Of copycats, outright thieves, copyright and legal stuff..

I guess I am finally ready to write this post. Especially in view of the latest "happenings" - it seems that even Christi Friesen has been the subject of being copied shamelessly. I will not name any names in this article.

I will not hide the fact that I am very opinionated about this, because 1. in the past I lost money due to people with no ethics who paid for my lessons (they were in another field, not related to polymer clay or even art) then once they had them they went ahead and presented them as their own work and distributed them first for purchase then freely; and 2. I actually had a friend (not BFF, just friend) who worked for close to a decade to develop a specific art technique that she presented to a small circle before fully launching it to the world. The next day, one of the people who were present at the presentation went ahead and launched it as being their own. The original artist committed suicide that evening. It doesn't matter if you think it was over reacting, that it wasn't an issue to die over, the fact is that the artist was so hurt to see her work of almost a decade stolen away so shamelessly, that before everybody else who had been present at the small presentation could come out and call out the thief and do any kind of damage control, she felt that it life was not worth living anymore and killed herself. It happened a little over 20 years ago, not in the US, but please, take this as food for thought.

Let me first start by explaining the whole concept of tutorials vs work in progress (WIP) vs artwork presentation. It should be a no-brainer that, while works in progress and artwork should obviously never be copied, tutorials are out there to teach people, and people are supposed to copy what is in the tutorial in order to learn how to do it. That is why us artists do the tutorials. So you can learn from it. So you can do what we do.

But it's one thing to practice a technique presented in a tutorial and another to present that technique as being yours.Why is it done? To be very honest, my raw and blunt opinion is that the people who do it are not artists. They cannot come up with anything interesting of their own so they have to steal in order to make their work interesting. Also, people who do it have a specific psychological profile that has as main characteristic a low self esteem and self-image issues. But that's just my opinion and it's derived from my knowledge and former academic education in psychology. There is also the issue of the monetary gain - after all, youtube channels are monetized, and the more people you attract to your channel, the more ads, and the more money you make. So yes, there are layers and layers in the motivation behind these acts.

There is, of course, the fact that we live in a world that now has a very large population. And it is very possible that more than one person comes up with the same idea independently from each other (I hope that makes sense). But when someone habitually "discovers something new" within a month of someone else (and usually it's the same "someone else") presenting it, that is no coincidence.

The fact is, everybody suffers from this behavior. The original artist may lose money, is faced with a lot of stress, does not get the recognition they deserve, it severely affects them emotionally. The ultimate consumer not only is mislead (and most of them are not educated enough to know what is going on) but also starts learning that it's ok to behave unethically, it's ok to steal.

It is also very true that the growth of the internet has the unfortunate effect of blurring, for some people, the lines between what is and not permitted. Not only permitted but between what is and not legal. To be very honest, I keep being flabbergasted over the way some peoples' minds work. For them it's alright to take something that doesn't belong to you. To give you an example, I was at one point, recently, in a forum where the discussion was exactly about this, someone purchasing a tutorial then presenting publicly and freely the technique taught in that tutorial. Everybody was all over them and calling them out, and then this solitary voice chimes in "well thank you for doing that, I hate how artists make you pay for that, we should all just share freely". I asked her if it was ok to go in your neighbor's house and steal their TV because you liked it and you thought you should be able to watch your movies on a best quality TV. She said "oh no, that is different". Well, it's not different at all.

Unfortunately, the whole growth of the internet and the social networking did effect in the most unfortunate way many aspects of our society. Ethics (or to be more precise the lack of it) is one of the most affected of all.

On this note, and to show you how blurred these lines are in the average internet user's mind, I will give you an example of my own experience. A few years ago, I posted a few photos of some of my watercolor works. One of them was of the Celtic goddess Morrigan with her two ravens. Right away someone piped up with "oh I love those ravens, I will show this to my tattoo artist and I'll have a tattoo done with them". I immediately pulled down the photos and told her that her tattoo artist can contact me and I'll be happy to make a design for them; for a price. She accused me of being a greedy bitch, and stated that artists should just give away stuff because "it's just art". Yes. Well that taught me the lesson of never posting again any of my works on the internet without a watermark across the whole photo. 

I always try not only to reference artists that inspire me, but actually try to educate my viewers a little about all kinds of art history and facts. Not only that, but to give you an example, I know how to do beautiful Monarch butterfly canes. But I also know several artists that have paid tutorials on how to do a Monarch butterfly cane. I might at one point make a paid tutorial about it, but I will never post a free tutorial about it. Even if I'm sure that the way they do it is most likely different than mine, it would make them lose money if I would be to post a free tutorial about it. And if at any time any of my tutorials would actually present something that is in another artists "paid" portfolio that I'm not aware of, once I am aware of that, I will pull down my own free tutorial. It may happen - see what I wrote above about different people coming up with the same thing independently - and it is possible to not even be aware of it, as the internet is so big, but as I said before, it's one thing when it just happens and another thing when it's a habit.

Now take a minute and think about this. And think also, how it would affect you if you knew that the tutorial you are watching (or reading) was stolen from someone else. Would that affect you in any way, or you wouldn't care? Would that affect the opinion you have of the artists who made the tutorial, or would it not, and you're just happy that you learned something new, for free?

I will stop here, and will give you a few links to read what others think and wrote about this.

First it's a wonderful explanatory article from the Blue Bottle Tree

Then another wonderfully written expose on this subject written by Harriete Estel Berman

And how artists feel when they are subject to being copied, on the Jewelry Making Journal.

On this subject, what happens on EBay.

Another great article on Polymer Clay Daily.

I think this is enough, you can find many references and opinions by doing a simple Google search.
I hope I gave you a little food for thought. And more understanding.

And I'll see you all in a little bit, on my live "wrapping up July and what happens in August" live event.