I have somebody re-selling my work for a lower price. Our solicitor is on holidays and will look into this when he is back however he says it might be a complicated process. Has anyone here had any previous experience suing an individual rather than a company before? I have already contacted the host and paypal so they are waiting for my fax/letter to pull the plug on him but his illegal activity was actually quite damaging so I am thinking about taking this further. Thank you!
Most hosts will require you send a DMCA before they shut down the site, you should do this if you haven't yet.
mightyb Copyright Infringement If you are thinking about borrowing (stealing) someone else's material. You should read this! Copyright laws provide for penalties of up to $150,000 per infringement. That is ONE HUNDRED AND FIFTY THOUSAND DOLLARS! This is not just some arbitrary number; keep in mind that this amount was just recently increased from $100,000 per infringement in order to give the copyright law even more teeth than it already had. So, let's say you go to someone's web site, download one of their pictures, or copy their text, and then use it on your web site without permission. In order to save a little time and maybe a few bucks, you have just opened yourself and or your company up to a $150,000 liability for each infringement. And when the rightful owner finds you (and they will), the legal "cause of action" that lands on your desk (a subpoena) will be seeking $150,000 for EACH infringement. Hiding behind that corporate shield won't help you either, because copyright infringement is a criminal act. Stealing copyrighted material is not only unfair to us, but it is also unfair to our good customers who follow the law and pay us for the use of our copyrighted material. We have an obligation to protect our customers. Because it's so easy these days for one person to "steal" the creative work of somebody else, lawmakers have recognized that for copyright laws to be effective, they must have teeth. If you use our copyrighted material without permission we will utilize the law to it's fullest extent. We prosecute every copyright infringement, no questions asked, and we will always seek the maximum fine of $150,000 when we file suit. You can have a great web site designed using professional copy writers and artists for a thousand dollars or less. There is no need to steal other peoples copyrighted material. However, if you really think that stealing that one image, or that one catchy phrase is worth a $150,000 gamble then you must know that time is not on your side. Sophisticated spiders can easily match copied test and identify stolen images. These spiders work 24/7 and you WILL get caught.
So ironic, you copying and pasting somebody's work What I am concerned about is... What happens if the offender is a 16 year old kid from India or something. Who will hunt him down and how on earth is he going to afford this sum of money? I want to stop these idiots from stealing and reselling my products but I don't want to ruin their lives.
Just sending a DMCA notice means their site gets shutdown, nothing more. The hunting down part would happen if you choose to sue them in civil court, or the authorities decided to go after them (unlikely unless we are talking about infringement on a large scale).
So your someone with a heart, yet are being serious? Why not try contacting them, if they don't comply then the only option would be to ruin their lives or deal with it. You can shut down their host, but with the internet today you can open up new hosting accounts just about anywhere for extremely cheap.
This is exactly what I was thinking about. Obviously the first step is DMCA notice which gets their hosting suspended however taking further action may not be worth it against individuals because like MelogKnaj mentioned some authorities would not bother. This is why I was wondering whether somebody had success actually chasing some individual down and getting compensated for damages and if it was actually worth it.
The DMCA notice doesn't mean anything. If you are operating on a large enough scale (hundreds of thousands of visitors/day or thousands of dollars/week), and within the boundaries of the International Piracy Laws, then you can get into trouble. If you aren't operating on a grander scale I wouldn't worry about it.
"Why not try contacting them, if they don't comply then the only option would be to ruin their lives or deal with it." No one's life is ruined unless their real identity is unveiled.
You shut down the site, and then another one pops up. Sorry that happened. I know what it's like to have someone steal your work, and IT SUCKS.
You should try contacting the hosting company, it would be easier to solve this issue if the host is cooperative (most legal and big host are)
If you copy someone's random image that is already all over the internet, you don't run much of a risk. Worst case is you get an email asking you to remove it or link back to the original source. Absolute worst worst case is that your host finds out about it and shuts your site down... However, copying someone else's material and SELLING it will be enough to prompt someone to take legal action. Also, I understand those laws are applicable in the US, but who is going to enforce them to people who are not even US citizens and not even in the US? Will the Indian government be in charge of that?
No the absolute worst case is you get a DMCA shutdown notice followed by a civil lawsuit. Sure it's unlikely, but it can happen. It's not worth the risk of some stupid image to get sued over thousands and thousands of dollars.
the biggest thing is if you are the plantiff, you site makes $2 a day and they are a 14 year old kind in india? Your legal fees are going to be worth way way more than the site
I don't know where this comes from (I suspect from someone trying, perhaps a little over-zealously, to protect his work by intimidation), or which country's laws are allegedly being cited here, but I understand that one of the difficulties over suing for infringement of copyright is that you have to be able to prove actual financial loss in order to claim monetary damages.