Content Theft

**CountryBoy** · #1 09-09-2007, 12:11 PM

Someone is stealing content from one of my blogs and republishing it on their own. It's complicated by the fact that they're using some sort of software to automatically harvest and rewrite my work in very poor English - no doubt to avoid any duplicate content penalty. Maybe they're just tapping into my RSS or Atom feed.

I'm not particularly fussed because I always blog with lots of internal links which this content thief has maintained so I've got quite a few backlinks out of it. I'm also the sort of person who lets others use my work no problem at all if they ask me.

Has anyone experienced content theft like this? If so what was your course of action?

**Corey Bryant** · #2 09-09-2007, 09:22 PM

Does your RSS feed contain everything that the other blog has?

If not, consider sending a Cease and Desist letter to the owner, the hosting provider, and the data center. Jeffrey Cohen comes to mind if you don't want to use a boiler plate letter.

**CountryBoy** · #3 09-09-2007, 09:26 PM

Yes, my feed contains everything the other blog has. Like I said, I'm not too bothered because I'm getting backlinks out of it. It's a bit of a nuisance that it's rewritten in such poor English - I don't want people to think I'm dim!

Quote:

Originally Posted by Corey Bryant

Does your RSS feed contain everything that the other blog has?

If not, consider sending a Cease and Desist letter to the owner, the hosting provider, and the data center. Jeffrey Cohen comes to mind if you don't want to use a boiler plate letter.

**Corey Bryant** · #4 09-09-2007, 11:38 PM

I think this is one of the problems with the RSS feeds. Some people only put in a few sentences to get users to the website. But if you put in all the content, then other users are allowed to have the content.

There was a blog over at Invesp about that. I could not find it but it might also have a few comments on whether to only offer a few lines or the entire article.