My Story. Of Why I Watermark My Photos.

I made a point a few weeks ago to talk about why I watermark my photos. 

And because I have numerous other posts scheduled, this one has been kind of on the back burner.

Just waiting for the best opportunity. Which I guess would be today.

I'm not going to drag this out, as it is probably self-explanatory why I do. But I will share with you my story, in hopes of maybe changing some other people's perspective on their images and watermarking.

To be honest with you, I read "this" kind of story a few times on the internet. And although it should have been a reality check. And although I already knew these things were a possibility...My thought process at the time was... I'm one little fish in a pond full of millions.

Why yes, this is true. However, it doesn't mean it can't happen to you.

So let us start with the email that I received back on January 2nd.

Okay. Back up. Holland?! What in the world is going on here. I mean I do realize that people all across the globe read blogs, but I would have never have imagined that mine would catch some attention in Holland, of all places. But again.. this just shows how little we know about our readership out there. 

The other thing that shocked me about all this, is the fact that someone caught them. Someone in Holland. What are the chances? Honestly. Maybe in the United States, sure. But in Holland? It meant that someone else in that country happened to read my blog, or stumble across my blog, and see these pictures of me and my daughter and realize that we were not the same person.

And I am so thankful for that. That someone reached out to me. That I found out about this.

Now, lets keep going with this story...

The same day that I received this email, my blog was getting like 5,000-6,000 hits a day for a couple of days. And the source of the hits? This forum that Kayla {above} speaks of.

Of course I go to this forum. I investigate {for hours}, and read and read and read. 

Now, mind you, all of this is in a different language. So I have to resort to using the translator online, which I did, and I was just shocked by how huge this topic was in this country.

I found pictures of my daughter and myself. Me being pregnant, me holding my daughter as a newborn. And me was not me, but someone that referred to themselves as "dubecky." How clever, she even used my name, or part of it at least.

And the people talked. They were enraged because this person had gone on and on about their pregnancy for months, showed pictures of her pregnant belly {me}, and then on January 1st she had stated that she went into labor early and then had pictures of me {and andrew} with our baby girl the day she was born.

They talked about how they couldn't believe that someone would lie, and why they would do such a thing, and so forth.

The forum was endless. The conversations were firing up a storm. And I sat there, honestly, just in amazement.... asking myself... "did this really just happen to me?"

I wasn't furious.  Surprisingly. Mad? Yes. In disbelief? Yes. Numb? Yes. But out of all the emotions? Shock overpowered them all. Like wow. I would have never known about this. Perhaps it has happened before? And surely it can happen again.

In the end, the girl actually got kicked off the website by the owners and clearly was scrutinized by her peers. But neither of those things mattered to me.

What mattered to me, was that I needed to prevent this from happening again. Sure, I cannot control what other people do. No, I will not let this stop me from blogging or writing my story, our life. It neither scares me nor intimidates me. But it gives me caution. Caution that I will use when posting images of me and my family.

You see, the majority of bloggers out there don't watermark their photos. Big bloggers, little bloggers. Most of them? 99% of them? Don't. You see,  Google images will provide you an endless amounts of pictures of babies with not a single watermark to them. And therefore? People out there can steal images all they want, and as many as they want. And most of the time? No one will ever know.

But when you do find out that they do? It makes you think twice. Makes you go that extra step to protect your images. And not just putting a watermark in the corner or on the bottom or top {because remember guys, you can simply just crop that out}, but doing so in a way that will hopefully prevent someone from stealing my images and making it seem as their own. And my only regret?

That I didn't do this from the very beginning.

So learn from my story. Take that little extra time. Put that extra effort. Use caution. Don't let it scare you or make you run away. Just be smarter.

Be the one that is in control.