Someone Stole My Picture

[i*m-still-here]

A seller stole a picture of an item have listed.

It's a one a kind item and there is no other like it.

The photo is clearly mine.

No doubt about it........... every little crease it identical.

I messaged the seller and he agreed he'd lifted my photo.

I reported the photo several times .................. I called ebay and the person agreed that it's clearly my item

There is no way that the other seller has that piece because there is no other like it.

It's a 100 year old antique.

The listing ended................... and the seller has re-listed the same item again.

What's that all about?

[rose-dee]

I don't understand why eBay is not restricting this seller from listing your item.  He is selling something he doesn't actually have and can't actually deliver to a prospective buyer.  That is fraud. 

At the very least, using another seller's listing photo without authorization is copyright infringement. 

Perhaps you should take this up with the "Pinks".  Give them the item# of the listing and the background, and see if they can do anything about it before you get hit with transaction interference.  They are very helpful and approachable, in my experience, and you can email them directly. 

Make sure you block the seller from being able to purchase the "real" item from you so you leave him out in the cold. 

[number63]

Unfortunately, even if you block the other seller from buying your item, he could just get his friend to buy the item and you wouldn't know who to block to stop that from happening.

Sorry if I missed you mentioning it, but do you have any bids on your item? If not, what about removing your listing and let the other guy figure out how he's going to ship the non-existent item to his buyer - he'd be screwed.

Do you have previous versions of the same photo, such as an un-cropped version, which you could send to ebay to prove you are the original photographer? maybe that would get them paying more attention to it. Else I guess you could take more pics of the item to prove you actually have possession of it.

If the other seller is using the link to YOUR photo host, you could replace your photo with something that the other seller wouldn't want anyone to see (as other posters have mentioned). If he just copied your photo from the ebay listing, then he could post the photo on his own photo server and you would not be able to alter the photo on his listing.

Copying a photo is usually fairly easy, even if the right-click copy feature is blocked. Also, to anyone who is handy with a photo editing program, water marks can be erased, even ones that cross right through the main object in the photo.

[i*m-still-here]

I really didn't care that much at first.........

BUT..............

I bid it on  it and won and then contacted the seller and told him that I knew it wasn't his item.

We exchanged a few messages.........

Then he re-listed yet again and when it didn't sell on that round he filed a non-paying bidder case on me.

That's when I got really annoyed.

(Didn't know you could re-list an item and if it didn't sell on the second or third try you could go back to the first bidder and file a non-paying bidder case.)

I called ebay and they said they'd take care of it, and when nothing happened I sent him an email which was somewhat nasty............ not that bad really but I did call him a little jerk.

That's about as harsh as it got.

He tattled on me and I received a reprimand from eBay.

What the Heck?

They also finally removed the item and thus no strike for me.

BUT........ anyone who thinks that eBay doesn't take all this tatting on buyers seriously........ think again!

The seller is crapping all over me ......... and when I call him a little jerk eBay smacks me across the face for it.

Reporting sellers for infractions.......... not so much.

At least in my experience.

[forester_studios]

I've had my photos stolen a couple of times by lazy sellers who can't make the effort to take their own pictures.  It is very annoying, but I doubt ebay cares much. 

Recently noticed one lazy jerk who stole 2 of my photos of a DVD and used them in his listing to sell.  I know it's my photos because the front of the DVD had a tear in the shrinkwrap where the price sticker was removed clearly showing in the photo and the second was a cropped image of all the DVD specs info off the back of the box. As well I recognized my countertop where the item was placed when I took the photos.

Can't be bothered complaining to ebay though.  I don't waste my time calling customer service anymore as they could not care less and do not know much anyhow. 

I would watermark my photos, but with the new photo requirements I don't think ebay allows that anymore.  What a pain!!!

[pocomocomputing]

Watermarks are allowed but there are rules to the size and where you can place the watermark.

Here is a link to the eBay Photo Centre and there is a section on watermarks.

http://pages.ebay.ca/sellerinformation/sellingresources/picturestandards.html

[art-in-the-making]

In the past I have reported my images stolen by other sellers and eBay has removed the offending items.

[egzatek]

Hello,

As asked in the first few posts of this topic, what are the item numbers ?

It really is tickling my curiosity

Would be nice to understand and see for ourselves the items in questions.

[helenm2010]

I'm sorry for eBay not taking any action against this person.  But I'm not surprised.  I am a cookbook author and selling my cookbooks on eBay.  I have been battling eBay and an unfair competitor for over 2 years, she has stolen my name, my photos, my company name, my trademarks, my cookbook titles and my company logo and lists her 1 cookbook with all of my credentials sometimes dozens of times.  eBay doesn't believe that is copyright and trademark infringement and they don't think that a stolen logo infringes my rights.  I feel abandoned. 

I hope at least you will get your problem resolved because it doesn't appear that I'm getting anywhere with them.  Being member of the VeRO program doesn't help either.

Take care, be strong and don't give up