Forums » Help » Art theft/use

Are there rules against it? For some reason I can't find the rules in the first place, but is there any sort of policy regarding use of art that is not yours without permission of the artist?

I would take the matter directly to the artist, but I'm having trouble finding the person as there's no watermark or signature and no link-back or credit was given.

That's actually a legal thing. It's copyright infringement to use the art without permission, and while the most likely outcome of the artist disapproving would be Kim having to remove it, the artist would be within their rights to sue.

That said, have you tried tineye.com?

I finally found the original artist of both pieces, though I don't know how often they check their galleries? My frustration stems more from the attitude of the person using the art than anything else. I asked if they minded crediting the artist directly or linking back, and they tried to dodge the idea that they were using it without permission and then firmly refused to credit or remove the pieces. It wasn't an innocent mistake by any means, particularly when they defended themselves by suggesting that any artist who didn't watermark their work clearly didn't care.

I am assuming that person is on rpr? If I am right, you should tell Kim about their person if you haven't already.

While there's a rule against image theft, It's enforced very rarely if at all: the site turns a blind eye toward playing copyrighted characters (recent helpful thread about why that is here) and image theft is as rampant on RPR as it is anywhere. Without any clue what the mods can/will do for you, since the crux of the issue seems not to be this person's art theft but their attitude, I would suggest just ignoring them.

Giving credit doesn't cut it. If the art isn't theirs they can't use it, period. The problem however is that only the original artist (or the person who commissioned the art of the artist is unavailable) can ask to have the art taken down in most circumstances. This is to prevent abuse of course.

Hoever, in many cases people have been asked to take down art if they a) admit to using it when it isn't theirs or b) the original piece uploaded by the artist explicitly states the art isn't to be used anywhere/something along these lines.

Trust me when I say it frustrates the mods incredibly that this can't be tackled differently, but there's simply no real way to efficiently enforce this kind of thing considering the sheer amount of images the site has and how hard it is to track down artists. Kim has experienced more than once that an artist simply didn't care either, as did I. (Contacted them about the theft and they told us they didn't mind, so THEIR attitude isn't helping either!) Then there is the whole "using generic anime art that nobody knows the origin of even though it's theft but nothing can be done about it" or "big company's art that they will never get in touch with for to have removed from a single players profile"

So the rule is simply, if the artist is notified, it's up to them to get it taken down by emailing Kim, unless the thief has given clear indication themselves they're doing something wrong. It never hurts to give the mods a heads up though.

I remove art from the site on a fairly regular basis when I get complaints from artists or copyright holders, and am very happy to do so. We also publish awareness articles now and again to try and help people understand this issue, and we're about due for another round of such PSAs.

Our rules are written such that by uploading an image to the site, you are certifying to us that you have the right to do so. We take people's word - because who knows what hobbies, skills, connections or hidden stores of dollars they have access to - until something proves them false. Have definite proof? Feel free to pass it along!

When we get down to the nitty gritty, enforcement of this issue is really difficult and incredibly frustrating. If we instituted a "no art without proof of permission/ownership" rule, the site would basically be empty. For example, take this thread -- Did those balls of yarn come from a photo Sanne took, or are they from a stock photo she found on Google but couldn't contact the original photographer about? Are all of Ferabird's sweet spider images shots she took herself or commissioned a photographer to get, or did she find them elsewhere on the net? Is Sland's icon something he did himself, something he commissioned, or is it borrowed from a webcomic? Novalyyn is using an image of Hobbes, a copyrighted character, meaning that even if she did draw the image herself, she still (probably?) doesn't have the rights to use his image (but who knows -- creation of fan images is a pretty murky area of copyright. You never know how different or the same the thing needs to be before there's grounds for a case!). Does Katia paint dragons in her spare time, or did she just find a dragon out there on the wide web that she thinks is cool?

Even if we assume everyone in this thread did not get permission to use their various images, clearly no one here cares or feels that's significant. People only seem to emotionally extend these protections to artists that they happen to personally know or admire. There are of course exceptions, but they're very inconsistent. And the people and companies themselves that hold the copyright have very different policies and feelings about use of their work, ranging from "under no circumstances," to "so long as I'm given credit," to "That's unrealistic to expect on the internet, I really don't care at all," to "Yay free publicity do it do it!"

And then there's the issue of giving credit -- many people feel that this makes it okay, or makes them morally superior to those who simply "repin" an image without giving credit to the artist. However, giving credit does not equal having received permission. This is like if Dreamworks studio made a Mickey Mouse movie, but "gave credit" to Disney for the image. It's actually more like an admission of guilt. Which creates this debate -- should the mods have to remove all art that is credited, because then we know it's not a photo or drawing by the person who posted it? But what if they tell us they got permission? Do we take that on faith? It's a pretty easy sentence to type, but most people never think to lie about that. This would create pressure for people to never credit, which is arguably worse.

Many good-hearted members, mods included, eventually go on quests to show that one particular piece of art (or a whole bunch of pieces of art) are not used with permission. This strikes me as sweet, but odd, given that nearly everyone who is using the internet is violating copyright themselves. That said, I used to be one of them, and any time someone came to me with a suspicion of art theft, I would join the quest and help track down artists and contact them. After a surprising number of contacted artists told me they didn't care, and as the tide of uploaded images rose to encompass hundreds a day, and as I realized I was often investigating the very people who had originally helped raise the alarm about someone else because in internet culture everyone with access to any social media does this constantly without even knowing they're doing it, it became clear that this was un-policeable if we had to verify every uploaded image, basically disbelieving the certification the members had made by doing so. I think this is the same conclusion every other social media outlet on the planet has come to, as well. =/ Society's laws and etiquette expectations have not yet matured enough to provide a realistic policy solution for creative control on the web, other than "innocent until proven guilty."

TL;DR version: Though there isn't much we can do with just suspicion, if you have proof, please send it to me. The best and easiest proof is getting the copyright holder themselves to make the complaint.