Thread:Vince Trageton/@comment-104549-20200205234012/@comment-3050796-20200207191122

Dear Sakaros,

thank you for your message. I was, to be honest, surprised that the images were taken down almost immediately following my comments. I hadn't finished posting the the final comment when the first image had already been removed. For what it's worth I'm greatful eventhough the damage has already been done - let me elaborate.

These ship designs and their "actual" backgrounds are a passion of mine which I've been working on for over two decades by now, even if only on a hobby basis. I have designed many ships by now, Star Wars-related and unrelated. I have released many of these ships as mods for X-Wing Alliance and have no quarrel with people reposting them, maybe even adding to the lore as long as their actual identity and lore - the way I had developed it - is honored, and credit is given where it's due. In this case neither of this has happened. With this author grabbing the images, writing up a whole new backstory and then posting it on a traffic-heavy wiki, the original lore is practically overwritten - especially if you consider how much time has passed since then.

Taking this one step further, in one case, the one I discovered and reported first, upon changing the ship's name, he actually used the exact same one name and class which I had created for a different design of mine. Just google "Warhammer-class Heavy Cruiser" and you'll see my point.

"Selling" may have been a poor choice of words, written in anger at the the realization what has been going on, but nevertheless my intellectual property is severely damaged here. It may adhere to US copyright laws but, since I have devised, created and published these images on European soil, my understanding of copyright is a different one.

Now, I have no intent on starting a copyright debate here but allow me to state that, for the reasons given above, the whole matter does not seem as everyday casual from my perspective as it is from yours.

So that was me ranting. If you actually made it this far you'll probably be rolling your eyes by now, but I had to get this off my head, civil or not. My personal point of view remains. To me what Admiral Caon did is and remains what I called it, damaging my intellectual property not to mention smudging and smothering my original designs, but, judging by you message I would not expect any form of reasoning or hindsight from him. This being the internet, I as a meager private artist may probably rage and ramble as much as I like, it won't change a bit and I would probably end up being painted as the "bad guy" in the end. I will, however, keep a closer eye from now on and, should I come across any more such cases, report them as you suggested.

Sincirely

Vince_Trageton