Adventures In Selling Online! #1

The Not So Great Amazon Image Theft Problem!

Firstly - Here's an image representing the way I was feeling earlier! Read on if you want to know why i'm raging!

Lesson Number 1. Do not try the patience of artists - they're really all wired to the moon!

Regular readers will have come to expect a more genteel, easy going, whimsical blog..but ...well folks today it's the other side of me making an appearance. That part of the inner artist that springs out like the Hulk saying - 'Brody Smassshhh!!'.

Remember the blog from a couple of days ago when i was remembering kicking up the autumn leaves as a wee boy. Well today I want to kick the arses of all those design thieves that have been selling my work on Amazon, some for over a year - of which i've only become aware today.

Let's be honest - anyone who sits down and puts their time, effort and skills into creating a piece of work and then puts it up for sale online, knows that they run the risk of it being copied and sold by some nefarious ratfink.

The question is - what does a site like Amazon do to stop this? And when it's brought to their attention, how do they handle this growing problem. I'll be going through this process in the next few days - so you bet i'm going to keep you updated with an honest appraisal of how i'm treated as an independent artist, and not a major brand, by perhaps the biggest marketplace in the world.

So be prepared for thrills, spills, illustrations and hopefully a lighthearted look at a serious problem.

For example - this morning I reported one violation, and the image was taken down within two hours...only to reappear 30 minutes later.

It's like 'whack-a-mole' but costing the copyright owner money!

Tune in tomorrow, where i'll be like Charlie Chaplin sliding through the cogs of the Amazon complaints machine!

​And as always folks, if you're buying any of my art, please follow the links from my shop page!

​Davy