Pinterest a case study

“Colorful background with texture of toys” is an artwork by renacuaje. Royalty-free with stardard restriction as stated in stock.xcgh.hu (www.sxc.hu) terms and conditions. Retrieved from http://www.sxc.hu/photo/1335748 on 30th March 2012 at 122.59.pm

Case Study: Copyright
Infringement in Social Media

Abstract
“Watercolour 6” is an artwork by Billy Alexander. Royalty-free with stardard restriction as stated in stock.xcgh.hu (www.sxc.hu) terms and conditions. Retrieved from www.sxc.hu on 30th March 2012

Pinterest is a virtual pinboard. People can organise expressed their opinions as well, in terms of United
and share things they found interesting in the in- States law. Most of them agreed that the infringe-
ternet, as well as looking at other people’s interest ment is most likely to happen. Pinterest reacted
to find inspirations and discover new things. This fast to this issue. According to its co-founder, they
new social media is a beta site and still in private provided a form to report copyright infringement
testing, but it went viral and has grown so fast. and relesead a set of code that would prevent people
Nevertheless, it recently faced an issue on copy- from pinning an image from a website. This might
right infringement. Using the ‘pin’ in Pinterest, one not be the best solution, but Pinterest is showing
can take an image in its full size and put it on his their good will and will still be improving their site
board, performing a duplication of a work without to be more compliant with the law.
the creator’s permission. Voices had raised regard-
ing the problem, including a concerned Getty Im-
ages founder and Amazon’s action to make sure
that Pinterest complies with the law. Lawyers had
at 10.00 am

at 10.00 am

Social media, Pinterest, copyright, piracy
Pin, board, repin, copyright infringement, fair use, fair dealing, SEO, Pin It button
FRED Reference

Keywords

for Dummies

Pinterest, as said in the website, is a virtual pin- user can repin it so that the content is shared to
board. It is a social media where people can orga- his/her friends. Much like a “Retweet” button on
nise and share things he/she found interesting in Twitter.
the internet, as well as looking at other people’s in- ☺ Board: Consider it as a folder. This is where you
terest to find inspirations and discover new things. put your pins. Boards are separated according
to subjects such as Dream Holiday Destination,
Some popular words that are commonly used in Decorating the House or Yummy Recipees.
Pinterest are: ☺ Follow: You can “follow” a person or an indi-
☺ Pin: A pin is an image added to Pinterest. Pin- vidual board. If you follow a person with “Follow
ning an image means putting the work in its All” like that on Twitter, you will automatically
,
original size and essence in a board. You can up- get updates on their pins or new boards. If it is
load an image from your machine or add from an individual board, the updates you received
a website using the Pin It button, which will link will be specifically on that board only. You can
back to the site it came from. follow and unfollow anytime; there will be no
☺ Repin: If an image is pinned, other Pinterest notifications sent to the respective person.
at 10.00 am


This new social media is a beta site and still in pri- users (mostly female) that enjoys ‘pinning’ items
vate testing, but it went viral and has grown so fast they find around the Web” The pinning activity can
.
over one year that it was named as one of “50 Best lead to repinning, where more and more people
Website of 2011” by TIME magazine in August1. will see the content of the pin and eventually inter-
One thing that may help the viral development is ested in visiting the real site of the pinned item. It is
the joining system. You cannot fill a “new account” amazing that Pinterest actually generates visits to
form to join, you have to be invited to be able to third-party website more than Google+, LinkedIn
fill the form. You can make a request to Pinterest and YouTube combined2.
to send you an invitation, but it will take a while
for them to send the invitation to your e-mail. It is Even Barack Obama use it for his 2012 campaign.
faster if you have a friend that is already in Pinter- You can find him on http://pinterest.com/baracko-
est inviting you. As a result, many people will ask bama/ . Obama has been using social media (Face-
their friends to invite them via Facebook or Twit- book and Twitter) since his first step towards the
ter, or even blogs. presidency, and if now his campaign team added
Pinterest into the campaign channel, it must have
CNN pointed out that Pinterest is the “2012’s hot- been because Pinterest had shown significant influ-
test website” because it has established “devoted ence in the digital social media world.

