Some images at Flickr are weakly protected with an image overlay called spaceball.gif. Whenever you right-click the image to save it you do save spaceball.gif instead which is a 1×1 pixel image showing nothing at all. The same happens if you try to drag the image to your desktop or hard drive.
However, if a photo is show it can be saved. The easiest way to achieve this is by blocking spaceball.gif from being loaded when visiting Flickr. You can do this in Firefox if you have the Adblock extension installed. When you are viewing an image at Flickr that you can’t save because of the spaceball.gif overlay you do the following to block the overlay.
Hit CTRL + SHIFT + B to open the list of blockable items. Navigate to the entry with spaceball.gif at the end and choose to block this item by right-clicking it. This prevents that spaceball.gif is loaded so that you can save any items at Flickr by right-clicking it.
Opera has a similar function. Just go to Tools > Advanced > Blocked Content and click Add in the menu. Paste the url *flickr.com/images/spaceball.gif into the new entry and close the menu.
via Cybernetnews
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doesn’t quite work
it does work, please explain what you did and what is happening
Is there no other way of doing this? I mean without using Adblock?
i got it banned, but it still loads.
It would probably be a good idea to empty your browser cache before or after applying this hack.
It really works.
Thanks,Martin!
WOW! It truly works. I didn’t realize that it could be this simple.
opera also works!!!
i cant make it work
are you trying to steal pictures from there ???
because this is not funny at all !!!
spaceball is to protect our own pictures !!!
shame !!!
You chose to view this page!
why would you search for it if it upsets you?!
Go troll somewhere else!
Works perfectly! Thanks….Regarding the previous comment which says “are you trying to steal pictures from there ???
because this is not funny at all !!!
spaceball is to protect our own pictures !!!
shame !!!”….Well…why does Flickr claim that “Share your photos…watch the world”. It’s supposed to be a “free site” to share photos.So where does the question of “stealing” comes?
Exactly it’s called share your photos. Not give away your photos. Watch the world, not take it.
And since when has flickr ever advertised itself as place to grab free photos for your desktop wallpaper? Never.
What you’re doing is stealing an artists work,
there is no other way of saying it.
Agreeing with the fella above: if you’re so into your photos not being downloaded by anyone, DON’T PUT THEM ONLINE. Simple. So get off the sanctimonious trip, and close your photo albums to the world.
Why else would they be teaching kids in school about not sharing personal information including photos of themselves?
Simple. People have ways of getting around filters and security.
If you’ve ever watched a crime scene investigation show you can see how police can even track a photo back to it’s original source.
Hackers can do this as well.
Simply put, uploading photos on the internet is like leaving your purse or credit card in the middle of a busy sidewalk. You never know who will find it, the good samaritan who returns it or the local pickpocket who keeps it.
It all sums up to don’t upload anything you wouldn’t want to loose or have stolen.
http://userstyles.org/styles/528
it worked perfectly. i’m going on a spree.
thanks, really usefull.
is there any way i can do this with internet explorer? im using windows vista. if anyone can help, please e-mail me with the instructions at westbank_souljah@yahoo.com
Now the shortcut for opening blockable items list for firefox 3
is ctrl+shift+V.
However, if a photo is show it can be saved. The easiest way to achieve this is by look “ABOVE” the image have a link; in this case is Pink water buffalo picture:
http://images.search.yahoo.com/images/view?back=http%3A%2F%2Fimages.search.yahoo.com%2Fsearch%2Fimages%3F_adv_prop%3Dimage%26ni%3D20%26va%3Dwater%2Bbuffalo%26fr%3Dyfp-t-501-s%26xargs%3D0%26pstart%3D1%26b%3D261&w=500&h=375&imgurl=static.flickr.com%2F46%2F136472882_550cc7da46.jpg&rurl=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.flickr.com%2Fphotos%2Fbonnechance%2F136472882%2F&size=157.6kB&name=Pink+water+buffalo&p=water+buffalo&type=JPG&oid=46ff3496358a45e0&fusr=bonnechance&tit=Pink+water+buffalo&hurl=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.flickr.com%2Fphotos%2Fbonnechance%2F&no=277&tt=82,938&sigr=11j155qp5&sigi=11d594om7&sigb=13pjtgoq7&sigh=119ti0evl
Above the Pink water buffalo picture is showing this line:
“Below is the host webpage http://www.flickr.com/photos/bonnechance/136472882/ with the image in its original context”.
Click the link; you will get the web page of Pink water buffalo stand alone by itself. Now you go to the menu on the top, click (View—>Source), you will get Microsoft Notepad contained the Source Codes of Pink water buffalo web page.
Next, go to the top menu of Microsoft Notepad, click (Edit—–> Find) and type into the box: JPG, then click “Find Next” (some time you have to click the button Up or Down).
Finally, the “Link” contain of the Pink water buffalo image JPG will be found:
http://farm1.static.flickr.com/46/136472882_550cc7da46_s.jpg
Open a “New” Microsoft Internet window Explorer, copy the link above to the Address and Go. You have a Pink water buffalo image with out the spaceball.gif overlay, now you can Right Click or save the whole Pink water buffalo web page to your computer.
It’s that easy!
Liemtran308 (Tám Lúa)
Home page: http://www.farfareastcreatures.com (coloring book)
It dose work! Thank you!!
THANK YOUUUUUUU.
:)
It may be easier and faster to add a rule like “http:/*/spaceball.gif”.
The only downside is if you ever look for GIFs from the movie “Spaceballs”, which isn’t real likely.
Or, just use Firebug.
Thanks man! :)
View source is probably the easiest way to get around the spaceball.
If you have a program that numbers the lines when you view the page source(Something like notepad++), the real address of the picture you want is on line 539.
omg thanks so much ….there are some cool pics Ive wanted but couldnt say
thanks again
It works fine in Opera as the author says, although the correct url to ban is
http://l.yimg.com/g/images/spaceball.gif
works with the current version of firefox/adblock, but you need to right click on the image and go to “adblock image”. From there it’s a snap. Thanks for the idea!
I love that you are posting directions of how to ILLEGALLY STEAL COPYRIGHT PROTECTED IMAGES and yet y’all seem fine with it.
Jerks.
This article explains technical possibilities. Do you really think that a silly transparent image will keep anyone from download the photo? For god’s sake, all someone would need to do is to look in the web browser cache to find the photo in there. The protection itself is weak and unnecessary.
Works fine. Piece of cake! Thx
Just to let you guys know. Any image from the net can be saved as a jpeg with any browser with the simple snipping tool that comes preloaded with Windows!! For anyone that thinks the other way is too hard or doesn’t want to use firefox just use that instead. And just for future reference if you don’t want people saving your images from your account than its as simple as not posting them on the internet for the whole world to see.