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The whole subject of intellectual property sometimes seems so complex. The pirating of creative works is widespread and shows no sign of declining anytime soon.
Copyright protection has as its purpose not just the protection of individual original works, but the preservation of the creative process itself. If an artist cannot have exclusive control over the copying of his works, he/she loses the leverage to be compensated financially for it. Much of the incentive to create can then die. All original creative works are protected by copyright in the U.S., even a doodle on a scratch pad, though it may not be commercially valuable enough to protect. Copyright varies in other countries. For example, a 'font' is protected by copyright in some countries, but not in the U.S. However, the name of a font is protected. By and large, copyright law in the U.S., especially since 1989, seems very protective of the artist. Actually doing something about an infringement, of course, is another matter.
Adrienne's Stolen Chicken The recent piracy of Adrienne Morgan’s chicken splash may be illustrative of this. First off, her window represents a higher caliber of splash work. And fast splashers can do quite well, though it’s somewhat seasonal. There are not too many things in the sign trade that pay as well with so little outlay for equipment and material. Nevertheless, it’s not the same as logo design. Window splashes are meant to be loose and fast. And temporary. They are not meant to be photographically reproduced, as is camera-ready artwork, nor are they generally used to represent a company image as a logo would. Is it practical to charge a substantial design fee, in addition to the price for lettering, for a catchy window layout? Or to try to sue for lost compensation when a customer turns your window cartoon into their logo? I think the answer is probably no in both cases. The thing is simply not that valuable. Adrienne could try to bloody the customer's nose in court for the principal of it, but she probably feels her time is more valuable than that. I am sure she will do just as she said she was going to: offer to re-splash the window and make another buck. And that doesn’t mean she hasn’t kept the faith. It's impossible to completely protect yourself from design theft. Often we can only hope that our competing sign makers subscribe to the same honor system that we do. And I think most of them do.
Use of Clip art While the use of clip art used to be derided by 'serious' design artists, it no longer seems to have this stigma. Not only are there mega-loads of it out there, but more and more of it can go straight to a plotter without too much trouble.I think customers expect us to be clip art rich. Are there intellectual property issues involved here?There could be. I think it's important to read the language of any clip art package to make sure we understand it. Are they selling all rights to copy their artwork, or do they set limits? Usually there are limits. For example, a clip art vendor may allow commercial use of a piece of artwork on a sign or a tee shirt,but they may not allow us to claim ownership of it. They would still hold the copyright. Obviously this would preclude making copies of a clip art collection and selling it. This would apply to individual copyrighted images as well. Does this mean it would be an infringement to print a piece of clip art on tee shirts and sell them? Possibly, or not. Sometimes it boils down to how significant a part of the design the clipart is. Is it the only thing on the shirt? Or is it just a small portion of an overall design? It's important to read the agreement. Or,a clip art vendor may specifically prohibit use of artwork as a company logo or "trade mark." Normally, a company owns exclusive copyright to their own logo and can recover damages in court if it's used by someone else. But what if a significant part of the logo is a piece of art whose copyright is owned by someone else, a clip art vendor? How could a customer sue for enfringement if their own ownership is in question? If we sell someone a logo design for their company and they cannot later protect their ownership of their own company's identity, we have done them a disservice.
Is Honesty Out of Date It's a jungle out there. Businesses try to devour one another in the name of survival. Dissembling and obfuscation are common business tools. Software piracy is all around us. And the situation with music on the Internet shows just how murky these waters can be. So is it naive to try to operate with a system of principles that many ignore? Or should we just fight tooth and claw even if it means having an occasional double standard? If Adrienne's chicken had been clip art should she cry foul (cute pun, huh?)? But she doesn't need clip art. I've heard of her talent from as far away as the state of New York. One thing is for sure: We sign makers have more to lose than most people if intellectual property laws are not respected.
Disclaimers I am not a lawyer, though I try to think through what I have to say before I say it. At the very least, I spell check it. My opinions are just opinions. I believe I am a good cook, too. My ex-girlfriend is not so categorical. She has seasoning issues with me. If you want good legal advice, talk to a competent attorney, however contradictory that term may sound. Opinions are like a*******. Everybody has one, etc.
