WAF Member who runs a site for posting other peoples pictures

[Mil-Archive]

This thread is to give a heads up to WAF members who are photo collectors. If you are not a photo collector then this probably does not concern you too much and might seem like an over-reaction but such is life

There is a member on here called 'AlifRafikKhan' (also a member on Axis history) - he downloads photographs posted by picture collectors and then posts them onto other forums eg

http://forum.axishistory.com/viewtop...=5192&start=45

He also starts threads to ask for pictures relating to this that or the other ;
http://dev.wehrmacht-awards.com/foru...d.php?t=370573

That is bad enough that he re-posts them elsewhere - but he also runs a blog which contains literally thousands of pictures all of which he has downloaded and then re-uploaded to his own site :

http://alifrafikkhan.blogspot.com

On one page alone of that site I found 43 of my pictures:

http://alifrafikkhan.blogspot.com/20...ion-dalam.html

I would recommend other photo collectors who post pictures on Wehrmacht awards forum to go and check his site to find out if he has also used your pictures.

As an example on this page

http://alifrafikkhan.blogspot.com/se...0Nazi%20Jerman

there are approx 50 pictures with 'wehrmacht-awards forum' listed as the source.

If you go to google and do a search for this

" wehrmacht-awards site:http://alifrafikkhan.blogspot.com/ "

without the quotation marks you get 13 PAGES of results.

On each page there are about 10 webpages off of his blogsite where he has listed Wehrmacht awards forum as the source of pictures. The scale of this is surreal !

Looking through it this evening I can see pictures belonging to other members like W Petz, PZV pics here
http://alifrafikkhan.blogspot.com/20...an-jerman.html

He also seems to prefer to copy from certain threads such as the 'My TR Portrait Postcard Collection'. I have pm'd him on axis history last night and got no response then found out he is also a member here so pm'd him here but no response - also reported him to the waf moderators and look forward to seeing how this is handled as to my mind this is completely out of order.

[Jean-Loup]

"Nazi Jerman"... Nice name for a blog. I also like the DAK asian volunteer that is posted at the top...

JL

[Mil-Archive]

Lots more Bill Petz and Pzv ones here -

http://alifrafikkhan.blogspot.com/se...0Nazi%20Jerman

Also Mousey, Vincent Siegers, Vincent.S, Bill Bourque, Larrister, Gylsen etc


Those are always watermarked and so more recognisable - there are others that look familiar but I don't know who owns them.

Just found an entire album belonging to pzv here

http://alifrafikkhan.blogspot.com/20...ier-ss-ke.html

& lots more Bill Petz & pzv here

http://alifrafikkhan.blogspot.com/20...e-mp-nazi.html

[juoneen]

He's made the waf his bitch.

[Mil-Archive]

Yep I saw that pic too. I am sure the guy who paid 1.5k for those panzer negatives a couple of weeks back will be thrilled to pieces to find out they are now all over someone elses site.

Very possibly sourced on here from the thread I started in the WAF photo forum which mentioned them.

Here are a few more WAF users whose pictures now adorn this little charmers site :

PK Collection/ askold / Tommy
http://alifrafikkhan.blogspot.com/20...rusia-roa.html

Westmoreland resarch (who I believe is also a member here)
http://alifrafikkhan.blogspot.com/20...ie-belgia.html

PK Archives
http://alifrafikkhan.blogspot.com/20...in-rommel.html

rmh collection / thomas hesse collection / Tim lewis collection
http://alifrafikkhan.blogspot.com/20...uran-nazi.html

There are tons more that look very familiar.

[Michael Fay]

thanks Helden

Helden,
thank you for this warning,
he probably took some of mine too...just dont feel too energetic to see who might have ripped me off now (along with wikipedia and certain individuals).

There is an unavoidable nexus between the world wide web access to information and plagiarism.

[PzV]

unfortunately this means we will have to watermark even more to halt this practice. I was also very unhappy to see a large number of my photos abused. Is there any way to revoke this persons WAF membership???

[JamesUS]

I agree the practice is somewhat unethical.
On the other hand, it seems a dedicated compilation ,,, And he is not trying to claim some sort of personal credit for these, right ?
Everyone by now must be aware, post something on the net, and it becomes public domain.

[Erwin L]

This is not very nice from him. Perhaps he is a member so he can rip pictures from the WAF

Perhaps you can fill in this BLOG complain formular. I hope it helps

http://www.google.com/support/blogge....blogspot.com/

best regards

Erwin

[Larrister]

Unfortunately once photos are posted on forums such as here at WA they are in the public domain and can be copied and posted elsewhere by anyone.
He does give credit for some photos, doesn't seem to edit out watermarks and isn't out to make money out of them.

There are several people the Axis History forum who spend all their time copying and posting photos from Ebay etc.

They are not true collectors of photos , they take other people's photos to fill threads which they start themselves.

I don't agree with this and have complained to the moderators there who told me that once they are in the public domain images are more or less free game for anyone.

The only way to stop people using other's photos this way is to stop posting them which I don't intend to do.

Larry

[JamesUS]

Well, I'm not a photo collector per se, so am not qualified to judge.
Offhand, my feelings are, if you have the original in hand, you are on the top of the hill.
Digital copies will never be worth anything ,, And anyone interested in compiling any particular subject will naturally scour the net to swell their collection.

