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The Uncomfortable Facts About Plagiarism

Posted June 1, 2009 in Business 31 Comments »

Has someone ever “borrowed” your work?

If you are a freelance writer, blogger, graphic artist, web designer, or photographer chances are that you’ve already had the unpleasant experience of finding your work on a site that did not pay you to use it.

Those of us who create intellectual property for a living seem particularly vulnerable to having our work stolen. Most people understand that physical property should not be taken without payment. Intellectual property is no different.

When I was growing up a childhood friend of my father’s, “Mr. C,” was a carpenter who made furniture for a living. He spent many hours crafting beautiful entertainment centers, bookshelves, dressers, and more. Creating furniture was “Mr. C’s” means of earning a living.

Everyone would agree that anyone who broke into “Mr. C’s” shop and took a piece of his beautiful furniture without paying for it was a thief. Yet, a few people who understand that payment is necessary for physical property don’t seem to realize that intellectual property should also be paid for.

As a freelance writer, I also spend hours working on my craft, which happens to writing. The blog posts and other materials that I write are my means of making a living. Yet, every so often, I find that a post that I’ve written has been copied word for word onto another site without my permission or my receiving any kind of payment for it.

As the Internet has grown in popularity, so have the incidences of plagiarism.

Many people mistakenly think that if a work of intellectual property is online it is part of the public domain. They think that because it is easy to “cut and paste” words, a photo, or an image onto their own site that it is okay to do so.

They couldn’t be more wrong.

(I’m not a lawyer, and the following information is not legal advice. If you are facing a copyright infringement situation, you may wish to seek professional legal counsel.)

Here are a few facts that all freelancers should know about plagiarism.

Facts About Plagiarism

  1. A work need not be registered with the United States Copyright Office to be protected by copyright laws, although doing so may provide extra protection if you find it necessary to go to court.
  2. Any work published after 1978 need not have the copyright symbol, ©, in order to be protected by copyright law. (Many people mistakenly think that if the symbol is not present the work is not copyrighted.)
  3. Most online works are protected by copyright law unless the original author or owner specifies otherwise. In fact, unless a site specifically states otherwise, it’s best to assume all online works are copyrighted.
  4. Many people wonder whether United States copyright law applies in other countries (a timely question since most of us are online.). The answer is that it just might. Many countries do have copyright treaties with the U.S.
  5. The expression of an idea is protected. Simply changing a few words for their synonyms does not mean that you have created a new work. If in doubt, give credit and use quotes where appropriate.
  6. Many people think that copyright just applies to written material, but the fact is that other forms of intellectual property such as photographs, computer software, music, video, and more are also protected.

What if You Don’t Know Whether Material Is Protected?

Are tweets (created at the popular social media site, Twitter) copy protected? What about reviews published on StumbleUpon, Digg, or other social media sites?

Often, you can find the answer to such confusing questions by reading the site’s “fine print,” usually called “terms of service,” or something similar on the site.

A good rule of thumb when you are not sure is to err on the side of assuming that the material you want to use is protected by copyright.

Your Options When Your Copyright Is Infringed

Let’s say that you post a photo onto your blog and later discover that photo on another website. The owner of the second site has not received your permission to use the photo. What do you do now?

You have several options when you discover that your intellectual property has been stolen:

  1. Contact the site owner and ask them to remove the offending photo.
  2. Contact the site owner and offer to sell them usage rights for the photo.
  3. Contact an attorney and take legal action against the owner of the second site.
  4. Ignore the copyright violation.

Learn More

You can learn more about plagiarism and intellectual property rights at the site of the United States Copyright Office.

Share Your Experiences

Has your work ever been stolen? If so, what did you do?

Share your strategies for dealing with plagiarism and protecting your intellectual property.


About the author: Laura Spencer is a freelance writer from North Central Texas with over 19 years of professional business writing experience. If you liked this post, then you may also enjoy Laura’s blog about her freelance writing experiences, WritingThoughts


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31 Comments
  • User Gravatar
    Nikhil
    June 1st, 2009 at 10:21 am

    I have experienced this ones.

    The site owner copied my whole site as it is, word to word without asking me.
    I immediately asked him about that and to remove all the contents from the site. He did not reply me but after that i didn’t get anything on that website.

    For protecting our work we at least have to put Copyright Line. So that we can take any further action if anything like this happens.

  • User Gravatar
    Antonio Riveras
    June 1st, 2009 at 10:31 am

    I experienced this on deviantArt once. I immediatly told the “theif” to remove the layout or I would have to take legan actions.

  • User Gravatar
    Kathryn - Collage Diva
    June 1st, 2009 at 10:31 am

    Great article. I learned a thing or two. I really try to be vigilant in what I publish on my blog and always credit my source and link to the authors.

