My articles.. stolen?

17 replies
Hi, I created this website around 3 weeks ago and created around 5 articles and posted them on my website. I then submitted them to ezine articles and they got popular in their category. Recently I searched for my website in google and I just found out that my articles have been copied to many places with a reference to my website but what has changed are the links. They kept the anchor text but changed the links.

I am sure this would have happened to many people but i don't understand how to fix it. In my opinion its stealing if people are using my articles without giving backlinks. It would be appreciated if someone helps me.
#articles #stolen
  • Profile picture of the author ss442
    When we publish articles to EZA they are in the public domain. Anyone can scrape off your article and use it on their site as long as you get the credit and they link to your site or at least reference your site.

    Someone stealing your article can be flattering, irritating, and confusing. If you are not getting proper credit go to "whois.com", paste in the url of the offender and write the owner a nasty letter.

    Or, if their site and promo looks better than yours maybe think about linking up some kind of partnership like an ad swap or something like that. I have contacted several companies that have used my articles and at the very least picked up some back links since they are using my articles.

    Other than that if your articles are working keep writing. At least someone thinks they are worth reading which can also be a form of viral marketing.

    Welcome to EzineArticles!

    Good luck, Ed
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    • Profile picture of the author artekweb
      I think someone have scraped your article and used them so dont publish for public till your work is over
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    • Profile picture of the author Laurie Rogers
      Originally Posted by ss442 View Post

      When we publish articles to EZA they are in the public domain. Anyone can scrape off your article and use it on their site as long as you get the credit and they link to your site or at least reference your site.

      Someone stealing your article can be flattering, irritating, and confusing. If you are not getting proper credit go to "whois.com", paste in the url of the offender and write the owner a nasty letter.

      Or, if their site and promo looks better than yours maybe think about linking up some kind of partnership like an ad swap or something like that. I have contacted several companies that have used my articles and at the very least picked up some back links since they are using my articles.

      Other than that if your articles are working keep writing. At least someone thinks they are worth reading which can also be a form of viral marketing.

      Welcome to EzineArticles!

      Good luck, Ed
      Actually, I found some of my articles on EA with someone elses name on them and the ironic thing about it was, that in it I made reference to my working with a well known guru. So there was no possible way you could not know that I wrote the article, I complained about the issue, nobody responded to me about it (although I did note it had been removed).

      Then when I resubmitted the articles under my name, the "reviewer" said that some of them were promoting "black hat" spamming techniques and I burst out laughing, because clearly the person never actually read the article. There were some resources listed in the article to provide people with information on where to look and what to do if they were falsely accused of spamming, how that got misinterpreted is beyond me. I was pretty shocked and even in my sig I had a link to my old "spam column" in DEMC. Needless to say I wasn't impressed with the process.
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  • Profile picture of the author King Shiloh
    Banned
    Contact those people you saw your articles on their websites and ask them to pull out the articles from their sites.
    Report the issue to EZA, by opening a support ticket, with proof of ownership of those articles. You can do a screenshot of the articles and send to EZA. Also include the names of the sites concerned.

    Good luck.
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    • Profile picture of the author sam770
      Originally Posted by King Shiloh View Post

      Contact those people you saw your articles on their websites and ask them to pull out the articles from their sites.
      Report the issue to EZA, by opening a support ticket, with proof of ownership of those articles. You can do a screenshot of the articles and send to EZA. Also include the names of the sites concerned.

      Good luck.
      yea, thats the way I would act
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  • Profile picture of the author you2life
    First of all, you posted the same articles to your website and ezine too. May be ezine deleted your articles because of duplicate content (but i am not sure as you didn't mention it). So question arises where should copied articles point to - to your ezine articles or your website? If your ezine articles are live then copied articles must link to your ezine articles but if ezinearticles has deleted your articles then just giving a reference to your website is enough for those who copied it from whether your site or ezine (when they were live). Although, you can always request them to put down your articles.
    Hope it helps. Will be better if you provide more information to assess.
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    • Profile picture of the author PatriciaJ
      Unfortunately that happens all the time, I've even seen products on sale on this forum that scrapes content and gives an option to remove links. You could contact the website owners and send angry emails but most will ignore you. It's best to just move on, publish as many articles as you can and forget the cheats because getting angry about it does you more harm than good. Just tell yourself that if these people can't make it without cheating then they are the losers not you.

