Randy also discovered that the cost of the average lawsuit involving patents or copyrights starts at about $40,000 and goes up from there. Even if you win your expensive lawsuit it will drag on for a long time. Whoever was violating your patent or copyright will have plenty of time to make all the money they could ever want by taking advantage of your ideas anyway.
So what can we do?
In Randys' case he now only makes things that require a huge investment in tooling up front, and things that have a very specialized market. You can't make big quick money on Randys products, like a fad item. Big quick money is what the knock-off artists (those who would copy your design) look for when they look for something to copy.
So how does that affect this website?
Here's the deal.
Copy anything you want from here but be sure you give me credit for it when you do.
You're welcome to link to this site as long as you link to entire pages. Do not link to individual photos or bits of text.
Better yet, let's trade links
So, you say, what are you going to do if someone just takes what they want and claims it was theirs?
The answer is "social engineering".
A similar incident came up amongst all the hot glass artists last year. It seems one person swiped a piece of another website and used the purloined piece in their website, claiming it as their own. The victim posted what happened everywhere you can imagine, especially in all the bulletin boards and forums that all the glass folks read. Very embarrassing.
Expect the same treatment if you do it to me. I will embarrass you.
Also remember the concept of karma, or what comes around goes around. Whatever you do in this life will come back to visit you in ways you never expected. I have lived long enough to realize that revenge is quite unnecessary, any good or evil you do to me will be delivered back to you in triplicate without my ever lifting a finger.
Now let's address copying other art. You are welcome to copy anything that I have done, just give me credit for the idea. If you look on my large glass bead page you will see a bead from a very popular bead making book, and you will also see me giving credit for the design to the author of the book.
When you are starting out learning an art, one of the easier ways to learn is to copy things, and if it's something I designed, that's OK. You might want to copy things so that the people you know can experience and enjoy them first hand, and that's also OK. That bead I copied has given any number of people great pleasure, and I wouldn't have wanted them to have gone without that.
Let's all just be sure to give credit where credit is due. You have to develop your own "voice" or style eventually anyway, or you become just another skilled manufacturer.
Manufacturing is boring.
You don't want to
miss out on the thrill of creating something from your own unique skills
and perception. "Good" art is not only art done by professionals,
"good" art is there in everyone, it just takes a bit of work, thought,
and observation on your part to bring it to the surface.
The End
Thank You