DMCA Notice & Takedown

1. Our copyright policy

PC MAW Media respects the intellectual property of others and expects the same in return. We respond to properly submitted notices of claimed infringement under the Digital Millennium Copyright Act, 17 U.S.C. § 512, and to equivalent notices under other applicable law.

We also take our own obligations seriously. Every image on this site is either our own work, licensed, or used under a licence that permits the use. If we have made a mistake, section 9 tells you how to get it corrected quickly.

2. Filing a takedown notice

If you own copyright in material that appears on pcmaw.com without authorisation, or you are authorised to act for the owner, you may send us a written notification. Before you do, please consider two things:

• Is the use actually infringing? Quotation, commentary, criticism, news reporting and comparison may be fair use or fair dealing. A takedown notice is not the right tool for a use you merely dislike.
• Would an email be faster? If the issue is a missing credit or an image used in error, writing to [email protected] usually resolves it within a day, without any formal process.

3. Required elements of a valid notice

To be effective under 17 U.S.C. § 512(c)(3), your notification must be in writing and must include all of the following:

1. A physical or electronic signature of the copyright owner, or a person authorised to act on their behalf.
2. Identification of the copyrighted work claimed to have been infringed. Where multiple works are covered by a single notice, a representative list.
3. Identification of the material claimed to be infringing, with enough detail for us to locate it — the full URL of the page and a description of the specific element (for example, “the third image, below the heading ‘Thermal results’”).
4. Your contact information: full name, postal address, telephone number and email address.
5. A statement that you have a good-faith belief that the use is not authorised by the copyright owner, its agent or the law.
6. A statement that the information in the notification is accurate and, under penalty of perjury, that you are the copyright owner or authorised to act on their behalf.

4. Where to send it

Notices should be sent to our designated agent:

Email is strongly preferred; it is faster and creates a clearer record for both sides.

5. What happens after we receive it

1. Acknowledgement (within two working days). We confirm receipt and give you a reference number.
2. Review. We check that the notice contains the required elements and locate the material. If something is missing we tell you exactly what, so you can resubmit.
3. Action (within five working days of a valid notice). We remove or disable access to the material identified. Where the material is one element of a larger article, we remove that element and leave the article in place with a note.
4. Notification. Where the material was submitted by a contributor, we forward a copy of the notice to them and tell them they may file a counter-notification.
5. Record. We log the notice, the action taken and the date in a register retained for three years.

We may also publish a redacted transparency note describing the notice and our response, without your personal contact details, unless you ask us not to.

6. Filing a counter-notification

If your material was removed and you believe the removal was the result of mistake or misidentification, you may send a counter-notification under 17 U.S.C. § 512(g)(3). It must include:

1. Your physical or electronic signature.
2. Identification of the material removed and the location where it appeared before removal.
3. A statement under penalty of perjury that you have a good-faith belief the material was removed as a result of mistake or misidentification.
4. Your name, postal address and telephone number.
5. A statement that you consent to the jurisdiction of the Federal District Court for the district in which your address is located (or, if outside the United States, any district in which we may be found), and that you will accept service of process from the person who filed the original notice.

On receipt of a valid counter-notification we forward it to the original complainant. If they do not notify us within ten business days that they have filed an action seeking a court order, we may restore the material in ten to fourteen business days.

7. Repeat infringer policy

In accordance with 17 U.S.C. § 512(i), we terminate the access and contributor privileges of anyone who is determined to be a repeat infringer. In practice this means:

• First valid notice: material removed, contributor notified, warning issued.
• Second valid notice: material removed, contributor’s publishing privileges suspended pending review.
• Third valid notice: contributor relationship terminated and all their contributions reviewed.

Notices that are successfully counter-notified, withdrawn, or found to be invalid do not count towards this total.

8. Misuse of this process

Under 17 U.S.C. § 512(f), a person who knowingly materially misrepresents that material is infringing — or that it was removed by mistake — may be liable for damages, including costs and legal fees.

We take misuse seriously. Takedown notices are sometimes used to suppress criticism, remove an unfavourable review, or take down a competitor’s legitimate content. Where we believe a notice has been filed in bad faith we will say so, we will decline to act, we will publish a transparency note, and we will consider referring the matter to counsel.

9. If we have used your work

We source images from licensed libraries, from manufacturers, and from our own photography. Despite reasonable care, mistakes happen — a licence lapses, an image is mislabelled, a contributor supplies something they should not have.

If you find your work here and believe it should not be, you do not need a formal notice to get it resolved. Email [email protected] with a link to the page and evidence of ownership. We will:

• respond within one working day;
• remove or replace the image immediately if the claim is credible, rather than debating first;
• discuss a licence if you would prefer the image to stay;
• add a credit if the issue is attribution rather than permission.

We would far rather fix this informally and quickly than exchange formal notices for a fortnight.

10. If someone has copied ours

Our content is regularly scraped and republished. If you find a copy of a PC MAW article elsewhere, we would appreciate a note to [email protected] with the URL. It genuinely helps, and we do act on it.

To be clear about what we permit: quoting up to 200 words with attribution and a link is always fine; full republication is not, unless we have agreed it in writing. The detail is in section 7 of the Terms of Use.

11. Notices from outside the United States

The DMCA is United States legislation, but we accept and act on notices from anywhere. If you are outside the US, send a notice containing the same information as section 3 — identification of the work, identification of the infringing material, your contact details, a good-faith statement and a signature — and cite the law you are relying on.

We will handle it under the same process and timescales. Where the applicable law requires something different from the DMCA procedure, tell us and we will accommodate it where we reasonably can.

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How to reach us about this document

Questions, complaints and requests relating to this policy should go to our legal contact rather than the general inbox, so they are logged and tracked properly:

• Email: [email protected]
• Post: PC MAW Media, 44 Kestrel Lane, Suite 12, Syracuse, NY 13202, United States
• Response time: five working days for acknowledgement, thirty days for substantive resolution

You can also use the contact form and select the closest topic. Related documents: Privacy Policy, Terms of Use, Cookie Policy, Disclaimer and DMCA Notice.