Stolen images sold on ebay. Better check!

[pawtraitart]

Hello. I've become the victim of image theft. A seller on eBay has stolen my images and has put them on her lightswitch covers. I recognize the art of other artists in her selection, but I just can't put a name to them all. You can check out seller id: printshopqueen and see if your art has been stolen. Hopefully not.

-Michelle

[Lady Rando]

Holy cow! She's violating a whole bunch of copyrights. Did you report her to ebay? Which one is the one with your art on it?

[pawtraitart]

Yes, I reported her to ebay and filled out a Vero form and all that. My images have since been removed from her auction items. Still, I'm sure she has inventory containing my images and has already sold things with MY work on them. It doesn't look like eBay will do anything to notify Coca Cola, the NFL, Disney, or the like. I'm trying to see if I can contact an appropriate individual from the big companies to notify them that their trademark images are being used against the copyright laws. *sighs* Some people just don't get it. The excuse this person gave was the standard "I didn't know it was your image". She obviously doesn't know copyright law AT ALL since she is also using all of those images from big companies.

[arlene]

please post this in internet sales too

[BTDogMom]

Michelle, I truly admire your work and I think it really really stinks that this type of thing happens - In a way seems like a compliment - but it's ignorance - so has anything come of this? Has the girl been kicked off e-bay? I'm just wondering whatever happened?

Thanks :D

[meriadoc]

nope : she's still there -
http://cgi6.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewSellersOtherItems&include=0&userid=printshopqueen&sort=3&rows=25&since=-1&rd=1

selling material that isn't her own....

[Lady Rando]

Yep, and she has 37 pages of copyright infringing work. Everyone might want to take a look and see if she's using your art.

[caviaporcellus]

Hi.

I've had a look and she is certainly selling a lot of stuff with copyrighted images on. I was aware that there are many people out there who will quite happily steal your work and try and make money on it themselves. For this reason, when I did my website, I put text across all my works as although it spoils the image slightly, it does deter people from downloading it.
I would do a thorough check on ebay as there may be other sellers doing exactly the same thing as she is.

Kath.

[Canis Lupess]

Haha, I looked through and came across a wolf image I am familiar with. I have a poster with that image on and the name of the photographer so I looked him up in google and have sent him a nice informative email with a link to the ebay item in question, haha.

I have seen another wolf image too and I think I recognize the actual wolf in it and if he is the same wolf, it will have been taken by Art Wolf, a wildlife photographer and I'll contact him too. :evil: :evil: :evil:

[Canis Lupess]

The second image was Art Wolfes and I have sent him an email too.

Had replies back from both of them saying they are going to look into the usage of their image.
The represetative for Art said they were going to contact the vendor and Ebay.

May this woman pay for her stealing.

[Marquisina]

I went to ebay to have a look at this woman's thievery and.... I don't know much about ebay, but why can't I see what the negative feedbacks are for her? And...why is she still allowed to have 817 items posted and considered a "powerseller"?She seems to have a lot of positive responses to her stuff, are people that naive? How would it be possible to educate "the masses" concerning copyright infringement, or do people even care? Looks to me like she's making a pretty good living off of other peoples work. It's just not right IMHO.

Marqui :confused:

[Smogryn]

I wrote this person to tell them that MOST of their images are owned by other people and what they are doing is illegal, this is the response...

ANYTIME someone sends us a notice of copyright infringement, whether Ebay or an individual, we remove that picture immediately. You have NEVER contacted us about this any pictures that are listed, and we then relisted them. We have people send us pictures from all over the country, we have no way to know, unless someone tells us, that it is a copyright infringement. Please send us any name of plates we have listed of your (or anyone you know, that is also copyrighted), and we will remove them.

So send em an email LOL.
I guess they don't realize ignorance is NOT a defense in the eyes of the law.

[Dave's in Florida]

HOLY COW! I found a switchplate with blue neon mushrooms, copyrighted by www.digitalblasphemy.com I have notified the artist of this infringement.

[MeijhanaKittie]

I read an interesting website the other day (and i wish I could remember it) about trademarks.

