Reading between the lines, it sounds like that effort has not taken off to the level Getty had hoped… and rather than recognizing that people just aren’t comfortable with embedding images from Getty (or that they don’t really know about the program), the company appears to be blaming Google Image search. We were cautiously optimistic a couple of years ago, when the company finally started experimenting with offering up images for free, via a system that would let you embed many images (though there were some concerns about the setup and conditions). It has a pretty long history of fairly idiotic bouts of pure copyright trolling, demanding cash as a bully, often in cases where there was no legitimate infringement at all. Getty, of course, has a troubled history with the internet. Getty claims that this is decreasing the rate of clickthroughs to its site, where it might be able to extract some licensing fees. The big issue, it seems, for Getty is that three years ago Google made its Images search act a little different, in that you can display full resolution images, rather than just purely thumbnails. Getty has not actually released the complaint but put out a press release with a few more details and had its General Counsel Yoko Miyashita, post an open letter.

Previously, the search engine only displayed tiny thumbnails of images. Google first introduced the feature in Jan. In its complaint to the European Union?s antitrust commission, Getty says Google Images, which displays full-screen slideshows of high-resolution copyrighted images, has hurt the stock agency?s licensing business as well as content creators worldwide. Photography company Getty Images is accusing Google of scraping images from third party websites and encouraging piracy, adding a new wrinkle to the Mountain View, Calif.?s ongoing legal battles in Europe. According to Time, Getty has filed an antitrust complaint against Google in the EU, apparently arguing that Google’s image search is undermining Getty’s licensing business and “encouraging piracy.”

Next up? Getty Images complaining about Google Images. confusingly arguing that Google News was an antitrust violation, because it both linked to its content and because it wouldn’t link to its content (don’t ask me, I don’t understand it either). With the EU making the first big antitrust move against Google in the EU over Android bundling practices (and more still expected over search), it seems that lots of other companies that have had trouble adapting to the internet are coming out of the woodwork to file complaints of their own (well, everyone except Microsoft, which has agreed to drop its complaints - despite kicking off much of the EU antitrust focus on Google). Wed, Apr 27th 2016 11:38am - Mike Masnick

Getty images reverse image search