Morality in cake decorating - Page 5

I am so HAPPY to see Cakebaker with such an awesome attitude!! I LOVE her cakes!!! I try to be as original as I can.....but there is always the customers who bring you a picture and want THAT cake. As hard as I try, it never looks exactly like the original, and I will give credit where credit is due.
I would be flattered if someone copied my design..... but I am most likely "not in that race"

I just always try to give credit where it's due. I'm a beginner so I don't have a huge portfolio. When a customer asks for a design I've never done before, I email her pictures I pull from the net, CC included. I specifically note that the cake I make her will be inspired by these designs. I tag the pictures with the line "lion cake by so and so". I tell the customer "I didn't make this cake but I can make you one similar to it. It will be inspired by this cake this but it's not going to be an exact copy. I can guarantee that the quality for the finished cake will be as good as or better than the one in the picture." I only use pictures of cakes I know I can make just as good or better.

I figure that people who post pictures online know that others will copy them or draw inspiration from them. The net makes pictures available to all for viewing. I could give my customer a bunch of links to click on but attaching the photos is just an easier way of presenting information.

I do think that passing pictures off as your own or using them uncredited s truly unethical. No excuses.

On the issue of posting recipes, what makes it any different from lending your book to a friend and her copying (writing down) recipes she likes?

The internet is a minefield of copyright issues. My lawyer friends and friends in publishing say the law hasn't caught up with the internet yet and probably never will.

I think a lot of you VERY artistic people don't realize is that there are many of us out there that could never visualize and "invent" an original design! I'm one of those people! I'm amazed at those of you who can take an idea and turn it into a gorgeous cake. It baffles me that you can see a ribbon, a color, an ornament, a ANYTHING, picture a cake in your head and then create it! I just don't have that ability.

That's why it thrills me to see all the cakes in the gallery! I can't come up with an original cake, but it's SO helpful to see the wonderfully creative cakes YOU'VE made! I can see what colors look great together. I can go "wow....those stripes are perfect that way!". It never occured to me to make booties out of fondant, or snowmen, or what fun you could have with an impression mat and little cookie cutters until I found this site and all your cakes!

Believe me, it's a HUGE compliment if I try to recreate one of your cakes! I do it because I'm so impressed with what you made! That's my intention, anyway.......

First....I do not do works of art to enter in a contest. I decorate cakes which are to be eaten and enjoyed as such.
Coming up with the design is the fun part of decorating for me and once I have done it I am ready to start planning the next design.
Once a design has been done....all of the cakes made after that are no longer originals...they are copies, even if it is the original decorator making it.
If I was going to advertise that I do only original designs..I would use it on a cake one time and never repeat it again. For the hundreds of decorators and customers who do not care if their design is original..they can copy my old designs as many times as they want. I am finished with them and ready to move on to the next creation.
You should be very proud if you are able to come up with original designs...not every decorator can do that. Let's give them a break and let them try to recreate a cake which was original the first time it was made and is now up for grabs.
I would think if you were making an original design you also would not want to use molds, cutters, mats, or anything else in the making of it, as that is using what someone else came up with.
I also do not allow my photographs to be used and claimed by someone else as their own. My designs, copy all you want. It is like someone else said earlier, you can paint Mona Lisa...and sell it, you just can't state that your painting was done by DaVinci...you have to sign your name to it.

1st ....sonoma9 - well said, I agree with you. I love seeing all the designs posted in the gallery. You all give me such inspiration! I am the 1st to admit I am learning and I love looking for ideas and tips to help me learn!

I would never copy someone's pic and say it was mine! I may attempt to decorate a cake in the image of another cake, but NO ONE can ever duplicate another's work. That is impossible! And it was mentioned earlier that you should ask for permission to use someone's idea, design, cake, etc. before attempting. Well,,,,,,I have asked before (by PM) on several occasions and the CCer's never answered my pm. What do you do then??????? Do you forget about trying a new design because the person didn't answer you and give you permission?

I'm in it for the business of it as well but I mean geesh, who gets to put a copyright on a design? I hate to say it's just a cake because I know how people hate that but even if it's your likelihood, it's still just a cake! A cake that you are going to make and your customer is going to love whether you came up with the design on your own or if it was inspired by another one or if the customer asked you for a specific design, etc. Like someone mentioned earlier, 9 times out of 10, no design that you even think is original really is. Somebody somewhere has done it before.

Again, I in no way, shape or form condone stealing another person's pictures. I believe that is completely dishonest. Before I would even think of doing something like that, I would just make my own and photograph it.

[quote="BCJean"]First....I do not do works of art to enter in a contest. quote]

someone recently asked me for advice on making the cake that is in my avatar. She said she's trying to come up with an idea for the fair and was thinking about using my cake as an idea. I don't mind sharing but I was a little put off by the fact that she would be entering a cake she didn't design into a competition. I have to say that cake was certainly not my idea, I got inspiration from others here at CC (and Collete Peters, of course). I thought to myself, "I guess its ok. She probably does not live in Michigan". Of course if she took the idea and made it her own, that's ok.

Does fair judging include original design or just decorating skill and technique? I've never entered in one so I don't know if this is a criteria or not.

