Old graphics designer for student organization threatening Cease and Desist

[toomanyquestion]

Hello, I'm part of a student organization at a university campus in California.

An old graphics designer for our student organization quit 2 years ago after a personal falling out and is now threatening a cease and desist letter/further legal action for her old graphics she created for us. She is doing this out of revenge and wants to intimidate us, but my question is does she have any real legal ground against us?

While she was our graphics designer, it was a completely voluntary position and she created these designs for our flyers, website, t-shirts, etc. We have not been misappropriating any of her intellectual property and have been using them exactly as they were intended for. We also no longer reproduce any of her old designs. Technically, she did enter into an agreement when she joined our student organization as a graphics designer, and if she created these designs for us then does that mean we also have rights to use these designs as they were intended to be used?

Any advice to help deal with this situation would be immensely useful. Thank you.

 

[quincy]

Hello, I'm part of a student organization at a university campus in California.

An old graphics designer for our student organization quit 2 years ago after a personal falling out and is now threatening a cease and desist letter/further legal action for her old graphics she created for us. She is doing this out of revenge and wants to intimidate us, but my question is does she have any real legal ground against us?

While she was our graphics designer, it was a completely voluntary position and she created these designs for our flyers, website, t-shirts, etc. We have not been misappropriating any of her intellectual property and have been using them exactly as they were intended for. We also no longer reproduce any of her old designs. Technically, she did enter into an agreement when she joined our student organization as a graphics designer, and if she created these designs for us then does that mean we also have rights to use these designs as they were intended to be used?

Any advice to help deal with this situation would be immensely useful. Thank you.

It depends in large part on the student organization in question and the "technical agreement" this organization had with graphic designer.

Generally, whoever creates a design owns the copyrights in the design, absent a written agreement stating otherwise. This would be the case whether the designs were voluntarily submitted for use or not, and whether the designs were used as originally intended or not. For this reason, the graphic designer could have a legitimate cause of action should the student organization ignore the cease and desist notice and continue to use the designs on the website, the flyers, the tee-shirts, etc.

Written agreements are smart to have whenever IP rights are involved. I recommend your student organization has all such agreements in writing in the future. For your current problem, it is smartest and certainly cheapest for the student organization to stop using all designs created by the graphic designer, to avoid all risk of a lawsuit.

Good luck.

 

[Zigner]

She is doing this out of revenge and wants to intimidate us...

Quincy gave a great reply, so I just wanted to make a suggestion. I would suggest that you refrain from assigning motive. Treat this as a business and legal matter, pure and simple.

 

[LeeHarveyBlotto]

Does she or your organization have any money to speak of?

 

[coolmaltese]

I knew someone who was part of a school organization/club that was in a similar situation. They dropped the old contested designs and used this as an opportunity to create a fresh new look for their organization's design, logos, etc.

 

[quincy]

I knew someone who was part of a school organization/club that was in a similar situation. They dropped the old contested designs and used this as an opportunity to create a fresh new look for their organization's design, logos, etc.

That certainly seems to be the smartest thing to do.