Forum Moderators: not2easy
Big Name News Site (PR of 7 or 8, very high technorati rank) is systematically taking our articles, rewriting them, and posting them hours after we do, whenever the news is breaking industry news. They're rewriting things enough that there's no "plagariasm" involved -- the words aren't the same. But the quotes are generally in the same place, the information is the same, and you can do a bullet-point list of points made in the articles and they match exactly.
My writers are doing all the work -- the research, the interviews, the legwork. They're doing it for pennies, because we're small and they work for a percentage of ad revenue.
Big Name Site is saving a LOT of labor by not doing their own research but rather waiting for us to do it. Plus, I suspect they are doing this to other sites as well.
I'm beginning to resent this. It's upsetting to my writers. It's annoying and lazy and rude. And they're not even giving us a link to say, "This is our source."
Unfortunately, I don't know what IP they're using to access the site or I'd serve them some "special" news on a regular basis, know what I mean? I'm trying to figure out their IP and will cheerfully serve them incorrect information if I can determine this. Unfortunately, this isn't very easy to figure out.
Short of feeding them "bad" news, however, does anyone have any suggestions? It's not exactly illegal what they're doing, just very lazy and unethical.
If you're certain the site is "misappropriating" your content and can prove that these stories have definitely been broken by yourselves, and there's no other way they could have gotten the information, my first inclination would be to make contact with senior personnel within the offending company.
Make contact with a director with relevant responsibility. Be prepared to argue your case very thoroughly and ensure that your approach and attitude is deadly serious. Make and keep a detailed record of any and all instances of these transgressions.
You will also need to work out in advance exactly what it is you want from them. Do you just want them to stop taking your stories? Would you be appeased if they gave due credit instead? Do you want to pursue for damages? What, exactly?
Seek legal advice. This, at the very least, will allow you to take the necessary approach when making contact. I have a feeling that, dependant on the legal position, you could find yourself facing a situation where their attitude is "so what", which means it'll be up to you to broker some sort of agreement whereby there's mutual benefit in your favour, perhaps by feeding them exclusives under licence.
Before then, do go in, but not with all guns blazing. Have a solid strategy mapped out that covers all possibilities. If the position is solely a legal one, then fine, let the law do its job. But, if your legal counsel advises that this is all bit of a grey area, and I suspect it is, then you'll need alternative strategies to deal with the "so what" attitude you may find is thrown back at you.
Just a few thoughts...
Syzygy
By knowing who reads what, and when, you could narrow your list of suspects a little.
At that point, it would be fairly easy.
Document everything that you notice. Take screen shots of the infringing content, including if possible when it was posted, as well as keep a log of the times your content is posted. If you have solid facts and numbers of the content posted, and the offenders corresponding content, negotiations should go a lot smoother.
Once there, I would work out what it is you want as previously indicated.
Do you want them to take it down? Do you want them to link to your site and give credit? Do you want compensation? Realize that as breachers of copyright, they should be willing to work out an arraignment.
Cheers,
Jeff
The inaccurate quote example is a good one; that might work.
-- Leva
