Dec 26, 2024
seen from United States
seen from Russia
seen from Türkiye
seen from Poland
seen from Türkiye
seen from United States
seen from United States
seen from United States
seen from United States
seen from Croatia
seen from United States
seen from Malaysia
seen from United States
seen from Canada
seen from United States
seen from Poland
seen from Australia
seen from United States
seen from Indonesia
seen from Malaysia
hello you said you don’t like reposts; I found this post of yours on Insta:
https://www.instagram.com/p/CYohEetLu8C/?utm_medium=copy_link
(I’m happy to comment + let them know, or you can too!)
- @akindofmagictoo
Thank you so much for letting me know! I'm not on the writing community on Instagram, so I don't actually ever know whether something of mine is being reposted. This is definitely something that I will be looking into taking down.
For anyone reading this, please know that I explicitly have said that I do not allow my posts to be reposted onto other websites or blogs in my FAQ. I have always declined people requesting to repost; if you see a post of mine on Instagram, Tumblr, Facebook or anywhere, it is being reposted without permission.
If you see anything of mine on other sites, please, please, please let me know!
Does anyone have any knowledge on how to handle this? I'm thinking of DMing them requesting them to take it down before escalating to a copyright violation request if it isn't taken down.
I'm suddenly realizing that I'm going to have to make a Writing Instagram account since I don't want to reveal my personal Instagram for privacy purposes 😰
I find it really telling that even after their “apology” (which was really weak and seemed more like barely admitting to their problems and sweeping it all under the rug), Anto still has the evidence up on his tumblr.
He can’t say “I don’t accept your apology because it sounds weak and fake and barely takes any real responsibility...” without sounding like a jerk to certain people. (Even if it’s true.)
There’s a difference between saying:
* Okay I finally admit I might have made a mesh that looks almost identical to yours and it might come across as copyright infringement oops sorry about that...and that it took so long to admit...
VS
* I am deeply sorry to the communities I hurt. Not just those who play the sims, but the creators on secondlife whose work I directly stole and edited and claimed as my own. I was not right to deny the claims against me when I knew they were true. From now on I am going to hold myself to a higher standard and apologize to those who I have hurt.
See the thing that rings false about Sonya’s apology is the claim that they didn’t “steal” the mesh but copied it side by side. This rings hollow because of all of the evidence posted by Anto and others that literally shows how IDENTICAL the “Sonyasims” meshes are to the original meshes. Yes, there are some minor differences, but they are few and the similarities are way too uncanny for it to be copied.
In my profession I deal a lot with kids who “trace” artwork and pass it off as their own. One of the biggest red flags is the artwork being too similar to the original. Why? Because if you’re “eyeballing” the work and drawing (aka copying from a reference image) there will be enough noticeable differences for it to not look exactly like the original. Lines might not be as smooth or straight, proportions might be slightly off, details missed. A traced image, however, looks 95% or more like the original with only a few details missed most of the time.
And sonyasims work, based on the screenshots and video evidence compiled, looks like a traced work I’d get from one of my kiddos.
See, there IS a difference between taking someone’s work directly and tracing and using it as a reference for a new work (particularly if you are in the process of learning how to do an art form). Usually if you are not making serious money (I.E you only sell your eyeballed work to a few friends/family members that want one vs trying to make a “brand” and sell it professionally) you can (normally) get away with eyeballing work and not changing it too much. (While it might not be 100% in line with copyright, this is commonly done at the beginners/student level — ex: a student selling a work they did in class at an art show that was heavily derived from a reference image to a friend/teacher.)
But when you decide you want to be a “professional” artist, you have to be able to take a reference image and remix and change it enough that it is a new work in its own right. Copying a reference alone won’t cut it. You have to make it different enough that people can’t come after you for it thinking you lifted a good portion of it from another work in any form. Lots of professional artists have had issues with this, a recent case being Jake Parker, the founder of Inktober, who was accused of plagiarizing from another artist’s how to draw book.
