Internet Quilt Image Copyrights: The Good, the Bad and the Ugly

Before diving into this week’s blog post, I want to thank all those who sent in Finish Line Quilts. My request from last week’s post was met with an avalanche of images. I received more than 30 submissions (but it’s not to late to send yours here). It will take me a while to use all of them (I use 6 to 10 quilts per post), and they’ll be interspersed between other scheduled blog posts. So please be patient. I did receive your submission and you will see it in the future. I appreciate such an enthusiastic response!

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I have attempted to raise awareness around the issue of artistic copyright. I wrote two blog posts about it, which you can find here and here. Those mostly concentrated on using someone else’s work (usually a photo) as a basis for a fabric collage quilt: using, say, a picture of a lion found on the internet. Choosing a good image to work from isn’t always easy, and using the internet to search for such images was and is something my students commonly do.

These posts have some good suggestions for where to find “safe” images, or how to request use of an image. Basically, without getting permission, you shouldn’t use an image. And that’s what leads me to this post.

I have two recent case studies of where my own quilts were found online and used by others: one in which my image was used with permission and one where it was used without permission.

Let’s start with The Good.

“The Good”

Last summer in July I was contacted by a fellow from Germany named Joscha. He is the lead singer of a metal rock band called Clockwork (see their new album cover above). He and his band members were requesting use of an image of one of my quilts for an album cover.

Here’s the quilt, called “Gombessa“:

He says he did an internet search of the word Gombessa (the African name of the unusual fish also known as a coelacanth) and my collaged image popped up. He then contacted me and very politely asked if his band could use the image.

We are a rock band based in Germany and are currently planning the release of our coming album entitled GOMBESSA. While looking for inspiration for the artwork, we came across your quilts, which we absolutely love.

 

We would kindly like to ask your permission for using a photo of your Gombessa quilt as the cover for our album. We will be making 200 Cds as well as 300 vinyl copies of our album and exclusively sell these at our concerts.

 

Please do let us know what you think.

 

Kind regards

 

Joscha – Clockwork

Well, when I did a little investigative work and looked up their band, just to make sure it wasn’t some sort of elaborate ruse, it became clear that he was who he said he was. I was intrigued to say the least.

Joscha turned out to be a sincere and thoughtful guy, sharing the lyrics and soundtrack of his song, “AL(L) ONE” with me, and now you, below (this is rock music, so do check your volume if so desired).

AL(L)ONE

Joscha’s only worry was payment. The band Clockwork is no Black Sabbath or Iron Maiden or Metallica (famous metal bands of my era). They write and play their music out of an artistic drive and not so much of a monetary drive, at least at this point of their career.

We are a semiprofessional band still and do everything ourselves. We write, record and produce our own songs and also book our own shows. We don’t have any label or record company support as of yet.

 

To be honest I don’t feel all too comfortable making you an offer [for the rights to use the image]. The reason being that I wish we could offer you a decent and reasonable amount of money. But the fact of the matter is that I sincerely believe however much we could pay would more or less still resemble a symbolic gesture. Hence I would appreciate for you to let us know what amount you saw fit, if that’s ok.

Name your price, was what he was telling me. So I said,

How about a trade for use of the artwork? I’d love to have a few albums to show off and give away. 🙂 I don’t want to take away from your sales stock, so how would four each of the vinyl and CD versions sound? And would comp tickets to one or another of your concerts be available? It’s quite possible I’d have family who would be interested in hearing your band, or may already know of you. Aachen is not too far from where a couple cousins live, and one of them is in a rock band himself (at least he was before becoming a dad).

He responded right away:

You have just made four guys very happy. 🙂

 

We are absolutely fine with your idea and will happily send you four each of the cds and vinyls, once they’re ready.

 

Comp tickets are no problem at all. We’re still getting the last few dates for our October tour together. Once that’s done I could send you the dates and venues and your cousins could choose the gigs they”˜d like to come to, how does that sound?

Later it occurred to me to ask why they chose the name Gombessa for their album. Gombessa is the native African word for the coelacanth, a fish thought to have gone extinct with the dinosaurs, but was found by a female western scientist in the early twentieth century in a fish market in South Africa. African fishermen had known all along that the fish wasn’t extinct, of course. (For a more complete story about my quilt Gombessa, visit this link for its Quilt Story.)

Anyway, here’s Joscha’s explanation for the name:

Rob, our guitar player has always been pretty interested in the history of evolution.

 

Also, he has this old T-shirt which features a child’s drawing of a fish wearing boots, or at least having four legs and feet. Underneath it is written: Don’t deny your roots.

 

One day he was watching a documentary about the Gombessa excursions. He was fascinated and asked us to watch it, too. We did and we also were stunned.

 

We all approve more of the way rock music was composed and performed in the late 70s.

 

Since we ourselves are all well in our late 30s/40s, we sometimes kind of feel like dinosaurs, sharing the stage with bands who are often half our age”¦ – it is for those reasons we decided to name the album Gombessa.

 

That, and because we think Gombessa has a great ring to it, if you know what I mean”¦

When someone asks to use an image of mine, this is what I’m looking for: a thoughtful, meaningful use of the image, which in no way infringes upon my ability to use the image for my own purposes. I think it’s pretty safe to say I won’t be releasing any music albums in the foreseeable future, and I look forward to hanging the album on my wall—a claim-to-fame I never dreamed of!

I have found in general that Europeans are much more conscious of the issues of copyright, as well as privacy in general, on the internet. (The EU was the first organization to make a law allowing people to ask that certain untrue or even simply unflattering information be deleted from search engines: it’s called the “Right to Be Forgotten.”)

