Elanso

I spotted this article on Techmeme from Om Malik suggesting that PicApp could provide free stock photos from the likes of Getty. Possibly useful for some niche blogs if you want to avoid legal problems.

Unlike most people I read terms and conditions which seems to be almost an exact copy of their policy. They may be identical in content

Here is an example

Using PicApp

5. By this Agreement, PicApp grants any User or Registered User (as defined below) a non-exclusive, non-transferable right to perform any of the following permitted uses with the Visual Content ("Permitted Uses"): use, publish online, publicly display and reproduce Visual Content from the Website. In addition, you may post comments on Visual content and/or edit Visual Content, in accordance with PicApp website policies and other policies, by using tools provided on the Website.
6. The term "Non-transferable" as used in Paragraph 5 means that your performance of Permitted Uses must be solely for your benefit. You may not sell, rent, loan, lease, give, sublicense, trade, exchange, make available for exchange or download, or otherwise transfer to anyone either the Visual Content, or grant any other person or entity the right to perform any Permitted Uses other than Viral Use (as defined below). You agree to take all commercially reasonable steps to prevent third parties from performing any Permitted Uses, other than by Viral Usage. Note that any use of the Visual Content without agreeing to this Agreement, or breach of the terms of this Agreement shall constitute infringement of copyright.
7. It is hereby clarified that Permitted Uses must not allow third party end-users, target audiences or recipients of such Visual Content to download or copy any Visual Content, other than to copy and use such Visual Content for web use, by electing to do so from a viral menu attached to such Visual Content ("Viral Use"). Any user performing Viral Use shall be bound by the terms and conditions of this Agreement and be deemed to have agreed to all such terms and conditions, as applicable.

I am not a lawyer, I haven't read the terms of conditions 20 times to make sure, but this suggests to me that it is impossible to use these images and still syndicate your content within those terms and conditions.

I know the intended purpose, you even register your blog in the signup process, but the ToC seems a little unworkable.

Speed

The make or break of a service like this might be how fast they get pictures online and available to use.

As a test I checked Google Trends for the hottest search term - Adam Morrison

Here is what appears to be one of the top stories - it is all to do with what he looks like, so a photo you can use would be perfect.

It seems like most of them are from May last year... shame

But now we hit the real problem... javascript

This isn't embeddable code as it was described, javascript content doesn't make it into RSS feeds

This avoids a lot of the legal problems, but makes it useless for "blogging" - if you are reading this on my blog you might also notice how slowly it loads.

PicApp - Great idea - very poorly executed

Kristen didn't notice the problem with Javascript either

Related posts

• Converting Visitors Into Subscribers (20)
• CoComment added in under 5 minutes (1)
• Blogcatalog - Does Onclick Pass PageRank? (49)