1
McCracken, H. (2011, August 16). The 50 Best Websites of 2011. Retrieved March 28, 2012, from Time: http://www.time.com/time/specials/packages/article/0,28804,2087815_2088159_2088155,00.html

2
Aronica, J. (2012, January 31). Pinterest Drives More Referral Traffic Than Google Plus, YouTube and LinkedIn Combined . Retrieved March 28, 2012, from Shareaholic: http://blog.shareaholic.com/2012/01/
at 10.00 am

pinterest-referral-traffic/

Copyright Issue in

Amidst its vast-growing popularity, Pinterest faces “We’re comfortable with people using our images
a problem. Several websites are voicing their con- to build traffic. The point in time when they have
cern that Pinterest may encourage copyright in- a business model, they have to have some sort of
fringement by allowing people to take images from license.”
their sites. Jonathan Klein, co-founder and CEO of
Getty Images, expressed his concern to TechCrunch, So, before, the images in Pinterest were driving
an online media. He does not mind having people people to visit the site, and Getty Images had no
post the image to their blog or if a student use the problem with images used for increasing traffic. But
images for educational purposes, even if someone now, Pinterest has gained profit and attracts US
downloaded and altered the image hosted on Getty $37.5 million investment, and that is not some-
Images. What he does not approve is when the im- thing that cannot be overlooked. As a reputable
age is used for business and with it gaining profit, site, Getty Images want to make sure that their
then the respective party should share it with the affiliates are getting what they deserved.
original creator. As quoted in an article in Tech-
Crunch.com:
at 10.00 am

A lawyer who happened to have a passion on photo- Pinterest Terms of Use also stated that the user is
graphy and an avid user of Pinterest recently wiped responsible to pay the fees that occur for himself and
off her Pinterest boards from fearing of copyright the Pinterest team should there be any legal process.
infringement. Kirsten Kowalski of Atlanta, Georgia, By mid-February 2012, she then decided that she
participated in a thread on Facebook in which some had better delete the images she pinned before, ex-

photographers were complaining that their works cept for her own images, to avoid infringement.
have been posted by other people or clients in Face-
book without their consent. She was wondering that Amazon.com has also showing interest in this matter.
if it was unacceptable in Facebook, then Pinterest Like any other start-up website, Pinterest does not
might face the same problem. have its own server and using Amazon Web Services
for their web hosting. Artists’ Bill of Rights, a pho-
Running her own investigation in the legal aspect, she tographers’ lobbying organisation, asked the Amazon
found that in Pinterest Terms of Use, each member group to take notice of the copyright violations, as
is responsible for their pins and repins. That is, they stated under the U.S. Digital Millennium Copyright
have to have a permission from the original owner Act (DMCA). Amazon agreed to process the notice
of the work to do so. Giving credit and a link back concerning the infringement done by Pinterest mem-
to the original work does not make it legal to post bers and to make sure that Pinterest will comply to
another person’s work. the Act. They provide an online form for copyright
owners who wants to file complaints to Pinterest,
She saw a section on US federal copyright mentio- although they encourage the respective party to go
ning ‘fair use’ It says that the use of copyright work
. straight to Pinterest itself.
without permission can only be done for criticism,
comment, news reporting, teaching, scholarship or What is Pinterest’s position exactly? Where did it go
research. Pin and repin do not actually fit those cate- wrong for them? Let us break down the case in the
gories, and that is why she got worried. Furthermore, next part.
at 10.00 am