-------------------- Brad Ferguson See More Signs 7931 Wornall Rd Kansas City, MO 64111 signbrad@yahoo.com 816-739-7316 Posts: 1230 | From: Kansas City, MO, USA | Registered: Nov 1998
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Brad . . . This topic has been, and will continue to be, hashed and rehashed in Letterville, but I thought you did an excellent job of putting it out there with reasonable questions that at least might cause peolpe to stop and think a little more.
These issues are not isolated to sign art & design but also are considered in the art world in general, as well as among photographers, choreographers, writers, musicians, and any other fine art area where creative ideas are born in someone's mind and must be made tangible. At that point of birth, that idea can be 'snatched' by anyone who could claim it as their own and exploit it.
Unless you are going to register all of your art individually, or as a body of work, with the U.S. copy right office, and many people do so, then there is little you can do legally or morally if someone decides to use your art as they choose. Even then, your in for a little time in small claims court or more time in larger courts. Granted there are times when this battle should be fought, but still, it comes down to individual moral choice and integrity. We can only hope to police ourselves.
There are so many 'blurred' lines of creativity.
I raise the following questions....who has not bounced ideas off of and created art after viewing a stunning peice of work??
Who has not used someone's exact sign 'shape' for an entirely different type sign??... Mabey even the colour scheme as well?
Inspiration could be an elusive thing. If I'm inspired by a peice of art or a sign....this means, for me at least, that I want to delve into those same techniques, textures, colours, subjects, etc.. I can do this without copying in any way, the artist's work I admire.
I don't want to copy, improve or add to his work. I want to create my own with the same exact stuff he used.
Obviously, there's no medium/materials infringement. All these things are available to everyone to create with equally.
But, even any individual art that you create....there's a chance that some one some where is doing something very close to the same thing....keep in mind that ours, and others are industries where stauration has taken place. In music for example...there's only 12 basic notes. Imagine the creativity it takes to create new music. But I don't think there's any thing new under the sun.....a lot of music is very similar..some notes being identical.
Clipart falls into this catagory. It's basically black & white sillouettes. What are you going to do?? How many ways are there to illustrate a sail boat for example in black & white?? 10? 100?
It does'nt matter. They're all gonna be quite similar. So of course one bright person somewhere had the idea of making, collecting & selling clip art as bodies of work. Does this one individual collect royalties on all clip-art sold everywhere??
Just as an example, we can probably hunt around a little and find a Mona Lisa print. Do you want the REAL ONE?? Do you want and 'original print'?? Or do you just want any print of her any way you can find it??
I think you could go into any little craft store and find her on trinket box. Who paid for that 'infringement'?? Yet Mona's lovely face get's exploited on greeting cards, stickers and the walls of librarys everywhere.
Someone makes money off her face and does'nt pay anything for it.
Again, the bottom line is a personal inegrity that will cause us to respect the work of others and a deep desire to be original with our own work. We can't police the world and what others do, just ourselves.
-------------------- Signs Sweet Home Alabama
oneshot on chat
"Look like a girl, act like a lady, think like a man, work like a dog" Posts: 5758 | From: "Sweet Home" Alabama | Registered: Mar 2003
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This was from a few years ago and had a good exchange for the most part. Might contain something relevant for some reading this post and maybe not for others. Check it out if care too; Letterville Op Ed, Clipart
-------------------- Bob Gilliland InKnowVative Communications Harrisburg PA, USA
"The U.S. Constitution doesn't guarantee happiness, only the pursuit of it. You have to catch up with it yourself." Benjamin Franklin Posts: 642 | From: Harrisburg, PA, USA | Registered: Nov 1998
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The whole thing is a quagmire which works to the detriment of the little guy. In most places the "law" is what a court has ruled even if it started as legislation.
For example, in 1989 the US Patent and Trademark court ruled that one cannot claim any rights in a typeface design. This because one cannot copyright, trademark or patent the alphabet. Ten years later they ruled that you can, however, patent the mathematical formula of the data that describes and defines the design .... which is to say where the nodes are on the vectors.
