Few small businesses have the funds to pay a professional photographer to create the type of images that look impressive on a website. Beyond a picture of your premises and, if applicable, your showroom is usually about all that you will have. To fill this gap, websites that sell images created by other photographers have been springing up all over the Internet. In terms of web design, these can be really useful. You can buy a photo that would cost hundreds of pounds if you had commissioned it yourself and often for only a few pounds. As websites do not require high resolution images in the way that printing requires, they can cost less than one pound on some websites.
We at Net Quality have used such stock images for many years now and the main source we used to use was the iStock site, owned by Getty images. They have an impressive choice of photographs, graphics and videos and until recently, their prices were reasonable. However, we have decided to stop using them because they are currently employing a unwarranted method to earn more revenue.
Getty images have been writing letters to thousands of businesses around the world demanding large sums of money because they claim that the website owner does not have a valid licence to use the photo. In many cases this is not true but this does not seem to stop Getty images issuing this highly threatening letters which scare many small business owners into parting with their hard-earned money.
Therefore I wish all customers of Net Quality Web Design to know this now:
I want you to know this because I know of at least one case where one of our customers has paid Getty images without consulting us first. So if you are a customer of Net Quality Web Design and your eceive one of these letters please let us know and we can give you the relevant licence information that will satisfy Getty images.
Because of this controversial action taken by Getty images, we know longer use iStock images. We have found other suppliers who charge less than iStock and do not treat their customers in this way.
But no matter who we use, you can be sure that we supply your website with fully legal images and we keep a full record of all purchase details.