5 ms·

Spike Lee responds to 'stolen' poster designer

45 points by Amadou 13y ago

powertower 13y ago
Whatever you might think Spike Lee is, he's certainly predictable.
logicallee 13y ago
Um...here are our top comments on that thread: " Seems weird he mentioned Spike Lee (who did nothing wrong, as far as I can tell) so many times, but didn't name the agency. Seems to hurt the wrong party's reputation. Additionally, he has no apparent way to contact him." and "... What! I think his post does no such thing. Spike Lee did nothing wrong and the post shows nothing but respect for him." Source: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6811060 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6811060 Spike Lee literally just said the same thing we said. but when we said, this doesn't seem to have anything to do with spike lee, it's like, cool. But when he says, "this has nothing to do with me" suddenly he's the bad guy. Just goes to show, if someone accuses you of something, you should apologize for it!! I guess he should have written "I've never met this person in my life...but I'm really sorry about what happened!" live and learn... By the way. If anyone here has any problems with anyone...I'm really sorry!
- kennywinker 13y ago
  The top comment on a HN post is not a consensus opinion. I saw that post but didn't agree with it, but nor did I downvote it.
- graeme 13y ago
  I don't think the top comment says what you think it says. It is possible that: 1. Spike Lee did nothing wrong, AND 2. Spike Lee bears responsibility You can complain to a CEO that one of their employees did something wrong, in the course of the employee's duties. The CEO then bears responsibility, even though they may personally have had no part in it.
- chris_wot 13y ago
  A top commenter doesn't speak for everyone. Most people were outraged that the designer was ripped off.
Amadou 13y ago
Looks like Spike Lee has just made the mother of all hypocritical "its OK to pirate my movie" responses: “Why Should I Pay Someone Who I Never Met Nor Had Any Contact With Ever? He Never Made Any Deal With Me. Why Don’t You Pay Me For Your Stupid Text On Thanksgiving Day?”
- kmfrk 13y ago
  So you think the guy's an idiot, but you still want to see his movies?
  - coldtea 13y ago
    Someone can be both an idiot and a good cook/director/whatever... Not to mention he doesn't think he's an idiot: just a jackass.
    - jamesdelaneyie 13y ago
      Kanye West
    - kmfrk 13y ago
      Rationalizing piracy is no trivial thing, although it seems to be popular in places like Hacker News.
      - dgesang 13y ago
        Didn't Lee pirate those graphics in the first place?
      - selmnoo 13y ago
        Criminalizing piracy is no trivial thing either. Once you can get over the fact that piracy is a complicated issue, that it is unlike stealing things -- where the owner of some object is deprived of his original possession, we can get to talking about piracy in a serious and mature way.
      - mindstab 13y ago
WestCoastJustin 13y ago
FYI -- this seems to be a response to the "Dear Spike Lee" posting @ https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6811060 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6811060
11thEarlOfMar 13y ago
Never was much for boycotts, but Spike is making me reconsider.
brownbat 13y ago
> Why Should I Pay Someone Who I Never Met Nor Had Any Contact With Ever? He Never Made Any Deal With Me. So if you use an agent, no responsibility? Comes off a bit like an "I didn't steal your bike, I'm just riding this nice bike my friend found for me" excuse.
- aspensmonster 13y ago
  Well, it is Hollywood. When it comes to financial scheming they give Wall Street a real run for their money.
jpea 13y ago
As a 10 year freelancer, doing a ton of agency work, it's not Spike's issue. His production company hired an agency to do ad promotion for a movie he "helped" make. The design guy was star struck and fairly new in the freelance realm and didn't do a proper job with his business logistics. It sucks, but it's not Spike Lee's issue. It's like blaming Obama for how a vendor screwed some engineer over while setting up the version control system during the build of the ACA site.
- pbreit 13y ago
  That's a BS comparison. Spike is an indie film-maker. The movie posters are a very visible part of the film. I'd say it's more like the President worrying about a website.
- modfodder 13y ago
  It's very possible the agency is Spike DDB, which was founded by Spike Lee. If so, the buck stops with Spike.
  - modfodder 13y ago
    Also possible that the agency is 1124design.com, which has worked on many of Spike's previous films.
- Amadou 13y ago
  The original letter didn't blame Spike, it asked him to intervene. You are definitely correct in the technical sense, but Spike's responses have been extremely tone-deaf. Instead of saying "not my problem" he should have said, "I'll have someone look into it."
  - ams6110 13y ago
