A certain website and my models of Olympic

[Jerry V]

A while ago I found that a certain website stole and was selling my papermodels of HMT and RMS Olympic. I searched this website about Alice Papermodel to see what to do.

I have filed several copyright infringement notices and an similar amount of Unlawfull actions notices I got a reply once.

Dear Sirs,
We acknowledge receipt of your notice and will forward your notice to the reported party within one business day. We will forward the counter-notice to you if we receive the same from the reported party. In the meantime, we would suggest that you directly reach out to and notify the operator of this website or the owner of the domain name to facilitate the resolution of disputes. Please note that we, as a domain name registrar service provider, are not in a position to take any actions against the reported party unless a judicial ruling or administrative decision determining that the website or domain name has committed infringements is available.
Sincerely,
Alibaba Cloud

After that I filed a couple of more notices since they were ignored, but now I had an direct email adress. My messages went unnoticed, but I wasn't going to leave it at that.

I contacted the Alibaba Group on facebook and got myself a phonenumber of a salesmanager at Alice Papermodel and I asked him if the HMT Olympic models were still available. They were, how many did I want to have?
None offcourse because they weren't theirs to sell.

First it was said that their own designteam had designed these models.
But when I asked if that was the case why they needed my photograph and why they made the same designmistake as I had I was asked to show the site where my photo was used.

I then showed him the link to the Alice Paper model site. He denied it was their site, theirs was Alibaba. com.

Then I asked where the Olympic models could be found, since he had just said they were available and for sale. I was asked if I wanted to team up.

No, I don't want to team up, I want my work removed.

A while later I was asked to pay 500 USD to have my work removed.
Offcourse I refused.
Not letting go and asking questions which were offcourse being ignored.
Then I said that he could ignore me all he wanted, but I wanted answers and wasn't going to stop.

Then I was asked to make a 200 USD deposit for risk allowance.
What was the risk they're going to take by removing models that weren't theirs to begin with? He said that it was Alibaba policy and that the amount of money was refundable after the models were removed.

So I stated, as per Alibaba's site their IPPR rules:

Intellectual Property Rights (IPR) Protection Policy
(Updated on October 9, 2019)

1． Overview

"Alibaba (“Alibaba-com”) respects intellectual property rights of others and we expect our users to honor the same. Alibaba-com takes a serious stance in dealing with intellectual property infringement claims on our websites at Alibaba-com and Alie Express-com (Collectively referred to as "Site"). We also rely on the cooperation of intellectual property rights owners.


2．Intellectual Property Right (“IPR”) Protection

Listings of counterfeits, replicas, or other unauthorized items are prohibited on the Site strictly.
Listings of offers to sell or purchase counterfeits, replicas, or other unauthorized items shall be subject to removal by Alibaba-com."



And I mentioned there was mentioning of a fee to be payed to have your IPPR honored and your works removed.

He told me not to teach him how to do his job, but I wasn't, I was merely stating policy.

Again I was asked to make a payment for their help in removing my models.
Offcourse I refused, again stating their IPPR policy.

And then I was blocked...

Isn't there anything we can do together to stop this?

Jerry

[airdave]

"China...just when you thought it was safe to have an original idea."


.
I think you are going after the wrong people.
Alibaba is bigger than eBay and amazon combined. They don't care about you.
But they just own the Chinese internet...Alicepapermodel is a smaller company renting space on the alibaba internet.

Alice is your problem.
Unfortunately they know there is not much you can do unless you want to travel to China and sue them in their own courts.
Good luck with that...Chinese prisons are already full of innocent foreigners, you'll probably be dubbed a subversive and a threat to China.

Send friendly but demanding letters directly to the seller stating that you are the copyright owner.
Include a dmca report.
If you can, include a legal cease and desist order (look online for an example and make it yourself).
Make up a fake Lawyers letter if you have to.

Order a dozen kits...wait until they are shipped, then cancel the payment!

Other than that, hope that they don't sell too many of your kits.
Feel better in the fact that alicepapermodel sells printed kits usually made from incomplete and/or inferior copies of the originals.
Many buyers are not satisfied and don't return to alice for more kits.
Their bad reputation is spreading (unfortunately not fast enough).

[Lex]

I just took another look on the site. The website we are talking about does not actually do business in China itself (but its Chinese origins are betrayed). Had it been otherwise, just about anyone would be able to tell you 101 ways to make its life miserable by using Alibaba's buyer satisfaction mechanics. Unfortunately in this case I have no idea how to achieve something similar, I don't really know how good or bad is the buyer protection in AliExpress.

Lastly I would kindly ask Dave to refrain from turning such discussion into an attack on a country's judicial system, or any country itself, for that matter.

