"rip off" or homage?

Homage – Hugh.
Immitation is still the highest form of flattery -but hey he’s no “comic strip blogger” 🙂

Hugh,
You’re a big man to openly take this ‘form’ of ‘flattery’ so well. Only someone with a truly kind disposition can do this. Kudos to you.
Personally I’d be ranting and raving and ready to split open the copier’s head. But then, I am the lovechild of Lucifer!

But does he have a “Gaping Void hates cats’ Tshirt? I wore mine just yesterday as matter a fact. Rock on Hugh!

I remembered the first time someone ripped off one of my posts (copied it completely).
First thought was…
Someone READS my posts?
Second thought was…
well, there wasn’t really any,
I was still amazed about the first.
Seriously, what I did do was reach out to the blogger and help the person find their own voice.
I took it as a cry for mentoring.
That blogger now has one of my fave sites (besides Gaping Void, of course – being one of the Hughettes) and we’re link buddies.
A thief once told me that he never stole from people he liked (‘course he did break into their houses, take photos of him sitting on their favorite chairs butt naked, and then send them to them…but that’s a whole other story).

no-one will ever be you and everyone who knows you, knows that to be true… “remarkable” comes to mind – don’t even phase about someone who can’t think for himself huh…x

Have to say, I’m genuinely impressed by your dry, confident response to this Hugh.
In truth, you clearly have nothing to fear. Still, it shows considerable strength of character to be able to respond to apparent plagiarism with such cool reserve.
Still no response from the other chap, alas. Would be nice to hear his side of the story.

Many artists have learned by creating reproductions of the masters. Hugh, think of yourself as a “master”.
The first cartoon drawing I ever made was a naked man pushing a lawn mower…. I hope there isn’t a subliminal message I am surpressing. 😉
(All men who just shrinked up a bit reading that, “relax”!)
Anyway, if this “pickle person” needs ideas…

I remember trying to doodle in the manner of Don Hertzfeldt once, but no matter how hard I tried, it was always trying too hard — too much detail, too much going on, etc. I couldn’t get the minimalism right.
The same thing happens in pickleshane’s. Regular comic art on business cards: not so hot. The mouth, the tongue, the sweat drops, the complexity of the scribble, all say “point missed”. Maybe not intentionally, but it misses something that you’d expect copies to miss, because they don’t know how minimal is “too minimal” and overcompensate.

Love the cards. I can see why someone would want to copy you. Think of it as a compliment. I’ve had a couple blogs stolen by copyblogger and that pissed me off at first, but really it just means I had a good idea, right?
I just wish they would give credit where credit is due!

Consider yourself really, really, really flattered.

i found the depth and the extent of the appropriation of your style oddly fascinating. it’s almost like you could outsource to him, if necessary.

Markes me think of all those junk e-mails I get for replica watches. Looks sorta like the real thing at first glance, but the quality is way sub-par.

Rich Lafferty: so you’re the guy who did the Pop Tarts commercials? 😉

The philosophical argument of where flattery and coping in artistic pursuits begin and ends has been echoing through the centuries. The legal one doesn’t seem ending anytime soon either. I think many artists start out by copying others then when that gets boring find their own style, maybe this fella will do the same thing…if not people will always come to the source.
The danger is think anything we create is truly original. All art comes from somewhere, something or someone else…I’d suggest Hugh’s satirical eye goes all the way back to Hogarth, the untold thousands of political cartoonists via Calvin and Hobbes.
I have to say thought when I first saw it I thought it was an ‘early Hugh’.

Sawadee-krub!
Check this out!
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At last…
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