Instagram Help

[aracic]

I didn't know where to make this thread, so I chose this as the most suitable thread I assume.

I need help. I have this Instagram account where I post daily HQ photos by Meisel that I found either on this thread or some other websites on Google. And I've been doing quite good lately until last night when I received a note saying that my content has been removed due to copyright infringement or whatever. So I thought it's like one picture or something but my whole content has been wiped out.

You can imagine my anger because I spent fu*king hours translating italian and finding credits and putting up a whole theme just to have it wiped out by a*sholes. So I decided to start posting again, and the same s*it just happened. I have 3 posts remaining so I assume it's only a matter of time until they're gone too.

I wonder if anyone ever faced such issue on Instagram? I don't understand it because I can name a dozen accounts that post photographs from magazines and s*it they don't own all over Instagram - why does mine keep disappearing? I experienced a similar issue last year when I had a Vogue Italia tribute account, unfortunately that one didn't survive cause they deleted it. I wanna know if there's a way to avoid this mess. I credit everyone and their mother in my posts, everyone's tagged and written, hashtagged, all of it.

And I'm sorry for my language I'm just really fu*king pissed cause I worked hard on this and I usually hate Instagram but this was fun and I got to share messages with Pat McGrath, Gisele shared my fu*king birthday wishes in her story and now it's just taken away from me. I'm pissed. So please, if you know anything about this help me out.

And contacting Instagram doesn't work, I tried a dozen times.

 

[Cute]

It sucks that all your effort was deleted. But I'm guessing that someone you're tagging is reporting it? Maybe just try writing their name out rather than tagging them (eg: "Makeup: Pat McGrath" and not "Makeup: @patmcgrathreal")?

 

[Bertrando3]

Could it be that Meisel himself asked to close it? I know your account and I follow it too and it must have been super upsetting to see this on Insta. Maybe someone from Meisel staff or his production company asked this? Other photographic accounts also closed down lately too, many with Demarchelier and with 80 supermodels. Could it also be (I am just guessing) that Conde Nast has a branch about copyrights too on social media? I hope you continue your account without these problems, they could have given you a warning but not that!

 

[Benn98]

Not to sound like I'm fear-mongering, but this is only the beginning. For every upstart photographer who's happy to have their work shared on Insta or on here, there is a Meisel or similar who doesn't want that for a variety of reasons. It'll be Pinterest next.

Instagram deleting your posts is a milder form of something which could have turned out far more tragic. Some websites will stand aside and let the photographer (or whoever complained) go after you directly. By UK rights, Meisel (let's just assume it was him for argument's sake) must issue a cease and desist before actually suing Instagram (or you), and that's why they've removed his images. I imagine if this continues they may well ban you from the site altogether, not too sure about their T&Cs.

Have you been posting textless HQs? I ask because they can't touch you if it's a scanned image with credits, because that could easily have come from your own magazine purchase. The thing about HQ's is that they infringe on the photographer's raw material. There may be a coffee table book out, and naturally rare images littered on Instagram may hurt the sales for the actual book? I know credited scans are not exactly nice-looking on Instagram, but that's the only assurance you'll have that the posts will remain on your page....short of reaching out to the entire creative team and their management for approval.

For the record, that is the #1 reason why I post magazine scans and not textless HQs on TFS because I can point to a credible and legal source should push comes to shove. That, and also just to stay true to the EIC's decision to lay images out in a certain sequence as you'd have it in a physical magazine.

Maybe Cute's tip isn't that bad after all, in the meantime. Or ask @amby because some of his posts on there are also HQ and textless.

 

[aracic]

Thank you all for your advices, I'll try out some of the ways you suggested and see where it takes me.

@Benn98 I do post textless HQs. I spend a lot of time looking for covers and editorials without text, it's like a hobby of mine. I have an organised file with over 17k photographs Meisel did, from outtakes and Vogue Italia editorials to his early works and at least half of all that is textless and in high quality. One of the reasons why I never posted any of that here is because I feared the legal trouble it could get me in. Another thing I often do is remove the text from magazine scans so they'd look more HQ but I assume they don't support that either.
But on Instagram I literally reduce both the quality and size of the pictures, usually I crop them so they're literally in their magazine page dimensions but I assume you could be right. Do you think placing the text where it would originally be inside a magazine on my textless files would help? Cause finding nice quality scans is extremely difficult, especially with most of the uploaded scans lost. It's really annoying cause I don't make profit of it or anything, it's what I do for fun in my free time and they're taking it away from me. But I guess that is their right after all.

 

[Benn98]

Thank you all for your advices, I'll try out some of the ways you suggested and see where it takes me.

