Idea Thieves, What to do with them ?!

Less than a week later someone posting about my website and asking for a similar module and add a link to my website to show developers the service on my website and ask if someone can copy it for him.

Like all the people who were looking for Fiverr clone scripts, right?

I did notice you were trying to differentiate your site (despite its unfortunate name) from the rest of the clones, but when you lie down with dogs, you get up with fleas. With over 1,000 other clone sites and most of them getting no traffic, some will do what they do best: lifting other peoples' stuff.

It's never pleasant when it happens. And it's happened to me, too. Some people think it's a cool blog and surely I won't notice if they copy some articles.

fLufF
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There you go. You can always try to copyright you content. So you have more of a legal advantage over your competitor.

I think you miss understand what I said , I developed the idea and had it a live. I am aware idea that doesn't exist goes with the wind

I also completely agree with MJ DeMarco on this point.

I love Ideas but in a business sense they really aren't all that important, ability to execute is what makes someone successful or not successful.

On other point that DeMarco also makes which I think is relevant is that if you want to deter competition is to make yourself looking bigger and more impressive than you really are.

People will look at the niche and think that someone has already dominated it, but it can be all smoke and mirrors until the point where you have grown the business to the point where you want it to be.

I totally agree with you. That age was over. I think it doesn't really matter how unique you are but how much traffic you got is what really count.

I know websites who got nothing much to offer today but since they are on the top of the game today, this is all what count

This is great advice and a common story. Ignore people who took from you, keep working and doing your thing. Any time you spend worrying about them is time wasted.

I totally agree - I used to write software for a living - always the danger of being ripped off.

But the good thing is, the people ripping you off are doing so because they are not capable of coming up with their own ideas, they can only copy from others. That means, once they implement your idea, that's where it will likely stay - exactly the way it was when they ripped it off.

You, on the other hand, are creative - that's how you came up with an idea that someone wanted to copy. Therefore, you can apply your creative juices to making your product/idea much better - that's something the copycat isn't able to do - that's why they copied it from you. Keep making your ideas better, and you'll always be one step ahead of the copycats.

Then also market your idea better than they do, and you leave 'em in the dust!

Until he stole some great ideas and built them into a billion dollar empire.

Coke or Pepsi?

Xerox anyone?

http://www.nytimes.com/1989/12/20/bu...ted=all&src=pm

Ideas are a dime a dozen. They are worthless, imo.

Implementing those ideas into something tangible is where you make your money. Funny, I have so many ideas but those ideas still don't bring money into my account until I implement them.

You should be worrying about someone making a better widget out of your idea.

Continue to work on your product. You see so many people pump out product after product and never continue improving them.

If you continue to improve a product that will insure it being tougher for competitors to enter your marketplace. They will have to compete on price and a lower feature set simply because you have been working on the product idea for a longer period. Or, they will have to pony up a lot of cash to create something comparable. By that time, you should have taken a good deal of market share before they can even roll out with the product.

You need to plan for this type of competition. Plan that your idea will be stolen and plan how you will combat it. Either by excellent customer service or continual product improvement.

If you don't share your ideas with people they won't be able to steal them.

You just have to ask yourself one question: "What would Micha Kaufman and Shai Wininger think?"

Unfortunately, you can't copyright an idea. Unless someone is stealing your intellectual property (word for word, code by code), there's nothing you can do about it except to follow good advice given by other Warriors - do it bigger and better.

However good your idea, someone may see the potential for improving on it. That's perfectly legitimate hence competition.

Even if someone is stealing your intellectual property, spending too much time on chasing these rogues will prove too costly to you, in the long run. While you are spending time dealing with thieves you are letting your profits go down the drain because your focus changes from productivity to defence or even revenge.

The Internet is a wonderful barrel of a place but the flip side of it is that there are many bad apples lurking around. So learn to live with it and, instead, keep one or more steps ahead of your potential competitors.

James

Every business has competitors. If you were creative enough to come up with the idea, you will continue to come up with ideas to stay ahead of your competitors!

Better yet, study what they do right and do it better :-)

I had a client for one of my products copy some of our ideas, and concepts, and he added a couple new good ideas of his own... but they were poorly implemented.

We decided to implement something similar but much improved.

The same client was demonstrating what he claimed to be his product... but the examples he used and which he claimed to be his technology were really using our software and not even using his product (which could not do what our product did as well as our product did it).

I sent him a letter telling him that I was always a fan of innovation (good ideas being made better) but I asked him to remove the false claims that the examples he created were using his product when they were clearly created using our product.

Did it bother me that he took some of our ideas after being a paying customer of ours? No. The only thing that bothered me were his false claims on his examples (which used our product and not his) which he removed after I requested him to.

Did it worry me? No, because I knew we had a superior product.

Did it inspire me to make our product even better? Yes, in fact he demonstrated some concepts (though poorly implemented) that we decided we would add to our product and make even better.

Copyright only covers a fixed work. NOT an idea in your head. Patent only covers something that is patentable and that is actually patented... trademark only covers marks that are actually used and those that are registered not that are only dreamed up in your head.

If you are whining about someone "stealing" an idea that you have not Copyrighted, Patented, or Trademarked...

You don't have intellectual property you're just a whiner with a good idea.

Sorry, you lost any exclusive claim on your concept the moment you went live with it. Just because you were first to implement doesn't give you a lifetime exclusive. Nobody "stole" anything.

All you can do is compete better. It sounds like you're bitter because they took your concept and implemented it better than you did. "Burning it" might harm the first cloner, but another will emerge from the pack if the idea is viable.

Remember two things:

1. Never forget:

a. The person(s) who stole it from you. Be on the look out and make him/them pay when time is right. Do not burn yourself to burn others. Be patient and smart. Believe me, that day will come. Earth is round.

b. Microsoft copied Apple. Apple still exists and is more respected. Creator can perfect something better than the impostor.

2. Create another product. If you can create one. You can create another. The first one is the tricky one. That was not the first and last product you created, but that was the door you opened for success.

Do you have any idea how many people are out there who are still waiting to create that one elusive product?

You were a success when you created the product.

Other things don't matter.

All the best.

Cheers

Aravind

Paul Hawken in his book Growing a Business has some great thoughts on this topic. The most successful business comes from who you are as an individual, and can't be stolen any more than another person can decide to become your twin.