Colorado Abyss - would YOU go to them using this photo?

[String]

Endangered or not makes no real difference surely. Grabbing and hugging the thing goes against the minimal environmental impact and distress to animals policy of all the scuba agencies im aware of. Pufferfish aren't endangered but that doesn't mean its perfectly acceptable to turn one into a spikey football.

 

[Tony387]

Just exactly how stupid would you have to be, to not only engage in this type of behavior, but to think it was so cool that you had to have your photo taken doing it. What a braindead moron.

Sent from my SCH-I545 using Tapatalk

 

[Mike]

A little premature? Really? How long should we wait before it would be appropriate to decide that what's going on in the picture isn't right?

As long as it might take to email or call the dive shop and ask them about it?

Has anybody done that? Does anybody actually have any information, or is it guilty until proven innocent?

 

[flots am]

As long as it might take to email or call the dive shop and ask them about it?

Has anybody done that? Does anybody actually have any information, or is it guilty until proven innocent?

Why? Do you think it was photoshopped? Do you think a dive shop would run an ad campaign five separate times, without ever seeing it? (you can do a reverse google image search on the original image)

 

[CT Sean]

Looks like they got the message. they've changed their picture (pretty sure those clownfish are photoshopped in)

 

[Mike]

Why? Do you think it was photoshopped? Do you think a dive shop would run an ad campaign five separate times, without ever seeing it? (you can do a reverse google image search on the original image)

Don't know, that's why I wouldn't make a judgement until somebody has actually found out.

 

[nimoh]

Holding a fish like that?

Not only wouldn't I take a class from them, but I'd send a copy of it to their state's Fish and Wildlife Department.

I took a PDF of it and attached it to this message, in case it mysteriously disappears.

flots

what a surprise...it has mysteriously disappeared

 

[boulderjohn]

I sent them a message notifying them of this thread. I did not get a reply.

 

[flots am]

what a surprise...it has mysteriously disappeared

Who would have guessed?

Oh wait . . .

 

[boulderjohn]

As I said earlier, you never know who is responsible for something like this.

Here is another example.

A few years ago the person who was responsible for updating the web site of the shop with which I used to work wanted to put a picture of a fish in a certain spot on the site. She went to Google images, found a picture, and put it on the site. It was just a picture of a fish she happened to select from the thousands available to her. Unfortunately, somehow the photographer who had taken the picture found out about it and sued. He was able to prove that it was his shot somehow. It cost the shop many thousands of dollars. Ironically, the shop owner was an avid under water photographer who had a nearly identical picture that could have been used without an issue.

The person who selected that photo could have been a web technician who is not even a certified diver. You can argue that management should have taken better care to approve the image, but the same would be true of all other day to day activities of an organization. The same could be said of the examples I cited earlier. At some point you have to entrust your employees to do their jobs, and sometimes they make mistakes that can come back to bite you.