Myspace Layout Stolen, effing loser can't make his own layout Options

[--DANNY--]

I was looking at the detailed visitor stats for my website (DannyDahl.com) and I noticed a large amount of hits from a myspace profile. Upon visiting the profile I see some mexican guy's face and text plastered all over my layout. He even used the same wording for each section on the profile. Same exact code... exactly the same.
He used a different picture of his face and slightly changed the background.

looking at the code of the profile, I see img references to like 10 images that are on my profile and hosted on my website.
my freaking Trakzor and cbtracker images are even on there! (that explains why i thought i had a million stalkers from new york all of the sudden)

aaaanyways, I'm pissed.
So before emailing him asking him politely... eff that shite this biznitch is even using this for his design myspace, showing off his work he's designed... he probably didn't do any of it.
so instead of messaging him, i sent an email to the Copyright Infringement staff of Myspace asking that all of the content be removed from the offender's profile, along with the deletion of his account if possible because I will not tolerate plagurisim.

If myspace staff is unhelpful, I'll probably try to screw over the bandwidth of his freewebs account that is hosting the 2 images that are his on the profile, and once that's done, then send him legally threatening email.

I'd link to the profile, but I don't want anyone tipping this mexican bastard off before myspace sees the profile.


Anyone else deal with this before? what did you do?

[MissHygienic]

While I don't condone plagiarism and I'm all about intellectual property, this is MySpace. It's a teeny-bopper, social networking website. I think these, "OH MY GOD, HE STOLE MY LAYOUT, I WANT HIM DEAD AND HIS ACCOUNT DELETED" reactions are a bit much, and he is not doing it for a profit. You take all of your energy to report him to the staff to get his account deleted, but he can make another account again under a different name? You think you have it taken care of, but you have no idea.

I've dealt with this type of stuff before, but not with MySpace layouts. You learn to live and deal with it. Anything you post on the internet can be stolen. You think people are actually respectful enough under an entirely anonymous name?

[michellerrific]

I think I'm going to agree a bit about what MissHygienic said. I mean, it's not like you have patents for your layouts. They may be high quality professional designs, but if they're not really under legal government copyrights, or whatever it is called, then all your stuff is at risk, and there's no use in complaining to any sort of authority. There's plagiarisms and 'jocking' all over the place online. You just have to deal with idiots who spend their lives doing this.

[Kontroll]

Fully agree with MissDouche up there.

[Marlons]

Damn you jockers, we can't even stop them, oh well like stated, you put up stuff on the internet at your own risk, anything can be stolen.

[--DANNY--]

I realize that there will always be douches out there who will steal it if they can.

But this guy is using this layout on his profile that is displaying his design talent. He even said that he created the layout and has full copyright ownership. He even said something along the lines of "DON'T TRY TO STEAL MY CODE BECAUSE IT'S TOO DIFFICULT! TRUST ME!"

So if taking 20 minutes of my time which I would have spent doing absolutely nothing while listening to music in boredom, to report him and have possibly have to lose his account is well worth it to me.

that AND he has the images for a couple different trackers i use, including one i made that is hosted on my website, on his page so it has been screwing things up for a while now.

Basically... it's kinda like the people who illegally download movies and music... they get one DMCA notice from their ISP and they freak out and get scared... they won't be downloading movies/music for a long time at the least.
So if this guy gets an email from MySpace's legal copyright infringement department... it'll probably scare him into not repeating that mistake.

in my opinion, telling people to just deal with it because it happens... is kinda like telling someone who lives in a bad part of New York to just deal with their house being broken into or their car being vandalized because well.. it happens and stupid people will always do it.

[michellerrific]

He's not the only jocker who's said "don't steal my codes". Really, they all say that because that's who they are. There are SO many people out there doing the EXACT same things and no one can stop every single one of them. You could do your best to report it but you can't guarantee that something will be done.

[Kontroll]

But this guy is using this layout on his profile that is displaying his design talent. He even said that he created the layout and has full copyright ownership. He even said something along the lines of "DON'T TRY TO STEAL MY CODE BECAUSE IT'S TOO DIFFICULT! TRUST ME!"

Yeah, and it's probably going to bite him in the ass later on. Relax.

ZOINX!

[pandora]

so uh why does it matter that he is mexican?

[--DANNY--]

so uh why does it matter that he is mexican?

It doesn't.
It probably doesn't matter that he is male either. Should I have censored his gender also?
I wasn't using it in a derogatory way or as an insult.

[MissHygienic]

So if this guy gets an email from MySpace's legal copyright infringement department... it'll probably scare him into not repeating that mistake.

I find that the people who are most passionate about others stealing their layouts are also the most naive. You can't make the assumption that he's going to not repeat the same things. These people think nothing of plagiarism, so they will continue to steal. You really think he's going to get sued over a few MySpace layouts?