The person makes aprons/etc out of material purchased at Walmart. The gist is basically ...

Oh, wait, found the site!http://www.tabberone.com/Trademarks/trademarks.html

The gist is once it's on another item, that item can be used to make items. I forgot the exact terms.

But I realize what she is doing with the lightswitch covers/etc is wrong. Now, if she had purchased your picture, cut it up, and used it on the switchplate, that would be another story.

I have known people who buy greeting cards with the picture of artwork, and then make barrettes/pins/etc. out of them. I think that would fall under the same thing, but I know I couldn't print the picture off the internet and do it.

Fuzzy gray areas.

And I probably made no sense, as it's 5:01 am, and I haven't gone to sleep!

Mary :cat:

[Paintbrush74]

Quoted in part:

...Oh, wait, found the site!http://www.tabberone.com/Trademarks/trademarks.html
...
The gist is once it's on another item, that item can be used to make items. I forgot the exact terms.
...
But I realize what she is doing with the lightswitch covers/etc is wrong. Now, if she had purchased your picture, cut it up, and used it on the switchplate, that would be another story. ...

Mary :cat:


I've heard that it's legal to do that (cut up pictures for collages, etc.) But if the person sells it on the internet, she probably takes a picture of it and posts it in the auction. She has now make a copy of someone else's material. I wonder how that would play out.

Lenora

[Diyart]

The position of artists is relatively strong in Europe in case of copy right
violation. There is also an organisation that will follow the rights of individual artist and will recover fees from people who published without permission.

Is there something like that in the U.S. ? Possibly it is a good thing to send
violators directly an invoice for the use of the image and if they don`t pay
to sue them immediately.
The answer given to the email is an insult.. it just says we will use your images
until you find out and protest ..
best regards
Martin

P.S.: I have checked some auctions of printshopqueen. It is obvious that they use images without having the copyright permission from the artists.
I think it`s the best to report this to official institutions which take care about copyright in U.S.

[bluewater]

Has anyone considered posting Feedback for this seller?

Some neg feedback might correct this seller.

Hint to all: You can create a misc ebay acct. and then post feedback. Post neg feedback if the seller deserves it.

[MeijhanaKittie]

Has anyone considered posting Feedback for this seller?

Some neg feedback might correct this seller.

Hint to all: You can create a misc ebay acct. and then post feedback. Post neg feedback if the seller deserves it.

you cannot leave feedback for a person unless you have purchased from them. Otherwise, it would be a good idea to leave "warnings"...but then that could get overused, especially by those who just like to leave them for "no" reason.

Mary
:cat:

[MeijhanaKittie]

and now, they have added this to the bottom of their ads:

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
VERO MEMBERS
Plates are handcrafted and not mass produced.
Plates are created as a tribute only.
No rights are implied or given with respect to the images used.
If you have rights to an image we’ve used, and want the listing removed, please email us and we’ll remove the listing immediately.
Once an item has been removed we will not relist the item.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

I believe that if they sell someone's items without their consent, not only would this open up a major lawsuit capability, I think the person could send an invoice to this person stating that since they have used the image, they now have to pay for the use. You could charge $1000 or more, then take them to small claims court, I believe. Check it out! Check out their 30 day past, and also check out their feedback for others sold (you can only search for 30 days, but I think the auctions stays in feedback for 90 days!).

Mary
:cat:

[MeijhanaKittie]

and maybe I am wrong on this one, but they state they do not mass produce them, but then they have this statement:

We try to keep most items in stock, but sometimes due to the popularity of a particular plate, we may have to make it. For this reason, we will ship within 4 business days of payment.

Mary
:cat:

[fractalfingers]

This is in the seller's description:

"No rights are implied or given with respect to the images used.
If you have rights to an image we’ve used, and want the listing removed, please email us and we’ll remove the listing immediately."

LOL this person actually seems to think that you can use other peoples work legally UNLESS they tell you not to.. as opposed to reality when you MUST be told that you have permission.

maybe you can get a few other artists together and make it worth your while to file a lawsuit.. share the cost.. collect legal fees and damages later.

