Yeah its a rip off. But I wonder if the guy who designed the graphics in Tetris should be expecting something from you. Just saying. Also, why did they fake age the graphic on the shirt? Looks better crisp.

Im not telling you to be a money grubbin whore. But this should line 4cr’s pockets for quite awhile if you were to litigate.

Jeffy: The difference is, I wasn’t making any money off of the use of the graphics – my usage is clearly covered under the tenants of fair use.

These guys are clearly making a mint (a Swiss mint? Mmm…) off of not only my design, but, Nintendo’s graphics!

Contact them and serve them a cease and desist.

SUE! SUE!

Or expect royalties. Ask how many shirts they’ve sold with the design, and ask for a percentage of the profits that should net you at least twenty bucks.

The thing is if they ripped you off, they probably ripped off other designs. Poke around and see if they didn’t.

This is absolute dookie, show those brits some American steel and rip them a new one.

A metaphorical new one, that is, via international law.

On a separate note, I just want to let you know that my Wife absolutely loves these. I sent her one every hour at work all day(using some from he previous years too). When I got home she had a big smile on her face, so THANK YOU for helping make this an excellent Valentines Day (and saving me some $ on flowers)!

I think the proper course of action here is to contact the seller and tell them to give you proper credit. You never intended to make money off of the design, but someone else is, and without giving you credit.

If they don’t bend to a simple, nice request, then consider making threats.

You guys should be making your own shirts.
With all the creative imagination what-not bouncing around this website, I should think that you guys would be talented enough to appeal to a market. That is if you had original artwork that was also compelling somehow.
I love your yearly charity t-shirts.

Sue and make a video game with the money.

Well, that’s what I would do.

I don’t like it. I smell BS.

The attention is great, but they’re whoring your design, it really strays from the original… if you want, get profit, but if not… *hands you wiimote with wii condom*

rip them a new one, like Arcanis said.

Lol, it appears that most other nerds on those other gaming blogs (yes, one of which I post to…) have no concept of nerd love…

Time to sue Mitch.

Hm…if it was just some random website, I’d think twice, but if it’s really a big chain store as was said above, I’d look in to it…they shouldn’t profit off the design without at the very least giving you a nod.

Comma of address, Zelda_Boy.

“Time to sue, Mitch.”

Also, I support that. They clearly owe you royalties.

Lotan’s right. Make some more shirts; those Google ads can’t possibly pay all the bills.

And seriously - that is just blatant plagiarism; despite the hassle/cost of lawyers, you should pursue legal action. Has anyone made a Phoenix Wright joke yet?

I’ve been playing Phoenix Wright! I can represent 4cr!

This is disgusting.

You deserve royalties.

If it was me, I’d let them know they copied me, and if they put up a stink or tried to deny it, I’d let Nintendo know they’re using Tetris blocks. Then they can get sued by some people with real money.

You’re on Crunchgear as well, by the way. They’ve used your image on their homepage, with no credit given to 4cr.

http://www.crunchgear.com/2008/02/14/happy-valentines-day-cr unchgear-readers/

Would Nintendo sue over tetris blocks? It seems silly to sue over something that is considered classic; and I’m fairly sure Nintendo doesn’t own tetris.

Mitch, if the gain doesn’t outweigh the effort, you should ask for royalties. Don’t forget, though, legal action is a bitch.

Is someone gonna digg this? I think that getting some attention from the overall community would be a little better than an outright litigation-slap-in-the-face-o-rama.

am i the only one that noticed that these are $80?

006: Digg It

Try this!

The fact that the clothing company is trying to sell these shirts for $40 is a crime in itself, nevermind the fact that they’re criminals for ripping off real artists. One has to wonder how many of this company’s t-shirts have designs stolen from other artists?

Jeffy,

Basically, there’s really no basis for the Tetris creator/rightsholder to collect. The usage of squares, L-blocks, and so on is far too common. If it was the structure of the game shown, there is some possibility, but as it is the idea of putting blocks together to form a heart is really not covered even by the original idea of Tetris, much less the expression within the game, which is the sole object of analysis for copyright purposes. You don’t even have to analyze it under fair use, because the expression is not even being infringed upon.