I'm not saying this to criticize you, but to tell you to slow your role the next time it happens. It's not worth getting worked up and writing paragraphs about the situation. There are probably over five people who have stolen your layouts and claimed them as your own work, you just don't know about it.

[Elba]

so uh why does it matter that he is mexican?

Forreals

[Elba]

8 User(s) are reading this topic (1 Guests and 1 Anonymous Users)
6 Members: MissHygienic, tungmyBANANA, Elba, sweetasphyxia, IGetSex, doublehelix


OMG TUNG HIHI

[pandora]

i dont think he's saying that he doesnt expect this to happen a lot and sometimes by the same people over and over. all designers actually expect it to happen a lot. that doesnt mean that they should be okay with it or that they should just roll over and let it happen

that's like saying "well people get killed on the streets all the time, so you shouldnt make such a big deal about it"

[--DANNY--]

You really think he's going to get sued over a few MySpace layouts?

I know he isn't going to be sued.
It just sucks to see my work on someone's page and them claiming ownership of it.
So if it can be removed by emailing myspace staff... why not?
And with how he put it together.. he didn't even remove code for parts he took out or remove code for the images for my tracker or for preloading the images for my friend rollovers, it obviously wasn't easy for him to steal it. Meaning if he doesn't have a backup of the code, he'll have to start all over.. probably something he wouldn't be willing to do.

But if you got caught for downloading a pirated movie... and you were to download more in the future, would you download them from the same site? probably not. so this guy probably wont steal a profile from me at least in the future.

[transcendentalis...]

i would check out creative commons licensing if i were you. i haven't ever used it or felt the need to, nor do i know enough about the licenses to say "yeah, of course you can use this!", but i skimmed through their faq and it seems pretty legit.

google it?

[--DANNY--]

that's like saying "well people get killed on the streets all the time, so you shouldnt make such a big deal about it"

my thoughts exactly lol

[MissHygienic]

The fine line here is that you can't compare MySpace layouts to not caring about freak accidents on the road or pirating. It is against the law to pirate movies, and it is also against the law to infringe a copyright, but when it comes to MySpace and you are providing the layouts for the public, there's not a whole lot you can do about it.

In the future, I couldn't give a rat's ass what you do, but from your reaction here, well, it seemed as if you were shocked that it happened.

[brooklyneast05]

hey whitney


good luck getting revenge for the layout sir

[--DANNY--]

i would check out creative commons licensing if i were you.

All I know is that according to the terms of Copyright...

"Copyright protection subsists from the time the work is created in fixed form. The copyright in the work of authorship immediately becomes the property of the author who created the work. Only the author or those deriving their rights through the author can rightfully claim copyright."

So I legally claimed copyright over the material on my profile when I created it.

This guy also did the same, which is illegal.

And from what I understand about the CC licensing, if something is labeled under CC as all rights reserved or not stated what rights are reserved at all, then if the content is reproduced, the original owner must be given credit... I think.

[pandora]

The fine line here is that you can't compare MySpace layouts to not caring about freak accidents on the road or pirating. It is against the law to pirate movies, and it is also against the law to infringe a copyright, but when it comes to MySpace and you are providing the layouts for the public, there's not a whole lot you can do about it.

In the future, I couldn't give a rat's ass what you do, but from your reaction here, well, it seemed as if you were shocked that it happened.

it doesnt matter if its myspace. i dont understand why the fact that its on myspace even matters to you.

[pandora]

sorry for double posting here.

i've had a lot of my layouts stolen. once i had my myspace layout stolen even though there was a vector i made of myself on it... and ykow what? it's gratifying in some ways. people are so jealous of you that they have to take your work in order to feel like they're on the same level with you.

and it's even MORE gratifying when you get all your friends to bitch them out and spam their comments/guestbooks/whatever and totally put them on blast, because then they have no choice but to take the layout down and then their site automatically has this bad reputation. it's REALLY funny when their own friends are like "wtf did you do?"

[jaeman]

Just imagine how song artists feel when you fill your iPod's playlist up for free.

[--DANNY--]

Just imagine how song artists feel when you fill your iPod's playlist up for free.

song artists get paid millions of dollars. That's hardly comparable lol :P
but your point is seen.

[jaeman]

song artists get paid millions of dollars. That's hardly comparable lol :P
but your point is seen.

I know, I made an attempt.

[pandora]

also you're not claiming to have written and sung the music yourself.

[S-Majere]

I'm totally with you on this - I've dealt with a helluva lot of thieves in the past. It irks me that people cannot grasp just how upsetting it is to see your hard work - that you provide for FREE - being ripped off and treated like shit. There's no feeling like it.

