Introduction & How To Handle Art Theft Based On My Experience

in #art6 years ago

Hi steemians!
Absolute Ama here!

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I've joined Steemit due to a recent issue of art theft. A person had been impersonating me, taking images of my paintings that I posted on my social media, and profiting from them on here for the past 5 months.

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I was fortunately notified by a follower that my paintings were being used. Luckily, the posts were flagged and taken down after a day of finding out but knowing someone had made alot of money off my hard work is very painful to grasp.

So through all this, I thought I would take the opportunity to inform you (if you didn't know already), how to go about issuing a copyright infringement towards art theft specifically for the Steemit community. It's actually quite simple:

  1. You can contact the 'Steem Cleaners.' Filling out a lil form describing what was stolen, provide links to the stolen images but also provide proof that the stolen content belongs rightfully to you. Here is the link I went through to get in contact with them.
    Steemcleaners.org/abuse-report

  2. Email support through steemit, for copyright infringement. Explain your situation, provide links to stolen content as well as have links showing proof that that art is yours (linking social media sites, portfolios, etc.)

Those are the steps I went through to get the stolen content taken down. But its also to note, I had the help of a follower who had an account on here already which was extremely useful and may have sped up the process.

I'm no expert in this area, and I am new to this community. These were just the methods I used to have the content removed. I hope you won't ever have to go through this, but if you do, this may help.

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On a better note, I'm excited to start posting updates of recent paintings and such, and getting to know you all!

XOXO,
AMA

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Good info and great piece of art there . , I think I am going to,like your art so I am now a follower .. Good luck

Thank you so much for your support! I appreciate it! 💕

we have to huntdown who ever is stealing your beautiful art! welcome to steemit its a beautiful place for those who love creating things.

Thank You! I believe their account was flagged and banned? So all is well at this point. Thank you for your support! 💕

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I just found your post and thought hmmm this art looks familiar! I love your art and had actually asked the thief if it was their own work because in the post it was not clear and they never answered me, which always made me suspicious! I'm glad you figured it out, your art is amazing and I'm going to feature you in my art curation today, sorry you had a bad first experience here but welcome to Steemit!

Thank You! I'm glad you were able to catch something fishy with their posts. 💕

Hi Ama. I love your work!

Thank You! Glad to hear!

Then, wellcome pretty! If that guy made money with your art, something tells me you have a good future here! So, good luck!

Thank You! I sure do hope so!

Sorry to hear that someone profited from YOUR hard work! But glad you got it reported and sorted, you deserve the profits for sharing it with us, not some scammer mumbles profanity to himself.

Thank you, I'm glad too! Too many headaches involved! 😧😧😧

Welcome to the community! Sorry to hear that happened to you. As a photographer I've had that happen to me more times than I can count. But, it's always nice when a fan catches it and reports it. You make some very beautiful work and I look forward to seeing more of it :)

Thank You! It's very unfortunate but like you said, we are lucky to have fans catch it! Hope you don't have many more issues in that area! Xoxo

Welcome to Steemit Ama! By the way, I'm Alma. Almost the same girl. Lol
Enjoy here and keep steeming.

Ahhhhh!!! That's so awesome!! Nice to meet ya Alma! We're ALMOST twinning! 😂😂😂

Welcome to Steemit Land! Great to see you continuing to post more often now!
I wish you the best! Hope you gonna have fun with our community and see you soon

Thank you so much for the warm welcome! I appreciate it! 💕💕💕

Hai steemian

Hello! 💕

Thats awful! I'm glad it got sorted out, though. Your art is lovely. Thanks for the helpful tips!

Thank you so much! I'm glad it was dealt with as fast as it was! Can't take much more headaches after this! 😧😧😧

THIS is truly important information. So many people are showing their art on this platform and it's great to know the steps you can take to protect yourself on the STEEMIT platform. Thank you for this information.

