Oh dear, this evening I found someone lifting my web copy. I’m flattered (well I’m not particularly flattered actually be honest), but have demanded the remove it within 24 hours.

I’ve been told I’m being very generous to not name and shame them and there is quite a lynch mob gathering amongst my business friends, and the word ‘legal action’ is being being bandied about.

Believe me once the 24hours is up I will indeed the naming and shaming them via this blog

Now, I understand that many people don’t understand copyright law, and in this case it’s a new ‘design firm’, but the principal designer has been working in the industry on an employed basis for 7 years…so there is no way they don’t know that copyright law forbides copying or reproduction of original works of art or literature, and that includes web copy.

I will copy and paste my own article here, written several years ago, which describes what copyright law is all about without going on about it too much;

All About Copyright

There isn’t an official registration procedure or place to register your copyright ownership, as copyright is an unregistered right requiring no official action to effect.

Copyright comes into effect immediately as soon as something is created, and whilst registering your ownership isn’t necessary it’s a good idea to mark your work with a copyright symbol ©.

The types of works protected by Copyright law include; original literary works such as novels, manuals, lyrics, original dramatic works, original musical works, and original works of art such as painting, engravings, photographs, sculptures and so on.

Any design work you commission and pay for as a client of Truly Ace is protected by Copyright – we pass our Copyright ownership of the original works onto you on receipt of payment for your project, and advise this in our terms and conditions at the time of your quotation.

Your Rights
As a Copyright owner you have a right to control the use of your original designs, and your rights commence as soon as the designs are recorded (including digitally), and you have paid for us to pass the Copyright over to you.

You will have a right to control any copying, adapting, distributing, or communication of your designs.

Protecting Your Copyright
We recommend that as soon as you become the Copyright owner of your commissioned designs that you take measures to prove you are the owner of the copyright – just in case a dispute should ever arise that requires you prove this in a court of law.

There is a simple method of proving the date you were the original owner of an original works – either save to disk, or print out (or ideally both) your design/s and post them to yourself.

This gives you a good measure of proof – provided you do not open the envelope (very important) – of the date that you became the owner of a certain artistic material.

Further Guidance

I’ll keep you updated on the situation….

Amanda
xx