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Hitch · 10-03-2018, 04:43 PM

So...

Today's adventure. Quoted a nice couple for a book with 116K words and 122 images, along with an index. They accept the quote, time passes, (this is normal, we quote lots of WIPs--works-in-progress that have to be completed prior to production) and today they send in the files for production.

Word count: 198,000 words, not 116K.
Image count: 205 images, not 122.

But the real kicker? Almost none of the images are 300DPI. This is a print book, so they really need to be at least 200. None are 200. They are all 72-96DPI. But wait, there's MORE.

Almost half of the images are .wdp files. "Windows Media Player." Why, you ask? Because they are SCREENSHOTS. Screenshots of Google Search results. Of images that, of course, are not public domain. One is an image that I find was taken from National Review, by a Reuters stringer. Another is taken right out of an existing book, opened up on Google books!

And yet, there's more. All the screenshots, of course, took the entire monitor, and not merely the image being, er, 'borrowed;' so, we'd have to manually trim and crop and fix, every single bloody one of these. And, of course, let's not forget resolution.

I wrote to the client, pretty damn speechless. I pointed out that really, it's MY business that's on the hook here. If they get sued, so too will I, and even a WHIFF of impropriety, around the protection of IP, and I'd be cooked. Toast. Over, done, yesterday's leftovers.

We'll see what happens. I hate to be required to give the dough back, but I don't see how on earth they can solve this. Clearance on 200 images would take MONTHS, even if they were willing to pay the likes of Reuters for images.

I don't know what pisses me off the most--that they didn't know, or they did know, and deliberately tried to get around it (who takes screenshots or images that they find on Google? If you're going to cavalierly lift images, why not just download the damn things?)? That they didn't bother making sure that they were 300DPI, which I'd told them that they'd need? That they didn't crop the bogus screenshots?

It's a ponderment. Days like today just really suck.

aka,
Hitch

10-03-2018, 04:43 PM	#32489
Hitch Bookmaker & Cat Slave Posts: 11,503 Karma: 158448243 Join Date: Apr 2010 Location: Phoenix, AZ Device: K2, iPad, KFire, PPW, Voyage, NookColor. 2 Droid, Oasis, Boox Note2	Sigh...meh, who needs those stinkin' copyrights, anyway??? So... Today's adventure. Quoted a nice couple for a book with 116K words and 122 images, along with an index. They accept the quote, time passes, (this is normal, we quote lots of WIPs--works-in-progress that have to be completed prior to production) and today they send in the files for production. Word count: 198,000 words, not 116K. Image count: 205 images, not 122. But the real kicker? Almost none of the images are 300DPI. This is a print book, so they really need to be at least 200. None are 200. They are all 72-96DPI. But wait, there's MORE. Almost half of the images are .wdp files. "Windows Media Player." Why, you ask? Because they are SCREENSHOTS. Screenshots of Google Search results. Of images that, of course, are not public domain. One is an image that I find was taken from National Review, by a Reuters stringer. Another is taken right out of an existing book, opened up on Google books! And yet, there's more. All the screenshots, of course, took the entire monitor, and not merely the image being, er, 'borrowed;' so, we'd have to manually trim and crop and fix, every single bloody one of these. And, of course, let's not forget resolution. I wrote to the client, pretty damn speechless. I pointed out that really, it's MY business that's on the hook here. If they get sued, so too will I, and even a WHIFF of impropriety, around the protection of IP, and I'd be cooked. Toast. Over, done, yesterday's leftovers. We'll see what happens. I hate to be required to give the dough back, but I don't see how on earth they can solve this. Clearance on 200 images would take MONTHS, even if they were willing to pay the likes of Reuters for images. I don't know what pisses me off the most--that they didn't know, or they did know, and deliberately tried to get around it (who takes screenshots or images that they find on Google? If you're going to cavalierly lift images, why not just download the damn things?)? That they didn't bother making sure that they were 300DPI, which I'd told them that they'd need? That they didn't crop the bogus screenshots? It's a ponderment. Days like today just really suck. aka, Hitch