Over the next few weeks, I plan to make posts about my experience as a fairly popular artist on Instagram, Tumblr, YouTube, and Twitter and how it relates to digital marketing and current events in the digital marketing universe. When I tell people about my popularity on the internet, it's often confusing. Lately, most "popular" users on social media seem to be considered popular due to the way they look, the body they have, or the previous fame they've been introduced to. But, not many people consider other sides of social media; the small circles of artists and creators. I fall into one of those small circles; I draw comics/graphics and animate for various bands that I listen to. It started off as a hobby, but over the years I have gained popularity and later, I have been commissioned by some of these musical groups. Additionally, I have drawn several graphics for MTV and have been published on their Instagram, all because my work had been boosted so much by my followers in the music world that an employee reached out to me personally.
All in all, internet popularity seems like a glamorous lifestyle. Companies send you free products to try out and review, in some cases, you can get paid per post, and people look up to you. I've never been paid per post, but I have been sent a few clothing items to post pictures in and a few art supplies to try out, and I've had people come up to me at concerts and ask for pictures. But, there are a lot of ugly sides to social media popularity.
The obvious ugly side to social media influence is the harsh opinions of people. Obviously, that's a huge negative. However, I personally don't feel as impacted by hate as I do by art theft. Art theft is a term for people who copy/trace drawings, re-post drawings and claim it as their own, or (in the absolute worst case) take an artist's work and re-sell it, with or without modifying it. This has happened to me more times than I can count. Sometimes I'll be looking through sites such as Redbubble, which allow artists to sell their work on various merchandise, and see my own artwork on someone else's account. The process of getting it taking down is strenuous, and by then, the person who is selling it could have already made a sufficient amount of money off my designs.
A very large perpetrator of art theft is Zara. I came across a movement called "Shop Art Theft" through Instagram, as I follow artists almost exclusively. A lot of popular artists and graphic designers have found their work being sold by Zara, a clothing company that prides themselves on "fast fashion." In summation, Zara almost completely empties and then refills their stores every 3 weeks. However, they typically create their clothes based on previously existing clothes and fashion. It's good for some consumers, as they can get high end looking fashion for cheaper prices. However, Zara is very looked down-upon by many artists and designers for tweaking designs slightly and reselling them as their own. Their highest offense is with enamel pins.
This picture is from shoparttheft.com, a site created by the frequent victims of Zara's art theft. In some of the stolen designs, it seems like a very small deal and something that isn't worth fighting for. But in some cases the theft is so blatantly obvious that it's unfair (see the website, more artists than just Tuesday Bassen are featured). Zara's popularity is growing, so the amount of money that Zara is making (and thus these artists are not making) is growing. I personally don't rely on my art as a source of income, but many of these artists do.
According to the artists featured on this site, Zara has yet to remove the designs, but have responded by saying there is "a lack of similarity." Situations like this often go ignored because most people don't typically think or know about artists on social media. For ways to shop for and support these artists, visit shoparttheft.com