Case Breakdown
At first, Pinterest’s goal is to allow people to col- artworks are included in ‘artistic works’ Copyright
.
lect the things they like from the internet in one infringement is an act of using a copyrighted work
place. Therefore, they provide the “pin” The prob-
. without authorisation from the copyright holder,
lem starts when the pinning happens. When a user such as reproduce or perform the work as well as
pins an image, he brings the image, which is pro- making a derivative work. Taking somebody’s work
tected by copyright law, in its original size to his without the owner’s consent is an act of copyright
Pinterest board. Not a thumbnail or in any smaller infringement, and that is why the pinning becomes
resolution file, but the original file. This is equal to a problem with Pinterest.
take somebody’s work and put it on your work (the
“board” can be considered as a user’s work, because As mentioned before, there is a section in US Fe-
other people would then see and decide whether or dereal Rights about Fair Use. Fair use is copyright
not they interested enough to follow the board). principle based on the belief that the public is en-
titled to freely use portions of copyrighted materi-
Copyright is a type of legal protection for peo- als for purposes of commentary and criticism. Fur-
ple who express ideas and information in certain thermore, when determining whether it is a fair
forms, such as original literary, dramatic, musi- use, one should considered aspects such as:
cal and artistic works3. Photoghraphs and imagery
3
Attourney-General’s Department of Australian Government. (2005). Copyright. Retrieved March 27, 2012, from Attourney-General’s Department of Australian Government: http://www.ag.gov.au/Copyright/
at 10.00 am

Pages/default.aspx

1. the purpose and character of the use, including confined to four purposes:
whether such use is of a commercial nature or
is for nonprofit educational purposes; ☺ Research or study;
2. the nature of the copyrighted work; ☺ Criticism or review;
3. the amount and substantiality of the portion ☺ The reporting of news;

used in relation to the copyrighted work as a ☺ Parody or satire;
whole; and ☺ The giving of professional advice by a lawyer; or
4. the effect of the use upon the potential market ☺ For certain purposes by an educational institu-
for or value of the copyrighted work. tion or library4.

Pinning an image (or video) may not be intend- One may say that pinning something can be done
ed for commercial use, so it may comply to the for a review, but The Copyright Act provides no
point 1. But pinning brings the whole amount of guidelines as to what constitutes fair dealing for the
the work into one’s board, and if you can have the purpose of criticism or review, so it is a bit hard to
original work from, say, Gettyimages, that you can determine a “review” .
use for your future work, why bother buying from
them? Therefore, pinning does not suit point 3 and For reporting news, it involves the following medi-
4 because it disrupts the ownership of the original ums:
work and destroys the market potention of a work ☺ a newspaper, magazine or similar periodical pro-
for its creator. vided that a sufficient acknowledgment of the
work is made),
How does Australian law see this problem? Appa- ☺ in a cinematograph film, and
rently, Australia does not have fair use defense like ☺ by means of a communication
the United States does, but there is an exception to
copyright infringement called “fair dealing” under Nevertheless, most people just pin something because
Copyright Act 1968. Fair dealing exceptions are they like it. Therefore, it is not exactly a “fair dealing”.

4
Attourney-General’s Department of Australian Government. (2005, May). Copyright - Review of Fair Use Exception - May 2005. Retrieved March 31, 2012, from Attourney-General’s Department of Australian
at 10.00 am

Governmen: http://www.ag.gov.au/Documents/FairUseIssuesPaper050505.pdf

5
i.b.i.d


from Lawyer’s Perspective
Regarding the copyright infringement issue, seve- Charley Moore, founder and executive chairman of
ral lawyers are giving their opinion in various me- online legal service RocketLawyer.com., also com-
dia. Itai Maytal, an associate at New York law firm mented on the pinned images in the Market Watch
Miller Korzenik Sommers, which specialises in me- article. “When you take it without payment, you
dia and intellectual property, was quoted in Busi- effectively reduce the ability of artists, photogra-
ness Insider article, saying that adding caption to phers to create more good stuff, because they are
the pinned image is essentially making the user to not compensated for it,” Moore said.
comment on the photo. By commenting on that
photo, Pinterest can make the argument that ha- Ali Aalaei, a practicing attourney servicing San
ving the photo on its site could be protected under Fransisco Bay and Silicon Valley which focus in small
“fair use” But then, a caption does not necessa-
. business, litigation and intellectual property, wrote
rily qualified as a comment in the full the spirit of on his blog that it is possible for photographers,
fair use, so you have to examine the caption more graphic designers, and some bloggers to “team up
closely, Maytal said. together to sue Pinterest, but people love Pinterest”
so it will be hard to take them down.
at 10.00 am

