Niche business cards are a fantastic idea!

Just because they have not yet been shut down does NOT mean that what they are doing is legal. WOW – you are SO ignorant!! Without a proper judging panel, proper contest rules, nor proper “alternate means of entry”, which EVERY real contest must have in order to even be LEGAL in this country, these “contests” are not really contests at all, merely underhanded attempts to rip off naive artists.

Although 99Designs is an Australian-based company, they are hosted right here in the US, and they are also conducting business right here in the US, therefore they MUST comply with US laws. Allow me to elaborate on this, and also to educate you in some basics of copyright law in the USA…

What 99Designs is doing is not only illegal in the USA, it is highly unethical as well. First of all, they state that, “After the prize is paid in full, the ownership lies with the contest holder which is royalty-free and irrevocable.”, which is absolutely LUDICROUS!!! There are ONLY nine categories (as enumerated clearly in copyright law) by which works can even be considered eligible to be work-for-hire. These “contests” (and again, I say this loosely, since they do not have a proper judging panel, proper contest rules, nor proper “alternate means of entry”, which EVERY real contest must have in order to even be LEGAL in this country) fall into NONE of these nine categories, so what this company is REALLY doing here is ripping off young designers fresh out of school who are too green to know their rights. They are simply skirting both labor and copyright laws, and attempting to steal intellectual property from others.

Slavery was outlawed in this country long ago. Let me elaborate… even IF these people were on-site employees of 99Designs, 99Designs would not get any rights to their works if they were not at least paying them the federally established minimum hourly wage, right? RIGHT. So why on earth, when these artists are NOT employees of 99Designs, and they are NOT being fairly paid, would 99Designs possibly think for a moment that they could own (or transfer the right to own) these artists’ works?

If someone is not your employee, and they perform work off-site, on their own equipment, on their own software, paying for their own electricity, receiving no benefits of any kind whatsoever from your company, and said work results in the creation of intellectual properties, then for those properties to even be ELIGIBLE to be considered work-for-hire they MUST fall into one of the following NINE (and ONLY nine) categories, as enumerated clearly in copyright law.

1) A contribution to a collective work (such as a magazine, newspaper, encyclopedia, or anthology).

2) A contribution used as part of a motion picture or other audiovisual work.

3) A supplementary work, which includes pictorial illustrations, maps, and charts, done to supplement a work done by another author.

4) A compilation (new arrangement of pre-existing works).

5) A translation.

6) An atlas.

7) A test.

Answer material for a test.

9) An instructional text (defined as a literary, pictorial, or graphic work prepared for publication and with the purpose of use in systematic instructional activities).

Works that fall outside of these nine categories (like LOGO DESIGNS!!) are CLEARLY ineligible to be work for hire, even with a signed contract. Just because 99Designs has tricked some artists into signing away their rights doesn’t mean that it’s legal to do so, or that their contracts are binding. 99Designs needs to realize that you can not bend and interpret the law to suit your needs. Law is law, and any wrongdoing WILL catch up with you eventually. (think Napster, The Pirate Bay, Jack Kevorkian, etc…)

A contract by very definition MUST be inure to the benefit of BOTH parties. Otherwise, by law, it MUST be construed as a waiver.

Also, if you will read through the blog postings for 99Designs, which can be accessed right from their website, many artists who have fallen for their scam never even receive the measly well-under-market-value pittance amounts that they were promised after the close of one of these “contests”. I have read postings from several artists who have already been waiting well over six months to be paid for their works. This is completely unacceptable, not to mention illegal.

ARTISTS!!! DO NOT EVER SIGN WORK FOR HIRE AGREEMENTS!! WE HAVE FOUGHT LONG AND HARD FOR THE RIGHTS THAT WE HAVE!! DO NOT LET THESE TRICKSTERS DECEIVE YOU!! YOUR WORK HAS WORTH!! IF YOU HAVE BEEN RIPPED OFF OR TRICKED, JOIN A UNION THAT WILL FIGHT FOR YOUR LEGAL RIGHTS, THEN FILE A GRIEVANCE!! SEEK BACK DAMAGES FOR THE USAGE OF WORK THAT IS RIGHTFULLY YOURS!!! JOIN THE GRAPHIC ARTISTS GUILD TODAY!! (HTTP://WWW.GAG.ORG)

Absolutely Infuriated with People’s Ignorance in this Field,
Peter McClean | Multi-Media Artist
http://www.petermcclean.com

On Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/PeterMcCleanMMA
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Also, ALL artists and designers should follow:
http://www.twitter.com/nospec
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(stay informed!) =]