I’ve tried to sort this issue out with Anthony behind the scenes and out of the public gaze, but have been unsuccessful, so here’s an explanation of the facts in the matter.
If you’ve taken the time to blog about the issue, please do me the courtesy of taking time to read this:
1. It was brought to my attention on Monday that in the downing street web site source code, there was a reference to a theme and css file created by Anthony and freely available for download on his website under the standard creative commons license. The theme, and the license are available on his site antbag.com, and if you can be bothered to download the theme and read the CCL, which i have, you’ll see that it makes no reference to a requirement to link to Anthony’s site in the footer of the template.
2. I posted in a comment on The Rouseabout blog that i would ‘look into it’, did so, and established that whilst the css file draws on a small part of Anthony’s css, and the theme folder name still bears his theme name, none of the rest of the files are based on his code (i personally compared each file line-by-line using Beyond Compare 2).
3. So what happened? One of my developers had looked into using Anthony’s theme as a basis for the code, but instead decided to code a theme himself from scratch. He did use some of Anthony’s CSS and correctly attributed him for it in the css file in accordance with the requirements of the CCL. Unfortunately, the developer subsequently did not change the folder name that our original theme code now resides within and so it still refers to Anthony’s theme.
4. On monday evening around 6pm (GMT) I called Anthony personally to explain the facts of the situation, and apologise for the emails and telephone calls he was receiving from bloggers and the UK press. Anthony made it clear during that conversation that he was doubtful of my assertions.
5. Following the call, Anthony emailed me to tell me that he didn’t feel that we had reached an ‘agreement’ (read from that what you will) and that:
“The truth is, the more exposure this story gets, the more quality links I will have pointing to my website from the various blogs and news outlets that will likely pick this up.” (whole email thread linked below)
6. On receipt of this email, and following consultation with my client and solicitors (whole legal blurb on the matter can be found here), I emailed Anthony yesterday (tuesday) at 12.33pm GMT expressing disappointment that he did not believe what i’d told him in our telephone conversation and extending to him the following offer:
“Given the security issues surrounding the project, i cannot release the theme code we developed to you, however, under supervision and at a pre-arranged time, either you, or a chosen representative are free to visit my offices during working hours to inspect the code and satisfy yourself that it is not a ‘copy’ of your theme but in fact, original code.”
I suggested that having proved i wasn’t lying, an apology on his blog might then be in order.
7. Anthony has not taken me up on the offer, and additionally, 24 hours later has done nothing to inform his readers of this offer through his blog (despite finding the time to further stoke the fire by posting in comments:
“All I’m gonna say at this time, is that I’ve been in contact with Dave Smith of New Media Maze to attempt to clear this up, and it hasn’t gone well.”
No doubt Anthony hopes that his Google Page Rank will continue to improve as the malicious rumour continues to circulate and more and more sites link back to him. This is unfair to commenters on his blog, and bloggers elsewhere, many of whom are continuing to post malicious and potentially libelous statements about my company in ignorance of the facts.
Instead, Anthony emailed me telling me that there was no chance of an apology. This email, along with the rest of the email thread, can be found here
Building a web site such as the Downing Street web site was always bound to come under public scrutiny: the cost, the code, the design have all done so, some positive, some negative. We anticipated a degree of public flack and have taken a lot of it on the chin. Our developer’s oversight to work within Anthony’s file structure was poor practice, and we’ll be correcting the issue shortly, but his decision to leave the attribution to Anthony in the CSS was good practice. As a creative agency we respect and value other people’s copyright and are careful to assign credit where credit is due.
However as an officer of the company, i cannot allow the company’s reputation to be sullied by factless rumours. I can understand that Anthony would be suspicious of my initial assertions that we had not used his code (the file structure very much appears to be a smoking gun), however having offered for him (or a local representative given that he’s in the US) to see the code, that’s the time to put up or shut up.
Allowing the rumour to run just for link bait is unacceptable and therefore I’ve taken the decision to put the record straight publicly.
With this in mind, and in the hope that we can put the matter to bed, I extend the offer I made to Anthony: If one of you (on behalf of the whole blogging community) wants to come to my office in Hoxton Square, at a pre-agreed time and under supervision, you can compare the code and satisfy for yourself that our code is completely original and in no way borrows from Anthony’s work. 2 conditions:
1. You put the record straight on your blog afterwards
2. You’ll accept my offer of a nice cup of tea.
Kind regards,
Dave
UPDATE: Antbag has put the matter to bed on his blog. Thanks Anthony, apology accepted, and once again, I’m sorry for the confusion and distress the whole matter caused. If you’re ever in London, the invite for the cup of tea stands.
UPDATE 2: I’ve been pleasantly surprised at how quickly most bloggers have issued corrections and where appropriate apologies around the issue, it takes a lot of guts to back down publicly when you’ve made a stand on something and subsequently find you were wrong.
One of the main websites to publish factual inaccuracies about the work my company has undertaken is Torrent Freak, a site which claims that “It takes approximately 1 minute for your comment to appear on TorrentFreak after it’s posted”.
So, I posted comment # 66 on the site at 11.29am GMT today 26th August (was #66, now someone else is #66), and despite approving several comments afterwards, mine remained ‘in moderation’. The comment points out that their article is incorrect, states the facts, and suggests a correction might be in order. I then resolved to email them to ask for a correction. The email sequence is here.
Finally, they updated the article, but decided to edit my response, removing the fairly key statement:
“Ant accepts this fact: http://antbag.com/my-regrets-about-the-copyright-dispute/.”
from the following:
1. The only file that was drawn upon from Ant’s theme was the css file, a fact that we have never denied. Ant accepts this fact: http://antbag.com/my-regrets-about-the-copyright-dispute/.
So you hold my comments in moderation, edit my response, and despite the original article being libellous, you’re not man enough to put your hands up and apologise? Never mind. Amongst every bunch of roses…
Update 3: My moderated comments finally appeared, which i suppose with my edited statement in the ‘update’ will have to do. Guess it doesn’t suit Torrent Freak’s agenda to properly put the facts straight and accept there’s been no copyright theft.
