Note: All of the stolen posts, including the one above (here’s the original on my blog), have been removed.
A couple of weeks ago late into the evening, I received an email that a blogger, coach, or content creator never wants to get.
“I just saw one of your posts on a coaching site. You should look and see if there are others. I’m already up to seven that she stole from me and she’s been stealing from other writers too.”
In the wee hours of the morning, I snuggled underneath the covers trying to shield my husband from the glare of my iPhone and my anger. After searching this woman’s blog on her “fabulously creative” business coaching site, I found that she had lifted twenty-three of my blog posts, nearly word for word.
Sure, in some cases, she changed conversations that I had with my husband into talks that she’d had with her daughter, but the lessons remained the same. She took the thoughts and ideas that formed the posts I’d written from my personal and professional experience and claimed them as her own.
Some people may think, “What’s the big deal? It’s just words.” It’s not. Life experience, both wonderful and tragic, went into creating those words. Big things that I went through to make me the person that I am today like the death of my younger brother, getting a Masters in psychology, being married and divorced, finding the love of my life at 38, having a miscarriage, having a baby, starting my own business, and working with a wide variety of clients inform everything that I create.
I read the words built from my sometimes hard and sometimes amazing life signed “xo, Tami” and I felt sick. This woman had been promoting herself and her coaching business with my knowledge and life experiences, as well as those of at least three other talented creative businesswomen that I’ve been in contact with since this incident. This had been going on for six months before I became aware of it. Who knows how many clients hired her because of her supposed knowledge and experience?
Stealing content and promoting it as your own work is nothing new in this day and age. I have artist friends who have seen cheap knockoffs of their designs showing up on poorly made clothing around the world. It’s up to the consumer to be proactive in vetting the “experts.” And unfortunately, it’s up to the artists and content creators to be aware of their work that’s floating around the internet.
Here are a couple of sites that can help you if you suspect your work is being used elsewhere online and you need to know what to about it.
1. Copyscape is plagiarism checker that allows you to search for your blog posts on the web. I haven’t used the service yet, but it’s been recommended.
2. If you find out your copy has been used without permission, you can send a DMCA Takedown Notice to the copycat’s web host. Details on how to do this can be found here.
Keep in mind that not everyone who copies is out to harm you. Some people are (somehow) legitimately unaware that it’s not okay to swipe an entire blog post and use it without permission. In the past I’ve found sites that have taken one of my posts and I’ve simply emailed the site manager and asked them to remove it. However, in the case described above, I went through the DMCA takedown process. Stealing twenty-three posts isn’t ignorance. It’s illegal.