The image for this week on Sepia Saturday is of women ironing,
I can’t go searching for a similar photo as I have different things on my mind. But I will say doing the ironing gives you the perfect time for doing some thinking. The monotony of the task takes you deeper and deeper into the mind and though I haven’t done any ironing this week, apart from a few quilting seams ,nevertheless my mind is bubbling over with the results of my thinking.
In the past some of us have discussed this vexed question of always giving credit to the source of any image or text which you “borrow” from another web site to use in your own blog. On the whole bloggers are very good as doing this, particularly those involved with their family history, and particularly those who use Sepia Saturday. Perhaps there’s the occasional slip but that is usually a one-off and done in the excitement of the moment, not with malice aforethought.
But some people who use Facebook exclusively and do not blog are a different breed altogether. Notice that I said some. I know some beautiful people who use Facebook but do not blog.
I am a Blogger who uses Facebook. I am not a Facebooker.
It is on my mind at the moment because the Admin of one of the Australian Genealogy style Facebook Groups has a bad history of grabbing images from our blogs, from the Government library in Victoria and other sites and loading them into her own Facebook site under her own name with nary a mention of where they came from. Politely asking for the source of an image results in you being immediately banned from the group. It has happened to several of us You Sep Sats know I enjoy sharing my family photos but I am unhappy about the thought of my images languishing in this unreachable Group.
I’ve been given lots of good advice about complaining to Facebook authorities which might be beyohd me. More likely is that I will never again share a family photo, much as I enjoy sharing. Time will tell.
But at lunchtime today I was remembering the game of Monopoly and got to wondering why couldn’t we have nice old-fashioned board game called Bloggers v Facebookers. I forget the rules of Monopoly but if a Blogger hits a Take a Card square they might pick up a card which says
Most Interesting post today – Collect $100
Well done on crediting your sources – Collect $50
A record number of Comments today – Collect $20
Good choice of Tags – Collect $10
You forgot your Sepia Saturday link – Cough up $5
And then on the Facebookers’ pile of cards
Who did you pinch that photo from ? – Pay back $100
You forgot to use your Spellchecker – Pay back $50
Too many posts per day. Take it easy. – Pay Back $10
I like the picture of your cat – Collect $5
Then of course there are the icons that you move around the board. If you are a Blogger you can choose from some pretty in purple little laptops, scanners, printers, WordPress software box, cup of coffee mug, etc whereas the Facebookers have the choice of mean green, slimy green, little um…..um…..um… well…. A tear drop with I’m a Facebooker on it…….a thief in a hoodie ….or ………
And all of this because of one unethical, disrespectful little Australian
So let’s play BLOGGLEFACE
O you can do something more sensible and go and have a look at what other Sepia Saturdayers have been up to this week.
Bound for Australia 
I don’t even have a Facebook account.
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Amusing but with a serious note I think. I would think the best option is still to complain to Facebook. Meanwhile, back to the game – your move!
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I’m afraid whenever you post a photo – on Sepia Sat., Facebook, or your own blog, etc. – you run the known risk of others outside your preferred area copying it. You really can’t get away from it. So I always make sure, when I’m sharing photos of others, I have their permission to do so. One member of my family has forbidden me to share any pictures of them past a certain point in their life & I respect that. It’s too bad we can’t control things as much as we’d like, but that’s the real world, unfortunately.
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The point that I am making is that it’s not the copying I am objecting to but the fact that the copier does not give credit to the person he copied the image from. Without that accreditaton they are virtually saying that they hold the original photo. Unless the photo is your own photo,or belongs to a family member who has given you permission to use, it every image you post should give the link to where it came from or the fact that it is your own or a family member’s.
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That’s awful. I contacted the person to ask permission of the image I used this week. I wouldn’t have used it otherwise. Hope things work out for you. You are right, ironing like other chores can help you sort out your thoughts.
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You’ve posted a thoughtful editorial about one of the unintended consequences of our digital internet age. Images, music, videos, text are all exposed to risk of theft, and I wish there was a fix, but I’m afraid Pandora’s box has been opened and can never be closed again.
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I think I know the group you are thinking of. There is a lot of talk about just how unethical they are and there seems to be a lot of people who are affected by their copyright theft. I’ve seen many in-copyright images shared as her own work, including a few with a modern photographer’s copyright symbol on it. Then there’s the older images which she does not acknowledge and claims as being from her own collection, even ‘liking’ it when people comment on her fabulous collection! And it’s not only images they are swiping. It’s whole mountains of text in extremely blatant plagiarism. The Admin who posts these things refers to it as her “research”. Apparently Google=Research!
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