Comments on: Bay Area Red Cross’s Awesome New Ad Campaign

By: Leo J

Leo J — Fri, 09 Mar 2007 20:39:45 +0000

It’s the concept and art in the ad campaign that make these images special. Jason DeFillippo added nothing with his photographs which anyone could have taken. It’s odd he got so bent out of shape about a photo credit when he gives no credit himself to whoever the real artist is who conceived and executed the artwork on the banners.

By: Rye

Rye — Fri, 09 Mar 2007 13:46:21 +0000

I’d say its pretty much useless to turn this Post into a discussion on the merits of the Global Warming Theory, much like with Politics and Religion, I revert to my Bartending Philosophy and say that you’re really not going to change anyone’s mind one way or the other especially when you consider that our Faith in Science tends to rival our Faith in Religion.
As to the CC license, you people obviously have way too little to do in your day to day lives if you find mewling about and inadvertant violation to be a priority.
In reference to the Advertisement, I find the Art to be Fantastic. The subject matter was undoubtedly intended to be educational, but I feel it may not necessarily ellicit the intended response.
Oh well, you can bank that 2cents.

By: Dom

Dom — Fri, 09 Mar 2007 07:18:15 +0000

If you read the copy on the ad it says:

What do we have to do to get your attention? Be prepared. Visit redcrossbayarea.org

This is based on the fact that only 6% of the Bay Area are prepared for a major disaster such as a huge earthquake. Despite previous ad campaigns no one is listening. The RED CROSS asked us out of frustration to dial things up and make people think. Hopefully more people will visit their site and act accordingly. More stuff in the campaign to come.

By: Anita

Anita — Fri, 09 Mar 2007 05:10:57 +0000

Commercial is pretty tough to define in the blogosphere … call yourself a community blog if you’re an s-corp or LLC, and just use the pictures and give him credit. If he lists them as creative commons, and you are just displaying the pics (vs. selling them), I’m pretty sure that you are perfectly within your rights.

By: Joel

Joel — Fri, 09 Mar 2007 00:42:08 +0000

Jake: Two reasons: Technically, although we are not yet breaking even, Dethroner is a commercial site. Also, Jason asked me to remove them initially (I offered to take down three of four, just so the post would still make some sense; or all four if he wanted) so I was trying to do what he wanted.

I think we’ve got it all worked out now, so I hope nobody tries to inflate this beyond what has already sucked up a couple of hours of time. At least one good thing will come out of this: I will be trying twice as hard to source images in the future, and making it clear that we will respect any copyright or creative commons license of which we are aware.

By: Jake

Jake — Thu, 08 Mar 2007 23:57:48 +0000

I don’t get why you removed the pictures– there was a Creative Commons license for noncommercial/ share-alike use. Couldn’t you have just appended the license?

By: Joel

Joel — Thu, 08 Mar 2007 23:56:01 +0000

Argh, seriously. I have no “tricks.” I try to find sources of all the images I use and even send Flickr mail to people asking for permission if I think it will be an issue or the license doesn’t quite match up. Sometimes I make a mistake, and when I do I quickly address it and fix it. I think Dethroner’s post are greatly enhanced by using the photography of others when we can and I hope to continue to be able to.

Beale, you pointed out to me that I had used your image without attribution. As soon as you did, I removed it and even explained how the mistake had occurred. I feel like lots of photographers – flickr users, especially – have been dicked around in the past and are understandably angry. I’m really making an effort to source pictures, but it’s easy, on the internet, to make the mistake.

By: Ryland

Ryland — Thu, 08 Mar 2007 23:52:23 +0000

This is what you get for fucking with the iPhone, Joel. I’m picturing all these outraged A- and B-list bloggers, mouse pointer poised over Submit, finger trembling on their single mouse button, silently mouthing the words, “This’ll teach you to mess with Steve Jobs, punk…”

By: Tom

Tom — Thu, 08 Mar 2007 23:46:29 +0000

spankbot you are an idiot…

By: A_B

A_B — Thu, 08 Mar 2007 23:42:08 +0000

“right act” = “riot act”

By: A_B

A_B — Thu, 08 Mar 2007 23:41:05 +0000

@spankbot

“Great movie – bad science.”

“FACT: Science Magazine analyzed 928 peer-reviewed scientific papers on global warming published between 1993 and 2003. Not a single one challenged the scientific consensus the earth’s temperature is rising due to human activity.”

http://thinkprogress.org/2006/05/25/national-review-warming/

If Derek Powazek and Jason DeFillippo, who are both 8020 Publishing (i.e., pile-on), and DeFellippo who is “the CTO and Co-Founder of Metroblogging”, want to throw around names like “fucking thief” and “idiots” when Joel posted this one picture, then it would behoove at least Jason to have the Metroblogging sites adhere to the same standards.

Indeed, just yesterday, on the San Francisco Metroblogging page, blogger Mark Pritchard posted this:
http://sf.metblogs.com/archives/2007/03/listening_to_the_past.phtml

Where did he get that image of antennas?
From a Greek company’s website;
http://www.lambda.gr/

Mark Pritchard is on the Metroblogging payroll (I assume). Is he an “idiot[] with no respect for photographers or the law” and a “fucking thief”?

I saw many pictures like that on Metroblogging websites. Get your act together before reading people the right act.

By: Mike K.

Mike K. — Thu, 08 Mar 2007 23:15:05 +0000

I dropped a little note over at Jason’s blog suggesting that “Dear you fucking thief”, might be a bit harsh. Especially given the following line in the Metroblogging Terms of Service:

“SUMMERY (sic)
Play nice, karma is a bitch.”

By: Joel

Joel — Thu, 08 Mar 2007 23:11:36 +0000

Also, I don’t understand why people think these ads are inappropriate. The Red Cross is reminding you what sort of situations could happen if there were an explosion or an earthquake, two disasters that are real possibilities, and exactly the sort of things you’d want to have remembered to donate to the Red Cross to handle. Would you call it fear mongering to use a picture of a child dying of AIDS to promote AIDS vaccine research? (That’s not a perfect analogy, I guess, but you get the point.)

By: Scott Beale

Scott Beale — Thu, 08 Mar 2007 23:06:55 +0000

I see you are up to your old tricks again. Recently you used one of my photos of Om Malik and didn’t provide a photo credit. So I guess you don’t respect photographers or Creative Commons.

By: Joel

Joel — Thu, 08 Mar 2007 23:02:13 +0000

You know, I got these images without a source, and presumed they were taken by people I had known but not put publicly online. I have removed all but the one, linked back to Jason’s site, and asked Mark F. at BoingBoing to update his post with a link to Metblogs. (I also told Jason I’d be happy to remove even the last image, if that is his preference.)

The name-calling is pretty over-the-top, but I can understand the frustration. It would be nice if you guys weren’t always off on such a tear about Creative Commons and could remember that people like myself, who always try to get permission before using a CC or copyrighted image, do occasionally make mistakes.

By: Derek Powazek

Derek Powazek — Thu, 08 Mar 2007 22:39:48 +0000

Hey you forgot the credit line: Photos by Jason DeFillippo, first reported at Metroblogging San Francisco, used here without attribution in violation of his CC license because we're idiots with no respect for photographers or the law.

By: Jeff Coleman

Jeff Coleman — Thu, 08 Mar 2007 22:32:52 +0000

“Awesome”

“You keep using that word, I do not think it means what you think it means.”

By: Itsumishi

Itsumishi — Thu, 08 Mar 2007 22:28:48 +0000

This is appauling. Red Cross should be ashamed.