Monday, September 14th, 2009
www.southsidetattoos.net + www.iceburgproductions.com = fail?
When Gavin and I launched his website I remember saying to myself “no one in their right mind would steal this site”. I said this even after my own site had been ripped off five times.
Let me run Gavin Castleton’s site by you in case you’re new:
We busted our chops to make this completely original. Special.
We think it is pretty cool, and clearly James “Triple Threat” Choma at Iceburg Productions in Florida thought so too. From his portfolio description for SouthsideTattoo.net
If you are looking for a unique website, this is one to check out! This client said that they were interested in Vampires and Skulls to showcase their tattoo shop. Using Jquery tools we were able to build this unique side-scrolling website, complete with a Lightbox photo gallery.
Have a look:
"By" Iceburg Productions
While I luckily can’t claim responsibility for the vampires and skulls I will give myself props for the “unique website” part. Graphics aside: Gavin and I spent months making his site an original experience to complement his very original new album Home. Sure some of my graphics/css are still being used, but the framework/layout/concept that was labored over (with some freely available javascript mind you) is very much intact.
But they blew it: the two halves of gavincastleton.com are clearly symbolic. Divided. A split-screen. Sure it is fine to slide back and forth and look to look at a totally sweet piercing, but where is the heart behind that? Gavin’s got it. Literally.
Let’s compare “inner” pages:
and
Through the wonder of Google (gavincastleton.com search) I found that page titles on the iframe popups hadn’t been changed from GavinCastleton.com: http://www.southsidetattoos.net/faqs/piercing-q3.html. It is amazing that laziness in THEFT (keep in mind, you’re already way lazy for stealing someone’s work in the first place) caused me to find out about this. Just like it did for Optimum Design.
Should I start building my sites in Flash again? Should people stop being lazy and completely unethical? Neither one of those is going to happen, but something has to. I’m not sure I can handle the theft of another design.
4 Comments Categorized { Copyright, Design, Rant }
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September 14th, 2009 at 1:48 pm
I knowm this is very distressing to say the least. Design thieving is so rampant. I have seen my blog template and other designs ripped off similarly so many times.
It’s so crazy when there are so many resources out there for template/design assistance, and when it’s no secret anymore that using someone else’s graphics, code or content in such ways is considered to be unethical and typically is absolutely not allowed.
Examples like these are especially offensive and perplexing, lazy as they may be, the thieves had to have a pretty good knowledge of coding and be proficient in some graphic design software in order to make their “improvisations” to the designs they stole.
I mean, I just don’t understand it. Wheres the fun in designing like that? Why put so much effort into something unoriginal, that you stole, when you could create something on your own?
I tell you, I swear I see something from my designs stolen more than I do any of the content I offer for download.
Someday, maybe their will be a solution. Till then, I am just going to keep doing what I do, and know I did it first. I am not going to change my deigns because they copied me anymore.
F— em.
September 14th, 2009 at 1:49 pm
You effectively knocked both sites off the web, for now anyway.
December 10th, 2009 at 11:32 am
I feel your pain. I recently had one of my designs stolen. How did I find out? He left in my google analytics code. Then I discover that the person in question couldn’t even code the contact form so it still points to my site. I could not believe it.
March 27th, 2010 at 5:10 pm
Thanks for the great info, I will definitely be back!