FaceBook: I Don’t and Won’t Use It, and Here’s the Latest Underhanded Change
I do not use FaceBook; there are several reasons for this that I won’t go into here. I will just summarize it as Faustian deal, though FaceBook is only one of many such online roach motels. Instagram is another lovely.
When terms of use can be changed at any time, you really have no rights at all. Do you really want to put your images at risk forever subject to terms that can change any time? To monitor the latest terms, forever? Images are not the only issue involved.
Read the ASMP FAQ on Facebook's commercial use of your photographs.
One reason to embed a copyright into your images (as I have begun doing) is so that at least your name is visible when the image is stolen; the thief will have to at least take the time to edit out the copyright. In my case I was seeing a double theft: commercial web sites selling camera equipment using my images, but worse, they were using my server to host the images (too lazy even to copy them!), which was a cost (bandwidth usage) and performance hit. At least make the thieves work a little by hosting the image themselves and having to edit out the copyright.
In the case of FaceBook using images without payment, this might even offer a small benefit: your name visible in an image posted somewhere. Small consolation, but not nothing. Unless of course it is next to some offensive product!
