Hello all,

If you guys hang out in DIY at all you might have seen my Habitable Shipping container ideas at RDProgrammer.com. Anyway, I found a guy who has reposted not only my 3D models, but a fair amount of text as well. He has given no reference other than making the heading of the p0age link back to my site. What can I do about this and what damages might I be able to get if there is any resistance from him. I am not a "pay me, pay me" person, but to have my hard work ripped off is Bullshit.

RDP

Intellectual property law is a complex subject. Plagiarism isn't necessarily illegal; violation of the copyright you hold over the images is. If he doesn't want to stop using your property (i.e., he claims "fair use"), then you could seek a court to prevent him from using it. Depending on if he's made money or if you've lost money, then you could also try for damages.

If you own the website or whatever media hosting it and you have a copy right then you can get a cease and desist order.

Just claim he's stealing Bandwidth by hot linking and he's stealing views from your website - making you lose money.

Most of the time a simple email to the host will get the info pulled though.

In addition to what m0ckturtle said, justifying fair use is usually on a case-per-case basis. If the person is copying large portions of your work (text or graphic) for any reason (education, research, etc), the fair use justification can be challenged.

Does the offending site make it look like they're passing it off as their own? What's the purpose of their article?

If you haven't already, contact the person first with a friendly notice. If it's still a problem, find the host and the country its based in and follow with takedown requests.

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If they're hotlinking (and I think the offending site is from a quick google search), change the picture to something else, like a warning or something mentally scarring?

Is he linking to any images/files on your site? If so change them to goatse.

This. Have seen it/have done it with spectacular results.

I laugh at your 'loss' OP.

Proceed to suck it dickweed. I believe in information being free but I also respect the time and effort that goes into creating those works. I think the authors/creators should be given credit as due and rewarded when deserved.

RDP

Anyway, final result is this:

http://i100.photobucket.com/albums/m22/RDProgrammer/hotlink.png

Didn't feel like dealing with him so just announced it to all his users.

RDP

Nice.

Soo on a different allias, I posted this thread on the guys comments. Apparently he changed it.

http://empowerthyself.com/node/2879


"I saw, and I apologized and removed all references to him (http://empowerthyself.com/node/2879#comment-1837)

Submitted by lxpk (http://empowerthyself.com/lx) on Sat, 2008-12-27 15:07.

"Thanks for the heads up though. " "