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Qbliss needs to clean up its act!
Nov. 27th, 2010 02:14 pmAttention AC and other web writers!
It seems we have a MAJOR content thief on the loose at the moment, and that would be a website called QBliss.
I only found out about them when running an occasional vanity check on google on my name. I found I was listed as a contributor to a site I'd never even heard of before! It turned out QBliss had stolen one of my Associated Content articles without my permission. Not only that but they had the gall to list me as a guest writer on their site and state that my content was "used with permission."
This was CLEARLY NOT THE CASE, as this was an article I'd published as 'Display-Only' on AC, meaning I retained all re-distribution rights. My only pay for the article was based on page views, through AC. Therefore having another web site steal my content was a direct theft from me.
I confronted them directly about it on Twitter, and it only took a few hours to get a response and have the content removed. Obviously they knew they were wrong to have taken it in the first place and had to take it down before I issued a DMCA Takedown Notice on their ass.
However, after reporting the incident on the AC forums, it turned out they have stolen OVER SIX PAGES OF SEARCH RETURNS OF AC CONTENT for their site. That's a lot of writers they are stealing revenue from, whether they want to excuse themselves as a not-for-profit organization or not. Clearly they have no understanding of intellectual property and the fact that no, just because something is on the internet doesn't mean it's public domain.
If you write any web content about LGBQT issues, I urge you to seach QBliss to make sure they haven't stolen your content as well. They've apparently posted a lot of content related to queer celebs like Adam Lambert, and not just opinion pieces related to social/political issues. It's shameful and they need to be confronted by the authors they've stolen from, so that they learn they can't keep stealing in the future.
It seems we have a MAJOR content thief on the loose at the moment, and that would be a website called QBliss.
I only found out about them when running an occasional vanity check on google on my name. I found I was listed as a contributor to a site I'd never even heard of before! It turned out QBliss had stolen one of my Associated Content articles without my permission. Not only that but they had the gall to list me as a guest writer on their site and state that my content was "used with permission."
This was CLEARLY NOT THE CASE, as this was an article I'd published as 'Display-Only' on AC, meaning I retained all re-distribution rights. My only pay for the article was based on page views, through AC. Therefore having another web site steal my content was a direct theft from me.
I confronted them directly about it on Twitter, and it only took a few hours to get a response and have the content removed. Obviously they knew they were wrong to have taken it in the first place and had to take it down before I issued a DMCA Takedown Notice on their ass.
However, after reporting the incident on the AC forums, it turned out they have stolen OVER SIX PAGES OF SEARCH RETURNS OF AC CONTENT for their site. That's a lot of writers they are stealing revenue from, whether they want to excuse themselves as a not-for-profit organization or not. Clearly they have no understanding of intellectual property and the fact that no, just because something is on the internet doesn't mean it's public domain.
If you write any web content about LGBQT issues, I urge you to seach QBliss to make sure they haven't stolen your content as well. They've apparently posted a lot of content related to queer celebs like Adam Lambert, and not just opinion pieces related to social/political issues. It's shameful and they need to be confronted by the authors they've stolen from, so that they learn they can't keep stealing in the future.
