Stolen Designs and Automatic Uploader

[colliewood]

Just recently I reported a shop that seemed to me was created with stolen designs.  Zazzle closed the shop immediately.  I don't want to make it my job to police Zazzle for shops like this,  but today I have seen many more questionable shops.  They seem to have some things in common:

1.  Their designs are only on t-shirts.  To me Zazzle creators would take their designs and put them on a few more products, right?

2.  Their shops will comprise of shirts which no real designer would make.  For example, black text or graphic on a black or navy shirt.  Or the graphic is placed in the middle of the shirt, rather than near the top.  Or sometimes very feminine shirts that are pink with glitter and rhinestone are on athletic male models.

3.  When you would normally see a series of some design, you only see one.  This could be a birthday shirt that says something like Vintage 43 years but then there is no shirt with any other year.  Or it could be a dog breed shirt with one obscure breed and no other breed.

4. I can usually find the same shirt on Amazon, with the exact same design.

5.  The name of their shops is usually some nondescript name, which to me, no invested shop owner would use.

I am not sure if Zazzle still has the automatic design uploader.  Does anybody know if it is still available?  I hope Zazzle is doing something about these type of shops.  They totally detract from all the hard work and talent of true creators.  And Zazzle is so lucky to have so much talent.  I am so envious of the creativity that I see from real designers who have built out their shops so beautifully!  I would strongly suggest to Zazzle if the automatic uploader is available that they get rid of it.  I think it must still be available because I think that it would be very time consuming for cheaters to upload a whole store's worth of stolen designs.

To me, this is very disheartening.  Thank you for listening.

[Barbara · Accepted solution]

I assume you're speaking of Quick Create, which Zazzle "paused" prior to Christmas and seems to be mulling over whether to bring it back. When you're looking at these stores, you might check when random products were created. I suspect they'll all be no later than the end of this past year.

Colorwash's Home

[colliewood]

Thank you, Barbara.  I don't think it is quick create.  I am referring to outside print on demand tools that I really don't understand.  One of these is called "Flying Uploads"  but I believe there are more.  In some way, they allow one to upload many designs automatically to print on demand platforms.  I remember seeing that Zazzle was one of the supported platforms.  Often times when I search for products to affiliate market and I search under the new tab, I will see a lot of similar products, could be 50 or more that are not very good listed in a row.  These are not t-shirts.  I mostly market invitations.  But I always felt that it was one of these automatic uploaders.  Maybe it could have been quick create.  I am not sure but I do think that if Zazzle is still allowing for automatic uploading, that it creates quantity over quality.  And for the t-shirts, even though some of the designs may be licensed directly from print on demand asset sites, I can point to a few designs that I am familiar with that I am 99% sure were stolen and automatically uploaded because who wouldn't take the time to change the color of a t-shirt in the first picture if there is no contrast.

If these automatic uploaders are still being allowed, I hope Zazzle reconsiders this.

[Barbara]

I ran a search on "automatic uploader," and the only thing I found that's related to what you're talking about is software designed specifically for RedBubble. It costs $10 a month to use. Other than that, the uploaders are for things somewhat different and seem to be for ease of uploading to places like YouTube. I still think you're seeing the results of the misuse of Quick Create.

Colorwash's Home

[colliewood]

Ok.  Then if that's the case, I am glad they stopped the quick create.  I did look up Flying Uploads and it listed a bunch of print on demand sites and Zazzle was included.  It seems that you can take your design and list it on a bunch of print on demand sites at the same time or at least in an automatic fashion.  I see how this could be an advantage to some people and maybe to Zazzle and I can also see that it would be advantageous to people selling stolen designs.

[Barbara]

I honestly don't see how it could work on Zazzle, not with the need for individual titles, descriptions, and tags along with departments and categories. We're probably safe from such a thing, and if someone knows how it would work, I hope they don't reveal it!

Colorwash's Home

[Badeesie]

I never used Quick Create myself and don't know exactly how it worked, but if that was what was being used, wouldn't there probably be the same design inexpertly applied to a lot of different products instead of just t-shirts?

[colliewood]

That's a good point, Badeesie.  I think that both quick create and automatic uploaders can be used by people who want to do wrong.  I researched two automatic uploader apps and both indicate that Zazzle supports this.  I have read, and this could be all wrong, that bots are used to steal t-shirt designs.  If this is true then the automatic uploaders could be used to add, with relative ease, stolen designs to many print on demand sites.  These apps are supported by many print on demand companies.  

[Adalynn]

I use Flying Upload, a POD upload tool, to upload mostly T-shirt designs on other platforms, not Zazzle, because Zazzle is more suitable for customizable products.

Flying Upload is a great tool to parallel upload T-shirt designs to multiple platforms quickly and easily. It is not a tool for stealing designs from other sellers. I read from a Facebook group that some people use bots to steal popular designs on Amazon and sell them on other platforms. That's why you can also find them on Amazon.

Flying Upload has an option to upload to Zazzle, but it has yet to be working since last year. I think Zazzle wants to reduce the number of low-quality text-based designs on its platform.

Zazzle is more about focusing on unique, creative, and customizable designs. I don't follow the advice of some YouTube "gurus" who tell us to spam the platforms with lame designs and expect to make much money.

I hope Zazzle does not enable Quick Create again shortly (or it's good to allow it with conditions) because many Redbubble sellers would flood without researching what kind of designs work well here.

[colliewood]

Thank you, Adalynn, for this information.  It's very good to know.  I also hope that they do not enable quick create or any other automatic uploader because as you point out Zazzle focuses on creative and customizable designs.  I would also like to say that I believe very much that Flying Uploads is a legitimate app created to serve a purpose.  Unfortunately, it can also be used by people trying to cheat the system.  It seems like Zazzle is on top of it!

[almdrs]

I'm ok with Quick Create never coming back.

I know, it is controversial.