      Asking ezine articles to do something isn't fair, it isn't their responsibility to police the Internet.

      Originally Posted by you2life View Post

      First of all, you posted the same articles to your website and ezine too. May be ezine deleted your articles because of duplicate content (but i am not sure as you didn't mention it). So question arises where should copied articles point to - to your ezine articles or your website? If your ezine articles are live then copied articles must link to your ezine articles but if ezinearticles has deleted your articles then just giving a reference to your website is enough for those who copied it from whether your site or ezine (when they were live). Although, you can always request them to put down your articles.
      Hope it helps. Will be better if you provide more information to assess.
      I don't think that you understood the information provided and what duplicate content is. The op didn't say that Ezine articles had deleted the articles and they wouldn't have done anyway because duplicate content is when something is on the same website twice. Authors are entitled to use articles on their own sites first and then submit to ezine articles and other directories. That is called syndication not duplicate content.
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      • Profile picture of the author Laurie Rogers
        Originally Posted by PatriciaJ View Post

        Asking ezine articles to do something isn't fair, it isn't their responsibility to police the Internet.
        I disagree with you on that, if your content is on their site and they do nothing, they are just as responsbile for infringement. It's just like those who upload movies, music etc. their work is copyright protected, so is ours if you provide a disclaimer (which I do) ... technically the site is just as responsbile as the person whom uploaded said stolen material.

        One thing a lot of people are not mentioning, is that you can also serve cease and desist orders to the person whom has infringed, their web host and their ISP. I've done it and in most cases it scares the crap out of some people and they remove the work (others not so much).
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        • Profile picture of the author PatriciaJ
          Originally Posted by Laurie Rogers View Post

          I disagree with you on that, if your content is on their site and they do nothing, they are just as responsbile for infringement. It's just like those who upload movies, music etc. their work is copyright protected, so is ours if you provide a disclaimer (which I do) ... technically the site is just as responsbile as the person whom uploaded said stolen material.
          That is unrealistic. There is no reason why EZA or any other directory should take responsibility for the dishonesty of others and especially as the cheats may not even have visited the site when their software scraped the articles. Most directories offer a free service, checking the sheer amount of articles being submitted is very time consuming but being expected to chase up the growing amount of plagiarists is not on. Also in many cases authors submit to more than one directory so it isn't always possible to know which an article was taken from unless as in this case it was just one.

          One thing a lot of people are not mentioning, is that you can also serve cease and desist orders to the person whom has infringed, their web host and their ISP. I've done it and in most cases it scares the crap out of some people and they remove the work (others not so much).
          True
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    • Profile picture of the author rosetrees
      Originally Posted by you2life View Post

      First of all, you posted the same articles to your website and ezine too. May be ezine deleted your articles because of duplicate content (but i am not sure as you didn't mention it). So question arises where should copied articles point to - to your ezine articles or your website?
      Ezine would not delete the article for this reason. It doesn't constitute duplicate content and you are perfectly at liberty to publish on your own site first.

      This is what I do when this happens to me.

      Email the owner of the offending site if you can find a contact. If they do not remove the article, or you can't find a contact then use whois.net to find out where the site is hosted.

      Issue a DMCA Cease and Desist notice. This usually does the trick if the site is hosted by a reputable host.

      Sbucciarel has the relevant notices on her site (do a search for her).

