Practice Management Member Conversations

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Interested to see what experience anyone has had with their Documents being scanned, uploaded, and made available through contractor-oriented subscription services.  

I received an inquiry from an awning vendor in Miami,FL for a smaller public-bid historic preservation project in Iowa.  I asked how they knew about the project and they told me they had reviewed the plans and specs on i****.com.  It turns out a printed set of our 35 sheets of drawings and 275 pages of specs were scanned and posted for a national audience - all without our knowledge.

Every sheet had copyright 2014 on the title block.  The documents are 100% Instrument of Service and solely our firm's property.  After contacting them, the documents were taken down.

Looking for anyone with similar experience or guidance on how best to respond.  

Thanks

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Peter Franks AIA
The Franks Design Group, P.C.
Glenwood IA
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This is downright scary though not shocking.  Perhaps AIA Iowa (or AIA National, since the service is available to firms nationally) might explore this and consider what type of letter or action is appropriate to send to i****.com.

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Michael Strogoff,  FAIA
Management Consultant to Design Professionals
Strogoff Consulting
Mill Valley CA
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Other than happening quicker - how is this different from the old days when F.W. Dodge and others microfilmed bid sets to distribute across the country for potential vendors to see?

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Joel Niemi AIA
Principal
Snohomish WA
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Original Message:
Sent: 11/18/2014 5:43:28 PM
From: michael@strogoffconsulting.com
Subject: RE: Unauthorized document distribution

This is downright scary though not shocking.  Perhaps AIA Iowa (or AIA National, since the service is available to firms nationally) might explore this and consider what type of letter or action is appropriate to send to i****.com. ------------------------------------------- Michael Strogoff,  FAIA Management Consultant to Design Professionals Strogoff Consulting Mill Valley CA -------------------------------------------

We post our bids online (for free) and we have had them downloaded and distributed by internet plan houses. The one propblem we have encountered is that these plan houses don't always post the addenda in a timely manner, so subs are asking questions that have already been answered.   

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Susan Hobbes AIA
Director, Planning And Construction
Clark County Dept. of Aviation
Las Vegas NV
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Original Message:
Sent: 11-19-2014 18:12
From: Joel Niemi
Subject: Unauthorized document distribution

Other than happening quicker - how is this different from the old days when F.W. Dodge and others microfilmed bid sets to distribute across the country for potential vendors to see?

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Joel Niemi AIA
Principal
Snohomish WA
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How is this so much different from the old days when F.W. Dodge and other services microfilmed bid documents and then distributed them to their subscribers / potential vendors / all across the country? 

If you're that concerned - I suggest adding a note to the effect "not to be distributed without Architect's permission" on each drawing.  Someone might respect such a statement.

If the Owner benefits through better sub-bids, where is the harm?

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Joel Niemi AIA
Principal
Snohomish WA
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Original Message:
Sent: 11-18-2014 17:43
From: Michael Strogoff
Subject: Unauthorized document distribution

This is downright scary though not shocking.  Perhaps AIA Iowa (or AIA National, since the service is available to firms nationally) might explore this and consider what type of letter or action is appropriate to send to i****.com.

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Michael Strogoff,  FAIA
Management Consultant to Design Professionals
Strogoff Consulting
Mill Valley CA
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If that scares you, we share revit models to contractors, subcontractors, manufacturers and fabricators through a Virtual Design Construct (VDC) process. Information that cannot be shared is of little value.

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Douglas Elting AIA
Visions in Architecture
Lincoln NE
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Original Message:
Sent: 11-19-2014 19:00
From: Joel Niemi
Subject: Unauthorized document distribution

How is this so much different from the old days when F.W. Dodge and other services microfilmed bid documents and then distributed them to their subscribers / potential vendors / all across the country? 

If you're that concerned - I suggest adding a note to the effect "not to be distributed without Architect's permission" on each drawing.  Someone might respect such a statement.

If the Owner benefits through better sub-bids, where is the harm?

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Joel Niemi AIA
Principal
Snohomish WA
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I"m guessing the website you note is essentially a plan room/project listing service?  Some questions.  Did they have a complete set of documents or were pages/sections missing?  Were they charging for access?  Where you charging for documents?  Since it was a public bid project did it matter where the contractor came from?  Was pre-approval required to bid?  Did you experience more bidders than you would expect because this website had your project listed?  If they were only distributing documents to bid on your project I'm not sure a copyright has any relevance....that would apply if someone tried to use the documents for another project, and being a historic preservation project that probably wouldn't happen.  I've never had a plan room list a project without asking the architect.  Did they tell you where they got the scans?  Maybe a local plan room or local contractor is sharing with a national service.  If that is the case the call should go to them.  Lots of questions but it seems if they were only distributing plans there is no harm in the end.  Maybe now they have your contact and will come to you directly to get documents.  And hopefully you got a better bid because it had a larger bidders pool.

