Possible troubles with owner of the place

[iddqdisOn]

Hi there,

I have a strange situation. 

I've made a photospere of interior of our local trade center. That photo took a 360k views.

Now that photo on the first position of the GMaps search output.

The owner of the Trade center had ordered a few professional photosperes from some company and placed them on GMaps.

Representatives of this company contacted me by phone (! I really don't know where they took it) and asked to delete my photo at the request of the owner - they do not like it. "They d'like to promote a quality product, not made by amateur"...

The marketing company wrote an email with this request.

After I refused to remove my photo, I heard a threat in my direction. They scare me by legal affairs, GDPR with cosmic penalty (on that photo placed a couple blurred people) etc...

What would community could recommend me in this situation?

[seannuh]

Yeesh that sounds aggressive. I don't think there's anything they can actually do to you legally, you're simply using the features of Google Maps the way it was intended. The only option they really have is to report your image to Google and see if they agree and have it removed.

[MortenSI · Accepted solution]

Hello @iddqdisOn,

Thanks for reaching out!

Google Maps is a public platform, and everyone can contribute photos and videos to points of interest.

I would like to advice you to head over to this article Google Maps Contribution Policy.  

I am letting you know that I have moved your post to the How-tos section, so other Local Guides may benefit from the answer to your question.

[LucioV]

I agree with @seannuh.

I was on the other side for a lot of times; my customers are always asking to get the professional virtual tours to be featured, I always tell them that all we can do is to report the image(s) for low quality, but that's all.

It's not fair to threat you to remove your photo, and you have full right (if the photo is respecting Google guidelines) to keep it in place.

[TravellerG]

Dear friend @LucioV, HOW WELL you have answered...? 

I too have your problem.. but keeping quite..

surely, it is unfair to threat @seannuh for a work he has done for the benefit of all..

Regs

[Anat2]

I got a problem. I wrote a negative review about a restaurant and the owner replied me with serious insults. The problem is, my review, even negative, follow the rules, but nobody can read it because of the insults. I want those insults to be eliminated. How can I do?