there should be a rule where the forum username needs to be somewhere on the submission. its an extremely easy thing for an artist to do and ends any debate regarding if its something the user actually created. making it that when it actually might -not- be something someone created and you call it out you get punished, may lead to less conflict. but encourages exploiting that system and is a huge flaw in the context of this contest. its a rule that solves multiple issues rather than getting the curator to play detective
a big reason artists even started signing their work even back to the Christian art era in Rome where everyone had to paint, sculpt, etc. christian themed art under Constantines rule, was too prevent this. people were stealing others art and passing it as their own and profiting financially. other artists making replicas of paintings and sculptures. so artists started signing their work, somewhere on the piece more so than for fame. its still done to this day by famous and non famous artists and has been for centuries. its apart of art culture so much that most starting artists try to think of stylish ways to sign their pieces and it makes sense. people even tag their username online on like instagram and other sites and even in memes now, TikTok literally has an auto tag in every video someone posts there. having to do it on a forum contest isnt a stretch
its logical, especially in a competition and is not too much to ask of an artist. theres a millions ways you can include your username for a piece you created for a contest. even if its an older one you didnt make specifically for this, theres a bunch of ways you can add your username to something, whether its digital art or a photo of traditional art in a way thats organic and authentic rather than like a photoshop tag over a picture. even in the spirit of competition as a whole, no one who is participating or even fans dont like to be cheated, thats a terrible feeling when someone is beating you and theyve been cheating the whole time. players in professional sports have broken records and inspired people later to find out they were using performance enhancing drugs the whole time, that also sucks. also no one is perfect, referees miss what seems like obvious calls, so leagues started adding equipment and even rules like coaches challenges to help this with this
but in this case, this single rule, trumps all these rules by simply adding your username:
NO copying other contestants
You must use a Drawing you have made - not someone else's
Posts such as: "Yours is fake" will not be tolerated and you will receive an infraction~