Because Joscha asked, we both left the interaction happy. He was happy to receive permission for an affordable rate, and I was happy to be able to help him out—and have a music album with a quilt of mine on it. Very cool.

That’s “The Good” of internet copyright.

Now for the other, darker side.

“The Bad and the Ugly”

I recently received an email from a follower and fellow quilt businessperson:

From: Jacqueline Cooper

Subject: Serendipitous Sea Turtle

Message Body:

 

Perhaps you are aware of or authorized this, perhaps not.  But I found your sea turtle image being used on blankets for sale on the Cold Tequila website, item “Turtle QT2340445 Quilt Blanket.

 

(They are using an image of mine.  Unfortunately, so far I have found 6 other comparable companies using it.)

 

Just thought I’d let you know.

She also attached a screen-shot of the page where my image was used.

Of course I had no idea my sea turtle image was being used in this way. I looked it up and sure enough it was still there. The image is a sample for my Serendipitous Sea Turtle pattern. Here it is on my website.

I did some research into the company, coldtequila.com, and the first thing I found was a ratings website (sitejabber.com) that gave the company one star out of five. Most complained about the quality of the quilts: cheap polyester instead of cotton as expected, smaller than advertised, not pieced but printed, and so on.

But one review was from a guild member in New York, Sharon A., revealed that a quilt for sale was actually a banner from her quilt guild!

Scrolling through my Facebook news feed and spot an ad from your company with a ‘blanket’ for sale in multiple sizes … the design is pirated from a quilt guild I belonged to for many years … the design is our banner … clearly says Schoharie Valley Piecemakers on the product. Shameful!! This HAS been reported to authorities and you will likely hear from them soon. How can you do this scamming to others good, original work? I would never purchase from your company, because clearly your designs aren’t all originals, and you use others’ work without their permission!

Her review dates from October 17, 2019, but as of this posting the “product” is still for sale on the coldtequila.com website.

How does this happen? In the case of coldtequila.com, it is really quite shrewd. The company itself is not the one uploading these images—so it claims. As it says on their website: “All products seen on this site are produced by Fans. ALL DESIGN is intended as a fan representation only and is not intended to infringe upon any copyright.”

By “Fans.”

They claim their business model is similar to society6.com, a website of which I am a member. (For comparison, you can view my products here.) In this model, artists upload images of their work, society6.com then takes the images and produces products such as coffee mugs, pillows, shower curtains and so on. The artist receives a portion of the sale price. But on society6.com it is clear and obvious on each page who claims to be the creator of the image.

On coldtequila.com nowhere is there any indication of WHO uploaded the images. Nor can I find any place on the website to actually become a “Fan” in order to upload images. I’ll let you draw your own conclusions about where the images come from.

You have to admit this is both “bad” and “ugly.”

What can I or anyone do about it?

I wrote an email to the coldtequila.com website demanding that they remove the image. Jackie Cooper, who alerted me to the piracy of Serendipitous Sea Turtle, also had an image pirated by coldtequila.com and they took it down when she reported it. However, considering the experience of the Schoharie Valley Piecemakers whose piece is still up, I wasn’t holding my breath. So I was surprised when I received a reply from coldtequila.com less than 24 hours later stating that they had removed my turtle. I followed up with a search and it seems to be true. However, what about the quilt guild and all the other pirated artist works?

I could spend days and days scouring the internet for cases of copyright piracy. However, how much of it is worth my time and creative energy? I’m afraid that even if an image does get removed from one site, it’ll likely pop up again on another. I have no desire to play internet whack-a-mole.

This is indeed what seems to have happened to Jackie Cooper with her image based on her pattern for Splash the Dolphin.

Even though Cold Tequila removed her image, it immediately popped up on several more! Here are some sites she listed where her image appears without her consent: Azcozy, Con Cubu, Cozybase, Hmcozy, Conially, Kzandshuri, Blaket2you, Cozzian, Kayleeandtepid, Humpine, Next home decor, aquacozy, lannadecor.

From Jackie:

They even use the name of my pattern!  It started out as 2 or 3 places. I contacted each as they popped up. They replied so sorry and we’ll take it down, but they didn’t. At last look, there were over 10 websites using my dolphin. They are multiplying! Out of curiosity I went so far as to Google Earth the addresses. Storage locker facilities, apt houses, etc.. The blankets come from China.

The pattern for Splash the Dolphin is available through Jackie’s Etsy page. She also has other quilt patterns for sale there.

So it does not look like it will ever end. I am not that computer savvy, but I think I’ll have to start watermarking my photos if I use them online.  Maybe that would help.  In the meantime, when someone googles (Splash) dolphin quilt, in the middle of all of those $49.95 blanket listings using my photo is my little quilt pattern on Etsy. Ha! Additional exposure for me!

Watermarking is indeed one way to discourage piracy. But unless one splashes the watermark across the entire image, a la stock photo websites, the watermark can be cropped out or Photoshopped out pretty easily. That’s something I’d rather not do at this point.

I wish there was some way to permanently attach a digital tag to a photo with copyright information. You may have seen “meta data” from your digital photos, which includes information such as exposure settings, date and time, or even location if you have that option turned on. But this data can be edited or even deleted quite simply. A permanent digital tag could even include information that says if the image has been licensed to a reputable website.

Hey, Google! How about it? Wanna get on that? Thanks.

In the meantime, it’s up to all of us as consumers to be more savvy. When purchasing products based on artwork, try to verify who owns the image. Choose reputable websites over ones that seem too good to be true.