The court allowed only the trademarking of the names of fonts.
Yet you can make claims on a slogan or a motto or a company name or a product name. So the court is saying the creative elements and the rights lie in how you string together the letters. The same would be true for musical notes, geometric shapes, and the whole litany of things you can define in drawing such as straight lines, arcs and curves.
I have never understood why the courts did not see the design of a letterform, however, as unique, creative and worthy of protection. If I take a few letterforms and overlay them with a few rectangles of the background color and the letterforms are I,B and M, I am accorded all the protection I may want. If I design 75 to 100 letterforms that no one has ever seen before, I am denied any protection whatsoever.
At the same time, Volkswagen America has received protection for "any image of their new Beetle" thus criminalizing the act of any artist, photographer etc. who might choose to draw one or photograph one.
-------------------- Fred Weiss Allied Computer Graphics, Inc. 4620 Lake Worth Road Lake Worth, FL 33463 561 649-6300 allcompu@allcompu.com Posts: 427 | From: Lake Worth, Florida | Registered: Feb 2003
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The copyright has expired on a lot of things and as in the Mona Lisa example, there never was a copyright.
One of Johnny Cash's songs about the Little Negro Church where they were having services for a little boy is actually over 100 years old. I have a antique book of poems that has it included. a lot of songs are very old poems.
The same thing with songs that use the music that was written many years ago.
-------------------- Rove Gratz Gratz Signs 342 Walden Station Drive Macon, GA 31216 rovegratz@aol.com Home Page: http://rove-342.tripod.com Posts: 861 | From: Macon, GA 31216 | Registered: Jan 2004
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quote:If I take a few letterforms and overlay them with a few rectangles of the background color and the letterforms are I,B and M, I am accorded all the protection I may want. If I design 75 to 100 letterforms that no one has ever seen before, I am denied any protection whatsoever.
Yes, ironic. Almost as ironic that 20th-century typographers continued to design in the face of widespread piracy. Frederic Goudy seems to have been more successful as a type designer than as a sign writer or as a printer. Perhaps the European courts are allowing a little more common sense to prevail in allowing protection for typestyles.
Brad
-------------------- Brad Ferguson See More Signs 7931 Wornall Rd Kansas City, MO 64111 signbrad@yahoo.com 816-739-7316 Posts: 1230 | From: Kansas City, MO, USA | Registered: Nov 1998
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I just re-read the topic from three years ago re clip art sharing. Some of the replies were still smoldering. I didn't really intend to re-open a wound by my post above. Still, I can sympathize with clip art makers who have their property used without permission. I was in signs for many years before I had the nerve to call myself a good designer. At times I almost lost hope it would ever happen. Later, when I had nice design work pirated, it hurt. I didn't so much blame the customer. Half of them were clueless. But I felt violated, betrayed, by a fellow sign maker. It wasn't so much the violation of the law that bothered me. But I felt insulted personally, like I had been slapped in the face by someone who knew that I wouldn't hit back. It was rude. Should I have been flattered for my good design? I didn't feel flattered. When I moved to Kansas City two years ago, my bicycle was stolen off my back porch. I wasn't told to feel flattered this time, I was just told it was my own fault. I was told, (1)I shouldn't have left it on the porch in plain sight (I now put my bike in the living room where it belongs), and (2)it wasn't worth anything, anyway (true), and (3) I shouldn't have moved to Kansas City. Okay, I accept responsibility for the crime. I accepted my punishment and I almost pretty much got over it. My problem is the way I was raised. You know, that whole 'respect the property of others even if it's of little value' spiel. I was told (by parents) that what was important was the principle of personal property, not the relative value of the property itself. But, I argued, surely stealing a car is more wrong than stealing a pencil. They actually agreed to this reasoning. But they said that the degree of wrongness only affects the punishment, it doesn't change a wrong into a right. I could never get around that logic.
