Forum Moderators: martinibuster
Now the question and discussion.
As we all have seen, there are huge article sites that have zillions of articles from all over the web, on all topics, and google adsense and so on. Most of them mention the source and autor, without a link to either of them.
My question is : Is it allowed? Does Google find out about them? Is there a way for google to penalize such huge sites?
Is it Ethical? I guess not, but I would like to know the general opinion.
Is it wrong? I guess yes, but then why most of AdSenses try to have atleast one such section in their site?
What is google's stand over this?
1. You lift my cotent.
2. My content is actually copyrighted. I filed. Now I am entitled to statutory damages and fees.
3. My lawyer (or me, since I am one) files suit against you. You agreed, when you visited my site and lifted my copy, that you would be subject to jurisdiction in my home state. So I sue you in my backyard.
4. Now, you lifted my copy to make money. Exactly how you are making money isn't that hard to figure out. Let's see: There's an AdSense ID, affiliate IDs, etc.
5. IDs are nice since I can now use that information. I know who is paying you. I serve a discovery subpoena on the payor, who in turn provides me with your identifying information. I use that information to make service of process, seize bank accounts, etc.
6. At or about the same time that I serve the discovery subpoena I also serve a Writ of Attachment (or similar writ) directing the company that pays you (Google, C.J., etc) to hold up all of your funds and not release them to you. That way, for various just legal reasons, I have a fund of your money to settle any final judgment, just in case you play games, run and hide, etc. Perhaps I seize your AdSense account, your CJ account, I might even be able to seize your bank account and other assets depending the outcome of litigation. I can't say exactly but there are methods that I have used. I've even used what is called a "body writ" - Capia Ad Satisfaciendum - which, in the right case, can enable a sheriff to seize a person and hold them until they post bond.
7. Now, you being a clever boy, think "Well, I'll just open up another account" and start all over. Well, what if I told you that all of your nice dot com or other domains were also subjected to a writ or judgment, with a turnover order. That at the end of the day I'd also own not only your account $$ but also your website address. Oh, but you'll just get other domains. You'll also keep your business overseas, but that won't work if the payor accounts are here.
8. Okay, so you just get new domains and new accounts. Maybe. Maybe not. Maybe the affiliate firms and Google get tired of having to deal with discovery subpoenas. Maybe now they start to take a harder look at who gets in. Lots of possibilities.
9. Also, when the discovery subpoena is served other letters go out the the various search engines advising of a violation of copyright. So your website gets put on hold in the SERPs.
10. Maybe when such a lawsuit is filed, in order to make it economical, the boutique copyright enforcement firms sue dozens if not hundreds of individuals or entities that are lifting copyrighted material. Maybe if the law firm nails 200 AdSense accounts, used by chronic copyright infringers for making money off of other people's work, it might be worth it to the law firm to take action. Economy of scale.
11. Maybe, in consequence, the search engines start to offer services - such as presubmission of copyrighted material - which is then "date stamped" in such a way that any aftercoming versions of the same material never even gets indexed, unless the original submitted material is submitted with special instructions that allows for copying. Maybe that same index is used to scan AdSense publishers in an effort to cut off DMCA complaints, etc.
Just food for thought.
This business of people lifting (stealing) other people's material and then attempting to use the material to generate money is just begging for all manner of solutions. Industry solutions to stave off the onslaught of legal actions - class actions or otherwise - intended to stop the theft. Legislative solutions to force the impositions of safeguards, since so much of the economy is based upon copyright and creative process. And, last but not least, the legal profession - which is always looking for ways to help people with problems when industry and the legislature doesn't act.
OBTW - This business of "asking nicely"? That's pretty funny. You steal my bike and I ask nicely that you "don't do that"? You steal my car and I ask nicely?
Steal my content and I'll have your thrown in jail, if I could, just the same as if you lifted my wallet. Stealing my content to make you money is the same as stealing money in my book. Steal my money and I'll be happy to see you behind bars. Don't be surprised to see content theft criminalized in some fashion, as a deterrent measure. Conscious lifting, repetitive taking, to make money. Sounds like a crime to me. If not now then soon.
Nice? That's funny. Hug a thief day. Ya, fershur.
but to bring you back to the real world, the only option open to you is to request the links, or request that something be done by their server..
Yet neither of them have a legal oblegation to do jack#*$! ...
so yeh oh yeh! fershur!
