scubamagazine.net are spammers w/shady business practice

Bruce -- I would write to PhotoBucket to try to get her account removed.

Bruce -- I would write to PhotoBucket to try to get her account removed.

I've now done that, adding onto an inquiry initiated by Jennifer Temple and Bob Wharton earlier. They found numerous other people's photos on her Photobucket gallery, but couldn't get anywhere because they personally weren't the artists of those photos. Since I was able to point to my own photos and give backup documentation, perhaps it will help get some results...

Well I think we all should avoid hitting the SM site at all. Why give that site a hit so they can go scam advertisers about traffic hits?

I just received an email from someone today who informed me that iDiveChick was also selling one of my photos on Photobucket. This surprised me since the photo has made the rounds on a number of boards, always with my copyright info attached. Pretty blatant, and I plan on contacting Photobucket and perhaps pursuing other alternatives.

What's that person's photobucket gallery?

Cor

What's that person's photobucket gallery?

 

Cor

http://s125.photobucket.com/albums/p53/iDiveChick/

I just received an email from someone today who informed me that iDiveChick was also selling one of my photos on Photobucket...

FWIW, I've been told that Photobucket does not allow sale of photos to OTHER people, but only for a person to buy prints of the photos they posted there themselves. She still shouldn't have your photo on there without your permission, but she isn't necessarily trying to sell it.

UPDATE: Now I'm being told that anyone can not only buy prints, but other merchandise with photos printed on it, for any photos on Photobucket. So the above appears to be incorrect.

BTW, after I told her yesterday that she had two of mine on there, she removed them both.

Sections of books are reprinted, cartoons form newspapers, posters and some very nice images. Maybe iDiveChick knows how to take good pictures and happened to be the one who got all these photos and actually obtained permission from the various entities including The Atlanta Journal-Constitution. I saw on the banned site iDiveChick mentioned "fair use" as something she thought applied. She needs to speak with a lawyer.

Of course some of I am assuming that there was no permission to sell or reproduce these things and iDiveChick may have the right to post these items and sell them, so no one should jump to conclusions and iDiveChick may not be guilty of anything other than accidentally and innocently using the photos of a couple of wetpixel members.

Maybe iDiveChick is lurking here right now and is quickly running over to remove these things before being caught and realizing that getting a bunch of people p$$sed (filing a lawsuit together against photobucket and issuing a subpoena) may not be the smartest thing.

Of course if iDiveChick is really trying to be above board, the complaints received should be enough to realize she has to change her ways. But the title of this thread and subsequent information does not bode well.

The procedures to get the photos down are here

http://photobucket.com/copyright.php

Imagine if photobucket got a few notices along the lines of the following, it may grab more attention:

---------------

DMCA Notice of Alleged Infringement ("Notice")

1. A user on Photobucket, with the user name of iDiveChick, is engaging in activity that appears in total disregard of the intellectual property rights, and other rights, including, without limitiation, trademark and name and likeness rights, by posting a variety of photographs and images which are, and/or appear to be, owned or controlled by other parties.

2. The location of the material in question is located at http://s125.photobucket.com/albums/p53/iDiveChick/

To date, iDiveChick has posted photos of the following material, all of wish are owned by parties other than iDiveChick, and for which the parties did not grant any right to iDiveChick to use such images:

3. Additionally, there are other items in iDiveChick’s gallery that would also appear to constitute items that could be in violation of PhotoBucket’s Terms of Use, including the following material that of iDiveChick has posted and has made available for sale, which includes the following:

a.) A map of dives sites which appears to have been taken from asiadivesite.com

http://s125.photobucket.com/albums/p53/iDi...boracay-map.jpg

b.) Portions of a book, including reproduction of the pages from, Diving Without Bubbles:

http://s125.photobucket.com/albums/p53/iDi...page_recits.jpg

c.) Reproduction of a cartoon by Mike Lukovich and the Atlanta Journal Constitution.

http://s125.photobucket.com/albums/p53/iDi...tioncartoon.jpg

4. Provide your mailing address, telephone number, and, if available, email address.

5. As to the material in paragraph 2, I hereby state that I have a good faith belief that the disputed use of the copyrighted material is not authorized by the copyright owner, its agent, or the law (e.g., as a fair use.) and I hereby state that the information in this Notice is accurate and, under penalty of perjury, that I am the owner, or authorized to act on behalf of the owner, of the copyright or of an exclusive right under the copyright that is allegedly infringed.

As to the material in paragraph 3, I am providing notice to Photobucket.com, as a courtesy to Photobucket, of material that could potentially subject Photobucket.com to liability from persons or entities who would appear to have rights in the material and in no event I am making any claim or allegation that iDiveChick does not, or has failed to obtain, the right to sell such material nor am I acting on behalf of any other party in providing such notice to Photobucket.

6. Provide your full legal name and your electronic or physical signature.

Deliver this Notice, with all items completed, to Photobucket's Designated Copyright Agent:

Alex Welch

Copyright Agent

Photobucket.com, Inc.

PO Box 559

Broomfield, CO 80038

abuse@photobucket.com

Fax: (303) 532-1099

The picture of mine that she posted was either a) taken from a photo contest website which explicitly states that the images are the property of the photographers, or B) were taken and photoshopped to remove the copyright logo, because I have never released that photo to anyone other than the contest website without the copyright info on the photo itself. Either way, it's a clear violation of copyright laws.

