ethical?

[coolWebsites]

Ok,

I'm reading some people's posts, a lot of people have some great stuff to say. I'm very pleased to be able to see what they have written and shared.

However, some people basically seem to promote software that takes other people's hard work/written articles with "content" rewriters to make a "new" articles. (It isn't really "new", it just simply takes words like "much" and replaces it with synonyms like "a lot,many",etc and then says its original content, essentially so they can "say" it is original and then also so they can "pass" in the search engines eyes as 'original' content).

Isn't this essentially "stealing"/"ripping off" someone else's hard work? But... it seems that in the quest to 'get rich quick', some people are ok with it? Is it just me (maybe it's just because I'm new to this aspect of marketing, maybe this is just the way things are done now?), or do a lot of people feel that way? Wouldn't it be funny if it got to the point where no one actually wrote anything new, but just had a software program to randomly replace words, and everyone read the exact same article, over, and over?

[Steven Carl Kelly]

CW:

Personally, I feel all the article spinning has added a lot of junk to the Web, which creates a lot of noise that makes it harder and harder to cut through. 1,200 versions of the exact same article really doesn't add a lot of value. That's my opinion, anyhow...

[Ian Seth]

I totally agree. I've seen some of this software in action and it just changes the order of the paragraphes and stuff like that. But i don't think this is the new way to go. there are still good quality article marketers that spend a lot of time creating one or two articles.

[R Hagel]

Originally Posted by coolWebsites

However, some people basically seem to promote software that takes other people's hard work/written articles with "content" rewriters to make a "new" articles.

I'm not fond of spinners either. However, many of the people who use spinners use them legally. That is, they use it to spin the PLR content that they've rightfully purchased. They may take one of their PLR articles and spin it into five or ten new articles.

Just wanted to point that out so that you don't think everyone who uses a spinner is doing something illegal or unethical. Some are, perhaps. But many people are using spinners for 100% legal purposes.

Cheers,
Becky

[jayden.fellze]

Originally Posted by coolWebsites

Ok,

I'm reading some people's posts, a lot of people have some great stuff to say. I'm very pleased to be able to see what they have written and shared.

However, some people basically seem to promote software that takes other people's hard work/written articles with "content" rewriters to make a "new" articles. (It isn't really "new", it just simply takes words like "much" and replaces it with synonyms like "a lot,many",etc and then says its original content, essentially so they can "say" it is original and then also so they can "pass" in the search engines eyes as 'original' content).

Isn't this essentially "stealing"/"ripping off" someone else's hard work? But... it seems that in the quest to 'get rich quick', some people are ok with it? Is it just me (maybe it's just because I'm new to this aspect of marketing, maybe this is just the way things are done now?), or do a lot of people feel that way? Wouldn't it be funny if it got to the point where no one actually wrote anything new, but just had a software program to randomly replace words, and everyone read the exact same article, over, and over?

I would have agreed to your thinking if internet would have grown at a lesser rate.
The rate at which new websites are created every moment and the rate at which newer content is added to websites everyday increases the demand for writers beyond manageable rates.
Now, this also escalates the rates of the handful writers that a website owner has. Thus, he/she seeks ways and means to lessen the cost of production....
but, ethically, i would agree

[BrianMcLeod]

Personally, I feel all the article moving has additional a aggregation of junk to the Web, which creates a aggregation of racket that makes it harder and harder to revilement through. 1,200 versions of the exact aforementioned article really doesn't add a aggregation of value. That's my opinion, anyhow...

[ExRat]

Hi,

I like these discussions.

It depends whether you have pre-conceived ideas about what the internet is, or should be.

Ask yourself honestly, do you?

Then ask yourself who really decides what the internet is (or should be) 'for'? Is it google? Is it the reader? The buyer? The marketer?

Not an easy question is it? But 'natural selection' type theories probably win out in the end.

One thing that I doubt is in question is that the internet is a 'marriage' between technology and humans.

Therefore, whatever your beliefs about right, wrong, ethics etc. you can't have one without the other. What I mean is that you can't benefit from the technology if it's not there.

Before the internet came along, I personally found it almost impossible to create a business that had almost limitless potential. Now anyone can.

So if you are going to take advantage of the technology (which can be done in a myriad of ways, including the very basic 'I can run a business from my bedroom' aspect) then you have to accept the challenges that come with it.

If you feel that the written word is being abused and that it is wrong, then do something about it. Go and show them, by using your unique hand-written content that attracts swarms of readers who by-pass mass generated junk on the way.

If you feel that the technology should be used for mass production, then go and show them, by using it to achieve your aims.

What I would add is that it is clear from participating in many of these discussions that most people who jump on the proverbial 'ethical bandwagon' regarding spinners, have only scratched the surface and are talking about basic word/phrase replacement tools.

If you just look a little deeper, you will find that there is a lot more to it than that and even hardened wordsmiths have found that by combining quality writing with the latest techniques (many of which aren't openly on sale, but have been created in bedrooms and kept in-house) it is possible to get the best of both worlds -

a) deliver quality content

b) manipulate that content to continue to deliver a) above, while leveraging their work to push that content to a mass audience, quickly, while also not raising flags in the search engines/posting venues, by posting the same thing everywhere.

