This week Rand's out of town so I'm taking over Whiteboard Friday duties. That's right, in my front-of-camera debut I (Scott) will walk you through the process we use to deal with copyright infringement. That is, what do you do when you find your original material illegally redistributed on another site? It's a little more business-side and a little less search-side, but I'm bettin' that enough of you have had problems with this that it'll be somewhat useful.
I also have the honor of officially announcing the SEOmoz Premium SEO Training Seminar we're presenting October 1st, in Seattle! We're very excited as this is the first live event of this type we've put on. We've got a great program set-up and expect a fantastic turnout (oh yeah, there'll be a party too). Check it out and come join us.
As a special bonus (because I have complete and total control of Whiteboard Friday this week), stick around after the credits and I'll take you on a quick, whirlwind tour of the MozPlex, as so many have asked for.
Since the Whiteboard's a little difficult to see in this video, here are the four steps I discussed along with links to some sample letters:
- Send a friendly e-mail to the site owner/manager asking them to remove the copyrighted material.
- Send a formal Cease & Desist letter to the site owner/manager dictating a strict deadline for removal of the copyrighted material and informing them you will contact their host if they don't comply.
- Send a DMCA Violation Removal Request to Google, requesting removal of the offending links from the index.
- Send a DMCA Violation Removal Request to the site's host. Under DMCA, they're required to shut down the offending site if you've followed the above steps and received no compliance.
I hope you've found this info helpful or, at least, entertaining. If there are other business or development related topics you'd like us to cover in future episodes or blog posts, let us know...we aim to please.
Cheers,
Scott
Hey, did you have permission from the copyright holders to use that music in your video? ;)
As far as sending a DMCA to the hosting company: In my experience (and it has been a couple years) hosting companies have no idea what to do with these letters and just ignore them. I have never got any action from sending a DMCA to a hosting company. One even responded to me with an email advising me to "contact DMCA". Yeah.
I used to contact the owners of the offending sites, but they often just ignore you, too. If the offending site employs AdSense (and in my case they do 90% of the time), you can send a DMCA to AdSense. (This is a slightly different address from the one you send to get the site out of Google's search index.) This letter objects to AdSense appearing on a site that violates copyright. AdSense then contacts the site owner and gets them to take the copied material down; or else they kick them out of AdSense. I have had great success using this method, and would advise everyone to do it. Don't complain to the webmaster; complain to AdSense and you will get action.
If there is no AdSense, I send regular DMCAs to Google's index, Yahoo, and MSN. This gets the offending page out of the search indices.
Absolutely correct. Great addition, beren. If a site is running Adsense, hitting them in their pocket book is often effective, and Google is helpful in this regard.
...oh yeah, glad you caught the irony there. I'm gonna plead non-commercial, fair-use...
Unfortunately non-commercial means not used in the pursuit of commerce. You're video is clearly part of a commercial exercise - you don't give away premium membership after all.
IANAL but have worked in intellectual property.
I was kidding, of course ;)
Beren you make a great point about notifying advertisers. The most common offenders are Made For Adsense websites, and these guys would drink snake blood if it was a google requirement to stay in the advertising program.
BTW, the SEOMoz offices looked awfully empty - was everyone out playing ultimate frisbee taking advantage of the 2 weeks of Northwest sunshine?
Great way to mix it up Scott - thanks. Looking forward to more business-related stuff.
On a somewhat related note, I recently had to speak to Google and Yahoo! about people bidding on the name of one of our clients and offering a discount. When you clicked through, there was no discount, only the option to buy from other people. I found both companies very responsive when I contacted them to alert them - though you can't stop people bidding on a phrase unless it's trademarked (which this one wasn't).
For so much trademark registration info you'll want to vomit, visit the US Patent & Trademark Office. Although since you're in the UK, you'll probably want a different site, unless your client is US based.
In the UK, I think it's these guys.
Will any of the SEO Seminar be filmed/broadcast online: perhaps just for premium members? Much as I'd love to make it, not sure my boss would shell out for the trip.
Scott--The sample letters are real time savers. Thanks for sharing them. Enjoyed the tour, too. This was a very useful presentation. You're pretty smooth in front of the camera.
Scott, well done! Loved the Mozplex tour..
Thanks, Matt. Not quite as impressive as your 'plex of choice, but it suits us fine.
I'm signed up for the training. Looking forward to seeing everyone!
Chic, stylin' place. I would have thought Rand would've had 3 giant monitors for all the surfing, scoping and e-mailing he does...
I think between the copyright info and the video of Rand's transformer collection, the SEOmoz seminar sorta got lost in the mix.
What's the format? 1 hour per session, broken down into 40 minutes for presentation, 20 for Q&A?
Not only are you smart, but apparently psychic too! Give or take a minute here and there, that's exactly what the format will be. Eight 40-minute sessions with ~20-minute Q&A after each, followed by a big-ass, catered party for all those in attendanance.
