Forum Moderators: martinibuster
I contacted AdSense with details of where the copyright violations could be found and where the originals could be found and it's absolutely clear which are the originals. The site which stole them is quite clearly a "scapper" site, with nothing but stolen articles and AsSense ads.
I expected Google to take some action. However what they did was leave the scrapper site alone (they are still carrying AdSense) and ask me to send in paperwork with a DMCA complaint:
"...It is our policy to respond to notices of alleged infringement that comply with the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (the text of which can be found at the U.S. Copyright Office website: [copyright.gov...] and other applicable intellectual
property laws. In this case, this means that if we receive proper notice of infringement, we will forward that notice to the responsible web site publisher..."
I don't need Google to file DMCA complaints for me. I'm quite capable of taking the appropriate legal action aginst the owners of the site concerned.
What I expect Google to do is cut off the AdSense account of these crooks. But they don't seem to want to do that. All a DMCA complaint will do is (maybe) get my material removed. Then they can just replace it with something stolen from someone else and keep on raking in the AdSense revenue.
AdSense seem to be only too quick to suspend accounts if you can believe the posts you see here. I guess as long as you don't click on your own ads, they pretty much don't give a damn where you steal your content from. Isn't anyone at Google AdSense HQ awake or are they just too busy counting their money to take responsible action?
Isn't anyone at Google AdSense HQ awake or are they just too busy counting their money to take responsible action?
Few people will take your word (or my word) that stuff has been copied. You might have copied from them. Therefore you have to "prove" the breech of copyright.
DMCA is the accepted way of doing this, so that is the route you have to follow.
You would get the same sort of answer from DMOZ, and DMOZ are not "busy counting their money", they just cannot get involved in "who owns copyright" or "who really wrote this article"
And don't fill it out for those other articles on your site, only your own. If you fill it out for articles that you do not own the copyright on, YOU will be liable for some pretty significant damages for your perjury.
AdSense seem to be only too quick to suspend accounts if you can believe the posts you see here.
That's a highly automated process. You're asking for a highly manual process. Your question can be rephrased as:
"Why won't Google hire the huge number of employees required for the labor-intensive chore of investigating and acting on every AdSense complaint in a legally defensible way, even if that significantly increases their overhead and decreases their profits?"
It would take anyone about 20 seconds to verify my identity and verify the content as my own.
I am attempting to contact the scrapper site owners but they are obviously sleeze. They have no email contact listed and their only address is a PO Box (which may or may not be bogus). The phone number they list is missing a digit (only 9 digits) and has an area code different from the address they claim. Their site has a copyright notice on it that has the wrong site name! (they put .com in the copyright notice though they are .org). The .com version of their name has never been registered.
As I suggested above, even a 6 year old could figure out who is bogus here.
I will file 3 DMCA complaints, one direct, one through Google and one through the hosting company for the scrapper site
In a case such as this I'd expect AdSense to freeze the account in question until the dispute is resolved. If they have the slightest suspicion that YOU are screwing with them they have no hesitation in freezing YOUR account and making YOU prove YOU did nothing wrong. It's not like the process of suspending accounts is exactly alien to them.
Actually my question could be resphrased as "Why don't the guys who read the email complaints take 60 seconds to check the facts I've supplied them with and come to some sort of conclusion about the validity of the complaint, rather than just firing off a form letter".
My AdSense account isn't trival either. It generates a significant amount of income for them and for me. I've been with them for 3 years. It's not like I joined yesterday and I'm making $0.25/day for them.
The quality of service complaints are dealt with to protect Google's business model. The copyright complaint is to preserve your business model. It is not their job to spend their money to protect your business.
If they just pull the site on your word, it opens them up to legal claims if you are lying. On the other hand, if you file a DMCA, including the part where you swear that you are the owner of the copyright or an authorized agent, that puts the legal onus on you.
By requiring the DMCA notice, Google is taking itself out of the legal picture. The battle is between you and the infringer. Google is just doing what it is legally required to do. If they just take your word, their deep pockets aren't protected against your potentially illegal attempt to take the alleged infringer down.
If I steal computers from a store and drive them around in my SUV, is Ford responsible? Sure, I couldn't steal computers without the SUV they sold me, but that's not their problem.
I had assumed that AdSense would not want to place ads on a site that was violating copyright. That's in the AdSense rules somewhere I'm sure.
I can deal with the copyright issues myself.
