Apr

28

How can you REALLY protect your copyright?

Filed Under Comics Artists | 

In the light of this example, I’m curious as to how you can really protect your work online.

For instance, if someone in Hong Kong (like the example in the link) puts together a book with artwork lifted from your site without your permission, how would you proceed?

Oft mentioned advice is to always have your work legally copyrighted (although according to copyright law, any work that you create is yours from the moment of it’s creation). But to ensure it, you have it copyrighted formally, and as back up, send your work through the post office back to you and don’t open it.

But what does that really protect? You are only ensuring that you have the proper legal documentation that a certain piece of artwork belongs to you. It won’t stop people from another country stealing your work if they wanted to, even if your artwork is watermarked. By this example, it demonstrates that watermarking does not discourage people from stealing your work at all.

If that happens, what can you do realistically? Your documents will only be useful if you decide to hire a lawyer and mount a lawsuit. Would the ordinary Deviant-Arter or Blogger have the financial means to do such a thing against an offending party living abroad?

You can mount an awareness campaign which includes protests, letter writing etc., against the offending party/publication, which is one way to go. They may be shamed into stopping the publication, but then again, they probably won’t. Some people are shameless and cold like that.

What do you all suggest, short of not posting your artwork online at all?

Comments

12 Responses to “How can you REALLY protect your copyright?”

  1. Jon on April 29th, 2008 8:02 am

    Could keeping a hard copy/print out of the work help? Or e-mail yourself a copy of your work and make your e-mail account a depository of your work?

  2. Gerry Alanguilan on April 29th, 2008 8:20 am

    Hello Jon! I think that would be useful if you were going to keep an archive of your work. I myself am wondering where the heck I will keep all my digital files. A lot of my artwork is created on the computer now (colors) and I’m wondering where I can store them permanently.

    I think even if you have legal proof that the work belongs to you, it won’t stop other people from another country stealing your work.

    I’ve heard suggestions from other people that it would be best just to share only low resolution files of probably just 400 pixels wide, which would hopefully make your artwork unsuitable for printing. I think at the moment, it might be the best way to go.

  3. gilbert monsanto on April 29th, 2008 9:05 am

    Yes, low resolution previews is the best solution for now. Kasi nanakawin lang naman ang images kadalasan for print eh. Unless, ang nanakawin nila ay idea to be executed by their artists.

  4. Rod Samonte on April 29th, 2008 9:12 am

    Gerry,
    How about transferring files to DVDs. DVD discs hold a lot of memory, and like movies you can easily access them and they should be easy to file.
    Rod

  5. Kat on April 29th, 2008 10:12 am

    I keep the raw files of my works intact, especially if I’m doing them digitally. The PSD files are pretty huge, but I burn them to DVDs for archiving.

    I also put watermarks right smack in the middle of my works, including my name and my site URL, and have recently gone to putting the images on lower resolution before posting them. Though I’m not sure how effective those are from preventing art theft.

  6. Charles Tan on April 29th, 2008 12:52 pm

    Jon: The point of mailing the work (snail mail) is so that the government has a time stamp on it.

    The problem with copyright isn’t in securing it but proving it in a court of law, hence the government timestamp valuable. Emailing yourself a copy is only valuable as far as archiving it goes, not to protect your copyright.

    Gerry: Depending on the size of the work, 400 pixels might be too small to appreciate. Usually 72 dpi is a good low-res resolution size that makes it unsuitable for print.

    For archiving, the various photo sharing sites do allow you to not publicize the photos you upload. However, it is limited by a) file size limit and b) this will only work for JPEGs/PNGs as TIFFs and PSDs are too large.

    For storage solutions, I suggest a branded external hard-drive although I expect in a few years, you can replace them with flash-based hard drives (which are sturdier and more resilient).

    My problem with DVDs is that sometimes they get errors (scratches, etc.) and you won’t find out until you need the back-up… (on a plus side, in a few years, we’ll have HD DVDs which have a higher storage capacity as back-ups).

  7. Jose Mari Lee on April 29th, 2008 1:11 pm

    It’s hot here in Costarica.

