Removed thread about Copyright protection

[Daryl185]

as a multiyplayer online gamer I have seen forums turn into WWIII literally over suggestions a player is/was using a game hack or cheat those forums turned ugly my greatest hope here is this thread will soon run its gammet and die down and be a thing of the past befor freindships get ruined and folks banned trust me it happens, what certain parties have or haven't done is not for us as a whole to judge that is up to the Courts and Lawyers to figure out, I know the Scrolling Community as a whole has been dealt a blow by what has transpiered but it will press on with those of us here and in other forums ext...., like a snowball going down hill it gathers more as it goes down hill and I am afraid we have not seen the end of this.

Happy Scrolling to all my SSWC Family

[J D Hillberry]

Originally Posted by Daryl185

...what certain parties have or haven't done is not for us as a whole to judge that is up to the Courts and Lawyers to figure out, I know the Scrolling Community as a whole has been dealt a blow by what has transpiered but it will press on with those of us here and in other forums ext...., like a snowball going down hill it gathers more as it goes down hill and I am afraid we have not seen the end of this. Happy Scrolling to all my Scroll Saw Woodworking & Crafts Family

I know this thread is getting long and most people don't have time to read through everything. I feel there is a good reason to make this information known in forums like this. To reiterate,
Unless a law suit gets enormous publicity, no one ever knows about it. Even less people know about it if the demands of the cease and desist letter are met. The only thing the public sees, is different products coming and going. It is business as usual.
My images have already been removed from the offending sites. If it weren't for this thread, your scroll saw community would have no idea that there was ever a problem.
J. D.

[Marsha]

Please people, let's not get ugly here and start throwing mud. This has been a very informative thread, and everyone's comments & opinions are very valid and valuable, but let's not get personal.
Marsha

[Sue Chrestensen]

It is my impression that many will learn from this thread, including publishers and individual designers. Finger pointing and blame will accomplish nothing other then to trivialize and minimize this issue.. with the help of the many artists that are aware of or directly involved in this or future issues of copyright protections I would hope that we can expand our world beyond ourselves and Jeff Zaffino and look at the broader picture which will continue to have the basic problem of theft.. there was a thread in Mr. Hillberry's forum which spoke to the issue of orphaned work, new laws being written and the issues of international copyright... perhaps it's time we look at that and discuss what we can do in the future rather then trash and re-trash the Zaffino offense.. we know what has happened..can we do something a bit more pro -active at this point?

[PuzzledMoose]

Well said Sue and Marsha.....

Originally Posted by Jediscroller

I honestly have no clue what you're referring to in any of my posts. Nowhere have I condoned stealing someone's work nor would I ever condone such actions. Having worked as a photographer I fully understand how important copyrights are and have a decent understanding of them as well.

I will quote myself here:
"I understand the frustration of having work stolen but again, this is about 1 designer. To read this thread gives the impression that it's all of us and I take offense at that implication."

Kevin,

Kewl, I think I was just lost there a bit. My apologies! I've been up now for over 30 hours.. I might be more than losing it...

-Jon

[Neal Moore]

Mr. Hillberry..I just finished reading post #46 on your forum and would like to offer my sincere thanks for your comment. We, in the scroller's community, are for the greater part not a lot different than our friends in the drawing and painting communities. We do it because we love it and it provides a lot of different ways to express ourselves. We have folks who enjoy doing pierced portraits, segmentation, intarsia, compound cutting, fretwork, puzzles and a world of other expressions that are made possible by our favorite tool....the scrollsaw. If you read some of our old posts you'll find that we as a group frown down soundly on the theft of anothers work and take that offense seriously. That said, I'll beat this horse no further...LOL!!! Thanks again for your post and I truly hope things work out well for you.

[Jediscroller]

Mr. Hillberry,
Thank you for your post both here and on your forum. I have deleted mine here as it served no purpose.

I wish no one ill will here and if it appeared so for that I apologize.
I'll blame it on my Irish temper.

I know firsthand how angering it is to find something of yours pilfered.

Respectfully,

Kevin Daly

[Mike_Sibley]

Originally Posted by CharlieDearing

Mike Sibley, am I understanding correctly that if I were to ask for permission to use your drawings to make patterns to sell (with your name as credit for original art and royalties, etc) this wouldn't be allowed?

On the contrary I do permit use of some of my work. Simply stated:

Permission will never be granted for the use of any Limited Edition work (mainly dogs in scenes). They are exactly what they say they are - limited to a numbered series of copies. I seek at all times to preserve the rarity value for my collectors. I publish these myself and own the copyrights.

Open Edition works (head-studies) are available under commercial licence through my publisher BERJAYA who own the copyrights. We also occasionally permit their use for non-profit applications. Past examples have been website decoration, headstone embellishments and so on. Whether a license woud be a viable proposition for you depends on your expected level of sales, as the fee is fixed and set to accommodate full commercial production. Items licensed in the past have included such products as watch faces and mugs.

I don't permit the use of any image in my "unpublished" gallery, as these are mainly private commissions.

That said, you can always email me (mike@sibleyfineart.com) or Mr Bacon at Berjaya (berjaya@hotmail.co.uk) as a certain amount of flexibility exists.

I hope that helps to answer your query.

MIKE
www.SibleyFineArt.com

[chrispuzzle]

I don't want to comment on the Zaffino case. It seems clear that there is a case to answer but how it will be answered is for the courts to decide.

Mr Hillberry said: "First - To use another artist/photographer work in the creation of patterns or designs for resale to third party users (customers and craftsmen) REQUIRES a documented hard copy (on letter head stationary) agreement that states the full terms and scope of the use of that image as well as any and all financial compensation. That document must be hand signed and dated by both parties. It's called a Copyright Licensing Agreement and is a standard document in any form of reproduction for other peoples original work.

So... emailing an artist asking if you can use their painting/picture/drawing in your scroll saw work is not the same nor equivalent to having obtained legal written permission to reproduce a derivative of that work for resale. In fact, such an email is misleading and deceptive! What it implies is that you want to use an image for your own personal work to display inside of your own home, not for sale."

This however is surely wrong. Verbal contracts and email contracts can and do exist. The danger in relying on them is that it's difficult to prove your case later. However, if I send an email asking for permission to make copies of a work and sell them for $100 each and pay a royalty of 10% on each sale, and you agree to that in an email reply, it's a contract. Indeed the company I work for routinely executes non-disclosure and confidentiality agreements with major US corporations using email and electronic signature. Very glitzy lawyers on both sides are happy with that.

What I am getting at here is that if a person makes an agreement, he can't turn round and claim that the agreement is invalid just because it was made verbally or by email. What matters is whether an agreement was made or not, and the rest is all about how to prove it after the event.

I am aware that Mr Hillberry is saying that no such agreement ever existed, either verbal or by email. It is certainly true that using a formal Copyright Licensing Agreement with hand signatures and everything spelled out in a way that makes courts comfortable is wise.

However, if you give your word on something, you should keep it, and not say "Aha! wrong letterhead! Doesn't count!"