1. At least in the U.S., this is clearly fair use [1] [EDIT: for purposes of copyright law], first because the use is "transformative," and second because it will have zero impact on the market for authorized copies (or displays or performances) of (i) the original copyrighted work, namely the Amazon Web site; or (ii) licensed derivatives of the Amazon Web site. See the Supreme Court's decision in Campbell v. Acuff-Rose Music, the "Oh Pretty Woman" parody case in which rappers 2 Live Crew prevailed [2].
2. If Amazon were to sue Philippe Dubost in the U.S. for infringement, the judge likely would toss out the case under the Supreme Court's Twombly/Iqbal doctrine [3], assuming Dubost filed a motion to dismiss --- I can't imagine how Amazon could plead a plausible case that the infringement had affected its market, as would be required by Twombly/Iqbal.
3. In the unlikely event that Amazon did sue Philippe Dubost in the U.S. for infringement, if Dubost won, he might very well be able to recover reasonable attorneys' fees from Amazon [4].
4. The resume suggests that Philippe Dubost is in Paris, so Amazon could sue in France for infringement of the French copyright; I don't know what the outcome would be in that case.
5. If someone at Amazon did want to file suit for infringement, the marketing people should throw their bodies in front of the train, because Amazon would be widely mocked. If anything, the resume's mimicry of the Amazon style provides (incremental) validation of Amazon's status as a First World icon.
5A. [EDIT:] On the trademark side, Amazon might have a plausible case against Dubost for "dilution" of a famous trademark, namely the totality of the Amazon Web site's look and feel. [5]
You wanna know why copyright infringement is a big deal? Two words: vicarious liability.
If you hire someone who has no idea how copyright works, and in the course of their employment with you they go ahead and infringe someone's IP, you're liable.
> "No copyright infringement intended" is not a thing.
It isn't a legal thing. I look at it as a social signal: "I am not trying to be a dick here."
Remember that the copyright holder has to actually take action. When I find my copyrighted stuff borrowed, my reaction depends a lot on who's doing it and why. If somebody basically says, "Hey, I don't totally get this copyright thing, but I'm trying to do it right," that would make me more willing to contact them and work things out amicably.
Could there be a language/culture barrier thing going on? YouTube seems to be clear that, whenever you use a copyrighted item in any way, you have to say "No copyright violation intended". It's possible he may think that is how Americans say, "I'm making a parody and not trying to profit directly from your work".
Regardless of whether this is or isn't free use, the author clearly doesn't understand the most basic principles of copyright. That ignorance could easily sink a small company. No hire.
As much as I like the new idea, I find it really hard to read. It's not that this page itself is bad - I have problems to find reasonable information on a typical Amazon page and his resume just reflects the same: lots of referals to other products and lots of noise. The typography is also very poor / hard to read unfortunately.
So - great idea... but I don't think it's going to be a success apart from creating a lot of social noise at the beginning.
> but I don't think it's going to be a success apart from creating a lot of social noise at the beginning.
Isn't the biggest problem with resumes getting them noticed and making them stand out? If so, he's probably going to get way more eyeballs on this than your standard cv.
This is how I felt. With Amazon pages, I know I can skip most of the text to get to what matters; the reviews. With a résumé, every bit of information is equally important. Amazon's layout wasn't meant to be read that way (for good reason), so using it in this context really throws me off and belittles data that shouldn't be ignored.
It's certainly an original and clever idea, but I don't think it makes the resume any more effective. In fact, I think being designed like an Amazon product page makes the resume less effective simply because most people have trained themselves to ignore much of what is displayed on an Amazon product page.
If a resume like this showed up on my desk, I'd show it to everyone nearby. It's unusual and carefully done, to the point that even if you don't like online shopping there's still this moment of wonder: Wow, what's going on with this guy?
Most resumes are a chore to read, reminiscent of those pamphlets your bank sends to notify you of changes to their policies.
Neat! However, here is some (hopefully helpful) criticism:
The stars bar chart bothers me because of its inconsistency, first it says 5 previous positions, and then you have 233 reviews, but the average is not quite 5/5.
You need to proofread this better. I have found a 'resent' in place of 'recent' and in the same section I'm not sure that 'Main Skills Rank' is the right title.
Other than that, very very nice idea and good luck!
Well, yeah, it's directly from the original product page I worked from. I didn't have a fun idea for that part, so I left it as-is with a blank link.
If you have a good idea, I would totally do it :)
Thanks!
Philippe
I thought the rating distribution was brilliant. I want to work with people who make most people happy, but also piss a few people off. Those are the people willing to make difficult, unpopular, but important decisions when needed.