    I admire Spike Lee's movies, but from public appearances, he's never struck me as the sort of person who gives much of a shit about what anybody but himself thinks of anything.
egypturnash 13y ago
I Wonder Why Spike Lee Writes His Tweets With So Many Capitals. Does Everything He Writes Look Like This? Now I'm Imagining His Love Letters.
- subsystem 13y ago
  I guess he's a capitalist.
- sarreph 13y ago
  Or His Scripts?
- hkmurakami 13y ago
  Maybe he thinks everything he says is a headline :P
- deleted 13y ago
  [deleted]
sarreph 13y ago
Ask HN: Why Does Spike Lee Like To Write Like This? [Hint: Capitalising Every Word In A Sentence Shows Everyone How Cool And Big You Are]
- DanBC 13y ago
  buT you'vE neveR seeN iT donE backwardS, righT?
  - chris_wot 13y ago
    My eyes!
scrapcode 13y ago
Can someone quote this response for those of us that have an overly protective firewall at work?
- hkmurakami 13y ago
  "I Never Heard Of This Guy Juan Luis Garcia,If He Has A Beef It's Not With Me.I Did Not Hire Him,Do Not Know Him.Cheap Trick Writing To Me.YO" “Why Should I Pay Someone Who I Never Met Nor Had Any Contact With Ever? He Never Made Any Deal With Me. Why Don’t You Pay Me For Your Stupid Text On Thanksgiving Day?”
trekky1700 13y ago
The least he could do is look into what happened, he has the power to easily do so.
coldtea 13y ago
From somebody who hired the crammy agency AND used the end (STOLEN) result in his poster, he comes of as a total jerk. I don't care if some minion did the bad deed for him. When he employs someone (I'm talking of the agency) he has to man up and take responsibility for what they did in his name, especially if AFTER the wrongdoing happened and was pointed to them, he still profits from it. I'd sue his ass to oblivion if I was the designer.
- deleted 13y ago
  [deleted]
alexholehouse 13y ago
It's not Spike's issue, but to be blunt this is a really stupid response. If he really doesn't give a damn he could just say we're looking into it, and if he wants to use this as an amazing opportunity for a bunch of free publicity he could roll with this and take advantage.
- graeme 13y ago
  How is it not his issue? You don't get to use something stolen just because someone else stole it for you.
  - cududa 13y ago
    If the CMO steals someone's logo, do you blame the CTO?
    - Mithaldu 13y ago
      The CTO? No. The CEO? Hell yeah.
    - skannamalai 13y ago
      If the CTO is the face of the company, then sure. it's not as if shaming the ad agency is going have nearly the same impact. It's Spike Lee's movie, he's the beneficiary, and he's not some fledgling director with no influence on the studio.
    - chris_wot 13y ago
      Yup.
- deleted 13y ago
  [deleted]
- gte910h 13y ago
  His company is distributing an infringing work. As a head of his company he should care because he's likely about to be sued for it if he does't make the guy happy.
rafski 13y ago
Spike Lee is very much the right addressee. He posted Garcia's original comps (not the final poster) on his Facebook. The images had "©2013 Spike Lee" slapped on them. These images are not in this article, but were on JG's website yesterday. Garcia kindly asked him for help, presenting both of themselves as victims of a shady middleman, leaving plenty of room for Lee not only to come out on top and save his face, but even to turn this into great publicity for the movie. Apparently, Lee decided otherwise.
leephillips 13y ago
Am I missing something? The two posters don't look much alike, aside from having a fairly similar trunk in the foreground at the same angle - and I'm guessing that this has something to do with the imagery in the movie.
- corny 13y ago
  Yes, the designer's site is down right now but the issue wasn't that the two posters looked alike. It was that Spike Lee posted the actual, unpaid for comps to his Facebook page. Without a contract or even payment the designer should still have exclusive rights to those designs. The Yahoo news article got that part of the story wrong.
  - leephillips 13y ago
    Thanks for explaining that. So it's a clear-cut copyright violation. I hesitate to pile on, but Spike Lee has consistentlty been an ass in public - something I first noticed in an interview many years ago when he was expressing revulsion at the idea that his sister might marry a white man, because black-white marriages were such a terrible idea, in his opinion. Very sad, because I think he's very talented as a filmmaker.
- gte910h 13y ago
  The field the girl in a pink dress running around with the umbrella, and the framing, the type of trunk, the coloring of the internal liner of the trunk, the man climbing out of the trunk are all very similar. On top of that THEN the implication that this was the inspiration from posting the comps...I think Spike Lee and his ad agency is screwed here if they don't settle. http://blogs.indiewire.com/theplaylist/designer-claims-his-oldboy-poster-artwork-was-stolen-spike-lee-responds-20131129 http://blogs.indiewire.com/theplaylist/designer-claims-his-o... look at the two pictures now.

