Sharing Nicely

I love all the information that is available to the Polymer
Clay Artist. There are many free resources available to us on the internet in
the form of tutorials and video lessons. If you wish to spend a little money,
there are quite a few people offering tutorials for a fee, and some sites that
offer video lessons for a fee. And let us not forget all of the wonderful how-to
books that are on the market! How lucky we are to have all this information
available to us!
The problem that I run into is that all of the purchased
tutorials make the same request: to please not share the information, and to
give credit to the author. While I do strive to comply with this- after all, it
is a lot of work to write and develop tutes, and the author deserves to profit
from them- after a while, this process becomes rather cumbersome. Quite a bit
of my work involves multiple techniques that I have learned from many sources.
So, for a simple cabochon that I make, should I be crediting every person that
has influenced the work? “This cabochon
was produced using the Skinner blend technique by Judith Skinner, color theory
by Maggie Maggio, Hidden Magic technique as shown on Parole de Pate, Mold by
Penni Jo Couch, and finished with
techniques learned from Donna Kato.” Whew! Now that is a mouthful!
The other problem I run into is that I forget which methods
and techniques I learned from a purchased tutorial, and which ones I learned
from books or free from the internet. I
teach and share a lot of information- what if I accidentally share “secret”
info from a purchased tute? I am not in the habit of being secretive about my
work, and it is just too hard to remember what I can and cannot share. This is
not to say that I set out on purpose to teach “forbidden” information. I do try
and respect copyright and proprietary information. It’s just that after I incorporate
what I have learned and make my own items, it is hard to keep all the particulars
separate. The other thing I tend to do
is not follow instructions exactly. So if I tweek a tute, does it then become
mine to share?
Just thinking about all of this makes my head hurt. I guess
I’ll just have to do my best to not share “secret” information. And please, do
not sic the Polymer Tute police on me. I’m doing my best to be good!

Remember to Clay Nicely!

Nora