So, Phil uses Amazon's design as a spoof for a resume. Aside from the is it copyright or not discussion, I am curios how this differs greatly from people leveraging the svbtle theme?
Every time someone does that, multiple people pop their heads up and talk about blatant ripoff (even when credit is given).
Sure, we have Amazon as e-commerce and this is a resume, where the other case are both essentially blogs. But, you have two cases of people using the design of someone (or something) else for their own purposes.
And, the argument that "people using the svbtle theme are trying to leverage the popularity of svbtle.com to gain legitimacy" is likely the minority. Most people like it for it's cleanliness/simplicity.
Copying a popular blog theme for your blog is obvious, and lacks creativity. Spoofing an actually-not-that-aesthetically-pleasing design intended for a completely different purpose, and filling it with quirky details is rather different.
It's the same reason why Android handset manufacturers got accused of "ripping off" the iconic design of the iPhone, whereas in an earlier era people thought Salvador Dali was being artistic when having the considerably more original idea of designing a telephone handset to look like a lobster.
Svbtle's design is based off of a standard, free Tumblr theme called Clarus. If you really wanted to edit that to have a white background and black text it'd take a few minutes tops, even for someone that wasn't familiar with CSS. I am definitely in the camp that if you're using the WP-Svbtle theme, you know what you're doing.
I don't like that. I don't want to be the asshole, but here it is :
1- No direct mention to Amazon, Really man? Not even a thanks? Not event saying if you are a fan boy (I am!)?
2- Spelling isn't a big deal, but in a resume, seriously?
3- Not humble at all, ie "...and maybe some creativity, who knows... ;-)" I don't want to hire or to work with someone who likes the smell of his own farts.
4- Finally, an Add on your resume... And no amazon doesn't put adsense on their pages... If you want to make some money that's okay, but just say it! Why lying? ... Epic Fail.
For a second I thought someone had posted their resume as an eBook on Amazon.com and then used the product description options Amazon gives "publishers" very creatively.
Since it turns out that this is not what this is, I might do it, post a link on Hackernews, get lots of eyeballs that way, and subsequently receive a super-awesome job offer. Assuming the latter is also phildub's intention: Good luck!
Indeed Amaz-ing work here Philippe; I'm impressed. I don't understand all of this copyright negativity. Perhaps I'm just naive in these matters, but so what if Amazon shoots you a cease and desist - BONUS! How great would that be for a follow-up blog post?
I have to say, this shows a lot of skills in web development. It's creative, even if the look and feel were borrowed from Amazon. This shows someone who can make something that "Looks like this..."
You can copy the source code of any amazon product page, it doesn't necesarily shows "a lot of skills in web development". (I am not saying he doesn't have the skills though).
Yeah, agreeing with victorhn. Any frontend developer worth half their weight in chocolate can replicate an amazon page in a about 3 hours (making all the adjustments he has).
I'm all for creative new approaches to resumes (I did it myself to find in internship while in school), but this is lackluster at best.
Hmm, as a recruiter who looks at hundreds of resumes a day, this kind of non-standard resume really annoys me. Just tell me who you are and what you do. Do so clearly and succinctly.
[+] [-] zacharyvoase|13 years ago|reply
> This website was made in Jan 2013 by Philippe Dubost for the sole purpose of a playful and creative job search. No copyright infrigement intended.
"No copyright infringement intended" is not a thing. Also, right below that it then says:
> © 2013, Philippe Dubost
Seems a bit strange to me.
[+] [-] dctoedt|13 years ago|reply
2. If Amazon were to sue Philippe Dubost in the U.S. for infringement, the judge likely would toss out the case under the Supreme Court's Twombly/Iqbal doctrine [3], assuming Dubost filed a motion to dismiss --- I can't imagine how Amazon could plead a plausible case that the infringement had affected its market, as would be required by Twombly/Iqbal.
3. In the unlikely event that Amazon did sue Philippe Dubost in the U.S. for infringement, if Dubost won, he might very well be able to recover reasonable attorneys' fees from Amazon [4].
4. The resume suggests that Philippe Dubost is in Paris, so Amazon could sue in France for infringement of the French copyright; I don't know what the outcome would be in that case.
5. If someone at Amazon did want to file suit for infringement, the marketing people should throw their bodies in front of the train, because Amazon would be widely mocked. If anything, the resume's mimicry of the Amazon style provides (incremental) validation of Amazon's status as a First World icon.
5A. [EDIT:] On the trademark side, Amazon might have a plausible case against Dubost for "dilution" of a famous trademark, namely the totality of the Amazon Web site's look and feel. [5]
[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fair_use
[2] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Campbell_v._Acuff-Rose_Music,_I....