Also, should we all assume that iDiveChick is really dumb enough to not realize what he or she is doing given that a Google search of "iDiveChick" results in page after page of nothing but negative comments and complaints of spamming and copyright infringement. This is simply a person that believe that he or she can use the anonymity of the internet to do what he or she wants.

Sorry about being up on a soapbox - "stealing" is a real hot button for me. And the tongue-in-cheek comments of the last poster did not go unnoticed. I'm just an amateur photog, and I imagine the pros deal with this stuff all the time. I plan on notifying Photobucket tomorrow, both in writing and verbally, of the copyright infringement.

Sorry about being up on a soapbox - "stealing" is a real hot button for me. And the tongue-in-cheek comments of the last poster did not go unnoticed. I'm just an amateur photog, and I imagine the pros deal with this stuff all the time. I plan on notifying Photobucket tomorrow, both in writing and verbally, of the copyright infringement.

Sorry a couple of sections were slightly tounge in cheek, but not the post itself. In fact I toned my post down - I have had material taken and it is a hot button for me also .

Between YouTube and the rest all of a sudden people have this unbridled stealing binge with no remorse whatsoever.

Of course if iDiveChick is really trying to be above board, the complaints received should be enough to realize she has to change her ways. But the title of this thread and subsequent information does not bode well.

Take a look at what I wrote, think about the implications in photobucket's thought process when they see that not only is the material from some photographers, but other big players who they do not have to think much about such as the AJC and they are getting a slew of complaints in a short period of time.

FWIW, I've been told that Photobucket does not allow sale of photos to OTHER people, but only for a person to buy prints of the photos they posted there themselves. She still shouldn't have your photo on there without your permission, but she isn't necessarily trying to sell it.

With a randomly-created user, I was able to get as far as being able to enter a credit card number (at which point I stopped) after selecting # of photos, their size, shipping/billing address, etc for print from iDiveChick's photobucket account.

Bruce - I saw that response to you about that, followed up to check it out for myself, and found it not to be true.

 

With a randomly-created user, I was able to get as far as being able to enter a credit card number (at which point I stopped) after selecting # of photos, their size, shipping/billing address, etc for print from iDiveChick's photobucket account.

FWIW, and I edited this part out of my longer post above, it makes no difference whether someone else can purchase the items or not, it is still infringment. This fact means that any potential argument for fair use (not that any existed beforehand) for the most part will be shot down - for profit and intentionally removing notices are not good things when trying to claim fair use.

But again I fail to see how any fair use concept would apply in this situation.

Has anyone found out where its avatar came from because that looks like it was ripped off a ad but i cant put my finger on it.

also has anyone had any luck pushing a DMCA claim through the hosting company of the site?

you all might want to keep a eye on this account to, nothing yet but need to keep a eye out.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/88986533@N00/

http://youtube.com/profile?user=iDiveChick

http://www.flickr.com/photos/88986533@N00/

This one has been removed by Flickr...

This spammer also tried this crap on my midwest diving forum, she/he/it's banned there as well.

James

FYI, ScubaBoard censors a lot of competitive sites, whether they spam or not.

Someone calling themself Sarah just joined my Scuba & Underwater Photography Meetup Group. I have since canceled this person's membership, but he/she/it has signed on as a member of every other scuba meetup group to spam Scuba Magazine.

http://scuba.meetup.com/132/members/4402126/

http://scuba.meetup.com/26/members/4402126/

http://scuba.meetup.com/105/members/4402126/

http://scuba.meetup.com/121/members/4402126/

http://scuba.meetup.com/111/members/4402126/

ADDED ON JULY 3: Meetup.com has cancelled "Sarah's" membership as of this morning (so the links above will no longer work). He did file a defanatory complaint with meetup against me for posting this on my meetup group.

Has anyone ever figured out where that photo came from?

Someone calling themself Sarah just joined my Scuba & Underwater Photography Meetup Group...

 

http://scuba.meetup.com/132/members/4402126/

 

Is this the same picture idivechick has been using?

Yup! Ban her butt!

Jack

One would think that whoever this person is might figure out that most of us are on to him/her and would find a new picture to deceive us with. :glare:

eric

sorry to drag up a old issue but there is some updates to this that i found recently. I found this link doing a follow up and found the info amusing. has anyone followed up on this as its now been a year later.

http://www.divepoll.com/scubamagazine.html

Underwatercolors - that avatar "she" was using is was taken from a playboy editorial.

Also does anybody have a archive copy of aboutus.org/[url=http://wetpixel.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=17238]scubamagazine.net[/url] [known spammer -editor] [known spammer -editor] as there was a interesting review about them and the copyright infringement that i remember seeing when all of this started but looks to be gone now as that site changed formats.

scubatooth, lol thanks for the link...

"He is a plumber from Van Nuys"

wow, I actually met that guy before. he gave me his card that said [url=http://wetpixel.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=17238]scubamagazine.net[/url] [known spammer -editor] [known spammer -editor] on it, with his real name, but of course no contact info except for an email address.

I figured he lifted that photo from playboy or somewhere similar, funny how many guys thought it was "real" and signed up on the site, even though I told people there was no "Sarah".