Well, hell hath no fury and all that - I go all out. I've stopped actively seeking infringers now because it just made me stress out too much, but if I find one I don't stop until my work is credited, replaced, taken down or whatever.

In order to successfully report an Infringement of Copyright to Myspace Support - you will need to complete an electronic form, with your name, address, signature etc and fax (or mail) it to their office. It's a pain in the ass and I've got as far as filling half of it out before realising I was wasting my time.

Now what I usually rely on is the implied threat of legal action and the fact that I have about a billion and one friends I can request a spamfest of (though that part goes unmentioned). The very fact that you have exposed this thief as a complete fraud is usually incentive enough for your work to be removed.

I have every sympathy.

[--DANNY--]

I sent him a message with a couple of legal threats in it, asking him to remove everything on his profile within six hours or I will be forced to take action.

(It was a well written threat for having been thrown together in a two minute typing fury. I think I'll save it so I can copy&paste it to a future offender... if i find any.)

Apparantely it worked because in less than an hour I received his reply saying thanks for not taking action and giving him the chance to remove it. His profile consists of only a few lines of text. Plain ol' myspace default layout.



I checked, and this guy has a createblog member account (it's the same as his freewebs account)... but there are only like 4 posts on his account and they're all from like 6 months ago. Lame, I was hoping to see an active member feel the wrath of the ban-hammer. :p

Normally, I would the saved copy of his profile that he stole from me so you could all ridicule him and send him all the "where'd you get this layout from???" messages, along with a link to a page that uses nothing but images from his freewebs page and refreshes without cache every few seconds so if you left it open overnight, it would make a dent in his monthly bandwidth.... BUT, since was willing to politely remove everything on the profile, I wish not to further provoke the thief.

[*Steven*]

AHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA

But seriously, what the f**k are you going to do to him? Scare tactic? IM GOING TO GET YOU IN TROUBLE TO JOCKING A LAYOUT THAT I POSTED ON THE INTERNET FOR EVERYONE TO SEE!

[--DANNY--]

AHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA

But seriously, what the f**k are you going to do to him? Scare tactic? IM GOING TO GET YOU IN TROUBLE TO JOCKING A LAYOUT THAT I POSTED ON THE INTERNET FOR EVERYONE TO SEE!

Yep. Although, it is in fact illegal, and if someone were to be willing enough to pay for lawyer & legal fees, you could sue for a number of things. It wouldn't be easy, but you could win.

And does the average (i steal layouts) joe think, "GREAT! lawyer fees! this will be awesome! please take legal action mr.original-content-creator!" lol

the threat is enough to make them cower in fear. :p

[pandora]

AHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA

But seriously, what the f**k are you going to do to him? Scare tactic? IM GOING TO GET YOU IN TROUBLE TO JOCKING A LAYOUT THAT I POSTED ON THE INTERNET FOR EVERYONE TO SEE!

obviously it worked?

[*Steven*]

Yep. Although, it is in fact illegal, and if someone were to be willing enough to pay for lawyer & legal fees, you could sue for a number of things. It wouldn't be easy, but you could win.

And does the average (i steal layouts) joe think, "GREAT! lawyer fees! this will be awesome! please take legal action mr.original-content-creator!" lol

the threat is enough to make them cower in fear. :p

If I were "(i steal layouts) joe" I would laugh at the threat of bringing the legal system in. I guess that's the American way, though. If someone does something mildly not nice to you, you have to sue them. Some a-hole cut me off today, should I sue him?

Also do you realize how much money you would be paying the lawyer to take on this case?

[S-Majere]

AHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA

But seriously, what the f**k are you going to do to him? Scare tactic? IM GOING TO GET YOU IN TROUBLE TO JOCKING A LAYOUT THAT I POSTED ON THE INTERNET FOR EVERYONE TO SEE!

Hey, just because something is posted in the so-called "public domain" does not mean it's a free for all. Any free resources, Danny's layouts included, are posted online with their own Terms of Use and implied licenses of use.

Serious business, Steven!

[EddieV]

Never, but I don't design.

[*Steven*]

Implications don't make a very strong case.

[monster]

dude, not to mention, your layouts suck ass. who cares.

[pandora]

i dont understand why we're still arguing about this. his method obviously worked because the guy took his layout down.

[--DANNY--]

The bottom line is that it is indeed possible to take someone to court over a situation such as this. You would have to be crazy to be willing to pay the legal fees, but who knows, the person you could have stolen from could be a spoiled kid with a rich lawyer daddy.
So the threat of taking legal actions works, as it should.

Monster, my layouts suck?
I don't have any layouts for free use on createblog.com... the only layout I have visible anywhere right now is the one on my profile, and I would like to think it doesn't "suck" since it won MySpace of the Month a few months back.
And even if it did suck, I put my hard work, effort, and time into creating it, so it should still bother me if someone steals it.

