[zombola]

Hi,
I was wondering if anyone can help me locate some software. I sell stock images which clients purchase with a license of 3 months. Once that period expires we expect them to re buy the license. Obviously this doesn't happen very often because the client already has the image. They are aerial shots and are usually for the real estate market. The estate agency will add arrows to point to a particular house but what I'm seeing more and more of is, if another house goes for sale on that same street, years later then the same image is re used with the previous arrow photoshopped out (badly) and a new one pointing somewhere else.
So, my question is:
Does a software package exist that lets you edit the metadata with a time limit? So that the image will expire after three months and the client will have no choice but to re purchase the license? We use Jpeg formats but would be willing to change if this feature could be added.

thanks

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What's to stop someone from doing a PrintScreen, (or using a Camera), and then saving it as a new image (without the time-limiting metadata)?

[SpywareDr]

What's to stop someone from doing a PrintScreen, (or using a Camera), and then saving it as a new image (without the time-limiting metadata)?

[zombola]

Good point! And considered, if they did a print screen, they would still only have a low res image. Suitable for certain things but not large prints.
I'm wondering if there is something that would add a water mark maybe or make the image unusable in some way after a certain time period.
I realise you can kind of do this with a PDF but surely there is software out there for this purpose with other image formats?

[bcohea]

There is no "expiring" mechanism in any major image format that I know of.

Therefore, you would either need to force the user to access the image through software which you control that could "expire" the image as you see fit, OR create your own image file format (and persuade OSs & common image software authors to support it!) with the appropriate expiration mechanisms in place.

Reminds me of DIVX. (NOT DivX ! There's a difference.) That format was created to allow the "rental" of videos that would expire after a couple days. Just an interesting aside.

However, as SpywareDr states, there's still really nothing there to keep somebody from taking screenshots....

edit: It seems you and Jonathan Bailey of Plagiarism Today have similar goals. He has been looking for a solution for a year and a half now.

Edited by bcohea, 08 April 2010 - 06:06 AM.

[SpywareDr]

Good point! And considered, if they did a print screen, they would still only have a low res image. Suitable for certain things but not large prints.

A 2560x1600 screencap (on a 30" monitor) isn't too shabby.