Getty Ads Annoy Meckler . . .

Stock Asylum Staff Report
November 15, 2005

( Editor's Note -- Nov. 17, 2005: Alan Meckler reports that all of the Getty Images ads that concerned him have been removed worldwide. He said the ads were removed without action from Jupitermedia, but noted that his company was prepared to take action. )

 

Jupitermedia CEO Alan Meckler complained in his blog this morning that Getty Images has been running Google ads under keyword searches for his company's stock photography brands.

Meckler said that Getty has taken out ads under keywords for Thinkstock, Comstock and AbleStock, all brands owned by the JupiterImages division of Jupitermedia. He said the ads were run in both the United States and France.

"Of course this is illegal and wrong," wrote the Jupitermedia executive. "One wonders why a company of Getty Images size and stature would resort to such low level and illegal tactics?"

In a check made this morning, ads for Getty Images Express, a new subscription service, were appearing under search results for some JupiterImages brands.

The ads were not there in the afternoon, which could mean that Getty has removed the ads or simply that the ads had already supplied the maximum number of daily clicks provided for under Getty's agreement with Google. Ads that go past the maximum are automatically dropped for the day by Google. The internet search engine might also have pulled the ads based on complaints from Jupitermedia.

"There is case law on our side," Meckler noted when contacted later in the day. "This is particularly true in France. In the USA there is not much case law but certainly precedents backing our position. Google of course is the organization that will stop this based on legal precedents."

Meckler did apparently see a hidden compliment in the situation.

"While we will take the proper legal position in all of this, I must thank the Getty marketers for validating the value of our brands which they so recently trashed and ceased distributing," Meckler wrote in his blog.

Getty has not commented on Meckler's complaint. Interestingly, an ad for Alamy, a British stock distributor, appeared today under Google returns for the keywords "Getty Images."

 

JupiterImages can be found at: http://www.jupiterimages.com

Getty Images is at: http://www.gettyimages.com

Alamy is at: http://www.alamy.com