So as Ah-nuld said in Total Recall, "Get your ass to Mars!" Er, Seattle.
I know I know, its almost friday again, but hey something crossed my path what brought me back to this topic.
Lets say there is a website that fully copies your content....
We might have a studycase over here :-)
checkout: https://www.colesearchreports.com/
Is this one of those content pirates you were talking about?
Actually, this is nowhere NEAR as gratuitous as I've seen.
Hi Scott,
Now I know what it means to be authoritative :)
When I do searches on your headlines you can find your copy on several places. I'm talking about the first 20 results in Google.
Some times these pages ends above your own SER.
I also see, and that must be a big compliment, your articles are inspiration for others to respond on your content so that they have new content :)
Never the less is this very confusing because I took the warning for copied content and the action by Google on this issue very serious.
Was my fear correct Scott?
Here some examples of you copied blog content:
https://www.yellowhousehosting.com/resources/2007/08/01/answers-to-10-seo-questions/
https://www.colesearchreports.com/2007/08/02/answers-to-ten-seo-questions-some-new-questions-from-danny-sullivan/
https://www.sbadvertisement.com/the-unexpected-downside-to-link-bait-success_21461.html
https://www.colesearchreports.com/2007/08/01/apparently-i-work-for-google/
Wow, nice office. Got to love the open plan PIT. I am sure it will provide some interesting conversation.
Cool Place, I love the design and the office desk, and etc it goes well with the whole place. I was thinking Rand would have a big desk, with a big chair in the back at first, but it was cool.
Nice place guys :)
Wow, I can't believe no one has asked yet, but c'mon Scott... you've played a lawyer on stage? Any elaboration going to be forthcoming? What production was it in? Are you still a thespian in your time outside the moz office?
Don't be surprised. Now you've featured on WBF, the paparazzi will be clamouring for more details! :)
Haha, my thespian days are well behind me (everyone experiments in high school and college, right?). But during my tenure I played a lawyer in "Inherit The Wind" and a judge in "The Crucible."
Scott, DMCA is good and dandy for big sites like seomoz, but for small sites I wonder if it will work and if Google will take the content out of their indexes and when they will do it, in the first place. So, like Beren recommended contacting Adsense is good.Also if it a real business not a MFA you can contact consumer affairs bureau. Also if the offenders hosting company does not listen to your request to notify the offender to remove the content file a consumer bureau report against the hosing company for liable to your business. Notify the offender that you will be notifying all Web directories were the offender Website is listed… Anyway be resourceful, if it is worth for you to get your content of someone’s Website. It is 21 century, so a little arm twisting cannot hurt.
the camera like you scott, in front as well as from behind (wait, that sounds wrong!)
i like this info too, very informative from the business side fo things. luckily i haven't had to deal with this before, but now i know.
btw being a texan - gotta love that old 97s!
Glad you liked it and glad somebody knows the Old 97's! They're one of my favorite groups and "Bel Air" is one of my favorite songs.
I like the change of pace with this topic. Glad you guys (and gals) decided to share some of you business advice also.
I never had to do go to step 3 before. How responsive is Google in general?
Whenever we've had to contact them, they've responded within a couple of days and been very helpful and thorough in their investigation. Although in most cases the stolen material has been pulled by the time Google gets to it (that is, the site owner has missed the dealine we've demanded, but has nonetheless removed the material a bit late, before Google can check it).
From everything I've read/heard/etc, if there is a clear DMCA copyright violation (especially if it involves paid content) they are very responsive. 'Do No Evil' apparently involves a pretty hard-line with copyright violators.
I tend to find most sites stealing content don't publish a contact email, most are just auto-scraping sites. Regardless, its super useful to have a quick 4 steps to follow and the sample form letters.
BTW - Scott you're debut was really good...You, Rand and the tripod should do a tag team Whiteboard someday...
I believe we've had to so some in-depth searching of our own in order to come up with contact email addresses :) Failing this, we just advance to contacting the hosts and Google.
If you absolutely, positively CANNOT find a contact anywhere, even via a silly contact form, you can always check the site registry and contact info via a WhoIs search at any of a number of places. If you can't get e-mail, snail-mail will do in a pinch (just remember to allow 3-5 days transit time for domestic delivery as a rule).
Hello Scott,
First of all, you are doing well on the Tube :-)
I have a question, I believe you do think its worth to protect your own articles. (I agree on that)
But does that also mean that your guard it on some way? Like active searches on phrases of text lines...
I can understand that manually searches is very time consuming, so what is your way (technique) of guarding your articles?
We have Google Alerts set up for several key phrases. We also use a service called Copysentry to search for occurences of the text from any of our Premium Guides or big articles appearing on unauthorized sites. We also check for mentions of us and/or our products via Google Blog Search...usually this returns benign results, but sometimes we'll find content thieves.
Very chichi office space. You've certainly got my bedroom beat, where my desk sits next to the cats' litter box.
