I'd like to make a request...
POSTED BY: shinyhappyklin
UPDATED: Monday, December 12, 2005 05:18
VIEWED: 1915
PAGE 1 of 1
All of us designing shiny stuff for Browncoats have, of course, a limited amount of themes, quotes, and such to work with . That is a given. Therefore, many of us may be doing our own take on the same quote, and that's ok.
However, what is not so ok is people stealing "trade dress"; that is, use of the same or very, very closely related fonts and the same design layouts, maybe just adding a picture behind the text to make it look "different", and/or using an existing very recognizable design (my "mouth" blue and white design, or my "Browncoats" one from the store for instance) but putting another quote in it's place.
This does a couple of things: Keeps me from reusing a design concept I worked very hard on to add things to MY stores, because then I look like I'm the one who stole the design when it was really the other way around. Second, it's just not terribly creative -- the idea is to come up with your OWN designs that are DIFFERENT than other people's. Finally, it's technically illegal to steal trade dress. I have shut down people on eBay (no one here, they were just ripping off a bunch of stuff overseas) because of this.
Since we're all riding the ragged edge of copyright issues here, I'm not gonna make a big fuss. I figure there's enough room in the 'verse for all of our shiny designs. Just be considerate enough to not blatently take a design that is very recognizable and "tweak" it by changing the color or the quote used -- that's not good for karma, and really isn't terribly creative. 
Just my 2 cents -- the vast majority of stuff out there I think is very creative, but when other Browncoats send me emails telling me that "someone is stealing your stuff", well, it must be pretty obvious that you are doing it, and hopefully the karma thing will bite you. Nuff said.
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"We gotta go to that crappy town where I'M a hero..."
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Shiny stuff for Browncoats at:
http://www.cafepress.com/outtotheblack
http://www.outtotheblack.com
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Amen to that. I completely agree and would hope others are considerate enough to understand and knock it off. I am thinking of some stuff as well, but the copyright issue and some other stuff is holding me up right now. Anyways my 2cents. Hang in there and keep up the pressure.
Nothing like being a Big Damn Hero huh
Aw Gorram, not another night picket I gotta pass
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