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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

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Original poster

to expect someone to ask permission before putting photos of my son on facebook?

81 replies

sunshineakindat · 06/01/2009 11:37

my SIL's flatmate put photos up from her bday party on facebook. some of which include my son, nephew and friends daughter. im not friends with her and found out through my friend. i dont really know the woman well but she seems okay. the point is thats my son and i feel that the only person who should be putting photos up of him is me- im not even friends with her so cant see the pics. i sent her a msge and she took them down. now i feel bad like i overreacted. am, i being unreasonable?

OP posts:

Bubbaluv · 06/01/2009 16:15

NCBirdy, Your daughter will probably be a lovely, happy confident child who won't get bullied at all! Think positive. I honestly think that if you worry too much and constantly look for malice or danger where none exists (or the risk is very small) it can cause problems in itself.

MillyR · 06/01/2009 16:31

I think it is generally a rule of courtesy that you do not put a photo of anyone on FB if the person in the photo might not want the photo there.

It has become silly as people put up photos of really personal events on to a networking site. I know that more professional people are leaving FB due to the way it is now used, and the demographic of users of FB is totally changing. Networking sites go in and out of fashion, and FB use will end up declining as people move to networking sites that have the membership criteria that FB used to have, or other criteria altogether.

I doubt FB take down photos just on legal grounds; it will respond to user complaints and ask people to take pics down for other reasons, surely?

It is very sad that people do not understand online etiquette, and ends up with situations of parents not being allowed to take photos of their own child in a nativity play because other parents don't want photos taken due to the internet.

Bubbaluv · 06/01/2009 17:03

MillyR, Surely, the benefit of FB is that the criteria of your network is set 100% by YOU?

MillyR · 06/01/2009 18:42

BL, only if the people you want to network with are on FB. Increasingly, people I know are closing their accounts or never using FB and leaving profile dormant. So I rarely check it because it is just the 'look at me drunk with my knickers on my head oh aren't I hilarious after a few' type people left. I just keep it because it allows people I haven't seen for 20 years to contact me, or me contact them. But I'm sure that other people have a great time on FB! It's just not something I regularly use anymore, and I've read online that dormant FB accounts are becoming increasingly common. Fashions just come and go!

pamelat · 06/01/2009 20:01

I make sure that only my friends can see my photos too but now I am worried as I have put photos on there of peoples children (with my DD) at parties and maybe I should have asked.

I feel very bad now.

pamelat · 06/01/2009 20:04

I guess I thought it was just like showing friends photos.

I have just called one mum now to "confess" and she laughed and does not mind, and says she does this too.

ahfeckit · 06/01/2009 20:21

a framed photo of your kids in your living room is a tad different from putting up a pic of your kids online...
firstly, you invite people into your home who you trust and know. same can't be said for the internet..anyone can look at those pics. and you wouldn't even be aware of it.
just another facebook saga. YANBU though. can't see the point of facebook so can't relate to it fully, sorry.

nelliesmum · 06/01/2009 20:27

WHY would you object? What do you honestly think is going to happen? and don't say "that's not the point" I genuinely want to know.

ahfeckit · 06/01/2009 20:35

I personally wouldn't want everyone to know about me and my family, that have no connection to me. There's something really great about remaining anonymous in life. People don't need to know who you and your family are and what you do, and what your fave TV show is etc. Some of us like to have a certain degree of privacy, whereas others will happily mingle with anyone and everyone. each to their own...
but in being free and easy about who sees your profile and what pics you post, you allow anyone to also post pics onto their profile of your family and then this is where all these AIBU posts start to come out about people being annoyed and upset over friends (or friends of friends) posting pictures without permission. it just gets all messy....
Before social networking life was much less complicated

pamelat · 06/01/2009 20:42

I think that only my friends can see them, there is a bit where you select who can them. It ranges from everyone to "just friends".

Original poster

sunshineakindat · 06/01/2009 21:40

blondie80, mayor quimby you say im going too far then make stupid comments. im not friends with this girl on facebook and i think its just polite to ask before you post pictures of someones kids on the internet. she is my sil's flatmate. its a bit stupid to say dont let them go to parties. next time i will just leave them at home by themselves and not teach them to socialise? the woman is not family and i hardly know her thats why i was surprised that she decided to put them on her facebook page. in my kids last school we werent even allowed to take pics at school events and their new school clearly states that they must be for private use. can u say you really know everyone your friends with on facebook well. some of my friends have over a 1000 friends on facebook.
abusers use facebook as well. baby p's mum had a facebook account thats how she lost her anonymity. nobody had a clue what she was up to and she had pics of her kids and said about how much she enjoyed being a mum. The problem is people dont go far enough to protect their children.
lots of schools have a policy stating that pictures are not allowed to be taken because people do things like that without permission. she has now taken them down without a fuss and acknowledged that she should have asked.

