Don't Call Yourself a Writer If What You Really Are Is a Thief

Fascinating. And the path of the thread is the same one it always takes.

I think it's hysterical when people claim to be good writers, yet insist they can't get more than $5 an article.

People who make that claim are not writers. They're not even hacks. They're keyword pimps, whoring out the language to cheap little thugs in poorly fitting SEO suits.

"Hey, Joe. $5. Me write you long time!"

Copyright is extended to something which represents original artistic expression.

By way of example, a recipe cannot be copyrighted. Nor can the directions to follow it.

If I say "spread peanut butter on one slice of bread, then jelly on another, and put them together to create a sandwich" I have said nothing copyrightable.

It honestly doesn't matter how I say it, the process is not covered by copyright. Even if I get all dramatic and say "slather the butter of peanut with aplomb upon the slice of baked grainly goodness, then do likewise with a preparation consisting largely of berries or other fruit, and combine them forthwith to make a pleasant and tasty comestible" - not copyrightable. That can be copied, and spun, and reworded, until the cows come home. There is no court in the land that will find anyone guilty of infringement, because I am describing a process.

Similarly, a lot of articles out there represent no original artistic expression. They are simply a repetition of facts, or a conglomeration of ideas, and there's no art to them at all. And as such, they are not even eligible for copyright protection in the first place.

In order to be copyrightable, what you express must be distinct from what is already available. And in a lot of cases, particularly in the article marketing field, this is simply not the case.

Amen to that!

The entire post was right on but that line is one that I wish every writer or person who wants to be a writer would understand.

There is a vast difference between copying sentences and chunks from articles (what it sounds like rooze is saying he does) and taking notes. It doesn't matter whether you copy/paste or use a pen - note taking should not be whole sentences. Your notes should be actual facts that you get from your source materials.

A real writer, who has learned something while researching, weaves those facts into a piece that has their own thoughts, perceptions and/or opinions to create a new work. They don't rewrite other people's work, not even in small chunks.

Some of you walk a very fine line when you say that everything you know came from somewhere else. It sounds like you're trying to rationalize copyright infringement, or as Tiffany put it, content theft.

That's why I always use over 1000 words: thieves are too lazy to rewrite over 500 .

I don't do what you do - cut, paste and reword. I said in my last post if that's not what you're doing, good. if it is, not good. There's no truce. There's no continued digging. I think you're just trying to excuse bad behavior and you aren't making sense saying I do the same.

Unfortunately, there are more and more IM products that seem to encourage the type of theft you are talking about, Tiffany. I know several software programs that post to web 2.0 sites that have a function to go grab an article off Ezine Articles, spin it, and then submit it to those sites. Or they grab 3 or 4 different articles and then grab a few paragraphs from each. This is blatant theft, but considering how popular these programs are and how many people use them, it seems to be becoming acceptable in the IM world.

When I raised my rates from a lower scale to a higher scale, I discovered that my clients were suddenly much more polite and respectful. They treated me as an equal, and not a slave. They rarely ever asked for re-writes, they never mentioned keyword density, and looked puzzled if I did, and they never mentioned Copyscape.

When I raised my rates even higher, I discovered that my clients knew exactly what they could do with content to earn very high profits, unlike the cheap clients who only thought of back links and search engine fodder.

When you charge more for writing, you get a lot more than just a living wage. That alone makes it worthwhile.

John.

Tiff,

It's very refreshing to read your post. So much of what is on the Internet is just rehashed. I am a consumer too. And get frustrated at reading the same stuff over and over.

Writing is creating. When the create is not there the writing is flat, lifeless. So, how can that get customers for anyone?

One person's create is totally different from another. Like you say, you'll be able to write on the same subject/information as another. But, you have your unique take on it.

Everyone does have that. You can tell if someone created an article or is just spitting back someone else's.

Good writing is something to be proud of. It takes work. I know because I do it. Either for others or my own blog, I like to feel good about the results. Has to be unique.

Debbie

What it really "boils down to" is this: we can't do anything about what others are doing or not doing.

But you need to understand what YOU are doing.

If you are the type who is taking work from someone else and "rewriting" or "spinning" it, think about this before you use it: how would YOU feel if someone did that to you?

I've had people steal my work and put it on their sites. It is not a good feeling. I would never do that to another person. I would have a tough time looking at myself in the mirror. (Looking at myself is already uneasy because of my gray hair. LOL)

As it has been mentioned before, many "gurus" say to go to Ezine Articles and find an article and "rewrite" it. That is awful. I always thought "how would that person feel if they knew that?" Like Tiffany is saying: some new marketers learn wrong. Not all because some will pay attention to that little voice that says, "this is wrong."

I am 64 I don't have a collage degree in anything in fact I have been Working for the past 50 odd years in factories.

I have only been writing for a little over 12 months everything I have learnt has been from the internet.

I had a spinning program because I was told by the person who was teaching me that it was ok to spin my articles, but often found they didn't make a lot of sense after spinning.

I still don't understand how PLR articles can be ok when there are many people are using the same articles, so have stopped using them.

What I do is, I read, I take notes, I go and write my article I have brought a few articles but have still had to correct the English in a most of them of them, rewrite others to make sense.

