Ok I want to address something that's been an issue for a while now. Better yet, since the Support Michael Phelps Now page started. If you're on Facebook, you know that profiles, groups, and fan pages have spaces to upload a variety of pix. I wrote about the PPP page having over 1500 pix at one point. We all have fun commenting, tagging, sharing pix.
That's what keeps our group connected. However our pic gatherers got emails from a variety of photogs who complain about group members 'stealing' pix! I'm saying very clearly, our group DOES NOT STEAL pictures. I'm thinking the photographers might think that we get some kind of payoff for displaying our pages and pix on them. THIS IS NOT TRUE. There is NO financial gain from our page. As a result, we've started adding citations as captions so people can see where the pix come from. Other pix we find, like from SI or Getty Images have like a little 'watermark' on them identifying the source. That's cool.
Now there's the issue of non professional pix shared across FB from personal profiles. We've all done it at some point. We've argued about it. Some people send messages saying: You STOLE these pix! Let me say first off that FB does have a Privacy option for pictures. If you dont want pix shared on FB, then put privacy blocks on for people you dont want to see them. I do it all the time. Other than that, you're just gonna have to go with the Honor's System with your FB friends. If you're not sure about certain friends, then block them from seeing a particular album. When I see pix from people who are FB friends, but we don't communicate often, I DO NOT post their pix. I make comments here and there. I would not post them to this blog or any of my fan pages.
Believe me, I saw some pix from the Charlotte UltraSwim that I would L.O.V.E to post onto my profile and make them my profile pic, but I summon the strength NOT to do it. There is one pic in particular of a certain swimmer that gives me goggle-wide eyes whenever I see it and....well nevermind :)
Anyway, a picture taker of some UltraSwim pix had problems with some images popping up in different places. PPP Admins took the step of temporarily blocking the "Add photos" option in order to keep certain photos from showing up on our page. Several of us will be at the World Trials in Indy, and we'll have many, many, many, many pix of swimmers to share. I personally will share some and keep some private.
As swimfans we have to understand that we all love to see new pix of our fav swimmers, but we must know that sometimes people dont want their pix scattered all around Facebook. I think it's just harmless excitement to want to see, comment, and share pix of our fav swimmers. But I do respect O.P.P. (other people's property) As I've said before, it's all about FUN, so let's keep the fun going and mix in a little respect at the same time.
BTW PP&P are setting up for Indy by having this blog, FB page, PPP Members profiles, YouTube, Twitter, and MySpace available for those who want to see how we show love for Mike and the swimworld. I started some test vids and posted them below. Dont worry, our vids wont be so...boring LOL. We have some of our hypest members going to Indy :) But follow us on the trip!:
Blogger - http://phelpspive.blogspot.com/
YouTube - http://www.youtube.com/user/PhelpsPhive
Twitter - http://twitter.com/ThePPP_08
MySpace - http://www.myspace.com/thephelpsphiveandphriends
Facebook - http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=32786806179