[fractalfingers]

Here's her contact info if you want to persue legal action.

http://www.printshopqueen.com/
hostname: webbuilder.covad.net
IP: 63.65.120.38
shopqueen@covad.net
phone: 510-988-1212
fax: 800-555-1212

Eliana Torres Design
544 Grand Ave.
Oakland, CA 94763

[teresasart]

It never ceases to amaze me how many people think they can claim ignorance of copyright law, as if that makes it all ok....

There was a problem this past summer/fall with a seller on ebay taking other artists images and passing off copies of them as her own original work. One of the WC artists here had images stolen in this fashion, and there was a long thread about it. Ebay was (from what I know) very unresponsive to the whole thing.....and she was NOT kicked off, so it became obvious that we have to not only watch out for our own work being misused, but each other's work as well. Thank you for bringing this to our attention. How upsetting to have your images stolen by these people....... Please let us know what happens.

Teresa

PS- Your dogs are really cute!

[bluewater]

Ok, so can't post feedback unless one buys from her. But she definitely is violating *trademark* laws: Coca-Cola, NFL, NASCAR, Major League Baseball, etc. I don't think trademarks expire like copyrights do, at least I am under the impression they are renewable indefinitely (?).

She is most likely operating this out of her home, since the pest control company uses their residence address, too. It's highly unlikely that someone with a home business can afford licensing to use images/trademarks from Coke, NASCAR, the NFL, the baseball league, various movies, etc....all of them at once??? I don't think so. I'd think that if they had enough money to do that they'd live in a more expensive house. And they wouldn't run their pest control business out of their house either. Think about it.

This stuff isn't licensed, I'll betcha anything.

Here's some info on this printshopqueen:

----Domain name registered by:
PRINTSHOPQUEEN
4914 ORLANDO AVE
WEST PALM BEACH, FL 33417

---Reverse phone search on street address:
Warren Kendrick Pest Control Inc
4914 Orlando Ave
West Palm Beach, FL 33417
(561) 688-1003

----Florida business record search:
http://www.sunbiz.org/scripts/cordet.exe?a1=DETFIL&n1=P97000011568&n2=NAMFWD&n3=0000&n4=N&r1=&r2=&r3=&r4=WARRENKENDRICK&r5=
Warren Kendrick Pest Control:
KENDRICK, WARREN
4914 ORLANDO AVE.
WEST PALM BEACH FL 33417
PD (president, director)
and
KENDRICK, CONNIE
4914 ORLANDO AVE.
WEST PALM BEACH FL 33417
ST (secretary, treasurer)

----Florida property record search
http://www.co.palm-beach.fl.us/papa/main/detail_info.asp?p_entity=00424324030020080
Parcel No: 00-42-43-24-03-002-0080
Owners: Kendrick Warren & Connie
4914 orlando ave is listed as a single-family residence valued at approx $106,000.
Abt 1700 sq ft; has a pool and detached garage.

All of the above is completely public record, anybody can go to the same websites I did to search for this information. I haven't posted anything that anyone else doesn't have access to.

I am sending an email off to Ebay. I am also notifying the various companies about possible trademark infringement as well.

I have looked over the licenses that came with 3 of myclipart/photo collections. They all basically say that I cannot use an image if the image will be the main part of the design. In otherwords, I can't print them out and glue them to stuff or print them on tshirts.

People like that annoy me.

[MeikaM]

I have to give her credit. Shes got a bigger set thanany moose I've ever seen. What nerve! They'll probably lose both buisnesses as a result of this if enough people take action. I'm stunned and amazed at how brazen this is. :eek:

[fractalfingers]

Wow, the whois records changed in the last week.. I wonder if it's a coincedence or if this person is in the habbit of running from the law for these types of trademark violations. The contact information I posted last week was valid last week.. notice the different names or the registrants.... this is very disturbing.. It's entirely possible this person is making some relatively big bucks using stolen images, and is using false identities to stay ahead of any lawsuits.. will ebay release their name and phone number?

