Is it ethical to copy website designs?

[lbradley]

I have a question... I am not a designer, but I am in charge of designing our church website because there is no one else to do it. I have a bit of creativity, but nothing spectacular. I get all my ideas from looking at other people's websites and immitating what they do. Is this wrong? Would you be offended if you designed a website and then I loved the look and designed mine similarly? (I am not talking about directly copying code or graphics. I mean, taking an idea and recreating it with my color-scheme and photos.)

This is my plan, so please let me know if any of you think this is unethical.

Lisa

[David Gillaspey]

I get all my ideas from looking at other people's websites and immitating what they do. Is this wrong? Boy, I certainly hope not! That was the whole point of my spending hundreds of hours researching church websites and compiling the best into a database on my site. I wanted to provide a single source of design inspiration for church webmasters.

So, my answer would be: go and be inspired!

Sincerely,

David Gillaspey
President
Great Church Websites

[flutem3]

Lisa wrote:

"(I am not talking about directly copying code or graphics. I mean, taking an idea and recreating it with my color-scheme and photos.)"

Hi, Lisa,

Copy away!! The only thing I would watch for is any material that has a copyright and make sure that you include that.

In fact just the other day I think Mark wanted to "steal" an idea from our website. I told him to "steal" the entire page. It would save him lots of time.

We get ideas from multiple sources anyway. It doesn't matter what we are doing whether it is music, literature, art, etc. We are always building on the shoulders of others so to speak. And we should.

If I have a question about the ethics of something I am doing regarding a particular website, and I have, I write to the webmaster and ask for permission to use the material. There is one guy that told me that I could use his material, and I could edit it in any way I saw fit. Now, I will have to admit that this was after I had been writing back and forth to him for quite some time. But it was a wonderful trust that he had in me, and I am not likely to mess it up. I think it is too precious. If any of you are familiar with:

www.kencollins.com

that is the gentleman. He is the minister at Garfield Memorial Church of Christ and has a terrific website with information to keep a person going for ages. By the way, did you know that President Garfield is our only president to have been an ordained minister? Yes, it was Church of Christ. :)

Carol

[cwgraves]

I get all my ideas from looking at other people's websites and immitating what they do. Is this wrong?When I work with small businesses and churches, I TELL them to browse the internet and find LOTS of examples of things they like about a particular site. Once they have done that, we go through the list and circle the thing that we liked about each site, and combine the results!

No sense in reinventing the wheel! There are LOTS of good sites out there. There's nothing wrong in borrowing an idea - just make sure if it can be copyrighted, you get written permission to use it (email is good enough).

[MCD]

Like cwgraves I encourage clients to visit sites for ideas. Most designers have gotten ideas and even color combinations from visiting other websites.

[MCD]

Like cwgraves I encourage clients to visit sites for ideas. Most designers have gotten ideas and even color combinations from visiting other websites.

[mrbelfry]

It isn't unethical to be inspired by a design but it certainly is to rip off content and/or code without permission.

However if anyone wants to rip me off i would consider that a compliment - no one's ever been inspired by me before!

[flutem3]

Mr. Belfry wrote:

"However if anyone wants to rip me off i would consider that a compliment - no one's ever been inspired by me before!"

How do you know that, Mr. Belfry? :) Sometimes people don't tell you. They just rip away. I thought that too until somebody on the forum wanted to use an idea I had on the website, and I told him to use the whole thing. It would save lots of time. So unless somebody mentions it, for all you know everyone who has been on your website and ours too for that matter has been inspired!!!!! Now, who is not giving himself enough credit. lol

Carol

[youthman]

I'm all for getting ideas from other websites. I ask my customers to provide me with a few websites that they like and ask them what they like about it (color scheme, layout, navigation etc.). I would never copy code from someone unless they gave me permission to but I have used concepts that I have found on the web in some of my own designs.

Ask any professional musician if their music is a product of other musical influences in their lives and they will all agree that they have. When Solomon said there is nothing new under the sun, I believe he was correct. The way I look at it, we were all created in the image of God and He is a creative God. So even if we think we've created something "original", we are mistaken.

[ckvkkeek]

Feel free to look around, and on many sites if they have a link to contact the webmaster email them. We are generally a pretty helpful bunch of people.

[Faithhb_lutheran]

Take inspiration, take structure, even take images just give credit. I scan the web for sites from the specific industry of the client I am trying to design for and if a particular design jumps out at me I will try to reproduce it but I always give credit in the source code to the creator for people who see my site. and of course if at all possible try to obtain permission first.