Question for knowledgeable article writing marketers

12 replies
I have a collection of over ten years of Men's Health. The same topics come up over and over again. Literally, almost every cover promises the same thing and if it doesn't, it certainly gets revised within every year.

What's to stop me taking those articles and completely rewriting them instead of using PLR? If I was to rewrite them completely enough in my own words I don't see the difference?

I would like to know a pro's take on this before I did it though...

Thanks
Dave
#article #knowledgeable #marketers #question #writing
  • Profile picture of the author robyna
    It's really a question of ethics and some people won't see any problem with it. It's not nearly as bad as just stealing someone's work word for word.

    The problem I have with it for me personally (I've written articles for years) is that you don't do any independent research and you're stealing someone else's research. If the article has something a little wacky in it, you won't know. If it's missing something important, you won't know. Plus, it's just one of those areas for me at least that feels wrong.

    I always use at least 3 sources, sometimes 4 or more. I might really like one article and base my article more on it and then throw some other stuff from 2 or 3 other articles I've found through research. But when you read my final article it doesn't resemble any of the articles because I've completely based it on the research of 3-4 (maybe more) articles.

    When I read an article in Men's Health or other places, I look for ways I can do it better, places it's lacking. And I improve it. There is always room for improvement, right?

    Hope that helps!
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  • Profile picture of the author Alexa Smith
    Banned
    Originally Posted by DoubleOhDave View Post

    What's to stop me taking those articles and completely rewriting them instead of using PLR? If I was to rewrite them completely enough in my own words I don't see the difference?
    "You can take their ideas but not their words" seems to be the general consensus of opinion. However, my non-lawyer understanding is that it isn't necessarily quite as simple as this, because "derivative works" can also breach copyrights (that's what I've seen internet lawyer Brian Kindsvater say, in other threads - "spinning" articles like that would be infringing their owner's copyright, so I don't really see why re-writing them yourself wouldn't be, because the outcome's pretty similar, isn't it? I stress, again, I'm not a lawyer and on this subject you should be guided only by the opinion of someone who is).
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  • Profile picture of the author Paleochora
    The problem is the same for musicians. There are only so many notes and so many ways of ordering them to create a pleasant, harmonious result.

    If you were to write an article on a very specific niche area, say, on "The Life Cycle of the European Tree Frog", it would probably have a great deal in common as other articles on the same subject. It may also share a good deal of syntax and common phrases with many other articles already published in the public domain. Could anyone accuse you of stealing? Perhaps not if you publicly acknowledged your sources with links to them.

    You have to marvel at someone like Sean Mize who seems to be able to churn out 1200 articles about Success Coaching (amongst other topics) without repeating himself or running out of inspiration.
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    • Profile picture of the author DoubleOhDave
      Okay I see where each of you are coming from and I think you collectively have answered my question.
      There is no way I would steal someone else's work word for word, and as I said I have ten year's worth of monthly magazines and trust me - the same facts get repeated ad nauseum. My idea was to use the facts from a number of articles on "how to sculpt your abs" for example, inject my own personality into it by writing the non-factual parts from my own mind and just use the factual parts of several of the articles as a springboard. A bit like writing recipes, where the list of ingredients isn't copyrighted but the description of how to cook them is...


      PS - I love the new avatar, Alexa!
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      • Profile picture of the author JohnMcCabe
        Originally Posted by DoubleOhDave View Post

        Okay I see where each of you are coming from and I think you collectively have answered my question.
        There is no way I would steal someone else's work word for word, and as I said I have ten year's worth of monthly magazines and trust me - the same facts get repeated ad nauseum. My idea was to use the facts from a number of articles on "how to sculpt your abs" for example, inject my own personality into it by writing the non-factual parts from my own mind and just use the factual parts of several of the articles as a springboard. A bit like writing recipes, where the list of ingredients isn't copyrighted but the description of how to cook them is...
        Dave, I have no problem with the process as it's laid out above. Where you might run into problems, especially in the health niches, is that while the same topics may be covered year in and year out, the science behind them changes. Look at something like eating eggs. One year, eggs are basically poison - a heart attack in a shell. The next year, eggs are nature's perfect food, and a couple a day won't hurt you.

        While you may have the experience and expertise to filter out the out-of-date info, some who read this won't. They'll just grab a stack of magazines and start spinning. Or 'rewriting'. And they'll put out advice that will either damage their credibility or endanger someone's health.
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        • Profile picture of the author DoubleOhDave
          Originally Posted by JohnMcCabe View Post

          Dave, I have no problem with the process as it's laid out above. Where you might run into problems, especially in the health niches, is that while the same topics may be covered year in and year out, the science behind them changes. Look at something like eating eggs. One year, eggs are basically poison - a heart attack in a shell. The next year, eggs are nature's perfect food, and a couple a day won't hurt you.

