Admin MilitaryImages.Net - Spread the word

[Bombardier]

When I began work on Mi.Net I had no idea that after 11 years it would become such a big part of my life, in terms of management and maintenance that is.
I have found it to be a brilliant source of information and I have made some great friends along the way.

We have some excellent members who never cease to amaze me with their photos and information, you all know who you are and I thank you for your efforts.

In the big wide world of the web it doesn't matter how fantastic our website is if it is not being found. i have spent many hours working on search engine optimisation and have also made some progress but its difficult.

The benefits of being easy to find in search engines are far ranging however most importantly the more people we recruit the more information and imagery becomes available to us all. There are a few things members can do to assist in spreading the word, which take very little time at all. I have listed a few and would really appreciate it if you could find a few minutes to help out.

• Tell you friends (word of mouth is invaluable)
• use the share buttons on images and threads (facebook etc) (this is by far the easiest and most beneficial)
• If you find a military website that has a link page, send our link to them. (they usually have a link submission page just use the email webmaster@militaryimages.net)
• If you post to military blogs they sometimes request your website address in the comment submission area.

I hope to add functionality to the site over the next 12 months and would appreciate any ideas that you have, not all will be possible but all ideas are welcome.
Dont get me wrong we achieve good results in search engines but all things can be improved.

I'm sure that most of you already do some of the things mentioned above and we all appreciate your efforts.

Thanks in advance
Bombardier

 

[Bombardier]

Well that was posted in 2014 and things have moved on a hell of a lot since then.
I have seen our search rankings increase over the last few years and other measurement tools I use have also shown a huge increase.

Thank you all for your efforts, if you have the time to post a few links around social media and such like it can only help further

 

[Jake84]

Will see what I can do.

I’m wondering though and sorry to bring again Mpnet to the table but don’t you have copyright issues here too? I really appreciate we can post medias and pictures. What makes this site allowed to have such images?

Cheers

 

[Bombardier]

Complicated subject really

But Fair use for non commercial purposes pretty much sums it up. That said should a copyright holder not like the fact that their images are being used then they can request the particular images be taken down (commonly referred to as a take down notice), in this situation an online service provider(OSP)such as Mi.Net is provided with 'Safe Harbor' that is to say a protection from any civil proceedings as long as action is taken, it is accepted that a host could not possibly screen every image posted for copyright infringement.

We have received many TDN's over the years and we have dealt with them accordingly.

For example the Imperial War museum once contacted me and asked about certain images that had been posted, they were more concerned with if the use of the images was commercial ie did we make any charge for using this website, of course we dont so they were happy enough once a proper credit was applied with a link to their website.

It is of course a very good way for copyright holders to advertise their work, most of the time they will display a copyright notice directly on the images and have no issue with them being shared.

I would point to facebook, how do they manage it?, if they screened every image and removed them if no copyright details were provided with the image it would be a pretty dull place to visit. (which I think it is anyway )

At times when copyright holders have contacted us we have discussed the matter with them and they were happy as long as a proper credit was attached and yet others just do not want their work using anywhere but their own site.

Of course simply because we have a safe harbor does not mean we do not respect copyright, quite the contrary and we will always do our best to assist any copyright holder.

We have had a lot of false requests too and I dealt with them with the contempt they deserved.

Hope that helps but as I said it is a very complicated subject.

**** I am not a solicitor and this is my opinion based on my readings, do not take any action based on what I have said. Always check for yourself***

 

[Bombardier]

One of the best ideas I have seen is the Creative Commons licences, we have provided some in our help section for our members to use when posting their own images.

Creative Commons licences

Creative Commons Licence types

www.militaryimages.net

 

[Bombardier]

Oh forgot to mention the rules for DMCA safe Harbor here is a link

Practical Law UK Signon

uk.practicallaw.thomsonreuters.com

You will see from that link that one of the conditions is that a designated agent should be registered to receive DMCA notifications, from the US Copyright Office, and make this information available on its service. (This we have done)