The principle of respecting someone's personal property is as old, I suppose, as the principle of respect for someone's life. Historically, the punishment for stealing was very severe--loss of life or limb. Sometimes stealing was only punished if it was stealing from someone important, a lord or king. Ancient Jewish law seemed way ahead of its time, requiring a thief to make restitution rather than just putting him to death or cutting off his hand. Christianity's later principles of "do unto others as you would have them do," and "he that is faithful in little things is also faithful in big things," were even more enlightened. But practical? I won't say, as I'm not really moralizing here, just posing questions.
Last year someone gave me a copy of Adobe Illustrator. I haven't installed it yet. I can get a copy through school for 99 bucks, and that's probably what I'll do. I'm not trying to appear self-righteous. Maybe I just have too high of an opinion of myself. I don't want to be labeled a 'hypocrite.' And I do still feel the sting of the bicycle heist a little. But I'm not going to condemn anyone. I've done my share of things that I'm not proud of.
It will be interesting to see if clip art vendors will weather the storm of 'sharing,'as it will surely only increase. I'm sure the little guys will die first. They always do. I had once thought that I would like to make a CD of sign ornamentation like what Mike Jackson did. But I'm sure I won't. I'm afraid I would make a few bucks till sharing saturated the market, assuming anyone would buy it to begin with. I hope Mike Jackson is making some money.
Of interest (to whom, you ask?) is an incident that happened to a lady friend of mine some time ago. She checked out through the grocery store line and then saw a magazine she wanted to read. She didn't want to write another check, the line was long, she was in a hurry. She put the mag in her bag and walked out. She reasoned that the theft was small and the store put the rack in a stupid place, making it too easy, and besides that they should have had more checkouts open. Only one problem: she got caught. It was the most humiliating experience of her life. I have mixed emotions. Part of me wanted to call her a dumb *ss and part of me felt terrible for her. Is artwork theft the same as shoplifting? I don't know. Sometimes the reasons put forward for justifying it are similar: The value is small. Nobody really gets hurt. There's not enough time to do it the right way. They make it too easy. Blah, blah. On the other hand, my lady friend suffered a very ill-tempered harangue by a store manager in a special room and was then paraded through the store in handcuffs to a police cruiser with lights flashing. Even the security guard thought it was overkill.
Life can be so complicated. Sometimes I just want to sit down with a scotch & water and talk to an intelligent (though beautiful) woman and let the battle rage around us. Clip art be damned!
Brad
-------------------- Brad Ferguson See More Signs 7931 Wornall Rd Kansas City, MO 64111 signbrad@yahoo.com 816-739-7316 Posts: 1230 | From: Kansas City, MO, USA | Registered: Nov 1998
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Ro, I realize the statute of limitations has expires on many songs . . .yet consider that the Beatle's were fortunate enough to keep their music protected, allowing it to be used at their discretion only.
I think the time frame is twenty years, but the original artist can renew the publishing rights by re-creating the music in another 'body of work' format such as a "greatest hits' for example, where he might even make minor improvements in sound or record a live concert.
Using Mona Lisa was about a well known example of art and how, regardless of whether there was ever any copy right, the respect for the work has decreased to trinket boxes and cheap prints ...yet ironically the original is still priceless.
You raise an interesting question Ro'.
Even if there's no fear of legal problems.. would we still morally, ethically and with integrity, respectfully 'use' another work of art and sign our name to it? (I would not.)
What about copying the exact art, let's say . . .Yosemitee Sam on a race car, for example...would you do it?? If you did, would you sign your name to it? Or would you leave your name off and sign it 'Walt Disney art'?
I wonder how many 'local' bands, of any caliber of experience or talent write for permission to play the well known songs they sing in the gigs they get paid for every weekend??
Not posing an opinion about it . . . .
I'm just askin' iz'all...
-------------------- Signs Sweet Home Alabama
oneshot on chat
"Look like a girl, act like a lady, think like a man, work like a dog" Posts: 5758 | From: "Sweet Home" Alabama | Registered: Mar 2003
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Brad, My oldest son finished computer animation schooling in Florida about 10 months ago. One of the classes was "Entertainment Business & Law. A 374 page book which covers EVERYTHING you have questioned.
The book is put out by Full Sail Real World Education, but I'm not sure if it is available to the general public. I sitting here looking at it as I type this post. Its complicated and very wordy. I think it would take a business law teacher to help one understand it all.