  • User Gravatar
    Laura Spencer
    June 1st, 2009 at 10:33 am

    Ouch Nikhil!

    The entire site? That happened to a friend of mine. She got so frustrated that she ended up taking down her site.

    Personally, I’ve only noted various posts that were copied verbatim without permission.

  • User Gravatar
    Matt Keegan
    June 1st, 2009 at 11:23 am

    Stealing content is getting so out of control. Some people think that just because they subscribe to a site via RSS that they can take complete articles or whole portions thereof and use it as their own work.

    Recently, I found one of my automotive articles posted elsewhere and also discovered that my original version of the article wasn’t indexed by Google, but the stolen copy was. I put a lot of research into that article, citing sources and offering my own links too.

  • User Gravatar
    Ricardo Mendoza
    June 1st, 2009 at 12:27 pm

    Hi, this happened to me in a very weird way… When I witnessed the violation, I felt happy (that someone thought my work was cool enough to sell) but at the same time I felt stolen-from, violated.

    I’m a filmmaker and we’ve made 2 independent films, but the story is not about the films, but about the posters for the films.

    Both images (high-res images of the posters) were on my website for the print media, someone downloaded them and started selling posters of them all over the net… I wish I was exagerating, but a google search shows that they are selling on amazon, ebay, google, moviegoods.com and some others…

    Simply search for *”Capitulo Unus” poster*…

    Our first movie is distributed, but I retain the rights to the poster/artwork and our second movie hasn’t even come out yet! and of course, that I fully retain the rights to all artwork…

    Well, to keep it short, What have I done about it?
    Absolutely nothing.

    For us, it’s a double-edged sword:
    1. If they keep selling the unlicensed goods, at least they’re getting the word out about our films, even if they are stealing…
    2. If I tell them to stop, they probably would stop and nothing happens…

  • User Gravatar
    Susan Johnston
    June 1st, 2009 at 12:31 pm

    I’ve had several posts appear verbatim on splogs and while I’ve tried to contact the site owner, they make it VERY difficult. I even went through WhoIs.net and the site owner’s contact info was marked private, which indicates to me that they know they’re not totally above board. It’s not worth it to me to hire an attorney, so I’ve just had to learn to let it go.

  • User Gravatar
    Laura Spencer
    June 1st, 2009 at 1:20 pm

    Hi Matt, Susan, and Ricardo!

    Thanks for sharing your stories.

    Unfortunately, they are becoming all too common.

    Hopefully, posts like this one will help educate those who believe that everything online is public domain.

  • User Gravatar
    Susan Hamilton
    June 1st, 2009 at 3:22 pm

    Thank you, Laura. I don’t think enough people are concerned about this behavior. Either they don’t realize how hurtful it is, or they don’t care, or they simply don’t know any better. I’ve addressed this issue also on our collaborative site, ZeroToSixtyMarketing.com and am pleased that you’ve taken a stand. I also agree with your perspective, and feel the best thing we can do is be informative and instructional. If more of us went after these thieves, it would be nice to think it would stop. The truth is that it’s ridiculously difficult to track down the offending party and slap their dirty little hands.

    I noticed you live in North Central Texas, as do I. I look forward to reading more from you.

  • User Gravatar
    Adam Pieniazek
    June 1st, 2009 at 4:11 pm

    Just had this happen twice to me today on two different posts. One, my post about how one of our sites got a Page Rank 5 in just two months was copied word for word but with links intact. After seeing the pingbacks, I checked out the site, saw it was copied word for word and posted a comment asking for just an excerpt less than 100 words to be used with a link back. The site owner quickly took down the whole post.

    The other was my post about bloggers with Google Friend Connect enabled. That post was copied word for word, the links were stripped out and new links added in to affiliate and ads. I would have never discovered that copyright violation except I had a google alert set up for “The 42nd Estate”, which was used once in the post. Really makes me wonder how many other posts were copied entirely with the links stripped out.

    Very frustrating, especially because comments are disabled and there is no contact information. The site is hosted on another domain (e.g. it’s a multi-blog site based of Wordpress MU) so I had to contact the main domain owners to request the plagiarized post be taken down. No action yet but they’re based in Australia so I’ll give them the benefits of the doubt. Hopefully they act quickly and I don’t have to file a DMCA notice.

    I have no problem with people using short excerpts word for word (I believe that is covered by the Fair Use doctrine), but copying a post for word is highly frustrating.

    Is there a tool that will take all my posts and search the web for the text to see if there’s any other word for word thefts with links stripped out? Linkscape?

  • User Gravatar
    Ida
    June 1st, 2009 at 4:48 pm

    First time I saw a photo that I had taken used on an other web site I got a little upset. I thought they could at least have asked. Then I started to think about it. I mean basically I never believed in a lot of those copyright laws (doesn’t mean I don’t follow them). But I do believe in sharing things that is put up online.
    Nowadays when I see my photo used on an other page I’m happy. I’m thinking about that this photo, my photo, was actually good enough for somebody else to take an interest and use it. And that’s real cool.

