The Skinny on Copyright

Tell me if this sounds familiar:

You purchased a pattern and ended up LOVING it! You love it so much, that you decide to give it to your friend. The pattern was a PDF download, so it’s a simple matter of emailing the file to your friend. Easy peasy! All done and good, right?

I’m afraid not. You just broke copyright law, and if the designer found out she could sue you, and she would win.

So,

Copyright is the ownership of anything that is written down. These days it also applies to music and movies, but basically if it can be written down for posterity, it is owned by the creator. In the crafting community, the things that can be written down are patterns. Not all patterns count for copyright, since if it is old enough it is in the public domain, and stitch patterns are so old and commonly used that they cannot be copyrighted, but new patterns and patterns that are for sale definitely are. Here is an Adam Ruins Everything clip about the public domain that is much more clear and entertaining than anything I could produce:

Trademarks are similar to copyright, but also a little different. Trademarks are licensed images used to represent the company. We as creators like creating things and images from our favorite movies and TV shows, but we do not have rights to many of those images. For example, I can’t sell a pattern for the 49ers logo unless I get permission from the 49ers. I can’t steal a TARDIS from Doctor Who, or take the Superman S. These images are all owned. I could only use these images if I either sell them for free or if I have permission from the companies that own them.

Now, why is copyright important? Essentially, it boils down to ownership and making money. If I created something, I want to be the one to make money off of it. I don’t want somebody else to make money off it, or somebody to give it away without being paid for it. Patterns may look like a simple thing, but the process of publishing a decent-looking pattern is a long and potentially complex process including creating the item several times write and fine-tune the pattern, getting testers to find mistakes, making corrections, and finally publishing. Many people use their patterns as a means of income, and every time they aren’t paid for their product, they are being ripped off.

When it comes to Trademark, a lot of these images are used to identify a company. When you think Disney, don’t you imagine Cinderella, Aurora, and Mulan in your head? These images are Disney’s identity to many people, and by using them without permission you are effectively stealing a company’s identity. Since this identity is so important to a company, they tend to go after offenders with a vengeance. It’s best not to cross the Mega Corporation Beast, since you will lose and be ruined.

Here is my video on this same subject:

So, what can you do to protect yourself and to generally be a good consumer? It’s actually pretty simple: don’t sell anything you don’t own, and when you give a pattern to someone else you can either send them the link or purchase a second copy for them. The Golden Rule applies here: if you wouldn’t want someone to do it to you, then you shouldn’t do it to someone else. It’s better to be safe than sorry.

Happy Crafting!