He did point out that Pinterest copies an image to ing things with a handy link to where you can buy
its own servers, duplicates and shares it. In fact, them from the people who make them. How is this
even if the original creator of the image is removing a problem? And who would sue his customers for
the image from his own website, it remains on Pin- giving him free exposure and better SEO - Search

terest. One can say that his copyright is infringed Engine Optimisation, red-?”
on the fact that the image is being duplicated, mis-
used and stolen by Pinterest users. “Problems are more likely to arise where users are
pinning or repinning content that derives its eco-
Kelcey Patrick-Ferree, a business attorney focused nomic value from its own existence, as opposed to
on internet and social media law, was interviewed from what it depicts. I would be very cautious about
in Arik Hanson’s Communications Conversations posting photographers’ work or photos of works of
blog. She said that brands and business who are art”.
joining Pinterest to market themselves should only
pin images that they own have the right to use. She suggested that a mechanism should be available
for copyright owners to remove infringing content,
“Most businesses are pleased when someone posts a just like YouTube does.
link to their site as part of a ‘beautiful home de-
cor’ collection. Why would anyone try to discourage We can conclude that the lawyers see the infringe-
that behavior? The Wall Street Journal published ment happens because the images are duplicated
an article the other day comparing Pinterest to and misused so that it lessens the economic value
Napster, and I could not disagree more. Napster for its creator. To seek refuge from the fair use law
was a method of sharing things so that you did not is still to be examined more carefully.
have to buy them. Pinterest is a method of shar-
at 10.00 am

‘s
Reaction to the Issue

Through her blog post, Kirsten Kowalski had raised “We care about respecting the rights of copyright
concern about copyright infringement in using Pin- holders. We work hard to follow the DMCA pro-
terest. Ben Silberman, the CEO and co-founder of cedure for acting quickly when we receive notices
Pinterest, reacted fast. He reached out to Kirsten of claimed copyright infringement. We understand
and talked about her concerns, as she posted on and respect that sometimes site owners do not
her blog later on. He also posted on the Pinterest want any of their material pinned.”
blog addressing the current issue. They are upda-
ting their Terms of Use so that it would not harm Flickr has applied this to their site, protecting im-
the users. They provide a page to report copyright ages they hold in their site. A Flickr representa-
infringement. They also release a set of code to be tive talked to Venture Beat site, saying “Flickr has
used by websites that are hesitant in having their implemented the tag and it appears on all non-
contents being pinned by adding it to the header of public/non-safe pages, as well as when a member
a page. As quoted in the Venture Beat article, has disabled sharing of their Flickr content. This
means only content that is ‘safe,’ ‘public’ and has
at 10.00 am


the sharing button enabled can be pinned to Pin- They also provide a “Pin It” button, so owners of
terest” So right now, if someone clicks on a page
. the work can put it if they want their work to be
that has this code, there will be a window appears pinned and the user can check if it is safe to pin a
as follows: work in the internet.

It is true that there are other ways to retrieve an
image in its full size that cannot be stopped by
merely some codes being put, but this action indi-
cates Pinterest’s good will. Providing a report form
is also a good way to reach out to photographers
and designers that may feel infringed. This might
not be the best solution, but Pinterest will still be
improving their site to be more compliant with the
law.
at 10.00 am

