Last week I came across this post by Meaghan Dougherty talking about a website called Quiltpatternspro.com which contained blogposts from many of our favourite bloggers without permission or link back. She suggested we all do what we can to spread the word. I posted an image of one of my blogposts from this website on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram and the response to those posts and to the posts of many others following Meaghan's lead was swift and furious. You can see from this image that the website was using my content to bring advertising revenue to its site - without my permission and without linking back.
The quilt bloggers of the world proceeded to bombard GoDaddy (the domain name host), Wordpress (the blog host) and Google Ads with information about the situation. Some of us also contacted Quilterblogs.com to let them know that it appeared that it was their RSS feeds which were being used to grab these blogposts. I should add here that Quilterblogs.com is a great website - it enables quilt bloggers to have their feed shared across a wider audience. The crucial differences between this and Quiltpatternspro.com are (i) we give permission to Quilterblogs to share our content - in fact we positively request it; and (ii) they link back to the original blogs, neither of which was the case with Quiltpatternspro.com. I'm not sure which of the above actions had the desired effect but within eight hours the website was down and has stayed down since. Moral of the tale - don't mess with the quilters. The truth is we are not a bunch of nice little old ladies.
Well do done ALL
ReplyDeleteThis happens a lot with knitting patterns, too. I guess people do anything they can to make a quick buck. :(
ReplyDeleteIndeed! Old ladies are good with their handbags too, btw! By the time I heard about this and went to act, the website had been taken down!! And stay that way I hope........!!
ReplyDeleteThis is good news. They had to close down: plagiarism is an offence, and any one of you could have sued the domain host or blog host who are definitely not anonymous (which the author probably is). It's good to realise we all need to be on the lookout for such practices, and all need individually to acknowledge our sources.
ReplyDeleteNever underestimate the power of an angry woman with a needle in her arson
ReplyDeleteI had heard about this in the early morning, but had to get to work. (I saw they had my "stuff" there too!) When I got home that evening to file a complaint, the website was down! Yaay for Quilters with Attitude.
ReplyDeletePower to the people :oD
ReplyDeleteNever cross a quilter, she/he has a veritable arsenal of weapons and knows how to use them :)
ReplyDeleteI love your well-stated moral!
ReplyDeleteIt's just nice to know that quilters and bloggers are looking out for each other. I never would have come across the illegal use of my content on that site otherwise.
ReplyDeleteOh I was up there are the front chucking bricks though their windows!!
ReplyDeleteI followed the whole story on IG, you are right, don't mess with us! We showed 'm!
ReplyDeleteSO glad to hear this :D
ReplyDeleteI correspond with a quilter who posted that a website was posting her tutorials and even pictures of her cats, without her blessing. The posts have been taken down from the offending website. I did not ask her who the offender is, so I cannot comment about that. Glad you got it stopped.
ReplyDeleteWell done to all of you
ReplyDeleteI told Jan Maree over at Aussie Heroes Quilts about being plagiarised when I saw your piece so not only was it angry quilters with sharp weapons at their disposal. It was it angry quilters with sharp weapons at their disposal backed by the combined might of the Australian Defence Forces!
ReplyDeleteUnbelievable. Thanks for stepping up and taking action!
ReplyDeleteThat's right!!!
ReplyDeleteI guess the quilters-that-be stitched that website right into the ditch!
ReplyDeleteGreetings admin
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Sad that some people feel free to speak negatively while hiding behind an anonymous name. Let's see if they have the courage to come out in the open. Good for you speaking up for yourself! You go girl!
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