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Timothy Wall AIA
Architect, Project Manager
The Troyer Group, Inc.
Mishawaka IN
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Original Message:
Sent: 11-18-2014 17:43
From: Michael Strogoff
Subject: Unauthorized document distribution

This is downright scary though not shocking.  Perhaps AIA Iowa (or AIA National, since the service is available to firms nationally) might explore this and consider what type of letter or action is appropriate to send to i****.com.

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Michael Strogoff,  FAIA
Management Consultant to Design Professionals
Strogoff Consulting
Mill Valley CA
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Nothing really special here, except that the Internet, like with all things, expands the reach.  Plan scanning has been going on for decades.  As a GC plans were sent to the Dodge Plan room so that remote bidders could review plans.  The documents were reproduced at a special non-traditional scale so they could only be reviewed at Dodge (Dodge Reports).  With digital documents and the Internet--poof--they are looking at your documents instantaneously in Nepal, Nuuk (Greenland), and Timbucktoo.  Welcome to the 21st century architects.  As for your copyright the plans aren't supposed to be used to create new plans, but as plans to be used for bidding, which I don't believe involves copyright issues.  Remember when you sent documents to the printer so that subs could buy sets for their bidding use?  Time to update your restrictions on documents--the box is open Pandora.

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Harry Bachman
Principal
Elkins Park PA
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Original Message:
Sent: 11-18-2014 17:43
From: Michael Strogoff
Subject: Unauthorized document distribution

This is downright scary though not shocking.  Perhaps AIA Iowa (or AIA National, since the service is available to firms nationally) might explore this and consider what type of letter or action is appropriate to send to i****.com.

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Michael Strogoff,  FAIA
Management Consultant to Design Professionals
Strogoff Consulting
Mill Valley CA
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This "service" is being provided by Master Builders, which is the Iowa equivalent of the AGC. They don't seem to understand or care that they are infringing on the designer's copyrights. 

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Michael Broshar FAIA
Principal
INVISION Planning Architecture Interiors
Waterloo IA
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Original Message:
Sent: 11-18-2014 17:43
From: Michael Strogoff
Subject: Unauthorized document distribution

This is downright scary though not shocking.  Perhaps AIA Iowa (or AIA National, since the service is available to firms nationally) might explore this and consider what type of letter or action is appropriate to send to i****.com.

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Michael Strogoff,  FAIA
Management Consultant to Design Professionals
Strogoff Consulting
Mill Valley CA
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Peter
In the current environment I assume that contractors and/or plan rooms are scanning all our projects and distributing them.  They would claim to you and your clients that this is a net benefit as it brings in a much larger pool of bidders.  Perhaps

I suggest you talk to Jessica Reinert with AIAIowa.  When I was on the board this was a regular topic of discussion.  At that time there did not seem to be any way to counter this practice.  AIAIowa attempted to partner with paid scanning services that Architects could contract with, but since several services were doing this for free there was not much life in that business and if left Iowa.

If you really want to stop the practice you will have to spend your time to track sets and work out a use agreement with each recipient, at minimum.

Good luck

Will

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William Downing AIA
Rohrbach Associates P.C.
Iowa City IA
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Peter,
My first experience with this electronic scanning of documents was in the late 90s, so admittedly, things may have evolved since then.  

The initial question is how did the documents get into the hands of the contractor-oriented subscription service.  Since the Architect did not upload the documents, then they must have been uploaded by the Owner or a Construction Manager, if there was one on board at the time of bidding.  If by a CM, this would have required the Architect's and Owner's consent before doing so.  If by the Owner, I believe that the standard AIA documents provide the Owner with an unlimited license to use the documents as they see fit for this project, potentially including the right to reproduce them for bidding purposes.  Hopefully, the documents that were uploaded did not bear an electronic seal/signature.  

If you have not already done so, I would suggest bringing the matter to the Owner's attention as this should reveal the source of the upload, assuming the Owner was aware of it.  If uploaded by someone other than the Owner, they technically would have required at least the Owner's consent, if not yours, before doing so.  Again, if the Owner was aware of it, I would double check the language of your agreement dealing with Ownership of Documents.  If the owner did not act within its rights, you may wish to outline the correct procedures for the Owner's edification. 

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Chester Salit AIA
Pasadena CA
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