Artists stealing from other artists

I found another artist has copied the text from my website word-for-word (again). I would love to say this is not the first time....but it has happened several times. The good news is, the more it happens, the better I am getting with dealing with it efficiently.

I won't sugar coat it, it's stealing. People think it's okay to just cut and paste portions of text they like, and pop it into their own websites. After all, it is easy to do that. To many people, it probably seems like "no big deal," but it's so important to have unique content on the Internet, and I've worked hard on my site's content....

If you have a flower in a pot on your porch, a flower you have lovingly tended, watered, covered when it was cold....may I wait until it's in gorgeous healthy full bloom and just take it out of your yard and stick it on my own porch and claim I was the one who grew it?!? The same people who would be aghast at this theft by taking, will cut and paste content from someone's site without a second thought.

I have worked hard on my website (I do it myself) and I have paid an expert to help me with my SEO (Search Engine Optimization - so Google and Yahoo will rank me). I do like to think I am a giving person. If any artist comes to me and asks for advice and help, I will give it generously, as artists like Kevin Candon took time out of his busy schedule to help me when I was trying to build my portrait business.

Of course, artists should be helping each other and building each other up. Stealing their work, whether it's written or visual, is definitely not part of that. I would love to see a world in which artists can trust each other.

Whatever kind of website you have, you should check out CopyScape to see if your content has been "lifted." To use it at the free level, you will need to enter each individual page's URL of your site into their search field. Their service called CopySentry will automatically monitor the pages of your website against everything on the Internet. The CopySentry service is currently $4.95 per month.

This page from CopyScape explains what plagiarism is, why it is a threat, how to prevent it, how to detect it, how to respond to plagiarism, and your rights.