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I’m an in-house designer for a large, international corporation. Although the company is well-established, the design team is new and ‘design’ is handled by whichever secretary has some free time and a knack for PowerPoint. A common job request is to design printed invites for client hospitality events. On this occasion, we are treating some clients to a performance of the stage musical ‘Mamma Mia!’ I get this request from a secretary…

Secretary: “So we’re taking fifteen clients for dinner, and then to see Mamma Mia. Can we get a nice invite to send them? Just stick the poster on the front, and I’ll email you the text for the back.”

Me: *Confused.* “I haven’t designed a poster for this event…”

Secretary: “No, silly, the poster for Mamma Mia! You can get it off Google, no problem.”

Me: “I’m afraid we can’t use the show poster as that would be copyright infringement. It would be very obvious we’d used it without permission and would make us look very unprofessional. Besides, it doesn’t fit our corporate branding.”

Secretary: “Oh. Can we not get permission to use it? I mean, it would be like free advertising for them.”

Me: “In the highly unlikely event that I manage to trace and contact the copyright owner, I very much doubt the global theatre phenomenon Mamma Mia is going to care about free advertising for a handful of businessmen who already have tickets.”

Secretary: “Oh, okay. Can we Google a picture of ABBA instead?”

Me: “No, we can’t use any images off Google! They’re all under copyright. I mean, unless we licensed something at hundreds of pounds for one small invite. But anyway, that wouldn’t match our corporate branding!”

Secretary: “Oh! What if we use a picture of just two of ABBA? Would that be cheaper than all four?”

Me: “…No. Look, how about a nice picture of the Greek island where Mamma Mia is set? We can afford that with our Getty subscription, it will match our brand, and most importantly won’t infringe any copyright.”

ExecSec: “Oh, alright. So is this new then? This copyright thing?”

Me: “Er, no?”

Secretary: “Well no one told me about it when I used to do the invites. Must have just been from when you started.”

Me: *Giving up.* “Yep. Sure.”

Even though the firm actually gave mandatory copyright training to everyone, I thought it best to quit while I was ahead!