Again, I can see how it can be perceived as very bad taste by some, and even a grave offense by others, but I can't see it anything to get stomping mad about, so long as they don't try to claim credit or make a profit on it.

[Mil-Archive]

unfortunately this means we will have to watermark even more to halt this practice. I was also very unhappy to see a large number of my photos abused. Is there any way to revoke this persons WAF membership???

He has pictures there which have only been posted on waf so it is clear to me we are not talking about theft of pictures on the internet we are talking about theft of pictures from this site. Primarily the photo forum but also others. He also has artwork, drawings, pictures of medals, caps etc.

Primarily though it is photo collectors he targets - and this is not one or two pics the guy literally hosts thousands upon thousands of original pictures sourced on waf.

I don't believe he should continue to be a member here when he is engaged in this practice on an ongoing manner, ignoring requests to remove pics and ignoring pm's on the matter./ He is blatantly using his membership here to source pictures on an almost daily basis for months on end with no sign of an end in sight.

There are not just 2 options here ;

a) tolerate this - (the favourite option of non photo collectors)
b) don't post pics on WAF

The third option is that things are not made easy for scumbags like this and a good example of that third option is to revoke their membership when they are discovered, when they refuse to take down pics they do not own and are notified of and when they continue to ignore pm's on this subject from members.

[PBR]

I hate people doing this, but, must be said, not first and not last to do it.
Well known authors also do this, shame on them.
This is why I don't post anymore not even a single picture from my personal archive.

Unfortunately, Internet Copyright on images is useless, there's no way to obtain the Copyright of old pictures, not even owing negatives sheets.

[Mil-Archive]

I hate people doing this, but, must be said, not first and not last to do it.
Well known authors also do this, shame on them.
This is why I don't post anymore not even a single picture from my personal archive.

Unfortunately, Internet Copyright on images is useless, there's no way to obtain the Copyright of old pictures, not even owing negatives sheets.

Not sure I fully agree about copyright. If I buy a WWII photo album of original unpublished photographs - it doesn't 'magic itself' onto the internet.

I get my digital camera out of it's box, I take the pictures, edit each of those pictures, straighten them sharpen them etc in photoshop then post them to the internet for other militaria enthusiasts & also for researchers to appreciate and further their knowledge.

Those are still my digital pictures taken with my camera and I own the copyright to my digital pictures. If I choose to share them with others it is not an open ended licence for some person to set up a website of their own and fill it up with other peoples pictures.

Photo collectors I know & have spoken to on this subject obviously have no issue whatsoever with researchers & enthusiasts keeping private libraries of pictures culled from the net.

There is however a line when it comes to republishing and the issue is that this guy decided to re-publish & host other peoples pictures in vast quantities without informing them, or, asking for consent.

Not only that but he starts threads on here asking picture collectors to 'Post your favourite pictures of X' (in addition to trawling other genuine threads of that kind).

He does not say 'Post your pictures of X so I can upload them to my site'.

When he posts into those threads to say 'Thanks - great picture' He does not say 'Thanks - great picture, btw it's now on my site'.

If he had an honest approach & asked permission I would have no issue with him whatsoever.

The WAF moderators have now pm'd him and are awaiting a response. He has also been reported on axis history and also a DMCA report too.

I recommend any photo collectors who own content this guy is now hosting should go to his site ;

http://alifrafikkhan.blogspot.com/

(Some of the direct links to certain WAF members content are posted above)

& click on the 'Report Abuse' then select 'Copyright/Piracy issues' this screen appears

Someone is stealing my content

* Is someone copying your Blogger-hosted content to another domain or website? Unfortunately, Blogger will be unable to act as your copied content does not exist on our servers. We strongly recommend contacting the offending blog's hosting provider for further assistance with this matter.
* Is a Blogger user copying your content? Please note that Blogger is not in a position to arbitrate issues regarding ownership of content; however, Blogger does comply with the United States Digital Millenium Copyright Act (DMCA). For more information on how to file a DMCA complaint with Blogger, please click here.
* Is a Blogger user engaging in piracy or providing links to copyrighted material? Please direct the copyright owner to file a DMCA complaint with Blogger. Please note that we can only process DMCA complaints originating from the copyright owner.

Then click on 'file a DMCA complaint' This takes about 2 minutes. It may or may not work but if it does they will take the site offline. It definitely won't work if you don't bother.

[PBR]

Helden,

I'm not saying that it's good to behave in such way, just saying that you don't hold copyrights on your pictures once the image is uploaded on the net: there's NO way to produce evidence that you are the only owner of such picture, the previous owner could have given scans to the ****er before you bought it, or he can claim to have the very same picture of yours (he can also print all the images of an album and just say that he got that very same album as well: a print of a picture is a picture itself, one dated 1945 one dated 2010, but in front of the law, both of them are pictures.
Basically Copyrights were claimed by photo-agencies or photographers, so, they belongs just to them, not to the ones that buy these pictures or negatives after 50 years (negatives and pictures were printed in several copies sometimes: so, if I have the very same negative that you have in your collection, who's the real owner? who hold the copyright? me or you?)

It's a neverending story, and this is the reason why many collectors don't post pictures from theirs collections anymore.