Sonyasims cannot claim ignorance about where the inspiration for their mesh came from. They can’t claim they were only copying the meshes of Anto and others for practice or as cc for their own game. They blatantly put it on their patreon, and claimed that the edited mesh was their own. They tried to be a “professional” cc maker by taking the work of others, editing it a slight bit, and selling it as their own under their own “brand”.
When called out on it, they denied it until they were blue in the face, even throwing out wild suggestions on how they’d “prove” their innocence. All this did was make people more upset, because in light of all the evidence shared....sonyasims’ denials rang hollow.
So what can we ask ourselves and learn from this?:
1) How are we as a community going to deal with “creators” who are blatantly stealing meshes from other sites and creators? I’m not just talking secondlife, I’m also talking turbosquid, imvu, sketchfab, and other 3D sites and places where people take and/or buy meshes and then resell them as their own sims 4 content. As I’ve detailed in one of my past posts, many of these sites don’t actually allow you to sell their meshes for 3D worlds like the Sims 4. And many sims 4 creators don’t inform the original mesh creators about how their mesh is being resold.
How are we going to deal with this? Because this is a bigger problem than just Sonyasims. Many high profile CC creators are VERY guilty of fully converting entire sets from 3D modeling sites to “sell” as their cc content and the community turns a blind eye to it because we want pretty things for our game and don’t think about where they come from. It’s easier to just assume that person made them....even if they are amazingly able to “crank out” tons of surprisingly high quality content on the daily...(almost as if they didn’t have to mesh much at all...🤭).
2) What actions should be required of those who have violated the community’s trust? At what point will they be “forgiven”?
If Sonyasims wants to rebuild trust in the community they will have to show that they deserve it. They have two options. Either try to find more obscure meshes to steal that people won’t recognize, or actually mesh stuff themselves and show they are sorry for their actions. I hope they choose the second, but at what point does the community have to forgive someone who’s wronged it? I think of Savvysweet, who although a majority of the community loves and still supports even with the incident earlier this year, still gets hateful asks and comments from others. What should a simblr do when they’ve been proven to have wronged the Sims 4 CC community? What steps should they take to show true remorse?
3) What do we, as a community value? Do we value having “pretty stuff” in our games, regardless of how it got there and what creative individual’s rights are stepped on? Do we value having a system of paywalls and exclusives where only those who have more can access the creations of the creative community? Do we desire an open source and sharing community where creatives come together and learn and share resources freely while respecting each other? These are all important questions for us to ask as we continue to move forward from this. While this is not the first time a creator has been called out for stealing meshes, this is one that has gained a lot of attention. And while I agree that they deserve the negative attention and consequences that come with their actions, I also feel that if we as a community are going to publicly hold them accountable for it, we need to examine others who are doing the same thing. Because it’s up to us to decide what we want our creative space to look like, and feel like. So chew on these questions, ponder them. If you have an opinion on them, I’d love to know. They’re just questions to consider, because I sure don’t have an answer.
Report anonymously video material you suspect to be child sexual abuse to the Finnish Hotline
THIS IS VERY IMPORTANT, THIS HAS BEEN HAPPENING FOR YEARS!
Odd, Grok posted a spam link instead of something useful when asked about copyright lawsuits
Has he been programmed to spread misinformation about this particular topic?
I'll leave that for an interested legal party, it doesn't come under my own purview as an observer
But with all of these AI training copyright lawsuits going on, it does make you wonder what dataset they used to train Grok that they haven't disclosed, given his previous mood swings its definitely public posts on twitter
I wonder what else people post on twitter, curious
Lol Grok exposed twitter for intentional misinformation
Upset my Mum by informing her of art theft...
My Mum currently seems to be annoyed with me because she was asking if I wanted to do a diamond painting along with her from a website she sent me a link to (they have a 3 for 2 offer on) and I spotted some images I recognised from elsewhere, such as a product photo of a Me To You bear which are trademarked and generally they only sell their products to greetings card companies and places like that. And don’t license them to be used without including details of the trademark. Then I spotted another image on the site which I remember seeing in someone’s amazon review for some gel pens! They had uploaded the image which they’d coloured in a colouring book page of in those gel pens. And on this diamond painting site, the image they used was of that same image complete with the shadow from the book binding! Like it was so obviously not the same kind of image as the rest offered and seemed a very odd choice. (The original review image wasn’t even coloured with any style in mind, it was coloured to show all the colours available and how they worked in a colouring book).
