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Getty Images Letter Forum / Yet another MasterFile case
« on: March 12, 2017, 09:58:06 PM »
Hey Folks,
Baby steps here. From a brief scan of threads here, you all know how it is.
The basic scenario is that an image of a local business was found among those typical vast and generous web search results. No copyright info, used on multiple local sites. I have not yet asked said business how they feel about photos of their business offered for sale for profit by some questionable artists, but that's a separate story.
We are a local hospitality business, and offered links to local resources to potential guests as a goodwill favor, as apparently folks still have a hard time googling stuff. The business in question is one of local attractions, and the page they are listed on is a low-traffic, secondary page. The image was low-res, low-value placeholder, essentially.
So out of the blue we get this email from Masterfile, you probably all know JB at this point. Give us some money now (approx. $1,500 USD) since the ugly poor reso image you used belongs to us somehow, or give us more money later because we will sue you kinda deal.
I asked JB for more details, and got one of those lengthy copy-paste responses. The redeeming factor was that I got a week-long extension to pay their extortion ransom. I also emailed Oscar in the meantime, but haven't heard back. Just reached out to Matthew, we'll see what happens.
So this is a summary, really. Not needing any consolation, but a specific course of action including response letter examples would be a good start, if you feel like helping. I know there's info in the Help section, but I am overwhelmed.
Thank you,
Your friendly Vermont Innkeeper
Baby steps here. From a brief scan of threads here, you all know how it is.
The basic scenario is that an image of a local business was found among those typical vast and generous web search results. No copyright info, used on multiple local sites. I have not yet asked said business how they feel about photos of their business offered for sale for profit by some questionable artists, but that's a separate story.
We are a local hospitality business, and offered links to local resources to potential guests as a goodwill favor, as apparently folks still have a hard time googling stuff. The business in question is one of local attractions, and the page they are listed on is a low-traffic, secondary page. The image was low-res, low-value placeholder, essentially.
So out of the blue we get this email from Masterfile, you probably all know JB at this point. Give us some money now (approx. $1,500 USD) since the ugly poor reso image you used belongs to us somehow, or give us more money later because we will sue you kinda deal.
I asked JB for more details, and got one of those lengthy copy-paste responses. The redeeming factor was that I got a week-long extension to pay their extortion ransom. I also emailed Oscar in the meantime, but haven't heard back. Just reached out to Matthew, we'll see what happens.
So this is a summary, really. Not needing any consolation, but a specific course of action including response letter examples would be a good start, if you feel like helping. I know there's info in the Help section, but I am overwhelmed.
Thank you,
Your friendly Vermont Innkeeper