S’porean woman allegedly claims professional photos as her own to promote travel & diving business
She said: 'Earth doesn't belong to us, so any photos taken by anyone also doesn't belong to anyone'.
app-facebook
Aaron Wong
19 hours ago
Dear friends, this is the follow-up on my post from yesterday. If you are not keen on this issue, please scroll along as it is gonna be a lengthy one.
Before I go on, I want to set the record straight. I am not here to shame / cyber bully anyone. This is not a case of someone calling another fat or ugly and making a joke out of it. It is purely to share facts of a serious case of IP infringement so that the community at large knows and can make their own informed judgment. Pl...ease know that countless attempts had been made by many people to rectify this privately but failed, which sadly led us to this post.
For the purpose of this case, I will share the story of a group of images that I have screen grabbed. (I cannot speak for other posts that might have been deleted since.) I do not know if they are still there because I have blocked this person and can no longer see her page. Here are the facts of this story.
Her name on FB is Neo Soon Sian Sylvia.
For a start, I don’t actually know her on a personal level. She had just came up to me during a dive event, introduced herself and later sent me a friend request on FB which I accepted. This is something she does to a lot of people within the diving industry. Friendships that are based on FB solely for affiliation. That is the full extent of my acquaintance with this person so I mean her no harm on a personal level because like many, I do not even know her.
Earlier this week, I had chanced upon some really nice images of Antarctica on her post. It was hashtag ‘#PhotosTakenBySylvia’. I was honestly surprised by her work so I did a simple and quick google search and within secs found out the the exact same image was in fact taken by a professional photographer by the name of Stefan Christmann from Germany who worked with the BBC Natural History Unit.
I checked her post again and realized that the picture was used to promote her Antarctica trips which she offers as a business. We felt this wasn’t right and contacted her saying she should not be using someone else’s images as their own. She should ask for permission and if granted, drop a credit mention as this is the most basic thing to do. She promptly deleted that message and began sending a hail of private messages claiming that she has permission to use those images. She went on to say "Not all professional photographers want credits and fame. Some prefer to stay out of the limelight." I found this odd, as a photographer for 22 years, I have never heard a photographer saying that because we know credits are not about ‘fame’ but a protection of IP rights. Any photographer knows that. But to give her the benefit of doubt, I contacted Stefan just in case that was true. He responded by saying he has no idea who Sylvia is, had never given permission whatsoever and would contact her to have his images removed. He did so on her post (screen grab below) and I left it at that for them to sort it out.
However, within that day, she started privately messaging me again, basically asking me to mind my own business. A quick check shows she had deleted all of Stefan’s messages.
I told her what she is doing is not right. In return she bombarded me with countless ridiculous claims, going as far as saying "How do you know that image is from Stefan? He could have stolen it too." She even added that "Earth doesn’t belong to us, so any photos taken by anyone also doesn’t belong to anyone." (Refer to screen grab below). I was utterly shocked by the warped sense of entitlement she has. I tried to explain that is not true and the meaning of ‘credit’. She started slamming me saying that "Not everyone wants credit and fame like you, if you are really good, credit will be due." I was speechless. So I decided to dig deeper about who this person is. Looking through her posts it became clear that you do not actually see a single image of herself in Antarctica at all. Every picture was lifted off the internet and hashtag ‘#PhotosTakenBySylvia’. Not one was of her. And when I looked deeper, I noticed most posts were tagged to the same few people and the people who comment or defend her in the post are also that same few. Looking at their profile, it seems pretty clear something is not right as these accounts had very little friends, 1 profile pic since 2013, and every single post on their page is tagged by her. BUT THESE ARE PURELY MY OWN SUSPICIONS and I cannot prove anything. I will leave it to YOUR own judgment.
She went on to spam me with messages. I had received over 100 messages at this point, all defensively claiming she is right.