The T-shirt, on the other hand, fully ripped off the graphical expression, is using it for profit, without permission. Open and shut copyright infringement case, they have no fair use defense, they might as well settle for whatever cash would be less than litigation and damages would cost.

As background, I’m in law school and have studied copyright and fair use.

@ mitch:
Teeenx

And yeah, ~$80 US is a rip-off.

Jerks. Somebody with a lot of friends should put this on digg.

Wow. Identical. I’m a product designer and have been ripped off before (I’ve seen student work appear in an Australian design competition that was basically a direct rip-off of a bike I won some awards for a few years prior.) It never feels good, but it’s a bit trickier when you’re dealing with a student.

These guys are selling shirts for profit. Send them a letter asap- and then POST THIS STORY ON http://youthoughtwewouldntnotice.com/blog3/ it’s an excellent plagiarism blog. Actually, I might go do that now.

Okay– It’s up! http://youthoughtwewouldntnotice.com/blog3/

Now let’s see how long it takes for another designer to notice one of their own designs in the All Saint’s store.

This seems to happen a lot. Isn’t there some shirt designer that’s basically famous for doing nothing but stealing ideas and altering them slightly?

I sent them an email directing them to speak to you or the guy that posted the first thread I read it on ^^

I’m sure I’ve seen it a few places on the internet since you made it (or at least very similar images). Somehow, it doesn’t surprise me that it made it on a shirt, even if it’s without your permission.

Dugg the story though. Hope it gets popular enough.

We have had this design since 2004. People steal things on the internet.

http://www.pennyarcademerch.com/pab070121.html

We have had this design since 2004. People steal things on the internet.

http://www.pennyarcademerch.com/pab070121.html

Sure people steal things on the internet, but this is not about stealing an idea (or playing of off it) it’s an exact copy!

I know you’d go apeshit over that as well, wouldn’t you Mike?

If ti were a small place i’d quietly shoot them a email But that not being the case, and considering how much their charging for those shirts, I’d raise royal hell about it. They should just plain know better.

If you don’t actively protect your copyrights, then you implicitly place your work in the public domain. You need to take some kind of action against these guys, even if it’s just a cease and desist letter.

Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, but wholesale uncredited plagiarism is an insult to your worth as an artist.

Yeah, I was gonna say. Penny Arcade’s had a similar shirt design goin’ for awhile. Unfortunate, nonetheless! A shame the shirt’s producer couldn’t be bothered to alter one damn block.

For the record, some quick searches say that Penny Arcade’s Heartris design was created around April 2006 – my card was made in early February 2006.

Even if they did theirs prior to mine, I wasn’t aware of Penny Arcade’s shirt design until a little bit ago. I didn’t lift it from them. The idea actually stemmed from the very first Valentine on 2006’s list. I drew it for the guys in #4cr and then later expounded on the idea.

Just for irony’s sake, here’s All Saint’s copyright notice.

http://www.allsaintsshop.co.uk/copyright/

Someone profiting off your work, while it might be flattering, is just… well, wrong. Very wrong. $80 a pop for these shirts? You know what, I’d pay it. I like the design, I like the cheese, I like the retro factor, and it totally appeals to my geek chic. But I’d rather pay that money to the DESIGNER, not corporate thieves.

And just to follow up, the issue with you using Nintendo’s original tetris blocks?

Well, there’s a process in the creative industries known as Appropriation, Fragmentation and Retextualisation. It simply means to absorb input, break it down into it’s components, then reconfigure it into something ‘new’. It’s general creative practice, even if people don’t particularly identify that this is what they’re doing.

In short, it’s called inspiration.

If, however, you’d copied the original cartidge, called it SIRTET, then re-released it, that would be plagiarism.

This is plagiarism.

If they’d made a heart out of space invaders or something, then I’d think they hadn’t really crossed the line, personally. But they just COPIED your work.

And then had the hide to sell it :/

Man…

First contact the companies to make sure it’s not just a mistake.

If they don’t remove it, pay you or whatever then I suggest contacting:

http://rbovarnick.com/

He’s my corporate lawyer and the best I’ve found, he’s a bit pricey but he’s a pro.

