The worst thing about that girl who designed porn banners for a living is NOT porn
Maybe you had not realized it yet, but the shady industry of porn attracts some REAL professionals. As in this case of the girl who
designed porn banners by finding online, and then creatively assemblying, hundreds of images like these:
<u><em><strong>CAPTION:</strong>
<a href="https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/9bzg9y/this-girl-designed-porn-banners-for-a-living" target="_blank">Click here to know how porn banners fool you</a>
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In “Things You Learn Designing Porn Banners for a Living Adi, who introduces herself by saying “I studied visual communication. I’m a graphic designer”, shares what she discovered from the “depressing reality of Photoshopping “amateur” sex all day long”. The article is an instructive report about some, um, quirks of human nature, well worth reading from beginning to end. The part that most amazed me, however, is this specific exchange:
Q: Could you just use anyone’s picture in a porn banner?
A: “Yeah! I found a picture of myself on a website once… [That picture] is on Google now, you know? If it’s there, it’s not under copyright."
That statement is 1000% crap. It’s part of the biggest lie on the Internet. If it were true, why would Google itself provide an easy way to filter Google image searches.. by usage rights?:
If it's on Google is not under copyright. Yeah, sure. That filter is there just for show.
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Current copyright legislation foster creativity much less than it facilitates censorship and perpetuates artificial monopolies. For these reasons, ignorance about copyright is a serious issue in general, which is even less excusable in “professionals”. So, the worst and most amazing thing in that story may be the fact that, in 2018, there is any “graphic designer who actually studied visual communication” who declares and applies such crap on any job. Especially when it takes 10 seconds online to find these and countless other answers to the question “can I reuse any photo I find on Google?":
- Can you just go grab any image off of Google Images and use it… NO, YOU CAN’T DO THAT.
- “In general you should consider that all of those images are copyrighted and not available for your use."
- (just) Assume Google Images Are Protected by Copyright
Who writes this, why, and how to help
I am Marco Fioretti, tech writer and aspiring polymath doing human-digital research and popularization.
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