45 points by Amadou 13y ago

Whatever you might think Spike Lee is, he's certainly predictable.

Um...here are our top comments on that thread: " Seems weird he mentioned Spike Lee (who did nothing wrong, as far as I can tell) so many times, but didn't name the agency. Seems to hurt the wrong party's reputation. Additionally, he has no apparent way to contact him." and "... What! I think his post does no such thing. Spike Lee did nothing wrong and the post shows nothing but respect for him." Source: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6811060 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6811060 Spike Lee literally just said the same thing we said. but when we said, this doesn't seem to have anything to do with spike lee, it's like, cool. But when he says, "this has nothing to do with me" suddenly he's the bad guy. Just goes to show, if someone accuses you of something, you should apologize for it!! I guess he should have written "I've never met this person in my life...but I'm really sorry about what happened!" live and learn... By the way. If anyone here has any problems with anyone...I'm really sorry!

kennywinker 13y ago
The top comment on a HN post is not a consensus opinion. I saw that post but didn't agree with it, but nor did I downvote it.
graeme 13y ago
I don't think the top comment says what you think it says. It is possible that: 1. Spike Lee did nothing wrong, AND 2. Spike Lee bears responsibility You can complain to a CEO that one of their employees did something wrong, in the course of the employee's duties. The CEO then bears responsibility, even though they may personally have had no part in it.
chris_wot 13y ago
A top commenter doesn't speak for everyone. Most people were outraged that the designer was ripped off.

Amadou 13y ago

Looks like Spike Lee has just made the mother of all hypocritical "its OK to pirate my movie" responses: “Why Should I Pay Someone Who I Never Met Nor Had Any Contact With Ever? He Never Made Any Deal With Me. Why Don’t You Pay Me For Your Stupid Text On Thanksgiving Day?”

kmfrk 13y ago
So you think the guy's an idiot, but you still want to see his movies?
- coldtea 13y ago
  Someone can be both an idiot and a good cook/director/whatever... Not to mention he doesn't think he's an idiot: just a jackass.
  - jamesdelaneyie 13y ago
    Kanye West
  - kmfrk 13y ago
    Rationalizing piracy is no trivial thing, although it seems to be popular in places like Hacker News.
    - dgesang 13y ago
      Didn't Lee pirate those graphics in the first place?
    - selmnoo 13y ago
      Criminalizing piracy is no trivial thing either. Once you can get over the fact that piracy is a complicated issue, that it is unlike stealing things -- where the owner of some object is deprived of his original possession, we can get to talking about piracy in a serious and mature way.
    - mindstab 13y ago

WestCoastJustin 13y ago

FYI -- this seems to be a response to the "Dear Spike Lee" posting @ https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6811060 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6811060

11thEarlOfMar 13y ago

Never was much for boycotts, but Spike is making me reconsider.

brownbat 13y ago

> Why Should I Pay Someone Who I Never Met Nor Had Any Contact With Ever? He Never Made Any Deal With Me. So if you use an agent, no responsibility? Comes off a bit like an "I didn't steal your bike, I'm just riding this nice bike my friend found for me" excuse.

aspensmonster 13y ago
Well, it is Hollywood. When it comes to financial scheming they give Wall Street a real run for their money.

jpea 13y ago

As a 10 year freelancer, doing a ton of agency work, it's not Spike's issue. His production company hired an agency to do ad promotion for a movie he "helped" make. The design guy was star struck and fairly new in the freelance realm and didn't do a proper job with his business logistics. It sucks, but it's not Spike Lee's issue. It's like blaming Obama for how a vendor screwed some engineer over while setting up the version control system during the build of the ACA site.

pbreit 13y ago
That's a BS comparison. Spike is an indie film-maker. The movie posters are a very visible part of the film. I'd say it's more like the President worrying about a website.
modfodder 13y ago
It's very possible the agency is Spike DDB, which was founded by Spike Lee. If so, the buck stops with Spike.
- modfodder 13y ago
  Also possible that the agency is 1124design.com, which has worked on many of Spike's previous films.
Amadou 13y ago
The original letter didn't blame Spike, it asked him to intervene. You are definitely correct in the technical sense, but Spike's responses have been extremely tone-deaf. Instead of saying "not my problem" he should have said, "I'll have someone look into it."
- ams6110 13y ago
  I admire Spike Lee's movies, but from public appearances, he's never struck me as the sort of person who gives much of a shit about what anybody but himself thinks of anything.

