It seems that Hot Topic has stated selling a t-shirt which is a dead ringer for one created by cartoonist Jess Fink. She isn’t taking it lying down.
I’m sorry but I really don’t think this design is coincidentally or simply inspired by clip art. Things right down to the pose of the character and the look of the feet and hands are the same, even the color. I do not know if you know this guys, but most soap is white. Why not make your rip off soap blue or white? I am not trying to give any ideas to any further assholes, I am trying to point out how blatantly similar this crap is.
Fink’s original t-shirt was sold on the Threadless site, and she reports they will pursue action against Hot Topic. A friend of Fink’s created the above banner which many sites are posting in solidarity.
More info here, including mention of another t-shirt designer we can’t talk about here.
I have that Threadless t-shirt!
I use to work for Hot Topic about 9 years ago, and all I ever saw that place do was try and figure out ways to rip off ideas from the kids that worked for them. They’d tell them things like, “Come up will a cool saying, and we’ll put it on a T-shirt and sell it in all our stores. We’ll even give you $50 in STORE CREDIT!” Not a cut of the sales, mind you. One girl I knew that did give them an idea that they used, never even saw her store credit. All that the manger of that store did while I worked there was say rude things about the kids that shopped there after they left, and only ever had a middle finger for me (as I would walk by the store) after I quit in disgust.
I thought this happened before where some designer that works with Hot Topic has been stealing stuff off of Threadless and pass it off as their own?
http://www.boingboing.net/2007/04/24/todd-goldman-loves-t.html
http://www.miketyndall.com/todd_goldman/