artist sued for copyright infringement of his own work

[D Rokk]

if u havent read the story yet i'd suggest it..

here is the link

http://www.jonengle.com.nyud.net/2009/04/accused/

[john turner]

page won't display. interested to know what it says though.

[D Rokk]

google search for artist sued for copyright infringement.. or something like that.. its rather infuriating and a good read

[tasty sweeps]

Today has turned into a real-life nightmare. I wish I could wake up. This nightmare started 9 months ago and has been recurring ever since.

First, a little background. I’ve been designing professionally for 11 years. I started by designing for my church and before long I landed my first design job with Bill Gordon & Associates, an Albuquerque law firm. In January 2000 I formed Relevant Studio as an umbrella for all of my freelance work. I was able to find consistent work through sites such as elance.com, guru.com and designoutpost.com. I began freelancing full-time December 2002.

I’ve known since I was a little boy that I wanted to be an artist. I knew from the first time my preschool doodle went up on my great-grandma’s fridge exactly what I wanted to be. I was introduced to graphic and web design in high school and fell in love with it. I went on to attend The Art Center Design College and The Art Institute of Pittsburgh, all while freelancing on the side to pay the bills.

My first big client was the Warner Brothers TV network (now The CW). They gave me a chance to work on the Smallville launch. Being a comic book geek and TV junkie, I couldn’t have been happier! Because the posters and ads were successful, I was contacted to work on the launch of Birds of Prey as well. That show barely lasted a season, but I enjoyed designing for it anyway. Those ads opened new doors which led to ad work for Alias, CSI and Lost among others. Those jobs were a dream come true for me.

More than anything, the TV ads were a validation for me. They were a sign that I’d picked the right career for me. I haven’t doubted for one moment that I was destined to be a designer. Until today.

This morning I received a message from a friend alerting me to a discussion about me on one of my favorite sites. I tried logging in to see what was going on to find out I had been banned. I emailed the site owner to see what the issue was. His response was that someone had contacted him to inform him I was being investigated for copyright infringement. One of the logos I’ve been accused of stealing was for a client of this site. In order to protect himself from a lawsuit, he had to boot me off the site and distance himself from the problem. I’m not happy about it, but I understand. He wasn’t left with much of a choice.

This morning’s shocker is just a sympton of a larger problem, a HUGE problem, that I became aware of July 2008. I’ve been quietly dealing with it for the past 9 months and thought I was making some headway. Today they crossed a line and have done irreperable damage to my business and my reputation.

I was first contacted by a stock art site in July of last year. They hit me with a bill for a whopping $18,000! I had an account with the site. Years ago I purchased an illustration of a chef’s hat for a client’s project. So, I thought this was some accounting mistake. Nope. This was a bill for new images. Very familiar images. They were images from several of my logos; 65 of them in fact. That breaks down to about $275 per image. They actually wanted me to pay them $275 for each one of MY images!

Once the sticker shock wore off the obvious question came to mind. Where the hell did they get these from? It seems as if most or all of them were lifted from my LogoPond showcase. They especially seemed to favor the ones that made it to the gallery.

My theory is that someone copied my artwork, separated them from any typography and then posted them for sale on the stock site. Someone working for the site either saw my LP showcase or was alerted to the similarities. They then prepared the bill and sent it to me. The good thing is that the bill gives me a record of every single image they took from me. That helps me gather dates, sketches, emails, etc to help me prove my case. The bad thing is that despite my explanations and proof, they will not let this go.

When I refused to pay the bill they hired a law firm specializing in copyright infringement. The attorney called and offered a settlement of $18,000. How is that any different than the bill? I refuse to pay THEM for work I created. That is the epitomy of ridiculous. The attorney didn’t like my response. He threatened to sue. I say BRING IT ON! I have no doubt I can win in court.

Here’s the link to the newly revived LogoPond discussion from August 2008: Copyright Lawyer

However, the new tactic I discovered this morning is so much harder to fight. They are calling or emailing every one of my clients they can find. They inform the client that I’m being investigated for copyright infringement and that the logo I designed for them may have been stolen from their client. After discovering my ban from Design Outpost I began contacting clients to see exactly who they’ve been in touch with. So far, I’ve heard back from three. In every case so far my client is furious with me. They took the lawyer’s warning at face value without bothering to contact me. I understand their reaction to an extent. I’m sure they’re worried that they may be sued as well for using ’stolen’ artwork and the best thing they can do is distance themselves from me.

