Cake Decorating Community - Cakes We Bake

I have a question about cake ideas.... If you or a customer, searches the internet, and you find a cake that they or you like and you try to replicated the cake, sometimes exactly, sometimes with your own spin on it.....Is that stealing? or should you use it for a contest or a show?  Making money off of it?  Was just thinking about that....want ya'll thoughts on this one.

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I saw new a puff tutorial on CC not long ago.  It's on the website.  Well, maybe about 2 months ago.  I quit the website not long after that.

Here you go:

Link to thread on Cake Central:

http://cakecentral.com/cake-decorating-ftopict-711087-.html&sid...

 

Direct link to Tutorial:

 

http://thejoyofcake.shutterfly.com/tutorials

Well from the tutorial I just looked at I think you did it just right Rosemary.  Thanks for sharing Dawn, that is an awesome technique. 

 

Hello Anne,

 

Thank you for the compliment! That cake probably took me 30-40 hours. I really didn't keep track because I worked on it nights after my real job (nurse) and the better part of a couple of weekends. I guess I do have lots of patience, at least when it comes to cakes (or anything artsy). I have OCD so I tend to spend way too long getting everything even. I listen to books on tape and can lose myself in a project for hours.  We live in the country and  I have my own commercial kitchen about a 100 feet from my home. I've been known to work until the wee hours if the book is good and the project is interesting!

My ultimate goal is to  specialize in  high end wedding cakes so that I canspend  lots of time on each and make more than $1.23 per hour LOL!

Rosemary
Anne Drew said:

Hi Rosemary,

 

What a beautiful "bubble cake".  How many hours do you think you spent making this cake?  I can see you love what you do.  You must have the patience of a saint and be very organised.

 

Anne

Hi Dawn, Thanks for the info on the tutorial. I've been very discouraged with Cake Central so I haven't sent a lot of time on the site in a while. I purchased two years of the magazine and they have yet to get their problems solved to get the magazine out to the subscribers. But I'll have a look at the tutorial just to see how Susan did her puffs. 

Dawn Becker said:

Here you go:

Link to thread on Cake Central:

http://cakecentral.com/cake-decorating-ftopict-711087-.html&sid...

 

Direct link to Tutorial:

 

http://thejoyofcake.shutterfly.com/tutorials

I refuse to go to the site anymore.  It's a lot more nastiness than helpfulness.  So it's a big deal that I went there for you guys and grabbed the tutorial.  LOL... I really am so uncomfortable on that site.  If you view the second link, you don't hot CC at all.
Ok Dawn... Now you have me dying of curiosity! Will you explain more about your problems with them?
Rosemary

Dawn Becker said:
I refuse to go to the site anymore.  It's a lot more nastiness than helpfulness.  So it's a big deal that I went there for you guys and grabbed the tutorial.  LOL... I really am so uncomfortable on that site.  If you view the second link, you don't hot CC at all.
This is fantastic! have never been to the site but have heard other negative comments about the cattiness there.. I really appreciate this tutorial though..so thank you for posting!

No matter what question a person would ask, and I mean as simple as how do you torte it would always turn in to an argument about whether a person was legal or not.

 

It just got so old.  I kept posting - can we please stop!!  She didn't ask a legal question, she just wants to know how to do xxxxxxx.  But, no - inevitably the same old circle would start - before you worry about that you should worry about being legal.  Then someone else - I hope you get caught!   You will deserve everything that happens to you!  The moderators never stepped in and made them stop.  It would drag on and on for pages and pages.  90% of the time this was how threads would end.  At least the ones I tried to be a part of. 

 

Then there is the fact that you cannot tell people where to buy things.  If you post, Oh you can get that at  such and such  dot com, within minutes it would be deleted.

 

The one and only time I asked for help, I got my head bit off... literally.  I even had quite a few people email me stating that they got the same treatment from this person (who seems to be one of the stars over there).  Anyway, I knew there was information on stacking cakes that I had never seen before.  I had a cake coming up and thought I'd give it a try.  Totally didn't work for me.  So I got on the site to look at it again.  But they were having problems (which CC admitted to) and I could not open that link.  So I started a new thread...

 

"Hey, so and so, need help with your xxx method.  I tried it and it completely flopped.  This is what I did and this is how it turned out.  Any suggestions?""

 

OMG!!!!!  OMG!!!!  You would have thought I'd asked her for her first child.  Not only would she not tell what I may or may not have done wrong, she proceeded to pretty much tell me how stupid I was and how dare I start a new thread instead of looking for the old one.... even though I started my thread by apologizing and explaining why I started a new one.

 

That was the end of all this for me.

 

I was one of the first moderators there when it first started, back in '05, I think.  I left then because I could never get answers from Jackie.  We would all PM her and never hear back.  Ever.  I could see the site slowly turning into something I didn't want to be a part of, so I left quietly.  This is the first time I have posted in detail my experiences with CC.  Anyway, when LC's site announced she was closing I went back to CC because it's nice to be a part of a board and get help and offer help.  Well, it was so much worse than when I left years ago.  I lasted two months.  I found this site about the time I left CC.  So much nicer.  People can actually ask a question and get it answered without legal talk first.  What a concept!!!!

 

I happen to be legal.  I really, honestly don't care if you are or not.  That's between you and Mr. Government.  If you want to ask legal questions - go for it and start a thread stating so.  There are many of us out there who will help you become educated.  If all you want to know is how to make a rose on a stick - that's all I want to see answered in that thread.  Nothing else.  I don't want to read about what a horrible person the poster is for not being legal.  And I got blasted for this opinion over there, also.

