Listening is an important business skill
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Today something happened to me that I felt was really unfair and rude and honestly quite upsetting.
I contracted for the logo for this site, and my va site and apparently the image was plagiarized.
I noticed it was very similar, just today, so I posted on that person's forum about it. Then five minutes later I got a very rude call about it.
Nothing I said would make anything better and she was not willing to hear me at all. She was already determined to believe I stole the image willfully and planned to keep using it willfully. Nothing could be further from the truth.
I think an important aspect of any business is to listen to people. If you cannot hear people and you cannot listen to them for five minutes then you're probably missing out on quite a bit in your life and in your business relationships.
Had the woman listened she would have known a few facts.
1) I was already in process of taking down the picture.
2) I was already going through my records to see who made it since I contract out to various designers
3) I liked her forum a lot
4) It was upsetting to me as well
Instead she continued and still continues to act like I was not planning to take it down when nothing could be further from the truth. I've emailed her, I've called her back, I've done all I can in this situation, nothing more to do. She simply won't hear me, and now has of course blocked me from her forum and I've returned the favor by blocking her from my email.
But now I want to spread the word that sometimes it is important to listen. In any dispute you have listening to the other side can often do wonders for your position.
If you listen you might discover that you're upset over nothing, that the issue is already resolved, and there is nothing to get upset about anymore anyway. You might even meet a friend, a business partner, an ally.
In this case, had I not posted about this in HER FORUM she would have never known. I could have quietly removed the picture and never said one word and frankly, in the future, that's exactly what I'll do if it should happen again. Sadly.
I cannot be responsible for going to every last website out there to make sure no one uses an image like mine, or a picture like mine. Especially when so many are being made from images from istockphoto.com.
I can only do the right thing if I find out it happened and that is exactly what I did and what I planned to do all along, which is why I posted about it on her message board to start with.
So, please, people, do one thing this week if you do nothing else, Listen.
I contracted for the logo for this site, and my va site and apparently the image was plagiarized.
I noticed it was very similar, just today, so I posted on that person's forum about it. Then five minutes later I got a very rude call about it.
Nothing I said would make anything better and she was not willing to hear me at all. She was already determined to believe I stole the image willfully and planned to keep using it willfully. Nothing could be further from the truth.
I think an important aspect of any business is to listen to people. If you cannot hear people and you cannot listen to them for five minutes then you're probably missing out on quite a bit in your life and in your business relationships.
Had the woman listened she would have known a few facts.
1) I was already in process of taking down the picture.
2) I was already going through my records to see who made it since I contract out to various designers
3) I liked her forum a lot
4) It was upsetting to me as well
Instead she continued and still continues to act like I was not planning to take it down when nothing could be further from the truth. I've emailed her, I've called her back, I've done all I can in this situation, nothing more to do. She simply won't hear me, and now has of course blocked me from her forum and I've returned the favor by blocking her from my email.
But now I want to spread the word that sometimes it is important to listen. In any dispute you have listening to the other side can often do wonders for your position.
If you listen you might discover that you're upset over nothing, that the issue is already resolved, and there is nothing to get upset about anymore anyway. You might even meet a friend, a business partner, an ally.
In this case, had I not posted about this in HER FORUM she would have never known. I could have quietly removed the picture and never said one word and frankly, in the future, that's exactly what I'll do if it should happen again. Sadly.
I cannot be responsible for going to every last website out there to make sure no one uses an image like mine, or a picture like mine. Especially when so many are being made from images from istockphoto.com.
I can only do the right thing if I find out it happened and that is exactly what I did and what I planned to do all along, which is why I posted about it on her message board to start with.
So, please, people, do one thing this week if you do nothing else, Listen.
Tags: business, copyright, listening, plagiarism
Replies to This Discussion
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Permalink Reply by Working Mama on -
Gosh, how rude of her indeed. And how sad to have such an attitude when you are in business and when the OTHER person is making an effort to resolve the situation. Sheesh! Good for you for taking the high road.
joanna
http://theworkingmama.blogspot.com/
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Permalink Reply by Rebecca Hurt on -
As the reply below says, "good for you for taking the high road" and it is too bad she would not listen to you. She could of found out the important information, like who stold her logo. As a previous Graphic Desinger.....that is what I would of wanted to know.
Her mistake.....her loss!
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Permalink Reply by Stephanie on -
It actually turns out that my logo is not stolen. In fact hers cannot even be a logo. Apparently you cannot use istockphoto images unless "substantially modified as to make unrecognizable" and copyright it. It's in their terms of service.
My logo was a custom graphic, not a photo, (not from istockphoto) and you can't find it on any site anywhere, while the concept was the same they were different and mine is copyrightable and hers is not. So, istockphoto.com has been notified and will deal with this issue on their own I guess.
For me, I still don't want my site or my logo to be the same as everyone else's. I am having an entirely new design made and I am VERY excited about it!
I really had not planned to make this blog that important. I just wanted to be able to network and share with others in my business but I have brand new plans now! I'm very exited and cannot wait.
I think as women we truly need to support each other. Competition can be very helpful in your business, and does not have to take away from you in anyway. You never know when your competition will end up as your partner!
:)
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