What I do mainly with Inkscape is make SVGs of raster images at the Antique Pattern Librasry ( https://www.antiquepatternlibrary.org/ ). Their stuff is all under the Creative Commons 4.0 (NC SA) license.
To prevent people from selling their PDFs, they watermark every page of them. Of course, the whole point with the SVGs is why they can't be watermarked.
So I figured that I'd comment in the SVG code itself that the SVG belongs to the APL and is not for sale. But I am concerned that the comments may be scrubbed out by software used by the nefarious folks who steal and sell them.
I have been unable to find a scrubber that handles SVGs, but I am sure they are out there. It's just XML, after all. But I can't find out whether they specifically scrub out comments or not. Does anyone know?
Does anyone have any further suggestions for protecting the SVGs without making it difficult for people who would be using them legitimately? I know there will always be some way for the thieves to make money with them, but I do want to make it as difficult as possible.
As you deduced, it's trivially easy to delete comments and metadata. Inkscape itself provides this function though the goal is to minimise file sizes, not to conceal ownership. Open the save dialog [File > Save As...] and in the drop down list choose Optimised SVG. One of the checkboxes is [Remove comments]. Since svg is at its root a plain text file format, it can be freely manipulated by anyone who receives it. There's really no way to include any inviolable features.
Using Inkscape with Other Programs SVG comments and metadata scrubbers
Inkscape.org
Hello, all!
What I do mainly with Inkscape is make SVGs of raster images at the Antique Pattern Librasry ( https://www.antiquepatternlibrary.org/ ). Their stuff is all under the Creative Commons 4.0 (NC SA) license.
To prevent people from selling their PDFs, they watermark every page of them. Of course, the whole point with the SVGs is why they can't be watermarked.
So I figured that I'd comment in the SVG code itself that the SVG belongs to the APL and is not for sale. But I am concerned that the comments may be scrubbed out by software used by the nefarious folks who steal and sell them.
I have been unable to find a scrubber that handles SVGs, but I am sure they are out there. It's just XML, after all. But I can't find out whether they specifically scrub out comments or not. Does anyone know?
Does anyone have any further suggestions for protecting the SVGs without making it difficult for people who would be using them legitimately? I know there will always be some way for the thieves to make money with them, but I do want to make it as difficult as possible.
Thank you.
As you deduced, it's trivially easy to delete comments and metadata. Inkscape itself provides this function though the goal is to minimise file sizes, not to conceal ownership. Open the save dialog [File > Save As...] and in the drop down list choose Optimised SVG. One of the checkboxes is [Remove comments]. Since svg is at its root a plain text file format, it can be freely manipulated by anyone who receives it. There's really no way to include any inviolable features.
I tend to agree with Paddy_CAD.
There is still value to saving copies as PDF with vector data, as the PDFs can be watermarked.
Anything can be stolen, but obstacles help keep away the amateur thieves.
Ah, well, I thought as much.
Thanks for clarifying!