@Benn98 I do post textless HQs. I spend a lot of time looking for covers and editorials without text, it's like a hobby of mine. I have an organised file with over 17k photographs Meisel did, from outtakes and Vogue Italia editorials to his early works and at least half of all that is textless and in high quality. One of the reasons why I never posted any of that here is because I feared the legal trouble it could get me in. Another thing I often do is remove the text from magazine scans so they'd look more HQ but I assume they don't support that either.
But on Instagram I literally reduce both the quality and size of the pictures, usually I crop them so they're literally in their magazine page dimensions but I assume you could be right. Do you think placing the text where it would originally be inside a magazine on my textless files would help? Cause finding nice quality scans is extremely difficult, especially with most of the uploaded scans lost. It's really annoying cause I don't make profit of it or anything, it's what I do for fun in my free time and they're taking it away from me. But I guess that is their right after all.

I hear you, and it sounds like a crazy amount of effort you've put in so far. Also, I don't even think they think it's about whether you make a profit off it or not, it's just infringement..... or some overzealous agency protecting the 'interest' of their talent.
I definitely think going forward, scans showing text should be your rule of thumb. Just had a look at Amby's page again, and the editorials are either watermarked images from the magazine, scans taken from here, or images were clearly supplied directly to him by the magazine/editor (he mentioned this once.)

If you could replicate the text placement identical to what it should look like in a magazine, I can't see them bothering you. It seems the idea is just for whoever taking issue with those images to see where exactly you've sourced them from.

 

[Conbothsides]

I'm not sure if it's cause the format of your posts is too similar to artandcommerce Instagram page?
Let's post scans or layouts for a change and see if they delete them again or not. They would look just as good, even more authentic.

 

[MulletProof]

Instagram deleting your posts is a milder form of something which could have turned out far more tragic.

THIS!.. there was a kid here who used to post a lot of HQs. Like araic, pure enthusiasm for fashion and sharing imagery, but in a way that kind of stepped into the toes of these big agencies. I'm not sure a cease-and-desist letter was involved in his case (the standard way on tFS), but long story short: his house was raided by the FBI, he (or his parents I guess) had to pay damages and he obviously never got his account here back.

It sucks really. When I was a teenager here, I used to go waaaay out of my way to acquire and share pictures.. I adored fashion and the thirst was insatiable lol.. and we were already dealing with copyright notices. A part of me thought that they had every right to go after people like that, but then, I was a teenage student, not affiliated with any business or business concerns, not in the US and protected by different laws, so.. not my problem. Fast forward 15 years later and more involved with businesses than with sharing pictures on a site, and also with a field that is OH SO protective of images (far more than fashion).. you would think I lean more towards their side but actually I don't.. when you look at what's happened in the past 10 years, the influence and outreach of sites like instagram and tumblr, packed with people that just share and get nothing in return and by sharing, it eventually turns these people into celebrities (when no one even knew what they looked like 10 years ago).. it's like.. what a bunch of ungrateful, out-of-touch little f*cks.. fashion is 70% rotten, 20% obsolete, 10% okay.. less people are buying magazines and they would be stupid to think it's going to get better, so to go after these accounts that introduce their work (especially the old one most people into fashion would not make any effort to search and find) to new eyes.. encouraging interest, respect and ultimately celebrity and money for them.. no wonder fashion can't get its head out of his a*s to figure a way out of the pathetic crisis it's been in where even rappers and their friends tell them what to do.. thanks in part to being so clueless on how to understand and get ahead -instead of being a follower- of social media platforms.

Anyway, I have no advice , but usually putting them "on blast" works.. how? I don't know. I also think instagram a lot of times double checks into their actions or at least provides some explanation through insider action.. meaning knowing someone who works there.

 

[Armani]

I had a fanpage where I occasionally would post candids of celebrities and was threatened by a photographer to take down their images or have them removed as a copyright infringement strike (on an account with zero posts - almost didn’t believe him at first). When I archived the photos, they were still deleted as copyright infringement... I’d advise in this case to give credit to each member on the crew who worked on each shoot in captions and explicitly write "Fanpage" and/or "All photos belong to their respective owners" in my bio. Although it’s near-impossible to get the deleted photos back, it’ll be a hell of a lot harder to take them down.

Instagram has become one tough app to navigate these days, with just how hard they push their Community Rules. Apparently, not even meme pages fit their rules anymore.... tons are either getting deleted or going private. And nearly all images with copyrights attached to them are getting swiftly deleted, due to either not crediting or the subjects of copyrighted photos themselves finding the image. I feel like this is part of the reason Facebook has become obsolete.... no? And now its about to happen to Instagram, with the copyright issues paired with the "invisible likes" beta.

I wish I knew someone who worked at Instagram personally, I really do... that would be a great help. Unfortunately, I don’t. However, IG does state they provide an opportunity for users to appeal any form of copyright infringement, so... I guess knowing the law is the best way to get out of it.