So I decided to do a post yesterday to highlight this issue. I did not expose her name because as I mentioned, this is NOT a witch hunt to shame someone. All I wanted to do was show her that the world does not agree with her ridiculous logic. The truth is, if she just accepted it, give some credit and change her ways, I would have left it at that. It’s really that simple. But instead, she got really upset and slammed me with 46 messages within 10mins (Refer to screen grab below). I literally have witnesses with me who saw all these as I’m in PHIDEX now and was chatting with dive professionals. We all could not believe it. It was all rants claiming that she ‘doesn’t care about her reputation’ and if they want, can get the police to arrest her. Also claiming that a "renowned big shot" like me is bullying her... "photographers should feel honored if their images are stolen because it shows they are good"... it goes on and on and on...
As the post heated up with 314 comments (all against her), many other divers / photographers started messaging me privately to check if I was referring to the same person and confirmed that they too had the same problems with her before. Some even more ridiculous than mine!
At this point, I conclude that this person really has some issues in her head.
Which unfortunately brings us to this post where I share the story. I know some might wonder, why I even bother since it’s not even my image? Well, as a photographer, I have had my images stolen countless times and as a member of this community, I see it as a duty to speak up privately because like so many, I enjoy sharing my images too and people like her makes it difficult and unsafe when they use images as their own for a commercial gain. Yes, I know images are used all the time without permission but not to this extent where someone spits in the face of basic IP laws. And yes, I should not have gotten so involved and shouldn’t have bothered but as you read the story, my main aim was to highlight it to the original photographer, hopefully educate and change her ways and move on. But as you can see, I am literally dragged along by her unrelenting harassment by which point it became personal.
So that’s the full story.
I am NOT asking everyone to go on a witch hunt to shame her. Please do NOT harass her. This is just for the community to know what this person is doing and for professionals to see if their images are in there without permission. If you feel this person is wrong and should stop, then let’s collectively report her to FB and shut her down. But I leave this decision entirely to your own judgment.
As for those who had reached out to me about your run ins with her, please use this post as a platform to share what happened so we can all speak up and what’s right.
Again, this is my story of what happened along with the proofs. How you want to read it, I leave it to your own good judgment.
Ok, this is officially the longest Public Service Announcement I have EVER written! If you got this far, congrats! I love you too!!
Her FB name is Neo Soon Sian Sylvia
Her website:
www.travelgowhere.com.sg
www.scubareefing.com
See More
https://mothership.sg/2019/09/antarctica-photographs-drama/
She said: 'Earth doesn't belong to us, so any photos taken by anyone also doesn't belong to anyone'.
app-facebook
Aaron Wong
19 hours ago
Dear friends, this is the follow-up on my post from yesterday. If you are not keen on this issue, please scroll along as it is gonna be a lengthy one.
Before I go on, I want to set the record straight. I am not here to shame / cyber bully anyone. This is not a case of someone calling another fat or ugly and making a joke out of it. It is purely to share facts of a serious case of IP infringement so that the community at large knows and can make their own informed judgment. Pl...ease know that countless attempts had been made by many people to rectify this privately but failed, which sadly led us to this post.
For the purpose of this case, I will share the story of a group of images that I have screen grabbed. (I cannot speak for other posts that might have been deleted since.) I do not know if they are still there because I have blocked this person and can no longer see her page. Here are the facts of this story.
Her name on FB is Neo Soon Sian Sylvia.
For a start, I don’t actually know her on a personal level. She had just came up to me during a dive event, introduced herself and later sent me a friend request on FB which I accepted. This is something she does to a lot of people within the diving industry. Friendships that are based on FB solely for affiliation. That is the full extent of my acquaintance with this person so I mean her no harm on a personal level because like many, I do not even know her.
Earlier this week, I had chanced upon some really nice images of Antarctica on her post. It was hashtag ‘#PhotosTakenBySylvia’. I was honestly surprised by her work so I did a simple and quick google search and within secs found out the the exact same image was in fact taken by a professional photographer by the name of Stefan Christmann from Germany who worked with the BBC Natural History Unit.
I checked her post again and realized that the picture was used to promote her Antarctica trips which she offers as a business. We felt this wasn’t right and contacted her saying she should not be using someone else’s images as their own. She should ask for permission and if granted, drop a credit mention as this is the most basic thing to do. She promptly deleted that message and began sending a hail of private messages claiming that she has permission to use those images. She went on to say "Not all professional photographers want credits and fame. Some prefer to stay out of the limelight." I found this odd, as a photographer for 22 years, I have never heard a photographer saying that because we know credits are not about ‘fame’ but a protection of IP rights. Any photographer knows that. But to give her the benefit of doubt, I contacted Stefan just in case that was true. He responded by saying he has no idea who Sylvia is, had never given permission whatsoever and would contact her to have his images removed. He did so on her post (screen grab below) and I left it at that for them to sort it out.
