It has been a month since I wrote my post, Rethinking Pinterest. I have been thinking about it. And I haven’t been pinning.

Yesterday, I read a post on Pinterest etiquette that set my teeth on edge. It was talking about copyright and proper attribution. But it completely ignored the elephant in the room. Even more annoying was a commenter who didn’t care about linking to original sources, saying if it wasn’t watermarked it wasn’t her responsibility. Really?!

So, today, I thought I’d share with you what all my thinking has come to. And my conclusion? What I felt a month ago has not changed, even with Pinterest’s new terms of service. I DO NOT want to pin things any more because unless I specifically ask for the photographer’s permission, I am infringing on their copyright. Simple as that. Because I like something, I’m going to do that person a disservice? No.

So you might be thinking, how wonderful Pinterest is and that person should be happy you liked them enough to pin them. Well, my reply, how do you know? Did you ask? That is the whole point of copyright. And plus, I really don’t like being sued. This photographer who is also a lawyer, Kirsten Kowalski, explains it much better than me.

And, so, I have deleted my boards. When I deleted them, it only reinforced my mindset in this matter. All my pins were gone from my account but if someone repinned something, it still showed up on Pinterest last night when I checked. And that sort of sickened me. That I gave Pinterest someone’s picture without their permission. Yes gave. Because me deleting it from my account didn’t delete it. Pinterest STILL has it.

But I have a solution. Will I still pin? Yes. But how? Pinterest has changed the way people blog. If I like something, and the blog has a pin it button, like I do on the bottom of this post, I know they are ok with pinning, so I will pin. But will I blindly go pinning from now on? No. If it isn’t written specifically somewhere that they are allowing pinning then I will not pin it.

So, I am restarting with Pinterest with this new set of guidelines for myself. It’s my happy medium.

Just some randomness before the weekend.

A what I wore today in drawings from a few days ago. I sort of like the colors by themselves without my drawing lines. I wonder what a comic would look like if I drew it like this?

And a wee little leprechaun.

Well, actually he looks gigantic here. He’s the leprechaun on my arm in this month’s banner. I don’t know why I put in tiny unseen details. Like his coat with the little buttons and the way it looks like a coat and not just green. You can’t see that when he’s sooooo very tiny. But I still put those details in. Why? I don’t know.

When I was making up the banner this month, I was laughing to myself making up a story behind it. I imagined two leprechauns magically showing up. Me and Alan are naturally surprised. LEPRECHAUNS!!

We are speechless at the wonder. I’m so shocked I do not even move my arm. Nathan, sitting in my lap, doesn’t even notice. But always curious Isabelle sees and joyfully snatches one of them up. She gleefully runs off while the leprechaun yells, “AAaaaahhh she’s got me!”

And…and…I am clearly weird.

Have a good weekend!

I was reading I am Baker today and followed a link to a very interesting post by Living Locurto about pinning on Pinterest. This is the second post this week I’ve read about Pinterest. And I don’t like what I’m reading.

I pin things I like occasionally but I’ve never really given Pinterest that much thought. Not much beyond how irritating it is to not be able to find an original source to something. But that’s it. I didn’t think about what was going on in the background in their terms of service. I was just putting up a virtual board of things I liked.

But reading that, “You no longer have control of that image, Pinterest does.” is very unsettling. I’m not being overprotective about my images. I don’t think I have anything interesting to pin. But reading this makes me NOT want to use Pinterest anymore. I don’t want to contribute to helping violate someone else’s image license. Because that is exactly what we are all doing, us pinners.

I’ve been reading some comments where people say, it’s not Pinterest’s fault. Well, I disagree. It is their fault. In their very friendly easy to understand About Pinterest, Pin Etiquette section they are promoting pinning, even talking about crediting sources. But it isn’t until you dig around in their hard to understand, in legalize, Terms of Use that it gets into the nitty gritty of copyright. So, basically, I feel like they’re promoting us all to infringe on others copyrights. I really don’t know how I feel about that. Sure it’s easy to use and pretty to look at. But…it’s wrong.

If Pinterest doesn’t change something, I think I need to stop using them. I can’t justify doing something that I think is wrong just because it’s convenient and I like it. I don’t know. I have to give this some thought. Anyone have any input on this? Maybe I’m tired and not thinking straight.

When I sat down tonight to write this post, I was going to say how I was still undecided about what to do with this blog. I was going to write, how I was very seriously contemplating just shutting it all down and just exclusively using Flickr. Flickr has everything I need, I can go back and look at the pictures of the kids. I can access it everywhere. As I sat editing our monthly photos, all those thoughts and more were running through my head.

Then I uploaded these photos to Flickr and…

…and it dawned on me why Flickr by itself is NOT going to work for me. When there is no blogging, like last month, I don’t upload any photos. They sit untouched on my computer. Look at this set of all the pictures I took of Isabelle for month 76. There are four. F.O.U.R! I definitely took more than four pictures. I think I took more than four pictures. See, with no blogging, I have no clue. And no pictures to look at? I will definitely miss pictures.

So…so…I’m not going to stop blogging. In fact, there will be blogging! You might even get some pictures from the Christmas season on here because…F.O.U.R. pictures!! But as to how I’m going to do it? I don’t know. But at least now, I know I want to.

Oh and I completely forgot. These pictures. I didn’t say a thing about them. These are our monthly photos. Isabelle is now six years four months. Nathan is two years four months. I particularly love the zombie shots of the kids. I don’t know what it is with my kids and zombies. The other day Nathan was in the car singing a little song to himself…about zombies. ZOMBIES!!

And that tongue picture? Nathan has been doing that lately unexpectedly for pictures. So funny.

I’ve been feeling a little uninspired lately. I don’t know what’s wrong. I’m in some kind of slump. No making. No drawing. I haven’t felt like getting on the computer. I’ve barely downloaded any photos off the camera all month though I have been taking pictures when the mood strikes, like this one from today as we were driving home.

Maybe I’m a morning person, after all, and the kids staying up late for months and less sun has knocked me for a loop. I don’t know. I haven’t felt like doing much of anything. I feel like I’m drowning in day to day living, the days are too short and I can’t get anything done.

I’ve been thinking about what I want to do with this space here of mine and I honestly don’t have an answer anymore. Yes, I’ve actually thought about not blogging anymore seeing as how I haven’t been doing much of it.

Would I be missed if I stopped writing here? I’ve always said that I write for myself. I’ve always thought of this as a journal that I can go back and look at whenever or wherever I have an internet connection. A journal strangers and family can look at. I am talking to my future self. But now? I don’t have anything to say to myself. I am royally stuck. I think I need to change gears.