A few words on copyright!

Greetings to all.  Hope you are all having a great week thus far.  I just wanted to write a (hopefully!) fairly short post about some concerns I am having with regard to the copyright on my little mice.  I have received a few requests from people for the patterns for the mice - so they can make and sell them themselves.  This, is, obviously, not on.  I do understand that there's no way I can claim to be the only person who can design and sell small felt mice, and there probably are some crafters out there who are using the ideas in my catalogue to create their own little mice.  There's not much I can do about that, but it is not acceptable for people to try and create them as a commercial venture.
The little mice in my catalogue - and the ones I hope to continue to create - are products of my time and imagination, and I hope everyone can respect  that.  Sadly, I know that this whole question of copyright and design fraud on the internet is not probably going to ever go away - as long as some people think it is okay to do this.  Several needlework designers I know have told me this is the most major issue they have to deal with;  one even said she reckons for every design she sells legally, probably three or four are downloaded illegally in one way or another.  This is sad, but, obviously a reality of the world we live in.  It's actually one of the reasons I decided not to sell my own cross stitch designs online, which I was originally intending to do when I started this blog last year.  It just seemed to be more trouble than it was worth!
Thanks for reading this - and I am happy to hear any input or advice any of you may want to share!
Have a lovely day.
Gail xx