Plagiarism of Whole Articles On the Net
Posted: Friday, April 18, 2008
by Hannah Quinn
Too-Write! Professional Services
Plagiarism on the Net and Article Theft is Alive and Well and Happening Right Now!
I recently submitted an article to EzineArticles which I first posted here in searchwarp.com on 7th March, 2008, titled: 10 Easy Ways To Lose Weight. The link here is: /swa307226.htm. EzineArticles emailed me asking for a ‘please explain' as they had found this article on another site. They gave me the link but it had already been removed. I wrote back to EzineArticles telling them of this, giving them the link to my article here at Searchwarp and a declaration that it was in fact totally my own article and came only from my own experience, knowledge and way of thinking.
I'm still waiting to hear from them as Australia is (approximately) 10 hours ahead of GST – so their editors are sleeping (no doubt).
In the meantime, I've conducted a google search and come across my article on a number of sites, and found my way back to what appears to be the original plagiarism on a site called goxini (dot) com. My article is there in total, without a change of word, and WITHOUT ANY ATTRIBUTION TO ME OR LINKS TO MY SITE OR SEARCHWARP.
This site is a blog and is, to quote the owner:
… the first stop each morning for an influential audience looking for what's hot, new, and undiscovered. Unlike most other sites or magazines, Goxini updates content every day, constantly blogging on any and all matters practical and interesting.
Undiscovered? Not this time. Constantly blogging? No way. The owner - Kelly is the name given on the site - has been discovered and I am taking what steps I can, including contacting google, although this is a somewhat ‘legal' process. However, this is a copyright infringement, and needs to be dealt with. It has nothing to do with money or reputation, although my reputation as a professional writer is very important to me. It is a straightforward case of plagiarism.
I'm sure this happens all the time, and probably is not discovered most of the time. It might pay for everyone to keep a close eye on their articles however, unless you have given Reprint Permission that is. I did not. I have marked this article as being available to searchwarp.com and my site only, and I own all other Rights exclusively. There is a clear banner at the bottom of the article, provided by Searchwarp, which states:
PAGE PROTECTED BYCOPYSAFE DO NOT COPY
It would not be as bad if my name was attached to this article copy but it is being claimed as the work of Kelly, who apparently manages to keep her blog updated daily by simply cutting and pasting from other sites. And to add insult to injury, she is making MY article freely available to anyone who wants it and also providing an RSS feed to it. She has at the top of the Share It page:
… From this page you can use the Social Web links to save 10 Easy Ways to Lose Weight to a social bookmarking site, or the E-mail form to send a link via e-mail.
So, it is probable that I might never find all the copies of this article that are on the web. I am attempting to find as many as possible so I can inform the page owners that it is a plagiarised piece of work.
As searchwarp.com points out under Reprint Rights:
SearchWarp.com is not an article distribution web site.
All articles on SearchWarp.com are copyrighted by the person who submitted the article to SearchWarp, unless otherwise noted.
As such, if you wish to reprint or publish any content found on SearchWarp.com, you must obtain explicit permission from the copyright holder prior to making a copy of the article.
Some authors may choose to freely give reprint rights within the body of their articles. You may reprint or republish any of these articles as long as the terms found in the body of the article are met.
If permission to reprint or publish is not clearly given within the body of an article, it is a violation of copyright law to reprint or publish this content.
And so it is. It is a blatant violation of copyright law. So, please be aware that this happens. I'm very grateful to EzineArticles for checking everything before making my article live and for contacting me, otherwise I might not have found this out. I will be taking what steps I can, steps which I am learning more about as I go.
In the meantime, keep an eye on any article to which you haven't given Reprint Rights because they might be taken and used without any attribution to you at all. If anyone else has had this problem or experience, I'd love to hear what steps you took and how it turned out. I'm eager to learn all I can. This article is the intellectual property of Hannah Quinn and is protected under International and Australian Copyright and Moral Rights Laws. Do not reproduce without the express permission of the author, Hannah Quinn. © Hannah Quinn 2008
hi hannah, it seems we just can't win, no matter what we do? thank you for bringing this information to our attention. best regards, sue thomSue, Thank you for stopping by and commenting on my article. This is an ongoing problem on the net and I suppose to be expected to some extent since the net is available worldwide and to people of all ethics or lack of. We can only keep alert and take action when it happens. Cheers, Hannah
Hannah, thanks for a great article and for bringing this ever growing problem on the internet to light. This is a problem that relates to every single author here on Searchwarp and other article sites. It is especially troubling if you are making a living from writing as posting copies of your articles on many sites can actually lead to the original being put into "supplemental searches" on google and not showing up at all, thus you get no credit and no visitors to your original work. Not to mention a writers reputation. I think the action you can take is somewhat limited but that doesn't mean you shouldn't try to have the copies removed. Approaching the hosting companies and owners of the servers is generally the first and often most effective port of call. Let us know how you get on and good luck! I think most of the authors here would be very interested to know the outcome and what action we can take if it happens to us. Ben.Ben, thank you for your comment and taking the time to make it. Plagiarism is becoming as big an issue as spam and we all need to take what precautions we can. Thank goodness for Copyscape and similar programs to follow up where else our articles are posted where no permission was given. I wouldn't have minded if they had acknowledged where the article came from and who wrote it. I object though when someone takes another's work and claims it as their own. I've received apologies from the offenders, but probably they were more concerned with being caught than with having offended. But, perhaps that is too cynical: perhaps not.
