First off, I’m very
sorry to hear that someone has been falsely claiming your work as their own.
As you’ve probably
gathered at this point, this entire scenario hinges on the contract (or lack
thereof) between you and the event organisers.
Given how little
information that we have to work with, i’ll answer generally from the
perspective of Vietnam copyright law. Regardless of jurisdiction, you are
right in thinking that this is flagrant breach of copyright.
This shouldn't be
considered legal advice, but that I hope it helps you potentially avoid this
situation in the future.
Is it possible to start legal
proceedings against the thief?
The answer to this
question depends entirely on information that you haven't included in your
question. You said that you were the official designer for the event that the
poster was designed for, so were you employed by the event organisers? or was
the work commissioned? Is there a clause in the contract that states that you
retain your ownership of the copyright despite it being work for hire? Each
would point to a different set of options.
Basically it comes down to
three potential situations:
If you are employed by
the event organisers in all likelihood the work will be deemed to have been
carried out in the course of your employment and thus under a contract of
service and copyright will lay with your employer.
If are you are an
independent contractor it is possible that the work was done under a contract
for services in which case, it is possible that you retain the copyright
ownership (unless the contract stipulates otherwise).
If you were commissioned
to do the work you likely retain authorship unless the contract stipulates
otherwise.
If you have retained
authorship:
You are well within your
rights to proceed with legal action against this person for breaching your
copyright in the work.
If you don’t own the
work:
You will need to try and
get the event organisers (or whoever does hold copyright in the work) to bring
an action against this guy.
OR you can attempt to
sue him for breach of your Moral Rights-
As the creator of an
artistic work, regardless of ownership, you have the right to be recognised as
the creator (right of attribution).
To go down this road
you’ll need to be able to prove that you are the creator of the work (easy
enough with the meta-data from the files, the exchanges you will have had with
the event organiser who asked for the work and the payments made for the work
etc).
How can you protect your
work in the future?
This might sound obvious
now but include a watermark, send low resolution files for approval (BTW - how
did this person get the file in the first place? Maybe you need to have a chat
with the event organisers about ‘circulating’ files of this kind).
It might be worth
considering including clauses in future contracts that retain ownership of the
work thus putting yourself in the strongest possible position to challenge any
infringers.
How should you confront
the guy?
Since you know who this
person is, start with a direct communication between the two of you, tell him
that he is breaching your copyright and that he needs to stop. Dont go full on
litigious unless you have no other options because it’s guaranteed to be drawn
out and expensive.
However, if he doesn't
care/respond then ramp it up: have a lawyer send a letter on big, scary law
firm stationary demanding that he stop or you’ll start the appropriate
proceedings.
And if that doesn't work
and you’re in a position to do so, take him to court for breach of copyright.
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