Hello everyone! Tara here—

We have a serious topic to talk about today, but it’s also something that’s incredibly important to discuss.

Crochet and knitting are both protected by copyrights because they are both considered “Works of Visual Art” by the U.S. Copyright Office.

So what does that mean?

For designers, this is wonderful because it helps protect their designs from being stolen by other people.

Copyright infringement is incredibly serious and there’s a lot to know.

If there’s a pattern you really love, you can’t sell it as your own. Even if you make a few small changes to the existing pattern. If it’s obvious that the new pattern is almost identical to the original, then there has been a copyright infringement and, depending on where you got the pattern from, you could be sued.

It’s stealing.

If you find a pattern that you really love and you want to share it, either with a friend or with a Facebook group that you’re in (or other social media groups), you can’t. The pattern doesn’t belong to you, so you can’t share it.

Just because you bought a pattern, it doesn’t mean that it’s yours to do what you want with it. The pattern itself still belongs to the designer.

Facebook groups are famous for sharing patterns, but only the designer can give permission to share a design. This includes taking photos of magazine pages to share, or sharing downloaded files you’ve received from designers when you’re purchased the pattern.

The pattern still belongs to the designer (unless the designer sold the rights to it). Sharing it without the designer’s permission is unfair to the designer, who put an immense amount of time and hard work into it.

For more information about the different rights Annie’s Magazines offer to designers for their patterns, check out my previous post HERE!

Even if you’re just sharing the photos from a magazine, publication, or designer on your social media page, the photographer/magazine/designer should be credited to avoid copyrighting their work.

Let us know if you have any questions and we would be happy to answer them!

– Tara Orchard, Editor of Crochet! Magazine

 

Source: Copyright in General

Source: Copyright Visual Arts Definition