It makes sense to me. Why restrict yourself due to 'ethics' that haven't been thought through properly? I'm quite keen on sticking to my ethical principles, but I also like to create leverage where I can through clever use of technology.

If you read or saw an interview offline by an expert, and that expert made sure to use exactly the same words every time they spoke, then after a while you probably wouldn't pay attention because you would say that they sound like a tape recorder.

But normally (not repeating word for word) as that expert does more interviews, they might find better ways to express their point. They might pick up extra things to say that get a laugh, or include a new topical example to make the interview unique.

Is that unethical? Personally, I don't think so. If it was, then perhaps all experts giving interviews should only be allowed to present their interviews once?

You see, I just made the same point a few times in different ways with what I wrote above

There's nothing wrong with asking about it here. In fact, it's a smart thing to do. But if you want to understand it more, I would suggest thinking a little more deeply about what is right or wrong (and why it is so) and also doing some investigation into the different ways that people spin content.

There's a huge difference between computerized word/phrase replacement and spinning text using spinning techniques which are applied by the human hand.

If we take it away from the extreme (mass 'spamming' of junk computer generated writing) and take it to the opposite extreme, then we would be examining peoples' websites and saying, "You have a 20 page site, but it appears that by saying slightly similar things you have padded out one page of crucial info into 20 pages with the same info, fluffed out with filler. You are ethically challenged." Many people do this as habit in order to target more keywords - same concept, perhaps on a smaller scale.

Often, the reader will never see, or be aware, of the other 19 similar pages. But the marketer is targeting different people making different searches.

See my point? Where is the ethical line to be drawn?

Is it ethical to have multiple different newspapers, TV stations and internet sites all delivering the same news stories with their own different slant on the events? Should we have one standardized news agency and every news source has to copy their releases word for word in order to avoid ethical dilemmas? Who owns the news companies? Are any of them owned by the same company, yet delivering different slants on the stories to satisfy their readers and validate their beliefs?

I think it's fair to say - 'Yes. They do this, in order to make more profit.' It's called 'covering all of your bases'.

It's our job to deliver information, and as hinted at above, market forces will decide whether your chosen method of doing so will ultimately cause you to prosper or fail. But you are in control of how much 'spin' you apply to it - in both senses of the word.

[coolWebsites]

Well, thanks for the responses so far. I appreciate the first 4-5 responses, ok, so it's just not me, you do feel the same way Thx.

As for exrat... Ok...

I'm not sure you understood me correctly. It is one thing to take your *own* content, and put it through an article spinner (and yes, actually they are basically simply text replacement tools. The more 'sophisticated' ones simply re-arrange sentences which programmatically is fairly easy.
One could literally right such a (decent) quality program in about 5 hours).

What I was asking was how ethical people thought it was that a lot of people (not necessarily here, but some) -- seem to think its ok to 'take' other people's content, put it through a spinner, and pass it off as their own. I *think* from what you've written in your post you agree with me. And actually I have thought through the ethics carefully.

I.e., if say you had a bunch of websites that you took content from other people and put through a spinner, and then set up these websites to get ad revenue, and then called it 'leveraging' technology, if someone found out how to reset your google adwords account to their account and your domains to their name, would that be 'leveraging' technlogy? (I think you know what I mean)...

Anyways, ok, I'm glad to know then that it seems from the comments so far that most people prefer 'ethical' means of doing things as opposed to what I had seen in a few other posts where a few seem to advocate less than desirable means to get rich quick... thx!

[coolWebsites]

Anyways, on a totally different note... Yes, I find it kind of funny. Because of all the 1000's of websites of 're-phrased' content, it sometimes is fairly diffiicult to find 'useful' information

[ExRat]

Hi Coolwebsites,

I'm not sure you understood me correctly. It is one thing to take your *own* content, and put it through an article spinner (and yes, actually they are basically simply text replacement tools. The more 'sophisticated' ones simply re-arrange sentences which programmatically is fairly easy.
One could literally right such a (decent) quality program in about 5 hours).

Yes, I agree that my comments are about spinning in general, with or without using other peoples' content.

If you add the 'other peoples' content as a starting point' into the equation - then yes, it moves a lot closer to the ethical line.

Personally, I'm not mad keen on taking other peoples' content and 'spinning' it. And if you're referring to spinning it via some basic program without human intervention - then I don't do this myself, because I don't think it's smart.

I appreciate that your point might be regarding certain types of spinning, and that is all that you are seeking clarification upon.

But otherwise, your definition of 'a spinner' is not the same as mine.

and yes, actually they are basically simply text replacement tools. The more 'sophisticated' ones simply re-arrange sentences which programmatically is fairly easy.

The ones that you might be talking about here might purely fit the above description.

But the ones that are used by the sort of people who might comment in this thread, are not that basic. Not all spinners fit the description you have provided.

Overall it's a very complex subject, especially when you throw the word 'ethics' into it. It's not unfair to say that 'there is nothing new under the sun.' Many great works are derived from or inspired by the work of others - it's just that most people don't realise it, and to them it is a revelation when they come across the knowledge for the first time.

[Anthony Smith]

I personally would have to agree with you. I honestly have done this once when i first started however, and did not like it much. Thereafter I decided never to do it again. I guess you live and you learn, sometimes you get desperate and your moral/ethic values might bend a little. thats called being human. Good post!