Would you believe, that one day after finding this beautiful image of the 'letter' hugging the girl, I got an email from Exclusive books Fanatics club possibly plagiarising this very image! It seems to me, WAY too much of a co-incidence that this image showed up today - right after the Smashing Apps Twitter post yesterday..Call it PMS...call it fury at people [possibly] not sticking to design etiquette - It would be so much easier to just steal other people's work! That's not why we are employed as designers...almost any monkey can copy and paste without getting the right permissions. It's not no-man's land: it's OFF LIMITS!
So I wrote a letter (below) and will update this blog if I get any response.
My letter to Exclusive Books this morning:
Hi
I am concerned about the possible plagiarism of the (rather blurry) image you have used on the top right hand side of this promotional advertisement (below).
As a designer, I am acutely aware of copyright restrictions & fiercely moral about the use of restricted copy & imagery, which is why I feel compelled to send this email.
At this point, I will appologise in advance if Exclusive Books / Fanatics / van Schaik legally bought the image from a stock site, but, only yesterday, I found this image on Smashing Apps at this link: http://www.smashingapps.com/
One of the biggest problems facing the design world is the quest for originality - originality puts what one designer/company/individual is doing above another. Spending a few extra minutes sourcing original, un-plaigerised material will not only put designers/companies/individuals in greater respect, it will stop them from looking silly when the source of the plagiarized material is found online!
Let's keep South African design original and fresh!
Sincerely
Gina Ross
No comments:
Post a Comment