Getty Images for Free? Photo Site to Allow Online Use of their Photos Without Subscription

In the past, Getty Images repeatedly encountered cases of illegal copying of their photos. Considering the huge volume of online content being posted each day, it's easy to imagine the Internet-based photo archive finding the matter of upholding their copyrights consistently and notifying infringers quite troublesome indeed.

However, the firm managed to work through this problem and even turn it into an opportunity. According to CNN, it has acknowledged that many of its images "are already being copied anyway."

As such, Getty Images will now be making 35 million images available to online publishers, particularly bloggers and tweeters, for free. It must be made clear that the "free" photos are for noncommercial use only.

The archive will allow the embedding of images "using a code similar to what's on sites such as YouTube." The resulting image will include a Getty photo credit and a link to its website.

"This will provide people with a simple and legal way to utilize content that respects creators' rights, including the opportunity to generate licensing revenue," Getty announced.

Getty's senior VP for business development, Craig Peters, also had this to say:

"The use of our content in these venues points to really the fact that people are excited to be sharing their ideas, their interests, their passions with our content. We're generating new brand awareness in this market."

Peters also clarified that commercial use of the company's pictures will require a paid license.

Nieman Journalism Lab director Joshua Benton said that Getty is trying to do with images what Apple's iTunes is doing with music and in legitimizing music sharing.

However, Getty is aware that it needs to enable this so as not to encourage paying customers to benefit from the embed service themselves.

"Getty makes a lot of money off folks like The New York Times and CNN and professional publishers. They do not in any way want to endanger that. They're trying to walk that thin line to protect that while at the same time enabling that different kind of business," Benton pointed out.