When is it alright to accuse someone of copying your doll/someone else's doll?

Baaaack in the day of 1999 oldskin Volks, I decided to get my first FCS doll, which at the time was only availabe in Japan and there were like 3 people you could send a money order to to order it. Everything was in Japanese...there were no mass wig lists to help out and eyes were the same way. I was pretty new to the hobby, having a Syo at that point that I got from Doll and Hobby Shop. So I did what I had to do to get a doll I knew I would like. I looked around at other people's dolls...and copied one. I have no idea who it was anymore, just that I knew I wanted an F-28 because it looked like a Lucas. I found someone with a lucas or F-28, I have no idea, and I'm not sure if I asked them what wig/eyes, he had, or if it was posted, or if I just guessed, but that's what I told my 3rd party to get me. He has his own personality of course, as I think theirs was some sort of bondage dude and mine is a time traveller.

So I think you have to consider motivation. Obviously if its a stalker copying your entire character, then it might be an issue, but if its someone new, possibly even someone frustrated, there's no harm in making someone else happy with their dolls. With the arrival of that F-28, I finally felt like I had a doll I could really really bond with, and so I was inspired and delved more into the hobby, learned more and more and as the hobby grew, so did my knowledge and the ability...the /skills/ to be able to create on my own. Imitation was just the first step for me in learning.

As a neat little end to the story, I have kept that F-28 constant, still with his default make-up from volks and his original eyes and wig, since the beginning. Its just always felt right.

 

mmm....kinda hard to say.
I think it shows lack of orginality when someone copies your doll.
On the other hand it's flattering because it means they like your doll so much.
I'm not sure. I have mixed emotions.

And about accusing...So you tell that person that you think they copied your doll. What do you want them to do? Get rid of the doll? That's not fair either.
And the whole thing just causes both sides to be upset.

I think it would be very upseting for the dollowener when they first see their doll in another persons home with another name. But the best thing is prolly to ignore it and hope that time washes away the unhappy feelings. After all, theres nothing much you can do...

 

That's not easy to judge when someone is copying a doll... Especially when they're dressing in a very popular cosplay.
I think that "copying" it's just something affecting the style and the way the whole character is made up. There are so much gothic lolita, goths, vampires and elves, so you can't tell...
Maybe, it's just copying when you find your close friend buying the same pair of glass eyes, the same dress and wig as you've already done previously, or using the same name for a doll which is based on the same concept (i.e a vampire). So it could be really annoying.
I don't think there is something really "original", but f you're the first to use a name or to give your doll a certain image, well, if it's successful someone could take inspiration from your character.
But if the characters and the stories of the dolls are very similar, I could say that's a copy, indeed.

 

It´s not easy judged but it´s very frustrating

After taking the trouble to create and develop a character someone empty minded with no ideas comes up and there ya go...It´s very sad

And worse when you think that no matter what you say you´re gonna look as the bad one.. especially if this person is respected/known /popular in other forums , journals.. there´s almost nothing you can do.

I am not very keen on showing al the drawings I make, the backstories I write, on lj and such.. and just because someone else does it does not mean it´s their idea

....just an advice.. be careful and watch out to who else is listening when you talk to someone about your doll projects....

Just a notice, I am talking about copying a character, not about having the same leeke wig or dollmore shirt.. many people buy it the same places especialy when new in the hobby, it´s not strange that some pople end up having something similar

 

I think dolls are like tattoos, very personal things. If someone copied a tattoo a person had just because they liked the way it looked but didn't even care about the meaning it held that would be annoying. It's the same kind of thing in my book.

 

i read the first two pages and this page, so if i happen to be repeating what anyone in the pages i skipped had said, sorry

i'm a fashion major. in school, they teach (teach? tell?) that there's no such thing as 100% true originality. every "new" concept is borrowed from something already existing.

that said, when i had gone and bought shion, i had looked at millions and millions of pictures of dolls. i had spent 3 years prior doing this (yeah.... i know ) once i had my mini database of doll pictures, i ordered shion and sorted through all the pictures i had for the luts faceup artists. i hope no one kills me, but shion is a combonation of:

