Plurk

194 responses to this plurk (Jump to bottom)

  • Jane Chin
    welcome! my first time hosting a Plurkshop and I hope I'm doing this right. First topic to cover:
  • Jane Chin
    1) How do we know when our content has been ripped off (without attribution or even with attribution if used in questionable fashion)
  • DebInAustin says
    yeah just keep going Jane. Folks will jump in.
  • Jane Chin says
    the way I found out in most cases is through Google Alerts keyword "jane chin". Many of you may do this already
  • DebInAustin says
    usually in a plurkshop we just jump in and ask questions.
  • Jane Chin says
    gassho, please jump right now. I share what little I know and I hope others help me fill in the gaps.
  • jaheed says
    Hey everyone.
  • Jane Chin
    welcome jaheed! I was asking how people know when their blog/website content have been copied and reproduced on another website.
  • Sir Proudgamer
    A friend had art stolen once, she was tipped off about the rip off by a friend on Deviant Art
  • Jane Chin
    gassho, google alerts to your name works IF the splogger included your name in the link. in some cases names aren't obvious.
  • pritcharddesign asks
    some photographers have lawyers on retainer just to watch ouot for copyright infringement
  • Te-ge asks
    how much of a blog post are you counting as splogging? The entire post or some of the post?
  • Jane Chin
    proudgamer good point; my husband has battled image theft for years (usually as ebay product images) and he gets tipped off by his fans.
  • Jane Chin
    otherwise he wouldn't even know about it
  • Jane Chin
    pritcharddesign i can totally see how that becomes a natural business expense (photogs retaining IP lawyers)
  • DebInAustin says
    what does your husband do Jane?
  • Jane Chin
    DebInDenver he is a rocket scientist, but has gear design as hobby and therefore lots of pics to go with it.
  • Jane Chin
    %pritcharddesign good point: if someone wants to take it outright your name wouldn't be seen at all. then how to detect this?
  • jaheed says
    I have several measures of tracking content and notice folks google my name "A LOT" which is startling. Why me.
  • jaheed says
    I think my searches come from folks trying to find out more about the company.
  • Jane Chin
    gassho I've caught splogsteals via pingback and comment forms as well
  • Jane Chin
    another way I've found is through a service called "copyscape" anyone use this?
  • pritcharddesign wonders
    maybe adding your name hidden in code so it'll still come up in search??
  • DebInAustin says
    I've never heard of copyscape, but I am new to the term splogging as well.
  • Jane Chin
    gassho I agree, nothing is 100% - if you publish anything good, you're running the risk. that's why I say "deter" bc can't "prevent"
  • Connie
    Some sploggers or content scrapers feel there's nothing wrong with what they do if they include a link back to you. (I disagree.)
  • Jane Chin
    (copyscape.com is also unfortunately not 100% free) but at least give limited results
  • Te-ge says
    doing google searches for specific quotes from your posts also works
  • Jane Chin
    connie I agree with you re: the mentality of sploggers/content scrapers linking back as "credit enough".
  • Jane Chin
    Teeg any suggestions on which part of your post to select quote? i.e. do sploggers usually go for first paragraphs, middle content, or?
  • Jane Chin
    gassho what did you do in response when you found out your content was ripped in full?
  • Connie has
    anyone confronted a splogger about stealing their content?
  • Jane Chin
    usually met with resounding silence IF their email is even listed
  • Connie
    I accidentally commented on a splog the other day, and it made me so mad.
  • Jane Chin
    my articles shouldn't be there anymore, but basically: I wrote articles for a very new website of mine, within days I found a site with >50%
  • Jane Chin
    of my article pasted on their "business opportunities" page
  • Jane Chin
    (which was choking with advertisements)
  • Jane Chin
    gassho have you tried contacting google about removing that listing due to copyright violation?
  • Jane Chin
    connie YES! good point - commenting on the splog (even if just to say "hey! you're stealing my stuff) is a bad idea. I learned that lesson
  • Jane Chin
    I made a comment to the splog post requesting that comments be made on MY WEBSITE. within hours a splog comment was added as if someone is
  • Jane Chin
    responding to my comment, which just helped the splog post.
  • Connie
    I thought I was commenting on the original post; hit the splog by mistake. :-(
  • Jane Chin
    gassho this brings me to my next question, which is - isn't all publicity good publicity - good or bad? it just exposes your name more, so
  • Jane Chin
    what's the problem?
  • Connie
    Problem is that they're stealing traffic - few people if any are going to click back to the real author's site.
  • Jane Chin
    great resource@connie I'm bookmarking that one by lorelle
  • Connie
    and most of them are link farms or ad sites, so they're making revenue off your content.
  • Sir Proudgamer
    If there is a prominent link back I suppose it can be good publicity, but how often do Sploggers do that?
  • pritcharddesign says
    agree with Connie, especially if they're trying to pass it off as their own!
  • Jane Chin
    connie I was wondering that... do they actually make $ from splog sites?
  • EagleHawk says
    I work for a webhosting company in the abuse department, and I know it is against our aup to host a splog.
