Unprecedented Amounts of Stock Images for Free…Legally | U Penn Social Book

"Once upon a time (last week), Getty Images functioned as a huge repository of watermarked photographs available for sale — paying, of course, would remove the watermark and grant usage of the photo. This model was far from flawless: Internet hijackers were taking screenshots and cropping out the watermarks, others were going to the websites of paying customers and saving the non-watermarked images from there, and the premise was generally clunky. The internet, especially in regards to media, has been trending towards accessibility and sharing. Services like YouTube open access to video viewing and sharing and Spotify opens the doors to music access and sharing. Getty images is embracing the possibility that images should join this trend instead of fight it. From now on, images from Getty images can be used by anyone at will and for free, if they use the special embed code (similar conceptually to YouTube) to post the image to their websites and social networks. As part of the embed, a trackback link to Getty images is placed below.  'Our content was everywhere already,' says Getty Business Development Executive, Craig Peters. 'We’ve seen what YouTube’s done with monetizing their embed capabilities…I don’t know if that’s going to be appropriate for us or not…But as long as the images are being taken as embeds rather than free-floating files, the company will have options.'  Getty images decision seems surprising for only a second or two.  I’m not sure how much the average internet user will care about watermarks versus embed codes. However, I believe this will most benefit blogs and business social media companies who will now feel comfortable using images that they do not own. It will be important in keeping a clean, upstanding image in the internet sphere. Getty images will get better trackback and analytics on their photographs which is potentially very valuable information, depending on how they decide to leverage it."