Nezumitoo's Faunel
Akoeabsolute's Ukyou
Zalem's Kiryuu
Kisakisama's Kaitou and Kage
belladonna's Casper
(there were more, but i don't relaly feel like going through the multiple thread's i've saved just for shion's look. these are the ones i remember off the top of my head)

and my very long, drawn out, 4 paragraph description of how those looks should be combined together and what i wanted tweaked from them.


does he look like any of them? i really don't think so. maybe other people will see a resemblance after looking at this list, but....... oh well. if ya didn't notice before, then let's pretend you don't magically notice now ^_^;;;

i know if i ever saw shion copied EXACTLY- same hair, same EXACT face, same attitude, etc etc, i'd be pretty freakin pissed. i feel that's the only time it's ever remotely "okay" to go, "hey, you copied my doll, that's not cool" (but in not as nice words, of couse)


EDIT: annnnnnd here's are pictures of him for you to look at if you don't know who he is

http://www.denofangels.com/forums/showpost.php?p=623977&postcount=55

 

Since there are so many dolls, eventually one will be very similar to another. You can find plently of examples in books, movies, and paintings (to name a few). So, my thought on it is that as long as they don't CLAIM to be that doll (which in my mind, sounds really strange), then it's okay.

To say the truth, I might have thought of this topic differently a year or two ago.

 

In my personal opinion, i'd be delighted if someone bought a DoC Si and the same outfit I have from Dollmore (it's his favourite outfit) and a similar wig (kinda hard since it's his default and I've not seen a similar one on the DoD site...) and the same boots from Mimiwoo and named him Yuki.

Yeah, it'd be kinda weird to see my baby in someone else's hands... but Yuki would love it since he's such a narcissist! I mean, unless you've heavily modded your doll so much that it's no longer anything like the original mold (or is very unlike it) because you particularly want one that's completely unique, it's hard to say whether it's copying or not.

I mean, the same name... would be annoying to me but only cause I'd get confused!! But the exact same look just says to me they like the way my doll looks.

I wouldn't be upset or offended personally, but I totally understand that some people would be - if you have put so much effort into making your BJD look a particular way and someone else copies it, I guess it would be really irritating.

However, I think if someone really wants to copy your doll, they should at least ask first, if only out of politeness than anything else!! It would be quite a shock to see Yuki strutting around someone else's bedroom when he's sat next to me if I didn't know about it beforehand O_O

As for when it's ok to accuse them? Well, I don't think it's ok for ANYONE to accuse someone of copying SOMEONE ELSE's doll. It's none of their business. If somone copied Yuki, i'd be mortified if anyone other than me said to that person 'OMG you've copied Ehryn's Yuki!!' And I'd personally be more inclined to take offence at the troublemaker than the copycat.

It's up to the person whose doll it is to decide if they should take offence at duplication. If it upsets you, mention it to them. If it doesn't, no-one else should care either. EVEN if you mention it annoys you to someone such as a friend or something, that's still no reason for them to go around stirring up trouble.

We have enough problems to deal with in this hobby (i.e. people not understanding/disliking the hobby, companies copying molds, hoax companies et al) without us at each others throats unneccesarily when quite frankly it's only the business of the two people in question.

That's my opinion on the matter anyway ^_^

 

In my case, I've got a few dolls that... either could be considered 'copies' or are likely to be 'copied' later.

The first are my three Arashi boys. They are doll-versions of a Japanese boyband I adore with my heart and soul, and the most recent one (I'm still waiting for him to ship!) is actually a Minimee. Another user and I both wanted the same guy, same style, so she paid for one of the heads and I ordered. We'll have the same doll, sort of, and being that he's a real person, the chances of our dolls looking really similar are high.

But he's a real guy. I wouldn't dream of getting mad at someone for making their own Ohno doll. There are plans to do a group order for another member's Minimee, so lots of members will have him. It doesn't bug me at all.

The other kind is my Musedoll, Honami. I literally fell in love with the example doll on their site; 01, smoky&shimmer faceup, crimped blonde wig, normal body. I loved her and wanted THAT DOLL. But I decided that I didn't want to exactly copy the example, so I got her a white wig instead of a blonde one. The difference is striking enough that it doesn't bug me.

So, yes. I think that in some cases, 'copying' is inevitable.