You know I LOVE you work! You have a right to be proud of your accomplishments too. And, I very much appreciate your sense of lightheartedness/attitude all at once. YOU are NOT obnoxious! That's what I really can't stand.

That said, I've been thinking about since I went to the gym and had a kid-free hour to think --

Most of us are in the amateur/quasi-professional-but-not-famous brackets. We are a big pond (the amateur/quasi-pro-but-not-famous group, and most of us couldn't make a Colette Peters or Mike Mcleary (forgive the spelling) as well as they do. Otherwise, we'd be in their bracket -- the super-famous-highly-talented-amazingly creative/inventive-paid-a-fortune-for-a-cake club. If I were in the top tier, I would never recreate someone else's cake because that would be an peer-level no-no. It would be embarrassingto do that if I were on that level.

But, I, being a humble home baker, would have no problem trying to replicate a pro's cake for someone who wanted it. That said, I recognize that people on cc really get into their creations, so if I use someone's design, I give credit - though sometimes I forget exactly where I saw it because I didn't save the pic. But, that's a courtesy and a nod to everyone's hard work -- not because I think it's immoral.

At the end of the day, there are no copyrights allowed on a cake design. You just can't say that you are someone else who made it. It would be like replicating a Monet and then selling it with the fake Monet signature you put on it. As long as you don't call it a Monet, you can paint it.

Okay, I'm almost finished If you've read this far, I'm amazed and flattered! The only 2 immoral things I think someone can do on cc or elsewhere is to publish an actual pic and pass if off as their own or to copy a cake and then in the description lie and say that they created it all by themselves when they know in their heart that they didn't -- if that's the case. THAT is immoral. And a lie like that betters no one. It cheapens your potentially beautiful work and dampens your spirit.

Ok -- offically stepping of my soapbox.... no self-righteous attitude -- just a long-winded gal who knows it and has stopped trying to hold my breath!

S.

I agree with cakebaker. There could be more than one person creating a cake that they feel is a unique design only to see it someplace else.

My son had a TMNT birthday theme. When trying to design a "unique " cake for his birthday I thought of a turtle coming out of a manhole cover.

After joining CC I searched for TMNT cakes to see what "other" designs I would find. And there it was, the cake I had envisioned. Made me realize that many people can and will envision the same thing when designing a cake or anything else. And here I thought I had a creative mind .

( by the way, hers was awesome)

Taking a picture and passing it on as your own is wrong. However, I don't believe that using a desgin for inspiration is wrong as long as you give credit to where it is due.

For the love of Duff people.........IT'S CAKE No one is taking a kidney from your dying 8 year old. No one is reposessing your house.

If you you post a bunch of pictures on the net....someone is going to poach them, either another decorator or a bride that will take your picture to her aunt Tillie to be copied.

That's why the rules of sales are " First, sell yourself, then sell your company, THEN sell your product" If you've done this well, you'll have no problems. The one thing your client can't get elsewhere is YOU!

I guess this is why I do not spend too much time browsing the gallery. Any cakes that I have seen tend to be forgotten by me and I might have vague memories of colors or shapes but not details by any means. I have noticed though for instance that when I made Cinderella's carriage for my daughter's birthday I thought I was being original. Then 3 days later I saw a carriage that was a million times better than mine posted and was in awe. It just goes to show that with me never seeing a carriage cake before and thinking I was so clever -- another person somewhere out there had the same idea and made one. It gets difficult to give credit to people if you do not even know another cake similar to yours exists.
Besides that -- I don't mind people trying to copy cakes of mine. Go for it. I will give you whatever details you want. I personally choose not to look at the galleries too much because i like to create my cakes specific to a person and sometimes spend months perfecting the design in my head. I have that luxury because I am a hobby baker (never sell my cakes).
I basically fall into the oppinion that taking a posted photo of someone elses work and declaring it to be your own is definately wrong!! I can't seem to find fault with people for imitating design elements or even a whole cake as long as it was made by their own two hands and not just a photo they stole and put their name on. I don't expect to be noted as inspiration but would be quite flattered if I was.

While that is true...there is a positive, delightful community here! If we are respectful of one another then...it stays that way! If we start just taking and not including the person you receive, inspiration, design, or otherwise you are breaking that positiveness that we all posses!

At the end of this very long thread, we finally have it .... the whole thing in a nutshell!

BINGO, txkat!

(bolding added by me in txkat's quote above)

See Txkat that is where I can repectfully disagree with you, but do understand where you are saying. But you probably haven't met the likes of me before ....to me it is not just cake. It is sugar art and sugar sculptures. I traded in ceramics and media arts to create my pieces. I had a ten year dry spell in my studio until I found sugar and cake and now I'm there every day. To me, its about my creations and they are my life blood and my art! Check out my blog and you will see how Ms. Muse tickles my creative bone. To some it is more then just cake! And to people like me it is not clients, or a company but art shows, juries, selection, grants and awards and being recognized as a artist - ALWAYS. But in the end I believe just like Sonoma9 that there are no copy rights on a cake, but don't pass off some elses work with your signature either!

....and indydebi I quess I'm the exception to the nutshell rule. Right?