(Update: And just as I post this.....)

 

[aracic]

Thank you all so much for your inputs and advices - I am now fully turning to either scans or fake scans or the golden content of pleasurephoto while art + commerce can keep their damn files to themselves. It's a shame though cause people deserve HQs, they're too beautiful. But whatever! I will also be crediting everyone and their mothers just to make sure no one feels offended or left out or infringed whatever.

I was so close to giving up entirely but now you all gave me hope and I'll just keep working and enjoying what I do in a slightly lowered quality lol Thank you so much, once again

 

[Phuel]

Could it be that Meisel himself asked to close it? I know your account and I follow it too and it must have been super upsetting to see this on Insta. Maybe someone from Meisel staff or his production company asked this? Other photographic accounts also closed down lately too, many with Demarchelier and with 80 supermodels. Could it also be (I am just guessing) that Conde Nast has a branch about copyrights too on social media? I hope you continue your account without these problems, they could have given you a warning but not that!

Meisel may be a high fashion visionary that fashion disciples adore, but he is apparently very shrewd when it comes to his finances and business practices. From what I’ve been told, someone like Edward Enninful is much more generous and supportive (of new creatives) than Meisel is.

It may not be a generous gesture on their part to fans, but it’s absolutely understandable from a business perspective. Even from a perspective of a professional creative who wants some to maintain some control over their intellectual property.

The safest course of action is to post unaltered spreads from the publications’s digital files, as Benn’s suggested.

 

[amby]

I am sorry to hear about the matter, aracic. When me and my partner started the page, we also had similar problems when someone reported or DMed us and asked the images to be taken down (usually big magazines, PR company or photographers contacted us when we posted images that were still embargoed), but we always replied to them and asked if in the future our page could received official email when the images (editorials or covers) are officially out. Some agreed some don't.

We always wrote down the source of the images ever since. I am not sure about who reported you but I have a hunch contacting Instagram won't make much difference in helping out. I agreed with bertrando (perhaps it was Meisel himself or his team), Cute (perhaps someone you tagged) and Benn98's opinions on the matter. When our page posted HQ text-less images, it's usually directly from the magazines, photographers (or one of the teams involved) or their PR company. I loveee HQ files of great fashion images, but I think Phuel's suggestion about the unaltered images does makes sense to avoid copyright infringement

 

[MissMagAddict]

THIS!.. there was a kid here who used to post a lot of HQs. Like araic, pure enthusiasm for fashion and sharing imagery, but in a way that kind of stepped into the toes of these big agencies. I'm not sure a cease-and-desist letter was involved in his case (the standard way on tFS), but long story short: his house was raided by the FBI, he (or his parents I guess) had to pay damages and he obviously never got his account here back.

I remember that. He hacked directly into Condé Nast to steal images. Vogue images were posted that hadn’t even been published yet. FBI. Boom!

 

[MulletProof]

^ it still makes me giggle haha.. that CN was outsmarted for so long (cause it was like his daily routine lol) and by a kid. In his defense, he didn’t technically hack, he would just play with digits going with logic and what I like to call human desire , I mean why would you put up a slideshow of 10 pictures but only making picture #4 and #7 public? it’s only natural to want to know what’s up with 5 & 6 so change the URL and bam...

Such an anecdote to tell/hide as an adult (and future employers).. like carrying a past that sounds super f*cked up but it was just about cute fashion pics..

 

[lucy92]

Unfortunately, the take-downs are all too common these days even for those exercising fair-use of the images.

I'm surprised Instagram didn't delete your account entirely like what happened with a large number of women that like to dress up as and mimic Kate Middleton.

Many of these women posted side by side photos of themselves in the same or similar outfits as Kate Middleton.

There's a story in the guardian here about the outcry that happened when instagram deleted these womens' accounts.

What the women didn't realize is that the Palace owns the copywrite for the photographers in the Royal Pool. And they instructed instagram to delete everything under the "#replikate" hashtag. Instagram restored the images when journalists started sniffing around.

Is there way to limit the hashtags for your posts, aracic?

 

[MissMagAddict]

I remember that. He hacked directly into Condé Nast to steal images. Vogue images were posted that hadn’t even been published yet. FBI. Boom!

I excavated the article from The Smoking Gun. Lol.

FBI Probe IDs Conde Nast "Hacker"
Fashion-obsessed student had home raided by feds

DECEMBER 20--An FBI investigation has identified a fashion-obsessed Ohio man as the person who last year illegally gained access to a Conde Nast computer system and downloaded photos and pages from upcoming magazine issues which he then posted to his blog, The Smoking Gun has learned.

