7/12/10

Deja Vu all over again.

You know how when you buy a certain kind of car, you start seeing that car all over the road when you probably never noticed them before?

Now that I've been actively looking for losers who are copying my stuff, I'm unfortunately finding it.

I pretty much gave up on the JC Penney thing a long time ago, because it went viral with no author and a bunch of people just decided they wrote it, but I just found this guy who stole about half my "chumbuddy" post.

Feel free to leave him a comment, although it looks like he just deletes them eventually. You'd think a 60 year old engineer would have more integrity. Unbelievable.

annnnnd.....we have a winner.

Hello Johnny,

We have received your DMCA take-down notice dated July 11, 2010 on
http://icewindsramblings.blogspot.com/2010/07/worst-name-for-product-chumbuddy.html.
We have reviewed the allegedly infringing content in question. In
accordance with our policies, we have taken the content offline and
notified the blogger of the complaint. Should the allegedly infringing
content reappear at this post, please let us know and we will take further
action.

Sincerely,
The Blogger Team

Thanks, everyone! You guys rock.

48 comments:

  1. Matt M10:05 PM

    Just left a comment on his blog on your behalf. Diesel also posted a new post on Mattress Police about you both getting hit by plagiarizing fools.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Anonymous10:08 PM

    Yep, Johnny, we've got your back!

    ReplyDelete
  3. Yeah, that other david lee roth looking dude was ridiculous. He jacked hundreds of my posts. It took me close to 4 hours to document them all and get myspace to remove them. I need to get "approved" on cDiver.net before I can leave a comment for the administrators of the place, but I'll see if I can get that nuked too. I left a comment for this Icewind dbag and he just deletes them. So I ended up having to send a complaint to blogger. We'll see if they respond. Why can't people just not be assholes? I don't get it.

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  4. Well, I'm a lawyer. If a lot of people were not assholes, I'd have a lot less to do.

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  5. Comrade, what kind of law? You don't make commercials for cable and start off all your conversations with "If you've been hurt in an accident..." do you?

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  6. Well that bites. Maybe I'm naive, but I didn't realize people were plagiarizing. If you've told Blogger about it, they ought to do something. Fingers crossed for ya.

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  7. Thanks matt, and anon.

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  8. Dick. Probably just a small one, though. I don't understand people who have blogs, but can't (or won't) actually write. I left him a comment to that effect.

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  9. Don't you know that the best form of flattery is plagerism?

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  10. That's really crappy! I hope you get them! I've been a fan of your blog for a long time and felt compelled to comment to show my appreciation for your awesome posts. Please keep writing (and entertaining me of course) and go get these losers!

    ReplyDelete
  11. Anonymous3:36 AM

    If at least they gave credit where credit is due... The JC Penney post is the reason I started reading your blog (someone had sent it to me as an email, and from its contents, I guessed it must have come from a blog; looking for the original was challenging). I feel for you. Writing in French (and not being funny), I don't have that problem, although I think some of my pictures must be travelling without the strings that should be attached...
    And I saw that you got the ISBN. Now, it's just a matter of getting it together, I suppose. Keep us posted when it comes out, because I'll probably have to ask for a copy.

    ReplyDelete
  12. Lynn, that may be true, but it still sucks.

    Alice, thanks!

    Doreus, don't expect too much. It probably won't be much more than what you've already read here....

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  13. Everyday Reader6:39 AM

    I left a comment on that blog but Matt said he also left a comment and I don't see his comment there.

    He must be deleting all of the negative comments so mine will probably be gone as well. This is what I said:


    "Why on earth do you have a blog and why on earth do you call it your ramblings when all you do is copy someone else's creative thoughts.
    The chumbuddy post was on line in Johnny Virgil's blog 2 months ago.
    You're not writing, you're cutting and pasting.
    Do you see how cheap that is?"

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  14. Yeah, he is just deleting them. I hope he's enjoying his little bump in traffic.

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  15. And the part I find amusing, in a sick kind of way, is it appears it is only our posts - the ones he's deleting - that anyone is making. This shows the type of following he already has - none. He couldn't get his own hits, so he stole one of your postings to "boost ratings". It's sickening, to say the least, and a hangable offense at best.

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  16. You're assuming he's a sixty year old engineer. Maybe he stole his profile, as well.

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  17. You know what?

    I hate people. (OK, not all of them.)

    Oh wait, I stole that from your blog "Can you believe this shit?"

    Hope that was OK - for me to be a total DB and steal from you.....seriously...what is wrong with people!!

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  18. The comments you've received are interesting and funny. You guys should read "The Bitchy Waiter" if you're not already doing so. He hates everyone too. He probably is plagiarized as well.

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  19. Wow. Could that be any more blatant? That's sad. Glad you found him and called him out.

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  20. Anonymous11:23 AM

    I know how you feel. I have caught two women by sheer luck who hijacked photos of ME -- not just modelling shots, but snapshots from one of my birthdays -- and then posted them on blogs pretending to BE me!!!!!! I dread to think how much more of my artwork and/or writing has been posted elsewhere. Creepy as hell.

    ReplyDelete
  21. Anonymous12:21 PM

    Just left a comment on your behalf. Hopefully this gets removed sorry to see this happen to you.

    LV

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  22. I left a comment there - just letting you know in case he deletes them and you'd like some record of it.

    Best of luck.

    ReplyDelete
  23. Long time lurker, here. I put up a sure-to-be-deleted comment over there on Dillweed's Ramblings.

