I search Amazon a lot. I’m always looking for some free, or cheap stories that will kill the dull time through out the day. Usually I write, but even that can eventually make me call for something else, something different. So here I am staring at an image I know the artist who created the book cover (I’m not going to accuse anyone of anything, especially if the job was and could have been done by someone else) did not make. Why? Because I was involved with a bigger Art Theft a while back and two of those same stolen images are being used for this author’s books. I’ve contacted one of these artist before and I contacted him again, today.
This is his image: http://fav.me/d4uilq (Image is now different)
and this is the book cover:
There’s also another one that was stolen from a poster from a movie called Creep:
So what do I do about them? Last time the culprit stole images ranging from Marvel to Indie Artist. I contaqcted each artist first and made sure they were given without permission and then contacted each author. Those author’s didn’t create the images, the publication did. So one man was at fault.
Now, it’s a smaller incident. One where an author thought he could google an image and use it as a cover. (Again, I’m assuming.) I contacted the artist and left it in his hands. I let him know, that he needs to report it to copyright@amazon.com and email the author.
But what should the procedure be. This is what I want to do:
1) Post it up so everyone can see what a bastard he is.
2) Let the artist know.
3) Add him to my ban list. (Anything by Trestle Press is on it.)
4) Get people to troll him.
5) Contact him with a angry email.
After the last incident, I have the power to do all that. People love to troll thieves, I like to send crazy email; but the author’s got super upset. Mostly since it wasn’t their fault. They were given “Free” covers by their publisher. It was his fault, the publisher/cover designer/sales team/jerk/idiot/mongrel that stole the images to make a quick 15 cents off one of their books. I never blamed the author, but readers did. It really hurt the inde-publishing market as well as many aspiring writers.
So, I’m curious to hear what the AKAQ (A Knife And A Quill) community thinks. Everyone here is either an avid reader and/or a learning writer. We are more open to ideas then throwing stones, we talk and converse to decide decisions but overall we like to write. We write about our feelings, about other people’s feelings and I like to think we know a bit more about how people tick. So what do you think?
Update: Artist has contacted writer and writer’s wife, and has reported the author to amazon.
A Knife And A Quill- old 