      I don't think there is anything that EZA can do as the person(s) publishing your content without your link may not even be member of their site. It's up to you to pursue the offenders. I always do and almost always the offending article is removed.
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    • Profile picture of the author Richard Van
      Originally Posted by you2life View Post

      First of all, you posted the same articles to your website and ezine too. May be ezine deleted your articles because of duplicate content (but i am not sure as you didn't mention it). So question arises where should copied articles point to - to your ezine articles or your website? If your ezine articles are live then copied articles must link to your ezine articles but if ezinearticles has deleted your articles then just giving a reference to your website is enough for those who copied it from whether your site or ezine (when they were live). Although, you can always request them to put down your articles.
      Hope it helps. Will be better if you provide more information to assess.
      As has been said by Rosetrees and Patricia you have got some of your facts wrong. Especially the ago old duplicate content myth. The OP has said he/she published the articles to their site first then to EZA. This isn't duplicated content, never has been duplicated content and EZA will confirm this in there TOS. When you take an article off EZA or any other directory and publish it on your site, it is, as has been mentioned, syndicated content. For many this is the entire point of article marketing.

      If you think about it, if these other people have taken his articles and put them on their sites, how can the OP have been punished for duplicate content?

      Better still, how would article directories even be in business?

      If your ezine articles are live then copied articles must link to your ezine articles
      ...not really, I believe they should link to wherever the original author wanted them to link to.

      but if ezinearticles has deleted your articles then just giving a reference to your website is enough for those who copied it from whether your site or ezine
      This kind of contradicts your definition of duplicate content, doesn't it? No offense, I just don't think your advice is accurate and I wouldn't want the OP to get confused or sucked into the duplicate penalty myth.

      For the OP, Rosetrees advice above is what I have done and continue to do, it's also what I would advise you to do.
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  • Profile picture of the author timpears
    I think I would go straight to the host and report this and request they take it down. You can contact the site owner first, but my guess is that will not do much good.

    I could be wrong, but that is what I would do if it is worth the trouble to you. There is a form, but I don't remember what it is called. Some kind of cease and desist for internet theft.
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    Tim Pears

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  • Profile picture of the author wkathome
    I wrote an article, posted it on my blog, and submitted it to different directory's. It was copied and pasted onto someone else's website with no mention of my name as the author and Ezine Articles suspended by account, saying that I'm the one who stole the article and submitted it. Go figure.

    It's sad to know that they really don't care about their author's.
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    • Profile picture of the author stephfoster
      Originally Posted by wkathome View Post

      I wrote an article, posted it on my blog, and submitted it to different directory's. It was copied and pasted onto someone else's website with no mention of my name as the author and Ezine Articles suspended by account, saying that I'm the one who stole the article and submitted it. Go figure.
      EZA did that to me not long ago. I got my information together and proved them wrong, got my account back. A part of it was that I also got the offending site to take my article down... they gave the usual "I didn't know that was wrong" excuse they all use. The other site taking the article down along with my pointing out that their copy had been posted days after the one on my own site was enough to show that I hadn't done anything wrong by EZA's standards.
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    • Profile picture of the author PatriciaJ
      Originally Posted by wkathome View Post

      I wrote an article, posted it on my blog, and submitted it to different directory's. It was copied and pasted onto someone else's website with no mention of my name as the author and Ezine Articles suspended by account, saying that I'm the one who stole the article and submitted it. Go figure.

      It's sad to know that they really don't care about their author's.
      I've had that happen too. They aren't very tactful but then a lot of plagiarised articles get submitted and the percentage of times that they will be right will be high. Those who are genuine get their accounts unsuspended, those who are cheating won't.

      I've learned to live with the fact that after they have been indexed on my sites I should submit to them first and wait until they are approved before submitting anywhere else.
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  • Profile picture of the author buscuit
    Hello,

    Yes, this does happen. Some of the sites I have posted articles on do say that my articles can be copied by others.

    I love writing, and have posted my articles on many sites.

    Are some sites better than others?

    Any feedback / advice you can give to a newbie would be appreciated.

    Thank you all for your help.
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