    What I'm really curious about is just how much this clown has lifted. He dates from 2005, so I wonder how many smash 'n grabs he's pulled off over the years.

    One understands the motive, though. Have you guys read this stuff? It's atrocious. Yikes.

    ReplyDelete
  24. Anonymous3:58 PM

    Your cease & desist letter scared me & I have nothing to do with his blog...

    ReplyDelete
  25. JV, I was doing mostly real estate law, which nowadays is about as lucrative as picking up empty soda cans from alongside the highway. No ambulance chasing or mesotheleoma or asbestos crap (and I don't negotiate with the IRS, either). Other than a very sparse website, we don't even advertise.

    If you know who that guy is in meatspace, maybe a short "cease & desist" letter?

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  26. Anonymous4:10 PM

    Just like I said in those 10 guidelines that I wrote, "Thou shalt not steal." That guy should read my work.

    P.S. Sorry for that one about the adultery. I know it was a disappointment. What was I thinking? I didn't know everyone would take it so seriously.

    Dave

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  27. Anonymous4:48 PM

    So sorry that there are such shitty people in the world. I understand that you take a risk whenever you publish something, that some asshole will plagerise it, but it just shouldn't happen.

    Authors like you deserve respect for your work. You entertain so many people. I can't even count how many times I almost peed my pants reading your posts.

    I left a comment for the douche bag. I hope he does the right thing now that he has been caught. Sometimes that is all it takes to snap people out of being slimeballs.

    Good luck!!!

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  28. Another one??!!??

    How do you find these people?

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  29. J. Hyde5:51 PM

    My comments have been left on yoru behalf, even signed the assholes guestbook for ya...

    ReplyDelete
  30. Wow, you guys are more pissed than I am! Thanks for givin' him the what for, as my grandfather used to say.

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  31. Lisa, see that little copyscape logo on the upper right hand side of my blog? Click it...

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  32. This kind of stuff makes me cray-zee. Are you using copyscape, etc?

    I was completely unaware of this fraud until I started freelancing...and so many "employers" wanted "original" works...that they would run thru to make sure it wasn't copied and pasted.

    Yikes. I'm still trying to get my brain around ppl who will allow ghost writers to write their blogs.

    I'll support you any way I can...this sh!t is lower than the low...

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  33. Have your wife send him a hat with one of those nastay spiders in it.

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  34. What do you say we go over and knock on his front door? Maybe he has some other stuff that belongs to you.

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  35. The Ed12:04 PM

    Has anyone emailed him yet? His email address is icewind_rx@yahoo.com. At least according to his profile.

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  36. That sucks but I didn't leave him a comment. The more people who visit his blog and comment only makes his blog more popular. I hope you get it taken care of.

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  37. Mick, hopefully he has my 60" plasma.

    TheEd, I dropped him the C&D letter to that address -- it didn't bounce back, but I also got no response.

    Leeuna, if by popular you mean "ripped a new one" then yeah, I guess you're right.

    Beck, that's too much work. I'll just send him a box of spiders. It's that time of year again.

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  38. For what it's worth, I attributed your JC Penney post, and linked your blog on my own, and said that you were greatness, and encouraged people to come see you.

    For what it's worth, a friend of mine has been fighting the misattribution of an essay that he wrote a few years ago, which has completely gone viral, under someone else's name. As my friend Marko is a professional writer, this stuck in his craw, so he's been fighting back. In his case, part of the reason it's so important is that it's a declaration of his philosophy, which is understandably disturbing to have credited to another, when it gets so much play.

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  39. J. Hyde7:47 PM

    Is it just me or is his blog GONE?!?

    :-)

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  40. J.Hyde7:49 PM

    Blog is still there, but the post is now gone...

    ReplyDelete
  41. Gone? That was fast. It was there this morning when I clicked the link. It's good that he's been shamed (or forced) into deleting his blog. The scary thing that I've just realized is that this could be happening on a HUGE scale (and not just to you). You could spend hours searching for these blog-robbers trying to get them to stop what they're doing. I assume that you need to work for money and you couldn't possibly devote the amount of time needed to this task. What's to be done? I feel like I should start conducting random google searches using words like CSI Poopsmith (one of my faves, by the way) just so I can help out.

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  42. Wow...that's sad. I'm a new follower, I know the feeling of when you go fishing you find that catch...that was a great parallel.

    The worst part is prob the hard work you have to do to remove that. Do you pay to copyright your work?

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  43. Just glad to see you won the fight Johnny! Now on to the next plagiarizer. Maybe we just take a page from your (his?! yeah right!) post, and grind him up and feed him to the sharks....

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  44. Wonder what the 'further action' would be. Maybe ipecac in his lasagna...;-)

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  45. Johnny;

    "Why can't people just not be assholes? I don't get it."

    The fact is you write with such wit and talent, which these sad people know they cannot come close too, so they decide to claim it as their own, so other people will think they can write with such genius. Sad, but true.

    ReplyDelete
  46. Everyday Reader1:42 PM

    Yay! It's gone. You won.

    Whom do you want us to go after next? You've created a monster.

    ReplyDelete
  47. That sucks. I have a photographer friend who deals with the same thing though... people staling her photos (even with the watermark all over the photo!) and using them as their own... Thankfully Facebook and the like have been very good about taking them down...

    It's not that hard to give a nod to the original owner of the content!

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  48. OMG. I found someone with OC on the internet!

    Nice blog. Bad Ass Geek sent me this way so I subscribed and all that crap.

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