I feel like this is nothing more than an underhanded campaign meant to demoralize me and destroy my reputation. If you read through their website you can see they work on contingency. This means they don’t get paid if their client doesn’t get paid. I’ve also made it very clear there’s no way in hell that I’ll ever pay up. I’ll declare bankruptcy and go to work for McDonald’s before that happens. Are they thinking they can beat me into submission? Do they think I’ll agree to a settlement to make it all go away? Guess again. I have the truth on my side and I will NEVER pay a rip-off artist or their extortionist lawyers.

Thankfully, I have a lot of incidental proof. I would never have thought to plan for something like this, but now I wish I had. Beyond timestamps this becomes my word against theirs to a degree. The logos on LogoPond have a date stamp showing when I uploaded them to the site. This is good, especially if the designs were stolen from my showcase. My submission date will always be earlier than theirs. Even if its only by a day, first is first. Kode ( @kodespark) suggested looking at the meta data in my source files. I didn’t know about meta data before today, but there are timestamps on the files as well. All of the meta timestamps pre-date my LogoPond submissions.

What do they have? A bill and a bulldog lawyer. They refuse to give me upload dates for any of the images in question. If they believe they’re in the right, then why would they hide that from me? I have asked time and again for the name of the artist who uploaded the stolen work. I finally received an email which is less than helpful:

“Sir, it is not a question of one artist, but several. It is quite obvious you’ve been using the site as your personal reservoir of stolen works.”

I find that extremely hard to believe. I don’t believe it. I don’t believe that a group of people came together to form a cartel of logo rips. They are skirting the issue and won’t give me a straight answer about anything.

So what do I do now? How do I fight back? I hope that making the issue public will help. If they’ve done this to me, they could do it to any one of us. It seems that every day one of us finds a new rip-off artist displaying our work as their own and I’m absolutely sick of it! If you don’t have any artistic abilities, then please find a legitimate line of work. I just don’t get it.

I know this is a long post, so I’ll wrap it up. I hope the issue is resolved soon and will be sure to keep everyone updated with my progress. Big big thanks to everyone who’s shown their support on Twitter, Logopond and Facebook! I love you guys and would have given up the fight without your support.

A lawsuit I can handle, but this has hit me hard. If they were shooting for demoralizing, then mission accomplished. I was so upset about this that I almost threw in the towel. I wanted to shut down my site and delete my LP showcase and go find a job doing anything else. If it hadn’t been for my friends, Mike and Kode, I probably would have. They started a #SaveJon campaign on Twitter that showed me now is the time to fight, not walk away.

that's from the OP's link.

yeah, copyright laws in many countries are not fair, just or sane. they are extremely biased and skewed in favor of large conglomerates or at least the highest bidder with the most hawkish lawyer. this is a symptom. and that fits nicely within the framework of the way most other things are run. and it's a shame. but there is a rapidly growing base of people and organizations that are working to bring about sane and just business practices and laws. i suggest you find, create and support such efforts.

[D Rokk]

thanx tasty.. the real kicker is that stockart.com gives 10% of any monies collected to the person who brought the infractions to their attention. that paves the way for all kinds of unethical and immoral people to make money off of the dismay (and hard work) of others

[john turner]

dammit, that's a nightmare. so basically the stock art site is b.s.ing, claiming that he stole work when in reality they are displaying stolen copies of -his- work?

dude needs to sue them.

[Relic]

This guy really needs a lawyer. I'm not very law-savvy myself but I'm thinking that not only can he put this to rest and make it right, he can probably turn it around and sue the bejesus out of someone. This may end up being pay day for the guy if he plays his card right.

[The Golden Boy]

Originally Posted by Relic

This guy really needs a lawyer.

Seriously needs a lawyer.

[BillyRay]

My guess is that he can't afford a lawyer right now or at least, not one that will trump the stock art supplier one. He basically said he'd prefer bankrupty over paying the bill.

I also like the angle the plaintiff is shooting, ie. calling everyone of the dude's client to make sure he feels the pressure/loses his job. This doesn't make them look like crooks or mobsters operating a racket. At all.

[Phil Smith]

I think he needs to contact the FBI, there's some obvious fraud going on here.

[paul_wolfe]

Seriously needs a lawyer

+1

[PaleMelanesian]

First thing his new lawyer needs to do is issue a cease-and-desist to stop them contacting his customers. Stop the damage as soon as possible.

