Don’t let this happen to you. And, take a lesson from this tale of plagiarism in the blogosphere.
Here is a bit of background: While doing some ego surfing on Technorati I noticed a blog called Cressfamily.com that linked back to The Client Side. I clicked through and started reading the post and realized that the words were mine. There was no mention of attribution or acknowledgement of myself as the source. It was simply blatant content theft. The reason the post linked back and I could find it on Technorati was that I had a put a link in the original post that referred back to a previous Client Side post and it remained intact when it was reposted.
I had heard of this happening to other bloggers (mostly to my fellow CAPOW friends) but could not believe it was happening to me. Does this mean I have made it big time? I feel so dirty ; )
And, to top it all off, the post underneath mine was ripped off from none other than Michael Arrington’s Techcrunch. Well, at least I know I am in good company.
Check out Scotts post and Techcrunch
Seems as though he copies, slightly edits by taking out key links to hide the real author's identity and then calls it his own. Anyone wanna bet he failed an essay or two for plagiarism in his scholastic past?!?!
Now the post he copied from The Client Side mysteriously came down today after Bryper came to my rescue, but the trial of it was caught on Technorati
Now for the real kicker – this person, Scott Cress, has a LinkedIn profile right on his blog. And, we were only two degrees of separation apart. He is a marketer from the eastern U.S. and we have a famous Canadian web pioneer as a connection point between us on LinkedIn.
It looks Scott has blogged for a while, so he should just know better. Can he claim ignorance? I think not. Is Scott a nice guy? I don’t know. Bottom line is that this is not cool. Not in any way.
What I hope is that this is a lesson learned. And, to show that I am not sore about it enough to hold a grudge, I am asking him via this post to come clean either by written comment or audio comment to +1 -206-666-2242 and explain his motivations. Enquiring minds want to know.
I’m waiting.
Technorati Tags: Content theft Blogs Caught Stealing Techcrunch
People like this are scum. We've all seen the scraping sites who do it just for links and who knows what other reasons, but the fact that this guy is identified, seems to at least have some sort of life on the web (the LinkedIn profile) makes it extra wrong.
I'd love to see his excuses for why what he did was ok.
Thank you for blogging about this. It's something we all have to keep an eye out for.
There is no hiding in the blogosphere, and I am surprised he doesn't know that. It will be interested to see what he has to say, even more interested if he continues to pick off other blogs and claim the thoughts/ideas as his own.
Michael,
It gets even better... I took his previous story on "DropSend" on Jan 16th:
http://www.cressfamily.com/blog/_archives/2007/1/16/2655253.html
and plugged into Technorati this search string:
dropsend "really big files to a couple people"
figuring that that was a relatively unique phrase... ta da... out comes a post from a gent named Matt Donovan posted to several different blogs of his back on **June 7, 2006*!:
http://donovanhouse.com/?p=63
http://www.leveltendesign.com/blog/general/by-matt/dropsend/
http://mattdonovan.wordpress.com/2006/06/07/dropsend/
Anyone want to take bets on how original the rest of his posts are?
Very annoying to see,
Dan
Thanks Mish and C.C. All he had to do was add "here is a post I found from The Client Side". One sentence and and there is no issue.
And the balls to have his LinkedIn button right beside the stolen post!!! I really hope he leaves a comment and joins in the conversation that he started and ultimately should close down for his own sake. We'll see what happens.
Definitely not cool.
According to Technorati, seems people aren't linking to his blog yet there are 414 links to The Client Side. That speaks volumes.
Not that I think it would stop him, but have your considered adding a Creative Commons licence to your blog?
I'll be following this story closely to see if Scott comes forward and learn what he has to say for himself.
Wow.
Any word from the dude? Did you cross post a message to him on his blog?
Such a crazy, crazy world. Never ceases to amaze nor be a source of amusement. ;)
I think the blogosphere has just forensically identified a serial scrapper! Although it is not scrapping, it is worse.
Seems like Scott is hiding out on all this activity. I have not heard a thing from him. If I were him, I'd probably do exactly the opposite. If he really felt bad, or it was a mistake, then he should say so.
I hate to be so cynical, but with his silence and with the prevalence of his plagiarism in so many other instances in addition to when he copied me, I have to think he knew what he was doing the whole way and just prayed no one noticed. Now he has been found out and he is being a sucky little child by not owning up to what he did wrong.
Scott Cress works at Hughes Marketing in Wahsington by the way. I wonder what his employer would say?
Michael
Not so much a comment, but a spot of light relief by way of a counterpoint to this ugly incident - I offer my recent experience of unconscious "plagiarism" (even though I was innocent it was a very unn-nerving experince, so I'm sure your copyist is feeling very queazy!)
http://makemarketinghistory.blogspot.com/2007/01/hills-have-eyes.html
I can feel your pain.. Especially when someone recently copied my blog >:(
Had to make a post and bring his attention to the CC license in my blog.. he decided to delete the copied content instead of giving me credit!
Michael,
The other day I wondered what had ever happened to this case. It is interesting to note that his blog hasn't been updated since January 18th, the day before you posted this. The content is still there, though. Did he ever contact you?
Just curious,
Dan