I don’t care if you’re flattered that they’d use it. They are ripping off their customers. 40 pounds a pop? That’s eighty fucking United States Dollars.

On top of that, copying your design? I don’t care if it was under the fair-use tenant, or whatever. It’s a blatant insult to the integrity of creative people internationally.

Take their asses to court, dammit, and teach them a lesson: Don’t mess with a creator, especially when it comes down to COPYING his work, pixel for pixel!

(And yes, you DID use Nintendo’s graphics, but I don’t really care for that, what I do care for is the fact that it was a valentine’s card image that was directly copied onto a T-shirt for gross profiteering.)

Being an artist myself, I have a big problem with this. While it is cool, in the very, very, VERY least you should get credit for this work. Beyond that, it is really up to you. I personally feel you should be compensated by an agreed upon percentage. Luckily for you, I happen to be good friends with a former head lawyer for BP Amoco who dealt with things exactly of this nature, including trade mark infringement, among other things (like, for instance, telling the people making shirts that say, “Smac A Ho” over the Amoco logo that they are in fact breaking the law, and may want to stop, before they go to jail.) I will give him a call tomorrow and see what he thinks your options are.

Why don’t you make those T-Shirt’s yourself and sell them. If people are willing to pay All Saint’s 40 quid, then they should be willing to pay the original creator the same.

Just contact them, and ask what their version of the story is.
Well, or maybe the readers of this site could ask them. Hm…

Seriously do something about this. Like you mentioned, you did this for free and you put it out there for people to enjoy. Someone making a nasty profit out of these shirts is exploitation pure and simple. My knowledge on copyright/trademark is non-existant at best, especially on I.P released on the Internet, but there has to be something you can do.

As Doc Lobster mentioned, if they had changed a few blocks here and there I probably wouldn’t be as upset but this is theft pure and simple. A vintage filter isn’t going to make it any different, you were ripped off! Please do something about it.

40 Euros each is a ton of money. what if they sold a 1000 already??

I say sue their asses, and get yourself a new car with the money.

Yep. All Saints is no CafePress. I thought I saw a rather large section of theirs in Selfridge’s, one of London’s biggest department stores.

Having closely looked at the two pictures this is certainly not a case of two people sharing a concept.

The blocks are clearly in the same alignment. therefore it’s plagerism.

If seen Penny Arcade and others damn a graphic fashion company for moderately ripping off others (eg different characters, slightly different design).

This doesn’t even display that effort. It’s a cut and paste job.

Given this fact and the pretty high profile nature of the company in question, i would at least shoot off an e-mail.

If that were me, I might approach the situation more amiably than filing suit. I’d tell All Saints you are flattered by their use of your design but that its not entirely fair that they are profiting from your creativity. Perhaps you could broker a mutually beneficial deal in which you could sell them future designs, and maybe get a fair compensation for what money they’ve made already. Hey, they obviously like your stuff.

THIEVES!!! Lol, j/k. All saints probably thought that nobody would notice considering the image is from 2006. Either that or somebody wanted to look good for a design they “just created”. Certainly e-mail these people with your side of the story & gauge their reaction. If they have sold these shirts using your Intellectual property, you are more than entitled to your part - even if its just recognition.

Theres no need to unleash the dogs immediately. Typical scenarios are two way roads, so its best to get the full story before you pounce on anyone. Who knows, with a but of good diplomacy you may even gain an avenue to sell other designs.

SERIOUSLY?
Dude. NOT HAPPENING.
PLEASE, at least write an email demanding compensation to the nth degree. Especially for how much they’re being sold for.

If you need a petition or anything I’m sure you have more than enough support.

Just think of what they would do to you if you copied their design… not to mention theirs isn’t a fanart, it’s business.

If something like that happened to me, I surely wouldn’t send them a “friendly email” but one to a lawyer instead.

I don’t know how many people are enjoying it since they are selling it for $78.50 based on current conversion rates. They are just trying to extort money with your idea, so you should do the same to them.

This chain has stores all over London including near Oxford Street. They make unnattractive (no offence to your ace design) clothes which they sell to folk with a lot of disposable income to burn. They make a lot of money.

