Getty Images, long known for suing people for using its photos on blogs, has surprised the Internet by making millions of them free to use. The photography giant announced that tens of millions of its photos are now embeddable, which means you can feel free to embed them on your blog. Just make sure you’re using the photos the way you’re allowed to.

Do you intend to take advantage of Getty’s new embedded photo offering? Let us know in the comments.

Here’s what it says about embeds in the terms of service:

You may only use embedded Getty Images Content for editorial purposes (meaning relating to events that are newsworthy or of public interest). Embedded Getty Images Content may not be used: (a) for any commercial purpose (for example, in advertising, promotions or merchandising) or to suggest endorsement or sponsorship; (b) in violation of any stated restriction; (c) in a defamatory, pornographic or otherwise unlawful manner; or (d) outside of the context of the Embedded Viewer.

That last one is important. You can use these photos, but you better make sure they’re within Getty’s embed code.

To find something you can use, go to gettyimages.com, hover over an image in the search results or on the image detail page, and click the embed icon. The viewer includes the photographer and the image collection, as well as link to the image page on Getty’s site. There, those who wish to use it commercially can obtain the relevant licensing information.

Here’s what the embeds look like:

How about that?

“With people increasingly turning to imagery to communicate and tell their stories online, the embed capability opens up Getty Images’ award-winning imagery for seamless sharing,” the company said in an announcement. “Through the embed tool, individuals can draw on Getty Images’ latest news, sports, celebrity, music and fashion coverage; immense digital photo archive; and rich conceptual images to illustrate their unique passions, ideas and interests. This innovation opens one of the largest, deepest and most comprehensive image collections in the world for easy sharing, thereby making the world an even more visual place.”

CEO Jonathan Klein said, “Images are the communication medium of today and imagery has become the world’s most spoken language. Whether via a blog, website or social media, everyone is a publisher and increasingly visually literate. Innovation and disruption are the foundation of Getty Images, and we are excited to open up our vast and growing image collection for easy, legal sharing in a new way that benefits our content contributors and partners, and advances our core mission to enable a more visually-rich world.”

Just to be crystal clear here, note that he said “blog, website or social media.”

It is a definitely a new day.

Of course you won’t be able to embed any photo of Getty’s, but as the pics above illustrate, the embed code is available on a wide range of photos, including celebrities.

The new offering certainly has plenty of benefits for Getty. It will get plenty of links and branding out of this. It’s also great for the photographers, as it will get their names out there, and ensure that credit is given where it’s due.

Getty says the embeds will provide people with a “simple and legal way to utilize content that respects creators’ rights, including the opportunity to generate licensing revenue.”

“You have to adapt to survive,” said Kevin Mazur, celebrity photographer and director, and co-founder of WireImage Inc. “Evolving to embrace technology that encourages responsible image sharing is the way forward for the industry.”

The embeds are supported anywhere HTML can be used. WordPress, which has 75 million users, is already telling users about the feature.

“This new Getty Images embed capability will open users up to a huge new creative repository in a simple, legal way,” said Raanan Bar-Cohen, senior vice president of commercial services at Automattic, the company behind WordPress.com. “We look forward to seeing all the amazing ways that our users can take advantage of this new access.”

WordPress says you can actually just grab the image URL from Getty, and copy that directly into you post.

But it doesn’t matter what blogging platform you use. If it uses HTML, you can use the Getty embeds.

Go ahead and go over to gettyimages.com, and search for something. There’s a good chance you’ll get some results, and good ones at that. This has the potential to significantly increase the quality of you blog posts.

Was this a good move by Getty? Do you expect to use the embeds? Let us know.

Images via Getty Images (Thanks, embed code!)