Forum Feedback Members' rights to their own work posted in TE

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Pimpom

Forerunner
I hope this is the right section for this topic.

Being new to TE, I'd like to have some idea of TE's policy regarding members' rights when they post their own work in the forum such as photos, drawings (technical or otherwise), design, codes, etc.

I understand that, once such works are published in a public forum, it may be difficult to prevent others from copying or redistributing them. What I'd like to know is whether TE claims the right to use such materials without obtaining permission from the originator.

As an example, I gave the link to a photo I took last year in another forum - only the URL, not the image or a hot link. They published the photo in their magazine without asking me and did not even bother replying to my email. No response either when I criticised their action in the forum.
 
Watermark your images. There's nothing much one can do if one wants to keep publishing the images in public forums.
 
this is the web world, anything posted online is not safe ............

you can file a case under "cyber law" if you know that person who used your image without your permission,

if you cannot then let this be a LESSON for you & move ahead in life ......................
 
If you take photographs and post them on forums you should watermark them, unless they are of such low importance that it doesn't matter if they get stolen. Content ownership is always a problem, and plagiarism is not the only way to misuse it - misquoting and using material out of context also works - as does marketing (overt or search), sale of assets, and appropriation of content for personal purposes. An example of the last would be to quote without acknowledging source so it looks like the knowledge originated from the poster.

I recently left a forum where my content was being misused by other members within the forum and the mods were not sorting out the issue (deleting my content from the other member's post).

I used to be a pretty regular contributor over there and since I didn't want any of my content to be misused I asked for all of it to be removed. Of course, now that website has a content policy which bans deletion of content (which is a violation of fundamental rights of India citizens, so I don't know what pipes they smoke!).

If the misuse has already happened and you have original ownership rights (which means you can prove the photograph belongs to you), you can send a copyright infringement notice to the magazine. A love letter from a lawyer always works out well, preferably to the magazine's lawyer. They have a knack for sorting things out, because they make their money out of fees.

TE has an infinite edit button. Which basically means the content is yours forever, including the responsibility for what you post. Of course, if it violates forum rules a mod will delete it. Apart from that TE does not claim ownership of any content and no forum can restrict your access to your content, but at the same time it cannot protect from it being misused. The only thing that helps is legalese, and a total lockdown (hiding forum totally from public users).
 
@cranky, Not entirely true. Good idea on water marking the picture.

Terms of Service - TechEnclave

By posting on the message boards or rig gallery or any other content section of this website (excluding private email communication), you will be deemed to have granted TechEnclave.com perpetual, non-exclusive permission to redistribute by transmission the information or materials worldwide without charge or liability with proper citation/authorization wherever needed as decided by the governing council of TechEnclave.com. TechEnclave.com also reserves the right to use any content once posted on its site on any other area of TechEnclave.com without liability and without requiring any explicit permission from the author.
Click to expand...

By granting TE perpetual permission, the forum can reproduce your work even if you delete it from the post (assuming they have it saved/copied/backup somewhere).

Also, TE can use your image/post in any manner the wish to, for free.

TE will to cite you though, unlike the other magazine/forum.

@OP, The rules on TE are not much different from what you have faced in the earlier forum. Please read the TOS carefully.
 
I read the TE ToS but missed the part quoted by NinByChoice. Thanks for pointing it out.

To all those who replied: Yes, I am aware that it's difficult to retain control of something published in a public media. But my question was not really about conscious violation of copyright by unscrupulous people. That's a different issue and practically anything published on the Internet is a potential candidate for plagiarism.

My question was about TE's policy. This was largely clarified by NinByChoice except for one thing. What about the contents of a link given here - i.e., where the material itself is not displayed in the forum?

And I don't mean only photos. The experience I cited was just an example. It could be a technical diagram, a piece of software, a movie clip or even an original story or a joke on a member's website.
 
The most extreme stuff we as a staff have done till date is put the good reviews and articles on our portal. :P And it is done to encourage members to come up with good articles. But even then they are put up as your articles.

Read the first part of that clause very carefully and slowly to understand what it means. It is necessary to have that in place ;)

TE is not and was never one man show. I am glad to say there are multiple level headed and morally sound people who govern TE. As long as that is the case, you can rest assure your content will not be misused by TE staff / owners.

Regardless what is TOS /T&C of any website, no one can bypass the national and international laws. If you have proper proof of ownership and can prove its your content that is being used without your permission anywhere, you can get your say if you are ready to fight it out.

Some of my reviews were simply copy pasted couple of years back on a website and a blog(one of those google adsense leaching blogs) . Entire articles were simply lifted from TE and pasted there by the admin himself. It took just 3 emails from me to get them deleted from the other forum and 1 email to blogspot to get the entire blog removed from their site.

I do watermark my images these days as I found out some of the people on TE and other Indian forums were using my images in their articles. few even resorted to use them in their market threads. And most recently my 5770 ocing results ( i was foolish enough to post image without watermarking on XS initially ) were used to create duplicate hwbot submission by some other indian bloke.

Misuse always takes place. I honestly do not like watermarking review images. But there is no choice. I know its anal practice, but I email my articles to myself 1 day before I post it anywhere on the web :P
 
Like Argus/cranky mentioned, it is a good practice to water-mark the images - I remember an occasion when a lamer Ctrl + C/Ctrl + V'ed my image(s) and some of the contents from the Samsung N128 review and put it up on his blog - I had reported it to the blog owner and he removed it the next day. The HTPC guide had also been shamelessly copied sometime back and IIRC Shripad helped me report the same to the user and he had removed it. There's nothing much one can do about it - alternately they can mention it in the blog and he/she can provide links to the article.
 
I don't think we have ever used content without giving due credit. Nor do our forum rules allow it for 'copy pasted' content. But yes we will not ask for your permission to use it for TE. You posted it on TE for TE. Isnt it?
 
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