Stolen Photos!!!!

John Rawlings · Post by **John Rawlings** » Sun Sep 23, 2007 7:58 pm

I am absolutely LIVID!!!!

A good friend just contacted me and gave me a Flickr Photo link of some rotten liar and thief calling himself PSDiverTom.

PSDiverTom has posted four of MY photos and claimed them as his, even making up names for the divers in them and locations they were taken. I suspect that MANY of the other photos he has on his Flickr page are not his as well, but are the work of other photographers. These shots are older photos of mine, so perhaps he thought they wouldn't be noticed.

Here is the link: http://www.flickr.com/photos/psdivertom/page4/

He has my four photos shown as:

rebreather in nanaimo
jerry and wolfie (eel)
sunken tugboat
jerry gets our calamari dinner - nanaimo

He claims to live in Winnipeg, Canada. I hope that if anyone knows this guy you will let me know who he is, or at the very least shame him publicly in the diving community!

This simply isn't right!!!!

- John

Jan K · Post by **Jan K** » Sun Sep 23, 2007 8:25 pm

That is terrible. The downside of internet sharing.. Is there anything you can do? Contact Flickr ? Please keep us posted, this thievery affects all of us. How could anybody have the guts to steal and then rename the chatacters in photos to suit them...

John Rawlings · Post by **John Rawlings** » Sun Sep 23, 2007 8:35 pm

Jan K wrote:That is terrible. The downside of internet sharing.. Is there anything you can do? Contact Flickr ? Please keep us posted, this thievery affects all of us. How could anybody have the guts to steal and then rename the chatacters in photos to suit them...

I've contacted Flickr about it and demanded that the photos be removed and that an investigation of his other photos be done. Additionally, I have added my "comments" to each of the four stolen photos. I have posted this same message on The Deco Stop, Scuba Board, NWD.com and Rebeather World, so hopefully the word will travel out around the world about this guy.

If you look at "his" photos (there are 75 of them!) on the link the style, clarity, etc. of each of them are so vastly different that I'm sure that most, if not all, of them were taken by other photographers. I suspect that there will be several photographers out there that will click on the link and discover that their photos are being claimed by this thief as well.

Thanks for your support, Jan! I very much appreciate it. People like this guy need to be shamed out of diving!

It's been a long, LONG time since I have been this angry.

- John

Fishstiq · Post by **Fishstiq** » Sun Sep 23, 2007 8:40 pm

Dude, that sucks. you put in the time, you put in the effort, and some jack@$$ blatantly rips off all of that!! ](*,) you know, some people never got to sit at the "cool kid table", and now they will do whatever to be cool for a little while. It's sad that they don't realise that all they have to do is dive and through a little effort the can be a part of a community that welcomes everyone. Who knows, maybe it's a blessing in disguise that i'm not a very good photographer!!

Joshua Smith · Post by **Joshua Smith** » Sun Sep 23, 2007 9:35 pm

Hmmm- did he take them down already? Can't seem to find them. What an a$$h0l3; I can't believe people rip off stuff like that.

Jan K · Post by **Jan K** » Sun Sep 23, 2007 9:47 pm

No, still there, I left him a note on the Possession GPO.

Tangfish · Post by **Tangfish** » Sun Sep 23, 2007 11:25 pm

Send Flickr a DMCA Notice:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DMCA

They are obligated by federal law to remove the images immediately. They'll likely ban the offender as well.

This makes me extremely angry.

This is also why I usually tag my photos "calvin-tang", since some theft is automated, I periodically discover stolen work of mine this way.

Tangfish · Post by **Tangfish** » Sun Sep 23, 2007 11:43 pm

Alright, some research yields this:

Name: Tom D. Hanaway
Location: Winnipeg, Canada
Occupation: Public Safety Diver
Email address: medictom1979@yahoo.ca
Rebreather World Profile:
http://www.rebreatherworld.com/members/medictom.html
DOB: November 11, 1957 (age 49)
Hobbies: Diving, flying

Some sort of personals listing:
http://personals.gearplay.com/cgi-bin/p ... PSDiverTom

If he doesn't take down the stolen photos, we should all email him until he does.

Huskychemist · Post by **Huskychemist** » Mon Sep 24, 2007 3:22 am

John Rawlings wrote:
He has my four photos shown as:

rebreather in nanaimo
jerry and wolfie (eel)
sunken tugboat
jerry gets our calamari dinner - nanaimo

This simply isn't right!!!!

- John

I agree John! I use photos/diagrams/etc. from websites all the time in my classroom, for educational purposes, but I always cite the source on the bottom of the powerpoint. For issues such as this, I see it as the same as stealing.

I just checked the images, and recognized the octopus shot...the guy doesn't even know what calamari is! There weren't any comments there...

Let's hope he pulls them down and gets banned from Flickr.

Lowell

John Rawlings · Post by **John Rawlings** » Mon Sep 24, 2007 5:12 am

Gawd! That second link is a date site! From this and other sources, it's starting to look like this guy is gay and is using the photos to attract other men!

He, or Flickr, has removed 3 of the photos, but the octopus shot is still there. He DID delete my comment, though, and I can't put another one in.

- John

Joshua Smith · Post by **Joshua Smith** » Mon Sep 24, 2007 6:27 am

Calvin wrote:
Some sort of personals listing:
http://personals.gearplay.com/cgi-bin/p ... PSDiverTom

WOW.

Joshua Smith · Post by **Joshua Smith** » Mon Sep 24, 2007 6:29 am

John- this guy has a semi-active profile on RBW- you should "call him out"
over there.

John Rawlings · Post by **John Rawlings** » Mon Sep 24, 2007 6:44 am

Nailer99 wrote:John- this guy has a semi-active profile on RBW- you should "call him out"
over there.

