blogs and copyright

A copyright is an exclusive legal right to a property, in our case, it is the legal right to anything we write and any picture or videos we take and post on our blogs. Everything is copyrighted upon creation, meaning that these belong to the person who created it. There is an implied “all rights reserved” in every blog. If a person wants to re-use any material, there should be an explicit agreement allowing him to use it.

However there are cases when you are willing to let others use your work, as part of promotion of your blog, and in these cases, you might want to consider putting up a license in your blog, specifying the rights you are allowing other users. Use the search engines in looking for the proper license you’d like to have on your blog.

Here are a couple of rights you can choose from:

Attribution – you let others use (copy, distribute or display) your copyrighted work, and derivative works based on it, but only if they give you proper credit.

Noncommercial - you let others use your work, and derivative works based on it, but only for noncommercial purposes.

No Derivative Works – you let others use your work, as long as they use it word for word, and no derivative works should be based upon it.

What will you do if your copyright is violated?

Act on it fast. Contact the blogger who plagiarized your content and ask him to remove your articles or pictures from his site. Make a strong point by making a link to the copied article in his blog and your original work. Ask him point blank. No need to beat around the bush. No one likes a copy-cat. But of course still show your breeding, no need to be threatening or crass.

If he doesn’t respond to diplomacy, then take more serious action. Email the web host provider. Most of these companies take care of their reputations and they would not like to be know as an accessory to any crime. Do this for every violation the blogger commits, this should get the hosts’ attention. If he has any advertisement on his blog, email the advertisers and let them know what happened. This should strike a nerve since you’d be attacking his source of income.

Try to warn other bloggers. Share your experience on your blog, let your readers and blog-friends know about this violator, share in also on social communities like twitter and plurk. We should all be aware of our rights.

In coming up with an article, we use our time, talents and treasure, and we have the right to protect and enjoy the fruits of our labor.