I simply want AdSense to pull the ads or suspend the account so these sleaze bags aren't making money off my content (and the content of others).
Suspending the account isn't a big deal. All it means is that the site would not get paid until the matter had been resolved. Google pulls ads off a lot of sites when there are account disputes. Just read this forum. Sometimes they putthem back, sometimes they don't. Sometimes they pay out past revenue, sometimes they don't.
I assume that if AdSense prohibits sites from using other people's copyrighted material, then, in order to enforce their own rules, they'd need to check on complaints.
Otherwise all I need to do is setup a site, rip content off from other sites, and sit back and count my AdSense checks. If AsSense aren't the ones who check into violations of their own AdSense rules, who is supposed to do it?
AdSense says "...For AdSense publishers, if we receive a notice or otherwise have reason to believe that your site is infringing (copyright), we may terminate your participation in the program....".
Well I've sent them a notice and a list giveing them a dozen reasons to believe the site is infrininging. I'd now expect them to take some action.
Whether or not a chose to file a DMCA complaint against the violator shouldn't matter to AdSense. All they need is "reason to believe" and I've sent them more than enough material and evidence to give them lots of reasons. I will send them a copy of my DMCA complaint too. However they shouldn't need it. The longer they wait before doing anything, the more money they and their advertisers make of course.
You even quoted the important piece from the terms. First, they mention "notice". The notice they want is a DMCA where you swear under penalty of perjury that you are the copyright holder, not some crackpot with a grudge. Then you might just notice the word "may". "May" means that it is at Google's discretion.
DMCA complaints aren't hard to put together. If that is what they want, then just do it.
The scraper stole your merchandise, its illegal for the webhost provider to sell it.... Sometimes the right phone call can shut down a site.
Talk to an attorney as well, you could file a lawsuit and put a hold on adsense payments to the scrapers... But I advise you talk to an attorney.
If people complain to AdSense I don't have much to fear. Even if they eventually do bother to look into it I'll have made enough money by the time they shut me down that I can just take out another account and domain name and start again.
Why should I bother to write my own content?
Obviously sites can run copyrighted material if they pay for a licence. I myself write syndicated articles on which I retain coyright. It's blindingly obvious I'm refering to copyright VIOLATION.
AdSense doen't seem to care much. BTW as for not being able to afford to employ people to look into things like this, the AdSense cut on the revenue from the site on which the original articles appear would more than pay a full year's salary for an AdSense account associate!
In a case such as this I'd expect AdSense to freeze the account in question until the dispute is resolved. If they have the slightest suspicion that YOU are screwing with them they have no hesitation in freezing YOUR account and making YOU prove YOU did nothing wrong. It's not like the process of suspending accounts is exactly alien to them.
I don't believe in the "guilty until proven innocent" method.
If that was the case, someone could accuse you falsely (or on hearsay or on limited or faked evidence) and interrupt your ad income for no good reason.
In my opinion, it should never be as easy as you want it to be to get someone's adsense account shut down.
I'm sure they have a process that they go through when they receive complaints, and once they receive your DMCA complaint (legal document) showing that you are the owner of the content, then they will follow their process (which will take time) to take further action.
( cos for the moment you are seeing this issue through the red mist of rage ..justified in the eyes of all of us here ..but you are not seeing why they have to ask that you do the "paperwork" ..even when it's ( the crime ) freakin "blindingly obvious" ..)
imagine this in the off line world ..
you have just been assaulted and or had something of yours stolen ( id theft where someone is pretending to be you in order to get a loan or whatever maybe a close simili ) ..
you find out ..
so ..you go to the cops ..
you ..."someone is stealing my identity" ..
cop .."ok ..who are you ..what's your name? "..
you.."I'm me ..my name is ( jane doe )" ..( I think you are female? )..
you .."and they are pretending to be jane doe ..me!"..
cop .."can you prove that you are the original jane doe" ...
you .."yes of course I can ...I have my drivers license ..passport ..electricity bill ..high school diploma ..my dog is here right with me ..plus my kids will vouch for me ..and the station sergeant is a guy who I dated in high school ..just ask him ..he's right behind you!" ..