But I have to admit, I was surprised to see Rand's desk. I thought all the bigshots in the business had one of those ultrawide triple monitor setups. If it's good enough for Danny...
Good job Scott. You look very confident and comfortable in front of the camera.
Question: Just in case the accused claims that it's their content, and demand that YOU take yours down (which is what I would do if I were a scumbag) how do you back up your claim? Or rather, how do you establish a preexisting copyright?
That's tricky. If you run into a situation where someone is fighting you on a claim of ownership, you're in nasty territory and you're probably looking at a legal battle. At that point, you'll need evidence (again, not a lawyer) and publication dates, comment dates, mentions in other blogs, forums, etc. can help establish precedent.
I was kind of afraid of that. I’ve been told by a friend in the music business, that you can mail a copy of your material (lyrics in his case) to yourself, and then the unopened postdated envelope can be presented to a court clerk, or in a worse case a judge, for examination and official opening.
I bet setting up an online service to store a dated document and digitally signed affidavit for just such an occasion would catch on. Opportunity knocks.
I was just discussing this very topic with a group of entrepreneurs the other night, and a couple of their IP lawyers suggested the mail-it-to-yourself approach doesn't hold water. It's better than nothing, and it's good to have some way to demonstrate authorship, but given the relatively low cost of copyright, there are many, better avenues.
Sounds like a great idea for an online service!
As to the "poor man's copyright" as it's often referred (mailing a copy to yourself), I've been told it's better than nothing but doesn't hold much water. If you're dealing with a document copyright, the best and most bulletproof method is to simply submit it electronically to the Library of Congrees Copyright Office. The fee is $35-$45, but for a valuable document (say a paid guide, e-book, whitepaper, etc) it's well worth it.
Yeah, and it would also be a pretty big pain for online content. However, in my (thankfully) limited experience with legal proceedings, evidence as flimsy as a note jotted on a memo pad has always been accepted with little or no question. If you are ever corresponding with a hostile attorney (or insurance adjuster), and you can include a copy of a note to yourself about the time, date, subject of a phone call, or a print out of an email, you are on WAY firmer ground than if you are just working from memory.
Avoiding court is always the goal (unless you're a lawyer). If litigation is even a remote possibility write down everything on paper. I've been able to prevent my company from having to deal with lawsuits on a couple of occasions by presenting a well-organized file of such evidence to a plaintiff’s attorney.
My industry is highly litigious.
Scott - nice change of face...I mean pace! :P
I am sure I will be referring back to this post in the future.
We publish a weekly 'tech tip' that has been used on other sites without our permission. Most of the time we are given credit and a link, as the original source, but we have come across a few sites that have not followed this protocol. Luckily, we have greater authority than many sites that post our content, and I ASSumed SE's look at which material was indexed first, thus showing which was the original.
Is this incorrect in thinking the SE's take that into account?
Thanks!
On-camera personality, behind-the-camera guru, stage lawyer: what can't you do, Scott?
Here's a serious question: do you (the greater SEOmoz community) think scrapers are always a bad thing? For example, there's a site in the usability space that tends to pluck articles for its news page, listing the first couple of paragraphs and then linking back. Now, it's not quite scraping, in that they do credit the original source, but they don't credit the source very clearly and the overall impression is that it's their material. On the other hand, their links have provided my blog with valuable traffic on more than one occasion. Should I let it slide while I build my audience base?
Dr. Pete, at least from my perspective, the traffic to your blog would seem to be more important, as long as they're not scraping TOO high a percentage of each article. Have you thought about emailing them & asking them to trim the excerpts?
I've seen that harm the site hosting the original material in the SERPs with Google favouring scrapers and news sites taking (stealing) the material over the site that originally published it.
While it is good to build link love and a network of methods to pull traffic in to the sites, I also know this can harm the original site in the SERPs.
Was the tour recorded early in the morning? The empty office makes it seem like no one bothered to come in. :P
Yeah, I got here at like 8:00 to record WBF.
Dude, no one did bother to come in. I don't see you here!
Why am I not surprised that Gillian is the only one working? ;)
Thanks for the tour, Scott. Nice multi-tasking behind the camera!
Luckily I have not had any copyright issues with any of my clients, but I appreciated the tutorial.
Thank God I left my desk in a state that somewhat resembles "tidy" last night.
Wow... all of those desks were clean and tidy... Better not video my office! lol BTW... do you guys own any real books? Didn't see any!
We have your standards (The Tipping Point, Seth Godin books, etc) on a bookshelf in the velvet couch room.
Great Job Scott.... enjoyed it and you did a great job. Can't wait to see you again in front of the camera.
Great tour, although a bit disapointing. Your site makes us believe you guys run a giant SEO company, which says a lot, I think about your actual work vs. the office space you own :-)
The fortress is still under construction. Matt insisted on a moat and it's a bitch getting around all of the laws to import sea serpents and vermicious knids.