    Just wanted to say that it’s not always about money and finding your work on another web site isn’t unpleasant to everyone.

    (Of course I acknowledge that a lot of people doesn’t share my believes and I respect that)

  • User Gravatar
    Jonathan Bailey
    June 1st, 2009 at 4:48 pm

    First off, thank you very much for posting about this topic and drawing more attention to this very serious issue. I am glad to see more writers and artists taking this issue up in a serious way and standing up for their work.

    However, I want to add something to your list of options when you are infringed. The list omits some of the most powerful and useful tools for dealing with plagiarism, namely the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA).

    With this act, any host that is located in the U.S. (or EU or other nations with similar laws) you can demand that the host of the site remove the work. You can also file notices with Google and have them remove the infringement from their index, eliminating the benefit.

    Learning how to send a good DMCA notice is one of the most powerful and important things that a bloger or other writer can learn to do to protect their content. It works about 95% of the time at removing infringing material, I know, I’ve used it and other methods over 700 times.

    If there is anything that I can do to help, please let me know, I am here if I can assist in any way.

  • User Gravatar
    Adam Pieniazek
    June 1st, 2009 at 5:28 pm

    Wow, my earlier comment about my stolen posts ended up missing a crucial fact. My post about the Google Friend Connect bloggers was actually stolen, then tweaked in a few places to try to avoid detection.

    95% of the content is mine, but the other 5% has spammy keywords thrown in.

    Looks like I’ll be using Jonathan’s advice about the DMCA notices if it’s not taken down soon.

  • User Gravatar
    Laura Spencer
    June 1st, 2009 at 5:43 pm

    Thanks everyone for the additional comments!

    Jonathon, I especially thank you for including the information about the DMCA in your comment. I had heard of it, but wasn’t familiar with the details. I think that your response probably helped a lot of us.

  • User Gravatar
    Adam Pieniazek
    June 1st, 2009 at 5:48 pm

    Want to second Laura on thanking Jonathan. Especially for linking to his Plagiarism Today site. There is an unbelievable wealth of information there to combat plagiarism. Anyone who’s suffering from plagiarism should really check it out.

    Thank you Jonathan!

  • User Gravatar
    DR
    June 1st, 2009 at 10:41 pm

    Check out http://www.copyscape.com – It helped me find one of the two people who had copied my entire portfolio site.

  • User Gravatar
    Ritu
    June 1st, 2009 at 10:54 pm

    Not trying to drop a link but this is my encounter with a content thief that I caught red handed on IM. I found a bunch more and ended up grabbing screenshot for all of them. Here is the link : http://applicant.com/my-encounter-with-a-content-thief/

    What are the odds?

  • User Gravatar
    BlackWasp
    June 2nd, 2009 at 4:29 am

    This happens all too often. The worst cases are when somebody takes an article, removes the links, add their own advertising and leaves the images pointing at my site. This add insult to injury as not only are they making advertising revenue off my content, they are serving it from my hosting account and making me pay for the privilege.

    Google has a policy that they will pursue the copyright infringer on your behalf but they make you work for it.

  • User Gravatar
    Vivienne Quek
    June 2nd, 2009 at 9:03 am

    A right to read doesn’t mean a right to use freely without permission.My articles were “stolen” many times and attempts to contact the blog owners often came to a dead end. One even shut down his comment box and “contact us” after I wrote to him/her!

  • User Gravatar
    Anne
    June 2nd, 2009 at 9:51 am

    Great article – I particularly like the way you laid out the salient points. In fact, I am dealing with a situation at the moment that might turn into copyright infringement if I don’t take care to keep my ‘finger on the button’ so to speak. It concerns a business card I designed for a client recently. I wrote about protecting copyright on my blog not too long ago – I’m linking your article to it as well.

    http://www.website-and-graphic-design.com/blog/website-and-graphic-designers-protect-your-copyrights/2009/04

  • User Gravatar
    DRoss
    June 2nd, 2009 at 10:39 am

    Something you can do to stop the asshole thiefs is find out who their hosting company is, contact the hosting company with an email explaining and more often than not the hosting company will actually take the offenders site down.

    My whole portfolio site was stolen. I checked the whois of the domain, contacted the hosting co and they took it down about a week later.

  • User Gravatar
    Laura Spencer
    June 2nd, 2009 at 11:16 am

    Thanks to everyone who shared their personal experience with this problem.

    You’ve added a lot of valuable insights to the post.

    Hopefully, if we make enough noise about this problem we can at least make a few content thieves think twice before they use material that isn’t theirs.

