16/02/2021
Happy Tuesday! Recent posts may have been scarce, but I have a doozy for today! Let's talk about using photos (not your own) in your social media posts.
One of the many hats I wear is that of Copyright permissions researcher. This means that I am tasked with researching and clearing the right to use third party text or images in published works. So I have to know when and how to request permission for something which is copyright protected, so that the publisher is not faced with a lawsuit!
However, you yourself may come across a lovely image, which would be perfect for your social media post, so you go ahead and upload it, and use the camera emoji and type the name of the photographer, and that's all you need to do, right. Right? Wrong!
Image copyright is image ownership. This is legal protection that is automatically given to the image creator as soon as it is snapped, saved, or drawn. This means that third party photographs, digital art, maps, charts, and paintings are all copyright protected and you cannot use them UNLESS you have permission.
How do you get permission to use an image that isn’t yours? You need to obtain a license or contact the creator directly. This is not always easy. And if you decide to just go ahead and use the photo anyway, you are opening yourself up to legal consequences.
Because obtaining permission can be time-consuming and costly (there are fees payable to copyright holders), there are many free stock photo sites available, such as Canva, Pixabay, Unsplash, etc. It would be well worth your time, and money, to browse these sights for suitable images. I personally use Canva, and to prove how easy it is (bearing in mind I am not a designer but a wordsmith), the image I've attached to this post, I just created in Canva in about 10 minutes, using a free photo, a filter or two, and adding my own company logo.
In closing, iIf you are still not sure if you can use an image or not, there is an ultra cool infographic from Hootsuite at this link::
https://blog.hootsuite.com/understanding-image-copyright/
And if you want to find more information on image copyright do's and don't, check out this link from WIPO (World Intellectual Property Organization):
https://www.wipo.int/copyright/en/faq_copyright.html