Blatant Content Plagiarism - Am I To Thank You?
Today I’ve been struck by the most blatant content plagiarism I have ever experienced in my life. (Please forgive my bringing this issue up almost at the Christmas Eve, but this just ripped me off!)
Checking my admin area, I saw a new comment that caught my eye:
Huh?! How do you like that? Yes, I will definitely post new articles but NOT for you! Ok, the guy copied my content - this can happen now and then - nothing new. But posting a comment on this is the ultimate impudence and stupidity. Here is the screenshot of the thief’s exact copy (well, he omitted my links and image) of my article on social media marketing:
[the thief deserved a post but NOT a link]
Well, I even don’t know how to treat this: is this blogger impudent or just stupid? Can he really think it’s flattering to me that he copied that “good post” of mine and promises to continue stealing my content if he thinks it’s “good” enough?
Well, Chirag, if you are really a regular reader of my blog, please note, I am not going to allow you to steal my content and republish it on your blog (at least you could have reworded the original post and provided a link to a source). Chirag, I am addressing you and every single content thief out there, do you have a clue do you care how much time and effort I need to create an article [provided I am new to blogging]? That’s a long process of creative thinking and research… And you just copy and paste my post??? That’s insulting and irritating.
Well, it’s sad that right before Christmas I was reminded that Internet is not all “friends” and “friendly communities”. It’s the world of bad guys hacking good guys and blatant thieves stealing the content…
15 Responses to “Blatant Content Plagiarism - Am I To Thank You?”
You may want to research the WHOIS information on their domain and send them a nice DMCA notice. You could use the WHOIS info to obtain the domain registrar and hosting provider information. If the splogger doesn’t comply with your take down request, you can report them to their host and have their site shut down. Most hosting providers have detailed TOC that strictly prohibit copyright infringement.
Best of luck with this!
By JMorris on Dec 22, 2007
Hi Ann,
This is a completely ridiculous act! How could one copy straightaway someone’s creative work? Seems like this person has moved to this link
http://smartsem.blogspot.com/2007/12/social-media-marketing-think-long-term.html
Copied your naming style. Calls her/him-self SMART SEO!! Comment there and ask her/him stop copying.
Follow JMorris’s instruction and at least comment and make her/him and her/his readers feel that they are reading a plagiarist stuff.
By Joan Marley on Dec 25, 2007
Go through this http://www.mcanerin.com/EN/articles/copyright-03.asp
would help u to punish the dumb.
Good luck
By Alex Stewart on Dec 26, 2007
What a jerk. Have you asked him to stop? You can certainly file a DMCA request and since he does have AdWords, you can get him banned.
Here’s how: Report AdSense Spam.
Hope that helps! Sorry about that, Ann!
By Tamar Weinberg on Dec 26, 2007
@JMorris: I appreciate your kind support;
@Joan Marley: The guy’s getting on my nerves! How many websites is going to copy my article to??? Thanks for pointing that out to me, Joan!
@Alex Stewart: Many thanks for the useful resource;
@Tamar Weinberg: I have, but I do not know if he received my email. I will have to comment on his blog (didn’t want to do that as it seems somehow humiliating but I just don’t want to waste time on that DMCA thing). Thanks for the support and link.
All the others who contacted me via skype and email - many thanks for your willingness to help!
By Ann Smarty on Dec 26, 2007
Hello Ann,
Greetings from cold Cleveland!
Glad to have found your blog. Sorry to read about the stupid plagiarist, I hope he just goes away!
- Monish
By Monish on Dec 26, 2007
A quick look through his shit sites definitely shows that the guy has been copying anything and everything under the sun. You’re gonna need to just try to shut him down without giving him a chance to stop.
By Syzlak on Dec 28, 2007
You’re cute.
Edit: deleted the last part of the comment - but could not bring myself into deleting the flattering thing
Ann
By WeAreTheRobots on Dec 28, 2007
It kind of reminds me of that commercial I saw on TV of kids saying I want to be underpaid and overworked when I grow up. Nothing is worse than doing all of your research, spending all your efforts on your work and then have some dumb-ass just take your work. Please pursue action against this person… for all our sakes.
By Dan on Dec 30, 2007
In this day and age take it as a compliment.
He’ll get bored of you and move on if he gets no reaction. If he’s using RSS simply look him up and ban him (google for one of many ways of doing this).
My wifes ex husband (and several members of his medication dependant family) regularly check in on my stuff according to detail logs but I’m actually receiving more information about them than they are from me. In the end, it’s pathetic really and reflects on his nature tenfold so don’t waste even a moment stressing about him.
If you’re worried about damage to your site, there is none, search engines can easily spot the thief from the original automaticaly thanks to their own extensive logs.
By ATV on Dec 31, 2007
These bums crop up all the time. Unless he outranks you for any of the terms your posts are targeting, it may not be worth fighting over. These people aim for the longtail and just work on volume. Independently, the posts he copies of yours to his sites won’t be helpful (unless he’s paraphrasing them, which is something else entirely). But when combined with content from other places, it might hit long-tail searches your various sites might not get traffic from.
That said, if the issue is more principle, then “sue the bastard,” as one of my profs likes to say :D!
By Gab "SEO ROI" Goldenberg on Jan 1, 2008
I have had to deal with content scrapers for articles I have submitted lately. I contacted the article hosting site, and they told me I would have to take it up with the scraper’s hosting company.
To add insult to injury, it ended up on some viagra spam blog. There are about 10 steps that you have to go through to get the content removed. Ultimately, it’s not worth my time to prosecute.
The next step in web development should be making it easier to report scraped and stolen content,
By Kurt "BuyBigTires" Hartman on Jan 2, 2008
@ATV: taking it as compliment sounds good
but not much to be proud of. If my site were older, the thief would stand no chance to do any harm to me.
@Gab: Yeah, you are right, this happens often, but I was just irritated by his stupid comment!
@Kurt: I agree, I contacted blogger and they gave me instructions on how to go on, the process seems to long
@Dan: Thanks for your support.
By Ann Smarty on Jan 3, 2008
Here is the guy’s Adsense code: pub-1821178384451123
Guess what you can do with that.
By blackhat on Jan 5, 2008