Basically looks like if you don't file tons of paperwork to register your stuff, and pay a lawyer to chase the offenders down, you can kiss your creations goodbye. Bummer, huh?
-------------------- Brad Ferguson See More Signs 7931 Wornall Rd Kansas City, MO 64111 signbrad@yahoo.com 816-739-7316 Posts: 1230 | From: Kansas City, MO, USA | Registered: Nov 1998
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Thanks for the link Bob... that was fun. as for adding further fuel to the fire, or not...
I'll settle for:
quote:di novello tutto par bello; nullum est jam dictum quod non dctum est prius una scopa nuova spazza bene
actually, Brad's magazine theft story reminds me of when i was living in NYC & the bunch of born & raised city kids I was partying with at night had a habit of jumpin the turnstiles to the subway (or just walking in the out door) Unfortunantly, I adopted that bad habit & then one day I did it on the way to work (for my first sign employer) & the new posse of plain-clothes subway cops that Mayor Dinkins had just installed to help clean-up the city CAUGHT me! I was help in a subterranian holding cell with several others untill they caught enough of us to switch into the "processing" phase of the ordeal. When locating my ID for me while my hands were cuffed, that ran across my $400 cash I was carrying that day when I skipped out on the 50 cent fare. Boy did I feel stupid!! & lucky that they didn't keep my money!
I read recently that M$ was sueing the creators of the Linux operating system called "Lindows" for a 'similarity of name infringement' or some similar such idea. Never mind that "Lin" is also the first 3 letters of Linux. Not having the $millions beghind them to fight it, they renamed Lindows to something else... (I can't remember what though)
BUT...
What if Apple Mac had gone ahead & tried to sue M$ 15 years ago for 'copying' THEIR windows idea... they didn't, of course, but perhaps they ought to have done so, to teach M$ a lesson in compassion or humility or something!
-------------------- "Stewey" on chat
"...there are no limits when you aim for perfection..." Jonathan Livingston Seagull Posts: 7014 | From: Highgrove via Toowoomba, Queensland, Australia | Registered: Dec 2002
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quote:Originally posted by Dave Draper: Brad, One of the classes was "Entertainment Business & Law. A 374 page book which covers EVERYTHING you have questioned.
The book is put out by Full Sail Real World Education, but I'm not sure if it is available to the general public. I sitting here looking at it as I type this post. Its complicated and very wordy. I think it would take a business law teacher to help one understand it all.
Check out Full Sail's website, they must write their own books for their courses. Would be cool if they had their bookstore online. www.fullsail.com
I did find a number of books on amazon covering the business end of this type of work. Guess it's like everything else in this world, you get what you pay for - some of the books are $15, others are $600.
-------------------- "If I share all my wisdom I won't have any left for myself."
Mike Pipes stickerpimp.com Lake Havasu, AZ mike@stickerpimp.com Posts: 8746 | From: Lake Havasu, AZ USA | Registered: Jun 2000
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For those situations where you sell the art but not the right to reproduce the art, why not just use generic clipart in vinyl? It seems to me that doing one shot logo's but not selling the rights to the logo's is doing 99% of the work and getting a small percentage of the cash. Also, by not prosecuting the violators you are punishing the honest customers who paid full price for the rights.
-------------------- Paul McDowell 7 Hills Signs Virginia Posts: 84 | From: Lynchburg, Virginia | Registered: Oct 2004
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Brad, There is considerable time and expense making a CD collection. I figure I have close to 800 hours getting the Americana Collection ready for sale. In some ways, that is the easy part! The big expense is after the CDs are ready. A single 1/3 page black and white ad in SignCraft, Signs of the Times, Sign Builder, and Sign Business is roughly $1000-$1200 per issue....not per year! Per ISSUE. So, running an ad in a couple of magazines can be quite costly and it takes quite a few CD sales to justify the venture each month.