cop .."yes ma'am ..but you have to understand that your accusation is really serious ..we cant just lock up this other person and throw away the key and confiscate their wallet and their bank account etc ..and even the sergeant will tell you the same ..paperwork counts in order to cover our donkeys"
cop .."so ma'am unless you are willing to make a formal complaint ..do the paperwork and go on record as saying that you are the original jane doe ..and they are the fake ..( cos you gotta understand ma'am we do get the occasional kook in here ..specially saturday nights ..and the full moon / summer heat doesnt help none ..as every cop knows ) ..this is what's known as filtering the flakes ..or your local equivalent ..not 100% foolproof ..but it helps ..particularly it helps to avoid "wrongfull arrest" suits filed by the second jane does lawyers against the cops" ..
you .."but it is so freakin obvious I'm me and she isnt and she is saying she is and she is getting all these things by pretending to be me" ..
cop .."lady ..I really feel for you ..but we gotta have the paperwork ..to cover our asses ( to cover our donkeys ) .."
you .."but you arrest people on the street for nothing ..you throw em in jail ..you dont need proof then" ..
cop .."lady ..that's as maybe ( and I cant and don't say that maybe some of the guys at the station mightn't be a little fast with the bracelets ) ..but they ain't me ..and without the paper work ..just in case you might be perjuring yourself against this other person for some reason that we dont know about or running some real elaborate scam ..I need the paperwork ..otherwise anyone could come in here with "proof" and "stories" and how would you feel if they did it to you ..and said you aren't jane doe but they are ..or got your website revenue shut ..or frozen ..just on their word without wanting to do the paperwork ) ..and then your lawyers came and ate ahole in my donkey ..and the captains donkey ..and the govenors donkey ..and so on ..so please do the paperwork if you want us to register your complaint
..and BTW there are ways of finding anyones hoster ..whatever they put or dont put on their website ..and threatening to eat hole in their donkey ..frequently makes them close the offending website ..and thus their donkey is hidden by a tarpaulin ..
capice :))
always make sure your donkey is protected ..
G have enough holed donkeys as it is ..they dont need no more ..so they are trying to hold onto the tarp ..sometimes they are more pro-active than others at protecting their holed donkeys ....do the paperwork ..and then sharpen your teeth if you spot any donkey showing ..
[edited by: Leosghost at 11:16 pm (utc) on Nov. 15, 2006]
you gotta respect it ..
I dont ..
If people complain to AdSense I don't have much to fear.
If you take content from my site you do. I've found success simply by following the instructions. The same instructions, by the way, that other people have repeatedly encouraged you to follow.
...shut me down that I can just take out another account and domain name and start again.
Think about what you're saying. Earlier in this thread you mentioned people getting their AdSense accounts shut down. If it's so easy to just open another AdSense account, why would people waste time here crying over a closed account?
FarmBoy
Have fun with your scraper site. I'm sure that someone that is completely unable to follow the simple directions to filing a DMCA will have no trouble stealing traffic from those that are able to.
And don't worry, there is no way that Google will ever be able to connect your AdSense accounts to your current AdSense account that appears to be making you decent money.
I'm looking forward to your future threads about how it is unfair that they shut down all your accounts quickly when someone else complained (following Google's rules) but they ignored you.
Sigh.
Just file the f*$(%@$g DMCA complaint and then see how fast they react. You could have filled on out just about as fast as your original post to this thread, and that other site might be banned from both AdSense and Google Search by now.
I don't need Google to file DMCA complaints for me.
Google wants that DMCA complaint because Google wants to be seen in the same category as the ISPs, I'd suggest to give them the complaints in the format they want.
While at it, I would send it to the ISP hosting that site, the site itself will go away as well.
BTW: only use DMCA style complaints inside the US, just complain about copyright elsewhere.
Complaining about the DMCA process itself seems pretty useless to me, even if you think that it is putting too much work on the shoulders of the IP rights owner (and I agree here). The DMCA process is the way to work on this.
What is "big" money to you or me, is small change to Google. Follow their rules and you stand a chance of getting an acceptable solution, merely shouting "foul" from the rooftops will get you nowhere.
even if you think that it is putting too much work on the shoulders of the IP rights owner (and I agree here).
If you consider the options available to you BEFORE the DMCA, you would be singing the praises of how easy it is to take these first steps.
Pre-DMCA your options were to send C&Ds to the site owner (generally ignored) and possibly to the host (also ignored). No one ever bothered with the search engines.
The only step with any legal force was to file a copyright lawsuit in federal court and file for an injunction. If they were out of the country, you would have to file in the infringer's and the host's country.
Now, even if they are in another country, you file a DMCA takedown with the search engines and they at least lose their main source of traffic, and Google kicks them out of adsense if they are using it.
