Drawar

To paraphrase what I wrote over at the original thread. I think it's important to give an "inspired by" credit if you started with someone else's code directly. But you don't have to give them a design credit if you made major alterations.
I think the footer is an excellent place for such things. And people with half a brain can see that you didn't just straight rip the template. Though I think it's very important to have it visible in the rendered code. Which is to say, on the site itself in HTML, not in the CSS file only.
I'm bad at paraphrasing. LOL

Just because a design has similar elements to another doesn't mean that the designer has studied those elements, or previous iterations of them.

As we all know, there's a huge amount of people who claim to be webdesigners. A lot of them have absolutely no formal training, and have done no study on design at all other than "what looks and feels good."

There may be no definitive sources for someone's work. And if there are, so what? Obviously I don't think designers should rip off others, but there's only so much that one can claim as their own to begin with.

There is a difference between being inspired by a design, and using the code of another design. If you use some of the code from another design, you must cite. If you are inspired, it is respectful to drop their name (perhaps in a post or on a page).

If you had to cite everything that inspired you, most themes would have 50MB footers full of citations- ideas emerge from other ideas.

I don't see Derek citing the work of Tschichold or Müller-Brockmann anywhere in his CSS

I didn't see any CSS, XHTML or Javascript in their works. Most books I buy are black text on white paper and I don't see a credit anywhere to Gutenberg. You're talking about wildly different mediums, and I don't really think there's much comparison.

Indeed. Inspiration is just taking a technique and making it your own.

If you start with a whole thing and modify away from it, you're still going to have a massive chunk of the underlying template -- otherwise you'd make your own.

If I saw a cool layout and implemented it using my own code I wouldn't seek the rights to do so or give credit. The same for a colour scheme. The same for a navigation method. Provided I'm only taking the idea, and within reason, I don't owe anybody anything.

If I see a nice site, rip the CSS and HTML and bust it out into my own template, I would have to get permission to do so legally and morally.

Mary,

I think you answered your own problem in your statement when you said "being an academic".

This isn't academics, there is no professional organization that web "professionals" have to belong to and thereby standards to live up to (as engineers do, for example).

So, at what point do the customizations, tweaks, and changes make a website something new and what makes grid-focus truly original work?

As others have mentioned, GF is an implementation of a method. If a person begins using that implementation, they would have to go a long way before they could remove attribution. How far is long? I suppose that's where you listen to that little voice in your head. Sometimes people have trouble doing that, but such is life on the web.

there is no professional organization that web "professionals" have to belong to

Largely by-the-by, but personally, I think the industry as a whole would benefit if there was.

I agree with you Rich, the industry would benefit, but the bar to the web would be raised and I guess that's what makes the web successful, it's "accessibility", so to speak. It's a pretty delicate topic, I think, but one I have thought of on a few occasions...

So what sort of credentials would be required for entry into this professional society? Would you need a high-school diploma? A University Degree? A college course in fine-art? Engineers, doctors, lawyers are required to take advanced degrees, pass certification exams and adhere to a set of ethical guidelines. Do you really think this would work in web design?

Regarding the originality of this (and many other similar designs), Khoi Vinh writes:

Generally, I ask that you refrain from reusing or repurposing the design of this site [subraction.com] in any way — especially if you’re a business of some kind, or you intend to turn it into a template for other people to reuse, or into a product that will be sold or distributed.

On the other hand, I freely encourage you to borrow and/or learn from the site in any way you feel is appropriate, so long as what results at the end is a design that’s reflective of your ideas, and not simply a regurgitation of mine. That’s what’s most important to me: that the design not simply be an instance of paraphrasing my design ideas, but that it’s a product of your own ideas. That’s how we all learn.

I see considerable "similarity" between grid-focus and subtraction.com.

Hi David,

I am not sure that this professional status could exist on the web, or that it should. If there was a way, it would have to be one that did not create barriers to entry that result from privilege or status (fwiw, many of the professions that you provided as examples can get the pro status with an undergrad degree and then professional exams. No advanced degrees necessary, however "lifelong learning" is often required).

I'm just saying that, having been a member of one at one point in my life, I can appreciate what such an entity would bring to the web. Topics such as the one brought up in this note would have a framework and peer review system to handle the issue. So would it work in web design, as you ask? I think it would, yes.

Unfortunately, imo, it would also result in creating a barrier to entry that just shouldn't exist on the interwebs.

I didn't see any CSS, XHTML or Javascript in their works. Most books I buy are black text on white paper and I don't see a credit anywhere to Gutenberg. You're talking about wildly different mediums, and I don't really think there's much comparison.

