Flickr to sell your pictures

Flckr / Sarah (Rosenau) Korf via Flickr

Greed once again rears its ugly head.

When people upload their pictures to Flickr, they do so to share with their friends, maybe to use elsewhere. What they do not do is upload for Yahoo to sell and make money off their pictures.

I once contemplated using Flickr, but when it was acquired by Yahoo, I thought no way.

Most sites cannot be monetised, and when they cannot, the sites try to by pushing adverts in your face, selling your personal data, or some other way to rip you off.

Sites that provide a service, for example bandcamp, which takes a small fee when artists sell their music are fine, as everyone benefits.

Sadly Flickr, Instagram, Facebook, Yahoo, they do not learn.

Instagram tried it on a couple of years ago, they claimed ownership of what was not theirs. It simply led to a mass exodus from Instagram, with posts of how to download all your pictures and other alternative sites to use.

Nor has it gone down too well with soundcloud saying it will insert ads in the music, or you have to pay for a premium ad free service.

Now is the time for mass exodus from Flickr.

It is apparently possible to set settings of Creative Commons licence, in order that pictures cannot be sold. But that is to miss the point, Flickr/Yahoo should not be selling what is not theirs.

If they wish to establish a site like bandcamp (music or spoken word) or leanpub (written word) where users places their pictures, set the price, with the express intent for selling or licensing their pictures, and the site takes a small cut, that is fine, but this is theft, pure and simple.

Big Businesses screams foul when we share what they have produced, but on the other hand ok for them to steal and make money off the back of someone else’s work.

It was exactly two years ago when Instagram tried the same scam. This led to mass exodus from Instagram. And numerous articles were posted, how to download your pictures, where to post where to share you would not be abused.

We now need the same for Flickr. Ideas welcome.

We share our pictures, we freely share our pictures, we in the main do not mind their non-commercial use provided we receive due credit and a link back to original, but we object strongly to Big Businesses profiteering off the back of our work.

• Flickr: giving photographers a bad deal
• Fight Over Yahoo’s Use of Flickr Photos
• Instagram declares war on twitter
• Instagram abuses its users
• Instagram bullshit
• Soundcloud – now with advertising!

Also published on Medium.

Svyati

Svyati by John Taverna (1944-2013).

A slow introduction from a cello and barely perceptible, low note from an organ.

I happened upon a rehearsal of Vivaldi Singers yesterday afternoon in Farnham Parish Church for a concert that evening. An interesting arrangement, the choir at the front where you’d expect, the cellist at the back.

La Plata

La Plata

La Plata featuring Nidia Gongora from the album Quantic – La Plata feat. Nidia Gongora by Quantic.

Colombian jazz-rock-salsa-reggae fusion.

Gaza flooded

As if Gaza had not suffered enough with the destruction by Israel, now facing flooding following two days of heavy rain.

UN has declared a State of Emergency.

Three months on from destruction by Israel, reconstruction has still not begun.

An estimated 100,000 Palestinians remain homeless in Gaza three months after Israel ended its offensive on the Gaza strip.

There are still those who do not believe Climate Change exists.

• UN declares emergency in Gaza over floods

Top Story in Climate Change Exchange (Sunday 30 November 2014).

Stagecoach bus driver drugged out of his brain?

This afternoon a Stagecoach bus driver who I strongly suspect was drugged out of his brain, or at least he gave every indication of being so.

Bus was running twenty minutes late.

Driver drove past bus stops even though passengers were clearly requesting him to stop.

He ignored requests from passengers for the bus to stop, then at last minute, pulled up past the bus stop.

He sailed past my bus stop. Passengers shouted out he was passing my stop, I shouted at the bus driver, we were ignored.

I alighted at the next stop and asked him why he did not stop, even though a request to stop had been made. I got no reponse, he looked like a zombie with glazed eyes.

I got off the bus thinking OMG that driver is drugged out of his brain.

I was sufficiently concerned that I considered calling the police or Stagecoach, but could not as had no phone on me.

Afternoon in Farnham

Delay setting off, three network in meltdown, no internet.

Three buses pass by, passenger even tells bus driver as she alights from bus, passenger, but still ignorant driver drives off.

Bus driver to Farnham appears to be in some zombie state, gives every impression of being drugged out of his brain, fails to pick passengers up at bus stops, fails to stop when requested to stop.

RS12 GTS

RS12 GTS

The world and his idiot appear to be out today. In busy centre of Farnham, black Porsche parked on double yellow lines, on footpath, in front of traffic lights. Driver, who was sat there, then gets out, narrowly missing pedestrian with car door, then goes into a shop.

15% off party food in Cook. But not off mince pies, apparently people do not eat mince pies at parties. Frozen or unfrozen mince pies? Why freeze mince pies? Cook has a perverse view freeze everything, as that is what we do. Mince pies is about the only thing worth buying from Cook. Expensive, but excellent. Something to sample. It was disgusting.

