The photo you see above was shot by me and posted on Hawaii 2/47, and yes it was also on our Hawaii 24/7 fan page on Facebook. Except that Guy Bello has posted this ripped-off version on his facebook page. Someone has taken my photo, put someone else’s photo credit on there and put a bunch of text on it. The photographer who’s credit appears on it says he didn’t steal the image and he doesn’t know why his credit is on it. At this point I somewhat believe him as he’s got plenty of his own photos online and no need to steal one of mine. The other credit on it with some words I haven’t contacted that guy yet, I believe he lives on the East Coast.
The big problem is that Guy won’t delete the image even though I’ve messaged him more than once (my request even appears in the comments which he read and ‘Liked’). I reported the violation to facebook but they won’t remove it saying there’s no violation.
Facebook’s DMCA violation system sucks. Most other websites let you post a link to the original art and the violation art. Not with Facebook. Plus there are no URLs when you’re viewing an image that appears in a pop-up over the facebook site window. I just found a more direct link to the photo in violation here.
I can’t be the only one that this is happening too. There needs to be a big lawsuit against Facebook to make sure they don’t violate Federal laws which they are doing. Shame on them and shame on Guy.
*UPDATE*
It looks like facebook or Guy took down his page. Or maybe I’m just being blocked from seeing it. In any case facebook needs to fix its reporting system, it totally sucks. WordPress.com has a form to fill-out and a human actually reviews the complaints, so do most other hosting companies. They need to stop adding things and fix what they’ve got.
*UPDATE 2*
I was wrong, Guy still has the photo up and doesn’t give a rip. I finally found the facebook DMCA takedown notice page which is buried deep within their help menus. For reference it’s: https://www.facebook.com/help/contact/208282075858952