My Design Has Been Stolen
 

A company on the 'net that makes "quilt blankets"...basically printed tops that they then machine quilt and bind has begun advertising one of my designs for sale as available i 4 sizes of quilt and as having been created by one of their "Professional in-house designers".
I have contacted them with proof that I am the copyright owner and that they are required to cease and desisit, but I'm not holding out much hope.
The name of the company is Charming Tribe.com and I will include a picture of the quilt that they have stolen.

Watson

OMG h ow horrible. Good luck fighting this company. Keep us posted, please.

Oh Watson! That is horrible!! I went to their website and clicked on something called "DMCA", where they actually lay out the steps to follow if you think they have infringed on your intellectual property. Wow! To me that is like admitting that "We're going to use other people's stuff and will continue to use it until we're told not to, in a complicated and (probably) expensive way. Phooey to you."

Wow, just wow, what is wrong with people these days! I really hope you’re able to get them to stop and I hope that Karma bites them in their thieving #ss. Please keep us posted.

WOWzers ....... not only yours,
but I see several other familiar quilts,
including two patterns from MSQC, including Jenny.
hhhhmmmmmmmm!!!!!!!

How sickening .......

...... and at the prices that they are showing, nothing aligns!

And what is this Kona fabric with microfibres added?

When you click on the image and read the details, it says 1-2 days to create the product and ship. I don't think these are hand-made designs. I suspect that they are digitally printed onto fabric and then quilted and finished.

It also appears that you are not the first person to complain, and, in fact, are waiting for people to complain. If you go to their home page and scroll all the down, there is a link labelled DMCA claim. It takes you to a google document that outlines how to complain about copyright infringement. If you post any additional images, you may need to watermark the pics before you post them.

This is terrible. I have to believe they know what they are doing is illegal or at least very sketchy. Good luck, I hope you prevail.

FoggyButFocused ..... actually it is Watson, that has had her design stolen.

went to the website.....and it looks to me like the whole website looks a bit odd. I could not see where they are located although they said they ship to 200 plus countries from here and something about not paying the duty charges which you will owe? No listing for shipping prices...I dunno....I don't think I would order from them The website also has a copyright date of 2021.

Sort of related but I watched that Netflix series on LuLaRoe and if I remember some of their “designers” said they were told to find images on Google and then change a little something to avoid the copyright issue. I don’t think it always worked for them. Maybe these folks are using the same awful strategy

@Watson The site uses Shopify. The Shopify agreement specially states that they cannot use copyrighted material. Shopify also has a DMCA form to fill out. I would hit them where it hurts - the pocketbook.

The site was created on September 18, 2021. The holder of the .com address states Iceland, although it seems like all that info could be faked. I would say this is a fake website trolling for credit card numbers.

Once again, good luck!

Rob Appel "Making it Fun" and "Man Sewing" I believe had something similar happen to one of his applique quilts - a guitar version I believe. Might be worth reaching out for some advice\ assistance.

I don't think it's likely a credit card scam - I think they will actually make you the thing off of someone else's intellectual property.

This is a terrible thing that has happened to you. I do hope you are able to get them to stop using your design & hopefully they will be fined or the whole site pulled from the internet & you will be compensated in some way. I don't know anything about copyrights but I do know right from wrong & this is just plain WRONG!

I am at such a loss for words, especially when I know Watson when I see him!

virtual hugs and warm thoughts, wish there was more...

I'm so sorry, Watson. I would definitely report them to shopify. I saw a couple other quilts that were made from patterns. Probably copyrighted patterns.

Seems to be a rather recent website, gives me suspicions as well.
I looked at around didn't see a pic of your quilt Watson, maybe they took your comments seriously, Lets hope!!
I agree, probably a scam site. Jo

This happens ALL.THE.TIME. Sometimes you get a printed fleece blanket, sometimes they just take your money and you get nothing. These websites are hosted offshore, so there's nothing that anyone can do legally other than inform their website hosting company and hope they take the site down. But that only stops them temporarily. It's happened to quilting giants in the industry such as Lisa Hagstotz (Calle), Ricky Tims, and a couple others whom I can't remember right off the top of my head. This is why I don't post pictures of my original designs on social media, although it's difficult to control what other people do with their pictures of my quilts.

