[zepolen]

This sort of mirrors my question about the legality of a TOS on the internet: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=548002

With no canonical examples of 'who was first', and bytes being bytes and therefore editable (ie. timestamps on files count for nothing whatsoever), it's impossible without some sort of trusted 3rd party in which to vouch for this guys story.

Even if the author has paper sketches, they in turn mean nothing as there is no proof as to /when/ they were created.

[jcl]

True, ownership of the preliminary work can be faked. However, without intimate knowledge of file formats and graphics algorithms it would be challenging to, for example, come up with an Illustrator vector file that rasterizes byte-for-byte to the scaled-down logo images copied from his portfolio. (assuming the thieves copied the graphics directly and didn't think to make their own vector file first...)

It may even be enough for him to have a credible high-res, layer-separated Photoshop file; someone who does not have the skills to produce their own original artwork probably also lacks the skills to convincingly fake a high-res version of someone else's artwork.

(Not sure if this has held in court, but I'd bet it has come up before.)