 

Please - no one turn this thread into a legal conversation.  I simply don't care what your status is.  I'm not impressed or turned off either way by your licensing status.  I joined a cake forum to talk about how to make and decorate cakes.  Absolutely nothing else. 

 

Oh and one more thing.. one of my tutorials was stolen off of my webshots page and posted as someone else's.  It took them two weeks to remove it - and not a word about it being stolen - no apologies, nothing.  But let someone say buy this at susandsuch.com and it's gone instantly with a reprimand to the poster.  The day they finally got around to deleting my tutorial, was the last day I entered the site until now to grab that tutorial for you.

 

 

Rosemary Galpin said:

Ok Dawn... Now you have me dying of curiosity! Will you explain more about your problems with them?
Rosemary

Dawn Becker said:
I refuse to go to the site anymore.  It's a lot more nastiness than helpfulness.  So it's a big deal that I went there for you guys and grabbed the tutorial.  LOL... I really am so uncomfortable on that site.  If you view the second link, you don't hot CC at all.
WOW! I LOVE THE WAY YOU THINK DAWN BECKER! I feel anybody with a little artistic feeling inside, looks at something and says, Beautiful, I want to try to do that! And I agree, that's with everything in this world. I do photography also, and you should hear what the photography world has to say. I think we should all learn from each other and teach those interested in our work, what we know. There's more than enough people in this world to support us all in business to make money. But there are people on lower budgets that want something particular, but affordable, and if there is someone willing to put in that time for them, kuddos to them! I'm not an expert at anything I do. I study and practice on all that I do. But I'm willing to share what I do with others. That's what makes the world go round. :} And just saying, the majority of folks out there has no idea who "the origional designer" may be. It's Ok-I would be proud if someone thought my cake was so pretty, they wanted to replicate it.

Dawn Becker said:

Bottom line: I never take credit for anything - ANYTHING.  Every last "idea" we have is inspired by someone else.  There is not a single new idea in this world.  Even new technology is based on a Sci-Fi idea from years and years ago.  How many times have we seen cell phone-like technology in old black and whites and even silent films?  Look at HG Wells – he described a flying machine – but the Wright Brothers get all the credit.

So I say things like, This is MY version of a Martha Stewart Cake I saw.  or - I saw this on Amazing Cakes and thought I'd try a downsized version.  or - I was surfing the net and combined about 4 different ideas I saw.  If I post a cake on this site based on something I saw here I might say, I loved JJ's cake - thought I'd try my hand at it.  Thanks for the inspiration, JJ!  But to my outside world (who doesn't know JJ) I would simply say I found it on the internet. 

And lastly -here I may post - saw a similar cake on Cake Central, here's my version.  But again to the world, got the idea off an internet search.

It's not rocket science, people.  There is no IDEA we invented.  Which is what the original poster asked about:

Cake Ideas, is it Stealing????

Since there is no such thing as an original idea - what is the answer to THAT question?

If we stop using already thought up ideas, we can all stop making cakes today... and sewing (all suits and wedding dresses look basically the same), and cars (all cars look basically the same, think about it), and washing machines (and they differ how?), and building houses (I think they all have at least four walls and roof)... yeah - it is all the same philosophy.  And yes, even cakes look alike – even when you put your own spin on it – it’s still looks like many, many others.

I am the only one I know that uses a stick to smooth my rose petal and other flowers edges.  Did I invent this idea?  I highly doubt it.  I betcha someone out there is already doing it and has been for quite awhile even though I’m the only one I know of.

OH!!  Sharon Z.  Many things on her videos that she gets all this credit for I've been doing for years before she came along - and a couple of those things I "thought of" on my own (read sentence above for qualifier) - but she gets credit from every one - "OH!  I use the Sharon Z method" - "you should try the Sharon Z method!!." 

Not picking on you Sharon - you know I love you - you are just a really handy public example.  And she is actually very gracious and never says it’s her idea to begin with.  It’s simply the way she does it.  Other people call it the Sharon Z way.

Look up any Emeril Recipe and I can show you at least 10 that are so close to exactly just like it.  But he gets the credit for recipes that have existed for long before he came along.

Again - no original idea exists - even if you think you invented it - I'm willing to bet someone out there is already doing it just exactly that way.  I've seen it too many times for myself.

A lingerie cake is a lingerie cake – I’ve made 3 over a period of maybe 10 years  – two pink and one black leather – it’s still a lingerie cake.  And how many pink ones came before mine, and how many came before those?

Its not stealing.  Its inspiration. Plain and simple.  I mean if someone has a photo from New York and They are in Texas, then I am sure there is someone in Texas who can make a pretty good replica, with a twist on it to make it their "own" without having to go to NY for the cake.  It is a shared art.

Rosemary,

I saw your cake last year and it was stunning!!!  Do you have an entry this year???

Rosemary Galpin said:

This is one of my competition cakes at the OSSAS last year. I fell in love with one of Susan Trianos' cakes on cakecentral.  I could not get the "little puffs" out of my mind. I contacted her, told her how much I loved her work, and asked if she would mind if I used the technique at Oklahoma. She could not give me instructions because she was doing a "how to" article for CC magazine at the time, but she gave me her blessing to make my own version for competition. I blended the single technique with four other tiers of my own design. You can plainly see that even though our puff styles are similar, the cakes themes are totally different. Saying that I "copied" Susan because of a single technique, would be like saying that everyone that uses Marina Sousa's hanging jewels is "stealing" from her designs. I hope to one day inspire bakers to purchase tools or techniques I market myself!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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