A new feature of Licensable badge has been launched by Google to improve the responsible use of images available on the web.
This feature has been exclusively launched for Google images in collaboration with Shutterstock which is a New York-based photography company. The “Licensable badge” will help people in getting credits for their work. Also, the users will be able to use the images responsibly without violating any copyrights.
“Google Images new features help both image creators and image consumers by bringing visibility to how creators’ content can be licensed properly,” Paul Brennan, Shutterstock’s VP of Content Operations said.
After clicking on the image, the users will be able to know the artist or the creator of the work they are going to use. The guidelines on how to use that particular image without violating any rights will also be associated with it.
Paul Brennan further stated, “We are pleased to have worked closely with Google on this feature, by advocating for protections that result in fair compensation for our global community of over 1 million contributors. In developing this feature, Google has clearly demonstrated its commitment to supporting the content creation ecosystem.”
The licensable badge feature was into Beta testing phase in February 2020 and is now available worldwide for use. Google in a statement said that it’s not always a simple task to find the right image among the millions of images available on the internet. And it is even more difficult to use the images responsibly without violating any credits or privacy rights.
With this amazing feature of Licensable badge, you can also view only the images that have licensing information available by using the “Filter” option. You need to click on “Tools” and then select the” Usage Rights” Dropdown Menu to filter out the images.
There are two options available for this – Creative Common licenses and the other one is Commercial & other licenses. The images that are available under Creative Common licenses can be used by the public. These are the images that are on the internet for free distributed use.
The other option of Commercial & other licenses consists of images that can not be used without the consent of the creator. This will prevent the misuse of photographs and images on the internet.
There are basically two benefits of introducing the new licensable badge feature. First one, as mentioned above it will protect the copyrights of the photographer or the artist. Because, on the web the images are free to use and hence, people use them without providing any proper picture credits. If you are interested in Royalty free music, you can refer to the article How to add Royalty-Free Music to YouTube Videos we have previously written about how to use them.
The second advantage is the revenue generation for the creator of the image. So, people who want to use the image which are under the Commercial & other licenses have to approach the photographer or the creator of the image. They have to provide the commission for the work of the original image made by them.
As shown in the image, you can see that the artist credits are provided in the license details. The name of the creator, credit along with the copyright credits are mentioned. Hence, the photographer has been given full credit and before using it, one may have to contact him.
On the other hand, you can see that in the above image no such credits are given. This is because it is not a licensed image and is available for public use. Hence, by the use of a licensable badge on Google images the work will not be unrecognised and used without permission.
This feature is of extreme use to the creators, photographers and the users of the image as well.
