When checking out someone who copied images from my site I also had a quick look to find out where else he was getting his images from.

I posted the image URL in image search and 8 Pinterest results showed up as similar images. The weird thing here was that the original image on the photographer's website didn't show up in the results. I had to click the image on Pinterest to find it. And of course, he has a "Pin It" button next to the images on his site.

It pretty much looks like this webmaster is giving all his content away. I'm afraid that a lot of webmasters are in for a huge surprise sooner or later when Google gives credit to Pinterest instead of the owner. Maybe it is logical in the eyes of Google's algo. If you find a certain picture 8 times on Pinterest and 1 time somewhere else then it must be clear who (which domain) the owner is.

Look for people you know that are already on Pinterest.
Follow them.
Find the original owner of the image during re-pinning and give them credit.
It's a social networking website where you can share links.

Follow the above steps to get the better usage on Pinterest.

Be aware that Pinterest outbound links are nofollow.

Credit or proper linkage will not influence the SERPs (because of the nofollow attribute).

Finding image owners of improperly credited images, and repinning these images to give them proper credit is a gigantic waste of time.

Wanelo (similar to pinterest but more shopping orientated) is really rising fast up the Alexa ratings.

I have got two followers!

Wanelo [...] is really rising fast up the Alexa ratings.

That's good news; an image collecting website that doesn't frown on self-promotion and is geared towards selling is a viable, moral, and probably won't bog down in the same legal quick sands as Pinterest.

The only time I use Pinterest is to raise DMCA's to get unauthorized content removed.

Glad I saw this thread, almost forgot to put the "No Pin" meta on a new site

Waste of time. People can work around that. When I raise DMCA's with them, a number of them point to Google images instead.

The topic is "How are you using Pinterest?" not "How are you blocking Pinterest?"

However, I have a few comments to counter some of the above.

If you want to discuss these blocking issues further there's already a thread for it: [webmasterworld.com...]

(3) Your content can be hotlinked from Pinterest to anywhere on the web without your knowledge or consent.
(4) Your website will compete against its own content displayed on Pinterest in the SERPs.

So? The same can be said from Google cache and other scraper sites yet most webmaster don't use NOARCHIVE nor block those bots so why should Pinterest be any different?

NO. People can hotlink the images that are displayed on Pinterest even if you have hotlink protection enabled for your website.

No. People can't even get the images on Pinterest to hotlink in the first place, not easily or legally anyway, if you follow my directions over here: [webmasterworld.com...]

Waste of time. People can work around that.

That same argument could be applied to locks on windows and doors, it just keeps the honest people honest, like robots.txt. But you can point to that when filing the DMCA and say you explicitly denied access to Pinterest and they did it anyway. More ammunition.

My individual expertise is that there are very few recommendations from Pinterest per pin - and I'm in the woman art bizniss, so the hopeless outcomes may be amazing to some. Grateful I saw this line, almost neglected to put the "No Pin" meta on a new website.

Grateful I saw this line, almost neglected to put the "No Pin" meta on a new website.

Don't become blasé about it though. Just because you are going to add it to your pages, it won't stop people and will be still worthwhile checking pinterest for unauthorized use.

I wish someone will bring out an app that will tazer people through the keyboard when they steal from sites.

"My individual expertise is that there are very few recommendations from Pinterest per pin - and I'm in the woman art bizniss"

Hey. Me too. Lady crafts, of all things. I get virtually no traffic per pin.

Google Trends has changed a lot, but back a month ago, I could see that most of the referral traffic from Pinterest goes to recipe sites - like 9/10 top referred sites are recipes, and one was haridressing if I recall.

Outside of those two areas, food, food, food and a bit of hair, pins probably cause more harm than good. Including pushing source pages down in the SERPs, but that's a whole other story.

I see that a Pinterest logo is now featuring on some tv adverts of products.

I see that Rakuten has bought into Pinterest with $100 million.

They are pretty big and know what they are doing.

I see that Rakuten has bought into Pinterest with $100 million.

They are pretty big and know what they are doing.

Yes they know what they are doing. Pinterest will need millions of dollars for future lawsuits ...

I share my images - Original [clicked by me] and share with the members. No no I am not a Professional Photographer :) . I click when I take a break from my daily routine office life....