Much to my surprise yesterday I learned that when googling “Phish Logo,” the results happen to bring back an image I created for a computer art class in college four years ago, a collage that uitlizes a Phish logo that I maticulously edited for hours for use in a collage featuring over 40 layers. While it’s probably just chance or luck, I feel honored that people discover a work of art I made when searching for one of the most recognizable logos in rock and roll (and that of my favorite band). Many of the photos in the collage came from my own collection, while I scanned and edited others in from a copy of The Phish Book (which I had to unbind to scan and thus ruin).
So what’s the problem here? Well, the image that comes up on Google links to some schmuck’s MySpace page where he has dropped my image with no attribution. Now granted this may just be another fun-loving phan, whom I would love to have a beer or share a high five with. He may not be a schmuck. However, he’s hosting a piece of art that took me dozens of hours to put together on a photobucket account, residing on his MySpace site. It’s also available on my flickr for all to see and download in up to 1024x768 resolution.
I’ve never had someone steal something I’ve made before, but this is weak. So, my question is this: do I contact this person and risk it dropping off the image results for “Phish Logo” on Google and going back into obscurity? Do I say nothing at all and let it continue to likely be ripped off? Do I even have any right to complain since many of the images I used were copyrighted to begin with?
