Actually, each time I dealt with was a complete Rip Off of my content. And I mean 100% of content was taken and republished elsewhere. I find those splogs that simply copy excerpt of your blog with link back to me (however useless it is) annoying but simply ignore them.

It is people who unscrupulously steal content in its entire form that piss me off. I’m not a writer and however much I enjoy sharing what I know and learn - it is a time consuming process for me. Seeing someone simply ripping it of and trying to earn from it - they got to think twice. I do take action and I will as needed.

Alex

For instance, if I checked 100,000 sites for duplicate content at single word level- at single word level they would likely ALL be duplicate content; at single sentence, considering quotes and common remarks perhaps 1,000 would be duplicate content; at paragraph level (because of block quotes) perhaps 10 would be.

The resources and bandwidth required to even assess duplicate content at any of these levels for all websites would be staggering…so Google’s tests for uniqueness either must be in the multi-paragraph range- or Google must randomly check and ding websites - which could be true, but certainly not fair (and I am NOT saying that Google is or even should be fair).

Fair is not their business, but relevance (in search results) is their lifeblood. In the aggregate, relevance is harmed by examining for ‘unique’ at too low a level of granularity- so I posit that Google must be at paragraph or higher level when checking for ‘unique’.

Thank for comment. As far as urban legends - however unclear are the Google Webmaster guidelines they do make a statement about content being a Unique. I read, I see and observe … I don’t know who sold you something on Duplicate Content, I personally never bought anything.

My statement on “duplicate content” penalties is based on one thing - it has not been proven one way or another as to whether is has impact or not, at least I haven’t seen it and I preffer to error on side of caution.

Only part that marred it was your “duplicate content” remark. Duplicate content carries no penalty- this is a geeky urban legend. Someone invented it to sell a new category of IM eBooks- a liar and a thief. And then the clones jumped on the bandwagon.

Think about it. Unless it is a total website copy, there can be no search engine slap on duplicate content. It would quickly render the search engines useless ( as Google is seeming to be of late). It would mean that if I wanted to find multiple instances of the appearance of a quote for example, Google could only return one. The search would have no relevance. There are MANY other examples “if you take the time to think about it”, which is key.

Just because a GooRoo or SEO expert ‘discovers’ a new twist and writes a book doesn’t mean it’s true- even if honest (which I believe many GooRoos ARE NOT) many people do not know how to collect data and evaluate it to reach a valid ’cause & effect’ conclusion.

Remember-
-People SELLING something to you have their interests at heart before yours. This requires you to think and set a MUCH higher threshold on what you will buy/believe (whether talking about a book, a government, “news” programs etc).
-The GooRoos are mostly “self proclaimed”. Or they sit in a virtual circle jerk with their GooRoo buddies and all offer testimonials for all their buddies’ work, whether it’s good or not, because -guess what- they’re all promoting each others products as affiliates or in JV deals. Incestuous behavior is the BIG red flag.

AW Cole
http://www.MoreMoneyBetterLife.com

As I have mentioned - I get automated notifications when someone links to me or mentions on Internet specific keywords so no effort on my part there outside of setting up alerts. While it does take some time to report and take actions - it is worth it in the end. Those people loose their AdSense id for life - so while they will continue to steal content, reasons to do so is removed. Or at least one of the biggest reasons.

Question:
How much time do you spend a lot of time actually hunting down and contacting these thieves and is it really worth the time over the effort.

And, wouldn’t a DOS attack just be easier? ; )

luis’s last blog post..Affiliate Marketing - Wikipedia Excellent Article!

You can copyright it but it will not prevent scrapers. I have outlined what I personally do … there are more advices on similar on other blogs. Each person decides to take their own steps or simply ignore it …

Unfortunately, nothing is full proof.

Tom Lindstrom’s last blog post..Why Should You Use Social Bookmarking?