Help! My designs are being stolen!

Way back in 2012, my Hedgerow Fingerless Mittens design debuted here on my TwoStrands blog. That’s the cover page to my original design which you see, above. Months ago, I redid them in Shetland DK yarn.  You can see that version on my website here.  Today, I see that someone who goes by “Voolenvine” has stolen my copyrighted Hedgerow chartwork, plunked it on a pair of otherwise plain socks, called it her own “Klara” sock design and, as you can see on her 8/2/2019 YouTube channel video, she carries with a long story about her “inspiration” for “her” (stolen) design.  Here’s the link to her YouTube video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JJdmwX_5ckE

You’ll see her “Klara Socks” using my stolen Hedgerow design show up 7:14 minutes into her video and she shows them, claiming them as her work, for more than 3 minutes, up until 10:24.

Oh *$&%#@$, she’s done the same in more of her YouTube videos!  The previous episode, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JJdmwX_5ckE, has more of the same lies, claiming my Hedgerow chartwork as her own.

You can also see “Voolenvine”‘s Klara Socks” on Instagram, where a (possibly entirely innocent and unsuspecting) test knitter shows her test knit, with my Hedgerow chart work on it, in progress: https://www.instagram.com/p/B0vyuMypPHI/

 

Interestingly, Voolenvine does not show these socks as WIPs on dear, old Ravelry, where my Hedgerow Fingerless Mittens PDF has sold for ages.

I’ve commented on these pages and I’m submitting official complaints about this infringement to YouTube and Instagram.  Unfortunately, that isn’t enough to stop thieves and posers from infringing elsewhere.  Sadly, I’ve found copies of my chartwork on many sites over the years and, no doubt, some will continue to pop up here and there.  But, this is, by far, the most outrageous theft yet.  Can you believe she went to the trouble to build an extensive narrative involving her great-grandmother around this?  Nuts!  Since this is so blatant, since I know many of you dear readers are also indy designers and it’s highly unlikely that my design work is her only theft, you folks should know about this.  Somehow, there may be more chapters to this saga!

 

 

Help! My designs are being stolen!