It´s somehow pretty useless to write over and over again about technologies for image usage tracking and the two predominant companies acting in this business field, Idée Inc. and PicScout (alphabetically). I guess everyone knows the companies, the people and presumably the technologies working in the background.
While PicScout has a longer experience and a longer customer list regarding image usage tracking, Idée Inc. offers additionally a visual search engine both for images and for footage and tracks also the image usage in print publications. PicScout expanded recently in July 2005 its image tracking services and partnered with Inquiry Management Systems of Toronto to include monitoring of images used in magazines.
PicScout released today initial results of the usage of the PicScout Image Tracker service at the photo agency UpperCut Images. UpperCut Images, owned by sister company PunchStock, is a well-known RF photo agency with currently over one million images.
The company explains in a new marketing flyer UpperCut´s situation:
Before launching, UpperCut Images recruited nearly 100 photographers specializing in providing high-end commercial stock photography to creative professionals around the world.
With the official launch in September 2005 amidst a barrage of advertising, UpperCut Images published its web site with more than 13,000 new images. [...]
UpperCut has retained, before the official launch, to monitor right managed copyrighted images over the web and to ensure joining photographers that their images are well protected.
Miles Gerstein [Uppercut´s founder] described his surprise to receive their first match reports so soon, only two months after the launch of UpperCut Images website: "We were astonished to find out that these images were used without our permission so quickly after we launched. The infringing companies stated that the web designer was unaware of copyrights issue and used the images without a license. Eventually, we settled those cases amicably and UpperCut Images gained new customers who might even license more images in the future".
PicScout also announced today that it is helding a client seminar for their Image Tracker User Group called "Legal Aspects of Infringements Settlements in Europe" on Friday, June 9th, 2006, between 3 p.m. and 5 p.m. during the upcoming CEPIC Congress in Biarritz, France. But, as Maya Bar, Picscout´s Director Marketing and Sales writes in an additional email, only Picscout clients are allowed to attend this seminar.
Tags: PicScout; UpperCut Images
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