 

It's hard to say when a doll is being copied because people have the same ideas, like the same things, there are coincidences... it's normal. However, if you've made elaborate and unique outfits for your doll, covered it in tattos, did radical mods or a very different sort of faceup and suddenly another doll shows up looking like it it's just too obvious isn't it? It depends on how unique your doll is. On the other hand if your doll has something so special that it makes it absolutely unique people will recognize the copy. So it's not a big problem anyway...

Just thought I'd add this: if a person absolutely ADORES another person's doll and NEEDS to have one that looks just like it or has one of it's features, well... I don't think it's terrible, so long as they don't post pictures on the gallery or take the doll to meets and conventions, basically taking credit for it. That would be a "bit" disrespectful.

 

I wouldn't be surprised if a doll looked like my Cain, (or had the same name, since it's rather common) or Cain looked like theirs, since i just bought him. Now, the dollshe bernards isn't all to common, yet, but he has the default makeup and random wig & eyes provided by Iplehouse. I make all his clothing by myself though, so it's not easy for anything to be identical in that part. I wouldn't mind if another doll looked like him though. It's not anything i can decide over.

 

I find that it's really easy to be influenced towards a certain 'look' for a doll or character (name included), just by browsing other dolls or characters. Also there's coincidences (I have personal examples of both. The first one's kinda morbid.....)
When I try to come up with a character for my fiction I tend to randomly browse sites that interest me just in case I get inspired. One particular time I was struggling to come up with a new OC and just gave in to browsing crimelibrary.com. A while later (days) I came up with an idea for an original character, choosing the last name 'Albright' for him, seemingly out of the blue, and also opting to have him be a serial killer whose 'signature' was the removal of his victim's eyes. After browsing crimelibrary.com again after that, I came across Charles Albright, a serial killer who removed the eyes of his victims. I had only looked over Charles Albright's case for a moment, but it had imprinted on my subconscious without me even realising. Perhaps the same thing happens with dolls?
My other example is one involving another of my OC's. My OC's name is Zane, he's always drawn as a cat-boy and he has the appearance and behaviours of someone that would be classed as 'emo'. Browsing on photobucket, I stumbled across 'Zane the emo cat boy'. I suppose that coincidences are as common in the doll world as with OC's.
Another suggestion as to why dolls may closely resemble each other is down to the people who buy them. Many doll-purchasers either are goths or are into the goth look, so it's likely that the same kinds of things appeal to them, hence creating the chance of an overlap of doll's appearences.
Really, I think that, before accusing someone of copying, people should determine whether or not it was intentional, subconscious or coincidence. However, I can understand people being upset when they think their doll has been copied.

Sophie.

 

I wouldn't ever accuse anyone of "stealing" or "copying" my doll's identity.

All of these dolls are customizable, so lets say that there's a boy doll with a blond wig and blue eyes and his name is Jesse. Then later someone else has the exact same doll, with the same eyes and wig and the same name. I wouldn't accuse that person of stealing my doll's image because I could easily just change mines wig or eye color. That way, my "Jesse" would still be my character but wouldn't be the exact same as their "Jesse" anymore.

We all try our hardest to make our dolls "our dolls", so even if another person attempts to copy your doll, they can never have the true one.

I personally would be flattered if someone liked my doll that much that they'd want to copy her style. It might be irritating if they had all the exact same clothing, wigs, eyes, and attempted personality of my doll, but what are the chances of a person being able to find all of those exact same things? And even if they did somehow manage to get all of those things, you still have the original. People have still seen your doll first, so the other person would be the one who comes out looking bad, not you.

I had to think alot on this subject myself, since I had come up with a wonderful name for the new doll I'm saving up for, only to find someone else had the same name for their doll So, I guess I'll still use the name, but just spell it differently.....

 

I guess it would depend on if one made their doll the exact copy of another's doll or they were influenced by them.
Being influenced is a good thing but copying isn't.
I can't quite relate to dolls right now seeing how I don't have one (yet)
Just because someone has the same wig, same hairstyle, same WHATEVER as you doesn't mean that they're copying you. (But if its exactly the same its a different story) If its exactly the same (same wig, same eyes, same balsgdkasglhg.)
then..you can rightly accuse them. >3> But I have been influenced, but there's no WAY I'd make my doll the exact copy....(Because I has my own ideas to make my doll lol in. 8D

 

If someone's ripped off the fine details of the story behind the character of my doll, I'm going to be a little peeved. This has happened once or twice, but I never made a stink about it - I was just irritated as hell, until I reminded myself that it's just a story. And it's unfortunate that the person doing the copying couldn't be original enough to come up with their own ideas.