[fractalfingers]

C:\Documents and Settings\CONNIE KENDRICK\Desktop\Gifs\twinkling stars.gif

I found this embeded in the source code.. very odd since the forms on the website tell you to contact the california address. but it's connie kendrick that's behind all this copywrite infringement.

[Kathryn Wilson]

Wow, the whois records changed in the last week.. I wonder if it's a coincedence or if this person is in the habbit of running from the law for these types of trademark violations. The contact information I posted last week was valid last week.. notice the different names or the registrants.... this is very disturbing.. It's entirely possible this person is making some relatively big bucks using stolen images, and is using false identities to stay ahead of any lawsuits.. will ebay release their name and phone number?

If you have a transaction with this person, you can get their mailing address and phone number. I've had to track down a number of buyers lately.

Unfortunately, since she is a PowerSeller, Ebay will do nothing. For some reason, it's like hands off. Check out some of the PowerSeller's feedback's next time you are on Ebay - it will amaze you what they are getting away with.

[Canis Lupess]

I saw a couple of wolf images and knew the photographers who took them and got in touch with them about it. I bet they've been in touch with her, thats why she has suddenly put up all that crap.
I'm probably not the only one either, I know she has been stung from others as well who have caught her using stuff that is theirs or belongs to somebody they know of.

Lets hope somebody else can do her even more damage. :evil:

[pinkbubelz]

I cannot believe what I am reading!

It's like she's saying that she didn't know drinking and driving is against the law and she won't stop until she gets caught!

I don't know much about law--I wonder if you can do something like a class action lawsuit against her?

I once had a friend who was putting together a program book for something... He is not an artist and just pulled someone else's work off of the internet....(the year before I got involved with his group.) When I was helping to design the covers the 2nd year, he tried to do the same...
I gave him a very stern warning and "lectured" him about how using someone's image (whether a scan, photo, jpg from the web, etc.) was copyright infringement and that even though the chances are slim of being "caught"... The owner of that image has every right to sue the pants off of the organization....

He didn't really understand me until he talked to one of his "professional" artist friends--they gave him the same speech.....

By the way, I then ended up being the designer for the work...

I believe there are some rubberstamps that are considered "angel stamps" (?) and their usage is okay in other works as long as the quantities are limited...

Even the usage of a university's logo or colors could be considered to be copyright infringement....

I, too try to add text to my photos of my images (not enough to make it too distracting, but enough so that if something's done to the image, I could tell (hopefully)...

The downside is that so many more people have software like PHotoshop... I am guessing that those people who REALLY want to grab an image of the web can do so...(of course, that NEVER makes it right.)

I went to an "artist's legal issues" workshop this fall-- If I remember correctly, when a person has ownership of a copyright on an image, that copyright also extends to "derivative works".... (i.e. works created from the original image.) Also a really interesting thing to note (although impossible to track) is that if you sell someone a piece of art and they sell it to someone else, then (depending on the state you live in) the artist is supposed to get a small "royalty" with each subsequent sale....

Interesting stuff....

--Iris

[bluewater]

(To Fractalfingers--)
Re: the info in one of your previous posts (that mentioned "Eliana Torres designs") -- didja get that from the printshopqueen website? After poking around the website, it looks like the E. Torres thing might be part of a template for the site, and not the identity of the ebay seller. It looks like the site is still being constructed, so perhaps this was just some left overs from a template. At least that's my impression....

To anybody else --

After doing a bit more research: Disney and some other companies sued some ebay crafters, and lost. Evidently a crafter was selling items made using fabric with a Disney print. Courts said it wasn't violating trademark to sell home-sewn items using properly-licensed fabric. So the switchplate lady could be decoupaging trademarked designs from fabric, wrapping paper, napkins, wallpaper, etc onto these switchplates. This might actually be ok. Maybe.

BUT-- I wonder -- If I buy a package of NASCAR napkins, there's usually a blurb about "all images copyright 2003 NASCAR blah blah, or Trademark NASCAR blah blah". I would think this would preclude gluing the napkins onto something else and then making a profit off them. If I licensed a painting of mine for a paper napkin, my intent would be that people wipe their faces with them and throw them away, not cut the pictures out, glue them to switchplates and make money. If I wanted to license my art to appear on switchplates, I'd do that.

