I agree with your point. My friend built his own design, based on a greenland design that I think he was given by Peter Strand. So when he copied his own boat, he was not stealing from anyone. If I were ever going to use a designer's boat as a mold, I would try to contact them to pay some sort of royalty.

Another question: how is it any different to take lines from a boat as outlined in a previous post? Its pretty much the same thing: borrowing from someone else's design process to get a step up in one's own. On the other hand, human beings have been standing on one another's shoulders for our entire existence when it comes to ingenuity. Should the designers of the Anas Akuta pay royalties into a fund for paddlers in greenland? One of the things I like about skin on frame building is that each boat is different in small ways from every other. So you are working in a tradition of design rather than stealing from others. Having said that, I support the right of folks like Nick and Jay and even the designers at commercial kayak companies to make a living.

Best,
James

: Stealing kayak designs isn't real cool, you're ripping off the designer.
: That's what the guy you know is doing by making boats using an existing
: design as a mold. It's alot like buying one set of plans from a designer
: and building them in production for sale without paying the designer for
: his work, it's still theft.

: I know it's out of context, sorry, this just upsets me.

: Bill H.