To those of you who’s Art I’ve put up on this site:
Just yesterday I removed one of the three pictures from “Deviant ART Photography“, per the request of the person who actually snapped the photo. If asked in the future, I’ll do the same thing for any of you. I understand this is your work, which you’ve poured your (at the very most) soul and (at the very least) wonderful talent into. Trust me. It feels like only yesterday when I emptied myself spiritually, emotionally, even physically, into a short story (don’t worry, I’m not gonna pimp it). And I wouldn’t be posting anything here I didn’t find beautiful, cool, or both.
Let me submit something to you, though. Allowing sites like this one, where clearly many visitors come for said beautiful art (currently 7 of the “Top 10″ showcase art), might not be such a bad thing for your career in the long run. Just about a week ago a post way back from February of this year – “Bjorn Hurrrri’s Work” – inexplicably garnered quite a few views. Of the random 40-some clickers, 17 of them clicked onto Mr. Hurri’s personal website while 12 or so linked over to a site he does digital work for. Just this past Fall a representative from a self-made unknown media agency contacted me about “Future City“:
Hi Sonny, nice blog. I work at a media company and would like to know where this image is from…..we’re interested in buying rights to the image. Can you help point me in the right direction. Please contact me via email. Thanks!
I traced the IP Address to one big flippin’ building in the heart of New York City. And what was the e-mail host/company? I’ll say this much, it was a gigantic, famous media company owned by the conglomerate Viacom. Needless to say, one fat-ass check had the name “Creator of Future City” all over it. I tried and I tried to figure out where I originally found that piece. Weeks went by. I sent e-mails back to the representative saying: “give me more time, I’ll find the artist”. But I never did. Eventually I was forced to tell “Anon”, as he/she went by, that I simply don’t know or remember. Now, I didn’t take credit for that. Could I have, illegally? Maybe. But I’m not in the business of raping artists up the ass. I’m in the business of sharing. Totally devoid of money, on any end.
I don’t make money off this site. Never have. But for a modest little WordPress page I do pretty well for myself in terms of traffic. And, like I mentioned earlier, lots of this traffic comes for art (You think anyone gives a shit about “Thank You’s or Apologies? Both??“?). So before any of you rush into asking me to take anything down, I’d urge you to rethink it. My intentions, although good, here are irrelevant (remember, I don’t make money from this). This is about you. Perhaps an e-mail/comment telling me to put your name under the piece would be better than me flat out removing it? Or, if you want, I can make an entire post about you, your art, your websites, your upcoming projects, and so forth. Or you could just drop your info to me. I’ll store it, save it. That way if anyone from a New York City based, billion dollar a year, media company comes knocking on my door, I can point them in the right direction, and you may not have to work for a year or two straight. Unless your into that whole “selling out” phase, in which case it shouldn’t matter to you that I’ve posted your art. But do any of you think that “Future City” would have been even viewed by that media company without this site? Perhaps, but the fact that they contacted me about it says something about exposure for artists here.
Look. I know bordering on public domain is a fucking scary balance beam to walk across; it should be, it’s made of Crusades style long swords and Devil scales. But I wouldn’t underestimate the guerrilla level exposure (as a friend once called it) of sites similar to The Sonny Wilkins Chronicle. If any of you would like me to link to your webpage, do ANY of the things above, or even take your art down (though I’d advise against it), just ask. Your wish is my command. And if the creator of “Future City” ever reads this, you can give me your name and e-mail, but it’s probably too late to get paid for the rights to your piece. I tried man, I tried real hard. Look on the bright side though, at least I’m not making money off of it.
Sincerly,
Sonny B. Wilkins, II.