          While you may have the experience and expertise to filter out the out-of-date info, some who read this won't. They'll just grab a stack of magazines and start spinning. Or 'rewriting'. And they'll put out advice that will either damage their credibility or endanger someone's health.
          Ah, John... I never thought that my idea might be influential on anyone else here. I wouldn't want to influence others to do this. You are right though, personally I have read, and practiced, so much of this kind of stuff that I am aware of changes. Although all fitness related stuff needs a disclaimer to be honest as some methods - even modern, commonly used ones - are contraindicative, i.e. they do as much damage as good, in plain English.
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  • Profile picture of the author Sandi Valentine
    It'd at least be a good source for titles or topics, even if you don't choose to rewrite paragraph by paragraph. I'd assume that many of the articles are feature length pieces, anyhow, so you'd be looking at things that would be much longer than the typical online article.
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  • Profile picture of the author NicoleBeckett
    John's exactly right... Science may have definitely come up with new stuff over the past 10 years.

    If I were you, I would use some of those topics as a starting point. After all, if they were considered "exciting" enough to make it into Men's Health over and over again, there's obviously men out there looking for the answers! Once you've got some topics picked out, do some additional (more current) research. That way, you'll have the most up-to-date facts, and you'll have a bunch of different sources of information.
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    • Profile picture of the author DoubleOhDave
      Originally Posted by NicoleBeckett View Post

      John's exactly right... Science may have definitely come up with new stuff over the past 10 years.
      .
      Yes, that's true Nicole, my reasoning though was that the core - say eight - common exercises that work phenomenally well, such as press-ups etc. haven't changed in ten years, and have only been used in different ways - e.g. differing sets of reps, differing amount to complete goals, different info about muscles other than just the arms that are used which the lay person would never have guessed (the core - everyone's priority for a healthy life)..

      To be clearer, I think, about my intention was to collate all the factual information and use it as 'PLR' to write my own articles from. In fact, as I write this I realise it's just research really..
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      • Profile picture of the author Alexa Smith
        Banned
        Originally Posted by DoubleOhDave View Post

        To be clearer, I think, about my intention was to collate all the factual information and use it as 'PLR' to write my own articles from. In fact, as I write this I realise it's just research really..
        It seems that way to me, also. I think the process you're describing is "research" rather than the creation of "derivative products" per se. (I'll be interested to see if a lawyer posts in the thread.)
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  • Profile picture of the author Sharyn Sheldon
    Definitely sounds like research to me too, if you're taking information from different places and putting it in your own words. I think you'll end up putting in your own slant and opinions anyway.

    But why limit yourself to Men's Health magazine? I know you said you already have years of them, but you can and should still look at others. Yes, all those magazines say the same thing over and over. It's the same with all the women's magazines too. However, they know how to write a headline better than anyone. You can just look at headlines of old magazines at magazines.com and get loads of ideas for new twists on the ones you have.

    Only caveat is the medical and time-sensitive content. You'll have to check your facts and do current research for those topics. Press-ups? No problem. How to prevent prostate cancer? Stay away or start consulting with doctors.
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  • Profile picture of the author Ord Allenbea
    Is this your own content ?

    Assuming it is your own content then there is nothing wrong with re-writing it. The thing is with any content PLR or your own, you must make sure you reach high quality.

    I know many people assume high quality is just about an article that reads well but this is not exactly true. High quality content must contain the below in order to be seen as high quality to the search engines and readers both.

    * Proper Formatting - short paragraphs that are 2 - 3 sentences long.
    * Proper Keyword Research - article must contain proper keywords.
    * Proper Semantics - article must contain related words and phrases.
    * Proper Grade Level - article must read at a proper grade level that corresponds to your niche, according the Flesch-Kincaid readability test.
    * Proper Spelling and Grammar - this is self explained.
    * Proper Position Of Links - yes links need to be in proper places (if no links allowed in the body of an article I do not syndicate to that site).
    * Content must be engaging, attractive, informative, and include a call to action in the resource.

    All of these are required for a proper high quality article. I know many miss 80% of these points above but that is why their articles do not produce as well as they think they should.

    Any content including plr can be re-written to meet the above. It is just a question of would it be easier to re-write or write from scratch. This depends upon the writer because some are very skilled at re-writing vs writing from scratch while others are very skilled at writing from scratch.

    Edit: Oh I see you actually meant men's health magazine, so that answers my first question. The rest still applies.

    Originally Posted by DoubleOhDave View Post

    I have a collection of over ten years of Men's Health. The same topics come up over and over again. Literally, almost every cover promises the same thing and if it doesn't, it certainly gets revised within every year.

    What's to stop me taking those articles and completely rewriting them instead of using PLR? If I was to rewrite them completely enough in my own words I don't see the difference?

    I would like to know a pro's take on this before I did it though...

    Thanks
    Dave
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