Craft:

Dear concerned citizen:

I appreciate your concern, and Kathleen from Twig and Thistle shared the same concerns with me via e-mail. I have replied to her e-mail (several weeks ago now) with the knowledge that I best have regarding the matter and have not yet heard back from her. If there is further concern I am sure it will be addressed appropriately between Kathleen and myself.

I have seen several people crying fowl play and "copyright infringement" over this piece, but it concerns me that people post these alarms to twitter, blogs, and forums but never attempt to contact me. Everywhere I notice the concern I find that there is easily a link to my Etsy shop or blog which would allow them to contact me personally. I happened to come back to this blog post and discovered your concern, but had I not randomly come back I would not have known about it. If someone is going to post a concern publicly they should also consider posting a comment on the blog our source of the concern so it may properly be addressed.

Obviously your comment isn't meant to be taken kindly and I understand there are a lot of people that think the first work they see is always the original (people just tend to be closed-minded like that), but as pointed out by the author of the post as well as other commenters, there are a lot of works like this already in circulation. One of the works linked to was created in 2004 (which far outdates Kathleen's work). There are countless examples of these hand-made notes on the web and it seems to be generally accepted that the idea of a handwritten note (in stiched form, written form, or some other form) is essentially not copyrightable as it has been in the public domain for hundreds of years (lined paper has existed since the 14th century).

Thank you to those who have already replied to this comment and I appreciate everyone's understanding that copyright issues are not as simple as everyone thinks and I would encourage everyone to do research before assuming someone has violated a copyright.

<3katie

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Posted by: Rachel Hobson on June 10, 2009 at 7:55 PM

Thanks for your note. I understand and appreciate your concern for your friend, and I've admired Kathleen's work. In fact, I featured some of Twig and Thistle's work here last weekend: http://blog.craftzine.com/archive/2009/06/stache_bash_party_elements.html

However, as I mention in the post, this isn't the first instance of embroidered notebook paper and writing that I've seen. Here are a few other examples

http://stitchspectacular.wordpress.com/2009/02/02/candace-hicks/

http://www.moniquemeloche.com/html/artists/reimer/reimer-work.html

http://www.flickr.com/photos/carsonelaine/458125250/in/photostream/

http://www.flickr.com/photos/loobiloo/3614277092/in/set-72157600116574938/

As Becky mentioned, Katie gave credit to Kathleen in her post and linked to the inspiration piece. When I initially posted this project, the notes were not offered for sale. That may be an issue the two artists need to discuss together.

Finally, while it's perfectly acceptable to express concern over a project, we ask that all readers keep their comments respectful. Thanks so much for understanding.

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Posted by: Becky Stern on June 10, 2009 at 11:48 AM

Katie, the woman who embroidered this, credits Twig and Thistle on her blog as the inspiration for this piece (with a link, even!), but we've seen loads of this same concept around the web.

http://www.laurendicioccio.com/pages.php?content=galleryBig.php&navGallID=6&navGallIDquer=6&imageID=10&view=big&activeType= (just one example)

As for your remark about the execution, we have a "be nice" comment policy. Rachel found it lovely enough to post here, and I agree that I like it even better than the original since it's more cartoon-gradeschool-looking with the thicker stitches.

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