Do you get tired of others copying your content?

How this affects your motivation to create content?

[explorador]

Hi webmasters, I've been creating content since 1998, and my journey took me to literally travel to places and countries to gather information, especially pictures. I had a passion for it (still... somehow... have it... somewhere?)

It's been a long time since I don't post anything on my websites, instead I've been quite active on some forums or groups, I don't hesitate on sharing information, but this is different. Someone asking something, and having me providing an answer, doesn't turn into an article of regurgitated words (mine), and my pictures.

I used to get upset about this, and proceeded with copy right take downs. Sometimes I didn't get upset, but proceeded because it was the logical thing to do.

But now... meh... I find very difficult to write and post. Besides some sort of writers block, or pure lack of interest, I feel some impact inside my being, like... being heavily disappointing and seeing websites copying my content to the point of cropping my pictures to remove the logos and watermarks. It's... quite too much, it's insulting. There is one website with many investors behind doing this, and they provide credits writing the name of your website, suppose it's "webmasterworld", they write "web masters world", with absolutely no link to the website.

I'm tired, upset? minimum, I just feel like "the world is now filled with thieves".

I remember reading several comments here from other webmasters saying they got tired of it, and stopped posting, stopped writing. I'm like, yeah... whatever, I'll take a nap instead (I don't like naps BTW).

I'm having increasing interest over writing a book instead. Yeah, that will be copied as well, I guess, but I believe there is a better chance of benefits and monetization (directly).

Opinions?

[Martin Potter]

@tangor and @Kendo, you are right. I withdraw the question. And the hope.

[lucy24]

I withdraw the question. And the hope.

’Tis the season to be hopeless. Sigh.

[tangor]

Don't be glum, chums!

All you have to do is change your business model, be better at protecting what you own, and learn a different method of selling what you have without having to rely on third parties for crumbs. Easy peasy!

But that is a DIFFERENT topic and well beyond the realm of "Do you get tired of others copying your content?"

[explorador]

I never miss Veritasium videos (That's Derek Muller Youtube Channel about science, math and related stuff), and recently posted about the future of his YT channel and probably retiring.

Several things said on that video reminded me of this thread, and that's why I decided to share it here: [youtube.com...]

Creating content (great quality at least) takes hard work, effort, time, and this leads to some sacrifices... you may know it on your way up, or you may not know what's ahead until you hit it. If things go well, something fun will multiply your work (and difficulties), those topics are quite real and heavy.

While that video is not about the damage you experience when people keep stealing your content, it does cover the hard work, the weight of a hobby that grows into something that receives a lot of visits, and later becomes (depending your case), an steady source of income. That, until people begin copying your content. The solid points here are: hard work, time, resources, family, vacations, etc., creating content it's not easy, and so, I think the video makes some posts on this thread more relevant.

In this case, Veritasium received donations and then steady funding, someone decided to invest there. With this comes not only money, but also a helping hand that could make the hardships of creating content a bit easier.

Hope you enjoy it, or at least some of it.

[blend27]

Friends of a Friends of a Friends Wife buys something of Garage sale in US. Sticks an image into Grok, that goes from a Picture on a table into an AI video of an AI Generated teen wearing it in, 20 seconds.

Me here with a 1200$ Cannon lens taking a picture to sell a...., since 10 years ago....

[jmccormac]

It does affect motivation. About 12 years ago, I was publishing Web Usage statistics (how webstes are used by categories) for the new gTLDs and some of the legacy gTLDs. Two operations tried to copy this without actually understanding usage analysis or much about web sites. The first gave up after a while. It was classifying redirects as being "Parked" pages. It was claiming that some many of the new gTLDs had the same usage as .COM and this was clearly wrong. In some of these new gTLDs, over 90% of the domain names were gone from the zone in a year. They were junk. The company was trying to do something that it hadn't the ability or expertise to do. It didn't really bother me apart from the risk that some people who didn't know any better would believe these results. The second was more insidious.

The second was an industry organisation. From the transcripts of some of their meetings it was evident that they clearly did not understand the complexity of the Web and the different kinds of usage play in a TLD and how that translates into renewal rates for domain names and the perception of TLD. As this group was "looking" for members, I asked if I could join. I was told that it was only open to registries and registrars. I was then asked if I could give a "presentation" to this group about how to measure Web Usage. The first company had already given a presentation. Naturally, I declined the invitation. Off they went playing at being Web Usage analysts and getting some awful crawler solution to do their analysis. It ticked all the boxes for people who think that they know about the Web because they have it on their smartphone.