He's also on Scubaboard and the Deco Stop....I'm making his presence known around the world. If he's smart....which I kinda doubt or he wouldn't have done this to begin with....he'll just delete all "his" photos and memberships and quietly fade away.

By the way, he apparently deleted my comments as well as Jan's, but Nailer just put up a new comment stating that the photo was stolen. Thanks for your support! There's nothing better than public shame to make a POS run and hide.

- John

John Rawlings · Post by **John Rawlings** » Mon Sep 24, 2007 7:44 am

Well, he has pulled all of my photos off the Flickr site (and others) now, so if you try to go there now and view them they won't be there.

The two photos that he still has posted on Flickr of a diver using a Megalodon with orange tanks (claiming that they are shots of him!) are supposedly stolen from someone else off of RBW, and there are many questions shooting around the various boards regarding the rest of "his" photos, so I believe that this "gentleman's" troubles are just beginning.....

Special thanks to those of you that posted comments on Flickr and sent off e-mails to this guy. Being supported by honest people is always a good thing, and I very much appreciate it.

- John

Scubak · Post by **Scubak** » Mon Sep 24, 2007 8:24 am

This pisses me off! Who does he think he is and that he can try and get away with this.
I'm with Calvin on tagging your photos...
I don't care if people use them or whatever, just ask or give credit.
Kirsten

GillyWeed · Post by **GillyWeed** » Mon Sep 24, 2007 10:50 am

I wonder which one of our comments set him off to take them off his site this morning.. I made one after Nailers 2.. Heh heh. Slimey bastard. Who does he think he is.. If you think the shot is cool.. Fine post it but then say "Hey check out my favorite photo of all time from John Rowlings..." Right?

John you need to do what I do.. Don't take such good photos and then no one would want them anyway.. $\:D/$

Cold_H2O · Post by **Cold_H2O** » Mon Sep 24, 2007 11:06 am

Its one thing to post someones pics and give them credit.
I have done it before.

But stealing is just wrong.

Glad to see your pics are no longer on his site.

Zen Diver · Post by **Zen Diver** » Mon Sep 24, 2007 11:43 am

For what it's worth, I sent emails to NAUI, SSI, SDI, IANTD and PSDA informing them of this probable imposter, and included links to his "personals" page.

Thieving, lying bastard

-Valerie

drock · Post by **drock** » Mon Sep 24, 2007 11:53 am

It's very frustrating to have material stolen. I once had a web site that had dive site reviews. Someone emailed me, saying a local dive shop was using my reviews on their web site. Sure enough, page after page of my material was there. I immediately sent them an email regarding copyright violations, and within minutes, the pages were removed. It seems someone cheated both me and the shop, trading my work for dive equipment. (I won't name the shop, because their response was to immediately apologize and remove the material, and because they were also victims).

Now, on my website, everything is marked with a copyright, not that that will necessarily protect me. It goes both ways, though. I won't put music to my videos, unless I write and perform the music, or I have permission from the person who did. To do otherwise would most likely put me in violation of someone else's copyright.

Joshua Smith · Post by **Joshua Smith** » Mon Sep 24, 2007 12:26 pm

Interesting rumors about this guy on Scubaboard:

http://www.scubaboard.com/forums/photog ... tos-2.html

Sounds like he has a Psych history and likes to pretend he's a Public Safety Diver. Not as common as someone pretending to be an ex-Navy SEAL, but the same general idea.

On Rebreather world, he claims that his "Developmentally disabled 15yo Nephew" got ahold of his passwords, and tried to spruce up his flikr page for him:

http://www.rebreatherworld.com/photogra ... tos-3.html

It's kind of fascinating to follow this story around the net and see how many people recognized these pics- one guy was featured prominently in several of them, and had never met PSDiverTom.....

Sounder · Post by **Sounder** » Mon Sep 24, 2007 1:25 pm

What a piece of crap... and a load of crap!!!

This guy never made the cut for the football team, the PSD teams, or anything else he's set out to do. I love the part about under-water sex in his personal. What a nut.

Anyway, glad your pictures were taken down. This guy is just a real POS.

Seth T. · Post by **Seth T.** » Mon Sep 24, 2007 2:10 pm

What a #@%&*! Sorry that happened to you John. You're still alright in my book!

Sounder · Post by **Sounder** » Mon Sep 24, 2007 2:21 pm

I sent emails and PMs too... and Val's comments on his pictures made me laugh. Nice work girl! I bet my PM will land me a message from a mod... and I'm ok with that.

John Rawlings · Post by **John Rawlings** » Mon Sep 24, 2007 2:54 pm

It's absolutely amazing what my little ol' internet posts have forced to the surface! Numerous photographers around the world have been stunned to see their images appearing on his Flickr page and identified as his work.

So far 24 photos have been deleted from his Flickr site, and I suspect even more will soon disappear, if not the entire set.

I have received information that this individual, who claims to be a trained Public Safety Diver and a member of the CAST team in central Canada, is in fact none of the above. In fact, the real CAST team has had problems with this wannabe before and would like nothing better than to track him down and deal with him. The Canadian authorities are "extremely interested" in discussing his delusional claims with him at the earliest opportunity.

I cannot imagine a life so devoid of interest that one must invent a life merely to get by. I am no longer enraged....I am saddened.

- John

GillyWeed · Post by **GillyWeed** » Mon Sep 24, 2007 3:04 pm

John Rawlings wrote:

I cannot imagine a life so devoid of interest that one must invent a life merely to get by. I am no longer enraged....I am saddened.

hear hear John! I agree 100% but I think you need a beer or something.. This has been a pretty crapy Monday for you I think.

Northwest Dive Club

Stolen Photos!!!!

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