Re: Protecting Images

I believe this thread has come up more than once on this list. As far as
anyone knows, there is no CGI or Javascript that can prevent an intellegent
user from downloading art you post on the web. There are a few solutions:

1. Don't post it. The web is a free medium.
2. Post low-quality, reduced, or otherwise marked images.
3. Use watermarking software. Won't prevent them from downloading it, but it
will still be identified as yours.
4. Create an animated GIF with three frames: the first and last frames
should be pure black, and the second frame should hold your image. Set it to
freeze on the middle frame. When viewed in a browser, it will appear normal.
When opened in Photoshop or some other program that doesn't recognize
animations, it will be pure black. A smart person could still use a GIF
animator to open and extract it, but it's better protection than nothing.

Do a search through the archives for more specific details on the discussion
and possible solutions.

-Adrian

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