As far as appearance/style/names/etc, I don't pay much attention. I know there have been several instances where I've inadvertently made a character similar to someone else's (for instance, how original is the name 'Kyuubi'? The answer is, not at all), but absolutely without the intention of doing so. So I just assume someone had the same idea as me.

Essentially, I feel that if I publicly accused someone of ripping me off, even when weird little details of my doll's character/story had been 'copied', I'd probably end up with my foot in my mouth

 

I guess I can understand that within a hobby that spans this many people there are bound to be similarities between dolls. I did see a doll that was the same mold as mine with the same hair color and same clothes almost. That weirded me out at first just because I thought "whoa! is that mine in there?!" as I scanned through the pictures ^_^; it does bother me a little that something I wanted to be original and unique isn't as much anymore but it's not that big a deal. I would, however, be really upset if someone ended up using a similar name to my boy BE. I mean ... who else would name their doll BE? XD; I doubt that would ever happen but I would totally have to ask what the deal was. half the time I think "copies" are either people trying to recreate something and make it different for their own tastes or just coincidences from similar preferences

 

I wouldn't call this copying, but I noticed that before I ordered my Pado, there was only one other Pado here on DOA, and that one was very quirky. I personally was not too fond of it, so I was worried if I really like my boy. After I got him, I was taken away by how amazing he looks! Then, I noticed, people started getting Pados Like, every week~ Since Dollmore does ship fast (I got Edgar within 10 days of putting in the order) I think that when people just see something they like, they try to attain something similar. ​

 

I'd say like everyone else. 1. confirm this is harassment 2. address the individual directly, then 3. handle it like any other kind of harassment.

A lot of people name dolls along the same lines... (I'm pretty dang sure I have the only Caine Canderson, but I could be wrong) and I'm not the first person to have red hair and green eyes in a doll, let alone an Elfdoll Red.... Even the clothes I make my dolls are all inspires off somthing else I've seen.

Some one would have to be clearly, intentionally copying Caine to get to me before I'd get upset over it.

 

you cant stop limiteds from looking the same.. theyre limited....

you cant stop basic "store boughten" sets from looking similar or the same because, for example, I know im not not the only one that thinks the basic "white dollzone yuu with default faceups with the sexy red outfit and them boots" is so delicious!

but when you sit down at a table and spend 5+ hours, yourself, sketching out ideas, making your own patterns and then sewwing and embellishing the outfit to your specific wants and you show it off because you're proud of it, a month later NO ONE should have that same exact outfit on the same doll with the same wig and shoes, especially if that custom outfit is still in your posession! That is what I call copying..... when you work so hard on your very own one of a kind, custom creation for your doll and someone else replicates it to the best of their ability or has it commissioned by someone other than you.

I would be so upset if I were to ever see my Luna's dress, red with blue and red tulle accents, paired with a pair of black with red and blue plaid dollzone heels on another feeple ashley. I spent about 8 hours sitting at the kitchen table, drawing and planning, making my very own custom patterns to make that dress and then sewing it. I was so proud of it and if i ever saw a replica of my dress and it was almost exact... I would create hell for that person.

It's not fair if its something completely custom, and I think that these dolls are meant to be unique. Why even bother with this hobby if all you want is what everyone else has? Den of Angels was meant to show off your special one of a kind doll, not for others to come up, judge and copy...

If you want your doll to be like everyone else's then you clearly don't understand this hobby.

To put it simple... "coincidence copying" is nearly impossible with how many combos there are. If you like the idea of what someone's doll looks like.. find an alternative, change a color, add something, subtract something.... don't do it exactly like that doll...

 

I like what everybody said in here and find it very intressting (I am going to subribe to the tread)

Me too are kind of afried of someone copying my Doll and my Doll's Name.
Cause somehow I take it personal (I don't know how to explane it)
But it makes me sad that people copying dolls that someone has done alot of work to be original and to be its own.