This is a guest post by Oliver who blogs at Thisisfreelance. If you would like to write for ShoutMeloud, check our guest posting guidelines.
Beat The Content Thieves!
I have been writing content online for nearly a decade now, and I have to admit, I enjoy it. I enjoy writing content that people love to read, I enjoy earning a passive income, and I enjoy researching my work, broadening my horizons.
What I do not enjoy is the pure amount of firefighting I have to do to stop content thieves drowning out my work. Every week I pick an article I have written at random. For each one I will search for instances where it has been stolen and distributed across the internet. Usually I will have to send out between 30 -70 DMCA notices. Considering 90% of the time I will have to who-is the domain and contact the website host, this can easily take an entire day to do.
Even doing this vast amount of administrative bull is not enough. I know that within a few weeks the content will have been copied and redistributed across the internet once more, and the firefighting dance will just have to continue.
2011 might bring a change to all this however. I would say the majority of the sites which steal my content use Google Adsense, and in a Press Release by Google, there appeared a very tasty bit of information.
The Google Adsense team has announced a much more stringent policy on copyright violators. Specifically, people who violate copyright will be removed from the Adsense program.
What does this mean to writers such as you and me?
It has the potential to mean a LOT. If someone steals your content and they are displaying Google Ads, click on the Google logo and report them for copyright violation. Include a DMCA style report in your comment to Google. Several of these will see the thief removed from Google. Hopefully it will not take long for people to realize that stealing your content is theft, and there will be repercussions. While a DMCA is a good way to get stolen work removed from a website, the loss of an Adsense account should make people think twice before they copy your content.
So remember, if someone steals your work, hit them where it hurts and get them removed from the Adsense program! Spread the word, and pretty soon content theft will be an insignificant problem compared to its current epidemic!
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{ 20 comments… read them below or add one }
Great way to penalize content thieves. Thanks for the post.
Hi Oliver, really a wonderful article. Content theft is one area which needs to be taken care of all the time. I have noticed few people copied my blog contents and posted in their blog, but I have no idea on how to stop them. Now you have given me a good idea. Thanks for sharing.
Good one!
Hope Google’s action will prove as a deterrent to content thieves. Many of my articles were copied word by word without any attribution but I didn’t take any explicit action as the time I would waste in chasing the content thieves can be used for some useful work.
Thanks For the info Oliver, Plagiarism is to Taken seriously Now
Google will help for sure if you file a complaint against a website for stealing the website, if that website does not use adsense then you have to go via their web hosting company or via DMCA…
Awesome step by Google.
1 or 2 years back pialgarism was increasing an an exponential rate and that triggered google engineers to plan something intricate which will help the bloggers to stay away from the tension
A great step indeed and great post also as I wasnt aware of this new policy of google. But your post helped me in knowing it.
My blog isnt new but yeah if I post a good post then there are many of them ready to copy paste it in their blogs. I better copyright my blog and also will consider your point
Thanks buddy
This is worth sharing. Thanks for informing
That is a nice step taken by Adsense i appreciate it……….
Yeah! Google adsense has very strict rules for plagiarized content.
What’s a DMCA notice? Better question, do you have a sample? Sounds like I should do that, too.
Sometimes copyright infringers may may respond with a request for you to prove you were the first one who created the original content. In which case you can use the tools listed below:
http://www.digiprove.com/copyright_proof_wordpress_plugin.aspx
http://timemarker.org/en/
Fight the plagiarism. But for me, I am not worry about people steal my work but am worry when they stop steal my work. You know what I mean. Cheers!
This is a very common trend now because of newbies coming to blogging industry. The always copy articles from popular blogs as they think it can help them.
They don’t know that google can penalize there blogs for this, they don’t know that they can waste there precious time by copy pasting the article and getting nothing at the end. As they will have to remove it one day.
All newbies are strongly advised not to copy any content from any blog. Write in your own words, only then you can build reputation in blogging industry.
Try to be your self!
Great post!
Thanks for the information on how to hit back by complaining to google…
Most stolen content cases is adsense autoblog that they use RSS feed.
Google Adsense now does not allow un-original content.Stolen contents will decrease (hope that)
This blog focuses more on google adsense post like banning and other unuseful stuff (Do some good posts) ,Guys there are lots of other money making strategies other than Google Adsense(you can’t be rich by using Adsense it just makes your blog crappy) Just think bigger don’t think for pennies because if you doing blogging do it for passion not for this sucking adsense
This is a good idea to stop copyright violators. But I think there is another downside to it. If the adsense of the thief is stopped. Be sure he will go mad. But what if he retaliates back, by constantly clicking on your ads. Google will cancel even your adsense on “Purposeful Clicks”ground. It has been holding me up for long against complaining directly to google.
@jaqui
Check out the FAQ on my website for a default DMCA template.
@aman
I make several hundred dollars a month from adsense, it is definitely not a waste of time.
@ankita
The good mews is that gooe does not really ban for this. Google will not only track that the invalid clocks came from another IP/MAC address, bit also that those clicks ce from a defunct adse se account. Several unscrupulous adsense uses have had their accounts banned for clicking repeatedly on competitor ads.
Why not just take all the time you’re spending hunting down thieves and use it to create more great content? Should you be really spending so much time fighting plagiarizers? Is the potential risk of NOT having them take the content down worth the effort and time you’re taking to fight them?
In my experience, people who are unwilling to write their own content are even less willing to promote it – so what are the odds that they’re going to outrank you or steal business based on the content?
Lastly, before anyone screams “Duplicate content penalty”, lets be real: Google is pretty good at figuring this stuff out. I absolutely wouldn’t give it a second thought.