Conclusion

As a social media that allows people to take images Pinterest reacted fast to the issue and trying to ad-
from other sites and post it on their own page by dress the matter. For now, they are changing their
pinning it to a board, Pinterest is facing a seri- Terms of Use, providing a form to report infring-
ous copyright infringement issue. Several concerned ing contents, and released a set of code that can be
parties had emerged, including Getty Images and used by website owners to disable an image from
Amazon. The problem lies with the pinning, because being pinned. This might not be an ideal solution,
it duplicates the work of an artist in its full size but they had started correcting the mistakes and
and posts it without the original author’s permis- will continue to make efforts to comply with the
sion. Pinning also reduce the economic aspect of the copyright law.
work for its creator, and as the lawyers stated, it
could hinder them from getting what they actually
deserve.
at 10.00 am

References

Aronica, J. (2012, January 31). Pinterest Drives More Referral Traffic Than Google Plus, YouTube and Linked-
In Combined. Retrieved March 28, 2012, from Shareaholic: http://blog.shareaholic.com/2012/01/
pinterest-referral-traffic/
Attourney-General’s Department of Australian Government. (2005, May). Copyright - Review of Fair Use
Exception - May 2005. Retrieved March 31, 2012, from Attourney-General’s Department of Aus-
tralian Government: http://www.ag.gov.au/Documents/FairUseIssuesPaper050505.pdf
Attourney-General’s Department of Australian Government. (2012). Copyright. Retrieved March 27,
2012, from Attourney-General’s Department of Australian Government: http://www.ag.gov.au/
Copyright/Pages/default.aspx
Cashmore, P. (2012, February 06). Why Pinterest is 2012’s hottest website. Retrieved March 28, 2012,
from CNN: http://articles.cnn.com/2012-02-06/tech/tech_web_pinterest-website-cashmore_1_
sites-social-networks-early-adopters?_s=PM:TECH
Davis, J. (2012, February 15). Is Pinterest the new Napster? Retrieved March 28, 2012, from LLSocial.
com: http://llsocial.com/2012/02/is-pinterest-the-new-napster/
Davis, J. (2012, February 19). New code lets websites opt-out of Pinterest. Retrieved March 28, 2012,
from LLSocial.com: http://llsocial.com/2012/02/pinterest-offering-code-to-block-pinning/
at 10.00 am

Davis, J. (2012, February 19). No Pin[Image]. Retrieved March 30, 2012, from LLSocial.com: http://llso-
cial.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/02/This-site-doesnt-allowing-pinning-to-Pinterest-Example-
LLsocial-is-pinterest-friendly.png
Deal, M., & Pagan, J. C. (n.d.). Goodies - Pinterest Logo [Image]. Retrieved March 30, 2012, from Pinterest:
http://passets-cdn.pinterest.com/images/about/logos/Pinterest_Favicon.png
Flickr disables Pinterest pins on copyrighted images (exclusive)[Image]. (2012, February 24). Retrieved

March 30, 2012, from Venture Beat: http://venturebeat.files.wordpress.com/2012/02/flickr-pin-
terest.jpg?w=558&h=9999&crop=0
Greekgeek. (2012). Is Pinterest a haven for copyright violations? Retrieved March 28, 2012, from HubPages:
http://greekgeek.hubpages.com/hub/Is-Pinterest-a-Haven-for-Copyright-Violations
Grove, J. V. (2012, February 24). Flickr disables Pinterest pins on copyrighted images (exclusive). Retrieved
March 30, 2012, from Venture Beat: http://venturebeat.com/2012/02/24/flickr-pinterest-pin/
Grove, J. V. (2012, February 20). Pinterest not a pirate anymore, helps site owners disable pins. Retrieved
March 28, 2012, from Venture Beat: http://venturebeat.com/2012/02/20/pinterest-no-pins/
Hanson, A. (2012, March 26). Legal concerns around Pinterest: Advice from a social media attorney. Retrieved
March 30, 2012, from Communications Conversations: http://www.arikhanson.com/2012/03/26/
legal-concerns-around-pinterest-advice-from-a-social-media-attorney/
Jennings, N. (2012, March 27). President Obama joins Pinterest. Retrieved March 28, 2012, from Post
Politics, The Washington Post: http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/44/post/president-obama-
joins-pinterest/2012/03/27/gIQAAZHleS_blog.html
Kowalski, K. (2012, February 24). Why I tearfully deleted my pinterest inspiration boards. Retrieved March
28, 2012, from DDK Portraits: http://ddkportraits.com/2012/02/why-i-tearfully-deleted-my-
pinterest-inspiration-boards/
Lynley, M. (2012, March 6). Pinterest’s cofounder: we’re still trying to figure out copyright laws. Retrieved
March 28, 2012, from Business Insider: http://www.businessinsider.com/pinterests-cofounder-were-
still-trying-to-figure-out-copyright-laws-2012-3
Lynley, M. (2012, March 08). This tiny feature could keep Pinterest from getting sued for massive copy-
right infringement. Retrieved March 30, 2012, from Business Insider: http://articles.businessinsider.
com/2012-03-08/tech/31135048_1_caption-copyright-image-owners
at 10.00 am

