STOP PLAGIARISM ON STEEMIT - ONE STEP SOLUTION TO IDENTIFY COPIED IMAGES
I am passionate about photography and hate it when people shamelessly copy photographs from the Internet and do not provide any source/reference whatsoever.
Recently, as some of you may know I started curating a list of Top 6 Photographers everyday. This means that I am now carefully browsing the Photography Tag and unearthing those hidden talents.
To my horror there are plenty of users (particularly new ones) who are simply copying images from the Internet and posting them on Steemit. Most of these posts do not have any text at all, leave alone sources or references and are earning decent amount of STEEM. It is very disheartening to see legitimate users doing poorly and these Plagiarized posts earning money.
I have started reporting these posts and users to the @steemcleaners group but they seem to be too many.
How to find Plagiarized Images in JUST ONE STEP
This is the solution which works with Chrome Browser on Desktop
1. Right Click on any Image and select "Search Google for Image"
This is it, this is all you need to find the original source of the image. If the image is found, Google will display the results and you can simply get the original source of the image.
The next step is to simply report the Post along with the Original Source at #steemcleaners-linkdrop on steemit.chat
I urge you all to report offending accounts and make Steemit Cleaner. Don't Upvote on any post where there is a slightest doubt on originality. Upvoting such posts only encourages these users to post more crap.
@anyx @firepower - I have reported a few users who are regularly posting copied images. A problem I have noticed is that these guys are posting a lot everyday but only 1 or 2 posts get flagged since it is difficult to report all the individual posts. Any suggestions?
I think you are right and this is where I think we don't need short cuts when building something new. In my time posting I've noticed the the original work is better appreciated by the community.
You are absolutely correct @tebogotalane. Original work pays you in the long run and attracts the right people!
People are they more inclined to vote up, instead of flagging. Due to it also using your voting power and giving you no payout. Everyone is greedy and that's just how it works.
Keep doing the gods work my friend. I'll be looking to more seriously curate myself, once I get more into the platform, been here for only a week and I'm blown away by it all still. Especially a few ridiculous payouts I got from some of my first photos.
Thanks for your comment. You are right.. people are looking for easy money and it is sadly just ruining the community.
Totally agree with you. I have a question you may be able to help with, I am new and haven't posted anything yet. I have written a post but just not published yet as I need to add the pictures, I was going to add the source of the images but my question is, even when adding the image source, is it ok to use images that are not your own? As in licensing etc? I might add I have never posted/published anywhere before, even off Steemit, so this may be a silly question!! haha
Thanks for your comment. Personally I would stick to images which are licensed free to use under commercial purposes as well. If you are searching on Google Images.. you can filter by Licence.
For detailed posting guidelines please read https://steemit.com/steemcleaners/@steemcleaners/plagiarism-guide and https://steemit.com/steem-help/@steemcleaners/why-cite-sources . Hope this helps
Thanks a lot, really helpful :)! I will make sure I know which license is available for which image. Thanks again!
I'd love to see the copy-paste photos cleaned up from steemit. One, they are making money and taking credit for images they do not own and two, these spam posts make it harder to find the good, quality original posts! Good on you for featuring the photographers of steemit! Upvoted and followed!
Thanks for the comment! Yes, you are right the original posts get buried in!
Followed you as well :)
This is one of my bugaboos, too. I'm guilty of not always posting credit for public domain images, but for goodness sakes--sites like Shutterstock give you the attribution links right there on the page. Simply could not be easier to get them. They're already formatted and everything, for any media.
Here's the worst--my hackles go up when I see watermarked images used. This is a much misunderstood issue, and I hope to see more articles from you about it. I've used a ton of Pixabay stuff for my articles. Those don't always come with attribution info. Should I just put "images from Pixabay" in my posts? I don't want to be guilty of the same thing I yell about.
Thanks for your comment @rhondak. I am no legal expert but yes "Images from Pixabay" and a link to the pixabay image should suffice since Pixabay itself does not require any attribution for using the images. Wherever possible the original link and name of the Photographer should be mentioned.
You may refer to this link for posting guidelines https://steemit.com/steem-help/@steemcleaners/why-cite-sources . Hope this helps
Thank you so much for that link. I had this argument with someone just the other day, and definitely needed it then. However, I'm sad to say I'll probably need it many, many more times.
I can only see the problem getting worse with the explosive growth of new users. But at the same time we can take this responsibility and work for the community. :)
Exactly. I'm helping moderate some writing support groups at Discord for minnows, and that's one issue I often address with them.
I feel plagiarism is definitely a big issue...honestly people just don't care sometimes about other peoples hard work and effort they put into something very personal. It should be stopped, I agree 100%!
Absolutely! It should be stopped.
Maybe an option to flag the user, if more than 3 or 5 or 10 posts are stolen?
Just throwing things out there... I donno..
That may be an option not sure.. but I was looking for something anonymous!
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It is a difficult problem. I write bookreviews and have my own blog about books where I place my reviews. When I share a book review here @cheetah kicks in at once while I am not practicing plagiarism at all. It is my own content on which I spent a lot of time.
Thanks for your comment @eagleye. Well if you have the book reviews on your blog and are linking the original source then it will not be a problem. I suggest you get in touch with the @cheetah team and get yourself whitelisted. This will prevent the cheetah comment on your posts! Hope this helps
Thanks for this suggestion @gyanibilli. I'll do that.
I have a question.
I keep seeing a user who posts a youtube video, sometimes with no description but often with a sentence or two. But it is not their youtube video. They don't SAY it's theirs but they also don't say who the channel who made the video is either. I question this tactic? Is it cool because now this channel is getting additional views or is it stealing because they are earning steem/money from someone elses hard work? It seems like it could go either way?
Thanks for your comment @wholesomeroots If the videos are from multiple channels that means they are simply posting videos on steemit for the sole purpose of earning off them. Once or twice is even acceptable but if it is the only thing that they do then it must be reported to @steemcleaners This falls under plagiarism.
I was hoping you wouldn't say that as I suspected as much.
i flagged the posts that are other people videos. it's the only thing he does post!? sometimes he writes something about it but mostly not. will flagging get him to fix the issue?