The Daily Render

A Digital Scrapbook for the Past, Present, and Future

Groupon.com is illegally using my map “DC Stencil” for a Facebook advertisement
|| 8/10/2009 || 6:09 pm || 1 Comment Rendered || ||

Screen grab from Facebook showing my map DC Stencil being used without my permission -- click to see full size

Click the Screen Grab to see the full-size image

About 15 minutes ago I visited my Profile Page on Facebook and noticed a familiar map of mine was being used without my authorization:

DC Stecnil by Nikolas Schiller - created August 22nd, 2005

My website’s Fair Use policy states “For any intended commercial use of content on this website, I request that you contact me so that we can arrange appropriate compensation.” There was no effort to contact me before using my map in the advertisement and had they chosen to contact me, I would have requested some form of compensation. I decided to report the advertisement to Facebook:

Screen grab from Facebook showing my map DC Stencil being used without my permission and my message to Facebook as to why the ad should be removed-- click to see full size

Click the Screen Grab to see the full-size image
(Yes I am aware of the grammatical error!)

I also sent the company, which I am purposely not linking to in this entry, a polite cease and desist e-mail asking them to either take down the advertisement or pay me and I sent out a tweet linking to this entry. Maybe I should pursue further action? Let’s see how they respond…

UPDATE – A few minutes after I sent my Tweet, I received the following responses:

Twitter replies about the illegal Facebook ad

Later in the evening I noticed that they merely changed the graphic and kept the original ad:

Screen grab from Facebook showing the same ad with a new graphic-- click to see full size

Click the Screen Grab to see the full-size image

Makes me wonder if they are using someone else’s image illegally?

UPDATE – This morning I received this e-mail:

So I get to BUG him about a $10 coupon after my copyright was violated? That ad was probably seen by thousands of people! What a crock.

UPDATE – August 12th, 2009 – I decided to do some sleuthing and found that the image that Groupon.com replaced my image with was also a copyrighted image! Using the website TinEye.com I was able to eventually trace their current image to this blog entry. I contacted the copyright holder and he said that he had not given them permission to use his photograph either….

Found RSS Art in the Grand Juxtaposition
|| 11/18/2008 || 4:11 pm || Comments Off on Found RSS Art in the Grand Juxtaposition || ||

Screen grab of the juxtaposition of a detail from Good Hope Quilt #2 and my RSS Art

The image above was generated by my recent creation “the Grand Juxtaposition.” I’m posting it because I have not been blogging lately and one of the best ways to stay up to date with what is being posted to my blog is through Really Simple Syndication aka RSS. Click the graphic above to subscribe.

The Obligatory MySpace Birthday Screen Grab
|| 10/10/2008 || 7:09 am || Comments Off on The Obligatory MySpace Birthday Screen Grab || ||

On my birthday in 2006 I noticed that my MySpace profile hit 10,000 visitors on my birthday (10/10) and I took a screen grab for archival purposes. I followed up again last year and again this year with the image above.

What I can extrapolate here is not that MySpace presence has diminished (I have more friends today than in 2006 or 2007), rather people are simply using MySpace less and less. This is exactly what happened with Friendster as MySpace began to take over the social networking “scene.” On a given day, I can find most of my friends using Facebook and in this respect I see history repeating. However there is no profile view counter on Facebook, so screen grabs like the one above are not possible.

Related MySpace Entries:

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Nikolas Schiller is a second-class American citizen living in America's last colony, Washington, DC. This blog is my on-line repository of what I have created or found on-line since May of 2004. If you have any questions or comments, please contact: