Sigh. I can feel a two-ton weight is going to drop over my head for even broaching this subject, but can we talk about how crocheters (and knitters) are using Pinterest?
I love Pinterest. I love being able to have a place online where I can store images that I love, with some of those images leading to websites with good content, even great content. Legal content. Freely-shared-by-the-owner-of-said content.
But many times when I’m on there I see a picture of something that I love – a dress, a sweater, a hat – that’s been either knitted or crocheted and I think to myself, “OK, I know when I click on the image, it’s going to lead to a site that is posting that pattern without permission.” And yep, it is. I swear I can spot one a mile away. It’s always a picture from a foreign crochet/knit publication. It’s sometimes from a domain with .ru at the end. And it’s always a site filled to the brim with scanned images I don’t recognize with a smattering of things I do recognize.
And sometimes it’s my own stuff.
Let’s talk about Pinterest the company for a second. They’re a really tiny company. They have very few employees. And they don’t respond to emails (not any of the many I’ve sent). Pinterest, right now, is like the wild west: we’re left to our own devices as owners of content to not allow ourselves to get ripped off if someone posts a picture illegally.
You might ask, “What if the picture is legal (you know, it’s just a picture of a pretty crocheted sweater that I love, love, love!) but the link – the link to where the picture leads to – is not?” Well, again, we designers are on our own.
THAT’S WHERE YOU COME IN.
I’m asking for your support as a designer to check the links from the picture. Click on the picture. See where they lead. And if it’s a site that’s posting images that are clearly scanned from books and magazines, please don’t allow the link to be posted along with the image that you so covet.
“Well, how the heck do I do that? How do I get rid of the link but keep the picture that I just want to look at and be inspired by?” you’re wondering. Once you’ve re-pinned the item and it appears on your board (or in your “feed”), hover over the image and you’ll see a button that says, “edit.” Click it. You’ll see a link that the image leads to. Delete the whole link. Then click, “save.”
Keep the image, delete the link.
In the end, this kind of activity – posting links to illegal sites – hurts designers. If it’s bad for crochet designers, it’s bad for crocheters in general.
Is that a deal? Can we “shake” on this?
Sounds like a good idea…I haven’t gotten the pintrest bug yet but I know many who do.
It’s such a great bug! It’s the only bug I like.
It’s just a great place to keep track of things and can be viewed from anywhere easily. It’s been really helpful to me.
I have so far not caught the pininterest bug, but have been urged to. I see what some of my friends pin and post on facebook and have the same issue. I don’t aim to take away from anyone else’s genuis, designs, etc…I want to compliment them by sharing their ideas and using them to inspire my own. Just wish more people were conscious of how badly it could hurt the creator. Thank you for the article, if I ever do catch the bug I will be sure to check the links and hopefully give credit where it is due.
I have considered this problem with Pinterest and also my own recently started blog. The problem I am having is that I am writing about crochet, art, design, and quality in our craft. My articles seem somewhat lackluster without illustrations, but since it is a blog, it would take too long to get permission before publishing. (sigh) So, I am often left with posting my article without images, simply attaching links and hoping the readers will click on them and suddenly say, “Aaha! I see what she means.” Not the best solution.
I’d be interested in hearing how others have solved this problem.