However, within that day, she started privately messaging me again, basically asking me to mind my own business. A quick check shows she had deleted all of Stefan’s messages.
I told her what she is doing is not right. In return she bombarded me with countless ridiculous claims, going as far as saying "How do you know that image is from Stefan? He could have stolen it too." She even added that "Earth doesn’t belong to us, so any photos taken by anyone also doesn’t belong to anyone." (Refer to screen grab below). I was utterly shocked by the warped sense of entitlement she has. I tried to explain that is not true and the meaning of ‘credit’. She started slamming me saying that "Not everyone wants credit and fame like you, if you are really good, credit will be due." I was speechless. So I decided to dig deeper about who this person is. Looking through her posts it became clear that you do not actually see a single image of herself in Antarctica at all. Every picture was lifted off the internet and hashtag ‘#PhotosTakenBySylvia’. Not one was of her. And when I looked deeper, I noticed most posts were tagged to the same few people and the people who comment or defend her in the post are also that same few. Looking at their profile, it seems pretty clear something is not right as these accounts had very little friends, 1 profile pic since 2013, and every single post on their page is tagged by her. BUT THESE ARE PURELY MY OWN SUSPICIONS and I cannot prove anything. I will leave it to YOUR own judgment.
She went on to spam me with messages. I had received over 100 messages at this point, all defensively claiming she is right.
So I decided to do a post yesterday to highlight this issue. I did not expose her name because as I mentioned, this is NOT a witch hunt to shame someone. All I wanted to do was show her that the world does not agree with her ridiculous logic. The truth is, if she just accepted it, give some credit and change her ways, I would have left it at that. It’s really that simple. But instead, she got really upset and slammed me with 46 messages within 10mins (Refer to screen grab below). I literally have witnesses with me who saw all these as I’m in PHIDEX now and was chatting with dive professionals. We all could not believe it. It was all rants claiming that she ‘doesn’t care about her reputation’ and if they want, can get the police to arrest her. Also claiming that a "renowned big shot" like me is bullying her... "photographers should feel honored if their images are stolen because it shows they are good"... it goes on and on and on...
As the post heated up with 314 comments (all against her), many other divers / photographers started messaging me privately to check if I was referring to the same person and confirmed that they too had the same problems with her before. Some even more ridiculous than mine!
At this point, I conclude that this person really has some issues in her head.
Which unfortunately brings us to this post where I share the story. I know some might wonder, why I even bother since it’s not even my image? Well, as a photographer, I have had my images stolen countless times and as a member of this community, I see it as a duty to speak up privately because like so many, I enjoy sharing my images too and people like her makes it difficult and unsafe when they use images as their own for a commercial gain. Yes, I know images are used all the time without permission but not to this extent where someone spits in the face of basic IP laws. And yes, I should not have gotten so involved and shouldn’t have bothered but as you read the story, my main aim was to highlight it to the original photographer, hopefully educate and change her ways and move on. But as you can see, I am literally dragged along by her unrelenting harassment by which point it became personal.
So that’s the full story.
I am NOT asking everyone to go on a witch hunt to shame her. Please do NOT harass her. This is just for the community to know what this person is doing and for professionals to see if their images are in there without permission. If you feel this person is wrong and should stop, then let’s collectively report her to FB and shut her down. But I leave this decision entirely to your own judgment.
As for those who had reached out to me about your run ins with her, please use this post as a platform to share what happened so we can all speak up and what’s right.
Again, this is my story of what happened along with the proofs. How you want to read it, I leave it to your own good judgment.
Ok, this is officially the longest Public Service Announcement I have EVER written! If you got this far, congrats! I love you too!!
Her FB name is Neo Soon Sian Sylvia
Her website:
www.travelgowhere.com.sg
www.scubareefing.com
See More
https://mothership.sg/2019/09/antarctica-photographs-drama/
