In 2005 I was contacted by Mr. Christopher Faulkner, owner of CI Host, to create a series of marketing/advertising illustration/cartoons. The total budget for the project was $3,000.
Mr. Faulkner was a returning client, and although there were some unusual delays in payments before, till that moment all my creative services had been paid.
The requested illustrations were created and delivered, and the payment was arranged as a monthly Paypal subscription of $300 per month.
After 3 months and a total of $900 paid, Mr. Faulkner canceled the payments and refused to pay the remaining $2,100.
In 2006, after numerous unreturned emails and phone calls, I used the services of a Collection Agency, which passed the outstanding balance due in the amount of $2100.00 to Mr. Faulkner's attorney, Hollis D. Godfrey.
On Fri, Jun 30, 2006, Hollis D. Godfrey Corporate Counsel for C I Host refused to honor the claim and I was left with the only option of pursuing this in court, which at that point I decided was not worth doing... I put all correspondence and invoices in the "Live and learn" file folder.
To my surprise, on the 17th of March, 2009 Mr Faulkner send me (most likely a mistake:-) an invitation to join his Facebook profile. After I was added to his "circle of friends", I wrote on his Facebook wall asking what has happened to the money he still owes me. In a matter of minutes, I received a reply: "Vlad send me those invoices ill get them to accounting. Chris.
[email protected]".
Hoping there might be finally a closure, I emailed him the 2005 invoice YET ONCE AGAIN. However, later the same day Mr. Faulkner blocked my account on his Facebook and made future communication impossible.
To me, this is a clear indication that Mr. Faulkner will disappear again and will refuse to honor our contract. There is no doubt that any use of my original artwork by him or his company, is a violation of the Copyright Law.
Vlad
Vancouver, British Columbia
Canada