Hannah~ This is a great contribution for those of us who are new to the ezine arena. More often than not, I allow folks to use my articles for their respective sites, TRUSTING that they're going to include my name and web info. It never occurred to me that they might not (include said info). Now, this may seem unimportant to some, but if it means having our work denied posting elsewhere, then it is NOT unimportant. Thanks for your input. Well done, Madam!Camille, Thanks for taking the time to read my article and leave a comment. Most of the people who use our articles are probably doing the right thing. There will always be some who just don't/won't. I've taken to including a 'request' for a heads-up if someone wants to use any of my articles elsewhere, as well as including my info of course. Hopefully, that will also give me some idea of who and where any of my articles are going. Yes, it is important, not just because of the work but also and primarily for our reputations. I'm glad that my experience had the good side of letting people know. Cheers, Hannah
Hannah, really enjoyed the article. I Know how you feel, because recently I myself have had two article plagiarized. I wasn't happy about this because there was no mention of myself, instead the site was using my articles as a way of selling their affiliate products. When I complained to Ezinearticles they simply told me there was nothing I could do. Now I know as writers we all want the maximum exposure, but we also want the credit for our work. Keep up the good work of exposing the plagiarism that seems to be infecting our community.Andrew, thanks for taking the time to read and comment on my article. It's not a very nice feeling is it, having your work stolen. It's a problem, that's for sure. Mostly, it seems to be bloggers who want the back links to their own sites so make their sites content rich - with other's work. I agree, we want our credit. The work comes out of our heads and experience, and we want that acknowledged. And any links are supposed to come back to us. I hope you get your situation sorted out. I'm disappointed EzineArticles didn't do more to advise you. I got good advice from Bruce when I told him what had happened. Cheers, Hannah
Hannah, Very informative. This is something else we'll all have to keep an eye on. You know, the second set of victims here are those who repost the article from the plagiarizing source. In good faith, they use the reprint rights granted by "Kelly" and attribute it to her, linking back to "her" blog, probably never realizing that they are violating the true author's copyright. Like many authors here, I submit articles to SearchWarp in hopes of generating more interest in my own Web site. How disheartening to know that my work might instead be promoting the blog of, frankly, a sleazy thief! (Luckily for me, my articles are not all that popular!) Thanks for enlightening us! Chuck BonnerChuck, Thanks for taking the time to read and comment on my article. I suppose I'll never find all those 'innocent' users and it also means I've lost the back links. As you say, one of the reasons we write is to attract interest in our sites. I can't stop myself writing anyway, so it won't deter me.I'm writing a follow-up article to this one to share what I've learned and what I did and what the results were. That's beneficial - two articles from the experience (so far). Cheers, Hannah
Thank you, Hannah, for an informative article. I appreciate your insight.Ken, Thank you for commenting on my article. I appreciate you taking the time. Cheers, Hannah
Actually, there is a law in the U.S. called the Digital Millenium Copyright Act (DMCA) which gives rights to those whose works are in a digital media format. If you google "DMCA", there is a lot of information on what it states and how it can be used. (The EU has a similar law). Most online publishers (SearchWarp included) accept an official notice called "A DMCA takedown notice" as a legal document. If you have a complaint with someone, you start by finding the form and making an official complaint to the site. Some sites (SearchWarp included) actually make the form available on their sites for those wishing to file a formal complaint. There is a good article also posted on SearchWarp called, "How To Stop Online Copyright Infringement With A DMCA Complaint" that might be helpful to you all as well.Jean, Thank you for making this article 'Pick of the Day' and for commenting. I've been looking into the DMCA takedown notice and also into Australian copyright law pertaining to the web. It's complex, no doubt about it, but I've found the proper procedure. I sent a takedown notice to the host of the offenders sites (same host for both) and received a reply. By then, the pages had been taken down by the bloggers. I also read the article you refer to. It was very helpful indeed as was the link it includes. Thanks for the information. It's appreciated. Cheers, Hannah
I thought this article was very helpful. I am a first year student earning my degree and have been trying to learn how to research but not harm another opinion or research of another as I have had many of my copy written, poetry floating around the web by others I can feel where this author is coming from.