Thank You! Glad you found this information useful! I wasn't sure if others knew or not but I thought I might as well throw it in there just in case! 💕

That's a truly awful way to find out about something as neat as Steemit, but hopefully now that you're hear, you can share your art with the community, and instead of someone else making a profit off of it, you can make that profit yourself.

While a lot of people downtalk cryptocurrency, it's largely because they're heavily invested in fiat currency, and are afraid of losing their edge and having to restart in a new currency. It's quite beneficial to have both kinds of investment, so earning both for your art is better for you financially.

It still is really disappointing that this is how you learned about the community. Thank you, however, for sharing the process of how to deal with IP theft in the Steem community - there are likely others who need this information or will need it, because unfortunately, IP theft is something that happens everywhere.

Thank you for your comment.
You raise good views that I didn't even think much about! Steemit is quite a unique platform and to be able to make cryptocurrency alongside fiat is huge, especially as an artist. I spend alot of time spreading myself out in terms of income sources to make ends meet but not in the realm of virtual coin so this will be interesting.

I didn't hold too much negativity to the site itself but I suppose if I didn't have this happen I wouldn't be on this platform, so there's pros and cons to the whole situation. 😧
But I'm glad that this post can shed some light on the process of how to file for copyright infringement, if it ever needs to be used because, as you said it happens everywhere.

I'm glad that you're considering the idea of raising yourself some Steem via this community. It's really not all that different from maintaining a presence on other social media outlets, aside from the fact that you should make it a habit to at least once a week check your wallet page to collect your Steem Power and Steem Dollars (which your posts earn).

If you post your work, any tutorials or the like you do, you can make yourself some pretty good amounts of currency here. It does take thirteen days to cash out Steem Power/Dollars to actual Steem, so keep that in mind when you do want to take out whatever you've earned, and it also does deduct from your Steem Power (which is basically your influence on the site), but it's still a really good way to earn currency - especially if you're not familiar with mining or don't have a set up that's powerful enough to mine with.

Again, welcome, and glad you've found another income source - it can be rough with art!

Thank you for your advice! Not sure why I didn't see this sooner! Yeah, steemit has been quite lovely so far. Still getting the hang of understanding the wallet and such so your words are useful! Thank you! 💕

Glad we were able to help you a little by at least removing the payouts and nuking the offending account. I was the one who reached out via facebook to confirm that your content was being stolen, if you need any more assistance or have any questions, don't hesitate to ask.

Thank you so much! I really appreciated that you contacted me in such a timely manner and helped remove my content. It means a ton to me! 💕

Welcome to Steemit! I love your style. Looking forward to seeing more of your work.

Who's the art thief!?

Thank You! Glad you like it! I believe the account was banned but they went by the name of keisya-art

Looks like Cheetah is getting busy on keisya-art!

Anyway, you have my attention now. I checked your instagram. WOW.

Ah! Thank You!!! I plan on posting some order stuff on here and then slowly updating to newer stuff so stay tuned! ✌

Welcome!! Sad to here your paintings were used like that:(, I can't wait to see more of your art work :)

Thank you, it was unfortunate but dealt with swiftly so that's all the counts! 💕

Hello! Welcome. You are awesome and I have a crush on you now. Followed.

Ahahahahaha! Why, thank You! 🤗🤗🤗🤗

Well done. It's reassuring to know that Steemit support and protect the artists here. Copyright infringement is a common problem and it's evolving all the time because of different internet platforms. Best of luck with your new channel and I really like your work. Bravo!

Thank you for your kind words! Yep, the internet has it's pros and cons when it comes to starting up an art career and trying to gain exposure from it and copyright infringement is a biggie. It sucks!

I have not actually had that issue of getting my art stolen (I'm a 3D Character artist for video games), but a couple of my friends, who are more 2D artists, have had their artwork illeagally taken and used.

It's a damn shame and I think this post is super informative and helpful!

Thanks!

Ugh! That sucks so much!! I'm sorry to hear that! It's too common of a problem, unfortunately. The internet has it's pros and cons.

