Behind the Tutorial...... Vol 1

Welcome to the newsletter that brings you interviews with PSP tutorial writers, articles and odds and ends relating to Paint Shop Pro..

I could think of no one better to kick off the interview section with than Joy (Designs by Joy). I know when I first became interested in PSP, hers was the first site that I visited, and one I still frequent. She has long been a source of inspiration to me. If you haven't been to her site yet, you are in for a treat :) Learn a little about one of the grand dames of the net in my interview with Joy.

I came across a very cool viewlet on making your own mask that I hope you will enjoy! Please allow time for it to load, you'll be glad you did :)

While researching for newsletter, I met a group of tutorial writers that are working behind the scenes to protect their work...Read their story, Protect_R_Tuts.

And don't forget to check out the tip of the week!

Interview

Tell us a little about your background Joy: Married, for 27 years. Rich and I were childhood sweethearts. I've been with him since I was 12. I've never dated nor even kissed another guy. :) We have three sons. And we have three grandkids. Theresa 6 -Shebli-4 and Jason -4. I've always been 'into' computers. Remember the vic 20 / Commodore64? Man, I remember typing in code from magazines for programs. That's a long time ago! I've upgraded to a Gateway with all the bells and whistles including DSL. I love it. I really do.

Where do you get the inspiration for your ideas? Things just sort of come to me. I might see something on TV or in a magazine. I try to duplicate what I see on the computer. I really truly enjoy helping people. I never intended to have a site as large as I do. It's over 250 meg now. Thanks heavens for Donna at The Rapids, my server. Donna lets me have all the space I want. I love that the computer gives us the chance to do something together. No one cares how we are dressed, what we look like, where we live or what our houses look like. (Thank Heavens!) There is no pretence. We are just here to enjoy the creativity and fun that PSP delivers.

Do you have a favorite Tutorial? I have to say the transparent butterfly. It was my very first tutorial. And still my favorite. I use it as my logo.

What aspect of PSP do you like/dislike the most? I like the ease of creativity. and tubes. Tubes are wonderful! So far PSP does everything I need. Also, I really like in PSP7 the image dicer. It's great for website backgrounds.

dislike the rotation tool. I want to be able to click on a corner and turn it. Not have to figure the angle and degrees.

What is in the works for you now? I'm trying to get my Site Design Business out of the basement. I have sold a few sites but that just makes me want to do more. :) I like to show practical things. Like my scrapbook series. I have a digital camera. I've taken 1,000 of photos. I wanted a way to show them off without the printing/scrap booking expense. It came to me that I have everything and more right here on my computer than most scrap bookers could ever hope for! And...BONUS! it's free. :) I have a CD burner so I can make copies for everyone as Christmas presents. Those that don't have computers, I'll use my camcorder to record the images on tape. The great thing is that you can record sound too. Now your grandkids can hear what your grandma sounded like. Very nifty.

The url to your site My splash/domain address is: www.designsbyjoy.net My main site is: http://www.therapids.net/designsbyjoy/

Do you have any groups/lists you would like to mention? Well....my two lists of course! :) Fun with me and PSP. We have over 500 members. Not near that many post messages. We welcome lurkers as people will join in when they feel comfortable and have time. We are a no pressure relaxed group. My other list is Fun with PSPStuff. Here we share the 'raw' materials to create with. Graphics, fonts, midis, tubes, tags, filters, really anything at all members want to share. The posts tend to be very large in size. If someone has mailbox size limits or pay by the minute for their connection, they might want to think twice about joining this group.

Thank you Joy for sharing your time with me:)

Thank you for giving me the opportunity to be your first of what I'm sure will be the beginning of many wonderful interviews of tutorial writers and informative newsletter.

Cool Stuff

Check out this psp_int9_masks2 on creating a mask...it's like having someone sit beside you as you work! If you like this one, be sure to check out Joy's viewlets to help you on your way:)

Protect_R_Tuts

Tutorial theft is rampant on the net. It amazes me that someone would try to take credit for the hard work of others, but countless sites have closed down in protest, and we as a community lose. Recently, a group of tutorial writers banded together to take back the net, and stop those that would steal what isn't theirs. The following is their story:

Protect R Tuts was formed in Dec. 2000. We had found out that a lady was storing tutorials in her Yahoo Groups files with all links taken off and copyright information removed. To confirm this, there was a few tutorial writers that had joined the list to see the files for ourselves and to contact the other tutorial writers that were effected.

We were shocked to find over 30 tutorials within the files! We mailed to the owner and politely asked her to remove the files from her Yahoo Groups. She refused. So we set out on a mission to find the other tutorial authors of the stolen tutorials. As we found them, we knew there was a need to be able to communicate with all that was involved. Thus Protect_R_Tuts was formed. Simply at first as a means of communication. Each person we found wanted to join the list to see for themselves and not go by rumors that their work was stolen.

We were still contacting the true authors of the tutorials which was not an easy task with the names, email addresses and links all taken off the stored tutorials. We thought if we all sent letters to the list at one time, maybe the impact of all the letters would be more effective than sending the one letter we had already sent. So we asked the group to wait until Dec. 8, 2000 at 8:00 PM Central time. This gave us time to find all the true owners and give them a chance to see the tutorials for themselves. Trying to get members of our group, from all over the world set up to 8:00 PM Central time was a task in itself. But we did it!!!