If this was a market stall designer who liked and, more importantly, adapted and developed your design idea then fine. But this is not flattery. It’s unimaginative, lazy and wrong. You don’t need to go for the money, just get it out of their shops and spread the word so they think twice to repear the mistake.

As everybody is saying, maybe you should start with a nice sunny and cool e-mail asking their side of the story. Then, after that, you’ll see if they are willing to cooperate.

Removing the shirt from the shelves, or giving you some money, or aknowledging your work in any way. If they don’t, maybe you should ask for legal counseling (maybe with the lawyer mentioned above).

Then, if there’s no other way, sue them. Not only because they stole from you but because they shouldn’t get away with that (and the fact that maybe it isn’t the first time nor the last time they do that).

Yeah man, email those guys pronto. At least get them to sell the shirts for 10 bucks (US), something fair, and maybe give a nod to you, the designer. Otherwise, hound those jerks until they cry. It’s possible one of their designers submitted it as his own design, and they’re not even aware of the stealing, so don’t outright accuse them, but if they seem aware of the fact that it was stolen, don’t back down. At best, maybe you can get a shoddy rip-off-artist out there somewhere fired.

Reach out to shmorky at somethingawful.com- he had the same thing happen to him

instead of trying to get money that will go to u try to get them to donate the money to a charity like u did with huzzah and childs play or get them to donate to the site. it might be easier to get money from those people that way cause it looks bad for a buisness to deny charity

Make them support charity (Childs Play!)!

I’m eager to see what comes of this.
Use your common sense mitch. At the end of the day it’s all about what you want. remember these places will have several designers working for them. one of them was lazy and copied something cool he’d seen on the internet.
At the very least make sure no-one else is profiting as the designer of this.

Ha, I’m glad you have such a clearly dated product to fight the Penny Arcade claim…

Regardless, I think there’s a difference between people having similar ideas and people right out taking the EXACT idea and selling it. It’s very possible for people to have the same artistic concepts based on some item out of pop-culture. You find this out more and more as a designer. I can’t tell you how many times I though I had a cool idea only to stumble on the EXACT SAME THING by someone else, something I was previously completely unaware of.

I don’t think there’s much more to say. They should take this down and they should compensate you or whatever you wish for the damages. Even if they made no money off it so far, that’s completely irrelevant.

http://www.penny-arcade.com/2006/01/25 - actually, they reference it here too… But regardless, I think your initial outrage on it still stands and you should continue to do something about it

I agree with Terminus, ring up these people and ask for a cut to be sent to a charity (such as Child’s Play), If they refuse then start to ask about legal proceedings. If they agree then everyone is happy, they get their t-shirts, you get recognition and also the human race as a whole benfits. which would be your doing as it is your design that is enabling this.

Also it’s a really nice piece of art, well done. (only the best stuff gets plagurised anyway )

I’m very glad someone posted the http://youthoughtwewouldntnotice.com/blog3/

My guess is that this company outsources to numerous designers - some who do very well as lazy art thieves. Definitely contact them with the intention of alerting them to what happened. They may not know.
The proper end result of this would be having the shamster’s cheque canceled and written out to you for whatever the full going rate was for that tshirt design. (along with an apology) Keep the money. You’re a professional - and as an artist myself, there’s nothing I like better than to see thieves receive their comeuppance.

Good luck!

Thanks for your support, guys! I just posted an update to the news post.

Also, thanks again to Namssorg for posting it to youthoughtwewouldntnotice.com. When Luke Plunkett of Kotaku and I talked a bit, he suggested we post it up there – and just as he did, it was! Rebels. Seriously? You’re far out.

It looks like allsaintsshop has disabled their email submission form. I’ve no doubt their being spammed to hell and back. I love their approach tho, instead of disabling the page with the shirt in question or posting a note assuring customers that they’re investigating the problem, they just cover their ears and sing “LALALALALALALALALALALALA” really loud.

Who cares about this? Honestly. It’s not like it’s even that good of a design. Seriously, you should just be happy that your **** site is getting some attention.

