Is it your art? No? Then don’t post it!

Yes… this SOPA

Remember SOPA? Remember how we were all pissed off about the fact that they were going to try to give the big media conglomerates huge sweeping ability to censor the internet when instances of intellectual property theft were seen?

Guess what? The reason SOPA was even on the table as a concept was because people are stealing intellectual property every damn day…

I belong to DeviantArt, an artists community. A site like that should be free from artistic theft. Each of us (with a few mighty, glaring exceptions) is an artist and should rebel against the concept of Intellectual Property theft.

I know, Deviant Art has a lot of people working under the creative commons license, but that doesn’t mean everyone is. If in doubt, ask. Even those not using the creative commons are pretty cool. Most of the time, they will give you permission if you JUST ASK.

Don’t do it!

If they say no… DON’T DO IT!

As an artist, you have the right to control how your work is used. That means that if you want to use someone’s image, writing, etc in your work, you HAVE TO ASK PERMISSION. If it’s under the creative commons license, you can use it, but you DAMN WELL better give them credit.

By posting it there, you are outright saying that YOU OWN THE THING. Look below every image and you will see a copyright statement… If you don’t own it, you are LYING!

If you find something on the internet and post it here: you are lying. You are also stealing. Put it in a photobucket account… don’t post it here… we don’t want to see the meme you found online… we don’t want thieves and liars here…

What’s that? I am taking this too seriously? Bullshit!

Artistic theft is, in my book, akin to mental rape. And we have no room for that here.

If you can’t follow the rules you agreed to when you signed up for the site… GET OUT!