Customers posting your art on FurAffinity

[foxwolf.livejournal.com]

Hey, just wondering if anyones had problems with their commissioners taking art that you drew or otherwise created and posted it on their fur affinity account. I have one customer whom I've done character sheets, a badge, an icon and most largely a fursuit for, all of which ended up on his fur affinity. I've asked him to at least give me credit in the comment area, which he did for less than half of them. However, it doesnt seem like anyone is reading that and he is getting 90% of the credit for the work, and has 30 people watching 'his' artwork when nothing that he has created himself is in the gallery, every last piece is mine. Just wondering what to do about this, I really dont want to tell him off for it or report him or anything, but I worked very very hard on everything there and I want credit for it.

Comments

[lilenth.livejournal.com]

You're supposed to have written permission, anyone can say they have permission but evidence is needed, and no he didn't provide the email addys. I should know, I checked every goddamn one and the argument he tried to use was that he held the copyrights because it was a collab, not a commission.

[thaily.livejournal.com]

Haha, a customer tells an artist "Work bitch, work!" and they think they're a crucial part of the creative process XD

[lilenth.livejournal.com]

Pretty much, this guy was like I own the character copyrights so it's a collab and I own half the copyrights.

Yeah because you can really call copyright on a generic gold dragon anthro. I spent several hours trying to explain trademark to him and he just got more shrill about how I was being nasty by telling him that "owning" the dragon didn't entitle him to redistribute the work.

[thaily.livejournal.com]

He can copyright the character, but he'll need to have an accurate character sheet/description and fork over cash to have it registered. When he does he'll have a form which proves he has copyrighted it.
But even if he does, the image's rights still belong to the artist who made it unless they came to an agreement which specifically mentioned he was getting the rights, and if he did he'd probably pay a lot more than 50 bucks per commission.
I say that guy deserves all the shit he can get from breaking copyright laws for as long as it takes for him to get it.

[lilenth.livejournal.com]

He hasn't got that as far as I know, and it probably wouldn't hold up in court anyway, he's got a really generic golden dragon morph. Also characters are only copyrightable as part of a larger work from my understanding, for a trademark, he'd need a iconic character.

Would you like the honour of helping report him again? http://dragoniade.deviantart.com/gallery/scraps/ He's uploaded more stuff in his scraps again, I reported them once before but for some reason they didn't get deleted. XD

[thaily.livejournal.com]

Probably because DA is run by mean, spiteful little children who de-mod anyone who actually enforces the rules and makes them look bad.

[lilenth.livejournal.com]

Are you referring to me, Jark or someone else as the people who actually enforced the rules? It's kind of confusing when some people are up in arms about what they did to me, some are up in arms over Jark, some are upset by both and some people don't give a damn either way.

[kitsuken.livejournal.com]

I'm sending him a query about if he has permission. If not then I'll help report him

[kitsuken.livejournal.com]

That's trademarking the character, not copyrighting it. copyright applies to an actual piece of data, whether a painting, a story or a piece of code. Trademarking applies to registering the design of something as a representative of yourself or your company which, as you mentioned, requires money. It also requires that there be original defining features about the character, generics can't be trademarked.

Just a few technical details about the definition of copyright. Otherwise you're bang on the money

[kitsuken.livejournal.com]

Surprise surprise, he used this arguement again as a reply to my below mentioned query, that the rights were shared between the "owner" of the character and the artist and that all artists "know this". I've pointed out that he doesn't in fact own the character legally and if he wants to post he needs to get permission from the artists in writing as, without owning a trademark on the character, all rights are 100% the artist's.

[lilenth.livejournal.com]

The guy's apparently not too smart from what I've seen of his responses.

[kitsuken.livejournal.com]

Actually I see why he thinks the laws people keep quoting don't apply. Since copyright ownership is dictated by country of origin and he's not a US citezen he feels that his ownership of the character is covered by the Barne Convention.

As such, I linked him to a page detailing the items covered by barne and asked him which the artist is using :p

Oh, and he used that old urban legend about the woman suing for the matrix as an arguement too, althogh I don't know why because that *still* involves a physical work and not an "idea". So I linked the Snopes.com dismissal of the myth :D

[lilenth.livejournal.com]

This guy has even argued with dA -admins- people who are not only trained but who eat, sleep and breath copyright policies and knowledge of the berne convention.

He doesn't care if he's actually legally allowed to or not, he just wants to do what he wants to do and anyone who disagrees is a horrible person in his eyes.

[kitsuken.livejournal.com]

haha, he's not gonna like me then. I'm responding with 3 paragraphs minimum and references to legal sites, something he's going to get every time he tries to contradict me (unless he has a point of course)

[lilenth.livejournal.com]

I give it five minutes before you're blocked and reported for "harassment". XD

[kitsuken.livejournal.com]

Actually he's now gone the whiney bitch way and said he's "tired of arguing". He also says that DA "chooses" to apply US law instead of the barne convention (wtf? and he's not even covered by that either!) and so if they continue to delete his images he'll keep uploading them. He then accused me of reporting him on two occasions (which I hadn't, and I doubt DA tells you who reported you)

I replied with "It wasn't me who reported you those times, but since you're unwilling to contact the original artist for permission I'll be adding mine to the tally" *reported*

[lilenth.livejournal.com]

Figured as much, he doesn't care about the truth, he cares only about what he wants to be the truth.

I'd have told him actually they don't, dA has no choice in the matter, the servers are physically located in california therefore the servers and contents are covered by californian and American laws. It's not a choice they can make, they certainly couldn't ignore the law, in some places under 18 nude models are legal but dA would be shut down if they allowed under 18 nudes because of American law.

Dragonaide likes reporting people who contradict him btw, if he can't find a reason, he'll make one up and carry on about it in an attempt to get the person in trouble.

[kitsuken.livejournal.com]

Well, he can't claim harassment now anyway. I sent a note saying "sorry for preaching copyright law. I was right, but it's not my place to point it out to others". Still reported him though :p

[kitsuken.livejournal.com]

Oh for the love of... I end the discussion and send an apology for ranting on about copyright law because he says he's had enough of arguing, and he sends me a note continuing the arguement -.-;

He ranted on about how "the damage was already done since it was reported" and he would have to "start all over again". he then rambles on about an "implicit agreement" between artist and commissioner that allows it and gave a link to Canadian copyright law

I said I din't apologise for reporting but for preaching, and that he still broke DA T&C. Oh, and the site he links includes the same arguements I made based on the US law, and that I wasn't going to discuss any more.

Seriously, I'm now tempted to watch this guy so I can *keep* reporting this stuff. No wonder he's had "65 arts pulled, 65 commissions" is he acts like this to people trying to help him avoid trouble -.-;

[lilenth.livejournal.com]

I personally get a warm glow from the thought of him having "to start all over again" Last time I saw him, he'd had 65 pieces removed because they weren't his, argued with the admin who responded to his temper tantrum, harassed the admin repeatedly and encouraged his friends to harass the admin because the admin wouldn't agree with him and restore the 65 pieces as he demanded.

I've seen some temper tantrums in my time, but for sheer self entitlement that's beats most of them.

He may try to pull "harassment" anyway, he screamed that I was insulting him last time I talked to him because I pointed out that there wasn't anything distinctive enough about dragonaide to apply a trademark to.