[3] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ashcroft_v._Iqbal#Rule_8_pleadi...
[4] http://www.copyright.gov/title17/92chap5.html#505
[5] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trademark_dilution
[+] [-] samfoo|13 years ago|reply
Amazon's monetary losses over this offense must be immeasurable. Jail time or crippling life-time debt could be the only satisfactory retribution.
/s
[+] [-] yycom|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] zacharyvoase|13 years ago|reply
If you hire someone who has no idea how copyright works, and in the course of their employment with you they go ahead and infringe someone's IP, you're liable.
[+] [-] beaumartinez|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] ht_th|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] wpietri|13 years ago|reply
It isn't a legal thing. I look at it as a social signal: "I am not trying to be a dick here."
Remember that the copyright holder has to actually take action. When I find my copyrighted stuff borrowed, my reaction depends a lot on who's doing it and why. If somebody basically says, "Hey, I don't totally get this copyright thing, but I'm trying to do it right," that would make me more willing to contact them and work things out amicably.
[+] [-] SoftwareMaven|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] charlieok|13 years ago|reply
http://waxy.org/2011/12/no_copyright_intended/
[+] [-] jdietrich|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] kyberias|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] unknown|13 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] ghc|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] phildub|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] quarterto|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] ma2rten|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] retube|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] viraptor|13 years ago|reply
So - great idea... but I don't think it's going to be a success apart from creating a lot of social noise at the beginning.
[+] [-] joelrunyon|13 years ago|reply
Isn't the biggest problem with resumes getting them noticed and making them stand out? If so, he's probably going to get way more eyeballs on this than your standard cv.
[+] [-] mnicole|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] wldlyinaccurate|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] jzwinck|13 years ago|reply
Most resumes are a chore to read, reminiscent of those pamphlets your bank sends to notify you of changes to their policies.
[+] [-] carlob|13 years ago|reply
The stars bar chart bothers me because of its inconsistency, first it says 5 previous positions, and then you have 233 reviews, but the average is not quite 5/5.
You need to proofread this better. I have found a 'resent' in place of 'recent' and in the same section I'm not sure that 'Main Skills Rank' is the right title.
Other than that, very very nice idea and good luck!
[+] [-] GotAnyMegadeth|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] joelrunyon|13 years ago|reply
I'm not sure if it's supposed to be insinuating that he's "one star" available, but I thought it was mildly clever.
[+] [-] phildub|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] japhyr|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] retube|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] scrumper|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] jmspring|13 years ago|reply
Every time someone does that, multiple people pop their heads up and talk about blatant ripoff (even when credit is given).
Sure, we have Amazon as e-commerce and this is a resume, where the other case are both essentially blogs. But, you have two cases of people using the design of someone (or something) else for their own purposes.
And, the argument that "people using the svbtle theme are trying to leverage the popularity of svbtle.com to gain legitimacy" is likely the minority. Most people like it for it's cleanliness/simplicity.
[+] [-] notahacker|13 years ago|reply
It's the same reason why Android handset manufacturers got accused of "ripping off" the iconic design of the iPhone, whereas in an earlier era people thought Salvador Dali was being artistic when having the considerably more original idea of designing a telephone handset to look like a lobster.
[+] [-] mnicole|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] kentwistle|13 years ago|reply
I think the idea is novel.
[+] [-] phildub|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] epsylon|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] jblock|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] hartator|13 years ago|reply
1- No direct mention to Amazon, Really man? Not even a thanks? Not event saying if you are a fan boy (I am!)?
2- Spelling isn't a big deal, but in a resume, seriously?
3- Not humble at all, ie "...and maybe some creativity, who knows... ;-)" I don't want to hire or to work with someone who likes the smell of his own farts.
4- Finally, an Add on your resume... And no amazon doesn't put adsense on their pages... If you want to make some money that's okay, but just say it! Why lying? ... Epic Fail.
[+] [-] eksith|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] davidradcliffe|13 years ago|reply
Doesn't have to be the most readable format since he has the same information in other places.
[+] [-] jonemo|13 years ago|reply
Since it turns out that this is not what this is, I might do it, post a link on Hackernews, get lots of eyeballs that way, and subsequently receive a super-awesome job offer. Assuming the latter is also phildub's intention: Good luck!
[+] [-] gluemonkey|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] mathattack|13 years ago|reply
If only I was hiring...
[+] [-] victorhn|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] jameswburke|13 years ago|reply
I'm all for creative new approaches to resumes (I did it myself to find in internship while in school), but this is lackluster at best.
[+] [-] unknown|13 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] dcuthbertson|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] esharef|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] notahacker|13 years ago|reply