egypturnash 13y ago

I Wonder Why Spike Lee Writes His Tweets With So Many Capitals. Does Everything He Writes Look Like This? Now I'm Imagining His Love Letters.

subsystem 13y ago
I guess he's a capitalist.
sarreph 13y ago
Or His Scripts?
hkmurakami 13y ago
Maybe he thinks everything he says is a headline :P
deleted 13y ago
[deleted]

sarreph 13y ago

Ask HN: Why Does Spike Lee Like To Write Like This? [Hint: Capitalising Every Word In A Sentence Shows Everyone How Cool And Big You Are]

DanBC 13y ago
buT you'vE neveR seeN iT donE backwardS, righT?
- chris_wot 13y ago
  My eyes!

scrapcode 13y ago

Can someone quote this response for those of us that have an overly protective firewall at work?

hkmurakami 13y ago
"I Never Heard Of This Guy Juan Luis Garcia,If He Has A Beef It's Not With Me.I Did Not Hire Him,Do Not Know Him.Cheap Trick Writing To Me.YO" “Why Should I Pay Someone Who I Never Met Nor Had Any Contact With Ever? He Never Made Any Deal With Me. Why Don’t You Pay Me For Your Stupid Text On Thanksgiving Day?”

trekky1700 13y ago

The least he could do is look into what happened, he has the power to easily do so.

coldtea 13y ago

From somebody who hired the crammy agency AND used the end (STOLEN) result in his poster, he comes of as a total jerk. I don't care if some minion did the bad deed for him. When he employs someone (I'm talking of the agency) he has to man up and take responsibility for what they did in his name, especially if AFTER the wrongdoing happened and was pointed to them, he still profits from it. I'd sue his ass to oblivion if I was the designer.

deleted 13y ago
[deleted]

alexholehouse 13y ago

It's not Spike's issue, but to be blunt this is a really stupid response. If he really doesn't give a damn he could just say we're looking into it, and if he wants to use this as an amazing opportunity for a bunch of free publicity he could roll with this and take advantage.

graeme 13y ago
How is it not his issue? You don't get to use something stolen just because someone else stole it for you.
- cududa 13y ago
  If the CMO steals someone's logo, do you blame the CTO?
  - Mithaldu 13y ago
    The CTO? No. The CEO? Hell yeah.
  - skannamalai 13y ago
    If the CTO is the face of the company, then sure. it's not as if shaming the ad agency is going have nearly the same impact. It's Spike Lee's movie, he's the beneficiary, and he's not some fledgling director with no influence on the studio.
  - chris_wot 13y ago
    Yup.
deleted 13y ago
[deleted]
gte910h 13y ago
His company is distributing an infringing work. As a head of his company he should care because he's likely about to be sued for it if he does't make the guy happy.

rafski 13y ago

Spike Lee is very much the right addressee. He posted Garcia's original comps (not the final poster) on his Facebook. The images had "©2013 Spike Lee" slapped on them. These images are not in this article, but were on JG's website yesterday. Garcia kindly asked him for help, presenting both of themselves as victims of a shady middleman, leaving plenty of room for Lee not only to come out on top and save his face, but even to turn this into great publicity for the movie. Apparently, Lee decided otherwise.

leephillips 13y ago

Am I missing something? The two posters don't look much alike, aside from having a fairly similar trunk in the foreground at the same angle - and I'm guessing that this has something to do with the imagery in the movie.

corny 13y ago
Yes, the designer's site is down right now but the issue wasn't that the two posters looked alike. It was that Spike Lee posted the actual, unpaid for comps to his Facebook page. Without a contract or even payment the designer should still have exclusive rights to those designs. The Yahoo news article got that part of the story wrong.
- leephillips 13y ago
  Thanks for explaining that. So it's a clear-cut copyright violation. I hesitate to pile on, but Spike Lee has consistentlty been an ass in public - something I first noticed in an interview many years ago when he was expressing revulsion at the idea that his sister might marry a white man, because black-white marriages were such a terrible idea, in his opinion. Very sad, because I think he's very talented as a filmmaker.
gte910h 13y ago
The field the girl in a pink dress running around with the umbrella, and the framing, the type of trunk, the coloring of the internal liner of the trunk, the man climbing out of the trunk are all very similar. On top of that THEN the implication that this was the inspiration from posting the comps...I think Spike Lee and his ad agency is screwed here if they don't settle. http://blogs.indiewire.com/theplaylist/designer-claims-his-oldboy-poster-artwork-was-stolen-spike-lee-responds-20131129 http://blogs.indiewire.com/theplaylist/designer-claims-his-o... look at the two pictures now.