When we sell a CD, we hope people get to use it for just about any end product they wish, including T-shirts. Some other vendors take a different approach. Clip art, in general, has a caveat when using it. It is sold to all equally, and all have a right to use it that purchased it, even within the same town or market. For example, a sign company might design a sign with a piece of clip art containing a saw and hammer for a construction company. Another sign company could use the exact same clip art and create an identical design, with different lettering, for a competing construction company. Neither construction company could claim full ownership of the design since it is clip art. Both companies could register their name with the state, but not the clip art laiden logos. Same would be true if someone used one of my panels, and put a large decorative B in the middle and then Ballenger's Home Furnishings under it. Another company could use the same panel and put a large decorative C in the middle, with Collier's Home Furnishings under it. Both could use the art, but neither could stop the other one.
I need to get back to work! Hope this helps a little. Clear as mud?
Mike Jackson
-------------------- Mike Jackson Golden Era Studios Jackson Hole, Wy www.goldenstudios.com/ Posts: 390 | From: PO Box 7850 | Registered: Nov 1998
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-------------------- Jack Wills Studio Design Works 1465 E.Hidalgo Circle Nye Beach / Newport, OR Posts: 2914 | From: Rocklin, CA. USA | Registered: Dec 1998
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Another idea here... why not create your own artwork collection then license it or sell it outright to one of the companies already involved in producing these collections? You might earn less per sale but you won't have the production and advertising expenses either.
Gawlly, if only there was some kind of "stock vector image" website, where any user could submit their artwork to the database and earn royalties based on the number of downloads, like the stock photography websites are now doing....
-------------------- "If I share all my wisdom I won't have any left for myself."
Mike Pipes stickerpimp.com Lake Havasu, AZ mike@stickerpimp.com Posts: 8746 | From: Lake Havasu, AZ USA | Registered: Jun 2000
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Ah... but Apple DID sue M$ and they lost. The suit took almost 2 years if I remember right.
I always wondered why Apple lost the suit, until I got a PC and saw the differences. No contest. M$ copied the concept but they didn't copy the ease of use. XP is closer to the original Mac OS than any previous version, but I still cuss it on a daily basis.
Now where did my Calvin Clip art go?
-------------------- Dave Sherby "Sandman" SherWood Sign & Graphic Design Crystal Falls, MI 49920 906-875-6201 sherwoodsign@sbcglobal.net Posts: 5396 | From: Crystal Falls, MI USA | Registered: Apr 1999
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Dave I cuss Windows on a daily basis and I've never even used a Mac to great extent, 'cept for one semester in college when the CAD lab had AutoCAD on Macs... that should tell ya how long it's been. I remember when I "discovered" the Wild EEP, in the middle of class. AHaha that sound still cracks me up, in fact I have a WAV of it on my PC set for just about every event.
-------------------- "If I share all my wisdom I won't have any left for myself."
Mike Pipes stickerpimp.com Lake Havasu, AZ mike@stickerpimp.com Posts: 8746 | From: Lake Havasu, AZ USA | Registered: Jun 2000
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Gawlly, if only there was some kind of "stock vector image" website, where any user could submit their artwork to the database and earn royalties based on the number of downloads, like the stock photography websites are now doing....
There were two and now just one. Artzooks.com is still going strong and I've been getting a royalty check every month for the last 22 months.
Clipart.com had a subsidiary called RebelArtist.com where the artist did his or her own uploads, keywording, categorizing and price setting. Their software did the rest and it was great until the lack of controls caught up with them and lots of images were found to not be the property of the person who uploaded them as well as various other copyright issues. They pulled the plug on it about a year and a half ago.
There are others as well that I've come across. You can find them if you search.
-------------------- Fred Weiss Allied Computer Graphics, Inc. 4620 Lake Worth Road Lake Worth, FL 33463 561 649-6300 allcompu@allcompu.com Posts: 427 | From: Lake Worth, Florida | Registered: Feb 2003
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Jack Davis once proposed that we letterheads complie just such a collection of artwork to share. He was pretty serious about trying to work out the kinks into a useable idea, but being the unique blend of anarchy & apathy we (that the little sliver of all our selves that becomes the collective entity here)are... it was destined to slip away with all the other posts that one day cease to garner a reply.
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