Retired Forums > Riddick/Imageline Letter Forum
Embroidery Industry Consumer Alert - We listened!
GRiddick:
Dear Matthew Chan,
I have told you several times before exactly what I thought about your skills and your appitude at being a "quasi IP lawyer" and a "quasi investigative reporter". Need I say more?
I have been contacted directly by several people in the embroidery design industry who do not agree with you, Matthew. They have read the most recent posts and encouraged me to keep posting my views as to how the infrmation and communications was so poorly handled regarding this issue from the get-go.
You have criticized me unduely ever since I told you I thought you were, indeed, guilty of copyight infringement of Getty Images from what I learned by reading your own story. You never posted those comments. I wonder why?
Your comments to, and criticisms of, me are completely uncalled for. I did not take a "swipe" at anyone. I actually like Oscar. I simply told this anonymous lady/gentleman the truth.
Oscar has handled himself like a true professional lately and given these people some very good and valuable legal and pactical guidance. Honestly, I cannot see what value you bring to this debate at all.
You do not own any proprietary graphic arts content that I am aware of, you are not a lawyer, and you are not an embroidery designer or digtizer. Please do us all a favor and monitor the web site, not make comments about things when you have abolutely no clue as to what you are saying.
BTW, what are you telling people your new theories about Imageline might be now that we have filed four (4) new federal copyright infringement lawsuits after you assured your audience we wouldn't, or couldn't, file any?
George Ridick
Imageline, Inc.
P.S. I personally think these embroidery industry folks are smart enough to hear both sides of a debate such as this and make their own choice and decisions. They need you like they need a hole in the head. Discussions were much more productive while you were MIA ove rthe past few weeks. You are simply pushing them into further legal trouble with your super-senstive and non-sensical responses.
Larry Pike:
Many people used images from clipart.com for years to make embroidery designs. Most of us first verified with them that making embroidery designs for sale with their clipart was acceptable use before doing such. We have retained their affirmative responses in our archives.
We no longer have any designs available from clipart.com on our website as your email brought to my attention that is was time to review the quality of designs we sold. We realized that our designs made in 2001 and 2002 were looking very dated.
Here is an email exchange between us and clipart.com re-confirming that they still allow use of the clipart obtained from their website for creating embroidery designs for sale.
---------------- begin emails ----------------------------
-----Original Message-----
From: Larry Pike [mailto:[email protected]]
Sent: Wednesday, March 04, 2009 12:38 PM
To: Kisha Woods
Subject: Copyright question
TO: Kisha Woods / Jupiter Images Inc
FR: Larry Pike / Artistic ThreadWorks Inc
DT: 3/4/2009
RE: Copyright Question
Hello Kisha -
My friend xxxxx xxxxx passed the following information to me and I want to verify that it is correct before I rely on it. I basically have the exact same question as xxxxx had about using images from clipart.com in creating an embroidery design.
I'm sure you get emails all day long from customers with questions so to refresh your memory this is what the email to xxxxx asked. Is it permitted to use images from clipart.com in making an embroidery design for sale.
Here is the basic info in the emails between you and xxxxx...
--------------------------
xxxxx 's question...
"So, it is permitted to create Embroidery designs from the artwork on Clipart.com, (for resale) and sell or distribute them for sale on a website, and on cd?
And as long as we do not modify the actual image copyright would belong to me on the actual embroidery design? or does Clipart.com claim copyright on any embroidery design that would be made from these images?"
Your answer...
"Clipart will always retain the rights for the images on the site. Of course we cannot claim credit on the product itself, just the image used. If you are going to post them on a website, then you would have to give credit on a credit page or adjacent to the image itself.
You are able to create your designs with the artwork on Clipart.com.
However, you cannot put these images on a CD as that would constitute "re-distribution" of the images.
You are able to post them on your website, but please make sure they are loaded at the lowest DPI possible (usually 72DPI).
Also make sure that you give credit as to where the images/clipart was obtained on a credit page or adjacent to the image."
And from an earlier email between you and xxxxx...
"You are also permitted to modify the images as much as you like. You are not permitted to claim copyright on the images that you do create using Clipart.com images. Intellectual Property laws do protect the artist and the original work including derivative works."
--------------------------
Thank you in advance for your time to respond to this query.
I just want to be sure that I got this right from my conversation with xxxxx.
Warm regards,
Larry Pike
www.ArtisticThreadWorks.com
Response back from clipart.com
Hi Larry,
I can definitely understand wanting to be sure about the usage of Clipart. Let me assure you that you are permitted to create, design and sell your embroidery design using Clipart images. The conversation between xxxxx and me is indeed correct.
Please let me know if you have any further questions.
Kisha Woods
309-687-0138
[email protected]
-------------------- end emails -------------------------
Clipart.com said we could and clipart.com still says we can (although we no longer do) use their images.
Larry Pike
Artistic ThreadWorks Inc.
GRiddick:
Hello Larry,
I apologize for the length of this answer to your earlier posting this afternoon in advance. I truly am trying to get you to understand where we are coming from, and to keep as many small embroidery companies out of crippling litigation as we can.
Some people apparently think the exchanges posted on this web site are a complete waste of time. I started out feeling that way, but have since changed my mind. If small embroiderers are comfortable watching a level-headed debate take place in this fashion, rather than through direct one-to-one conversation, then that is fine with me at this stage of the game. We are spending most of our time on far larger, and more toxic, infringing fish right now, anyway.
I think you are sincere in what you are trying to do here, and I applaud you for that. I also think the entire issue (using clipart to produce embroidery designs) can get very confusing on occasion. Here is where you need to be ultra careful with both your logic, and in the decisions you make going forward with your business.
