From a copyright/protection standpoint, what places online are safe to post your photos?

[Gavin Hornak]

A quick question... As a professional photographer who obtains legitimate copyright paperwork for all of his photos, where are places online that are safe to post your photos without giving up the rights to them?

I just watched a KelbyOne class on copyright, and they go over how in the privacy policies of websites, you relinquish your rights to some photographs by uploading them to their site. Some sites, take 500px for example, says that you are the soul owner of your photographs. They will never distribute it on their own or sell it to others. But my question to you, what other sites are safe to post on?

The ones I am specifically interested in are Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, Deviantart, Tumblr, and Flickr. But if you are aware of the policies of other sites too I would be open to that information as well!

I would say ill just go read the Privacy Policies myself, but in all honesty I have tried and legal-talk seems to be a little too hazy for me to fully comprehend what they are saying.

Thanks for your help!

[Kim]

I personally know Facebook, DeviantArt and Flickr ask only the license to display the pictures on the website; you retain the full copyright of the images. When it comes to sharing on the Internet, though, you can't prevent anyone from copying the images without regard to copyright.

[Yeti]

I don't believe any website truly has you "relinquish rights." What they do often say is that you're granting them a license for various uses. Their uses can vary. And sites like Facebook change their policies all the time. So you might agree one minute, then disagree the next.

There are no sites on the web that are "safe" to post on. If you start posting your work online, you're essentially saying it's worth it to you to get attention, or advertising revenue. You're willing to trade off that some people are going to copy things, or that a website may show your profile in their own ads, etc. That's true no matter where you post.

If you're mainly concerned about a "rights" perspective, you should set up your own website, and not use somebody else's service like Deviantart or Flickr. True professionals also tend to set up their websites with tools like Flash these days, so that others can see some of their work, but it's difficult to impossible for anybody to actually download or distribute it. Other professionals stick to posting quite small thumbnails of their work -- just enough to see an image for placing an order, but nothing that could even get enlarged to a 4x6 print.

From my own personal perspective, I wouldn't even consider Facebook or Twitter -- you're the product, and you're going to get what you pay for. Places like Pinterest and Tumblr have way too much ability to repost what others have posted, and their policies are going to reflect it. Flickr and Deviantart seem to be where "professionals" go, but even then, the true pros do their own sites, and have zero questions about control of their work. And they're usually too busy doing new work to bother with posting extensively on the web for "advertising."