Today I got an interesting message from a site that was completely automated. It essentially mentioned how it found a person who was using some of my work where I can then take action against them or simply leave it. For example, send them a polite message where they could license my work or I could just tell the site to take it down and that will be the end of that. It got me thinking though as in these cases I usually like to see who it is that is taking my work.
As I investigated a little bit and it seemed like it was someone in a foreign country that was talking about stories in a video while using my work in the background as the visual. He did this more than once too. Overall it felt like a small independent artist. That made me think where if I just told the site to take it down then his account will have a permanent record of stealing work as an example. I didn’t really feel that was necessary. So instead I opted to send the person a message to see if he can rectify this.
I know for large corporations they usually don’t care as they will shut everyone down instantly to protect their copyright. But for me at times I feel it’s almost like the idea of seeing a kid running a lemonade stand versus a business running one where technically they would need a permit. Would you not be more lenient on one over the other? Or like here with copyright should you viciously protect it no matter what with an iron fist?