Copyright Law

[scotto313]

OK, If you have missed the drama going on in the Online Leagues Forum, consider yourself fortunate. As for the less fortunate souls, the whole ordeal has me questioning my involvement with online leagues and all OOTP forums. I enjoy doing logos for people and I get satisfaction out of helping people with this fine game. However, PLEASE BE ADVISED, most of the images I do are at least partially lifted (stolen) from others. Some of these may or may not be copyrighted. I am not profitting from them and I intend no harm. I have an Altruistic nature. I have been verbally assaulted by members of this ostensibly respectable league. While I had no part in the web site design, I did do most of the logos and I really like the league and its people. I am a thief and should most likely be punished by the likes of the great FOBL. Where I go from here, I have not yet decided but, I am once again disappointed by how we treat each other.

[Le Grande Orange]

Well, some folks are possessive of their creations regardless of how they are used, and have the right to be if they so choose.

The only things I can suggest are:

1) If you create a logo that includes someone else's work, acknowledge that up front when you present your logo, and credit the other person if you know who the original author was. Depending on the visibility of the other person's work in your creation, you may want to contact them up front about using their work as a basis for your own. If you explain what it is you're doing I suspect most won't have an issue with you using or modifying their work, provided you credit the original source.

2) If someone objects to your use of their work in your logo, then I would suggest politely responding with your side of the story. You can then say you will credit them appropriately, and if that isn't sufficient, then you will withdraw the logo. Having respect for someone else's work is important, so if they want you to remove the logo because their work is included in it you should do that.

3) Create your logos entirely from scratch. This is what I did in the ones I created a couple of months back, but of course, doing it this was tends to be more labour intensive and time consuming. However, the results belong entirely to you so there are then no ownership questions.

Authorship rights, regardless of whether you are profitting or not, are important, so it just better to respect the creative work done by others up front. So, if you want to use or modify their work it's best to get permission first. As I said, I don't think most will object if asked. And don't underestimate the joy of creating a logo completely on your own; it does take longer but at least you know the work is all yours.

[Randall]

Originally posted by Le Grande Orange
And don't underestimate the joy of creating a logo completely on your own; it does take longer but at least you know the work is all yours.

Unless your attempts look like the work of a 4 year old...
Not that mine do...
True, they are up on my mothers fridge, and when asked, she claims I'm 4, but that is just a joke, right?

[Cuss16]

as long that you are not gaining any money from this and that you are not producing the logos in vector format you have nothing to worry about. So keep up the awsome work!

[Eugene Church]

scotto:

You are a fine, decent person whose only intention was to help others...and that you certainly have done. You did not knowingly use something that you knew was illegal to use. I think almost all of the logo creations are gotten from other sources, at least in part. So, I'm also party to this, because I use these great creations that you and many others have so graciously designed. I have even tried to make donations to the designers and no one wants to accept it. They all replied they enjoy making logos and want to give something back to the OOTPB Community.

As Le Grande Orange stated: If you use something that belongs to someone else, just give them credit. If they complain about you using it, then apologize and stop using it.

As per Cuss16, apparently you have not done anything illegal.

Don't let this event get you down and rob you of the joy and satisfaction you get from doing all of us favors...from which we get joy and satisfaction. You keep on doing logos.

If someone doesn't want their graphics used, they should post it on their website and make it clear that you need permission to use them.

[Subby]

Jesus.

If you whine this much over fake baseball, what do you do when the supermarket is out of super-absorbent tampons?

That said, I wouldn't take any of that stuff personally. The posts are just ones and zeroes and completely meaningless in real life. If you enjoy doing logos and graphics, keep up the good work. I wouldn't let the occasional ravings of a bunch of prison-work-releasers get you down.

And for the love of Louie Anderson, please tell me you were being sarcastic when you referred to FOBL as respectable.

Phew. Just checking.

[Shub]

Hey scotto, you are one of the few left around here that still does logos and all that, and you do a great job, and I know that everyone appreciates your efforts and your work.

We all steal bits and pieces from others. I've only done a handful of complete original work, I do just like everyone else- I go to logoserver or a smiliar site, or do an image search on google, then I doctor it to make it a bit different. Since none of us are getting paid to do this, and we aren't using them in a commercial sense, then there really is no problem. No problem unless the original creator of the artwork comes back and says "hey I wish you wouldn't use my design" and then we should ditch the logo. It all comes down to ethics, basically.

As far as everyone arguing about copyright law and website design stealing, I'm not going to get into their war, but all this talk about law and lawsuits and all that jazz is ridiculous. As long as Microsoft lets you right click and "view source" there will be a hard time getting anyone in court over stealing some code. Anything on a web page that was created by the author of that web page is supposively protected by copyright law. None of us has ever seen this mysterious copyright law in righting, but we all believe and know it exists. HTML tags are not protected under any kind of law, so you could rip-off the entire Microsoft site, so long as you change the images and content contained within it. They cannot copyright tags.

Most people probably don't even realize that most of the fonts we use in our logos are somebody's property, and using them commercially is illegal.

My point is, don't stop what you are doing. If by some chance you used a portion of someone else's creation and they tell you that they would rather you didn't, then of course you shouldn't, but I haven't seen that happen around here yet, and I doubt it will. I've had people modify my logos, which were modified from something else to begin with, and it doesn't bother me. I take it as a compliment, actually, that somebody thought my work was good enough to use again.

Every logo that you have posted has always been recieved with "thanks! great work scotto!" and for anyone to comment on your work being stolen or copyrighted is just as much of a criminal as you may be, because their league or their website is probably loaded with them too.

So keep it up scotto, OOTP6 will be around before too long and we'll have more logo requests than ever, and people will be counting on you to help enhance this great game we have.

[Eugene Church]

Very well put, Shub.

[CubsFan915]

Originally posted by scotto313
I am a thief and should most likely be punished by the likes of the great FOBL.

Nah. When we express ourselves like that, it's really nothing but a demonstration of penis envy. Subby, especially, wishes he had one.

Though I don't have the slightest clue about Malificent and Scarecrow. They're just friggin' lunatics.