Kimkia - 1:29 am on Oct 21, 2003 (gmt 0)

Not sure where to begin with this -- but I run a popular craft site, where I offer instructions and sometimes step-by-step photos to show someone how to do a particular craft.

Well - the site is usually number one in google for the search terms and a number of other competitive terms.

I get between 2 and 3,000 uniques a day, depending on the season. And with the growth in popularity, I've found, comes an increase in copyright theft.

For me, most of the problem is confined to Yahoo and MSN type groups, where my content is reproduced word for word, often drawing images from my server, or alternatively, using my images with a rename and posting to their own server.

There's a seasonal cycle to my site -- with peaks in traffic coordinating with Easter, Halloween, Christmas etc. At those same times, I find my stuff pinched and reproduced all over the craft groups in Yahoo and MSN.

Sometimes it's a one off post from a member. But more recently, it's multiple articles ripped off by the admin of these groups, complete with images -- but my name and the site name (let alone an active link) are cut out.

The last forum I took on about this issue also copied articles from about a dozen other well-known sites in this category, so I emailed those sites with a heads-up. About three (surprisingly few) replied to me -- but, in told, about 50 articles were ripped down off that forum within a week, so I'm assuming that complaints were made to the forum admin.

Now I've come across an MSN forum that has received my complaints but, so far, is refusing to remove my material. They are stealing my images as well, so I have replaced the images with a nice little note saying "This image and the accompanying article stolen from..." etc.

What else can I do?

I work hard to produce material for my site. I design original crafts, take step by step photos to reproduce directions, write the instructions, code the material, post it on the site, work to SEO the site etc....and then some nimrod comes and takes whatever without so much as a please and thank you despite copyright notices all over.

Please advise....

[edited by: engine at 8:26 am (utc) on Oct. 21, 2003]
[edit reason] specifics [/edit]