OP posts:

ahfeckit · 07/01/2009 11:51

good point, sunshinekindat. i have to agree with what you are saying there. sadly so many people are oblivious to what's going on out there. facebook and other social networking sites are really just a recipe for disaster. especially when pictures of any sort are put up (not only kids, but of people in general where comments can be added). it can create problems at work, if something is said about the workplace on your facebook page, a joking comment can be taken seriously and end up in all sorts of bother...list goes on and on...

pamelat · 07/01/2009 13:55

I might see if I can delete mine.

I do know all of my facebook friends though, only about 70 people. Maybe I am not just as popular as some people (1000 "friends"?!)

blondie80 · 07/01/2009 14:02

i don't think someone sharing pictures of their birthday on fb is unreasonable. if you don't want photos of your kids citculated by whoevers birthday it was you should have said so at the start and not let photos be wasted cause your kids are in them.
as for the bullying thing, hate to break it to you but all kids get called names at some stage, be it because of hair colour, weight (both fat and skinny), height, intelligence, wealth, etc, etc it happens, it's life.

onager · 07/01/2009 15:06

I think there is a difference between

a) Taking pictures of your child especially to put on facebook

b) Taking pictures of a group which just happens to include your child and then putting those on facebook.

If I were putting our birthday photos up and someone objected because they child was in one corner I'd go ahead anyway, but if I had a page say "my kids friends" with individual photos and someone objected then I'd take their one out.

onager · 07/01/2009 15:07

I would think they were daft to object though.

pamelat · 07/01/2009 15:46

good point onager. My DD is the focus (for me) on each of my photos. The others just happen to be there.

Nekabu · 07/01/2009 16:10

blondie80 "as for the bullying thing, hate to break it to you but all kids get called names at some stage, be it because of hair colour, weight (both fat and skinny), height, intelligence, wealth, etc, etc it happens, it's life."

One word: Photoshop. You know those photos of people looking like complete wallies doing really embarrassing things that get emailed continually around the internet? A goodly proportion of those have been Photoshopped to significantly change or add to the original photo. Name calling is temporary and restricted to your local environment, a photo that's doing the rounds of 'amusing emails' goes around for years and years and is worldwide. Victims find photoshopped photos of them up on websites, emails faked from them and sent around message boards as well as forged social networking accounts set up in their name and filled with false and/or embarrassing things. Sadly the internet has given bullying a real chance to spread it's wings.

blondie80 · 07/01/2009 16:29

nekabu, noone has ever photoshopped or set up fake emails etc from me or anyone i know ever. has this happened to you?? or anyone you know??

is this really a reason that someone shouldn't share their birthday pics? incase some kid in the background gets photoshopped by a stranger then fake emailed round the globe? wise up.

Nekabu · 07/01/2009 16:40

Yep. I had someone who did both - photoshopped (thankfully just on a website which eventually went) and faked a huge number of emails from me. Sadly this isn't that uncommon and is becoming more so all the time as internet usage grows.

Considering I deal with victims of internet forgery fairly regularly as part of my job I don't think I'm a total novice on the subject but of course am always willing to learn and to, in your own words, 'wise up'.

I wasn't referring specifically to someone in the background of a birthday photo but of putting photos up in general. It takes two seconds to check with the individual concerned or, in the case of a child, their parent.

blondie80 · 07/01/2009 17:04

what do you do if you've snapped a stranger in the background and can't find them to ask?? just delete the pic incase they don't want you to use it??

if you don't want photos of yourself, children etc circulated by the owner - say so before the photo is taken and obviously avoid being in view of the camera.

Nekabu · 07/01/2009 17:06

"what do you do if you've snapped a stranger in the background and can't find them to ask?? just delete the pic incase they don't want you to use it??"
Crop them out or blur their face. There's quite a lot of simple photo editing software out there, often free or with the camera.

sasamaxx · 07/01/2009 17:27

Is this not all getting a wee bit obsessive?

Nekabu · 07/01/2009 18:02

sasamaxx, I really can see where you're coming from and can see that it does look that way. If you had experienced an internet fraud campaign (the same guy that did me also did a load of other people, including someone's young daughter - he forged a load of porn stuff from her and bulk mailed it to forums where it was archived and came up every time her name was Googled. It took her father, who was the one he was aiming at, well over a year to get that lot removed) or had spoken to the extremely distressed victims who are not only upset but also bewildered as to how such a thing had happened, you may understand where I'm coming from.

I guess it's like chucking out your bills, etc. There are some people who shred everything and some people who can't see what all the fuss is about as nobody would ever go through their bins. Sadly the wake up call is often extremely nasty and the damage takes a long time to stop and even longer to undo.

Of course this isn't going to happen to everyone! But it's a lot more common than you'd think and is getting more so all the time.

ahfeckit · 07/01/2009 18:39

Nekabu - finally someone is catching my drift. you are going along the same route i've being trying to get across on this thread and also the other one about photos on facebook...
i know most people just choose to either ignore the more sinister side to the internet, but really let's get real here, it's not all innocent folk that surf the net these days. it's usage really is increasing all the time by all sorts, where all sorts of horrid stuff goes on with photos.

Sorry to hear Nekabu that you went though such a crap time with identity fraud. it could happen to anyone.

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