  • User Gravatar
    michelle
    June 2nd, 2009 at 12:38 pm

    @ susan johnston

    “I even went through WhoIs.net and the site owner’s contact info was marked private, which indicates to me that they know they’re not totally above board.”

    not necessarily true. as a single woman living alone and working from her home, my domain registration info by default contains my phone and home address. phone number not such a big deal as it is on my web site. but the address i do my best to seriously protect. i don’t want even the possibility of someone–or more sinisterly, some bot–managing to extract it from whois or anywhere else.

    for what it’s worth, my hosting service forwards and correspondence to the actual registrant. i would expect this be standard business practice for any hosting service providing anonymous registrations.

    having said all that, i am diligent about plagiarism education and awareness and constantly remind my web design students they must give credit for any and all text and images they use in their projects; including credit to themselves if it is original work.

    the discussion usually contains points like:

    –it’s a matter of respect, for yourself, your work, and the work of others;

    –citing and crediting lets you piggyback on the expertise of others; when you cite you indicate you are part of a larger community of thought which enhances your own credibility

    –as a creator of intellectual property, you expect credit for your own work when it is used by others–what goes around comes around.

    @ Laura Spenser (and others), question for you…assuming all proper credit and a link back to the original composition is given, how much excerpting is too much in your eyes?

  • User Gravatar
    Laura Spencer
    June 2nd, 2009 at 4:27 pm

    Hi Michelle!

    Thanks for jumping into the conversation.

    As for your question about fair use, as I understand it there isn’t really a one-size-fits-all answer. There are so many different types of copyrighted material (of all different lengths) out there. To be safe, when in doubt contact the author and ask permission to use the material.

    The U.S. Copyright Office addresses fair use here: http://www.copyright.gov/title17/92chap1.html#107 (section 107),

    For more information you can also look at other informative sources on copyright issues, such as Jonathon Bailey’s excellent Plagiarism Today site (see his earlier comment).

  • User Gravatar
    Anne
    June 2nd, 2009 at 5:08 pm

    I echo Michelle’s comments re. private Whois info … just because a person decides to pay the extra to have a private registration does not mean that the owner of a website is less than trustworthy! Whoever started that rumor needs to be given a good reprimanding! It is more likely that spammers and other nefarious ne’er do wells on the internet will input false contact information than fork out the extra $ to enjoy a private registration (with the rare exceptions, of course).

    I for one always do private registrations because a) identity theft is a real crime and yes, it can happen to you too, especially if you’re ignorant enough to go posting your private contact info. for the entire world of criminals to freely access. The exception here being legitimate businesses, who naturally will input their business contact information (which is not the same as registering as a private individual). b) It is my legitimate right to protect my privacy online.

  • User Gravatar
    Robert J
    June 3rd, 2009 at 1:10 am

    I’ve been pursuing an Associates in Photography part time, to help avoid these situations (when designing it;s often tempting to just hit Google Images). Not to mention the hours upon hours it saves searching through photo sites (even stock sites). I’d say so far about 80% of the time I can just go out and shoot whatever it is that I need. Granted I haven’t been asked for an Antarctica background, but it works out nicely, gets me out of the house for a little while.

  • User Gravatar
    SpikeTheLobster
    June 8th, 2009 at 6:09 am

    Nice article. I’ve suffered from this a couple of times, with people plagiarising articles from directories, mostly. The thing I never understand is that they just lift the content in its entirety… I mean, how stupid is that? Then again, we’re talking about plagiarism, so I guess intelligence isn’t a requisite trait for the perpetrator.

    In my case, I’ve done well in all circumstances. I’ve managed to get all stolen content taken down, by various means. I even wrote a blog entry about it all, with suggestions on how to track content and what to do if it’s stolen (it’s on my blog in the ‘free stuff’ list).

    What really drives me nuts is the wholesale theft. I mean, it’s not as if I’d mind people using something I wrote – frequently for free – if they’d just ASK first and provide me with a backlink and a byline! But they don’t bother. They just take it. Again, I say – how stupid are these people?

  • User Gravatar
    blue2x
    November 17th, 2009 at 12:57 am

    I had experience this before too, my logo showcase, one image with 100’s of free sample logos for the adobe developer center where ripped by somebody from some mexican ebay site ( some kind of a portfolio account selling his logo services ) , a friend reported it to me but I had a problem contacting the web administrator since it was on a different language.

    I asked help from my deviantart community to take this site done, friends from Adobe as well , but it was still there. Someone told me , maybe you’re getting popular , lol.

    You might also want to check the jon engle vs. stockart story >

    http://www.thelogofactory.com/logo_blog/index.php/anti-spec-work-parable/

Trackbacks

  1. The Legal Minefield | John Wang
  2. Get paid, inspired and informed | The Writing Base
  3. Website & Graphic Designers: Protect Your Copyrights : Web Site Design

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