Rushing to judgment can be very dangerous these days, and no place is more dangerous turf than today's turf in the "digital world", in general, and on the Internet, in particular. Here's what I mean:
1. We never licensed Jupiter Images/Clipart.com to use any of our Imageline clipart illustrations and designs on their Internet display and distribution website, let alone provide any of them to others. Not in 2001 and 2002 as you referenced, and not now. Never. I could not see anything in what you wrote above that indicated that you actually downloaded the designs we identifed to you privately as ones owned exclusively by Imageline, Inc. that you had said you downloaded from clipart.com. You should check that out very carefully.
2. You and others in your industry probably do not realize the confusion that results even from some of your simple terminology and questions. Here is what I have learned from the embroidery industry in just a little over three months. You refer to embroidery designs generically to mean both the hard goods that you produce (either by hand or through the help of a computerized machine), as well as the digital files that are produced by computer to make the embroidery machines "stitch" a particular design in tangible physical form.
3. As you probably know by now, Imageline invented the electronic clip art industry with joint ventures with IBM, Lotus, Microsoft, WordPerfect, Apple, Harvard Graphics, Xerox, and others back in the early 1980s, when the IBM personal computer was first announced. I can tell you first hand that although Imageline never did, some developers of electronic clipart would, indeed, let their licensed digital files be used to produce physical embroidery designs, such as a design stitched onto your sister's sweater or your son's baseball cap. However, I know of no reputable clip art developer (copyright holder) who allowed their digital designs to be converted to embroidery digital design formats and then be re-distributed or sub-licensed, as we in the software industry call it.
4. I do not know for sure, as I have not yet spoken to Ms. Woods or the executives I know at Clipart,com's parent comany about this particular issue, but I could tell from her comments about "CDs" and "re-distribution" (as you have described them) that Ms. Woods probably did not understand the exact question she was being asked by either you or XXXXXX. I think she was saying ..."sure, you can make as many embroidered ball caps as you want, and even sell them to others, but you cannot display, sell, or re-distribute ANY designs in digital formats".
5. I know this is NOT what you or the rest of the small (and large) embroidery designers and digitizers wanted to hear, but I am almost certain that it is the truth. Check it out more carefully yourself.
6. Take a look at Bernina, Great Notions, Amazing Designs, Dakota Collectibles, EmbroideryDesigns, Cactus Punch/VSM Group, Embroidery Central, and some of the other "big boys" in your industry today. Have you noticed that they are now selling their digital embroidery designs to the print market and general Internet market as "high end clip art"? Several of them call the images "Printables". What clip art developer is their right mind whould allow anyone to convert their digital files to another electronic format and then allow those converted files to be used to compete directly with their own original designs that look almost identical? I will answer this for you. They would not.
No wonder so many people rushed to judgment and got themselves into an uproar against Imageline for our sincere, and admittedly aggressive, efforts to help clean up this mess (we call it a "piracy epidemic") that has infected your entire industry with tainted goods for years.
If I thought Imageline was claiming ownership to someone else's work (1), or was accusing people who had a legitimate license of infringement (2), or was charging end user infringement settlement fees that were out of proportion with common industry practices (3), I would get very angry myself. But none of those three scenarios is what we have here, Larry.
The host of this web site jumped to all of the wrong conclusions about Imageline right away. Apparently he thought he had "discovered" another Getty Images, Masterfiles, or Jupiter Images he could pound on, and criticize, in his own self-interests. What he forgot to tell all of you in the embroidery design industy was the truth. We have explained all of this to him several times and he hasn't seemed interested in listening to a single word we have said. Why? We are still not sure.
I think Oscar Micelen now realizes we do not go after end users (only those we find distributing our exclusive goods to others). I truly believe that is why his tone towards Imageline has changed and I have had several productive "conversations" with him, even if some of them were online and shared by others.
I do not feel the same way about Mathew Chan, but you can make your own judgment as to whether he has helped you at all or simply tried to sensationalize this entire issue. What you end up paying to either Imageline or lawyers (or both) will probalby help you make this decision.
I hope this e-mail helps clarify a few things for you and others, Larry. Please send me evidence if you, indeed, find that clipart.com, or any other large company for that matter, actually licensed you any of the artwork Imageline has identified to you as proprietary. All of our digital artwork is registered with the U.S. Copyight Office, so it wil not take us even an hour to verify any of the statements we make to you as 100% truthful.
Be sure to ask others if they can do the exact same thing for you. And especially XXXXXX, if that is who I think it is!
Thank you for trying to clear things up and educate others in your industry as well.
George Riddick
Imageline, Inc.
Larry Pike:
1. I answered your question.
Larry Pike
Artistic ThreadWorks Inc.
dhall:
6. Printables
I found this interesting, and so researched this claim. I only found one company selling "printables", which are grahics to print and then iron on to a project. The graphics look like digitized embroidery designs when printed.
As a digitizer, I do find it objectionable that a design site would also sell ANY type of graphic if the digitized designs are also being sold. However, I can see that there is a reason for doing so. Many people would love to use the designs, but don't have machine embroidery capabilities. Or, a hand-embroiderer may want to do these projects by hand. Having a design template to work from is what a lot of them look for, including from us digitizers.
The question that remains, is if Mr. Riddick is claiming that the original graphics for these "printables" also belong to him/Imageline. If he is not making this claim, then I'm not sure what his problem is. If the original clipart developer has granted permission for this end use, and we have no proof that they haven't, then there is no problem.
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