Date: 08/31/06 (WebDesign)    Keywords: web

I don't know if anyone has any advice on this score, but a few months ago I was approached to design a website for a firm of plumbers. They supplied me with the copy, a rough layout and a list of keywords that they wanted included in the meta-tags. Fairly specific stuff for a change, and I built the site pretty quickly. Then, a few weeks later, I get an email from a very angry web-designer, claiming I have 'ripped off' his design for another plumber's site. When I went and looked at the site, it was basically a carbon-copy of the rough I'd been given, pretty much IDENTICAL body text and even the same keywords in the tags.

I explained to the designer that I had been supplied the copy by a third party, but he was pretty livid (only to be expected). When I went back to the client to ask him to explain, he seemed completely unaware that he had been willfully infringing copyright by copying his rival's site. The end result was I took down his site and told him to re-write all the text and then submit it to the angry designer for his approval.

He has now re-written all his copy (admittedly parts of it are still similar, but, honestly how many terms are there for unblocking drains?) but the designer is still saying he doesn't accept it and that it is still 'too similar' to his design. Looking at the two sites side by side, I really can't see what he means any more and can't help feeling he's just being pedantic now because of the whole plagiarism issue.

My question is this: at what point should I feel as if I can say, look, we've made enough changes and we want to re-launch the site? My client isn't keen to pay for legal advice and I can't seem to find anywhere online where I can ask these questions.

Source: http://community.livejournal.com/webdesign/1160680.html