    But this topic is even hotter I couldn’t resist not to join the discussion.

    I am really surprised why you guys don’t take advantage of the INGENUITY of ACROBAT.

    But first, you must have ACROBAT PROFESSIONAL.

    Save your document as PDF.

    Using ACROBAT PROFESSIONAL:

    1. Open your pdf document

    2. Go to DOCUMENT:

    Choose SECURITY

    3. Click the box that says:
    REQUIRE A PASSWORD TO OPEN DOCUMENT

    Document Open Password: (you place here your password)

    4. Click Box that says: USE A PASSWORD TO RESTRICT PRINTING & EDITING THIS DOCUMENT AND ITS SECURITY SETTING

    Document Open Password: (you place here the password)

    Then it will open another window where you will once again be asked to type in the password.

    Then you save the PDF document (you HAVE to. If you don’r save it, the protection won’t be in place).

    VOILA! your document will never print nor be edited by another person who doesn’t know the password.

    Very simple, indeed. Acrobat is a fantastic software. If VISA Says: don’t leave home withoutit, then I’d say for Acrobat Professional: Don’t have a computer without it.
    ;-D

  8. Gio Paredes on April 29th, 2008 5:12 pm

    Hello Mr. Jose Mari Lee,
    I think that is a good if you are sending files to an associate.
    But the issue here is how do you protect your art work from people around the world from downloading the image file (.jpg, .gif) from your website, blog or DeviantArt site and using it as they see fit. Certainly that we do not post the password protected .PDF on those site mentioned for preview. Unless it is intentional for download only.
    So I agree with the concept of posting only a low resolution image fit for viewing only and not good for printing.

    Charles Tan
    I think you already hammered the answer to this dilemma.
    I too had a problem with my backups on DVD. Some disc are not really that reliable. Even without any scratches the data were unreadable. So my suggestion. Multiple backup baby.., external HD, DVD and USB drive. :-)
    There are no such thing as too many backups.

    (Note to Boss Gerry.. Pa bura na lang po yung isang post ko. Too many typos… :-( )

  9. Jose Mari Lee on April 29th, 2008 11:10 pm

    Ginoong Paredes:

    I see what you guys are concerened with.

    Actually, some dishonest people would not stop even if you only have 72 dpi. They will do it anyway and they will still print it or use it for their own schemes. I’ve seen really bad graphics quality that are used in many printed books or reading matreial, especially in newsprint publications.

    I don’t know. Maybe place your presentation material as flash-based so that they can’t just drag it on the deskstop and use it?

    It happens all the time. thieves use low-res images taken from all sorts of sources.

    Back-up has to be done anyway. An external HD would be a good solution for that, but it’s only good for keeping a copy of your hi-res originals.

    But stopping thieves from pilfering your files attached to your site can be a tricky thing to do, unless you use flash and hoping that the thief does not do a screen-capture and use the image anyway :-(

  10. Gerry Alanguilan on April 30th, 2008 7:15 am

    Screen capturing a flash image is what will most likely happen. I should know because it’s what I do. he.he. Purely for research and personal use of course.

  11. Robby Villabona on April 30th, 2008 2:25 pm

    If you can display it on the screen, then there’s no way to protect an image from being copied, no matter what file format you put it in.

    But if you have the budget for it, and are serious about protecting your online work, you can use a service like Digimarc which will:

    1. Put hidden watermarks in your image files.
    2. Host server space on which you can store backups of your image files.
    3. Scan the Internet for any unauthorized use of your image files and report them to you.

    If you find someone using your image files without authorization, you can start by sending a demand letter (with an invoice?) charging for the use of the picture. If they pay, then good. If they don’t, then they may take it off the site. If they refuse to pay while continuing to use it, then hiring a lawyer would be a last resort.

  12. Jose Mari Lee on May 1st, 2008 1:26 am

    To make the long story short:
    DON’T post your images on the web.
    To minimize the piracy, just post whatever images that were published before. Original images that are not published yet, don’t post.

    Sweet and easy :-D

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