IT came like that
Two days ago on November 10, 2019, someone contacted me via my website to tell me he saw one of my poster design online. Ok! Well! I continue to watch my other email and I decided to read the strange mail a second because it was enough to awake my curiosity.
Firstly; I was doubtful about the message in my mailbox. Is it a spam or not? I finally came with the feeling that Its content is too unconventional to be spam.
Secondly, I never received that kind of mail before, so, I decided to answer back because, at that point, I was too curious — as well as my ego, I agree! — and that pushes me to answer him.
So, I asked the man if it is possible to provide some pieces of information about the plagiarism and all the stuff he knows about.
They plagiarized my poster print it and sell it
The man answered that the reason why he contacted me was that he saw on the internet a duplication of my artwork. He saw one of my posters printed on a t-shirt by a “firm” based in Maldive. He noticed the plagiarism by surfing in Pinterest (my account) and saw my poster print on a t-shirt.
Then, he decided to contact me and except the fact that he identified a plagiarist who prints and sells my work, I still feel there is something that I don’t know behind this story. How can I know if I am not there in Maldive? — kidding.
There is something good behind that
They added text above Apollo’s face on a white rectangle. It looks relatively delicate, the idea is not bad, and that brings something new to the poster, as a cool refreshment.
The design looks good on t-shirts. I think I have to put them on t-shirts, posters and other apparel. This is a welcomed idea that is motivating me to do so. It wasn’t too bad to get plagiarized at a small level. That means they liked the design and wanted to see it print on t-shirts. It is such a sweet compliment to my work.
Some news about the intention of the plagiarist
Yesterday, November 11, 2019, someone else contacted me — this is the reason why I post today’s article one day later. I received a message on my Facebook account and then, I learned something new about the plagiarist!
He is a 17 years old man and the owner of the society based in Maldive Excalibr&Co. He has a dream he told me, he wants to create a Street Wear Brand. On its message, he apologized so much about the fact that he plagiarized my artwork without askingk the permission. He didn’t know about the copyright of artworks, and, in addition, he is not a designer. Feel strange about it because someone removed all my pieces of information from the poster, intentionally.
I believe that he never contact me if some people on the Internet, via Instagram, noticed the plagiarized artwork and wrote something to him about copyrighting infringement. They gave him so much pressure that he finally got in trouble with his own mind and decided to contact me for apologies.
He told me that he throws away the t-shirts with my design after being in trouble. He also says he only gets 96$ with the t-shirts and he will Paypal me the money. At that time, I was a bit doubtful about his real intentions. I answered that 50$ would fix all the issues — I think it is fair, I was thinking about the situation for a moment before to conclude that he also works for this money too.
Paranoia of the plagiarist
After that, I told him it is terrible to infringe the copyright of people’s artworks. I thought the story would end, but not — I am smiling. He told me a community on the internet makes him pressure about some legal issues.
One more time, I investigate my memory and deduct that the only person who can use legal issues is me, the copyright owner. He calmed down and asked me if he can publicly show our conversation. I said yes, it is ok.
To conlude about that story
He felt terrible and under pressure. I tried my best to calm him down until I got the idea to create a poster with its logo about Copyright. Use his logo will probably let know to those who pressure him that things are fixed.
The poster I made is named Under Copyright, this is the number 316 of the Daily Design Poster Challenge Apollo 365°. I made it for fix the issues with Excalibr&Co, so, you can stop blaming him because now, it is fine!
As the last word, I would like to say “inform yourself about copyrighting before to use images, artworks or anything else into a commercial project!
