Finds illustrators' artwork copied onto merch and ads, then files the notices
TL;DR Easelguard watches the web and Indian shopping sites for copies of an illustrator's published work, keeps dated proof of who posted it first and files takedown notices. Artists and small studios pay a monthly fee. It could work because copying is everywhere and chasing it alone is tedious.
India has over 2–2.5 million creators who earn from their content[1], and illustrators are among the easiest to copy. A drawing posted on social media can turn up on a T-shirt, a phone cover or a café menu within weeks.
We found no India-specific count of these cases. The global numbers give a sense of scale though - one monitoring service reports finding over 350 million matches of its users' images and handling over 250,000 infringement cases[2].
Most Indian artists never act on it, because finding copies, proving priority and writing notices eats hours they'd much rather spend drawing.
The seed wanted to record art on a blockchain and use AI to judge style. We dropped that. A chain records who minted a file, not who drew it, so anyone can mint a stolen image. Tokens would also be taxed as virtual digital assets at 30% with 1% TDS on each transfer[3]. And style itself isn't protected by copyright anyway.
Easelguard keeps the useful part. An artist connects a portfolio or social media account, and each work gets a dated fingerprint and, where the tools allow, Content Credentials, the open provenance standard backed by big software and tech firms[4]. Image matching then scans marketplaces, print-on-demand stores and social shops for copies. The artist reviews each match in one tap and picks ignore, ask for credit, offer a licence or take down. Easelguard drafts the notice and sends it to the platform's grievance officer with the evidence attached, and stubborn cases go to partner law firms.
The user and the payer are the same people - freelance illustrators, comic artists and small design studios. Our assumption is a free tier for a few works and ₹399–999 a month for full portfolios.
Global rivals take a cut of settlements instead, and one charges 50% of what it recovers[2]. A licence fee from a small brand that used a design without asking is a second revenue line.
India's IT Rules 2021 require platforms to acknowledge user complaints within 24 hours and dispose of them within 15 days[5], so a well-formed notice does get read. Content Credentials have support from the big software and social companies[4], and image-matching models are now cheap to run at scale.
There's no public figure for art infringement or monitoring spend in India. The firmest number is the base of over 2–2.5 million monetised creators[1], and nobody knows what share of them are illustrators.
As an adjacent signal, one global service says over 150,000 creatives across 120+ countries use its service[2], which shows artists will sign up when monitoring is free to start.
Global image-monitoring services[6] monitor images worldwide and chase settlements through law firms, but they're built for photographers and Western courts. C2PA tools label provenance but don't hunt for copies.
In India we found no service built around illustrators, Indian marketplaces and Indian notice rules. That gap is narrow, and the global players could fill it.
| Difficulty | Moderate (37/100) |
| Starting capital | ₹40–75 L |
| Time to launch | 5–8 months |
Matching is the easy part. The hard parts are crawling Indian shopping sites that block bots and keeping false matches low on stylised art, and then getting platforms to act on notices from a third party at all. Enforcement beyond notices needs lawyers, so the business leans on a good law-firm partner.
No sector licence here. You send notices for artists, you don't act as their lawyer, so the baseline plus a clear line on legal work is enough.
Building this outside India? The categories above usually have a local equivalent, so check with your own regulator.
Don't trust AI to decide what counts as infringement. A similar style is not a copy, so the artist or a lawyer makes that call on every match.
Want to work out the AI layer for Easelguard? Talk to Yash →
Here's what can go south -
I think it's worth a look if you know the Indian illustration scene and can build image search. If you want a tokens business then skip it, because the chain adds cost and proves nothing.
Prove one thing first - that notices sent through Easelguard get at least half of copies removed within 15 days.
Plan for about ₹40–75 L over 5–8 months, mostly image matching, store crawling and the first group of paying artists.
No licence. You file notices on the artist's behalf through each platform's grievance process, and send anything that heads to court to a partner law firm.
Yes, global image-monitoring services already work this way abroad. You would need to learn each country's takedown rules and copyright law before you file.
The free Easelguard validation kit has the line-by-line capital breakdown, the effort scoring, the copyright and platform-rules checklist, a 14-day validation sprint with pass/fail targets, a 90-day launch plan, 10 interview questions for illustrators and studios, and 5 assumptions to test. Download the kit →
Thinking about building Easelguard or something close to it? The make-or-break work is proving that notices get copies removed on Indian marketplaces, and I'm happy to help you test that. If you need a hand, you know where to find me. Talk to Yash →
For illustration only. Names are fictional and ideas hypothetical; sourced facts are real but may be out of date. Nothing here is legal, financial or professional advice, and Yash Khatri is not personally liable for any use of it. Read the full disclaimer.