Looked in Loaf, sorry, tea room closed. Lots of bread left, which they throw away.

Vivaldi Singers, local amateur choir, rehearsing in Farnham Parish Church for a concert in the evening. Taverner, Vivaldi, Palestrina. What I heard did not sound like either Palestrina or Vivaldi, very dark, therefore I assume Taverner. it is always worth saying which Taverner, as there are two, though both are John Taverner. I guessed the later Taverner.

Note: My guess proved to be correct, Svyati by John Taverna (1944-2013).

candle lit Farnham Parish Church

No candles. I looked around and found candles. Lit a candle, quite atmospheric, candle and Taverner.

Nightmare in Waitrose. Each visit service gets worse.

Return bus, zombie driver.

Three network not fit for purpose

Two weeks ago three mobile phone network three days in a row, Sunday, Monday, Tuesday, unable to gain access to internet, error message, no internet.

Since then intermittent no internet access.

Early hours of this morning, no information available on account, minutes, texts, data.

Normal, when working, so slow like watching paint dry. Only time works at reasonable speed is early hours of the morning.

This afternoon, three network in meltdown. No internet. Calls to three, terminated, when could get through, indefinite hold.

The problem is simple, they are overcapacity, they lack the network capacity for their existing customers.

The regulator should step in and stop three network from taking on any new customers until such time as they have resolved their network capacity issues.

The regulator should hit three network with a massive fine.

The regulator should force three network to compensate all their customers.

It has now got so bad, three network should be forced to pay ten pound compensation, each and every time there is a problem.

As I write, three network has once again ground to a halt.

Most of the time, three network is unusable.

New in Bandcamp Pro: Video!

Blair crony organised Save the Children humanitarian award

Tony Blair Save the Children

SCUS [Save the Children US] simply did not anticipate anything sensitive – in the USA Tony Blair is widely seen very positively for his contribution to international aid. — Jasmine Whitbread, chief executive Save the Children

The scandal involving a humanitarian award to Tony Blair by Save the Children at a tacky celeb infested glitzy award ceremony in New York shows no sigh of abating, if anything it is growing.

Talking to Save the Children staff today, they are incensed at this award to Tony Blair, they regard it as obscene.

Over 500 Save the Children staff have now signed an internal petition calling the award to Blair “morally reprehensible” and demanding it to be rescinded.

An internal team has been formed to try and contain the situation. Yet more waste of money by Save the Children.

A letter sent to employees from the charity’s chief executive, Jasmine Whitbread, says the episode has “touched a nerve close to our sense of identity”, and adds: “We are all frustrated and disappointed at the situation we are in.” She says there should have been better risk assessment.

In other words they still do not get it. They see it as a PR disaster that must be contained, nothing more.

Jasmine Whitbread also admits what many had already suspected it was Blair crony Justin Forsyth, chief executive of Save the Children UK, who was responsible for Tony Blair being recipient of a humanitarian award. She also claims she did not know what was going on, until the shit hit the fan.

Over 115,000 people have now signed a petition calling on Save the Children to strip Tony Blair of this undeserved humanitarian award.

The Blair cronies whose hands are dirty, should be fired.

What the award has done, is shone a light on the murky incestuous relationship between Save the Children and Tony Blair, and the revolving door for Blair’s cronies.

Matthew Doyle, wheeled out to defend Tony Blair in a BBC interview, started working with Tony Blair in 2005 when he was appointed as his special comms adviser at Number 10. He was previously press aide to the then Secretary of State for Work and Pensions David Blunkett, and before that he worked at the Labour Party as head of press and broadcasting for the 2005 general election. He then, as did many other Blair aids, went to work for the Office of Tony Blair. In other words like too many of our Members of Parliament, a party apparatchik who has never done an honest day’s work in his life.

Then we look at those associated with Save the Children.

Sir Alan Parker, the chairman of Save the Children UK and PR company Brunswick, a Blair crony. Blair was among the guests at Parker’s wedding in 2008.

Jonathan Powell, Blair’s former chief of staff, is currently on the board of Save the Children.

Save the Children UK chief executive, Justin Forsyth, was a special adviser to Blair for three years. Save the Children was attacked last year when it was learnt Justin Forsyth was paid £163,000 a year, including more than £22,000 in performance-related pay. He has since taken a pay cut to £140,000.

• Save the Children honour Tony Blair for his ‘humanitarian work’
• Former aid defends Save the Children humanitarian award to Tony Blair
• How Tony Blair crony organised the award that discredited Save the Children

Crypt Covers | Golden Brown

Crypt Covers: Golden Brown performed by Duke Special and Hope & Social.

Once a month, Hope & Social invited a guest down into the Crypt, their studio in a crypt beneath a church, and within a day, recorded and put out on-line the next day.

They have now collected together their first sessions of Crypt Covers and released on bandcamp as Crypt Covers I.

• Crypt Covers | Dress You Up