The kind of parasites that sponge off of the labor of others have had a free reign on the Net for too long. I just cannot understand the mentality of these people or their sympathizers. They literally think that because something is on the Net, it is free and fair game, or should be, just like some sort of Marxists or anarchists or something.
Through sites like copyscape and googlealert, it is possible to detect your copied content on the web.
Sooner or later you will be caught & the original owner will be your new enemy on the web. The waybackmachine can prove his content came before yours.
He will ( and must) report you, file a DMCA & try to boot you out of adsense. He will study your other sites and keep an eye on you! Beware!
Read this excellent post by jenstar "if you are a publisher running adsense and you steal someone else's content, you can be suspended from adsense."
[webmasterworld.com...]
So, don't steal!
You are making it a big deal when in fact, nobody really wants to steal your contents because there are thousands out there that are free as long you give a link back to the source.
Why would someone take a risk unless that person is a freaking retarded.
Also, who in the right mind would steal an article and put Adsense on it when they know they can get it for free from numerous reputable web sites?
Do you think these people will give a damn about your article with all the troubles?
The fact that the matter is, many websites are begging to use their articles as long you acknowledge the source of it.
imoo
But taking an article would be seen in the eyes of the law as Fair Use under the Copyright Law...
You can take only a portion of any work--usually a small portion--and can't take enough that a reader would no longer have reason to go read the original. Because an article is considered a whole work, no, you cannot take the whole thing without permission. Any lawyer who told you otherwise was wrong.
I can say with 100% surity that to persue this in anyway will simply waste your time, effort and sanity.
Would a few of the people who have gotten scrapers to take down their articles please stand up? (Or post links to the threads about how they did it?)
Also, who in the right mind would steal an article and put Adsense on it when they know they can get it for free from numerous reputable web sites?Do you think these people will give a damn about your article with all the troubles?
The fact that the matter is, many websites are begging to use their articles as long you acknowledge the source of it.
In a just world, this would be true. Most free-for-all articles have been republished dozens (or thousands) of times, though, so anyone who publishes them yet again stands to get hit with duplicate content penalties. A popular, unique article is valuable, and some particularly clumsy scrapers do steal them.
You can take only a portion of any work--usually a small portion--and can't take enough that a reader would no longer have reason to go read the original.
Can I just point out that these statements and most of the others are based on what your interpretation is of fair use and what consitutes copyright... when in fact that is a far different thing to what a court would decide.
It seems that the conjecture here is all based on the people here being the judge and jury, when in reality th law sees the point in a far different light and completely differently.
You would think that the fact no one has come up with a court case where a person has successfully sued for content copyright would give you a clue? but alas no.. people still seem to persist in believing in a delusion ... odd..
It will cost you money
It will cost you time
You have to win
You have to prove damages
You can't collect damages the defendant can't pay
You may have trouble collecting anyway
....and on and on....
It's a generally accepted fact that upwards of 95-97% of filed civil action lawsuits are settled before going to jury verdict. That means that in 97 of 100 cases there's not much to report. So, there's not much to read about.
The other 3%?
Of those cases the only time you will read about the case is if there's a multi-million dollar verdict and chances are that will only be covered in "local media". That is, not play big online. Lesser verdicts, ones big enough to bankrupt most people, don't make news. (Also, verdicts for copyright violations aren't covered by insurance for most mortals.)
Amongst the same 3%, you will only hear of a "reported opinion" if there IS an opinion of the court to report, which basically means that the case went up on appeal and new law was made.
Lobo, the purpose of WW leans in favor of education, not posturing or otherwise. Keep that in mind and chances are you'll gain value from your time spent here. Maybe in time you'll also lend to the educational process, which certainly is something most all of us will value and appreciate.
The distinction between “fair use” and infringement may be unclear and not easily defined. There is no specific number of words, lines, or notes that may safely be taken without permission. Acknowledging the source of the copyrighted material does not substitute for obtaining permission.The 1961 Report of the Register of Copyrights on the General Revision of the U.S. Copyright Law cites examples of activities that courts have regarded as fair use: “quotation of excerpts in a review or criticism for purposes of illustration or comment; quotation of short passages in a scholarly or technical work, for illustration or clarification of the author’s observations; use in a parody of some of the content of the work parodied; summary of an address or article, with brief quotations, in a news report; reproduction by a library of a portion of a work to replace part of a damaged copy; reproduction by a teacher or student of a small part of a work to illustrate a lesson; reproduction of a work in legislative or judicial proceedings or reports; incidental and fortuitous reproduction, in a newsreel or broadcast, of a work located in the scene of an event being reported.”
