Yesterday I did something that I had never done before, and though inadvertent, has the same effect as if it were planned.   Titia, who is an Amazing fractal artist, had graciously posted numerous of her FE spots for downloading and tweaking.  Well, I set about toying with these gems, and as I tweaked one, would save it, and move on to the next one.  I must have spent hours doing this, then went back and looked at several of them.  Honestly, by that time, I had looked at so many, that I had no idea which was which or how many tweaks I had made. 

As I looked throught the tweaked images, I chose one, that I called "brings joy" and brought it into Photoshop for final processing.  I posted this image to R'Osity.  Later that day, I received an email from Titia, informing me that my image was only a small tweak of one of her spots that she had posted.  I immediately deleted the image and apologized to her.  However, I feel that this error also deserves a public apology as well.  Stealing another's work, whether accidental or intentional has the same effect on the original artist.   I have been fractaling for about 10 years, and have Never stolen another's image and clamimed it as my own, and I feel Very bad about this incident.

So, to Titia and to All, please accept this public apology for this error.  

Sincerely,
Joey

hi joey
your  honesty speaks for you

Joey....You are a gem :-)

I second Alida's and Titia's responses to your apology, Joe. 

Go, Joey. We know you don't go in for plagiarism. 

It's okay, Joe, you did the right thing when you made this apology, and besides--it happens to the best of us sometimes, whether we mean it to, or not--and we already know you didn't mean it to happen. I second Titia's response--you really are a gem!

My first post, as I am a n00b here with zero credibility, but I believe Joe is deserving of the forgiveness so graciously offered by Titia.

I also think that Joe's straightforward honesty and acceptance of responsibility should be seen as a mild reminder of the level of trust each of you forwards to the others with every posted work.

I'm favorably impressed with the ethic I see.

As I can understand working with FE, I can see how this might have happened.  You are an honorable man for letting Titia know and apologize and for even letting us know!  It can happen to the best of us, so thank you for showing us that their are those that care for the work of others and that honesty is a wonderful policy.

had it been me i'd have asked the artist if i could use the image with their name in the credits. that way i would not 'lose' the image and in theory nobody would get hurt. but it happens that something gets copied, or near copied by accident (look at the music industry) and the person has no clue it even happened.
it is good to see that this type of thing can be handled civilly on a public forum.
otoh, i wish we could have seen the image in question to get some idea of what happened and how. also, i'm always sorry when i hear anybody deleted their art. not sure why, but i had the same reaction in school if a classmate crumpled up a drawing... i'm just that way...
actually i came trying to find the contests because i think they will let me vote by now and i got distracted by the thread.
good luck, you two.