Glad you found this info useful 💕

Oh man, I'm happy someone caught that! I feel bad because I was following that account. D:
Your art is amazing! It's good to see the actual artist getting rewarded for these beautiful pieces.

Ahhhhh!!! That's good to hear though! I was really worried that their following might think I was taking or something (ya never know on the internet 🤷‍♀️), glad to hear though that's not the case from You! Thank You!

Hey, welcome to steemit. I'm sad that you had to find us and steemit this way but i am also glad another amazing artis joined. And thanks for the pointers on what to do if i ever get in a situation like you. Once again, welcome.

Thank you for the warm welcome! In light of the issue, I've received nothing but support on steemit so far so all is well! 💕

Wow. How fucked up!! Very impressive how you handled it, and so glad you got it dealt with!! Especially bc your work rocks, and to have all that talent stolen... ugh. And very good point that steemians need to be especially mindful of this. good job

Thank You! Yeah, it's painful to have to witness your own work being taken like that. I hope no one else has to go through it but if they do, hopefully they will get through the issue fast!

welcome to the community ~~ im new myself ! your art looks really amazing so ill give a follow ~~
feel free to look at my page aswell , artists need to stick together ~

Ahhh, thank you for the support! I'll check out your page ✌

So sad to know that theres people who shamelessly ride on other people’s effort. These people really should be brought to justice! Thank you for sharing! This is so enlighting!

Thank You! I feel the same. Was so sad to find out that I've been work ing so hard on creating yet this person just swooped in and stole it all, only to make decent profit. It sucks! Hopefully others will know what to do from this post if they ever encounter this issue!

thank you, your post

No problem! 💕💕💕💕

Sounds like a headache. Glad you got it sorted though. Beautiful work by the way, I can almost see why someone stole it 😛. Seriously though, make your own content people! This happens more than it should, its pretty shameful, stealing from independent artists :/

Thank You! Right?! It's disappointing that this is such a huge issue on the internet. 😩😩😩😩

Taking care of business like a boss. :-)

Yeeeeee! 😬😬😬😬

Wow dear welcome here
Fantastic paintings
Don't be sad for those type of people
I appreciate your work .
I am also a artist but your work is amazing .
Happy to see you here on this good plateform
I am new here
Visit my profile check my art

Thank You! Yeah, I'm not holding much grudge against the situation, just happy that it was fixed fast. 🤗

My pleasure

My pleasure

Ama, that really sucks, and I'm sorry to hear that. But it's great to know that you not only discovered it, aaand found a resolution, but furthermore joined the community yourself and made up some lost profit. Beautiful work, I'll be following!

Thank you for the support! Yes, I'm grateful to be able to have found this site I the first place. Everyone is so nice which is lovely!

Great, let's keep art authentic on the blockchain.

Yes!!! 😬😬😬😬

yay! i'm so glad that even after some person stole your art & used Steemit to showcase & profit from it, that you still joined Steemit :D Welcome!

Yeah!!! I didn't hold too much negativity towards the site, especially since they took it down so fast!

Followed and resteemed because as an artist who knows a few other artist on here, we need to know how to handle these things. Beautiful, absolutely dreamy work too!

I'm moving a lot of my old work from my Tumblr so I hope nobody thinks I'm thieving. LOL <3

Thank You!! Hope it'll inform others o what to do. These issues happen too often, unfortunately!

For sure! We gotta give credit where it is due. :( It's bad enough contending with art theft...on top of feeling like capitalist entities do not value people if they do not contribute and be productive...so artists mean zilch to them. We make the world a beautiful place to live, goddamn it! LOL Sorry for the rant.

No, I know exactly what you mean! There wouldn't be much of anything without art. Shoot, how else were houses built without a draft of what to make. We definitely deserve more credit. 💕

Welcome to Steemi! Your art is gorgeous! :D

Thank You! 💕💕

Oh that's good if the posts were taken down. How long ago was the plagiarized content posted before you saw it and reported it?

I have just reported mine but the copied post was 8 months ago so I am not sure if it will still be deleted.