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Copyright is a sore spot for The Goose. It's very unfortunate that these days, so many people will take advantage of the work of others. Copyright laws were instituted to protect everyone who creates a product or work of art (writing, photography, etc) from having these creations copied and used for ill gotten gain. Copyright and Patent laws are the very reason why we have so many products that we have today (including medications, electronics like VCRs, TVs, computers etc as well as books, music, videos, games etc). Why innovate when you can just clone someone else's heavily researched product? Significant amounts of time and money are invested in Research and Development departments in businesses around the US (as well as around the world). If these companies weren't protected by copyright and patent laws, other companies could copy the product and make more profit than the originator of the product since they would have significantly less R&D expenses. This would lead to less innovation and we wouldn't have the products we have today.
Back to stamping - The Goose is very aware that there are people selling CD's filled with photos either taken at convention or worse...COPIED FROM OTHER WEBSITES! Did these people make all of those projects...no! Did these people invest their time and money scanning the photos, buying the websites and displaying these quality photos and projects - NO! Clearly, the people who are profiting from these photos are sorely underinformed regarding the amount of time people spend building their websites, stamping their projects etc.
PLEASE be aware that people who are selling these CD's are violating that stamp company's Copyright policy. Not only that, those who are copying photo images from websites are being unethical and disrespectful to those who provided the images for viewing. These images were put up for free (or even at cost to the owner of the website!) for your FREE viewing. This is NOT an invitation for anyone to come, copy the photo and burn it to a CD for personal profit! Not only that, the image was never intended for distribution on CD. The Goose does not believe that photos of a personal nature (like scrapbook pages) should be on such CD's. You would think that these "websurfing, photo saving, cd burning" people would consider this prior to their thievery and would respect a personal item. However, The Goose no longer takes any chances and has removed all photos of a personal nature.
The Goose apologizes for the removal of all scrapbook pages, since it seems from the stats that many people did enjoy them. They were there for your PERSONAL inspiration, not your personal profit.
Be aware that when other stampers realize that they have paid hundreds of dollars for their websites and scanning equipment to provide FREE products (images) to these profit hungry people, they will probably get smart and will pull their sites down too. These sites were provided to you as a service, most of them do not charge for the view and many are very high quality and high maintenance (as well as high priced for the owner who provided it to you FREE).
If you agree that this practice of saving images from other's websites to burn on CDs for profit is WRONG, PLEASE PLEASE DO NOT BUY THESE CD's! DO NOT FUEL THE FLAME! You vote with your pocket book - when demand dries up, they'll move their thievery to other venues and leave the rest of us alone. In addition, Stampin' Up! rules are in place to protect their copyright interests as well as to have everyone compete on a "level" playing field. Please do your part by supporting demonstrators who play fair and follow the rules. Demonstrators who use eBay and openly violate copyright rules may offer you a great deal today, but will also drive the honest, helpful demonstrators out of business, leaving you without your honest stamping ideas and service. Don't be fooled...these people who aren't following the rules will not be there for you with ideas - they probably have none of their own which is why they must resort to thievery and breaking the rules to support their lifestyle.
And by the way, NO IMAGE or FILE ON THIS WEBSITE IS YOURS TO TAKE! There is no permission expressed or implied to do anything with the images except LOOK at them while you're here. If The Goose finds that any image has been sold, distributed or used for anything other than viewing on this website, ALL IMAGES WILL BE REMOVED. This policy applies to anything on the website...any text, file, image... Download buttons are provided for items specifically intended for downloading and distribution. All other files should be left where you found them, uncopied.
Just in case The Goose wasn't clear - YOU MAY NOT SELL ANYTHING YOU FIND HERE ON eBAY!!!! Yes, this means do not copy, screen print or otherwise capture any text on this website then sell it to people as a compilation of stamping hints on eBAY. Did you write it? Did you think of it? If your answer is no, then don't sell it! (Exception: You may sell physical products that you buy here to whomever you want, however you want. The above statement applies to intellectual/electronic property).
The Goose again apologizes for any inconvenience caused by this policy. It wouldn't be necessary if people didn't attempt to do things like copy photos they didn't take of projects they didn't create and make a profit. It also wouldn't happen if people weren't selling printed emails and calling it a "compilation of stamping hints" and selling it on eBAY! If you want to sell something, PLEASE CREATE IT YOURSELF! Invest the time to make a great product and market it. Don't resort to the theft of intellectual property! This is illegal, immoral and unethical. If you're doing any of these practices, YOU SHOULD BE ASHAMED OF YOURSELF.
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