Today I was going to just whine about my laptop being broken. Then something funny (NOT!) happened …
I’m famous! Well, at least my online work is good enough to be STOLEN!
I almost fell off my chair when a member posted a group of three photos in the Freeform Crochet World Group on Facebook. The photos showed my spiral patterns and had a link to a video on YouTube. Whaaat?!!
Then I laughed out loud! And fell off my chair … ROFLMAO!!!
I watched the video … the most boring 3 min 32 sec ever … of every photo from my tutorials. Except, it didn’t show the cover photos showing my blog name. Eagerly I waited for the end to mention snovej.com, or me, or something. But no, only the name of the video maker: Crochet4You.
Sigh!
I really felt bad for them, embarrassed even. Don’t they know you can’t do that? Not online where everybody knows somebody who knows everything. At least eventually!
I thought about all the time they spent downloading my photos and putting them together into a video. I also thought about the eager crocheter who wanted to learn to do this. She would have had to pause the video after every photo! When she could have seen it on my site, with written instructions as well!
Today you can search for the origin of a photo. Just right click the photo and a small scroll-down window will show up. There you choose “Search Google for this image”. If the photo is posted on a site, it’ll give you the link in a new tab. I recommend doing this for patterns/photos you find that do not have a link to their origins. Especially, do us all a favor, and check out photos before you Pin them to Pinterest!
I of course informed Crochet4You both on Facebook and on YouTube that the photos are mine. The above photo is from our group. This is so silly, really! All they had to do was give me credit for my work. That’s what honest bloggers do! Tell the world about something nice they found online, and provide a link! This way we all support each other, eh?!
And, these patterns are all FREE! But it doesn’t mean they are free to post as your own!
Of some reason they have another Facebook page with the exact same name. The link to the video was also posted there. I made a comment there too, but wasn’t able to post it. The post had been removed! It was also removed from the other page, and the video was removed from YouTube.
Just as I had been contemplating reporting them to YouTube. Apparently if you have a complaint, you have to email them a “free form” letter. I had fun with their choice of words!
Good thing I had all the pages still open on my laptop and was able to take the screen shots I’m sharing here. I don’t want to report anybody here. It’s not my style. But this was such a blatant copyright infringement, I just had to share it with you all!
I hope they did this because they simply don’t know proper online ethics. After all, they just wanted to share the patterns with their viewers. Their page is full of photos belonging to other people.
My last words to any copycats out there is that, yes, go ahead and make something with my pattern and post it as your own. My free patterns are simple and something any one with a little bit of crochet knowledge could figure out.
But DO NOT, I repeat DO NOT, copy my photos and my words without providing a link to this site! I will find you! Or, my friends will! Faster than you can imagine. That’s the beauty of belonging to a wonderful online fellowship of like minded crafters!
My bad was that I do not have my name on each photo. The photos don’t even look good! They were taken ages ago when my digital photography skills were minimal, and I had no knowledge about digital editing. Today I’m better! At least Anna says so. And I have, and can use to some extent, the Adobe editing programs. Maybe I should spruce up the photos a bit. Adobe Lightroom could do magic with them! And I should add my blog name …
Anyway, back to my current problem.
On Sunday when I pressed the power button on my laptop, NOTHING happened! I repeat: NOTHING HAPPENED. Nothing at all. It was like pressing a wooden peg on a wooden toy, hoping it would spring to life with magic sounds and lights. (Dexter does that to his new wooden truck!)
Luckily I’m staying with 2 1/2 geeks right now. They tried their tricks. But, NOTHING HAPPENED! My son-in-law is pretty good with these things, and as soon as he gets more time off from work he’ll look into it.
But until then I do not have access to my Adobe programs. Heck, I can’t even upload photos from my Nikon. I’m now working on a tiny mini laptop that doesn’t have a card reader. My camera cord is in Minnesota. I forgot it there since I normally don’t need it … Bleeh!
Here’s links to all my free spiral patterns. Have fun! They’re all free, with awesome (?) photo tutorials and copyrighted right here …
~ Marina
Freeform Crochet Basics: The Spiral
Freeform Crochet Basics: The Two Color Spiral
Freeform Crochet Basics: Part 4
Freeform Crochet Basics Part 4b: Bigger Spirals
Freeform Crochet Basics, Part 5: The Nautilus Shell
Freeform Crochet Spiral Scrumble
Freeform Crochet: Single Crochet Spiral
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