I just got a painful reminder of why I'm afraid to post my art on here.

I was searching around for art of my favorite character, and I found one of my favorite images of him. But I KNOW the artwork of the artist who made the image. I have collected her stuff for years and I know her signature. And here on DA, someone had stolen the image, claimed to have done it, and went as far as to cover up the artist's signature with cheesy text. It made me so upset I contacted the original artist immediately. The original artist put all her love and energy into her work and it got stolen again and again like this, which is why she is no longer on DA.

Things like this really make me sad. If people only knew what really went into this work I wonder if they would still steal it and claim it as their own?