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Advertising from space. We officially have no shame. The Colonel?!
The most amazing edited song I’ve ever heard. “I can neither play the drums or the piano.” Brilliant. [Kottke]
Basketball court.
John Gatto is a teacher on a mission. Worth a read!
Amazing performance of Liquid by Jars of Clay.
Indiana Jones 4 script axed by Lucas. Okay, regardless of what people think of him post-Star Wars, it’s still his baby, meaning he has the right to turn down a script he feels doesn’t due proper justice to the character. With that said, I’m very disappointed. We need Harrison in just one more kick-their-asses Ford flick.
IE7 CSS tweaks via Zeldman.
Blood:Water Mission has a new t-shirt for sale. Sales go towards building fresh water wells in Africa.
Nintendo’s Wii is packaged and ready to ship. I, for one, am stoked.
Big friggin’ helmet for sale. This is for real, folks. And it’s so stylish…
October 31, 2006
There seems to be a trend among designers and bloggers to call out supposed design thieves. Good, I say. There’s nothing worse than intellectual property theft. Ripping an idea, font, colors, and a vector drawing may not seem like a big deal, but to those of us who spend hours upon hours coming up with that design cocktail, it’s very important. In fact, it’s our livelihood. So excuse us if we cry foul when an idea is stolen that otherwise puts bread on our plates. It’s certainly easy these days to let a large audience here about the crime. And perhaps therein lies the problem.
You Thought We Wouldn’t Notice is a site dedicated to exposing design plagerism. I’m always intrigued by what they find under the next rock. It is almost a cop of sorts, in the form of a web site. By exposing the copied designs, said copycats don’t get away scott-free. And for the most part, it seems they tackle the most apparent forms of theft.
Greg recently noted a case of apparent design theft. 190 comments later, one thing was apparent to me: be very, very careful who you call out publicly, because a storm of emotions from countless designers will follow. Greg was well within his right to comment on what he saw as outright design theft, but his readers’ reactions shows just how far-reaching a simple statement can be. If you read his article and follow the links, you’ll note striking similarities between both designs. Yet there were numerous comments where people simply couldn’t find the distinction that made it a case of theft. I was ready to jump on board and cry foul, but alas comments had been shut down. Still, I found it very interesting that comments ran the board from “thief” to “innocent victim”.
Which is another result of the Internet’s almost viral nature. Once something is said, no matter how fair or unjust, the brush fire has begun. While most cases are probably worthy of that fire, in the few cases where it truly was influence over theft, the damage is already done.
Currently, the best example of the need to call out plagerism comes in the form of a baseball t-shirt. Aqui Designs are praised for their “edgy” work, yet it seems quite apparent the work is not originally theirs. Perhaps I’m missing the mark, but I consider this worthy of some attention. As far as I can tell it is a direct rip-off of someone else’s art. I find absolutely no room to argue a case of influence rather than theft. My opinion on the matter, while pretty black and white, may be grey to others.
So what about cases where it’s not quite so apparent? What if the influence is there, but might be open to interpretation? Is it possible that an idea is similar in nature, yet not by design? I spent some time looking for a case where the argument can be made both ways, until finally realizing I can’t in all fairness find something along those lines, because it’s my opinion against yours.
I’m a believer that all design—in one form or another—stems from other work that has shaped the designer’s thoughts and ideas. We’re constantly surrounded by design, so it’s pretty useless to deny constant influence. But where is that line? Because design is subjective by nature, each case has a different line drawn in the sand. We have to be careful to determine when design is merely influenced by something else, or if true theft took place. In some instances most artists can see plagerism pretty easily. Same font, same arrangement, same colors, etc., it’s a no brainer. But what if the similarities are small? What if a concept is similar, but with a different execution? What if the execution is similar, but not perfectly equal? Can the argument be made that this occurred by accident? I personally don’t know, but I find it hard to believe every single case where there are similarities is pure theft. Black and white is easy. The grey area is where things get difficult.
I can personally admit to have been inspired and influenced by design. I’ve made it a personal rule never to let that inspiration take over my own projects, but as a designer I can’t help admiring certain designs and taking notes of its strong points. I’ll never believe any designer that claims he or she is never influenced by other designers. I don’t believe our minds work in such a shut off state. I believe the best designers are those that have the ability to expose themselves to many, many different ideas, and utilize that inspiration in their own work. Do they plagerise what they’ve seen? No. Are they aware of ideas they’ve attained through outside sources? Probably.
We also run the risk of putting our foot in our mouths. “Reaction before contemplation” seems to be the norm. Hell, isn’t that what blogging is? Personally I believe that if a case of plagerism is found, that gives us all the more reason not to tread lightly and start barking to the wind. We need to invest time and thought. Unfortunately, instead it seems it’s much more fun to post a “I Found a Thief!” article. Now don’t get me wrong, if the case turns out to be pretty cut-and-dry plagerism, then bring the house down. All I’m saying is, don’t jump the gun.
In the end I’m not really claiming to fight the good fight, or let by-gones be by-gones. I think each case calls for thought, criticism, feedback, and more thought before we all cry havoc and unleash the dogs of war.