This is not nice at all

freshface said
Apple products, etc. and then wait for the author to show the license.

http://www.apple.com/legal/trademark/guidelinesfor3rdparties.html

Theres actually a fine line read the end part there

jonathan01 said
so you already moved to Aussy land Jarel?

If so change your country flag… yur slackin man

Jonathan

I’m still here, but I haven’t officially moved here yet. I’m just waiting on my visa. I’ll keep it just a tad bit longer…

OrganicBeeMedia said

jremick said

KingDog said
What was that Jarel, 4 hours of sleep? You must be going easy on yourself in Melbourne

Haha! I actually accidentally overslept and managed 6!

Do we need to add you to the robot list as well?(ask Ivor aka the machine)

Haha, a friend of mine calls be Robot Bob already.

OrganicBeeMedia said

freshface said
Apple products, etc. and then wait for the author to show the license.

http://www.apple.com/legal/trademark/guidelinesfor3rdparties.html Theres actually a fine line read the end part there

Nice link man. So you either photograph the product yourself or acquire a written permission from Apple to use their own photos. And then you also need to follow those other guidelines which kinda makes sense only for responsive items where you showcase your item running on multiple Apple products. Or not. It’s a fine line, like you said.

Hey everybody

Just wanted to jump in here and make sure we’re all on the same page about a few things. First up, we hear your feedback I’ll explain more later what we’re taking on board for the future. 

As Jarel said, we recently did a review of the site templates category in ThemeForest, and authors were notified well in advance through Notes and on the author dashboards. Sheesh! Don’t forget all the Notes posts on properly license assets and respecting copyright/intellectual property!

Let me clarify why and when an author’s account might be disabled (temporarily, or permanently, depending on the circumstances):

1. The author’s items receive multiple DMCA complaints from copyright owners over time.
2. The author’s items receive multiple  copyright or intellectual property (IP) complaints from others, like the public, or over time we notice multiple issues (eg in the review process).
3. After Envato does a category review. During a category review, we disable items where we can see obvious IP issues. But we also make a call on whether to disable an author’s account until they actively confirm to us that they’ve read the KnowledgeBase information about IP, and that they’re going to review their whole portfolio. Essentially, we ask the author to confirm that they are taking accountability for copyright issues in their portfolio.

Lets not beat around the bush. The whole reason we do this is that we’re at a point where we all need to move on from just responding to complaints. We need you to proactively check your entire portfolios. Don’t wait for someone else to pick on an issue. And so we’ve been forced to find ways to get authors to be proactive and take accountability.

Of course, many authors are being proactive and checking all the assets used in previews and in downloaded items. So thank you to everyone who’s been doing that! And again, I’m not making comments on any specific authors, I’m just answering the questions asked about why accounts are sometimes temporarily disabled.

We’ve heard your feedback on this and in any future reviews, we will consider whether to give authors with disabled items a little while to confirm to us what their plans are to review their whole portfolio. Better still, hopefully all authors out there will no longer need Envato to tell them to review their portfolios.

So, spread the word – and repeat after me – “I love copyright! I’m off to review all the assets used in my entire portfolio now!”

Oh yeah – and nice soliloquy Jarel (I had to look it up on Google to get the spelling right – I haven’t used that word since writing essays in school!).

Seriously though – respect to him, he really does work like 18 hours a day, 7 days a week.

freshface said
And I also think that reviewers should be officially ordered to just reject items with obvious copyright infringements such as images with Angelina Jolie, Apple products, etc. and then wait for the author to show the license.

For the record, that’s what we do now. Almost all recent files are clean. It’s the slightly older files that are the problem—ones submitted when we didn’t need to come down with an iron hammer on infringing items.

Thanks vahid, that makes all clear

One thing, how IP complaints or DMCA works? Someone sends you info that author uses illegal files or stolen code – do you verify it or just assume that person is right and you take steps (like soft-disabling item) immediately, and than you wait for author’s response?

purethemes said
Thanks vahid, that makes all clear

really? I have no words

vahid said
Essentially, we ask the author to confirm that they are taking accountability for copyright issues in their portfolio.

didn’t we already took responsibility when we accepted the term and conditions when we create our account as authors on envato? and also when we check the box under the “message to reviewer” area, before hitting the upload button on the item upload page?

If there is something to sign please send me the link because I don’t want my account getting disabled while you wait for confirmation from me.

vahid said
And so we’ve been forced to find ways to get authors to be proactive and take accountability.

Get some of those elite accounts, ask them to fix some small issue, then after a while disable their account. Then wait for them to protest on forums. then inform the community that they need to take their accountability for their portfolio. Perfect plan.

vahid said
We’ve heard your feedback on this and in any future reviews, we will consider whether to give authors with disabled items a little while to confirm to us what their plans are to review their whole portfolio.

No need, if the author have elite status disable the account directly. I’m sure he is a bad guy who will never take accountability for their portfolio so no need to give them time to fix a simple small issue.

Sorry vahid, I DO NOT AGREE . At all.

1) Is 4 days “well in advance”? 2) “actively confirm to us that they’ve read the KnowledgeBase information” > there was no word about this in the soft disablement notification, it was just the info that the item was soft disabled, and nothing about any active confirmation. I can post these emails here if you want me to. 3) The account deletion was NOT described as “temporarily”. It was SUDDENLY and unpredictable and like “forever, forget it dude”. You switched off the lights, just so. 4) I wanted to just delete the soft disabled item but there was no possible way for me to do so. Also, in the notification there was no word about where to edit the item or that not editing it would lead to deleting my account.

All in all, this was the worst communication and worst treatment I ever had to experience with ANY of my online partnerships.

Why is it so hard sayiing: “Sorry, we’ve made a terrible mistake?” If you or other staff members keep writing thousands of words why you were right and the disabled authors were wrong, it will only make things worse.

This was one of the worst weeks in my life, thanks to your treatment. Made me aware that I cannot sustainably rely on you. It’s like sitting on a catapult seat.

purethemes said
One thing, how IP complaints or DMCA works? Someone sends you info that author uses illegal files or stolen code – do you verify it or just assume that person is right and you take steps (like soft-disabling item) immediately, and than you wait for author’s response?

the answer is here:

http://support.envato.com/index.php?/Knowledgebase/Article/View/115/64/a-dmca-takedown-notice-has-been-issued-against-my-item

despite reading all written explanation from staff and managers, i still can’t get it… it still sounds so ridiculous to me, disabling an account permanently just because an author uses an actress’s photo in a theme demo, which he shows off on his own public domain… It has nothing to do with Envato… But even if it’s still an issue, why dont you just remove that theme from the marketplace for good for ever, but leave the author’s account free? There are hundereds to thousands of people here just working here by releasing themes for a living. How comes that you can close an author’s account that easily? Remember that you have grown from a bunch of authors to this level. So please, respect the authors who brought you to your place you are in today. respect the authors that you’ve earned millions over their hard work ( yea you are working hard too for a good marketplace, but we would not be same, without each other… neither you nor us )

if that’s so easy, you have to disable around a hundered account right now, just because of using ipad, iphone, imac photos in their preview images and themes… all those screen images belong to apple… do you have courage to disable hundereds of accounts in a row?