I don't see any such indication, and frankly, it would take an absolute moron to assume that because "fair use" is not "easily defined" that anything goes. There's going to be a cut-off point--a place at which most will agree that infringment has occurred. And I think that swiping a whole work, for profit, pretty much is a perfect example of that.
Another article about fair use [utsystem.edu].
And another article about fair use [bitlaw.com].
While fair use has some fuzzy areas of definition, I believe that only an imbecile would assume that there is no risk, and no reason to restrain oneself when copying. Look at the articles linked above and decide for yourself.
Webwork, i think you are overreacting and it rediculous!
Webwork is right on the money on this one, if you think some of us out there don't protect our stuff like wolverines I could give you the email address of the idiot that stole from me last year. My lawyer put him in a vice and we barely cranked the lever before he cried "UNCLE!" and all his web sites, over 10 of them are permanently offline.
I was very nice, I offered him to go offline or forfeit his house to satisfy 'statutory damages' in the 6 figure range.
File a copyright, it's cheap, and it's the lottery if you check your numbers periodically :)
You think you are protected but you're not.
Some people may crack with a liitle pressure, it only means they know as little about the law as you do.
I do talk from some experience, and have gone indepth with this with company lawyers and ( more to the point) my wife is a contracts lawyer dealing with copyright, trademark and infringement law)
I do have some good background and research on the subject.. I'm not disagreeing that there should be legislation on this and we should have protection, but the fact of the matter is , we don't ...
Again you are quoting a statute law, which looks great in theory but works very differently in practice..
This particular, case is a good example, in that the owners of the website have already stated that they do not post the reviews, but rather it was posted by 'a student' and that their disclaimer is there for all to see.
In otherwards there is nothing this guy can do.
There has NEVER been a successful action on this topic.
So for all the conjecture and homemade legal practice, there is not a lot you can do if the person taking the content chooses to ignore you.
Except perhaps spend thousands on legal fees, taking it to court only for the content to have changed before you get there..
[edited by: Lobo at 12:05 pm (utc) on June 15, 2005]
This particular, case is a good example, in that the owners of the website have already stated that they do not post the reviews, but rather it was posted by 'a student' and that their disclaimer is there for all to see.In otherwards there is nothing this guy can do.
There has NEVER been a successful action on this topic.
The webmaster of the site in question ( articles site i mentioned ) has simply written back that some user had submitted the article, so he cant take responsibility. Indirectly he has refused to take it off and also not giving a link to my site.
Is the point in question...
And before shoving your ignorance down peoples throat.. Can you show us all the change in the law that has taken place due to a court case on internet copyright violation?
You couldn't be more up your own..
This particular, case is a good example, in that the owners of the website have already stated that they do not post the reviews, but rather it was posted by 'a student' and that their disclaimer is there for all to see.
They can disclaim and ignore until the cows come home and it won't save them from a DMCA complaint.
If they fail to comply they lose their safe harbor, and you can file DMCA against the site owner, ISP and all the search engines and effectively shut them down as the people UPSTREAM will disable them until they comply as an ISP won't want to lose his safe harbor. That's typically about as far as I have to take most copyright issues and it's over and done and only cost me my time.
If you have actually been smart enough to file an actual copyright on your work you can get potentially get statutory damages if you wish to pursue the matter. If you didnt file, the DMCA is about your only hope based on my experiences with various infringements.
In some states you can't take personal property but you CAN put a LIEN against them to collect an uncollectable debt so when they go to sell the property it's all tied up and it also puts a big fat blemish on their credit report. So when I said "take your house" it didn't mean today, I'm very patient, and what's allowed does vary by state so it always pays to check your options and get some leverage.
Would you be able to point me in the direction of a web page that details how to copyright an article? Is there an actual fee and submission to a gov't office? If so how can a 100 article web site pay this? I'm assuming a gov't fee is going to be over 10.00 USD.
It costs 30.00 for the entire site but does not cover any new pages or rewritten works...that requires an extra filing for 30.00 more dollars.
You must do this within 3 months of creation OR before any of your pages have been stolen.
Ann
Incredibill, that's the type of lawyer I want! (but hopefully won't need).
BTW, exactly how do you file for a copyright?
You can't "protect" a blog as easily as a static site.
Just remember it's an EXPENSE against any income you're making so you're lowering your taxes while protecting your rights, a 2 for 1 special :)
