[jojong]

I've seen some people post their images here and other sites with watermark(I think that's what they are called, light imprint over or at the corner of the image). I've always wonder why people do that? Do you "protect" your chip images? Why?

I've also seen many times GamingOre asking if it would be ok to take an image to use somewhere else. This is a very good courtesy, but is it wrong?

[AlbinoDragon]

My actual images (photos of chips) I don't watermark. I figure that with the exception of my customs, the chips are out there and my image (or scan) isn't necessarily any different than any other. If you do look in my collector gallery, you will see I scan them against a black background to make them different than pretty much any other scan though (and to hide how hideous the scanner I use is).

On the other hand, I've been in the habit of watermarking my custom designs after the whole incident maybe nine months ago with sevendeuceoffsuit (I think that's it) where someone here had their design swiped and used elsewhere. If someone is truly dedicated, they could undo the watermark, but if you're that good with Photoshop, you should be able to make an inlay yourself.

I guess it's just to protect ones intellectual property from those who have lower morals than most people in the world (but pretty average of most people on the internet... but not here per se).

[jojong]

Thanks for the response. I can understand when it's a custom design. Why a scan of casino chip I don't understand? Like you said, they are pretty much every where.

[ross]

when I do my scans I usually post them online --- although i have been very lax at that lately. I am working on hi-res scans of my collection now that are added to a database. (if you want to follow along at home I print the inventory sheet after each session into http://www.poppel.com/temp/book1.pdf --- its 21mb now so be warned). I've only touched the surface of my collection and wouldn't be surprised if its measured in GB when i am done. My PDF writer doesn't compress that great.

That said, I consider my scans to be public domain. People can use them for any reason they want. If you really need it I will package them up and send them over. I do hope that people will not use the scan for ebay as I would rather see the actual chip -- not a representation.

But that's me. Other people, especially who treat this as a business rather than a hobby, and have different PPOV and like to protect their content.

[VARoadstter]

One potential problem (admittedly one that a watermark doesn't fully address) is the potential for a scammer to lift an image and use it to post something up on eBay. In nearly every case a scammer will use an image of the object they are supposedly in posession of. The image adds some small level of credibility to a listing. Now, if the image is watermarked it really can't serve that purpose well as the scammer would have to look elsewhere to find a picture.

In a nutshell, though, the entire point of watermarking is to protect intellectual property.

[Sea Vulture]

Techincally, every image created by a person and posted is copyright protected. With that said, unless a person registers it with the copyright office, they aren't likely to sue you. They would have to prove damages. If it's not registered, they can't collect attorney's fees, so the risk reward isn't there.

It's usually common courtesy to ask permission, especially if you want to use images from fellow members, even if you want to use them on, say, ebay. It's when people steal other people's images and use them on the same site to sell the same type of item (ebay for example), therefore competing with the person whose image was stolen, that there is a real issue. Using a person's image then competing with them is really not cool.

I can speak from experience on this, having just gone through a Federal Copyright Infringement Lawsuit against a person who raided my commercial site and was using it for his own benefit. He's probably on the verge of bankruptcy right now, and deservedly so. Rather than try to work it out, he told me to F off. Bad mistake. Let's just say I won, and he's regretting the F Off attitude and will likely re-evaluate future responses like that.