So I look into the site and they claim to be located in the UK, especially on their trip advisor reviews - they say “Oh we are in the UK, just our manufacturers are in China and Asia and so that’s why the products get shipped from there”. In other responses to peoples reviews they claimed that they are a UK company, but due to covid they are having stuff made in Asia because its safe. ??? What??
And then I found a digital artist leaving a review which hasn’t been responded to saying that his art has been stolen by the company and they haven’t responded to him trying to get them to stop.
I check the contact page and their “business address” is listed in an image not as text on the site. So I had to manually type the address in to find it. Also strange is their “UK” customer service team (no phone number) is available from 8am to 10pm (already strange hours in the UK) in Eastern Time. Which is ridiculous. We work on GMT here. Google maps showed that the building that they supposedly are registered at has newspapered up windows and doors. I looked up their supposed company name on Companies House, to find that its registered under a totally different address and it is apparently a wholesale clothing company. Not a company selling diamond art and paint by numbers and so on.
I decided to look up more about the site stealing art and found a deviantart thread talking specifically about that site (and others) stealing many artists work and not compensating them. And not responding to take down notices.
I thought it looked like a dodgy site and the FAQs say they may ask you to confirm your identity by sending a photo of your bank card showing your name and the last 4 card digits, and to scan a copy of your passport or driving license or country ID card. To prove your identity. But then claim that you can send them the scanned image with “identifying information hidden”. So why send it at all? Seems scammy.
Anyway, turns out my Mum had already ordered from them and was going to get some more - the ones she ordered had arrived fine and she was enjoying working on it.
But after I pointed out that they were image thieves, she got all angry at me. Saying:
“That's such a pity. How awful that it is happening. I wouldn't have even known about diamond painting if it wasn't for you. And I thought I was hooked! But I'm hating the idea of it now 😢 “
As if its my fault she chose to buy from that site. I shared one image I liked and one video of an artist on youtube who has worked with a reputable company who have paid her to use her art for diamond art kits. Then I found some sold at Hobbycraft by another reputable company (who have art made specifically for them to use, or who use out of copyright art like Van Gough stuff) and as Hobbycraft sell in the UK and the company are based in the EU, they have to abide by the law (copyright and health and safety), unlike China who flout it every chance they get.
And she’s acting like I’ve told her she can never do diamond paintings again.
NO. I said that particular company is bad, so are the others using the same stolen images. So if we buy from reputable places who actually pay artists for their work, its fine. But she seems to think I’m attacking her.
Its not her fault she thought they were legitimate enough and people definitely were getting their products. That’s not the issue. The issue is the images being stolen and profited off.
I didn’t mean to upset her with letting her know that. I was just trying to say why I wasn’t happy having anything from there myself after seeing that. I’m honestly surprised that my stepdad didn’t check the site out more. I think Mum had convinced him it didn’t matter which site you buy from as they are all mostly fronts for the same manufacturer anyway. Which is true there are two major companies wholesaling to the other places like Amazon.
And I’m trying to work out if I’m supposed to feel bad about this because I introduced her to the concept or what. Like am I responsible for her having bought from a shady site because I told her about the artform, shared a legitimate business (which she felt was too pricey) and a video? I’d be ok if she was angry at the company and angry that they had tricked her into buying stolen art. But her response was to say she wouldn’t be doing any diamond paintings if I hadn’t told her about it and now I’ve ruined it for her. I don’t understand!
IP Law Series: Common Violations
IP Law Series: Common Violations
Welcome to the latest installment in my blog series about intellectual property! Click here to read my introductory post, which is all about trademark versus copyright. Click here to read my last post, which is about fair use exceptions.
Today’s post is going to cover some of the most common violations in blogging and crafting, since those are my two areas of personal expertise.
Before we…
View On WordPress
Why are Christians websites going to Youtube to shut down atheist videos with false copyright violations?