Try telling that to the shark that’s about to eat your ass for lunch.
if the shark is cute he can kiss my ass for breakfast.
The easy solution to the Orphan Works Law is to actually copyright your works. You can copyright everything you’ve ever done as a collection for $45. Then it’s documented, and if someone rips you off, you have every right to legally pursue damages. You can’t add to a collection afterwards, and have to copyright new pieces or collections at that same price, though. Take note that you cannot sue someone without actual documentation from the copyright office in Washington, you can only stop them from using your work. WWW.USPTO.GOV
If any of you think the countless years of an artist’s focus, dedication, and serious financial investment towards the skill it takes to make quality art are worthless, then you obviously aren’t getting paid to do art dummy! I’m a full time custom artist with a decent salary in a screwed up economy, and in Kentucky at that! (and no, I haven’t posted to my site in two years, don’t like to put client’s work on the web)
Why would I want to give my work away when profiting from it is how I survive? That’s how I eat, pay bills, and buy computer crap! That’s how you should too if you know what’s best for you! NEVER give your work away unless it’s for sentimental reasons. Even if it’s not marketable, keep it for your personal portfolio. Have a little business sense - market AND protect yourself as a creative commodity. The entire business world is based on creativity, artists don’t have to starve anymore! Especially not digital artists!
If you’ve never been paid for your work, then I can see why you would think it’s worthless… Stop thinking we live in a world where you aren’t supposed to profit from your hard work. That’s what makes the sacrifice worth it.
If you have that sweet combination of natural and hard earned talent, and you’ve been investing your time and money, then you should find a way to be compensated for it. If anyone tries to take that from you, rip them a new …:mad:
taking credit for work that isn’t yours is extremely rude and rightly infuriating, but worthy of wrath?.. rarely… what has he taken but respect which should have been offered to you?
and then when money gets involved, such as somebody using your work to make money which should have been yours… I can understand taking action… that’s defense of your own livelihood
just think… it wouldn’t bother you if we didn’t live in a society which expects us to sell ourselves every day of our lives in order to be granted the right to live… money is an abstract object with no meaning beyond human fabrication… remove this absurd factor from the equation, and art would go back to what it was through most of human history… an intangible, but powerful tool for enriching culture and human lives, building communities, and promoting understanding and wisdom between people… something which most cultures understood as gaining infinitely in value with every passing on… a resource limited only by people’s interest in sharing… concepts completely lost to the modern world of unnecessary forced competition, where even thoughts are made into commodities which benefit only those who can afford them
how about who cares? the earth, our solar system, galaxy and all the precious art won’t even exist one day.
all the more reason not to waste our time?
Mr. Jamez:
If you’ve never been paid for your work, then I can see why you would think it’s worthless… Stop thinking we live in a world where you aren’t supposed to profit from your hard work. That’s what makes the sacrifice worth it.
Even taking money out of the equation, to see something you made exhibited
with the name of another is extremely disconcerting.
I would venture a guess to say that those with the attitude of it doesn’t matter, have never had the situation happen to them.
It is truly a feeling of violation, especially in a community such as this where
young people just starting out are seeking the advise and feedback of others.
Should the advice and feedback they get consist of don’t post your work?
An argument can be made that having their work stolen is a valuable lesson
to be learned.
That unless you are willing to spend money and effort to protect it, it should
not leave the confines of you environment.
The Top Row would truly be naked.
Many of the artists here need a source of feedback of what they make.
This type of activity is basically the work of one individual, working alone, sometimes without any input whatsoever.
To post your work , seeking advice and help, only to see it stolen, is
at the very least discouraging and immoral.
Must add, that to see arguments that this type of theft is in any way
shape or form ok, is, itself, uncomfortable.
Fortunately whenever this type of argument has come up in the past,
there is a sense of moral outrage that bring some feelings of hope.
what was the question again?
People always act like money is so evil. Money is what makes people get off their ass. Otherwise, we’d all happily waste the day away and the world’s productivity would come to a screeching halt. By nature, people need the incentive to build the world around them, and it’s a GOOD thing the incentive exists. Otherwise, we’d be in the freakin’ stone age technology wise, and we’d all be sculpting mud! Do you really think the world would be better if no one had to work? Hell no, look around you. Imagine if NO ONE had to work for survival…
What’s so bad about a career in what you love? To have one, you CAN’T give your work away! If I didn’t profit from and protect the work I do for myself and others, and just gave it all away, I’d be out of the damn job and on the street! Or at some crap job I hate! Making money doing what you love is a very rewarding and positive thing.
People will always create and invent regardless of money, it’s human nature. But money can be bad in that it encourages us to spend time creating superficial things that we know pay well (entertainment industry), rather than creating things that improve the quality of life in a more meaningful way. So money can actually hinder progress.
I definitely agree, all artist start out as hobbyists that don’t get paid to do it. Yet a career in art, while not completely free, is relatively incredible.
if the concept of money vanished tomorrow, yes… people would get really lazy for a while… we’ve all been raised in a society which forces us to work under threat of starvation… where failure to sell our labor to someone wealthier than ourselves results in complete forced severance from the obscene surpluses of food and shelter and luxury we create in the modern world… bitter resentment towards any activity is only natural when violently forced to do it
I would probably wake up and go “oh my god I’m not being brute forcefully coerced into some BS job that doesn’t benefit anybody… I’m going to enjoy it for a little while”
but it wouldn’t take long for people to snap out of it and think “crap I need to eat… my house is falling apart… I miss all the stuff I used to have… I can be lazy and lay around and rot or I can help to bring back all the cool stuff we used to produce”
and that would be the end of that… and the real striking difference is people in this situation would do things they care about… which means people like me wouldn’t be trapped doing stupid crap that waste’s everybody’s time (customs brokerage analyst)… and there wouldn’t be any BS politics hindering progress over economical issues…
perhaps capital did something to dig us out of the dark ages… I don’t really believe it, but I don’t have the knowledge to argue it… but I can tell you that in the modern world just about every industry is actually held back by the profit motive
do you know why we don’t have clean, renewable energy yet?.. it’s been demonstrated over and over again that all of the technology is there… wind, geothermal, and solar power are absolutely practical today… the problem is nobody’s figured out how to charge people for wind and sun!!
how about everything on your computer… let’s not even touch art there… just software… can you imagine how much power mankind as a whole would gain and how much more progress we could create if all the software of the world was available to everybody?.. and there’s no technical reason it shouldn’t be that way
how about entertainment… file sharing… you know what the war on file sharing was really about?.. it wasn’t about the profits lost from people not buying music or movies… it’s because professional industries are afraid of amateur content, and they want to strangle amateur distribution channels… there is tons of evidence to this effect, and it’s a clear-cut case of money preventing people from producing!
how about planned obsolescence?.. without money, there is no way in hell people would actually do more work just to make sure an item breaks within a set period of time…
I’m sure you get the point
Good points for sure. This debate could probably go on for eternity!
survival will always be an incentive, we don’t need money to enforce that one 
but yes… cheers to making a living doing something you love… I have yet to make an penny off of art, but the day I do will be one of the happiest days of my life… and by god I’m going to get there
I would have to tattoo for food if money was gone. …and to steal that one you’ll need a knife. :lol:
:eek: uch!
The more you work and put yourself out there, the greater your odds of getting lucky as hell