It was classifying Chinese adult content landers as being highly developed websites. Most of those sites were one year wonders in heavily discounted gTLDs. Gambling affiliate landers with a similar lifespan were also classified as highly developed content. Then there was the rubbish about TLDs that are used for brand protection and to redirect users to the domain name owner's ccTLD or .COM website having lots of content. It got back to the redirects problem. Their analysis couldn't distinguish an in-TLD website from a website in another TLD that was using a redirect. I also wrote an article on an industry website about running a "Signs of Life" survey on one of the new gTLDs. A "Signs of Life" survey is the first survey on a newly launched TLD to see how it is being used. And thise industry group started to refer to its crawler and "surveys" as being Signs of Life survey because they simply didn't understand Web Usage. The cluelessness was offensive. Was it demotivating, partially. At least these people, however clueless, made some effort but it was pure Cargo-Cult! Google is far worse.

One of the problems with running a large site is scraper botnets. Scrapers try to steal content. In some cases, the entire traffic from various countries is simply scrapers. Google with its "GoogleOther" is just as bad. There are times when I wonder if it would be better to go to a subscription-only model.

Regards...jmcc

[edited by: not2easy at 10:13 pm (utc) on Apr 14, 2026]
[edit reason] typo [/edit]

[lucy24]

From the transcripts of some of their meetings it was evident

Inquiring minds want to know ...

Oh, n/m. If you told me you’d have to kill me.

[jmccormac]

Google's effort to be an "answer" engine rather than a search engine is perhaps the most demotivating thing. tt is almost cutting the content creators out of the loop with its AI responses.

At least with Google as a search engine, there was a kind of social contract that creators would provide Google with their content and, in return, Google would provide the creators with traffic to their websites. With Google's AI answers, that social contract seems to have been broken. With much of the browsing being done on smartphones, the AI responses generally are top of the results. Perhaps the best thing is to build a site that is not dependent on search engine traffic and gives the user what they want. (There's a good book on Amazon about this ("Hooked") is wort reading in terms of designing sites that people want to keep using.

Regards...jmcc

[jmccormac]

Just on the Web Usage issue, one of the things that cropped up in the surveys was the use of software that could automate the generation of websites and churn out thousands a hour. It was essentially taking SERPS, Social Media posts and scraping website content to generate websites (for affiliate advertising and SEO). Unless you knew the characteristics of these sites, they would appear as "genuine" websites. Recent advances in AI have taken that to a new level and it is probably possible to get AI to generate a website. It is taking scraping and content spinning to a new level.

Regards...jmcc

[Martin Potter]

It is taking scraping and content spinning to a new level.

Given the most recent developments in AI, soon they won't even need us to create the content.

[jmccormac]

The problem with AI is that it has no error checking. It is only as smart as its inputs and that leaves it open to Garbage In, Garbage Out. I was trying to find out the registrar for domain names on a DIY website builder site. For a human, it isn't really a difficult question (check the WHOIS/RDAP). Because Google's AI was relying on fragmentary and often dubious web pages, it got it completely wrong. At least with human content creators, there is an element of error checking (especially when it comes to Journalism and news sites). I think that the NY Times took a legal action against some of the AI companies over mining its website archives and content. A lot of sites may already be banning or blocking AI scrapers.

At the moment, it is a kind of happy time for AI scraping and websites are only beginning to block the AI companies. What they are doing goes well beyond the legal doctrine of fair use and it may get into some very tricky legal territory as it may involve plagiarism. I have noticed that Google's AI results now have a website icon graphic (it is small but visible) where it takes the ansewr from a website. It is a small image and I don't think that it is linked to the original site. Citing a source like that may be a genuine kind of fair use. Any legal actions may force a kind of attribution by the more "ethical" AI companies.

Regards...jmcc

[explorador]

jmccormac: Google's effort to be an "answer" engine rather than a search engine is perhaps the most demotivating thing. tt is almost cutting the content creators out of the loop with its AI responses.

It's also quite demotivating to see there are no real options to disable the AI answers... nope, it's always forced, at the top, first thing appearing on web results. Same goes to the repetitive "try this AI thing, try that AI thing". On some smartphones it's also difficult to remove or disable (at OS level), because there is always a button that when pushed says "I'm here, ask me anything". Same goes to constant offerings or tools to summarize messages.

There are 2 things that make me loose hope in humanity.

#1. Many years ago we went on a trip with some friends, 2 of them were X religion (supposedly similar to ours) and out of the blue tried to turn the trip into forced preaching. The worst thing was having them saying "the prophet said 2+2=6, and vast are the peas" <- to them these were sacred words, the ultimate truths. Yet, we know a bit about history, religion, etc. so we corrected them: 2+2 = 4, not 6... and vast are the SEAS, not the peas. They didn't even blink, they didn't mind, it was literally a "ah, whatever, anyway, my religion says...", and I'm seeing the same on students and "professionals", being informed on how what they got from the web is wrong, and they are like "oh, ok, I will search and COPY PASTE again".