[john turner]

Originally Posted by D Rokk

thanx tasty.. the real kicker is that stockart.com gives 10% of any monies collected to the person who brought the infractions to their attention. that paves the way for all kinds of unethical and immoral people to make money off of the dismay (and hard work) of others

surely if their incentive program can be shown to have encouraged this kind of illegal process, they can be found doubly liable.

someone needs to get this guy to post here on talkbass . maybe one of our resident lawyers will give him a hand.

ooo, it's been digged already...
http://digg.com/design/Stock_art_web...riginal_artist

[tasty sweeps]

crappy as it is, i have to say that i have to take these kinds of things with a grain of salt. if you freelance and do work with the WB and think you're "making it" then i'd say you're on a collision course with reality.

i'm not knocking that, i'm just saying that you've got to realize someone's going to try and get you like that. business destroys art when it's allowed to. always. so getting involved with a companies like that, as what amounts to a self-proclaimed little guy, has hazards. this being one of them.

[Bob Lee (QSC)]

The stock image company reminds me of a certain cable company suing every possible entity with the word "monster" in its name.

[Mikio]

that's why I do not upload any of my serious work on MySpace.

[Stinsok]

Happened to John Fogarty.

[ProfGumby]

This makes me sick. As someone who has had some intellectual property basically stolen from me, I can empathize with the artist.

In my case I was an idiot and share ideas I was working on for company B and their rep, who was in effect my boss, took the idea and ran with it. No credit to me, no acknowledgment, nothing. And when I question said rep, he claimed he had no idea what I was talking about. And since I did so in trust and good faith, I had no leg to stand on.

Or when said sponsor looks to their field staff for help then uses said ideas and then tells you there is no form of compensation for what you did,claiming it was part of the "deal". Again, my fault for trusting a shark.

Other times I submitted articles for publication, received the standard pink slip rejection and return of said article, only to see my article in that magazine a few months later, with some other bums name attached. Same article theme, same flow, same structure with a few things changed to protect the guilty, er, I mean publishers. So what am I gonna do, hire a lawyer and spend thousands and thousands of dollars to recover the couple hundred I might have made from an article or two?

The scumbags and sharks know that most people are either so intimidated by a vicious attack or are not wiling to spend a years wages to recover a small amount. So knowing this, the scumbags exploit this from the decent and honest people of the world.

I take a negative or mean and spiteful approach to very, very few things. But this is one that gets my ire up! These people are scum, lower than pond scum and worse than a sneak thief! And you know I think they should bring back hanging of horse thieves! (Or bass thieves... )

To all who write or create or design, you HAVE TO take a CYA approach to everything you do! Dated, time stamped notarized whatever it takes to prove your work is your work has to be done!

And it still may not be enough. There are not enough levels of hell or fiery volcano's to toss these scum into!

The dude in the article had better call the FBI, find a lawyer who will also work on a contingency basis, or go to the national media quickly! Or do the bankruptcy thing, but then that is still a victory to the scum sucking thieves.

Whatever happened to innocent until proven guilty? And why doesn't the courts go after folks like this that are not only suing but actively destroying the man's career before a court or Jury can rule? Shouldn't this then also be a crime? And I say all of this, of course, based on the assumption the artist is telling the truth.

The sad fact is, unless the courts find in favor of the artist, force total compensation for any and all legal fee's and lost wages and jail the real thieves, this will never change...

[dancehallclasher]

I like how we're all assuming his story is true. It very well may be. But it may not be.

[D Rokk]

whether this particular story is true or not this sort of thing happens and it serves as a reminder to protect ur intellectual property and cover ur @$$

but what you need to look at in this particular story is that the 18000 dollar bill came to him 9 months ago, he hired a lawyer to write a letter saying he would not be paying it. they havent went after him thru legal means tho.. they have destroyed his reputation by calling his clients (highly illegal btw) and saying he is under investigation for copyright infringement (not true and also highly illegal) they have not taken him to court and he is not under investigation. a single instance of copyright infringement can find him oweing $175,000.00 they are accusing him of 64 infractions that is 11,200,000.00 if they took him to court for it. surely a lawyer would know this. then why would they not have taken him to court yet?

go to the stockart.com website and look at the anti piracy policey, they state very plainly (in a rather unproffessional manner) that they want to take down anyone who is involved in piracy and will give 10% to you if you help them. they also go on to describe a spider they are working on that will track all of ur computers activity if u click on anything there site. last i checked that is called a worm and that is also illegal.

the reason, dancehall, that we are all assuming his story is true is because stockart.com is so blatently unscrupulous that it would be an assault to others intelligence to believe to the contrary