The FBI probe resulted in a raid earlier this year at the Ohio home of Ross Ulrich, a 22-year-old community college student. In a TSG interview, Ulrich said that he confessed to agents as they executed a search warrant at his family’s Columbus residence.

The graphic design student said he also copped to accessing a Warner Bros. server holding images and clips from a variety of movies in production, as well as the computer systems of ad agencies and other magazine publishers.

Ulrich told TSG that he believed federal investigators have not yet made a decision whether to charge him in connection with his downloading of more than 1100 files from the Conde Nast system. He said that a federal prosecutor in New York was “supposed to give me a court date,” but that he has not heard from government investigators in several months. Ulrich is seen above in his Facebook profile picture.

Asked about his motivation for accessing the Conde Nast system, Ulrich claimed that it was simply to obtain images that he could be the first to post online. He added that many bloggers and fan sites compete to publish images from paparazzi agencies and fashion photo shoots. The higher res the better, Ulrich noted. On his MySpace page, Ulrich lists his "heroes" as fashion photographers Bruce Weber, Steven Klein, and Mario Testino. As for favorite books, he wrote, “Does FLAUNT Magazine count?” Another online profile lists "b*tch is trippin'" as a favorite quote of Ulrich, who often uses the online handle "r0b0tj0n3z."

While Ulrich said that a black market exists for the purchase of passwords that allow entry to the web sites of large photo agencies and publishers, he contended that he did not pay to gain access to the Conde Nast and Warner Bros. systems. Instead, Ulrich said, he discovered via a Google search a list of compromised servers that had been posted online. This list of FTP addresses and related passwords allowed Ulrich to spend time “poking around,” he said, “without having to brute force anything.”

Ulrich recalled that during one of hisConde Nast forays he discovered the December 2009 cover of W featuring Demi Moore. He quickly uploaded the unpublished image to The Fashion Spot, a style site where Ulrich was a frequent commenter in the invitation-only forums. The image of the W cover lasted only a few hours before Conde Nast demanded that it be removed, recalled Ulrich, who listed interests of “trends, models, beauty” on his The Fashion Spot profile page.

Ulrich then opted to post his purloined images on FashionZag, which he opened on Google’s Blogger platform.

Conde Nast learned last November that its computers had been compromised when pages from upcoming issues of several publications--including GQ, Vogue, Lucky, and Teen Vogue--began appearing on FashionZag. Those images--which included the entirety of GQ’s December 2009 issue--quickly began appearing on other sites.

An internal Conde Nast investigation revealed that one of its computer systems had been accessed repeatedly over a three-month period by a user who downloaded files from a wide array of the publisher’s titles. A subsequent copyright lawsuit filed by Conde Nast disclosed that the unauthorized access came from a single IP address. Ulrich was later tied to that IP address after subpoenaed records from an Internet service provider revealed that it was connected to an account in his father’s name.

Ulrich told TSG that he agreed to pay Conde Nast $12,500 to settle the firm’s copyright claim.

Court records show that Warner Bros. also filed a federal lawsuit last year after the firm discovered that its servers had been improperly accessed and that copyrighted images had been copied. The IP address from which the film company’s servers were accessed was identical to the one logged by the Conde Nast system. At the time Warner Bros. and Conde Nast filed their respective lawsuits, they were unaware of the intruder’s identity, and named “John Does” as defendants.

Ulrich told TSG that he has not paid Warner Bros. damages, and believes that the film company had decided not to further pursue its civil action.

Noting that while he once subscribed to Vogue and several other Conde Nast titles (and was a “starred” commenter on The Fashion Spot), Ulrich said his legal troubles have impacted his enthusiasm for such things. “I’m kind of over it,” he said, adding that he hoped federal investigators realize that he has learned his lesson.

 

[MulletProof]

“without having to brute force anything.”

that's what I mean!. Not forced=not hacked, taking that to my grave.

I thought he was younger.

So sad he kind of slept on the IP thing and that's what got him. He just googled in unorthodox ways..

 

[Benn98]

Ulrich said his legal troubles have impacted his enthusiasm for such things. “I’m kind of over it,” he said

I know it's no laughing matter, but I just find this part so hilariously blasé. After everything which went down where you nearly landed up in the slammer, and that's the takeaway? LOL!

 

[aracic]

Good god what a mess! Ulrich is definitely my new hero. It's really, really easy to crack some links on big fashion archives and it's upsetting that they can get you in trouble because of their stupidy. If you want to protect your clients so badly, put some money into your security and hide your pictures, damn it.

I didn't get notifications so I didn't know you all still wrote here. Quick update, after a few scanned posts the account got wiped out again and then deleted for good so in Ulrich's words, I'm kind of over it. lol

 

[eugenius]

^^^Hmmmm, who was this?