Have you heard of Blog Scraping? No? Read on then... it is not nice
I hadn't heard of it either until Vicki posted about it yesterday.
Basically, somebody copies one or more of your entire blog post and post them on their own fake blog. So what's the fuss you might think?
On these fake blogs, where your own post is replicated, they are adverts on the side bars. It seems that most of these ads are for porn sites or else. So not only money is made out of your work (your post generates some visits and visitors and visitors might click on the ads) but you are also associated with sites you might not want to be related to.
I don't think I have personally been a victim of blog scraping, my blog is probably not popular enough but then who knows? I don't want to be associated with sick and horrible people promoting inappropriate content.
My blog is where I share what I enjoy doing in my precious free time, what I have enjoyed creating and taking part in and I want it to stay this way only. My blog has also made me "meet" at least virtually some wonderful people and I don't want those people to be put off me for the wrong reasons.
I would encourage you to go and read Karen's post, she has been a victim of it and she is also telling you how to protect yourself by truncating your blog post. If the posts are truncated, the reader needs to click on read more to have the full blog post. But it also makes it impossible for an automated program to copy the entire blog post. So more work for the readers I guess but most probably the only way at this stage to fight back and try to keep our blogs and reputations safe. I think it is worth it. Don't you agree? I hope you will still read me as I am going to put Karen's advice into practice now.
Better safe than sorry as they say. Keep smiling, keep crafting and hopefully, keep popping in! All together we might win!
Celine
Basically, somebody copies one or more of your entire blog post and post them on their own fake blog. So what's the fuss you might think?
On these fake blogs, where your own post is replicated, they are adverts on the side bars. It seems that most of these ads are for porn sites or else. So not only money is made out of your work (your post generates some visits and visitors and visitors might click on the ads) but you are also associated with sites you might not want to be related to.
I don't think I have personally been a victim of blog scraping, my blog is probably not popular enough but then who knows? I don't want to be associated with sick and horrible people promoting inappropriate content.
My blog is where I share what I enjoy doing in my precious free time, what I have enjoyed creating and taking part in and I want it to stay this way only. My blog has also made me "meet" at least virtually some wonderful people and I don't want those people to be put off me for the wrong reasons.
I would encourage you to go and read Karen's post, she has been a victim of it and she is also telling you how to protect yourself by truncating your blog post. If the posts are truncated, the reader needs to click on read more to have the full blog post. But it also makes it impossible for an automated program to copy the entire blog post. So more work for the readers I guess but most probably the only way at this stage to fight back and try to keep our blogs and reputations safe. I think it is worth it. Don't you agree? I hope you will still read me as I am going to put Karen's advice into practice now.
Better safe than sorry as they say. Keep smiling, keep crafting and hopefully, keep popping in! All together we might win!
Celine
That is just awful! Had never heard of it!
ReplyDeleteWow, I have to hand it to them, that is really creative. I would never have imagined such a thing. I for one think your posts are worth an extra click :)
ReplyDeleteOh my goodness, what a thing. I've had some slightly odd sites listed in the Traffic Source section of my blog stats and horribly, I think your post makes senses. I will start truncating my posts now. Thank you for blogging about this and raising awareness of this issue. I say NO to bad people!
ReplyDelete