I don't have the money to pay $30.00for an article.

But I do want to do whats right

very interesting post and i learnt a lot out of this thread. thanks so much

Good observation.
Unfortunately I think we've passed the point of adding much in the way of substance to this discussion since people have 'dug-in' to the point where a retraction of their position would cause too great a loss of face. Painting oneself into a corner in many ways exposes the most 'despicable' kind of person in my mind, one who when faced with a preponderance of evidence against their stance, continues to push forward their ideas as being noble and righteous; defaming those whose opinions they do not fully understand, yet presume are dissenting to their own.
The capacity to readjust one's opinion based on hitherto unknown facts, or based on the clarification of a previous misunderstanding of the facts, is the very essence of rationality, reason and sanity. Without that capacity we're merely cheerleaders for some concept.
The misguided 'cheerleader' in this context requires little or no understanding of the concept, has little or no desire to gain an understanding of the concept, and perhaps lacks the capacity to truly understand the gestalt of the concept if they felt so inclined. Yet still they persevere, their motivation appearing to come from something as shallow as a 'digital thanks'.
And don't get me started on those who 'pile on' in support.

and there you have it, folks. Even the law is ambiguous, don't you agree?

I don't think we, as marketers, have any right to determine what is illegal or not, in this case. Not when the laws themselves are so confusing.

My advice to warriors: if you have any doubts whatsoever about any online legal or copyrighting issue, there are Internet and Copyright lawyers who can answer your questions and then, and only then, will you get the right answers.

There are many people who think they know the laws, but they are not lawyers or judges, who are paid to interpret the law.

And any good lawyer is going to want to know all the FACTS, before proceeding with any lawsuit.

So in closing, I urge warriors to be very very careful about publicly accusing anyone of anything, because you could possibly face a lawsuit yourselves, for defamation of character.

Obviously when talking about ethics and morality we're going to come across many gray areas - especially where content and original ideas are concerned.

I do think, however, that there's a stark difference between researching and then writing and rewriting what someone else has already written.

It's obviously going to be the case that nothing is truly "original" because we're using our recent research and out whole upbringing and life experience to form our own unique perspective on something - and most of that is from learned facts and learned behavior. However, there's still a difference between using what has gone before in order to take things further with anything that we are writing and blatantly rewriting an original piece of work.

We often hear about how people have others as inspiration for what they have just published or written and writers will often mention who has influenced them as a writer or artist etc. However, if I were to read a novel and then rewrite it in my own words, that's obviously plagiarism and I don't think that anyone would say that that's acceptable.

Also, we wouldn't expect someone to take several novels, copy and paste parts from each of them, rewrite it and then call it a new novel - so I don't see why that should be acceptable to do with an online article either.

However, when we're dealing with smaller prices of writing such as articles and we're playing in a much wider arena that is the internet - where our little old article is nothing compared to the mass of information out there on the web - I suppose that it's often tempting to simply rewrite the articles of others because it's easier to get away with.

Of course, that doesn't make it ethically correct though. Would someone notice? Probably not. Would you want to hire someone that writes like that to work for you? That's up to you.

It's not even the fact that of rewriting an article or pretending to be an expert that is the real problem - if we have private label rights to an article, we're free to rewrite that article on a sentence-by-sentence level and it's not a problem because we own the right to do so. This is obviously totally different to actually taking an article that we don't have the rights to and rewriting it. I don't think that that this discussion is about the act of rewriting per se, but rewriting something that we don't have the rights to.

I think that the safest way to write an article is to take notes from various sources (I use a pen and notepad because I find it easier to refer to) and to also read as many different credible sources as possible on the matter. Then, I think it's best to, from reading the research that we have come across, choose a slant to go with. So if it was an article on a health topic we could choose a social, political, economic or scientific of the problem and then begin to write our article from that perspective or point of view.

I think that everyone, as a writer, has a natural point of view and way of looking at the matter - just as everyone in this tread has their own way of looking at the issue of ethics and content creation. I think to write from that perspective and then simply use the facts that we have collected from our research to support certain points is the best way to write an article.

We're not just copy and pasting the article of others, we're still using what we've learned and we're coming at it with a different perspective. I think that that's not only the most ethical way to write content but also the most practical in the sense that I wouldn't really want to be rehashing that someone has already said anyway - if content is just rewritten then we're not really taking it to a new level with a different perspective and I'd question the value of content like that anyway.

The internet has enough recycled information anyway, I don't fancy adding to it.

Comments added above, for what it's worth.

Oddly enough I think the crux of my conversation with the OP'er comes down to how we take our notes. We all take notes, consciously or sub-consciously, and then re-interprate them into our own words. I've been picked up on my method of note-taking, and it's been assumed that the notes somehow become the finished product, without a process having occurred in between.

Actually it's a bigger cultural phenomenon. I was just watching a documentary on this very subject (can't remember the name ... so no credit! LOL). Anyways, music and more is all about mashups, borrowing, recombining... "sampling." Anyway, the point is that this is a bigger cultural debate going on right now, all about ownership of ideas, creativity, copyright... in every field.