#2. On other forums (in english, and this is people from the US, absolutely confirmed), I'm seeing them using AI to deal with messages and solving doubts, literally they will take a multi page thread like this and ask some AI "summarize in 2 paragraphs". Same goes to some of them explaining how they had the most amazing multi hour conversations with some AI, even saying "it's my friend". And locally, my wife (who works at one big university) is telling cases of multiple young girls and women (not just students... workers too) anxious about something the guy they like said, and to deal with that they constantly tell some AI "the guy I like send me this, what should I reply? what does it mean?". On some cases my wife has told them how wrong this is, but they are only focused on the interpretation of the messages, and when she explains "he clearly says he had fun last weekend", they react frustrated because they want to hear "he likes you", and so, they go again to the AI changing the text and questions in order to bias the AI into telling them what THEY want to hear.

[Kendo]

no real options to disable the AI answers.

yes, it is force fed, but one can scroll down - when the search results are actually displayed - after the AI bit settles

[Jimmy08]

I can really understand your frustration. When you’ve spent years creating original content, traveling, collecting material, and then see it reused or altered without proper credit, it feels discouraging.

Unfortunately, content copying has always existed online, but what has changed is the scale and ease of it. That makes it feel more personal, especially when even watermarks or credits are removed.

That said, your experience and archive still hold real value. Even if the web environment feels less respectful than before, your work is not “lost” — it has already created impact and awareness in ways you may not always see directly.

About moving toward a book, that’s actually a natural shift many long-term creators consider. Books offer:

* stronger ownership perception
* better structured storytelling
* more control over distribution
* and often clearer monetization paths

Of course, copying can still happen anywhere, but the intent and audience engagement are different in publishing formats compared to open web content. <snip>

Maybe the middle ground could also be worth exploring — selective publishing, gated content, or community-based sharing where your work feels more protected and valued.

Either way, your experience still matters, and it’s understandable to feel drained after such a long journey.

[edited by: not2easy at 8:33 pm (utc) on Apr 23, 2026]
[edit reason] Please see TOS [webmasterworld.com] [/edit]

[Martin Potter]

From the point of view of trying to frustrate (attack?) AI agents who visit your website to borrow or steal your content, I got a good chuckle from reading this summary, "Google Studies Prompt Injection Attacks Against AI Agents Browsing the Web" [it.slashdot.org ], of a less amusing Google Blog [security.googleblog.com ]. The "attacks" that I laughed at were the 'harmless pranks', as defined by the three Google bloggers. Food for thought, I suppose, depending on one's inclination.

[fylingRI]

I can relate to this more than I probably should.
Back in the earlier web days, creating content actually felt like creating something. You traveled, researched, took your own photos, spent hours writing, formatting, publishing... there was pride in building something unique. People visited websites because they wanted your perspective, your material, your experience.
Now it often feels like the internet rewards whoever copies the fastest.
And honestly, I think what hurts most is not even the copying itself. The web has always had scrapers and thieves. It’s the complete lack of respect behind it. Cropping watermarks, rewriting credits to avoid linking, huge investor-backed sites pretending they “curated” something they simply took from smaller creators... that drains motivation fast.
I’ve seen many long-time webmasters slowly stop publishing for exactly this reason. Not because they ran out of knowledge, but because the emotional return disappeared. At some point you ask yourself:
"Why spend three days creating something original when someone else republishes it in three minutes?"
Forums are different, like you said. Helping someone directly still feels human. It’s contextual, spontaneous, part of a conversation. But publishing articles today can feel like feeding machines.
The strange thing is, the people who built the web are often the ones withdrawing from it now.

As for writing a book: honestly, I think that makes a lot of sense. Not because books can’t be copied, everything can, but because a book still carries identity and ownership in a way websites increasingly don’t. People value books differently. There’s intention behind buying and reading one. It’s also a more direct relationship between creator and audience.
And maybe even more importantly: a book feels finite and meaningful. Websites became endless content treadmills. Publish, optimize, update, defend against scrapers, repeat forever.

A book is different. It says:
"This is my work. My experience. My voice."

I don’t think your reaction is bitterness. I think it’s exhaustion from watching craftsmanship become disposable online.
A lot of older webmasters feel it. They just rarely say it out loud anymore.

[explorador]

fylingRI: there was pride in building something unique. People visited websites because they wanted your perspective, your material, your experience.
Now it often feels like the internet rewards whoever copies the fastest.
And honestly, I think what hurts most is not even the copying itself. The web has always had scrapers and thieves. It’s the complete lack of respect behind it. Cropping watermarks, rewriting credits to avoid linking, huge investor-backed sites pretending they “curated” something they simply took from smaller creators... that drains motivation fast.