[airdave]

Originally Posted by Lex

Lastly I would kindly ask Dave to refrain from turning such discussion into an attack on a country's judicial system, or any country itself, for that matter.

Since the topic and original post question are partially related to "actions of legal recourse" specifically against a Chinese seller
and this would (for any impressive effect) require actions in the Chinese courts, I think my opinion and comments are totally relevent.

The topic of how well foreigners fair in Chinese courts of late is current news...at least here in Canada:
https://nationalpost.com/news/it-jus...nt-experts-say
https://nationalpost.com/news/politi...ations-experts
and so, I'll agree, my views are somewhat skewed by the current news.

Since this forum (understandably) tries very hard to keep Politics out of the discussions
...even though it is almost impossible when discussing anything related to China these days...
I will respect the forum guidelines and do my best to restrict my opinions to the immediate paper related topic only.

...
As I said Jerry, the only way you might get a real result is filing a grievance in Chinese Court against the vendor.
Whether its the result you would like, I can't say.
But actions from outside the country may not have any effect.

Outside of that, we have learned that Chinese vendors and the like, do not seem to adhere to the moral and fairplay standards we all expect.
Or the rules of intellectual property.
Plagiurism and piracy seem to be rampant to a degree not seen in other countries
and the attitude from Chinese based vendors is repeatedly one of "you can't touch me".

Although I will admit I have purchased many items on amazon from Chinese based vendors
and been pleasantly surprise by their support efforts when I have experienced a delay or a shipment problem.
I have received refunds and replacement items with little trouble.
Maybe this has something to do with selling on amazon versus alibaba?

And, I reiterate, feel a bit better knowing that sales of these models is not as great as you might think, and we've heard from many unsatisfied buyers about the products.

[Jerry V]

Hi Dave,
thanks, I allready thought not much can be done about it.
But I am not giving up that easily. Alltough going to court in China most likely won't happen.

Jerry

[Kevin WS]

Jerry - Dont give up. Keep thinking of angles and see what develops.

I had a run-in with a major software developer and refused to give up. To cut a long story short and without going into details, they upgraded odd items which would not work on my machine and they refused to support me. As they would not publish a warning for potential customers of the possibilities of this happening I decided to take them on. Eventually a lawyer in the UK represented me free of charge, and I got a refund of the base packages and all DLC I had bought over the last few years.

I know this is not the same as your situation, but the point is I faced a situation where everyone said "impossible" and "you will never get resolution.

Just persevere and you may be surprised at what develops.

I am trying to think of a couple approaches further you could try. Have thought of one. Will see if I come up with any more and we can then maybe have a call and discuss

[Jerry V]

Hi Kevin,

Thanks, I am not giving up that easily, perhaps your ideas might work.

Jerry

[Jerry V]

After sending in numerous Intellectual Property Rights notifications.
And contacting Alibaba via Facebook, having spoken to three different people of which two of them wanted me to pay a large amount of money to remove my own models of this site. But I refused. Afer doing so they blocked me on facebook.

But I didn't leave it at that. I had made screenshots of all the messages send via Whats app and Messenger indicating, proofing they were my models.

Sending them this PDF via mail along with sending in the IPR notices finaly payed off.

I did a google image search for my model on that site, couldn't find it.
Then clicked on the links I had provided Alibaba to my models, both links malfunctioned and an error 404 showed up.
Today I did a manual search for my models in the shipsection...

They were gone...

It doesn't matter how big the animal is, it doesn't like a flea in it's fur!

Jerry

[ennder]

Congrats!!!

[airdave]

Good to hear.
...

On a slightly off-track similar related context...

I watched a video the other day, by a Chinese youtuber, about a new Kids movie just released in China
that is obviously a bad rip-off of Disney's Cars.
They even copied Disney advertising and Poster art to sell the film.

The Most Shameless Chinese Knock-Off | Video Essay - YouTube

Unfortunately, the CGI production is some of the worst CGI you've ever seen.
An embarassment to the industry and a huge let down for anyone seeing the film.

But the main issue was the state of the creative industry industry in China that is plagued with badly produced plagiurism and unoriginal material.

Other issues of copy-catting and plagiurism were cited and it reminded me of the never ending story
of cheap knock-offs, stolen property, and intellectual property violations coming from China.

Obviously its a problem and concern for many Chinese too.
And this is something we often overlook...its not about the "Chinese", but more specifically pirates and thieves.
And I am sure not every seller on the AliBaba network is a thief or pirate.

Unfortunately, knowing how difficult it is for anyone outside of China to reach them and stop them, makes it that much easier to resort to this behaviour.
And that much easier to ignore complaints that might affect profits.