By this logic, it would be okay to take someone's web design and use it for a magazine layout or an album cover. These do not require CSS, XHTML, or Javascript and, by the above, it is fine that the actual 'design' be nearly identical in appearance? To me, CSS are XHTML are nothing but the methods of implementation and have little/nothing to do with a design. The latter focuses on a specific layout of appropriately spaced content along with a palette of colors and some atomic elements.

If you start with a whole thing [css + markup] and modify away from it, you're still going to have a massive chunk of the underlying template -- otherwise you'd make your own.

Again, is the CSS or markup really that relevant to the design? I could probably leave 80% of the CSS and markup untouched while making a very different website.

If I saw a cool layout and implemented it using my own code I wouldn't seek the rights to do so or give credit.

That seems like a bit of a slippery slope to me. It follows that I could start with a screen capture of a website (or a magazine/book/newsletter/postcard layout), code some CSS and markup to make a site that appears nearly identical without citation? I know that this happens, but (personally) I think it's rather shady.

I see considerable "similarity" between grid-focus and subtraction.com.

As MikeP_ wrote both grid-focus and subtraction are, "implementation[s] of a method". Grids have been used for a long time in print publishing but, at the risk of stating the obvious, I don't think it is the grid layout alone that makes these two sites look so similar. They also share a color scheme, some atomic details (i.e. underlining of list items), the top navigation, etc.

Mary

Keep in mind, Mary, that design patterns themselves are methods, and it is accepted that patterns that work will be used and reused by many. This includes color schemes and many other facets of design (navigation, header treatment, list items, link treatment, image treatment).

Coming back to your original issue, the trouble becomes about who to give credit for discovering these methods. The web is dynamic, one cannot simply troll thru the journals to find the history of discovery. Who really "made" Ajax? Was it Brent Ashley? Adaptive Path (JJG?). Who invented the header layout here on 9rules? Doug Bowman? Did he invent the sliding doors method for tabs? No, he named it and published it, but I can name two people who were using similar methods long before he did (but the web being what it is, that evidence may be offline today).

It's not an easy task to weed all of this out. Not having any real standards in place and the web being what it is makes it difficult to make real judgments in all but the most obvious of cases. So in the end people use these commonly accepted methods without attribution (in the 'academic' sense), and cite inspiration(s) if they have one.

I think the real point here is that no complete design is going to be 100% original. It comes down to how much the author feels he pulled from other sources... one has to just trust the author to give credit where credit is due. If they don't they've destroyed their own credibility and will have to deal with that loss... and the reader, viewer or whatever will move on to a better source.

I agree with what everyone is saying here. You all make valid points.

Let me make a point here though:

In the music industry, copying as little as a 3-note sequence is copyright infringement.

I really don't know if any of the above mentioned designs/fonts/themes were copyrighted at all, but as far as stealing ideas goes, the U.S. Court of Appeals is pretty strict.

Ok let's look at this a minute. I had a blog that dated back to the late 90s. They weren't called blogs then and there weren't many of them. I had a two column design and I paid a considerable amount of money to have a 3 column one. They were done in tables. The minute CSS came out again I paid a considerable amount of money to own the source for the code that made a 2 and 3 column design.

Being one of the first to have it, and there are only so many ways to do it, someone somewhere is infringing on my copyright. Graphics I can definitely see the strictness. Code? Only so many ways to make a 2/3/4 column site. Only so many ways text can be placed on a page. I don't think there is a way to do it that hasn't be done without infringing on someone somewhere.

I'm not saying it's ok to copy someone's code or not to give credit when credit is due. It's just not cut and dry like some industries are.

Hi guys. This copyright thing will have no end :) as in the music and everything else. This is because mostly people are so attached to money and scient of power or proud of themselves sometimes that they don't think about anythingelse. I understand that you may need to protect something if you worked hard at it. But hey..OPEN SOURCE...none mentioned it.

I am not an expert.. I am just starting as web designer..if I can already call me that way. For my website milkaddict.com I am using Derek's layout for wordpress, the older one though.. called October special I think.
I don't actually like his new one eheh :)

So I am using this October special but I actually modified it in some parts.. as width / content / some other elements...but I mentioned him on my website as it's based on his work (or at least I got the work from his website!) and I am using his code.
This until I will be able to build my own layout. Which I think will be very similar to the current one..which I saw also around somewherelse..but once I will get to create my own code from zero.. even to reproduce something that may look "kinda" similar..I will not mention him anymore.

I will even put a link to download my CSS... with all the comments / tutorials that I will write for the code.. and links to the techniques that I will use.. so that people can learn how to make websites the right way..instead of learning from other people's code..because if we have a better WEB is good for everyone browsing it.

We all get ideas somewherelse...