If
you're an 'ideas person', and you do reasonably well with those ideas, there
inevitably comes a time when some kind soul points to someone else's work and
says 'aren't you cross about this....?'
It
will become a familiar experience over the years: irritating and deeply,
boringly, predictable. Even more so because the prevailing attitude is that if
it's not completely protected by law, it's fair game. So you will not only have
to explain to supporters why you can't just sue the pants off the offending
person, you'll also get to listen to said person justify the production of a
direct copy of a distinctive piece of work with 'legally we sort of can, so
shove off'.
Intellectual
Property is a complicated business, even when you have technical drawings and
patents to back you up. When it comes to events, it's useless. You can't own an
idea, just a name, a look and a 'feel'. Legal stuff boils down to a battle of
wallets in such situations: who has the resources to be the bigger bully, as
you wade around in the grey area. Even if you're the winner, it's a bullshit
win.
The
nature of our work means that a lot of the time we're at the front of a trend.
Then we'll start to see the signature feature of an event we started a
year ago wedged into all sorts of formats, making varying degrees of sense. Or
the whole format appropriated, with it's content and workings re-arranged, sold
under an almost identical tag line. This happens after you've shown it works,
it's engaging and it can turn a profit, of course.
To
an extent, that is the price you pay for being ahead of the curve: people catch
up sooner or later, and because you work in the public arena, suddenly your
work is 'public property' and it gets pulled apart and recycled by less
skilled, less gentle hands.
To
be clear, we're not talking about the people who are doing their own thing.
Those people whose work is sometimes similar, but also completely different,
because it comes from their own experiences and point of view. It's as
individual as a fingerprint. Give 20 of us the same starting point, and you'd
get 20 different results. There's plenty of room for anyone with an
idiosyncratic world view and a bit of time on their hands. Those people tend to
feel uncomfortable about similarities - they'll even ask you if you mind,
should they make any changes? They're not a problem at all.
No,
we're talking about the people who are more comfortable a few steps
behind. The borrowers, the recyclers. Whose ideas aren't formed around the
scattering of interesting, random bits that creative people magpie
together out of habit, but around Google searches that throw up other people's
work. Second hand stuff.
We've
learned to live with this, if a little unhappily. But recently we had our first
(and hopefully only) carbon copy. Something we've worked on for years, lifted.
Complete. Concept, workings, every small detail - that part rankled, the hard
won solutions to small problems, the moments of elegant thinking - the language
used around it, the packaging, the design. Probably the nicest thing we could say
is that you had to sort of admire the chutzpah required. But only once all the
other responses had quietened down a bit.
So
it occurs to us that perhaps we all need to consider for a moment where
inspiration ends and copying begins. And what happens after you've decided to
opt for the conceptual five finger discount.
Now,
we've all seen an idea and wished it was ours. Sometimes it's being done by
people who seem a very long way away, in every sense. You think 'I could have a
go at that, there's no possible harm in it'. It's really tempting. You convince
yourself that doing it 'your way' would make it new work, you're just 'taking
inspiration'. They'd never find out anyway. But here's the thing: it's a bad
move.
First,
if you admire someone's work enough to 'take inspiration', they've probably
been around a bit longer than you. They know what's going on in their field,
there are Google alerts set up so they can follow their own press. They know
lots of people, and everyone talks. The second your re-hash gets a little
exposure, they are going to know about you. And do you know how those people
whose work you admire are going to feel about your little homage? Sad,
disappointed and angry. Not a surprising reaction when you consider that you've
decided to kick a stranger in the teeth and tell them it's a compliment.
Second,
much as you may have told yourself otherwise, the moment your re-hash
popped into existence you damaged the original's brand. Because you made a
poor version (it is inevitably poor, because yours hasn't got the integrity
that working from scratch brings) which people will conflate with theirs. You
made it crappier and open to a million further, even crappier copies
(no-one wants to be the first close copy, but being the 22nd is super easy).
You single handedly called time on the idea you loved so much. But that's
fine, because you will get a few quid and some second hand glory out of it.
Well done you.
Third,
your re-hash will always be derivative. If you become even slightly successful
with it people will be quick to point out similarities, and you won't look
so great. Maybe the general public won't notice or care, but your peers and
your clients will. People are quick to draw simple conclusions from
obvious situations and they don't aspire to work with skilled copyists. They
aspire to work with people who deliver original content.
And
of course, there is the question of where you will go next. If you picked a
good idea to rip off and you didn't do a terrible job with it, you'll soon
be the big fish in your local pond, but you can't live on someone else's
idea forever. You're going to have to have a new idea! Back to Google! How
many times will that happen before people start to notice?
So
please, think twice before treating our portfolio like the Woolworth's pick 'n'
mix counter. It's easily avoided: be honest.
We've
seen this on every scale imaginable, from performers copying each other's
costumes to major clients shopping around for cheap copies of a successful
person's signature style. It gets tolerated because it's not clearly defined
legally, no-one wants to be seen as a paranoid weirdo who thinks they own the
colour red and the nature of creative process means that two people can come to
the same conclusion on different sides of the world with no contact. There are
lots of places for lazy, derivative 'creatives' to hide.
One
thing we know: the person copying always knows better, deep down, no
matter how sweetly they talk themselves into it. The person being copied
always, always minds, no matter how benign the intention. It is never a
victimless 'crime', even if the only damage is to a friendship
or someone's feelings. It's taking something you want, because you think that being aware of it awards you co-ownership. It's a selfish, destructive action and to characterise it as
'creative' is both misleading and patently untrue.
So,
be honest with yourself: do you know better than this? And if the answer is
yes, no matter how attractive the idea, how delicious the re-arrangement
already brewing in your head, how fat the cheque, walk away. Because it's
so much better when you get to where you want to be on the back of an idea
that's entirely your own. You deserve to know how that feels, and we hope
that you never have to deal with some arse copying it because they think their
wishes and needs are much more important than yours.
If
you'd like to know more about where we think good ideas come
from, have a look at this post on the subject and this book, which largely informed it.
