Repurposing amazon images- gets you banned?

[AhFreshMeat]

I would ask amazon this... but unsure if I’d get banned (LOL)

Hi guys, so I just created and published around 80 articles with 500+ images that have amazon images in them (I took the amazon images, pasted them in canva, added a cool looking title & pros and cons in the image)

These images do not have a hyperlink attached to them

Will this get me banned from amazon affiliates? Should i take them all down (would take me a long time to replace)

I’d appreciate anyone who has insight on this. I’m unsure how often amazon reviews sites etc and if this would even violate the tos; I couldn’t find a clear statement from their TOS.

 

[JamaicanMoose]

You're fine if they're the images used in the listing.

You're not fine if they're images customers posted with their reviews.

 

[Ryuzaki]

I was told that it's okay to download them and host them on my own server, even crop out extra white space, resize them proportionally, etc. Anything was fine as long as I didn't change the "intent" or inherent meaning of the pictures. And yes, images posted by customers are strictly off limits.

 

[thisishatred]

I was told that it's okay to download them and host them on my own server, even crop out extra white space, resize them proportionally, etc. Anything was fine as long as I didn't change the "intent" or inherent meaning of the pictures. And yes, images posted by customers are strictly off limits.

So just to note, Amazon is known for giving replies that are different based on the person you speak with. I wouldn't take any person's (including my own) response here as gospel. Especially when affiliate support's responses change with the wind.

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This was a conversation I had with support/a follow up email in 2018:

To address the conversation about "Image Links" earlier.

Videos, product images, and reviews written/created outside of Amazon.com, including professional reviewers, authors, publishers and customers, are copyrighted by others. [This more or less is what both @JamaicanMoose and @Ryuzaki noted] We display them on our site by permission from those third parties. Amazon.com doesn't have the legal right to give you permission to access, use, or display them.

If you wish to use Amazon.com's product images on your website, you may obtain them by creating Product Links on Associates Central, SiteStripe or through Product Advertising API. Customer product reviews are also available through Product Advertising API. [However, this wording is important as they don't imply that you can download them, simply that have you to use their APIs to render product images] Your use of product images and reviews obtained through Product Advertising API is limited by the terms of the Associates Program IP License Product Advertising API License Agreement, which is available here: - Link to License -

Before deciding to access product images or reviews through the Product Advertising API, we encourage you to familiarize yourself with the full terms of the License and in particular with the terms relating to storage, display, and refreshing data.

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So in the above, from what I understand and what I've been told by support (like 3 times now), you're also not allowed to download a publishers images (product photos) from the listing and upload them. However, how does Amazon know that you didn't get them from the manufacturer directly (or even permission for that matter), from their website, or some other means? IMO, they likely have no idea. The number of people who simply download/upload the photos is too many to count.

I've had several conversations with Amazon's support about this. My most recent question was in regards to sitestripe itself and if I could simply remove the hyperlink/URL as browsers are simply blocking them.

For example:

<img* border="0" src="//ws-na.amazon-adsystem.com/widgets/q?_encoding=UTF8&ASIN=B07MS8CD6N&Format=_SL160_&ID=AsinImage&MarketPlace=US&ServiceVersion=20070822&WS=1&tag=TAGHERE-20&language=en_US" ><*/img>

Killing the hyperlink around the image so the image isn't click-able was fine with them. However, it's worth noting, Firefox would still block the image from rendering.

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Something to note too is that they take the pricing data seriously. Back in 2019 I still had graphs I generated via Excel to compare "kits" vs buying the items separately (from 2018). This resulted in me "caching" their pricing in the form of an image. Support emailed me and told me it wasn't allowed as the data/image was static.

 

[AhFreshMeat]

So, All of these replies have helped immensely. I've came to the solution of simply 'cartoonizing' or 'vectorizing' these images, distort them a bit, and use that (looks even more engaging and original for websites)

Takes me less than 10 seconds on some of these online graphics tools. Hope this is helpful for someone who has this issue in the future!