In regard to online entities that host photos, I have noticed a change in the practices of several of these in the last few months (perhaps since the beginning of the year).
On flickr it is now almost impossible to download a recent image. Even ning has blocked me from trying to copy a member's image and post it in a different area of the site, even though I am administrator of the group. When I first joined picasa 2 years ago there were a lot of whole lace books scanned and posted online. Then I began to notice that these had disappeared. I think that google received a lot of complaints about this and insisted that the parties in question take the images down. I suspect that the images are still there, but under a privacy lock. So the person who uploaded the images can make them available to an individual who knows to ask for it. When pinterest first started I found several of my images posted with no mention of the source -- my website or either of the 2 ning groups. But for several months now, starting at some point last year, nearly all of my images that have been pinned on pinterest are accompanied by a link to my website or to the ning group. (From my point of view this is acceptable.) I take all this to mean that online entities are responding to issues of intellectual property. It is unfortunate that the Spanish lace makers are refusing this issue. Changing attitudes there will probably be a very long term project. When you see vendors selling photocopied patterns, tell them to pay the author have the selling price. Tell them they are stealing. Convince a few people, ask them to tell the vendors they are stealing. Make google translations of these discussions here on arachne and mail them to officers of the various lace guilds in Spain. Perhaps if they see that the rest of Europe condemns their practices, they may begin to change. Writing a book is a huge amount of work. And we do it for love of the subject matter, not for any expectation of vast wealth. I wrote my books when I wasn't working, and wasn't bringing in any income, but living off my savings. Working full time and writing a book is just not possible. So I sacrificed income to achieve the books. Lorelei - To unsubscribe send email to [email protected] containing the line: unsubscribe lace [email protected]. For help, write to [email protected]. Photo site: http://www.flickr.com/photos/lacemaker/sets/