If you were a painter... and you were painting in public at a park.
You suck.. you are absolutely horrible.. but you spend hours and hours painting a scene. Upon finishing the painting, someone walks up and takes a picture of the painting without asking or even talking to you.
You then find this person's website where they are claiming to have painted that piece and are using it in their design portfolio..
but you shouldn't care because it sucks right?

[Insurmountable]

I've had this happen before, I didn't do anything I just removed the images from my website and changed the image names around and re-hosted them so who ever was using the layout, their myspace officially looks f**ked up.

Myspace staff isn't helpful, I do agree. They never help you and I think I've only been able to contact them and get a response once..

Personally I wouldn't care to much I guess, I write a copyright on the images and stuff and then the copyrights are imagemapped so their links back to my myspace or website anyway.

[monster]

The bottom line is that it is indeed possible to take someone to court over a situation such as this. You would have to be crazy to be willing to pay the legal fees, but who knows, the person you could have stolen from could be a spoiled kid with a rich lawyer daddy.
So the threat of taking legal actions works, as it should.

Monster, my layouts suck?
I don't have any layouts for free use on createblog.com... the only layout I have visible anywhere right now is the one on my profile, and I would like to think it doesn't "suck" since it won MySpace of the Month a few months back.
And even if it did suck, I put my hard work, effort, and time into creating it, so it should still bother me if someone steals it.

If you were a painter... and you were painting in public at a park.
You suck.. you are absolutely horrible.. but you spend hours and hours painting a scene. Upon finishing the painting, someone walks up and takes a picture of the painting without asking or even talking to you.
You then find this person's website where they are claiming to have painted that piece and are using it in their design portfolio..
but you shouldn't care because it sucks right?

Horrible analogy. I wouldn't give a shit because it was a shitty drawing. I'd know that if I kept practicing, I'd get better. They can have my shitty layo-er...painting. I'll make better ones.

The fact that you're pissed about your shitty layout and that you think this is your magnum opus, then you fail at webdesign, or art in general.

And, I did have an "S" on my "layout," bitch.

[pandora]

i think he's talking about the time and effort taken to create the layout. not the quality of the layout itself.

anyway, this is a bit off topic.

[--DANNY--]

And, I did have an "S" on my "layout," bitch.

no shit sherlock.
you said my layouts sucked.
i dont have more than one. dumbass.

[monster]

no shit sherlock.
you said my layouts sucked.
i dont have more than one. dumbass.

whatever, layout, layouts, your shit sucks

[Tung]

8 User(s) are reading this topic (1 Guests and 1 Anonymous Users)
6 Members: MissHygienic, tungmyBANANA, Elba, sweetasphyxia, IGetSex, doublehelix
OMG TUNG HIHI

HI ELBA!

[libertie]

I've had this happen before, I didn't do anything I just removed the images from my website and changed the image names around and re-hosted them so who ever was using the layout, their myspace officially looks f**ked up.

rofl that's really funny!

I really don't care if my stuff gets jocked - actually, I usually put up a notice that's like "hey feel free to use this for whatever you want, I don't give a shit". I'm just completely carefree when it comes to that sort of thing I guess.

[jaeman]

That's just too crazy.

[Tung]

so uh why does it matter that he is mexican?

I think he's trying to imply that Mexicans like to steal things.

[pandora]

that's not nice :[

[jaeman]

It isn't.

[hypnotique]

so uh why does it matter that he is mexican?

CAUSE THEY ARE f**kING DIRTY NASTY THEIVES.



i f**kING HATE MEXICANS.

















































(I'm Latino by the way Just so that no one Reports me for being a hater)

[miyashu]

LOL @ Villainess' comment.

personally, i've dealt with this kind of thing a few years back, when i was still trying to figure out photoshop. when i caught the kids who yoinked my stuff, i thought it was hilarious because taking those layouts was like taking a bunch of dog sh*t off my lawn without any gloves on.

like someone said in a previous comment, i probably have a bunch of people claiming my layouts as their own and i don't even know about it. in the end, i just keep doing what i love, and that's making layouts :).

anyway, i'm glad that your situation was resolved.

[jaeman]

I think it's total BS when someone takes a photograph, especially.

[Tung]

CAUSE THEY ARE f**kING DIRTY NASTY THEIVES.
i f**kING HATE MEXICANS.
(I'm Latino by the way Just so that no one Reports me for being a hater)

I actually have alot of mexican friends, and when I'm out with them, and I see other mexican looking people, I say hey he's mexican huh? And they get really offended, and say no, they are latino. And they go on and on, about how Latino and mexican is completely different.

[jaeman]

Yeah, Mexicans and Latinos make that argument a lot.