  • Connie
    Yes, they make money if they're running Google ad sense or other link ads. That's the main purpose for the splog: make money.
  • Jane Chin
    eaglehawk welcome! from your experience, how does an author/blogger complain to the webhost productively to get result?
  • Bakla
    just got in (using plurkify rooms)
  • Connie
    EagleHawke Does it do any good to complain to a web hosting site about a splog? How would you know where splog is hosted?
  • ThoughtWrong
    (s_bye) just got here guys, sorry late
  • Jane Chin
    connie then we're assuming that splogs are effective in generating high levels of traffic to create good revenue, based on content amount
  • Jane Chin
    connie this is where I really like Blogger and their "Flag This" bar atop the sites. In the past I've also complained to Blogger and they
  • Jane Chin
    removed the splogs
  • EagleHawk
    first find out the IP of the splog. using windows do nslookup domain.com
  • ThoughtWrong shares
    that splogs can get high SEO which in turn means high traffic
  • ThoughtWrong shares
    part of SEO is sites linking to yours and you linking back to theirs, thats what search engines look for
  • EagleHawk
    then find out who the owner of the ip is and report it to their abuse@ address.
  • Jane Chin shares
    a twilight zone moment when a splog that took my content got ripped off by another splog LOL
  • ThoughtWrong says
    if you let their comment appear on your page w/ the link back to their site then its like a big bump in the search engines
  • Jane Chin says
    i thought i was in a spy v. spy mad comic strip.
  • EagleHawk
    It does matter to some providers, I know it matters to mine.
  • Bakla
    Have you guys checked if your images were also copied onto splogs (and even hotlinked)?
  • Connie
    I imagine it matters to most hosting providers. They have a reputation to maintain and don't want to anger their customers.
  • gwfrink3 says
    yes it certainly matters to us.
  • ThoughtWrong shares
    that in WP and other CMS you can see from the dash board what sites are linking to you, analytics will also do this
  • Jane Chin says
    bakla my images were taken as well - except now they're making ME violate the photographer's copyright.
  • pritcharddesign asks
    if you leave a comment with a link to your original blog, will that raise their SEO?
  • Jane Chin says
    gwfrink3 I emailed saying if content isn't removed within 48 hours I will be mailing an attorney letter to the owner's physical address.
  • Jane Chin says
    got IMMEDIATE response. but this is rare, bc the owner seemed to want to do "some" honest biz or wouldn't put picture/email/addy there
  • EagleHawk says
    It really depends on the provider, but as splogging becomes more and more popular (per se) more providers are waking up to the problem.
  • Bakla says
    janechin i had some photos stolen by a splogger. even hotlinked and used up my bandwidth.
  • Te-ge
    How are you defining splog? The site that had your content, JaneChin doesn't seem to fit most defs. Not saying they aren't, just wondering.
  • gwfrink3 says
    I've had good experience from that kind of aggressive action, JaneChin. They are usually aware that they are in legal jeopardy.
  • Bakla says
    I changed the filename in the wp-content directory so their site now displays an x mark
  • Jane Chin says
    Teeg based on the article connie shared, bc the site had NO original content, it was a splog
  • pritcharddesign says
    excellent JaneChin. You almost *have* to send letter from atty if they're violating your photog contract.
  • Jane Chin says
    the site seemed to have diff. contributors, copying and pasting from diff sources and displaying on the site.
  • Jane Chin says
    but i'm sure none of us are going to get a % of the profits generated by the ad revenues from part of our content,in my case>50% of article.
  • Te-ge says
    actually, it looks like about half their posts are original..all the ones written by the wife. They also have a PR of 6.
  • gwfrink3 says
    thus far I haven't had to haul anyone into court (crosses available fingers and toes).
  • gwfrink3 says
    danica here in Plurk had her blog content stolen in a Sploggist kind of way, across international boundaries, and mounted a campaign.
  • EagleHawk
    you really don't *have* to have an attorney do it the first time. Here is how to send DMCA notices tinyurl.com/5rlcfa
  • gwfrink3 says
    pressured to thief. I wish she were with us to report on that. Loss of content to a splog in China, for example, poses special difficulties.
  • Jane Chin
    Teeg i think the trouble with this one is that you have a splog embedded in the blog. So far all the posts from "Rich" are not original.
  • gwfrink3 says
    eaglehawk is right. I've never had an attorney send a letter for me. Was IMHO not necessary for preliminary action. Mileage varies.
  • Jane Chin
    but again, my experience in this one case is unique in that the owner appears to want legitimacy thus share contact info. Most splogs aren't
  • Te-ge says
    JaneChin I suspect that with the high PR he feels he's helping business sites that he likes. Did he take your entire post or part?
  • DebInAustin says
    so is there "splogging by accident?"
  • Jane Chin says
    gassho what was the old face of scraping (v. splog as new face)? I'm not sure I understand.
  • Te-ge says
    DebInDenver splogging is usually defined as a site stealing a blog post in order to make money or gain rank from it.