Seriously though, these guys better compensate you super swell like. I mean, they screwed you for Valentine’s Day and didn’t even buy you dinner.

You should TOTALLY get soem money from that.

sue them. get a lawyer and get your share. Don’t listen to these guys “send them an email and a bouquet of flowers asking for an apology”. As a lawyer about what you can do, I bet none of these guys are lawyers. if you were in texas you would already be getting a new house for your idea being stolen.

nuke’m til they glow then shoot them in the dark.

Financial whatevers aside, this is just a raw deal right here. Not cool at all.

wow that’s really weird.

i was doing a photography brief on fashion and i saw that tshirt and thought it was rather cool. but at £40 it wasn’t worth buying. that’s almost $80.

and now i know it’s a stolen idea i’d never buy it.

i took a pic of it when i was out that day. thought you might be interested.

http://img185.imageshack.us/img185/524/4crripofftshirtgc3.jp g

hope you get fairly compensated.

i’d demand a load of money. ;P

the amount they charge in that shop they can’t be short of it.

Mikey: Awesome!! Thanks! Putting this in the main post tonight.

The t-shirt design world is 90% rip offs.

Do we have any proof that the t-shirt wasn’t there selling before the valentine card images were posted on 4cr?

Anyway, I really want to know what will happen with that story.

zounds indeed mitch. i hope you get your burlap sack of royalties

Legal action is the only way to go. They have stolen a design that you created and are now profitting from it. That’s against the law.

Sue them! Who knows how many designs they have stolen? They didn’t ask permission and have ripped off the EXACT design [they didn’t even change the Tetris blocks so it’s obviously stolen).
Ask a lawyer for advice.

you deserve compensation

sorry. forgot to say this:

all saints obviously thought they could get away with this. they blatantly ripped-off your design and probably believe they won’t get in trouble for it. i think you should try suing to get compensation. all saints haven’t even tried to modify your design greatly. they are being asshats!

just checked all saint’s site! wow. they are claiming the design is theirs!
sue them! sue them!

Or would be plagiarized if you owned the tetris graphics.
Which you don’t.

“Tetris graphics” don’t exist. With each release, no matter which publisher — and there have been quite a damn few — the graphics have changed. This design looks like it was taken from the Game Boy version. Great. Of course, Mitch certainly doesn’t own those specific pixel-arranged sprites, but he does own the idea of their complete arrangement as an unfinished heart (needing to be “complete”), whether those sprites are arranged from the Game Boy version, the NES version, the PC version, the cell phone version or whatever version you happen to have played. And he certainly owns that specific arrangement of Tetris pieces. Alexey Pajitnov may not be getting payed, but then again, when has he ever? And, until now, when did his Tetris pieces ever equal a heart?

Send them a nice and sunny email? Why in the world… Let’s hear how it sounds in the real world (even if you ignore PB’s answers):

http://thepiratebay.org/legal

(Admittedly nobody is asking for money, but that’s for some other reasons, not because they are nice guys.)

Nice one, I hope you get paid Mitch! Or at least they stop it so you can sell them yourself. Which you could anyway.

But I guess the fact that they had the idea to swipe the design and sell it is why they’re the rich corporate whores.

Good luck!

I read on something awful you are from PA. If you are in Philly goto or contact the Philadelphia Art Alliance. They should be able to help with this and from what I understand in the past they have offered FREE legal representation to artists for cases just like this. Here is the website http://www.philartalliance.org/

I’m certainly not a lawyer but do alot of creative work and the tetris heart would, from my less-than-lawyerly position, be considered a derivative work. If the definition applies to your tetris heart then your work is covered by copyright.

But don’t fuck about and get a proper lawyer to figure this out.

All the idiots stating that he doesn’t own the Tetris graphics himself should read up more on law before making this statement. There’s a good chance that the Tetris images (not the name, that is a whole different deal) reside in public domain.

http://www.deezteez.com/menstshirts/you-complete-me-tetris-h eart-shirt_168.html

hate to tell ya… but you got another one to dell with, i saw the add for it in the back of a US magizine Feb 4, 2008 pg 90.

go get em.

This shirt is so grate.
May I introduce in my blog?
I will buy two for us.