Dragons Galore

My Dragon's Blood soap was featured today in Barbed Lotus' Dragons to Keep gift guide. Thanks!

It's still cold and dreary here, much more so than our usual winter weather. On top of that, I've got a lingering cold. It makes me not want to get out much. We're going to have an outing today to a new health food store, hopefully it will warm up some.

Haiti: How to Help

The devastation in Haiti from the earthquake yesterday is reported to be "unimaginable." It's possible that tens of thousands have died in this tragedy. What can you and I do to help? Money is going to be needed desperately to provide food, clothing and shelter for survivors. I've just donated to Wyclef Jean's Yele Haiti organization. Other options are here.

Copyright and Product Photos

This is starting to happen more and more lately, and it's really getting to me. Yesterday someone notified me that a new shop on Etsy had used one of my product photos. I went and checked it out. Sure enough, there was my Blood Orange Patchouli photo on a listing for someone selling $75 worth of shea butter soap. Now who on earth opens a new shop and on their very first listing uses a stolen photo of someone else's soap?

I decided to find out. I contacted this new seller and she told me that she had paid $1.99 for my photo from someone selling them on Flickr. Somehow she couldn't provide the link to that person. Not only that, she'd bought about 10 other photos because "I can't take good photos." This new seller contended she had been selling soap and candles for about 10 years. It's hard for me to believe that in 10 years, she couldn't come up with a decent photo of her own products.

The seller took my photo down immediately after I contacted her. She replaced it with another one that looks very familiar. I am almost certain that I've seen it elsewhere on Etsy or on The Dish forum. So it's possible that the seller still is using someone else's photo.

I wonder what happens when a buyer orders a product based on the photo they've seen, then when the seller sends it to them, the product looks nothing like the photo? Who would take a chance on something like that? Apparently a depressing number of sellers are doing so.

And it's not just soap photos being stolen. It's all kinds of products. That's why I started this thread in the Ideas forum on Etsy. I would like Etsy to require sellers to certify in some way that they own the copyright or licensing rights to photos they upload to their stores. It will not stop all of the blatant thieves and cheaters, but it might make those who are unsure of these things think twice about it.

Back to School

Both of our kids have gone back to college. Sniff. After a whole month at home, eating together, watching movies, going out and generally having lots of time for talking, it's hard to have it over so quickly. It's going to take me a while to get back to a quieter and somewhat duller life without our kids at home.

It's been cold and rainy for a week now. Today it never got up over 39 degrees and it's still drizzling. The cats are in my DH's office, too cold for them to be outside. Even though they yowl and scratch and are dying to get outside and freeze to death. This is supposed to go on for another week or more. I really, really hate cold weather.

Today I played with Michael 4 in Poser, trying out some morphs of my own. Take a peek. It's hard to believe this is a pretend 3D character and not a real person!

Raggedy Ann Dolly

I got the cutest little doll pattern from OhSewDollin on Etsy, and just had to make it for my husband's granddaughter. I had so much fun picking out the matching fabrics for her dress, bloomers and legs. The pattern calls for button eyes, but since little Sofia is only 1 year old, I cut out black felt circles and stitched them on instead.

I'm so happy with how this turned out. Years ago when Vicky was an infant I made one for her with a yellow calico dress, and was secretly thrilled when I visited her dorm last time and saw her original dolly sitting on her bed.

Here's Sofia's doll :D

Relaxing

I'm just chilling, enjoying the rainy, gray, slow-paced start of a new year. I've been playing with Poser this morning, working on a new character for Aiko.