NEW WORK [ coming in january ]

Swiping

Recently, I saw an image of mine being used on a local Boston business blog and their facebook page. I was never contacted regarding usage so I emailed the owner-editor asking them to remove my copyrighted image or call me to discuss usage fees. 

   

The business owner was surprised I didn't want my photograph on her site. She said "People are typically happy to have their images on my site." I did want it on her site, I just wanted to be paid properly for it or at the very least, asked. She also said "Did you see I credited you properly at the end of the post?" There was a credit but the credit was nowhere near the image. It was tiny and lost about a page away from the actual photo. And there was no link. So what the business owner thought was "proper" was not.

   

Now this business makes money. There are advertisements all over their blog and facebook page. She does speaking events. So it's interesting to me that she feels it's okay to swipe photographs and use them to help her business grow while not paying the proper usage for the photographs that are helping her business turn a profit.  

   

How do we protect our copyrighted work? Should professional photographers watermark every image? This image was taken from the actual client's site, it was not swiped from mine. So a watermark would not have worked in this case anyway.

   

And more importantly, how do we educate people? This person clearly thought it was acceptable to swipe an image and use it for her business without permission. To be honest, I probably would have let her use my image for free if she had simply asked first. 

this is just a taste of a new promo [ coming soon ]

 

Love, Otto

Wishing you mischief and joy all year long. Happy Holidays! 
   

Dirty

If the pesticide "Poncho" is killing honeybees so rapidly, what's it doing to us? What's it doing to my two young growing boys? Thank you to the EPA for protecting them. (Yes, yes, that's sarcasm — you're reading it correctly.)
  
And if you don't know what I'm talking about then start with these 2 articles:
Organic Gardening article  
Fast Company article
  
Photo credit: Tom Theobald   

Poor Otto (can you even see the dog?)

[  TWO KIDS Series ]  I'm the mother of two boys! How the heck did that happen and when are their real parents coming to get them?!

My Salad Bar

It's been dancing around 17 degrees in Boston lately as a low and I'm still growing and eating delicious lettuce and arugula. Crazy! This is the first year I've done this and I wish I'd started a few years ago. It's so easy. At night I cover the lettuce and arugula beds with a floating row cover (vegetable quilt). I put it over wire hoops and hold it down with rocks or hooks.    
  
Just make sure you grow frost-tolerant lettuce like this freckled romaine (click here). The majority of my seeds come from Botanical Interests. And Gardeners.com sells great season-extending products at great prices (follow this link). (I think the bottom shot is Red Sails.)
  
Earlier this year: the Pea-Pea Teepee (snap peas from botanical interests)