One girl saw no reason to wait and sent her letter demanding her files be removed at once. This was done, only to be replaced by another tutorial by the same author. So we knew the only thing we could do was to mail to this woman all at once. We all had our letters ready to go and at 8:00 PM Dec. 8, 2000 we sent our letters to this woman's list, to her server, and privately to her members. It was what we called "Black Friday".

After all the letters had been sent, we waited. Only to get a message from the list owner, saying "Are you all done having your fun now? Can we get back to work?" One member of PRT suggested to go Public with the news of what this woman had done and offered a list she belonged to the information about what this woman was doing. It was only after this woman was flooded with emails telling her what she was doing was wrong and she needed to take the pages down out of the files, did she shut down the list. We all felt that was the only way to stop what she was doing was to go Public. And it worked!!

Not all was pleasant. There were some people on the net that did not agree with what we had done. At the same time they were also the ones that did not offer to help us. And there was some that thought if you put it on the net, then it is okay to take it. This is NOT so!!

SO to make people aware, a lot of the tutorial writers took their pages down. And placed a page explaining why the pages were down. We explained that we needed each and every person on the net to help us!! To help the people that offer their hard work to people that love PSP! Help us find tutorials that are stolen. Report them to us!! The PSP community is really a small place on the Internet. And word does get around very quickly!!

The members of PRT cried together and felt helpless together. We came up with 100 ideas of how to stop tutorials from being stolen again or we hoped we had! We all set out to Protect_R_Tuts!! We added our names to all the images on our tutorials. We added our copyright information in depth. We tried our best to educate the good members on the net, we did not mean to punish them by taking down tutorials but tried to make them aware of what could happen if they do not report tutorial thieves. We added the link to Protect_R_Tuts email address and begged people to help us! We offered buttons that people could place on their pages in support!! The response was overwhelming from the PSP Community.
It was at that time we decided to keep the Protect_R_Tuts Yahoo Groups. Since that time we have been alerted of many tutorials that have been stolen. Our goal is to find the true owner of the tutorial and offer them our help and our support. We have found that most of the time, one mail to the tutorial thief is not effective. It may take many mails! It takes the PSP community to help us if we need it!!

What we do not wish to see is a "Witch Hunt". Once the thief has been exposed, and has finally said they would take the work down, Our job is over. There is no need to keep the flames going. We do not actively search out tutorials that might be stolen. Our time is far more valuable! We feel we can be more constructive in other areas! But if we are alerted, or if we find a link by accident our list springs into action.

It it not our goal to find tutorials that look "similar" to ours and make them remove them! There are a few of us with Church Tutorials for example. Being similar does not mean "copied" or "Stolen"! After all how many ways are there to make an apple? :) Basically they will all look like an apple in the end!! How you explain how to make the apple should be in your own words. That keeps you safe from copyright infringement. But why would there be a need to have 100 Apple Tutorials? We would hope tutorial writers would and have come up with their own original ideas :) That is what makes us all different. But hey if you can make a Church another way you are more than welcome to!!

It is also our belief that a Tutorial writers "Terms of Service" are just that! Terms to use their work, Terms you should agree to before doing their tutorial. OR a Graphics Artists Terms of Service before you take their work. Terms of Service should be the same as a contract. If you do not like the Terms of Service you are welcome to leave the page. It is not up to the visitor of the page to change the Terms of Service to suit their needs or wants.

Tutorial writers are welcome to join us, we have asked each other questions such as How can I explain how I get this effect, or help with wording about copyrights. We have tried our best to research the copyright laws. You can join by mailing to:
Protect_R_Tuts-owner@yahoogroups.com
You must include your link to your own original tutorials page.

If you suspect a tutorial is stolen, you can mail to
Protect_R_Tuts-owner@yahoogroups.com

Please supply any and all information that leads you to believe the tutorial is stolen. We will do our best to find the true owner of the tutorial, and offer them support to get the tutorial removed. ANYONE turning in a stolen tutorial will remain anonymous.

The Tutorial writers on Protect_R_Tuts wish to thank you the PSP Community for the support and help they have given us to help expose tutorial thieves. For it is the honest people on the Internet that keep us writing for you!

For more information and some wonderful links to Copyrights you are welcome to see our Protect_R_Tuts page.
http://www.geocities.com/tutorial_thieves/PRT.html

Thank you for giving us the chance to explain who we are, why we are and most of all What we stand for. Honesty and fun on the Internet. We hope you continue to enjoy tutorials that these talented People on the net have supplied for you. It takes each person working together to achieve the goal we all share. Have some fun and learn as much as we can about PSP!!

Members of Protect_R_Tuts

All Around PSP Site

If you are looking for background tiles, clip art, fonts, or tags, you will find it all here at Quiescent Graphics! In fact, Quist made the graphic above.

Tip of the Week

This week's PSP tip is one that Joy posted originally and well worth repeating.

If you have ever added new tubes, masks, graphics, etc. to your folder and then had them not show up, try this:

Go to File...General Program Preferences and click on Browser Preferences.

Uncheck "Save Browser files to disk".

Paint Shop Pro by default saves the images in your folders to a cache file named "pspbrwse.jbf" as it is faster than rescanning the folder's images. So if you can't find something you just loaded, chances are you are viewing the cache. If you are satisfied that you do not want to view the cache, you may do a search for pspbrwse.jbf and delete all you find, you would be surprised how much space this will clear up in your computer.

Like this newsletter?

Feel free to pass it on, and if you wish to sign up, just click on the link below:)

Questions, comments or if you would like to submit an article or special tutorial please contact me,

Connie