Looks like they are ripping off a lot of designers. You won't be the only one sending "cease and desist" letters!

I contacted Shopify and they took it very seriously. Asked me to fill out an official form and send it back. I was going to do that tomorrow and I went to the website to get the link and it has been removed!
So, either Shopify jumped on them or they reacted to my comments this morning. Either way, they are no longer selling my design.

Watson

Spam reported.

Watson - that's great news!! I'm glad you took action and that Shopify responded appropriately!

Just Wanna Quilt is a podcast for quilters hosted by copyright law professor Elizabeth Towsend Gard. Here is a link for the podcast. She has a facebook page as well where she calls the members a Quilting Army. Every day quilters are interviewed and tell their story. She also interviews famous quilters. You may wish to contact her with your story. Good luck.

https://www.justwannaquilt.com/about-the-podcast

I am so sorry to hear this. It actually angers me. You put a lot of work into this piece and even though it is hard to fight copyright infringements it is still worth the try. Have you contacted an attorney yet? This is one of the bad side effects of the internet.

Watson, good for you in being so quick to respond to this. It's an outstanding piece of textile art and needs to be respected.

I am glad that they were so quick to respond, I am sorry this happened to you and I hope it doesn’t happen again.

Looks sketchy to me too - Under FAQ-s - "My tracking # doesn't work" - their answer - "If the tracking number is still not working within a few days, please contact the shipping carrier." No, that's not going to work. It's the seller's duty to follow up, not the buyer's. I would stay far, far away from this company, looks like the typical FB scam ad. Especially since their pictures imply that the products are handmade. And the fact that they are calling them "quilt blankets".

Glad you got your problem resolved, OP.

ETA - went to their "blog" - they stole a "Winter Star" quilt tutorial from Jenny Doan including using a picture of her. Brazen.

This company is in China. They have other names they ship to the US under.

They ship under Ergoteachers as well

Watson, I can't imagine how awful that was for you to find out. Glad they took it down!

I'm so sorry this happened to your masterpiece! Just the other day I found one of my original quilts listed on a similar site for sale for the same price. Makes me wonder if it is the same company. It's wrong!

I"m so glad that you contacted them and got your design removed. That was a beautiful quilt and should remain an original and not be cheapened by some Chinese company who just wants to rip people off.

It looks like everything on their site is a rip-off of someone else's work. I'm glad your quilt design was removed, but really the whole site needs to be taken down.

Totally agree with Dunster!
Though we all know that these sorts just resurface in other ways.

Watson ... so glad that you got yours pulled from their offerings.
I am sure you can't help but be skeptical, as to where, what, when ........... again.
Totally curious as to how you found it was there?

A friend was shopping on the site and ran across it. She had over $300.00 of merchandise in her cart and dumped it all once she saw what they had done.

Watson

I haven't looked on the site but "quilt blanket" sounds a little goofy to me!

I did some "digging" around and found a few QB members quilts, and even one of Jenny's from MSQC, on their site. The site that I found my quilt on had a different name, but same layout and description.

I think it will be a good idea to start watermarking our quilt pictures that we share on here.

Too bad it happened to you, Watson .... but thankfully, she was eagle eyed enough to recognize yours, then totally dump her potential purchases!! I'm guessing this was one of the infamous pop-up ads that we are inundated with. All the more reason to not even bat an eye at those!

I would wager they don't even send you anything close to what is shown in the pictures. Some of those trapunto quilts, you couldn't reproduce by machine and they certainly aren't making them by hand at those prices. Probably just a scheme to get your CC info.

A few days ago my FB feed on my Kindle was full of ads for the Post Office selling stamps at a discount. Like that would ever happen. I reported them all. I have adblocker on my laptop but when I look at FB on my Kindle or phone I see ads. I wouldn't trust any online ad or website unless I know of it personally, like Macy's or Kohl's.

ETA - try searching Google images for some of the more distinctive quilts - they are all over the internet. Also, they have 284 pages of quilts, at 24 quilts per page, that's over 6700 quilts that they have the patterns and fabric for, and can whip up for you when you order? I don't think so.

Can you tell I hate thieves and scammers? lol.