I’ve been having some heated debates about my attitude towards design and design theft.
As we all know, theft doesn’t just mean outright stealing someone’s coding/graphics, it also means not crediting correctly and being “inspired.”
That last one, about being “inspired.” That one’s a doozy. Where is the line drawn between stealing and “copying.” And is copying even wrong? I know a lot of designers that are real stifflers about the whole copying thing. I mean, there’s always been that saying floating around: Imitation is the highest form of flattery.
But I see some people treat it as some kind of personal insult.
I myself am not afraid to admit that I am incredibly lax with my crediting/ etc. Just look at the terms of service on Relentless Designs. I credit the dickens out of everything I make because confrontation emails and vegetables happen to be things I really dislike waking up to, but I don’t really expect and/or care for reciprocation.
I have but one argument for my side of the case: I pick my battles.
Okay, so let’s imagine the worst. Some guy completely rips off my design and says “Yeah, I did it. It looks sexy, don’t it?” and everyone is like “yeah it’s awesome” and then someone finally goes “hey i think that chick at Relentless stole your layout.”
Then it gets even worse, that guy’s lackeys start calling me a thief and therefore my name is forever soiled blah blah.
Is my life over? no
did i lose any money over it? no
do people think i’m a lying, cheating, dirtmonkey? yes
do i care? not really.
i mean, my close friends and i will trust that i do not steal and they’ll know the truth. when it comes to web design, a thief will always be revealed when he attempts to make another layout that most definately sucks.
I get a lot of guff for being so carefree about the whole credit/link back crap. But it’s HONESTLY not a big enough deal for me.
A while back someone was caught copying a layout of mine. I was then shown about five other copiers of this same design. All I could do was laugh at the horrible editing they’d done and get on with my day. I sent them all emails going “nice try! =)” and went back to dinner.
a couple of people who’d allegedly “stolen” this design were completely petrified that i found out and emailed them and sent their apologies swiftly. which was nice of them.
in another example, some girl made a layout very strikingly similar to one i’d made. they weren’t spitting images but the elements were there and it was very obivous that she was “inspired” by my work.
a couple of acquaintances of mine were like “aren’t you gonna get her? aren’t you gonna bust her out?”
i said no, and i got a lot of odd responses. nobody understood where i was coming from.
i ain’t gonna lie. i get inspired all the time. i even admit to it in my portfolio all the time. does that make me some big, bad crook?
can you put andy warhol at fault for “stealing” the image of a soup can?!
can you yell at michelangelo for using David in a statue because he’s a real guy?
trust me. i’ve tried the whole “make noise about a copier” angle. it ended up in a lot of frustration, tears, and enemies than i had the time for.
once upon a time, i found this chick with a very similar layout to one i’d made. i called her out on it and she said she’d done no such thing.
then she went to the photographer of the image that we both used and the photographer emailed me saying “she did not steal your image.”
yeah, like you’d know, buddy.
and after that, she displayed my IP address on her web page, along with some of my friends for her friends to harass.
that violates a million amendments.
and there’s only like. twenty something amendments.
including the one about the right to bear arms.
that’s just a lot more pain and suffering than i’m willing to or wanting to go through ever again, and for what? so she can take down some layout that KIND OF looks like mine?
screw that, i’ve got bigger fish to fry.
tastier ones, too.
bottom line is. riddle me this, batman, am i SO wrong for not being a nazi about the theft issues, or are there just plain more important things to worry about?
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