Absolutely true. And people are loosing any remaining sense of shame regarding "copying / stealing", or saying they came up with the information themselves, when it's yours, or they got it from some artificial intelligence freebie.

fylingRI: I’ve seen many long-time webmasters slowly stop publishing for exactly this reason. Not because they ran out of knowledge, but because the emotional return disappeared. At some point you ask yourself:
"Why spend three days creating something original when someone else republishes it in three minutes?"

Also absolutely true. On forums (the negative side of things), you could write an elaborate and valid post (like yours), and then have someone saying "eh, you are stooopid", sure, you may feel affected, insulted, or not. But the forum would have some sort of organic curing, validation of your quality opinion and knowledge thanks to the community or perhaps the moderators. The thing is, when everyone crosses to the other side, you may still write a nice quality post, but what if 10, 20, 30 people say you are stoopíd? what if the forum moderators do nothing about it? what if even the mods are part of the problem? sure, you will stop posting, your good efforts receive garbage in return, it's only natural you pack your things and go. <--- this is happening to the web.

fylingRI: As for writing a book: honestly, I think that makes a lot of sense. Not because books can’t be copied, everything can, but because a book

also, stoopid people don't usually read &#128513;, this serves as an automatic filter regarding audiences.

fylingRI: A lot of older webmasters feel it. They just rarely say it out loud anymore.

Again, true.

One gets tired of being right and coming from the future. I remember writing about these things about 5-10 years ago (people becoming dumb, dumber!, failing to read, poor reading comprehension, posting garbage, asking you what color is the spider... regarding an article you wrote literally titled "the black spider"), etc., and lots of people even on this forum told me I was wrong, then they joined the list of affected parties.

fylingRI: Forums are different, like you said. Helping someone directly still feels human. It’s contextual, spontaneous, part of a conversation. But publishing articles today can feel like feeding machines.

Yes, but... I'm seeing changes, I'm seeing people rewarding others who say what they want to hear instead of valuing the truth or helpful responses. I've seen this on some places more than others (spanish speaking more than others), forums have become a place for venting negativity. It's amazing the kind of theories people post (and believe!)

[Kendo]

Something new for the G haters.

I had a problem uploading images to a website "Network Error" and their support suspects that it is more to do with resolution than file size.

My .JPG image are being uploaded and converted to .WEBP - I looked up the definition of WEBP and from Google:

WebP is a modern image format developed by Google that provides superior lossy and lossless compression for images on the web. It typically reduces file sizes by 25% to 34% compared to standard PNGs and JPEGs without sacrificing visual quality.

Here Google is claiming credit for a technique that us web artists have been using for nearly 3 decades - by using Photoshop to rescale images and save at 80-90% quality - when viewed on a computer screen the difference in quality is unnoticeable.

A reduction in quality of 70-80% on images that have already been reduced to 80% quality is most likely causing the errors.

[necajev]

I think AI has changed the equation, but I don't think copying is the biggest problem anymore.

Years ago, if someone copied your article, they still needed your content to exist first. Today, AI scrapers can ingest thousands of articles, summarize them, remix them, and often answer users without sending them to the original source. That has a much bigger impact on independent publishers than the occasional scraper ever did.

<snip>

I've also become less focused on search traffic alone. Building an audience through newsletters, communities, and direct visitors feels like a safer long-term strategy than relying entirely on Google or any single platform.

[edited by: not2easy at 1:55 pm (utc) on Jul 30, 2026]
[edit reason] Please see TOS [webmasterworld.com] [/edit]

[explorador]

necajev:
Years ago, if someone copied your article, they still needed your content to exist first. Today, AI scrapers can ingest thousands of articles, summarize them, remix them, and often answer users without sending them to the original source. That has a much bigger impact on independent publishers than the occasional scraper ever did.

Keep in mind:

- Years ago, you could deal with this via copyright claims more easily than today
- Years ago, you could find cases where things got solved contacting the hosting provider

Right now, you can be the original author and still have issues proving it's you. Also, hosting providers will usually wash their hands (even Google does this). Besides, the amount of copyright claims years ago wasn't as huge as today. Dealing with copyright claims today may even require a dedicated person, or even a team.

necajev:
AI scrapers can ingest thousands of articles, summarize them, remix them, and often answer users without sending them to the original source. That has a much bigger impact on independent publishers than the occasional scraper ever did.

Scrappers (humnas) have been doing this for years, and got better at it, making it harder to prove your case as author. AI making it worse? sure, I agree, I can see the point, just remember it was the search engines who first removed the authors from the equation, because it's been a long time since you can read a result without visiting the author website.

Yes (about your last bit, that I didn't quote here), I'm also moving towards offline audiences instead of online. The effort is too big to just surrender my content to others online.