McCracken, H. (2011, August 16). The 50 Best Websites of 2011. Retrieved March 28, 2012, from Time:
http://www.time.com/time/specials/packages/article/0,28804,2087815_2088159_2088155,00.
html
Nelson, K. (2011). Pinterest 101: a tutorial. Retrieved March 28, 2012, from The Daily Digi: http://the-
dailydigi.com/pinterest-101-a-tutorial/

New code lets websites opt-out of Pinterest. (2012, February). Retrieved March 30, 2012, from LLSocial.
com: http://llsocial.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/02/This-site-doesnt-allowing-pinning-to-Pin-
terest-Example-LLsocial-is-pinterest-friendly.png
Norton, M. (2012, March 21). Amazon Shows Interest In Pinterest’s Copyright Troubles. Retrieved March
30, 2012, from IT Pro Portal: http://www.itproportal.com/2012/03/21/amazon-shows-interest-
in-pinterests-copyright-troubles/
Orsini, L. R. (2012, March 21). Amazon.com takes an interest in Pinterest. Retrieved March 30, 2012, from
The Daily Dot: http://www.dailydot.com/business/pinterest-amazon-web-services-dmca/
Pinterest logo [Image]. (2012, January). Retrieved March 30, 2012, from Shareaholic: http://blog.sharea-
holic.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/01/Pinterest_Logo.png
Poletti, T. (2012, March 13). Could Pinterest become the next Napster? Retrieved March 30, 2012, from
Market Watch, The Wallstreet Journal: http://articles.marketwatch.com/2012-03-13/commen-
tary/31153677_1_users-bulletin-boards/2
renacuaje. (2011, February 3). Colorful background with texture of toys [Image]. Retrieved March 30,
2012, from Stock XCHNG: http://www.sxc.hu/photo/1335748
Shontell, A. (2012, February 28). A lawyer who is also a photographer just deleted all her pinterest
boards out of fear. Retrieved March 28, 2012, from Business Insider: http://articles.businessinsider.
com/2012-02-28/tech/31106641_1_repinning-copyright-entire-image
Taylor, C. (2012, March 22). For Pinterest, revenue will turn copyright questions into real problems. Re-
trieved March 28, 2012, from TechCrunch: http://techcrunch.com/2012/03/22/for-pinterest-rev-
at 10.00 am

Possible Future Investigation

Pinterest as a marketing tool for businesses and brands, how Pinterest can be used in educa-
tion

Questions & Answers
Question 1: Does an artist can promote his/herself by pinning his own work to Pinterest?

Answer: Yes, he can. After all, the safest way to pin in Pinterest is pinning something that
you actually own. So, he can pin his works to Pinterest and make several comments on it.
It is recommended though, to pin something that he would not mind being re-pinned by
others, something that would not caused him economic value loss when other Pinterest users
repin from his pinboard.
at 10.00 am

Pinterest a case study

Recommandé

Recommandé

Contenu connexe

Dernier

Dernier (20)

En vedette

En vedette (20)

Pinterest a case study