Can They Be Sued?

[tee_hi]

This is not anything that has happened to me, but a different thread made me wonder –

If a Buyer was to either cancel an order or do a chargeback, but then was later found to be using our work, could they be sued? Not just reported to Fiverr’s CS, but actually sued in a court of law? If they canceled the order/charged-back, then that means the work doesn’t legally belong to them, so they have no right to use it, is that correct?

I’m just wondering because I do V-O work, which can’t be watermarked and though I’ve only had one cancel, it IS something I wonder about. I don’t worry, mind you, just wonder.

[woofy31]

I don’t know whether it can be taken to the court or not, but for music/videos/voiceovers you could easily report them if they’re used/shared on popular sharing sites, and you can also report a site to Google to take it off their search results if it’s using those. And I’ve heard of sellers who successfully took down their stolen work from the web.

[tee_hi]

I don’t know whether it can be taken to the court or not, but for music/videos/voiceovers you could easily report them if they’re used/shared on popular sharing sites, and you can also report a site to Google to take it off their search results if it’s using those. And I’ve heard of sellers who successfully took down their stolen work from the web.

Thanks so much. Like I said, it’s not a pressing concern, but more of a curiosity. I have a tendency to engage in a lot of “What if?” scenarios.

[uk1000]

Couldn’t you add an inaudible audio watermark (or is that against the rules)?

[woofy31]

Thanks so much. Like I said, it’s not a pressing concern, but more of a curiosity. I have a tendency to engage in a lot of “What if?” scenarios.

You tell me? After a cancellation, the following orders that day I’ll be like “what if?” 😛

[tee_hi]

There HAVE been a couple of orders where I included a light “beep” or me whispering my name every so often and then I delivered the unblemished copy upon Order completion, but for the most part, it’s too much trouble. Because even if I make an audio file to always add to orders with those things, then I have to manually remove that file later on because it’s not automatically removed like with art projects. Plus, a Buyer would probably be in the right if they insisted on an unblemished copy before closing the order, which would leave me back at square one.

Fortunately, I’ve only had one cancellation so far, so it hasn’t been an issue. If it ever does become a pressing concern, I may go back to doing that, but as of now, I’m ok.

[solwonder]

I wanted to know this too!! Have a sneaking suspicion on my first cancellation but I didn’t want to be impacted by a poor review so just left it alone…I’ll be def scouring the web looking to see if she did use it after all!

[meldawn9]

When I have to do a cancellation on an article someone is unhappy about, it immediately goes on my own blog site. That way, if the scammer sells it to their client, or they post it on their own site, it will be plagiarized content. As far as I know, Ggl punishes sites with plagiarized content. The trick sometimes is to find a way to use that content on my blog, as often it pertains to a certain niche.

[misscrystal]

In the U.S. you can sue anyone for anything but that does not mean it’s a good idea. In this case it’s a bad idea. You only sue for monetary damages and probably have zero. You’ve lost zero money due to this. Also the person would need to be served a notice to come to court and if they are in another country or another state that’s not usually possible unless you have some high powered lawyers and lots of money to spend on this.

[fonthaunt]

This is not anything that has happened to me, but a different thread made me wonder –

If a Buyer was to either cancel an order or do a chargeback, but then was later found to be using our work, could they be sued? Not just reported to Fiverr’s CS, but actually sued in a court of law? If they canceled the order/charged-back, then that means the work doesn’t legally belong to them, so they have no right to use it, is that correct?

I’m just wondering because I do V-O work, which can’t be watermarked and though I’ve only had one cancel, it IS something I wonder about. I don’t worry, mind you, just wonder.

If a Buyer was to either cancel an order or do a chargeback, but then was later found to be using our work, could they be sued? Not just reported to Fiverr’s CS, but actually sued in a court of law?

Theoretically you could file a lawsuit against someone who did something that you find wrongful. On Fiverr you would have a massive challenge, though. Even if you and the buyer were in the same country and the laws of that country were in your favor, you’d have to know the identify of the buyer for sure so you could have them served by the due process of that country. To identify them certainly, Fiverr would have to offer that information to you or your legal agent.

Fiverr is going to protect the anonymity of a buyer, so you’d like have to pay a solicitor/attorney to try to get a court order demanding the information from Fiverr just to get started. (In the same way, if a buyer wanted to sue you for something they perceived as wrong, Fiverr would go all out to protect your personal info.) It would sure be an uphill battle, but I think if the chargeback was a great deal of money (2K+) you’d find it more worth it to just try to persuade Fiverr to back you up. I have heard that they do sometimes help sellers who lose a very large amount. For a cancellation, I wouldn’t even consider trying the court route.

By the way, someone else might have mentioned this but you absolutely can do audio watermarks. I know of multiple VO artists on Fiverr who use them.

[miroslavglavic]

you can do an audio watermark. audiojungle does it, I notice it with many youtube intro gigs. you hear audiojungle throughout the audio piece.

so you could add tee_hi being said throughout, tell the buyer that it gets removed with final delivery and the audio is only for previews.

[wp_kid]

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