I sent out several emails to various companies who have trademarked designs on her switchplates, with direct links to the item in question. Only got one reply--not that I care, really. I'll just keep an eye on her ebay page and see what happens.

After the Disney case, I wonder if companies are going to start including a clause "for personal, non-commercial use" on licensed napkins/wallpaper, etc. This would prevent sales from craft items using the designs, I'd think. Just the way some software is free for a home user, but costs money for a business user.

A note: Looked at three online switchplate companies with their own websites. Not one of them sells anything with a trademarked design. No coke, no nascar, no football teams, no nothing. Ebay is the only place I found, so far, with people selling this kind of stuff.

[Vegas Art Guy]

Wow, I thought that only screenprinters had this kind of issue. Personally I'm very careful about violating someones copyright. I.E. I don't do it. I see articles like this on a regular basis in The Artist's Magazine and in American Artist. They both have websites and you can probably find the information you need there. In addition just by changing something in a photo does not mean that you have not violtated a copyright. In fact, now the courts say that unless you make substansial changes (so that people could not tell which was the original if I remember) you are just as guilty as if you had simply thrown the image on a t-shirt without making any changes.

[MeijhanaKittie]

The other day, on a famous set of cards (I think Blue Mountain, or similar), I saw something like "for personal use only, not to be used in collages/etc". I wish I could remember the quote, but it was on the back of the cards. Basically said you can't use it in other items. Now, that is stated.

It's interesting to see what else happens...

Mary

[Trisha H]

I have heard said that some of the big companies can sometimes turn a blind eye to small scale stuff - it's a bit of free advertising.

However, unless they have in-house artists etc., there must be an agency producing the advertising for things such as the Coca Cola bears, and I would imagine they'd take great offense at this kind of thing. Such high profile accounts are hard to win, and are usually won by fairly high profile agencies.

A wholesaler used to publish some of my work and produced very good royalties, but the company owner retired, and somehow, some of the prints got into the hands of unscrupulous people. Trays bearing my paintings have appeared in Brooklyn, Harlem, and here in the UK at £1 stores & a restaurant in the South West.
Trying to trace these people ended up somewhere in the middle of the South China sea. Mind you, in the first place the original company should not have sold off excess stock (if that's what they did do) when the owner retired.
It seems a lot of the time, it's not worth the considerable expense of trying to stop these practices.

I'm afraid as far as Ebay are concerned, as long as fees for listings are being paid, they don't seem to care too much. They just say that the feedback is there for people to see and it's up to them whether they take the risk or not.
It would be a different story if Ebay could be deemed responsible for the content on their site where copyright is concerned. I'll bet they have that one well covered though!

Trisha.

[Elfies]

Oh my....
And its 77 pages to look through! I think some of the artists would simply get lost and will never know their images was used!

This is so ugly!

Maria

[arlene]

But I realize what she is doing with the lightswitch covers/etc is wrong. Now, if she had purchased your picture, cut it up, and used it on the switchplate, that would be another story.

I have known people who buy greeting cards with the picture of artwork, and then make barrettes/pins/etc. out of them. I think that would fall under the same thing, but I know I couldn't print the picture off the internet and do it.

Fuzzy gray areas.

And I probably made no sense, as it's 5:01 am, and I haven't gone to sleep!

Mary :cat:
nope sorry i believe you're incorrect...if you had bought fabric with say my image all over it and made handbags, then yes you're correct...but to cut up one of my pictures or make copies and cut it up is infringement.

[tabberone]

Just to correct. Disney didn't sue me, I sued them. They backed down.

Disney as well as Major League Baseball has a disclaimer on their fabric stating for non-commercial home use only. There is nothing in copyright law that backs that up.

The use of licensed fabric is ok. I don't condone copying images, downloading them, etc.

Lee vs A.R.T. was about someone using greeting cards and mounting them on tile. The Court ruled that that was ok so I don't know about someone printing something saying you can't do a collage.

Of course the company can print anything they want, it just has to be enforceable by the courts.