Actually “inline linking” (or hot linking, leeching etc ) is a form of theft if the image is hosted on a server where the site owner is paying for bandwidth used and you do not have permission to hot link.
Linking for a site such as imageshack, photobucket or other image hosting sites is OK, but even these sites prefer you to use thumbnails to reduce the bandwidth used.

Preference and law are two different things. An image hoster should expect people to download their images and provide suitable bandwith. You can’t have the cake and eat it. If you make a living hosting images (photobucket, flickr ect.) for people, then host and let people use the service.

That implies that because something is available to the public stealing it is OK –

You are not stealing it, you are linking to the source.

so I have a garden gnome in my front garden. It still is my property but on full view to people passing by. If someone decides they like my gnome and walk of with it that is theft.

Notice how the gnome would be gone from your garden, whereas the image remains on the original server. Thats the difference. It would be more like; I like that gnome, i will show it to my sister.

If someone is bothered by the prospect of their images being stolen from any site they post them to then they either don’t release them or they release them in in a low resolution size and ‘print’ size which is OK when viewed at 72dpi (the average monitor resolution) but would look highly pixelated and crappy if downloaded and blown up for other uses.
Of course watermarking the whole image is another solution – but unless you cover the whole image most single line watermarks can be edited out.

Both valid solutions for protecting your images.

I work for a commercial website which has had review images stolen by other sites and posted with no credit or link to our site. We have pursued sites which have done this and have successfully had the images removed.

Were they inline linked, and did you need a court order to get them removed?

I suggested for a long time that watermarking was a good idea and recently these have been added to the images. Now if a site uses our images the source is known.

Best way to prove the ownership and few prof sites would display images containing the watermark of another site.

…

Finally I would like to advice forum users to use Inline linking, whenever they are in doubt about the copyright status of an image.

This means that the image in the post, is actually downloaded from the site where it has originally been placed.

An example:

Here I link to my own photobucket account, where I store a picture.

[IMG]http://i183.photobucket.com/albums/x217/MONDARIZDK/Western_Lysander_ExC…]

I have omitted to close the [IMG] tag so you can read it.

This next picture is copyright protected, so Im unable to use my own photobucket account for storage. Luckily the owner has stored the image for me.

Here is the image on that users account page:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/matthewphx/287322950/

And here is a Inline link to that particular image file:

http://farm1.static.flickr.com/113/287322950_608f9a8e88.jpg?v=0

Inclosing that URL with [IMG] tags I can simply link directly to that location:

[IMG]http://farm1.static.flickr.com/113/287322950_608f9a8e88.jpg?v=0%5B/MG]

(I have now changed the inline link, so it serves as an example only eg. no picture actually displayed)

This is a fully legal way of displaying images, even if they are under copyright protection, as they at no time are copied from the original location (besides when they are viewed). Linking is fundamental to the workings of the WWW, so if people want full control of their images, they should not be online.

Although any picture by default is protected by copyright, there are plenty of pictures, where the creator releases the picture under another licence.

The pictures below is released under GNU Free Documentation License, which allows anyone to use it, even commercially (limited to 100 copies in print, unless the original image data is provided, so practically unlimited when sold as the Ebay pictures linked above – one by one prints).

There are a number of variations of the GNU licence and even licences with unrestricted use, such as public domain.

I feel its a good idea for forum users to familiarise themselves with these licences, as it could save Key Publishing some trouble.

Most wartime pictures taken by US servicemen are now in public domain, due to the government legislation in place:

“An image or file if a work of a U.S. Air Force Airman or employee, taken or made during the course of the person’s official duties. As a work of the U.S. federal government, the image or file is in the public domain.”

I think Britain have a slightly different legislation, but basically they have a 50 year copyright span.

“Although if you change the image, even slightly, you are entitled to copyright for the new image”

Not true, for obvious reasons.

People (generally those not creating copyrighted material) have a lax attitude to copyright. If you breach someones copyright, it’s theft, that simple.

The problem is that digital copying is part of WWW technology. Every time you view a picture online, you have downloaded a copy of the data wich produces the image. Protecting the copyright on digital material is litterally impossible (this does not mean its right to copy other peoples work).

There is a sharp line between copying and theft. When something is stolen, if does no longer reside in its original place, but when its copied, it is actually cloned and reside in two places. What you can say is, thats it can inflict a loss of earning.

Please to not take the following as my opinion, but as a general online conception about copyright and common access computer networks.

The current concept of copyright does not adapt well to the structure of digital networks. Since its impossible to change the network to suit current copyright issues, the implementation of copyrights will have to change.

Copyright holders should be looking for an enhanced “first publish” fee, so as to compensate for the release to a digital media.

There is no “lock”, or other protection that will prevent digital copying. If its digital it can be copied without loss of quality.

Just as copyright was initially invented to prevent others using an original work to suit the situation then, the copyright retaining and issuing body, will have to come up with something that suits the new situation. Claming moral issues is all very well, but it will not prevent copying of the material.

It will not be the copying community that looses this “fight”, but unless new types of regulation and compensations can be implemanted to ensure proper financial compensation to the creator, the basic idea of copyright will die a slow death.

Clinging to a archaic legal protection is not the way forward, but adapting to the new conditions might prove valuable.

Again, this is not my opinion, but the general ideas floating out there on the WWW. I do however belive they are right about the need for changing to suit the new situation, but I do not have a solution.

The image in question is a drawing AFAIK. It looks like a professionel job too, so here we are dealing with the actual issue of copyright. Namely that the artist could have made, or even should have made, a profit from the use of the drawing. There is a loss involved, or at least a percieved loss.

Naturally everyone is protected by those copyright laws, but if I upload an image taken at Duxford, I would not actually loose anything if someone made a copy. Actually I would be delighted if someone could use my picture. Thats why I upload my aircraft images to Wikicommens under a “fair use” licence, which means “go ahead and use it, but don’t use it commercially”.

Just because you hold the copyright, you don’t need to exercise it. Please also consider, that the actual “profiting” from illegally copying aircraft images is almost nonexistent.

Also you do not automatically recieve copyrights to images taken by others. Anyone who collects wartime photos (car boot sales, Ebay ect.) have no legal copyright to those images, which in most cases are taken by unknown persons. they can prevent their distribution by uploading low resolution copies, or by watermarking the images with their name (but not copyright). Although if you change the image, even slightly, you are entitled to copyright for the new image.

The bottom line is, that people who have no economical income from their images, should maybe consider their gain from copyright protection. I have often been on websites, where the images are nearly unviewable by copyright notices and watermarks in order to establish ownership. Thats a shame.

I think you should ask your artist friend about what he thinks, before deciding about refusing to sign them. Its also possible that the person asking for your autograph, was unaware of any copyright infringement. Lets say that he owns the book with the drawing (or in other ways own a legal copy), which he do not want to use for the autograph, how would you classify this infringement?

Copyright law is equally valid online. However, it is sometimes difficult for people to know what level of protection a picture, or drawing, has, as some work is released under “fair use”, or other copyfree licences.

Many people retain copies of pictures found online, for their own personal use (although this is technically pirate copying, it the work is protected). Basically thats what you do when viewing a picture (it needs to be downloaded, otherwise you cant see it). So its a fine line between actually copying and simply viewing the picture, in both instances the picture is residing on your PC.

Besides that, you are right in saying, that credit should be given to the original creator.