Forum Moderators: martinibuster
I found this today ..it's about copyright and adsense.
[google.com...]
This above is a must read for those who steal other's hard work ( copy webpages or websites without permission).
If u steal content, you can be reported for copyright infringement - u can loose your account and good standing.
Thugs beware. Thanks adsense!
sb.
If u steal content, you can be reported for copyright infringement - u can loose your account and good standing.
Yep. There are some former AdSense publishers because of this. And soon to be some more.
You can use the services of copyscape dot com (no affiliation) to start the hunt.
FarmBoy
I reported them to google (as they have an adsense account) and the reply I got back from google was basicaly saying we are not going to do anything about it, it is my own responsibility to secure my sites content.
I was under the impression that copying content and hotlinking was theft of some kind or another and was shocked to find that google didnt give a BEEP about it?
nice to see that this might change sson
They also had, a floating adsense tower, "ads by gooooogle" covered up, as well.
Now I reported them for all three. 3 times! Nothing happened the first time. The second time they removed the floating tower thingy. Only to put it back a week later!
Third time they removed it again, along with the covered ads by google.
But still use newsgroup content as theirs. Surely this is also wrong? I give up...
[edited by: Woz at 11:09 pm (utc) on Nov. 17, 2005]
[edit reason] No URLs please, see TOS#13 [/edit]
What if the copyright infringer reports YOU! for copying? How do you prove you own the copyright?
Just another good reason for why it's important to register.
One of them was a YPN publisher and I put in my C and D letter I was going to contact YPN and then signed it with a "FAX COPY - Yahoo Publisher Network."
THat guy had 22 domains copying my content using cloak and redirect. Copyscape found it. Needless to say, he took it all down. All 22 domains. Guess he didn't want to lose his YPN account.
However, I reported him to YPN 2 times before I sent the C and D letter and they did nothing. Adsense and YPN couldn't give a rat's ass about content thieves.
Another hard learned lesson of what these corporate behemoths say and do are two seperate things.
Its surprising what you may find sometimes.
I once used the Google snippet search technique with a very long and unique snippet and found my content on over 400 different sites.
..the reply I got back from google was basicaly saying we are not going to do anything about it, it is my own responsibility to secure my sites content.
Try going through the proper DMCA complaint process and then notify AdSense as they instruct. That process seems to work.
Now I reported them for all three. 3 times!
In my experience, reports to AdSense about a site that violates the terms seem to fall on deaf ears. But if you find a site that has stolen your content and report it through the DMCA process then notify AdSense, it usually works...at least for me it does.
What if the copyright infringer reports YOU! for copying?
Go to Google and read about the DMCA complaint process. They provide a stern warning about the consequences (including financial costs) of filing a false claim. The copyright thief doesn't know what, if any, steps you have taken to establish the date you published the content, so the consequences will deter most people.
I got rid of 3 copy cat's recently by using copyscape and a well written C & D letter. Two of them were in other countries and I made reference to the fact I had local lawyers on retainer.
I'm no lawyer and I avoid trying to be my own lawyer or making claims I can't support. My experience is those techniques will just end up in a much bigger problem more often than not.
Bobby
In a way it's affecting you - they wouldn't exist if it weren't for the materials they flat-out steal, and theoretically your traffic might be a little higher as well as your income.
I can't exactly send them notices - I could contact the sites and magazines they are ripping off I suppose.
If somebody from Google would take five minutes and listen to those of us in such a situation - they would easily see and verify that these sites are breaking all kinds of laws and they are using Adsense to rake in the bucks.
If you see site B steals content from site A, then a polite email to site B should be appreciated.
Site A can raise as much fuss or as little as they choose.
Be sure to include relevant URLs so its easy for site A to see the ripoff.
That done, its out of your hands. -Larry
Example
Website: www.widgets.com
This is the Title of my page WDGTSCM
This is the Description WDGTSCMDS
Near the copyright WDGTSCMPG
PG is Page, DS is description, etc.
Make sure your acronyms have zero results in all search engines before you start! Even more important, remember changing your Titles or Descriptions NOW may temporarily impact your SERPS rankings, so be forewarned and careful if you do this. The unique acronym on your content will probably never have any impact.
I've found that these unique acronyms seem to have little or no impact on SERP ranking (maybe it helps). I have several pages ranking number 1 for moderately competitive phrases with long winded acronyms similar to these examples.
Now I want to find scrapers I just search for
"-site:www.widgets.com WDGTSCM" or
"-site:www.widgets.com WDGTSCMDS" to find copied descriptions.
And to find copied content search for
"-site:www.widgets.com WDGTSCMPG"
This is great it shows all the copies of your pages and even the copyright notice if you put it adjacent to the notice.
No scraper or hijacker will know how to look for these phrases other than doing a full spell check and looking for missspellings to pop out.
These long winded acronyms are also great for finding partially indexed (or URL only pages) just search for
"site:www.widgets.com -WDGTSCM" will find all indexed pages from your site indexed by Google but without a Title. That's all your URL only pages.
Google seems to index all pages ignoring robots.txt. Its just the pages blocked by robots.txt are always URL only (partially indexed). Google Sitemaps (sitemaps.xml) clearly documents this characteristic.
Another interesting search is
intitle:wdgtscm -site:www.widgets.com
Finding pages actually hijacking your Title.
These acronyms are great because they do the job for ALL YOUR PAGES AT ONCE!
Conceivably the acronyms could help prove copyright infringment as well. I've been putting a Copyright notice in as hidden text as well.
I've received no complaints about these weird strings from my visitors and I do get compliments on my site, mainly on the content, haven't had many "gee your sites pretty" comments.
Anyway I could go on and on.
Hope this helps!
Now stop me if I'm wrong, but don't people (myself included) and news sites create an RSS link so that people can PUT the content on their sites?
So where is the line drawn?
Heck, even photos from the originator come up in the feed!
Hopefully Adsense Advisor can shed some light on this for us.
