“Stealing is stealing. I don’t care if it’s on the Internet or you’re breaking into a warehouse somewhere- it’s theft.”
– Patrick Leahy
After putting hours of work researching, editing and publishing your content on your blog, you would never want to be discredited for your own work by anyone in anyway.
Finding out about your content being copied is most hurtful and unfortunate thing for any blogger.
Before getting into what should be done when your content gets copied, let’s find out why we need to stop people from copying your blog content.
Here’s what happens when someone copy blog content and why we need to stop them-
- The first reason (quite obviously) is that your content is the result of your efforts and hard work. One puts a lot of research, writing, editing and not to mention the crazy amount of mental energy for creating a good blog post. It is your (intellectual) property and as such only you should get to decide where it ends up.
- The second reason is from the viewpoint of SEO. When someone copies your blog content in their site, Google will find that content as a duplicate. You will lose precious SEO points. You might lose your search engine ranking or page ranking as a result of your original content getting copied. I learned about this while researching on the topic from an article published on shoutmeloud.
- Another reason is (again obvious) you won’t get any credit for the work you have put in. Your content might reach to some genuine people who value your work but they will never know the real creator of that content. If they did, you could form a meaningful connection with them through the medium of that content.
- And the last reason is an answer to this fundamental question, ‘why do we blog?’ I think, we blog to connect with like-minded, relatable and real people or in short our kindred spirits. When someone steals your content, they also steal some of those prospective connections. People who would value the experience of knowing you as the creator of something they appreciated, they (as well as you) will miss out on this valuable experience. Now, I think that is the most important reason why we need to stop people from copying your blog content.
Whatever your reason is to speak against content theft, your reason is valid. You have every right to claim for your work and you must try to protect it from getting copied by content thieves.
Next day/ Tomorrow we will continue this series and I shall try to shed some light on ‘how to stop getting your content copied.’ If and only if that is something possible, we shall find out next week!
This series is also available as an EBOOK on Amazon. You can access all the information on Content Theft & Content Copying, organized & well put together in one place.
Start reading it for free:
“Content Theft: The Undesirable Event in the Life of a Blogger”
💬 What are your thoughts on this?
Do share your opinion on- “why we should (or shouldn’t) stop people from copying original blog content?”
As always, Thank You for reading :)
How do I find if at all any of my content is copied?
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I have covered this topic in the series. You can learn about the ways by which you can find if any of your content has been stolen in one of the series post, which will be published day after tomorrow. In tomorrow’s post we’ll discuss a few ways to prevent content theft. I hope you’ll find the information useful 🙂
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Its important to give credit where credit is due in all aspects of life. Looking forward to the series of blogs.. 🌷
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So true. Thank you so much for sharing the thought ❤︎
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I more than agree. You shouldn’t do to others what you wouldn’t want to be done to you. Stealing credit fits that sentiment well
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Love that thought, thanks for sharing it ❤︎
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Thanks for the nice & important topic you have chosen .Let us we will be everyone aware for everyone’s content .If anyone got our friends’s content anywhere we must have to tweet for it or must have to give information to the blogger whose content has been theft.
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Thank you so much Pranita for sharing the wonderful thought. I agree with you, all bloggers should help each other & if anyone finds any stolen or copied content, then the same should be reported immediately & if possible inform the true owner of that content.
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I am learning so much these past couple weeks. I know not to steal content but with photos I get worried too. I am giving credit when and where I can and I am either using my own photos or I am using a site like unsplash. In this world of blogging we have to be so careful…. but I never really thought of it the other way around. Someone taking MY content. Thank you for this read!!!
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Thank you so much Melissa for sharing your thought. It’s so nice to know that you’ve been learning about using content & that you give credit. If you give credit, it’s not theft. At least I think so!
It’s okay to use photos from free photo websites like the one you’re using. I use pixabay & it’s specifically mentioned in the website that no attributions are required.
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Thanks for the help. I look forward to more posts from you!!!
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Thanks again ❤︎
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The last reason of blogging is perhaps most of us would connect with. A very painstakingly laid out post.
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Thank you so much Neeraj for sharing the thought. I thought a lot of bloggers could connect with the last reason, glad to know you thought so too 🙂
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i like this series and im glad to see you posting it. im sure someone will “borrow” it. lol
i have been blogging for a long time. maybe longer than most people and since most of my posts are photos, im sure they have been taken. some have asked when they liked a specific photo and i have gladly sent them a copy with the only caveat is to give me a byline (credit). i dont place a water mark on my photos and i have been asked why i dont. apps to place water marks also are able to defeat water marks, so what is the sense?
plagiarized content has been around since the first human made their mark on cave walls. for every way to protect our content, there are ways to steal it.
thanks for posting this series.
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Thank you so much for sharing your thought on this series. Took me a while (& a lot of work) to bring the series to you. I’m so glad you’re liking & appreciating the series.
I agree, it’s not possible to stop people from using our content available on the web. But in whatever way we can discourage bad & wrong (stealing) intentions, we must not shy away from those ways! Talking about it is I think one of those ways.
I always watermark my photos, I’ll try everything at my disposal to fight content theft. Even at the risk of failing!
& if anybody tries to steal any of my content, I know how to find them & where to report them. I’ll also share the same info with you in the upcoming posts in the series.
I hope you’ll find those posts useful.
Best wishes,
Binita 🙂
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🙂
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I agree stealing is stealing no matter where and how it is done. The thief must be brought to book. But on a brighter side, it also shows that your content is good that is why someone is trying to get a piece of action. But that is no excuse.
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Thank you so much for sharing the great thought & I really appreciate the ‘brighter side’ perspective in this regard. Thanks for the compliment 🙂
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Very much logical points, each one matters a lot for the bloggers.
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Thank you so much for the appreciation 😊
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It is a great blog and great help for people to save themselves. Looking forward to more good contents from you.
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Thank you so much for the feedback. I appreciate it 🙂
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Thank you for sharing. I have thought about copywriting my posts.
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Thank you so much for the appreciation. & do consider using copyright, I highly recommend it. Best wishes 🙂
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Thank you so much for sharing the post 🙂
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