by Doreen Martel

Created on: November 08, 2011

Most writers feel that images should be used to enhance the content they are providing for their audience. Unfortunately, this has led to abuse that is similar to plagiarism if you put it into terms that are more familiar to a writer. In order to understand why you should not steal royalty free images for your articles, it is important to understand what royalty free means.

Human Record defines royalty free as “This is a type of image license where the buyer pays a license only once and is free to use the image multiple times for multiple projects as defined in the licensing agreement. Pricing is straightforward and based only on the required resolution of the image.” Therefore, the image is not free the first time, it is free to use after the appropriate fees are paid.

Photographers payments

Royalty free photos are available on many sites including iStockphoto and Getty Images. Photographers upload their images and drawings to these sites to share for a fee. When the fee is paid, the photographer is reimbursed for the use. For writers the easiest way to think about this is if you were hired to do a blog post, you write the blog post and send it to the client who never pays for the post. Two weeks later, you run your text through Copyscape to discover a client used the text on their blog. They are earning money from your post, you are not.

Ethical considerations

Ethics alone should govern how a writer uses images. Writers depend on their reputation and treating other freelancers with the same respect that a writer asks for is one of the ways to maintain a good reputation. Writers do not want to be known as someone who steals images for their own use.

Legal considerations

Theft is theft whether it occurs in a store or online. Stealing is punishable and stealing royalty free images may be prosecuted. While many individual photographers may not waste their time, energy or money suing a writer over an image or two, larger sites (like Getty or Istock) may feel that it is in their best interest to do so. Why take chances?

Aside from the legal issues involved, the best reason why you should not steal royalty free images for your articles is that it is simply wrong. While royalty free images may range in price from pennies to hundreds of dollars, there are sufficient resources available where writers can purchase low-cost images or find public domain images.

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