Stealing Trend
June 21st, 2007 Filed in: News & Updates Jump to commentsSo, what is the next web trend after the Web 2.0 trend? Steal. I’ve been noticing this trend for a while and in fact it is rising. Rippers now on the Internet steal anything from text content, graphics, icons, design templates, to coding scripts. Almost every other week, I get an email from visitors telling me who stole my work. By the way, thanks for reporting copyright violations to me. This becoming an issue and I really want to bring it up. I have setup a Flickr gallery to showcase the ripped work. Here are some of the sample cases.
TV Print Ads (new)
Two days after I published this post, someone sent me another email reported my work being stolen by two Bosnia & Herzegovina TV stations - OBN.ba and RTRS.tv. He was nice enough scanned the newspaper ads and sent it to me. Although, I’ve never seen the actual ads but I believe they just ripped my high resolution wallpapers (without any editing). This is ridiculous, from a TV station?
SWsoft Sitebuilder
SWsoft Sitebuilder is an online application that allows users quickly build their website without any programming or design experience. The hosting provider will install the Sitebuilder on their server. Their clients will use the online wizard to pick a template, fill in the content, and then upload to their web space. I found several of my artworks were included in the application as a template. I certainly did not give them permission nor sold my work to them. It was actually a media/hosting company who reported this to me.
Canvas Printouts
Believe me or not, I found these in a local shopping mall, Pacific Mall. If you live in Toronto area, you probably have been to the mall or know about it. It is located at Kennedy and Steele. I was shopping at the mall and found my works were selling at a retail booth. They printed my work on a large size canvas and selling for $35CAD. I quickly took some pictures with my camera phone and asked the owner where did they get the products from. The owner told me they brought their products through several level of connections, thus unable to trace the manufacture.
Best Web Gallery being ripped
Shortly after I launched Best Web Gallery, I found a site just ripped it exactly the same, but replaced with a different logo. They even copied my gallery entries and screenshots. As usual, I sent them an email and asked them to remove the design and related content. However, I didn’t receive any response. So, I submitted to Digg and got more attention. Then, the site quickly removed the theme in the next day.
How did I catch them?
Well, the Internet is very small. Unless you don’t publish your site online, otherwise the chance of you getting spotted is very high. Most of them are reported from visitors. The others are traced from referral links and tracking codes.
What should you do if someone stole your work?
I’m sure I’m not the only victim. What would you do if someone stole your work?
Send them an email? Half of the time, they don’t even have a contact number or email address on their site. If you are lucky enough, they will apologize and remove your work. The worst I’ve seen they just ignore your emails and pretend nothing happened. Or even worst they will claim as original and question you back “are you sure you are the original creator?”
Find a lawyer and sue them? It is probably not worth the value to sue them because most of them are small business or personal website. The lawyer fee will probably cost you more.
How do you handle your copyright infringement issues? Any advises or suggestions that you can share with us?
June 25th, 2007 at 10:25 am
I haven’t had many people steal my artwork, so I guess I’ve been lucky, but in the few cases I have had to deal with I usually just go up the chain.
Email the offender, if they take it down - great. If they refuse to, or claim they made it, contact thier hosting provider and threaten to sue them for allowing thier clients to use copywritten material on thier servers. Usually does the trick, if it doesn’t, actually consult a lawyer, alot of them will tell you if you’ve got a case, etc for free - and I’m sure for a small fee they’d be happy to email the hosting company and tell thier findings. I doubt that you’d have to go any farther at that point, but if you do, then sue them… for the rights they infringed, and whatever profits they may have taken from you, or made, I’m sure you could make a nifty amount.
June 25th, 2007 at 6:00 am
If the rip is ont the net, I send an invoice, and a threat of warning the provider. That’s enough to get it removed.
If the rip is real life, invoice+lawyer, anycase. But I have a friend, so that helps diminishing the costs
June 25th, 2007 at 5:09 am
Ive heard of people profiting form these situations. Google probably holds all your answers nick. But it probably worth it to register all your work form here on out with a physical copyright. you can for instance print out a image and mail it to yourself, itll act as a copyright.
Honestly that mall thats selling your artwork will probably be a easy target. And honestly I dont think the store owner has any “sellers in china” but thats just my opinion. For something like stolen artwork on websites like the free website generator, contact their host and shut them down. You deserve credit for your artwork, and they deserve no internet =D.
June 25th, 2007 at 4:06 am
You’re an amazing artist and no business can earn money with your work without paying anything to you. Sue them. It’s their problem if they can pay the money or not, the case will make everyone think once more before they steal something.
June 25th, 2007 at 2:13 am
It seems like a lot of people suggest to find an intellectual property attorney. Has anyone experienced these cases before and what is the chance of winning?
June 24th, 2007 at 11:24 pm
Let them steal your work.
Just make sure you copyright your images or work through the copyright offices before you publish them on the internet. If you register your work through the copyright office the one who stole your work is due extra damages and the case is usually clear and cut without any hassles and it’d be well worth the trouble. You’ll be a rich person laughing your way to the bank.
Oh and carolyn wright is a great attorney. Shes a copyright lawyer you should check out her blog:
http://www.photoattorney.com/
Just my take.
Keep up the beautiful work.
June 24th, 2007 at 6:24 pm
Mk As explained in my blog the top image has been taken down, sorry for any confusion and/or irratation its caused. I just want to clarify I was mislead and that I had no intention of stealing. I’ve sent the fickr account with the stolen graphics to Nick, hopefully he’ll have fun with the account owner.
Now please, anyone whos coming to my website and posting immature comment, stop, I know you may be upset by the fact that I look like a theif but just take my word for it. I didnt intentionaly steal the artwork.
And Nick; You really should get a lawyer over the art that the store is selling. You deserve at least some profit off that. Hiring a lawyer in that situation would be well worth it.
June 24th, 2007 at 2:44 pm
I’m very sorry, but i have to admit that i stole part of your work once too. It was for a hairdresser’s bussiness card. She wanted something attractive for the background. I was desperate trying to find an apropriate illustration, then i found your site and saw your illustration “flow” from which i took part of it.
Finally the client got another image which she wanted to appear in the card, so what i stole from you wasn’t utilized. But anyway i was a f***ing thief. As a graphic designer, i also got my work stolen somtimes, but that is no excuse for what i tryed to do.
One sometimes thinks that the internet is too big and taking something that is right in front of you is not bad, and it will never be a danger to you, but it really sucks. There’s always somebody behind the work you are about to steal. I forgot this, but thanks to you i won’t forget it again.
I regret my behaviour and i apologize sincerely.
José Manuel, Seville-Spain.
June 24th, 2007 at 1:26 pm
Hate to say it, but if you don’t want someone swiping your artwork, best not to put it on the Internet. I know that’s not the answer we all want to hear, but that’s how it goes. Best thing you can do is license by Creative Commons, really.
June 24th, 2007 at 12:28 pm
Hey nick,
I feel terrible that someone is stealing your work. I live in the toronto area (just out of oshawa) and I go to durham college for webdesign / development. I would be disgusted if anyone stole my work and claimed it as their own or didnt even give me credit.
I can only suggest that you take legal action against the store you saw in Pacific Mall since they are actually making money of of your work.
I know legal costs are expensive but if you can go to small claims court or something and get a settlement it might help you out a bit.
I know there are ways to protect images with javascript aplications not allowing right clicking and such… and I hope you look into things like that and other options in the future to try and cut down on mis-use of your work.
Contact me if you ever need a programmer / designer, or heck just want to chat (im in the area).
~Good luck!