works of others without their permission. Adobe's Acrobat 5 has a feature called "open Web page" which allows you to copy an entire Web site, complete with images and links to a PDF file, disregarding the rights of the site owner in much the same way Microsoft's Internet Explorer includes a "save site" feature built-in to the operating system.
