26 replies to this topic

[Gerry White]

I did find a cool service the other day that wouldn't keep people from scraping sites, but would force a link back to you as the original content provider. You can check it out on my blog. I have not used this (as I just found out about it), but it looks pretty good.

I spotted that recently on allaboutiphone - a cool iphone site, (no affiliation) and yes, it is a cool service - however it still relies on the "scraper" being honest - it is more of a reminder - kinda like when someone rightclicks to steal, me walking up and shouting "Oi copyrighted" (in my head it has a sarf London accent) and the reporting feature of it is interesting, it sends back a report everytime someone highlights some text on your website - the downside is that, and in firefox it will keep clicking. www.allaboutiphone.net Or as an ex-client of mine once suggested "..you can just disable right click.." (note, that last one wasn't a serious suggestion).

We have been looking at site scanning type tools to find duplicate content, but I don't believe anything effective will come along anytime soon, we may have to develop something in house if we are serious about it, at the moment just putting out the smaller fires is the most cost effective solution ...

[PKar]

Hi,
Karon, you are absolutely right. Only wish that the world were a better place to live in

Regarding cheap content, I must share something I read somewhere. Many buyers buy cheap content worth a dollar or two intentionally, bcause they know they can size up a $1 content to look like a $50 piece. Hiring a cheap writer just saves them time, they themselves would have otherwise required to look for resources. They buy content at throw away peices, rephrase the sentences and bingo! - they have a piece that looks factory fresh.

[copywriter]

Yeah, I've heard of that, too. Basically getting junior writers to do all the front-end work, then the purchaser spiffs it up and makes it a higher quality piece.

[Yoshimi]

I'm not entirely sure I see anything wrong with that, if write A isn't a top class writer, and write B has the skills to improve the piece to be worth more, then why shouldn't they? Surely once write A gains more experience and improves their writing skills they too will be able to charge more?

I don't see that this is any different from a property developer buying a derelict building for 20k, getting planning permission and selling it on for 60K the profit is in what you add to the project, and the skills you bring to the table above and beyond what you bought.

[copywriter]

Pkar and I didn't say anything was wrong with it.

[Jill]

There's nothing wrong with it if they actually do it right. Unfortunately, many of those junior writers just plagiarize.

[Yoshimi]

sorry, complete misinterpretation on my side...I must need more coffee!

[copywriter]

Here you go

[PKar]

Hi Yoshimi, obviusly there's nothing wrong in it, but I personally feel that ffects the freelance market. As Jill pointed out cheap work is mostly plagiarized content, so one day or the other the buyer is gonna find that out and have wrong impression about the pen-wizard community

Also I believe a cobbler handles a torn shoe best. If I buy his tools for a couple of bucks and start, not only will I be making bad shoes, but also inspire commoners to become part time cobblers...ruining the market of the real cratftsman.

[breddings]

Fascinating discussion. I've tried to keep up with finding where my work was being plagiarized but eventually just gave up.

Gerry says

We have been looking at site scanning type tools to find duplicate content, but I don't believe anything effective will come along anytime soon, we may have to develop something in house if we are serious about it, at the moment just putting out the smaller fires is the most cost effective solution .

I've never used a service or tool like this. Seems like it'd be simple enough for a programmer to put together - scan the content and look for duplicates. What am I missing? What's lacking with the tools you've looked at?

[torka]

Copyscape doesn't work for you?

--Torka

[Gerry White]

Copyscape doesn't work for you?

--Torka

Well, we tried CopyScape and it seemed to miss a lot - plus we write the news for about 700 clients, so I was hoping we could use our own database to scan for this ... of course spidering the internet is hard work, so it would be far easier to use the Google API or something. It is a service we would love to supply to our clients of course as, well lets face it - if we sell our clients articles and they are stolen it devalues it immensely... Hate to say it, but if Google offered a service, I think we would be tempted