  • ThoughtWrong thinks
    that some sites are complete scraping bots and it dosent matter what content they get, those are the ones to look out for the most
  • Jane Chin says
    teeg he took almost all, left out maybe the final paragraph. and my articles run long as well, word count is significant.
  • Jane Chin says
    I can say that microbusinessmentor.com hasn't benefited as my original article didn't have comments coming from people who say "i read it
  • Jane Chin says
    on that other blog and this is what I think"
  • Te-ge says
    some copy posts without the intent, but that's more of a copyright or plagiarism issue.
  • Jane Chin
    gassho is there a reason why you haven't done anything re: the article bank taking your article?
  • gwfrink3 says
    the only "by accident" I can think of is an improperly debugged robot run amok. Good faith requires correcting that without being asked.
  • Jane Chin
    versus the way this plurker/twitter did it with one of my articles: is.gd/1dGk
  • Jane Chin
    this reminds me of another plurkshop on "who owns the conversation". I think those of us in niche markets and building personal brands NEEDS
  • Jane Chin
    to own the conversation at least at the beginning to gain traction.
  • gwfrink3 says
    that looks like a straightforward taking, not an accident, unless you granted permission.
  • Jane Chin
    gassho confronting: contact/email, reporting violation to host/ISP, in some cases attorney cease & desist
  • Jane Chin
    any other methods you can think of?
  • gwfrink3 says
    if you aren't at home with copyright law, I think involving an attorney is usually wise.
  • Jane Chin
    (true splog I've found you can't find the person so aim for the webhost/ISP) as previously suggested
  • Te-ge says
    I've noticed that many big bloggers ignore sploggers for the most part. If you write a big post, some people will copy word for word.
  • Jane Chin
    Teeg I agree; big bloggers can afford not playing pixel police. For people like me (small blogger), every incident makes me less visible
  • Connie
    I think some ppl view splogs as inescapable, like email spam.
  • Jane Chin
    unless I"m wrong and it helps me in some way, then I'm all for it.
  • gwfrink3 says
    thinking back on what I said earlier, daily newspaper experience in these issues give me a leg up possibly not shared by all.
  • Jane Chin
    connie yes, it took a few yrs before the feds took spam seriously, bc it was costing consumers money with scams and such.
  • Connie
    Think we should point out difference between plagiarism and splogs, which are mostly created by bots and feeds.
  • gwfrink3 says
    thank you for hosting this, JaneChin. Must go, however.
  • Jane Chin
    gassho that is unfortunate. gwfrink3 yes, you may know more about copyright bc of your background. thank you!
  • Jane Chin is
    grateful for your participation and input here! have to feed the baby, but please feel free to continue the discussion. (g_worship)
  • DebInAustin says
    great job JaneChin! Thank you for leading this and sharing your expertise with us!
  • Te-ge says
    Interesting discussion. Thanks for leading it, JaneChin. :-)
  • EagleHawk
    gassho have to disagree with you there is a will to fight email spam at the fed level. look at spamsuite.com splogs will never be a crime
  • affiliatecoffee says
    i completely missed the discussion - my apoligies..here are my thoughts on it.
  • affiliatecoffee says
    there is little we can do at the moment to stop sploggers - some cases report them if using free wordpress or blogger account.
  • affiliatecoffee says
    and in some cases - go legal route- but in my opinion whatever blog platform we use, there should be some sort of extension/tool available
  • affiliatecoffee says
    which does not let the splogger at least just copy paste the data - there is an extension available for joomla that makes this possible
  • affiliatecoffee says
    similar should be developed for other platforms...if possible..and in most cases -finding the person's information through whois is possible
  • affiliatecoffee says
    who has copied the blog - even if its "private" - we could send a polite e-mail to them. in most cases - they would remove
  • affiliatecoffee says
    janechin and others already highlighted various ways by which copied content can be traced.
  • affiliatecoffee says
    a simple google search with strings like "this is blog content" can be searched and see how many sites have duplicate content too.
  • affiliatecoffee says
    because most of them get indexed in google. then its a matter of taking it up with the splogger.
  • EagleHawk
    affiliatecoffee you can always report it for the ISP, most often if it's a good isp, they will take action.
  • affiliatecoffee says
    eaglehawk - not so sure about the ISP - shouldn't this be taken to the hosting provider instead?
  • EagleHawk
    affiliatecoffee ISP and hosting provider is interchangeable in my mind since I work for a hosting provider.
  • EagleHawk
    and technically a hosting provider is a ISP.
  • EagleHawk
    hosting provider does provide internet service to the website.
  • affiliatecoffee says
    eaglehawk - agreed then. in my mind - they are separate. ISP to me is someone like Comcast - and hosting provider - someone like Bluehost
  • affiliatecoffee says
    p.s janechin - call me a party pooper - but i am not so sure why we are giving so much credit to plurkshop by plurks done by users.
  • affiliatecoffee says
    i see that they are encouraging community participation and ensuring important conversations get the attention they deserve.

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