Copyright Issues and Jumping to Conclusions

One of the Yahoo Groups that I belonged to until just recently was Quilters Corner Club. It is now defunct, mostly because the person who started it has apparently disappeared, and the other two women who were in it with her started, and recently expanded, a new group called One Stitch at a Time Saturday night I read on the OST group that the founder of QCC, the nowhere-to-be-found young woman, was selling as her own designs a group of New York Beauty patterns that look to be identical to those designed by someone else. On the QCC site they are called the International New York Beauty BOM. Beginning this past June she posted for our free use two patterns per month. If we did not get them from the site during that month then we had to buy them from her. A few months ago she started selling all the rest of the 25 if we wanted to move more quickly than two a month. In early January we expected the next two to be posted but they never appeared. We then began hearing the the other two women could not contact her, and soon they pulled out completely from QCC. I have already made 4 of these blocks and had planned to make a pillow using some of them, as well as finishing the BOM as they appeared. The OST woman said she was going to throw all of her patterns from the BOM away and I gathered thought we should all do the same thing. After reading this, and seeing the photo evidence they presented, I found some patterns and books by the designer who they told us was the actual designer and purchased them online. Later that night, or the next morning, I read a follow-up posting from someone else who was trying to set the record straight. This person, who as far as I know has no contact with any of the other women, told us that she emailed the "actual designer" who told her that indeed the patterns were designed by the first person. Seems that a fabric shop where the "actual designer" recently held a class was looking online for a picture of a New York Beauty quilt to advertise her class. Rather than get a photo from her, they just went online and found this one and put it on their website as hers, when in fact it was from the first young woman. Apparently they are taking that picture off their website, although it is still there as I write this. I did think it was odd that as I looked at designer #2's patterns and books I did not see any that looked exactly like the International NYB from QCC, but it never occurred to me what the real reason for that was. I did however like her patterns, and will be happy to have them in my collection. When this mix-up was pointed out to the OST women, including a quote from designer #2 the response was that there was to be no more discussion of this topic on OST. Clearly there is more going on there than has been said, and the fact remains that the first young woman is the only organizer of a retreat scheduled to be held in WV in April that now no one can find out anything about. I have not signed up for that but apparently several people have, and have paid for it. Messy, messy, messy!

I plan to continue at some point to complete the NYB blocks that I have already, and if we never get any more of them I'll just do something with the ones I have. And the pillow is still on my list of projects. One of the OST women is now designing some other NYB blocks that I may also use for something, but they are a different size from the others. Here is a photo of the 4 blocks I've made so far -

If you have followed this saga and are not confused to this point - then good for you!!