Maybe if you'd called it a "scrapper" site they would do? :-)

I dont know why you bother reporting this. If you have a popular site you will be scraped by hundreds of thousands of scrapers.

Also remember Google cant just go off and remove content willy nilly without serious manual investigation.

Calling his team morons isn't going to help your case :)

I'm guessing that they want gethan to do the work since they can't copy and paste from a fax!

we ask that you respond to this email, listing all of the URLs in question.

since they can't copy and paste from a fax!

A classic case of lawyers and techies! :D

OCR ?

OCR ?

Having seen the videos of where they work they'll probably think that means Oxygen Consumption Rate or Office of Community Relations or Open Collaborative Research when they should be the Office of Collateral Responsibility:-)

Woohoo...we've nearly got the board all to ourselves today!

== my paraphrased response ==

Here is a copy of the 41 example urls on the infringing site with the matching urls on the original sie below.

Please note that "the site" is what is known as a SCRAPER site (look up the term in say - the google search engine) - the entire contents of that site have been copied using some kind of automated method - changed very slightly, and then republished.

I do not know how many pages infringe - there are probably thousands - potentially millions - there is google adsense advertising on every single page.

As google is clearly in the wrong at this point - advertising and profiting on stolen content - I would appreciate it if you could use a little bit of initiative and close the account of the offending advertiser, confiscate any earnings from them and stop accepting scum sites into the adsense program.

Looking forward to your response - feel free to forward this to your supervisor.
=======

@drall - I report because that is my moral obligation to the original authors of the content - not because I expect to stop them all. It is also google's moral and legal obligation to look into the reports and deal with them. Maybe one day - one of the fabled geniuses in the googleplex could automate a scraper site detection tool - and pro-actively investigate entire sites with no unique content that sign up for the google adsense program.

@karma > Calling his team morons isn't going to help your case!

So much publicity goes out regarding google staff being so much better than everyone else - that the engineering tests are so difficult that mere mortals couldn't possibly qualify to work there...

Obviously this grunt in the legal team didn't pass anything of such calibre.

Don't really care about my case - I care more that google don't do anything proactive to stop scrapers.

Please note that "the site" is what is known as a SCRAPER site (look up the term in say - the google search engine) - the entire contents of that site have been copied using some kind of automated method - changed very slightly, and then republished.

Absolutely hilarious!

(Sarcasm won't get your mail recognized better with the Googlers. After all, you have to bow obediently in front of the Gorg, your ultimate master!)

If the heart of the issue is copyright infringement then maybe it's best to go after them using that route. Getting their AdSense revenue cut off is an incomplete solution because the content is still there and they can make money some other way.

I'm fairly certain it has to be YOUR content that is infringed in order for a DMCA notice to be acted upon, which is what your notice resembles, although it isn't in fact a DMCA. If you're going to fax it in then it's going to have to be your content, plus you're going to have to swear that it's the truth, which comes with legal responsibilities.

This is probably why your fax didn't get a useful response. Do yourself a favor and simply click on the Ads by Google link and report them in that manner. You'll have a higher likelihood of a response that way and save yourself time, expense and aggravation.

> YOUR content that is infringed in order for a DMCA notice to be acted upon

Or represent the original authors - eg Brett (or his lawyers) could order a DMCA for the content on WebmasterWorld

> This is probably why your fax didn't get a useful response.

I'd say it's a sign of an under-staffed, under-trained and neglected department within google.

> Do yourself a favor and simply click on the Ads by Google link and report them in that manner.

That's not a bad idea - the current DMCA process is archaic - anything that skips out the Fax step is a good idea - but do these type of reports get acted on - or disappear into a black hole?

I've tried the DMCA route with scappers and it does not work. The scrappers only take a few lines of my text and that (apparently) is within the Fair Use rule.

DMCAs for people that copy about 7-8 lines (or more) pretty much always works.

An exact search for any sentence in my site returns dozens of results - sometimes more than 100.

When seeing these and those domain squatters with adsense I feel I just ate an anchovie+ice cream+pickle

Same song over and over. Obviously Google is profiting from scraper sites so do not expect any changes anytime soon.

Why do you think there is no new publisher/website approval system? Because Google is profiting from those scraper sites and tiny blogs that are copying content from legit websites. I do have 3 full time writers and two dozens of freelancers and I pretty much gave up on this issue.

Unfortunately, greed for profits is more important in this game.

F.

@ sailorjwd:

It's like "flogging a dead horse". Fifty+ years in business has taught me that "you know what" always rises to the top.

What galls me is that many of the very same trash are reading this right now.

the current DMCA process is archaic

Google does a lot to reduce content owner's ability (and desire) to file a DMCA process. That's why they require either letter or fax. I'd still use that route for the most offensive infringers, because Google HAVE TO act upon the receipt of a formal DMCA complaint.

(Other companies, for example Yahoo!, accept also DMCA notifications by email.)

anything that skips out the Fax step is a good idea - but do these type of reports get acted on - or disappear into a black hole?

I'd say both "black hole" and "not acted upon". Based on my own experience -when I was still caring enough about Adsense that I notified Google of blatant offenders- I came to the conclusion that it's futile. Weeks after notifying Google the same offenders were still online. Apparently, these must have made REAL money for Google. (Having said that, months later many of the offenders were removed in one of the big cleaning rounds.)

I guess that things have not improved since then, so at best you will probably get an automated "thank you for contacting us" email, which -in Google's eyes- is likely to be regarded as "sophisticated customer service".