Make Money Online at Natespost.com

   If it hasn’t happened to you yet, it eventually will. A post that you wrote, one that you worked hard on and did extensive research for, will be stolen. The first sign will be organic search engine traffic dropping for that post. Then, when you do a google search for the keyword you used to rank tops in, you notice that you have been replace by someone else, with your content. And when this happens, you will be slightly pissed. This is what happened to me and here is what I did about it.

   A post I wrote several months ago, http://natespost.com/index.php/install-wordpress-on-yahoo-server/ had still been getting some traffic for me from google. When I was checking on things a few days ago, I noticed that it had completely stopped for the last few weeks. When I did a search for the keywords that I had ranked #1 for, I noticed that I had completely disappeared, and that another blog had taken my place as #1 using my content. The feeling was a little like seeing a stranger driving away in your car, I would assume. Time to get your car back…

   The first thing I did was report it to google. Two days later, I got a response from google explaining the process. To file a DMCA complaint, you have to fill out a form and fax it to the number they provide. Having filled out the form but yet to fax it, I thought I would give the offending party the chance to take my content off his blog first. My email request to him was replied to with a defiant sounding “Show me the proof that it is your content.” The feeling then is like the guy flipping you off as he drives away in your car. Time to do some research.

   Yesterday I published a post which gave an account of the ordeal along with his full name, home address, phone number, and a picture of his new baby. I had collected even more info to use in the future and would know if he was behind any of his friends’ future malicious attempts. Meanwhile, kudos to google. Although I had not faxed in the complaint, an employee there apparently laid human eyes on the situation and corrected the search engine response. (they do have access to detailed caching which can show who posted what and when) For all the bad things you hear and read, I was impressed that someone took the time to help me out. Anyway, after seeing the post about him, he emailed me agreeing to a trade. He would take my content off his blog if I would remove my post about him. Deal. The thing is, now that my “car has been returned”, I really have no ill feeling towards my new-found friend. He is trying to make a dollar like the rest of us, he just needs to go about it the right way. I sincerely hope he continues to be a reader and learns with the rest of us, giving his advice also.

   Now as a small measure of protection, I recommend that when feasible, when you publish a new post, refer to an older post of yours with a link. It can be in the form of “As we talked about in my august post {link to that post} …..” Anything to make it easier for the human eye at google to know that it is your content. Also, at shoemoney, I found a great plugin by Joost De Valk that you can download here. It automatically adds a footer to your post which links back to you when read (or scraped, copied, stolen) from your rss feed.